God’s plan of salvation

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, just as God chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless before God in love.

God destined us for adoption as God’s children through Jesus Christ, according to the good pleasure of God’s will, to the praise of God’s glorious grace that God freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. In Christ we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our sins, according to the riches of God’s grace that God lavished on us. With all wisdom and insight God has made known to us the mystery of God’s will, according to God’s good pleasure that God set forth in Christ, as a plan for the fullness of time, to gather up all things in Christ, things in heaven and things on earth.

In Christ, we have also obtained an inheritance, having been destined according to the purpose of God who accomplishes all things according to God’s counsel and will, so that we, who were the first to set our hope on Christ, might live for the praise of God’s glory. In Christ you also, when you had heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and had believed in Christ, were marked with the seal of the promised Holy Spirit; this is the pledge of our inheritance toward redemption as God’s own people, to the praise of God’s glory.

Ephesians 1:3-14 

About this testimony

This is one of the oldest testimonies of faith in the Christian tradition. It is an ancient church hymn praising our salvation in Christ and can be found in Ephesians 1:3-14. Despite our fall from God, God destined us before time to be God’s children “through Jesus Christ.” Through Christ’s blood we have the “forgiveness of our sins.” The God praised in this hymn is a generous God who despite humanity’s misery rushes to our side and restores our glorious inheritance—to be God’s own adopted daughters and sons.