Ephesians 1:11

Plain English Version

God always does everything that he plans. And a long time ago, he picked us, and planned to join us to Jesus Christ and make us his people.

Cross References

Acts 13:48

Those people that were not Jews heard those words, and they were very happy. They said, “Thank you God for this message. It is really good.” And a lot of people there believed in Jesus. You see, a long time before that, God picked those people to live with him for ever.

Acts 20:27

I told you all everything that God wants to do for you.

Acts 20:32

Paul kept on talking. He said, “Now I’m asking God to keep you safe, and to keep you believing the true message that God is very good to you and will save you. If you keep on believing that message, you will grow strong for God, and you will know that you are in God’s family, and God will give you the good life that he is keeping for his own people.

Acts 26:18

and you will tell them the true message about me. It will be like you will open their eyes so that they can see things properly. They will come to God. Then Satan, the boss over the bad spirits, he will not control them with his power any more. It is like they are always in the dark now, but they will come into the light. They will believe in me, and they will stop believing lies. And then God will say they are not guilty of the bad things they did, and they will be God’s people.’ Jesus said that to me.”

Romans 8:17

We joined up with Jesus Christ, God’s son, so we are part of God’s family now, and we will get some of the good things that God gives to his son. But people gave Jesus a lot of trouble, and they will give us a lot of trouble too, because we belong to him. Yes, we will get trouble, and we will get good things too.

Romans 8:28

And we know too that God picked us out to be his people, to love him and to do whatever he wants, so he makes everything work out good for us.

Romans 8:29

A long time ago, God knew about each of us, and he knew which of us will believe in him, so he planned to make us like his son. He sent Jesus to us. He is God’s son, and he is like the older brother to all of us.

Romans 8:30

So, after he picked us out, he called to us to come to him, and after we came to him, he said that we are all right now, and he will make us really great too.

Galatians 3:18

You see, God promised to do something good for Abraham before that law came. God gives people good things because he promised those things, not because those people follow that law. And it is like that for us too. God is doing something good for us now, because he promised to be good to us.

Ephesians 1:14

And now God promises us that one day we will be properly free from doing wrong things. He gives us the Holy Spirit now. It is the first good thing that he gives us, and it shows us that he will give us other good things, for sure. So we really thank God, and we say that he is really great.

Ephesians 1:18

God promised very great things to his people, and now he has them ready for you. I pray that he will show them to you clearly, like he will switch on a light in your minds, so you can know and be sure about these good things.

Ephesians 1:5

so he got Jesus to bring us into his family, and now we can be God’s own kids. God did that because it is what he really wanted to do.

Ephesians 1:8

He does all that for us, and he also makes us wise and helps us to think properly.

Ephesians 1:9

God planned it all a long time ago, and nobody knew about it. But now he let us know about it. He told us that he is using Jesus to do the things he planned, things that make him happy.

Ephesians 3:11

God always planned to save people, and he sent our leader, Jesus Christ, to do it.

Colossians 1:12

And we want you to always say thank you to God, our father. He brought you into his family so that you will get the good things that he promised to give to his people. Then you will live with him in his good place.

Colossians 3:24

Yes, you are working for our leader, Jesus Christ, and remember that later on he will pay you properly, just like he promised us.

Titus 2:14

Jesus died to save us from all the bad things of this world. He did that to change us into his own special people, like he properly cleaned us inside, and now we don’t want to do anything bad, but we only want to do good things.

Titus 3:7

God was very good to us, and he did all that for us. So now we are his friends, we are in his family, and we are sure that we will live with him for ever. So we can be very happy.

James 2:5

Listen to me, my good Christian friends. God picks out poor people, and he helps them to trust him properly. He promises to give them a good place in his family. He promises that to everybody that loves him. In the end those poor people will be really rich.

1 Peter 1:4

We are his family, so he will give us a lot of good things. He has them all ready in heaven for us, so now we just wait for those things. God looks after them all there for us in heaven. They will never rot or get dirty there, and nobody can ever mess them up.

1 Peter 3:9

If somebody rubbishes you, don’t rubbish them back. If somebody does wrong to you, don’t do payback to them. Instead of that, you have to ask God to be good to them. God picked you to be in his family and to live like that. And if you are good to people like that, God will be good to you too.