Also delighted to discover a wonderful literary device that I found in Ephesians. Saw how Eph 1:3-10 forms a Greek 'chi' (as in the Greek letter chi) structure, with v7 forming a central theme - literally - of the whole passage. "In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins..." In that same passage, Paul also effectively and compactly summarizes what the whole book of Ephesians is about.
I know it sounds rather academic, but believe you me, when you see that literary device in use (which manages to still be seen clearly despite the inevitable translation issues), gosh, you see the fluent literary genius in the good apostle's writing style. It's so beautifully written and helps hammer home in your heart the centrality, depth, cost, significance and degree of our redemption. It makes me cry just to think of how deeply - and dearly - we have been redeemed.
(And I love how 'redeemed' and 'redemption' still carries its same secular meaning in today's English language, being used in the marketplace just as plainly as it is used in the pulpit. It's so plain - commercialized even - that I don't think it will lose its potential to punch the hearts of even world-weary businessmen for a long time yet - which I think a significant number of Ephesians were working as. (Yes I know English ain't Greek, but the New Testament Greek word for 'redemption' was also used commercially.))
Anyway, with redemption playing such an important theme in Ephesians, Paul goes on to graphically illustrate our depth and degree of redemption. Imagine, alive physically but dead spiritually... I guess that makes us sound like... zombies! ZOMG! But thank God we weren't Left4Dead... He came, saw and gave the Supreme Sacrifice.
Hee. There's other wonderful themes in Ephesians... Nope, one WFL class won't be enough. But yes, do be inspired by this wonderful epistle! God bless!
Yeu Ann
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