50 Fun Facts About Book of Ephesians

Which goddess's temple at Ephesus, one of the Seven Wonders, did Paul's preaching threaten in Acts 19?

Artemis of the Ephesians was the rioters' chant, and the city clerk calmed them by insisting Ephesus was 'the guardian of the temple of the great Artemis and of her image, which fell from heaven'.

How many chapters does Ephesians run to, half of them doctrine and half instructions for daily life?

Six chapters, and the whole of 1:3–23 is just two long sentences in the Greek, the opening blessing often punctuated as a single one.

Ephesians 2 says believers are saved 'by grace, through faith' and 'not by works', so that no one can do what?

Boast is ruled out because the whole of salvation 'is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God', verses the Reformers made a proof text for justification by faith alone.

Which piece of the armour of God in Ephesians 6 can 'extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one'?

The shield of faith is taken up 'in addition to all this', after belt, breastplate and footwear, and the KJV calls the arrows 'the fiery darts of the wicked'.

Ephesians 6:12 says the believer's struggle is not against what, but against 'the spiritual forces of evil'?

Flesh and blood are set aside for 'the rulers', 'the authorities' and 'the powers of this dark world', which the KJV calls 'principalities' and 'powers'.

Ephesians 4 counts one body, one Spirit, one hope, one Lord, one faith, one God and one what?

Baptism completes the list, which follows the plea to 'keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace' and the call to be 'completely humble and gentle'.

Which of the Ten Commandments does Ephesians 6 call 'the first commandment with a promise'?

Honor your father and mother carries the promise 'that you may enjoy long life on the earth', quoted from Deuteronomy, and is addressed to children told to obey 'in the Lord'.

Ephesians 3 ends by praising God as able to do 'immeasurably more than all we ask or' what?

Imagine closes the line, with the power 'at work within us', and the doxology ends the doctrinal half before chapter 4 urges a life 'worthy of the calling'.

Ephesians 4 permits anger but not sin, and sets which daily event as the deadline for staying angry?

Sunset is the cut-off: 'do not let the sun go down while you are still angry', and the next verse adds 'do not give the devil a foothold'.

Ephesus, whose congregation Paul's letter addresses, lies near the town of Selçuk in which modern country?

Turkey's İzmir province holds the ruins, and the harbour that made Ephesus a great port silted up under the Küçükmenderes river, so the site now sits inland.

Ephesians 6 identifies the sword of the Spirit, the last piece of the armour of God listed, as what?

The word of God is the sword, and the passage then turns from armour to prayer 'in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests'.

Which book does Ephesians 5 quote for 'the two will become one flesh', before calling it 'a profound mystery'?

Genesis 2:24 is the line, and the writer says the mystery is really 'about Christ and the church', husbands being told to love their wives 'just as Christ loved the church'.

Which role completes Ephesians 4:11's list of Christ's gifts: apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and what?

Teachers close the list, given 'to equip his people for works of service' until all 'become mature', no longer 'infants, tossed back and forth by the waves'.

Ephesians 4:32 asks readers to be 'kind and compassionate to one another' and what, as God in Christ was to them?

Forgiving each other 'just as in Christ God forgave you' closes a chapter that has just banned 'bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander'.

In Revelation 2, what does the risen Christ hold against the Ephesian church despite praising its hard work?

Forsaking its first love is the charge, with a threat to 'remove your lampstand from its place' unless they 'do the things you did at first'.

Which co-worker did Paul urge to 'stay there in Ephesus' and silence false teaching, in a letter bearing his name?

Timothy was left in Ephesus while Paul went on to Macedonia, and the same letter has Paul call himself the 'worst' of sinners.

What was the trade of Demetrius, who stirred the Ephesus riot of Acts 19 by warning craftsmen about Paul?

Silversmith Demetrius made miniature silver shrines of the city's goddess and complained that Paul 'says that gods made by human hands are no gods at all'.

