Abstract
Atheist. The word sends a cold shiver through me. To most people, I would guess, the word means "someone who denies (or disbelieves in) the existence of God." But did you know that the New Testament uses the word a little differently? In Ephesians 2:12, the only verse of the Bible where the word atheos appears, Paul uses the term to describe the Ephesian Christians before their regeneration by the Spirit of God. He reminds them that when they were separate from Christ they were "without hope and without God [atheos ] in the world."