One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.
The apostle Paul wrote this letter to Christians in Ephesus — a major port city in what is now western Turkey — to help a diverse, divided community understand what holds them together. This verse is the final item in a list of seven 'ones' Paul stacks up: one body, one Spirit, one hope, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, and now — one God and Father of all. The three phrases that follow — over all, through all, in all — describe the reach of this one God: he has authority over everything, he works through the fabric of all things, and he is personally present within all of created reality. In a culture full of competing gods and sharp divisions between people, this was a sweeping and radical claim.
Father of all — over all, through all, in all — help me stop shrinking you to fit the compartments of my life. You are larger than my schedule, my categories, my fears, and my failures. Let your presence be unmistakably real to me today in the ordinary and unexpected places. Amen.
Three prepositions, and they keep going deeper. *Over all* — God has authority; nothing exists outside his reach or knowledge. *Through all* — God is actively at work in the texture of events, in the mundane and the catastrophic alike. *In all* — God is not merely watching from a distance but present within the whole of reality, including in you. This isn't a claim that everything *is* God. It's something far more personal: the God who is *Father* — relational, warm, close — is also the God who permeates everything that exists. On the days when life feels fractured beyond repair — when the church feels hopelessly divided, when the news makes the world feel like it's coming apart, when your own inner life feels scattered in fourteen directions — this verse offers something unusually sturdy to stand on. There is one God. Over the chaos, through the chaos, in the chaos. He is not bewildered by the complexity of your life or of the world. What would it mean for you to stop treating God as one compartment in your week and start living as if the Father really is through all and in all — including the parts of your life you haven't let him near yet?
What do you think is the difference between God being 'over all,' 'through all,' and 'in all'? How would you explain those three phrases to someone who had never read the Bible?
Where in your life do you most struggle to sense God's presence — and how does this verse speak directly into that specific place?
If there is truly 'one God and Father of all,' what does that mean for how Christians should relate to other believers who look, think, or worship very differently from them?
How does the unity described in this verse challenge the way you personally engage with division — in your church, your family, or your broader community?
Is there a specific area of your life you have been keeping separate from your faith? What would it look like to invite God into that space this week, not as an obligation but as an act of trust?
Have we not all one father? hath not one God created us? why do we deal treacherously every man against his brother, by profaning the covenant of our fathers?
Malachi 2:10
For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. Amen.
Romans 11:36
And the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul: neither said any of them that ought of the things which he possessed was his own; but they had all things common.
Acts 4:32
And the LORD shall be king over all the earth: in that day shall there be one LORD, and his name one.
Zechariah 14:9
A Song of degrees of David. Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity!
Psalms 133:1
But to us there is but one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we in him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we by him.
1 Corinthians 8:6
There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.
Galatians 3:28
For ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus.
Galatians 3:26
one God and Father of us all who is [sovereign] over all and [working] through all and [living] in all.
AMP
one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.
ESV
one God and Father of all who is over all and through all and in all.
NASB
one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.
NIV
one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.
NKJV
one God and Father of all, who is over all, in all, and living through all.
NLT
one God and Father of all, who rules over all, works through all, and is present in all. Everything you are and think and do is permeated with Oneness.
MSG