This phrase is based on Col. 1:20, but can only be understood by the context, which expressly limits the “all things” to “things in heaven and things on earth;” which is all the more remarkable, because in a somewhat similar passage (speaking, however, not of reconciliation, but of owning Christ as Lord) in Phil. 2 Things under the earth are explicitly included. To extend the range of the “reconciliation of all things,” to things under the earth, as is so common at the present day, is therefore clearly to add to Scripture.