Opening illustration: A missionary wrote a newsletter to thank his supporters for being “prayer warriors.” Because of a typing error, though, he called them “prayer worriers.” For some of us, that might be a good description.
In his book Growing Your Soul, Neil Wiseman writes, “Prayer must be more than a kind of restatement of fretting worries or a mulling over of problems. Our petitions must move beyond gloomy desperation, which deals mostly with calamity and despair.”
During an anxious time in our life, we become “prayer worriers.” we beg, “Lord, please keep my neighbor from causing me problems tomorrow.” Or, “Father, don’t let that ornery person spread gossip about me.” Apparently these kinds of prayers are never going to shape us or strengthen us in anyway but may help us to consider God as a genie in a bottle.
But then the Lord teaches us to pray for people, rather than against them. I began to say, “Lord, bless and encourage my neighbor, and help him to sense Your love.” Then I watched to see what God would do. The Lord’s amazing answers not only helps others but also helps us to cure our own anxiety!
Paul was no “prayer worrier.” He prayed for God’s people that they might know the strength, love, and fullness of God, who is able to do far more than we can ask or even think. Such confidence made Paul a true “prayer warrior.” Are our prayers like that?
Let us turn to Ephesians 3 in our Bibles and check out the prayer Paul prayed for our inner man to be strengthened.
Introduction: Paul asks for spiritual blessings, which are the best blessings. Strength from the Spirit of God in the inner man (a terminology which the Greek understood and used in their daily life); strength in the soul; the strength of faith, to serve God, and to do our duty. If the law of Christ is written in our hearts, and the love of Christ is shed abroad there, then Christ dwells there. Where his Spirit dwells, there he dwells. We should desire that good affections may be fixed in us. And how desirable to have a fixed sense of the love of God in Christ to our souls! How powerfully the apostle speaks of the love of Christ! The breadth shows its extent to all nations and ranks; the length that it continues from everlasting to everlasting; the depth, its saving those who are sunk into the depths of sin and misery; the height, its raising them up to heavenly happiness and glory. Those who receive grace for grace from Christ’s fullness may be said to be filled with the fullness of God. Should not this satisfy man? Must he needs fill himself with a thousand trifles, fancying thereby completing his happiness?
Particularly, Paul desires them not to faint on account of his afflictions in their behalf; declares that he bows his knees in prayer before the great Father of the redeemed family, that God would be pleased to strengthen them, and enlighten them, and give them clear views of the glorious plan.
How can ‘The Inner Man’ be strengthened?
1. Permanence of Christ (vs. 16-17a)
For many of us, this is basic Christianity. Children speak of Christ in their heart - though, we often find this basic idea difficult as well ... how is it that Christ dwells in our heart? This metaphor is strongly related to all suggestions that our lives are connected with Christ. Whether conflict, or success, or failings, our lives have been connected with Christ ... whether Christ "dwells in our hearts" because he is always in our thoughts, and we pray just as we breathe", or if this is something deeper and more mystical ... Paul’s prayer is that we are tied more and more closely with Christ.
When we put our faith in Jesus Christ, it’s as if we invite Him to come and make our hearts His home. But in a very real sense, He is not yet “at home” there until He takes full possession of every area. He takes us on a tour of our hearts, as it were, takes a look at a room that is behind a locked door, and says, “Child, I would like to go into this room. Would you please hand Me the key?” We might be very unwilling to do so. We might be afraid to let Him in that room because of what we keep in it. “No, Lord. I keep that room locked for a reason. There are things in there that it would not be appropriate for You to see. I have some favorite sins and habits I keep in there. I’d rather You not go in there.” For Jesus to dwell in our hearts by faith would require that we give Him the key to that room. It would be as if He says, “Child, your heart is now My home; and I must make Myself at home everywhere - even in this locked room. Give Me the key; and let’s clean out this room of the things that don’t belong in your life, so that I can truly be at home in every area of your heart.”
Later on, He takes us to a closet, sniffs, and says, “Child, there’s something smelly in this closet. Open the door to Me and let Me have a look inside.” And we say, “No, Lord! Not that closet; because that’s where I’ve been keeping the resentment and bitterness that I’ve been holding onto against someone. It’s been in there for years. You can have access to everywhere else; but let’s just leave that closet alone. Believe me; You don’t want to open that closet.” But He says, “Child; if I can’t go into this closet, then I’m not really at home in your heart. Open the door; and let’s go in and clean those awful, putrid things out so I can truly be at home in your heart.”
