## This I say therefore, and I exhort you in the Lord, ##

"Therefore I strongly encourage you in the Lord"

## no longer walk as the Gentiles walk in the futility of their minds ##

"stop living like the Gentiles with their worthless thoughts"

## being darkened in thought, alienated from the life of God by the ignorance that is in them and by the stubbornness of their heart ##

"They cannot experience the life of God because their minds have been blinded and their hearts are hard"

## being darkened in thought ##

they no longer think or reason clearly.

## alienated from the life of God ##

"separated from godly living"

## by the ignorance that is in them ##

"because they have no knowledge of God"

## by the stubbornness of their heart ##

They refuse to listen to God and follow His teachings.

## They have handed themselves over to debauchery in impure actions, in every kind of greediness ##

"They have given their lives to an excessive desire for pleasure by their filthy behavior and greed for everything they desire"