Next, Paul writes that he bows his knees before the Father. Paul is not indicating here that we have to bow our knees when we pray. In fact, throughout the Bible we find people praying in various different positions.
However, the idea of bowing our knees is a picture of submission, reverence and awe. It illustrates a subject coming before the king to bring a request. The point Paul is making here, is that when we come before God to pray, we need to come with a right heart. We can come boldly, as we learned in our last message, because our access to God is based upon what Christ has done for us. But we also need to come with reference and awe.
Then Paul uses an interesting phrase to describe God. He calls him "the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name." Frankly we could spend our whole time just looking at this one phrase today, however, of you would allow me just make a couple of quick observations.
First, there seems to be a reference here to creation and the fact that all created beings owe their existence to the Father. But because of the context here in Ephesians, Paul seems to be emphasizing the idea that in the church, we all have the same Father. It doesn’t matter whether we are Jew or Gentile, male or female, black or white, rich or poor. We are all God’s children and God loves all his children equally. He doesn’t play favorites. So when Paul prays, he is praying for all of God’s children, including all of us who are followers of Jesus Christ.
Let's focus our attention today on Paul's prayer, verse 16 through 19. "that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner self, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled to all the fullness of God."
Paul’s desire is that Christ would dwell in the hearts of his readers. The word, "katoikēsai," translated "dwell" is an interesting word. In Greek, it means to inhabit, to settle in, and as you might expect, there are several different words that mean to live or to dwell. The one that Paul chose to use here is a word that means to "settle in and be at home in."
Paul’s prayer for us is that we’d be able to do the same thing spiritually with our hearts that most of us do with our homes - to make it a place where Christ can settle in, make it a home and take up permanent residence. Even though Jesus comes into my heart at the moment that I commit my life to Him, Paul’s prayer here makes it clear that my life is not quite ready at that point for Jesus to settle down and be at home there. So, as we’ve seen throughout our study of Ephesians, we embark on this process of having our lives transformed so that we can become more and more like Jesus and to prepare our hearts to be the place where He can come and settle down and be at home.
Let’s look at Paul’s prayer and see if we can unpack some practical principles, that will help us to make sure that our heart is where God’s home is.
We’ve been reading about those glorious riches from the very beginning of Paul’s letter. We’ve been chosen by God and predestined to be adopted into His family. Jesus has redeemed us from an empty way of life through his death and resurrection. The Holy Spirit lives in our lives as a guarantee of both present and future spiritual riches. We’ve been joined together with other believers in the church for the purpose of revealing God’s wisdom both here on earth and in the heavens. And if God has already done all that for His children, don’t you think that He is capable of equipping us with everything we need to prepare our hearts so Jesus can come and make Himself at home there?
What a powerful truth, not to mention a great relief to know that I’m not limited by my own resources? In the process of preparing my heart so Jesus can settle in there, I have the glorious riches of God at my disposal. But how am I able to tap into that amazing power that God provides? That’s where the next three principles come in.
In verse 16, Paul tells us that "... through His Spirit..." Here, we clearly see all three parts of the trinity at work in Paul’s prayer. He prays to God the Father, who is the source of the glorious riches and the power that is available to us. And the purpose of that power is to enable us to prepare our hearts so that His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, can come and take up residence. And it is the Holy Spirit who is the conduit through whom that power and those resources flow into our lives. The Holy Spirit has a number of functions in our lives. We’ve already seen in Ephesians that he serves as guarantee of our future inheritance of the riches of God. But one of His other important roles is to point us to Jesus Christ.
In John 14:26, prior to Jesus going to the cross, He describes that role for us. "But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit—the Father will send Him in My name—will teach you all things and remind you of everything I have told you."
At least one of the ways that the Holy Spirit is the conduit for the riches of God is that He reminds us of the teachings of Jesus and helps us to apply those teachings in our lives. Although we get all of the Holy Spirit that we’ll ever get at the very moment we become a follower of Jesus Christ, the Bible is very clear that we can impede His work in our lives.
In Ephesians 4:30, Paul teaches us, "Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption."
As we can clearly understand from this passage, and some of Paul's various other letters, the Holy Spirit will not force us to respond to the revelation that He brings into our lives. Therefore, we can grieve the Holy Spirit and quench His work in our lives. Whenever the Holy Spirit leads us and reminds us of the teachings of Jesus, we can either choose to respond by submitting our lives to that work of the Spirit and making the changes we need to make to get our lives in line with that revelation or we can choose to ignore that revelation. Putting out the "fire" of the Holy Spirit.
In other words, if I want to make my heart God’s home, than I need to develop the habit of submitting my life to the work of the Holy Spirit in my life. And as I read the Bible and pray, I need to do it with an attitude of humility and submission. I need to be willing to respond to the work of the Holy Spirit in my life even before I know what He will reveal to me.
Then we must emphasize the eternal. "... in the inner self," "in your hearts."
