Chapter 5

   Therefore be imitators of God, as His dear children.  

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   And live and act lovingly, as Christ also loved you and gave Himself up to death on our behalf as an offering and sacrifice to God, yielding a fragrant odor.  

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   But fornication and every kind of impurity, or covetousness, let them not even be mentioned among you, for they ought not to be named among God's people.  

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   Avoid shameful and foolish talk and low jesting--they are all alike discreditable--and in place of these give thanks.  

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   For be well assured that no fornicator or immoral person and no money-grubber--or in other words idol-worshipper--has any share awaiting him in the Kingdom of Christ and of God.  

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   Let no one deceive you with empty words, for it is on account of these very sins that God's anger is coming upon the disobedient.  

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   Therefore do not become sharers with them.  

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   There was a time when you were nothing but darkness. Now, as Christians, you are Light itself.  

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   Live and act as sons of Light--for the effect of the Light is seen in every kind of goodness, uprightness and truth--  

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   and learn in your own experiences what is fully pleasing to the Lord.  

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   Have nothing to do with the barren unprofitable deeds of darkness, but, instead of that, set your faces against them;  

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   for the things which are done by these people in secret it is disgraceful even to speak of.  

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   But everything can be tested by the light and thus be shown in its true colors; for whatever shines of itself is light.  

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   For this reason it is said, 'Rise, sleeper; rise from among the dead, and Christ will shed light upon you.'  

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   Therefore be very careful how you live and act. Let it not be as unwise men, but as wise.  

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   Buy up your opportunities, for these are evil times.  

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   On this account do not prove yourselves wanting in sense, but try to understand what the Lord's will is.  

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   Do not over-indulge in wine--a thing in which excess is so easy--  

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   but drink deeply of God's Spirit. Speak to one another with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs. Sing and offer praise in your hearts to the Lord.  

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   Always and for everything let your thanks to God the Father be presented in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ;  

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   and submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.  

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   Married women, submit to your own husbands as if to the Lord;  

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   because a husband is the Head of his wife as Christ also is the Head of the Church, being indeed the Saviour of this His Body.  

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   And just as the Church submits to Christ, so also married women should be entirely submissive to their husbands.  

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   Married men, love your wives, as Christ also loved the Church and gave Himself up to death for her;  

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   in order to make her holy, cleansing her with the baptismal water by the word,  

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   that He might present the Church to Himself a glorious bride, without spot or wrinkle or any other defect, but to be holy and unblemished.  

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   So too married men ought to love their wives as much as they love themselves. He who loves his wife loves himself.  

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   For never yet has a man hated his own body. On the contrary he feeds and cherishes it, just as Christ feeds and cherishes the Church;  

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   because we are, as it were, parts of His Body.  

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   'For this reason a man is to leave his father and his mother and be united to his wife, and the two shall be as one.'  

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   That is a great truth hitherto kept secret: I mean the truth concerning Christ and the Church.  

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   Yet I insist that among you also, each man is to love his own wife as much as he loves himself, and let a married woman see to it that she treats her husband with respect.  

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