Colossians 1:9-23 - Prayer For Maturity Based On Christ's Preeminence

⁹ For this cause, we also, from the day when we heard of you , cease not, in your behalf, praying and asking - that ye may be filled unto the personal knowledge of his will, in all spiritual wisdom and discernment, ¹⁰ So as to walk worthily of the Lord, unto all pleasing, in every good work, bearing fruit, and growing in the personal knowledge of God, ¹¹ With all power, being empowered, according to the grasp of his glory, unto all endurance and long-suffering with joy, ¹² Giving thanks unto the Father that hath made you sufficient for your share in the inheritance of the saints in the light, ¹³ Who hath rescued us out of the authority of the darkness, and translated us into the kingdom of the Son of his love; ¹⁴ In whom, we have our redemption - the remission of our sins, -

¹⁵ Who, is an image of the unseen God, Firstborn of all creation, - ¹⁶ Because, in him, were created all things in the heavens and upon the earth, the things seen and the things unseen, whether thrones or lordships or principalities or authorities, - they all, through him and for him, have been created, ¹⁷ And, he, is before all, and, they all, in him, hold together; ¹⁸ And, he, is the head of the body, the assembly, Who is the beginning, Firstborn from among the dead, in order that, he, might become, in all things, himself, pre-eminent; - ¹⁹ Because, in him, was all the fullness well pleased to dwell, ²⁰ And, through him, fully to reconcile all things unto him, making peace through the blood of his cross, - through him- whether the things upon the earth or the things in the heavens;

²¹ And, you, who at one time were estranged and enemies in your mind in your wicked works, yet, now, hath he fully reconciled, ²² In his body of flesh, through means of his death, to present you holy and blameless and unaccusable before him, - ²³ If, at least, ye are abiding still in the faith, founded and firm, and not to be moved away from the hope of the glad-message which ye have heard, which hath been proclaimed in all creation which is under heaven, - of which, I Paul, have become minister.