Efficiency ("energy")
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Energeia names effective working, activity, or operative power. In six uses, Paul applies it to God's working: His power toward believers, grace enabling Paul's service, each part contributing to the body's growth, Christ's power to transform His people, divine energy sustaining Paul's labor, and God's power in raising Christ.
Reader summary
Full entry for ἐνέργεια (G1753) · Open the biblical lexicon
Energeia names effective working, activity, or operative power. In six uses, Paul applies it to God's working: His power toward believers, grace enabling Paul's service, each part contributing to the body's growth, Christ's power to transform His people, divine energy sustaining Paul's labor, and God's power in raising Christ.
The BSB source-word alignment has 8 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include power (2), working (2), [the] work (1), [the] working (1), a powerful (1).
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Ephesians 1:19. Its strongest book concentrations include Ephesians (3), 2 Thessalonians (2), Colossians (2), Philippians (1).
Energeia names effective working, activity, or operative power. In six uses, Paul applies it to God's working: His power toward believers, grace enabling Paul's service, each part contributing to the body's growth, Christ's power to transform His people, divine energy sustaining Paul's labor, and God's power in raising Christ. Second Thessalonians 2 supplies the necessary contrast.
The lawless one's coming is accompanied by Satan's working, and God sends a working of delusion in judgment on those who refuse the truth. The noun therefore does not mean holy power by itself. Its moral and theological character comes from the agent, object, and argument of each passage. Teachers may speak of God's effective action where the text does, but should not use the term to baptize excitement, technique, institutional momentum, or claims of supernatural power.
The governed local index counts about eight G1753 uses. Six describe God's effective working, while two in 2 Thessalonians 2 show Satanic working and divinely sent delusion within judgment.
And the surpassing greatness of His power to us who believe. These are in accordance with the working of His mighty strength,
Paul stacks power language to describe God's effective strength toward believers; G1753 contributes to the sentence rather than carrying the whole claim by itself.
To this end I also labor, striving with all His energy working powerfully within me.
Paul's strenuous labor and God's powerful working belong together, correcting both self-reliance and passivity.
The coming of the lawless one will be accompanied by the working of Satan, with every kind of power, sign, and false wonder,
The same noun can describe Satan's working, proving that the word's moral character must come from its agent and context.
BSB source-word alignment connects this entry to exact verse rows, English rendering, source form, transliteration, and parsing.
How English Renders ItA compact distribution from source-word alignment before the full evidence tables.
Greek word. Active, manifest power at work, distinct from mere potential; God's dynamic operation in redemptive history.
Active, manifest power at work, distinct from mere potential; God's dynamic operation in redemptive history.
(ἐνεργής), [in LXX: Wis.7:17, 26 13:4 18:22, 2Ma.3:29, 3Ma.4:21 3Mac 5:12 3Mac 5:28 * ;] operative power (as distinct from δύναμις, potential power), working: of God, Eph.1:19 3:7 4:16, Php.3:21, Col.1:29 2:12; of Satan, 2Th.2:9 2:11 (cf. M, Th., l.with; AR, Eph., 241 ff.; Cremer, 261).
Textus Receptus witness, full corpusGreek token appearances from Scrivener 1894 Textus Receptus in the full New Testament corpus.
8 Greek text appearances shown. Linked morphology labels have verse guides.
working, activity
Read verseworking, activity
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Read verseworking, activity
Read verseworking, activity
Read verseworking, activity
Read verseworking, activity
Read verseworking, activity
Read verseFull New Testament corpus: 260 chapters, 7,957 verses, 140,628 tokens. Data source: honza/textus-receptus (data only), with authority check against byztxt/greektext-textus-receptus.
How this word appears across different grammatical cases and numbers.
This word appears as a noun across 2 case and number patterns. The form changes show how the word functions in a sentence; they do not change the basic lexical meaning by themselves.
Verse guides are not available for this word yet, so verse references remain plain evidence markers.
Selected passage-level study witnesses for this word. This section is not the full occurrence list.
Showing 4 selected witnesses from 8 lexical occurrence verses.
ἐνέργεια is built from this root:
Compound and idiomatic phrases that include this word. Follow a link to study the phrase and how its parts work together.
G1753 is morally nonselective at the lexical level. God's working raises, transforms, equips, and grows His people, while Satan's working accompanies deception. Paul can also speak of God's judicial working when people refuse the love of the truth. This range gives pastors a needed test: effectiveness is not the same as faithfulness. Ministry labor should depend on God's power, but claims of power must still be judged by truth, allegiance to Christ, and the stated fruit of the passage.
The Ephesians and Colossians uses also resist a false choice between divine action and responsible participation: grace enables service, Paul labors, and each part of the body works. By contrast, deceptive power can appear impressive while serving a lie. The passage must identify and evaluate the working.
Eph.1.19
The local index counts about eight uses, seven accusative singular and one genitive singular. English renderings vary among working, power, and energy, so readers should trace the noun's agent and function rather than depend on one English label.
Scripture's wider teaching about God's acts, deceptive signs, truth, judgment, and Spirit-enabled service can inform synthesis. G1753 does not by itself identify every instance of power or activity.