Ephesians 2 builds the church on 'the foundation of the apostles and prophets', with Christ Jesus himself as what?

Cornerstone is a title lifted from Isaiah 28 that 1 Peter also gives Christ, and the building 'rises to become a holy temple in the Lord'.

Ephesians 2 calls the devil 'the ruler of the kingdom of' what, a title used nowhere else in the New Testament?

The air is the devil's domain in the KJV's 'prince of the power of the air', 'the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient'.

Which 'dear brother and faithful servant' does Ephesians 6 send to tell readers 'everything' about the writer?

Tychicus came from the province of Asia, Acts 20 says, and one of the Pastoral letters records him being sent to Ephesus again near the end of Paul's life.

Ephesians 1 calls the Holy Spirit a seal and what, 'guaranteeing our inheritance' until the redemption?

A deposit, 'earnest' in older Bibles, renders the Greek arrabōn, a down-payment that binds a bargain, so the Spirit is the first instalment of what is promised.

Ephesians 1 says God 'predestined us' for what 'through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will'?

Adoption to sonship follows the claim that God 'chose us in him before the creation of the world', verses long argued over in debates about predestination.

What is the 'mystery' Ephesians 3 says was hidden from earlier generations but now revealed through the gospel?

Gentiles are heirs with Israel, 'members together of one body, and sharers together in the promise', a secret that 'for ages past was kept hidden in God'.

Which line, possibly a fragment of an early hymn, does Ephesians 5 introduce with 'This is why it is said'?

Wake up, sleeper, 'rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you', may be a snatch of early Christian song, and it follows the promise that 'everything exposed by the light becomes visible'.

Which four words does Ephesians 3 use to measure the love of Christ, a love that 'surpasses knowledge'?

Wide, long, high, deep is the measure, and the prayer's goal is that readers be 'filled to the measure of all the fullness of God'.

Ephesians 6:4 tells fathers not to do what to their children, but to give them the Lord's 'training and instruction'?

Exasperate is the NIV's verb where the KJV has 'provoke not your children to wrath', and it comes right after children are told to obey 'in the Lord'.

Ephesians 6 tells masters to stop doing what to their slaves, since their own Master in heaven shows no favoritism?

Threatening them is the one practice named, after slaves are told to obey 'not only to win their favor when their eye is on you'.

Ephesians 4:28 tells a former thief to work 'doing something useful with their own hands' for what purpose?

To share with the needy is the stated aim, not restitution, and the rule sits between commands against lying and against 'unwholesome talk'.

In the armour of God, Ephesians 6 makes the breastplate out of which virtue, an image borrowed from Isaiah 59?

Righteousness is the breastplate in both passages, and in Isaiah the warrior wearing it is the Lord himself, wrapped 'in zeal as in a cloak'.

What is the helmet in Ephesians 6, where 1 Thessalonians 5 instead makes the helmet 'the hope of' it?

Salvation is the helmet here, and Isaiah 59 already has God put 'the helmet of salvation on his head', the verse both letters draw on.

Where does the KJV of Ephesians 6:12 locate 'spiritual wickedness', beside 'principalities' and 'powers'?

In high places is the KJV wording; the NIV instead has 'the spiritual forces of evil' and 'the powers of this dark world'.

What does the KJV of Ephesians 5:16 tell readers to be 'redeeming', 'because the days are evil'?

The time, Greek for 'buying up for yourselves the opportunity', becomes the NIV's 'making the most of every opportunity'.

With 'in Ephesus' missing from the earliest manuscripts, what kind of letter do many scholars think Ephesians was?

An encyclical meant for several churches would explain why the writer greets nobody by name, though Acts has Paul spend more than two years in Ephesus.

From which city is Ephesians traditionally dated to around AD 62, with Paul imprisoned and awaiting trial?

Rome is the traditional setting, but scholars who doubt Paul's authorship date the letter to AD 70–100, a decade or more after his death.