This principle is so vitally important that Paul uses two different phrases to describe the idea of developing our inner lives. Both the inner being, literally the "inner man" and our hearts describe the very center of our being. That includes our personality, thoughts, will and emotions. And it is that part of our lives we need to develop in order for Jesus to come and be at home there.
We live in a culture that is obsessed with outward appearances. The cosmetic industry rakes in billions of dollars per year, from people who are desperately seeking to change their outward appearance. We can spend all the time we want on the outside, but if we don’t take care of the inner man, our hearts, then all the work we do will not last. So how do we make sure that we develop that inner man?
Paul gives us some hints about how we do that in II Corinthians chapter 4. In verses 16 through 18, Paul tells us, "Therefore we do not lose heart, but though our outer person is decaying, yet our inner person is being renewed day by day. For our momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison, while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal."
There is far more to this short passage than we could even begin to tackle today, but Paul makes it quite clear that the way that we are renewed inwardly day by day is to fix our eyes on those unseen things that are eternal rather that the temporary things that we can see. In other words, I need to focus on developing on those things that will last for eternity – my character, my convictions, my thought life, my devotion – rather than those things that will pass away – my body and my material possessions.
I’m certainly not saying, and I don’t believe Paul is either, that we are not to take care of our bodies or be good stewards of the material goods God has entrusted us with. In fact, the Bible clearly teaches that we should do both of those things. But what Paul is saying that our main focus should be on developing those parts of our lives that will last for eternity. It only makes sense that if Jesus is to be at home in our hearts, that is where we ought to focus our time and our resources.
Paul tells us to trust in God's truth, "...through faith." When Paul writes that Christ dwells in our hearts through faith, the faith that he is describing is much more than just some intellectual belief. In fact, it is even broader than what we normally think of as faith – trusting in Jesus Christ alone as the means of being made right with God. That’s certainly part of faith, but it’s really only the starting point. If we want Jesus to be at home on our hearts, we need to have a much more faith than that, an all encompassing kind of faith.
In James 2:18-20, James gives us some helpful principals of that kind of faith. "But someone may well say, “You have faith and I have works; show me your faith without the works, and I will show you my faith by my works.” You believe that God is one. You do well; the demons also believe, and shudder. But are you willing to acknowledge, you foolish person, that faith without works is useless?"
There are a number of people, who would claim that James’ writings contradict Paul’s claim that salvation is by faith alone and not a result of our works. But if you read Paul’s letters carefully, you will find that both of them are actually very much on the same page. James is pointing out that real faith will be demonstrated by our actions. As he points out, even the demons have an intellectual belief about God and His Son. And I think we’d all agree that kind of faith is totally inadequate as a basis for our salvation or for making our heart a dwelling for Jesus. If we want Jesus to come and make Himself at home in our hearts, then we need to have the kind of faith that trusts that as we obey the teachings of Jesus and the leading of the Holy Spirit, God will accomplish what is the very best for us, even when we can’t see how that can be.
In John 14:23, Jesus Himself, put it this way. "If anyone loves Me, he will follow My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our dwelling with him."
In verses 17-19, Paul tells us "so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled to all the fullness of God."
As we read this wonderful passage, it seems that Paul has laid out a very easy to follow roadmap for us to follow. He presents Biblical principles in a very logical order.
However, for the purpose of this message, I’m actually going to start with the end of the passage and work our way backward. That’s because Paul reveals our destination at the end of the passage and before the roadmap is going to do us any good, we need to know where we’re headed.
At the end of verse 19, he says "..that you may be filled to all the fullness of God." God’s goal for the lives of His children is that they might experience a life that is filled to the very brim with the fullness of God. In fact, Jesus in John 10:10, indicated that was the very purpose for which He came to earth.
"....I came so that they would have life, and have it abundantly."
Paul indicates that when we make the decision to be a follower of Jesus Christ, God imparts His fullness to us in Christ.
Remember that Paul is writing to believers here in Ephesians. So if those believers already have the fullness of God in their lives as a result of their union with Jesus Christ, why would Paul pray that they might be filled to the very top with the fullness of God? It seems to me that what Paul is praying is for his readers to become what they already are in Christ – in other words he wants them to be all that they can be, what God intends them to be, not what they presently are.
When we make the decision to become a follower of Jesus Christ, we get all of Jesus we’ll ever get and in Him we get the fullness of God. However, we don’t necessarily experience the entire impact of that fullness right away. In fact, none of us will be able to know all that fullness in this lifetime here on earth. But as we mature and develop in our relationship with God, we are able to experience a little more and then a little more of that fullness operating in our lives.
Paul makes a clear connection between attaining the whole measure of the
fullness of Christ and our spiritual maturity. So the destination that
God sets out before us is our spiritual maturity. But this is a
different kind of destination, because it is one that I can never reach,
at least not while I’m here on earth. That idea is foreign to our
natural minds. For example, we would never set to take a trip in a car with a quarter of a tank of gas, without knowing that we had the means to fuel up as we needed to, otherwise, what would be the point of heading out
toward a destination we knew we could never reach. But God has
determined that our spiritual journey in such a way, that we will never come to a point of
completion, at least on this earth.
