Colossians 1:9-20

9For this reason also, ever since we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you. We keep asking God that you might be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding—

10to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, to please Him in all respects, bearing fruit in every good work and growing in the knowledge of God.

11We pray that you may be strengthened with all the power that comes from His glorious might, for you to have all kinds of patience and steadfastness. With joy

12we give thanks to the Father, who qualified you to share in the inheritance of the kedoshim in the light.

13He rescued us from the domain of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son whom He loves.

14In Him we have redemption—the release of sins.

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

16For by Him all things were created— in heaven and on earth, the seen and the unseen, whether thrones or angelic powers or rulers or authorities. All was created through Him and for Him.

17He exists before everything, and in Him all holds together.

18He is the head of the body, His community. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead— so that He might come to have first place in all things.

19For God was pleased to have all His fullness dwell in Him

20and through Him to reconcile all things to Himself, making peace through the blood of His cross— whether things on earth or things in heaven!