⁸ For you were once^(A) darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light^(B)

Jehoiachin Released^(A)

³¹ In the thirty-seventh year of the exile of Jehoiachin^(B) king of Judah, in the year Awel-Marduk became king of Babylon, on the twenty-fifth day of the twelfth month, he released Jehoiachin king of Judah and freed him from prison. ³² He spoke kindly to him and gave him a seat of honor higher than those of the other kings who were with him in Babylon. ³³ So Jehoiachin put aside his prison clothes and for the rest of his life ate regularly at the king’s table.^{(C) 34} Day by day the king of Babylon gave Jehoiachin a regular allowance^(D) as long as he lived, till the day of his death.

⁹ But you are a chosen people,^(A) a royal priesthood,^(B) a holy nation,^(C) God’s special possession,^(D) that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.^(E)

²⁵ Then someone came and said, “Look! The men you put in jail are standing in the temple courts teaching the people.”