Instructions for Christian Households(A)

21 Submit to one another(B) out of reverence for Christ.

22 Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands(C) as you do to the Lord.(D) 23 For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church,(E) his body, of which he is the Savior. 24 Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands(F) in everything.

25 Husbands, love your wives,(G) just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her(H) 26 to make her holy,(I) cleansing[a] her by the washing(J) with water through the word, 27 and to present her to himself(K) as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.(L) 28 In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives(M) as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 After all, no one ever hated their own body, but they feed and care for their body, just as Christ does the church— 30 for we are members of his body.(N) 31 “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.”[b](O) 32 This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church. 33 However, each one of you also must love his wife(P) as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.

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Footnotes

  1. Ephesians 5:26 Or having cleansed
  2. Ephesians 5:31 Gen. 2:24

15 Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ himself?(A) Shall I then take the members of Christ and unite them with a prostitute? Never! 16 Do you not know that he who unites himself with a prostitute is one with her in body? For it is said, “The two will become one flesh.”[a](B) 17 But whoever is united with the Lord is one with him in spirit.[b](C)

18 Flee from sexual immorality.(D) All other sins a person commits are outside the body, but whoever sins sexually, sins against their own body.(E) 19 Do you not know that your bodies are temples(F) of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own;(G) 20 you were bought at a price.(H) Therefore honor God with your bodies.(I)

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Footnotes

  1. 1 Corinthians 6:16 Gen. 2:24
  2. 1 Corinthians 6:17 Or in the Spirit

I am jealous for you with a godly jealousy. I promised you to one husband,(A) to Christ, so that I might present you(B) as a pure virgin to him.

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The New Jerusalem, the Bride of the Lamb

One of the seven angels who had the seven bowls full of the seven last plagues(A) came and said to me, “Come, I will show you the bride,(B) the wife of the Lamb.” 10 And he carried me away(C) in the Spirit(D) to a mountain great and high, and showed me the Holy City, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God.(E)

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27 Nothing impure will ever enter it, nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful,(A) but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life.(B)

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