Colossians 1:9-20

9For this reason also, since the day we heard this, we haven’t stopped praying for you. We are asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding,

10so that you may walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him: bearing fruit in every good work and growing in the knowledge of God,

11being strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, so that you may have great endurance and patience, joyfully

12giving thanks to the Father, who has enabled you to share in the saints’ inheritance in the light.

13He has rescued us from the domain of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of the Son he loves.

14In him we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

15He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.

16For everything was created by him, in heaven and on earth, the visible and the invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities — all things have been created through him and for him.

17He is before all things, and by him all things hold together.

18He is also the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he might come to have first place in everything.

19For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him,

20and through him to reconcile everything to himself, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.