| [an error occurred while processing this directive] | New International Version |
| 1[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 1I want you to know how hard I am contending for you and for those at Laodicea, and for all who have not met me personally. |
| 2[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 2My goal is that they may be encouraged in heart and united in love, so that they may have the full riches of complete understanding, in order that they may know the mystery of God, namely, Christ, |
| 3[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 3in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. |
| 4[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 4I tell you this so that no one may deceive you by fine-sounding arguments. |
| 5[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 5For though I am absent from you in body, I am present with you in spirit and delight to see how disciplined you are and how firm your faith in Christ is. |
| 6[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 6So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live your lives in him, |
| 7[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 7rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness. |
| 8[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 8See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the elemental spiritual forces of this world rather than on Christ. |
| 9[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 9For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, |
| 10[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 10and in Christ you have been brought to fullness. He is the head over every power and authority. |
| 11[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 11In him you were also circumcised with a circumcision not performed by human hands. Your whole self ruled by the flesh was put off when you were circumcised by Christ, |
| 12[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 12having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through your faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead. |
| 13[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 13When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, |
| 14[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 14having canceled the charge of our legal indebtedness, which stood against us and condemned us; he has taken it away, nailing it to the cross. |
| 15[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 15And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross. |
| 16[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 16Therefore do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a religious festival, a New Moon celebration or a Sabbath day. |
| 17[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 17These are a shadow of the things that were to come; the reality, however, is found in Christ. |
| 18[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 18Do not let anyone who delights in false humility and the worship of angels disqualify you. Such a person also goes into great detail about what they have seen; they are puffed up with idle notions by their unspiritual mind. |
| 19[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 19They have lost connection with the head, from whom the whole body, supported and held together by its ligaments and sinews, grows as God causes it to grow. |
| 20[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 20Since you died with Christ to the elemental spiritual forces of this world, why, as though you still belonged to the world, do you submit to its rules: |
| 21[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 21"Do not handle! Do not taste! Do not touch!"? |
| 22[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 22These rules, which have to do with things that are all destined to perish with use, are based on merely human commands and teachings. |
| 23[an error occurred while processing this directive] | 23Such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom, with their self-imposed worship, their false humility and their harsh treatment of the body, but they lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence. |
| [an error occurred while processing this directive] | New International Version (NIV) Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. |
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