Bible Study

Ephesians 4:17-20

The New Life

[17] Now this I say and testify in the Lord, that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds. [18] They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart. [19] They have become callous and have given themselves up to sensuality, greedy to practice every kind of impurity. [20] But that is not the way you learned Christ!—

2 Kings 17:15-18

[15] They despised his statutes and his covenant that he made with their fathers and the warnings that he gave them. They went after false idols and became false, and they followed the nations that were around them, concerning whom the LORD had commanded them that they should not do like them. [16] And they abandoned all the commandments of the LORD their God, and made for themselves metal images of two calves; and they made an Asherah and worshiped all the host of heaven and served Baal. [17] And they burned their sons and their daughters as offerings and used divination and omens and sold themselves to do evil in the sight of the LORD, provoking him to anger. [18] Therefore the LORD was very angry with Israel and removed them out of his sight. None was left but the tribe of Judah only.

Jeremiah 2:5-9

[5] Thus says the LORD: 

    “What wrong did your fathers find in me

        that they went far from me,

    and went after worthlessness, and became worthless? 

    [6] They did not say, ‘Where is the LORD

        who brought us up from the land of Egypt,

    who led us in the wilderness,

        in a land of deserts and pits,

    in a land of drought and deep darkness,

        in a land that none passes through,

        where no man dwells?’ 

    [7] And I brought you into a plentiful land

        to enjoy its fruits and its good things.

    But when you came in, you defiled my land

        and made my heritage an abomination. 

    [8] The priests did not say, ‘Where is the LORD?’

        Those who handle the law did not know me;

    the shepherds transgressed against me;

        the prophets prophesied by Baal

        and went after things that do not profit.

    [9] “Therefore I still contend with you,

    declares the LORD,

        and with your children’s children I will contend.

Ephesians 2:12-13

[12] remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. [13] But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.