I strongly believe, that if there were anyone who could have ever completed his spiritual journey here on earth, it had to be Paul, But even Paul, as he approached the end of his life, recognized that he still hadn’t gotten there. And yet, he still kept striving to reach the final destination. We will never arrive, but the more mature we get, the closer we come to being all that God intends for us to be.
What really breaks my heart is to look around and to see all of the Christians who want to settle for just getting by on spiritual crumbs. They're seemingly ok with it. Why? Because they don’t want to do the hard work that is needed to get on the journey toward spiritual maturity. They could have the fullness of God in their life, but they choose to settle for the cheap imitations, the fake knock-off's offered by the world.
So, I suppose the question you want answered now, is "How do we get to our destination of spiritual maturity?"
We must experientially know the love of Christ. "may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge"
Paul tells us that the way we get closer to our destination of spiritual maturity is by grasping the love of Christ. Experiential things can be seen, touched, and verified. If something is experiential, it's real, rather than conceptual. Paul tells us that Christ’s love is wide and long and high and deep and that it is the kind of love that surpasses knowledge. Then he turns right around and prays that his readers would be able to know this unknowable love.
In our last two verses, Paul says, "Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us, to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen.
This is one of my favorite passages. However, as you might suspect, this is likely one of misused, taken out of context passages in all of Scripture. If we separate this verse from its context in Ephesians, it is easy to make this passage, especially verse 20, into the basis for what is known as the "prosperity gospel." The proponents of that theology would claim that this verse means that God is able to give you more than what you could ask for or even imagine. Which, is true enough, however, it is not intended to be misused or taught as is in prosperity preaching. A "Jesus in a magic lamp" theology. Just ask Jesus for a Hyundai, He will give you a Bugatti. And, if you ask for a $150,000 house, God will give you a $10,000,000.00 estate.
I not only find this type of preaching to be disgraceful, or a satanic doctrine, but an insult to Almighty God. I can't speak for you, but my God is far greater than some wish granting genie who resides in a magic lamp!
Taken in its proper context, this verse is far more significant than just being the basis for us to receive material blessings from God. In fact, I would suggest to you that this passage is the key passage in the entire book of Ephesians. It provides us with a bridge, or a transition, from the doctrine contained in the first three chapters of Ephesians to the more practical application of that doctrine in the last three chapters. It causes us to look back and see how the power of God has already been at work in our lives. And it causes us to look forward to see how that same power gives us the ability to live a life that brings God glory.
So when Paul writes that God is able to do immeasurably more than we can ask or imagine, according to His power at work within us, he is not making some general statement about God’s power or His ability to work in our lives. I’m convinced that when Paul writes that, he is looking back at everything he has written up to this point.
What an incredibly beautiful description of the working of God's power in our lives!
The immeasurable power of God, is like the working of his mighty strength, which he exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age but also in the one to come. And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.
In Closing..
If we want Jesus to come and make His home with us, then we need to trust him enough to obey His teachings. That means when someone wrongs me, instead of trying to get revenge, I forgive and pray for the other person. It means that when I have the desire to engage in a physical relationship outside of marriage, I refrain from giving into those desires, because I trust that is in my best interest based on the words of Jesus. It means that I don’t worry about my material needs because God has promised to provide them for me.
"... that you may be filled to all the fullness of God." I don't know about you, but that’s certainly immeasurably more than I can ask or imagine. To be real honest, I can ask for anything. And I can even imagine something far greater that I will ever have. But how could I ever ask God to do all that He has already done for me? How could I even think about asking Him for more than to sacrifice His own Son so that I can have all these spiritual blessings? How could I ever imagine that God would do all this for me after the way I’ve ignored and disobeyed him repeatedly, time after time? To be completely honest, the whole idea just overwhelms me.
Paul doesn't want us to just look back at what God has done, he also wants us to look forward. To look ahead, at how we can live our lives in such a way to bring God glory.
Paul writes something quite interesting in verse 21. In his doxology, he writes "to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen."
A couple of things particularly strike me about that phrase. The whole idea that God gets glory in the church is really quite amazing in the first place. But what’s even more interesting to me is the fact that Paul puts the church before Jesus Christ in this phrase. Paul seems to be indicating that since the church is the body of Jesus Christ, it is so inextricably linked to Christ that it is really impossible to separate the church from its head, Jesus Christ.
All the spiritual blessings that we have, all of God’s power working in our lives is only possible because of what Jesus has done for us. So it’s pretty easy to see how God gets glory through his Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.
As we become more mature in our faith and as we are filled more and more with the fullness of God, then God receives glory. But as we’ve seen, and as Paul points out again in this morning’s passage, we’re not capable of being filled with God’s fullness on our own. Certainly that is something that is immeasurably more that we could ever ask for or imagine. That’s why we need His power at work in our lives.
May it be so...
the Lord make His face shine upon you,
And be gracious to you;
The Lord lift up His countenance upon you,
And give you peace.
Now and forever, in Jesus' name
Amen