Ephesians is grouped with Philippians, Philemon and which other letter as Paul's four 'prison epistles'?

Colossians resembles Ephesians 'in many points', and both were carried by the same messenger from the same imprisonment, alongside the one-chapter note to Philemon.

For about how long did the crowd in the Ephesus theatre chant their goddess's greatness in unison in Acts 19?

Two hours of shouting began when the crowd realised Alexander, pushed forward to speak, was a Jew; the city clerk then warned they risked a charge of rioting.

The sons of Sceva, a Jewish chief priest in Ephesus, were beaten and stripped after attempting what in Acts 19?

An exorcism 'in the name of the Jesus whom Paul preaches' backfired when the spirit answered, 'Jesus I know, and Paul I know about, but who are you?'

In Acts 19, Ephesian converts who had practised sorcery burned their scrolls, valued at how many drachmas?

50,000 drachmas' worth of scrolls went up in flames after the Sceva fiasco left 'the name of the Lord Jesus' held 'in high honor'.

Where in Ephesus did Paul hold daily discussions for two years after leaving the synagogue, according to Acts 19?

The hall of Tyrannus hosted Paul after the synagogue turned 'obstinate', and Acts claims that as a result 'all the Jews and Greeks who lived in the province of Asia heard the word of the Lord'.

At which port did Paul bid farewell to the Ephesian elders in Acts 20, warning that 'savage wolves' would come?

Miletus is where they 'all wept as they embraced him', grieved most by his word that 'they would never see his face again'.

Under what title did Marcion's followers use an edited Ephesians, according to Tertullian?

To the Laodiceans fits a letter whose earliest copies lack 'in Ephesus', and the Muratorian fragment damns a Laodiceans 'forged in Paul's name for the sect of Marcion'.

Which codex of about AD 200, split between Dublin and Michigan, is among the earliest surviving copies of Ephesians?

Papyrus 46, one of the Chester Beatty papyri and perhaps from the Faiyum, holds nine Pauline letters and puts Hebrews straight after Romans.

Which German term from Luther's Small Catechism do scholars use for the household rules in Ephesians 5 and 6?

Haustafel, 'house table', covers three pairs, wives and husbands, children and parents, slaves and masters, and similar lists appear in 1 Peter and the Didache.

Which verb is missing from the Greek of Ephesians 5:22 on wives, carried over from verse 21's 'to one another'?

Submit appears only in verse 21 in the earliest Greek manuscripts, so the wives' verse hangs on 'submit to one another out of reverence for Christ'.

Which bishop of Ephesus, praised by Ignatius of Antioch around AD 107, may have been the runaway slave of Philemon?

Onesimus, 'whose love surpasses words, in the flesh as your bishop', is Ignatius's greeting, written while he was being taken to his execution.

Who first framed the 'recapitulation' theory of atonement, built on Ephesians 1:10, 'to sum up all things in Christ'?

Irenaeus of Lyons held that Christ 'became what we are, that He might bring us to be even what He is Himself', with the Ephesians verse among his main proof texts.

Which psalm does Ephesians 4:8 quote for 'he ascended on high', turning its 'received gifts' into 'gave gifts'?

Psalm 68 in the NIV reads 'you received gifts from people, even from the rebellious', and the altered line introduces Christ's gifts of ministries.

Whose hymn 'Soldiers of Christ, Arise' began as a 1747 poem titled 'The Whole Armour of God, Ephesians VI'?

Charles Wesley published it in 1749 with 16 verses of eight lines, and the hymn became known as 'The Christian's bugle blast'.

Which sin does Ephesians 5:5 brand as idolatry, listing it beside immorality and impurity?

Greed makes a person 'an idolater' with no inheritance 'in the kingdom of Christ and of God', and verse 3 bans 'even a hint' of it.

What does Paul do in Ephesians 3 'before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name'?

Kneel is the posture he names before asking that Christ 'may dwell in your hearts through faith' and that readers be 'rooted and established in love'.