Later on still, He says, “Let’s go have a look in the basement.” You were afraid He might say that. “Oh, Lord” you say; “Please, no! Let’s not go into the basement. I have some things in my past that I’m deeply afraid of down there - horrible things that I try to forget. It’s dark down there; and those old things are very frightening and very ugly. I’d rather keep them there, under lock and key, so they won’t ever be free to bother me. Let’s just stay on the upper levels where it’s well lit and happy.” But the Lord says, “Child; if I can’t have full access to the basement - and you with Me when I go there - then I’m not really at home in your heart. Take My hand. Let’s go down there, turn on the lights, and conquer those things together.”
And later on still, He says, “I would like to have a look at the attic now.” And once again, you groan. “Oh no, no, no, Lord! A thousand times no! Not up there! That’s where I keep my thought life; and I sure don’t want you to see what goes on up there! That’s where I go to think about things I don’t want You to see!” And, once again, He says, “Child, if I don’t have the attic, then I’m not really at home in your heart. Open the door to Me. Let’s go up the stairs together, and clean out what’s in your mind. Let Me be the Lord of your thought-life; and then I can be truly at home in every area of your heart.”
So then; Paul prays for us that Christ may dwell in our hearts by faith - truly dwell there! He prays that the Lord may gain access to every room in the house; so that He can truly make Himself at home. And you can see now why Paul says that he prays that we would be strengthened by the Holy Spirit in the inner man! We would need all of the strength that the Spirit provides in order for Jesus to make Himself at home in every area of our hearts!
But the more Christ is at home in our hearts, the more His love will permeate His home. That leads us, then, to the next thing that Paul prays for concerning his brothers and sisters in Christ …
2. Foundation of Love (vs. 17b-19a)
This aspect of Paul’s prayer reminds us that every spiritual blessing we enjoy has been a product of love. We are chosen by the Father for eternal glory “in love” (1:4). We have been raised out of death together with Christ “because of His great love with which He loved us” (2:4). Jesus loved the church and gave Himself for her (5:25). “In this is love,” John writes, “not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10). So; our experience of comprehending Christ’s love assumes that we are first rooted and grounded in that love - which, by grace, we are.
Paul also prays that we become rooted in love. In Ephesians, Paul explains how Salvation is among other things the healing of human relationships. Paul prays that God will grant the readers a solid love -to keep their feet steady you may say ... or love solid as the ground under our feet. This standard is stated over and over again from Christ, throughout Church history. Paul prays that we will understand Christ’s love that "surpasses all understanding". With our minds, we can reason that the whole of Christ’s life and death on this earth are a testament of His love. The choice to give his own name and reputation to replace the one we earned for ourselves is a testament of his love. Many people focus on the details of the cross - as the whole of life of Christ seems too much to understand. We focus on salvation from hell, as we cannot comprehend salvation from a life of focusing on ourselves instead of Christ. If Christ roots us in love for one another, and he has killed conflict between men on the cross - this is part of Christ’s love for us. We spend a lifetime understanding this love ... and it is deep enough for a lifetime of epiphanies.
When we consider how vast His love is, in all its dimensions, it’s no wonder that Paul prays that we would comprehend the incomprehensible! Jesus’ love for us is as broad as all of humanity - both Jew and Gentile; because it “preached peace to you who were afar off and to those who were near” (Ephesians 2: 17). It is as long as long as eternity, because it chose to redeem the objects of this love from “before the foundation of the world” (Ephesians 1: 4); and will gather them to Himself “in the dispensation of the fullness of times” (v. 10); and will display them as trophies of His love throughout “the ages to come” (2: 7). It is as deep as the lowest hell, because it reached down to us “who were dead in trespasses and sins” (2: 1); and it is as high as the highest heaven, because it raised us up, and “made us to sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus” (2: 6).
3. Fullness of God (v. 19b)
Paul doesn’t pray that we might be filled full with God. Rather, he prays something remarkable; that we would be filled with all the fullness of God! Paul’s prayer is something that is definitely a continuous process. No matter how much we grow, there is more fullness to fill us. But how can we - little creatures that we are - be filled with all the fullness of Someone that the universe itself could not contain? It can only happen as Jesus Christ makes Himself completely at home in our hearts and causes us to comprehend the fullness of His love for us.
The apostle means what he says, and would be understood in his own meaning. By the fullness of God, we are to understand all those gifts and graces which he has promised to bestow on man, and which he dispenses to the Church. To be filled with all the fullness of God, is to have the whole soul filled with meekness, gentleness, goodness, love, justice, holiness, mercy, and truth ~ the fruit of the Holy Spirit. And as what God fills, neither sin nor Satan can fill; consequently, it implies that the soul shall be emptied of sin, that sin shall neither have dominion over it, nor a being in it. It is impossible for us to understand these words in a lower sense than this. But how much more they imply, (for more they do imply), I cannot tell. As there is no end to the merits of Christ, no bounds to the mercy and love of God, no limits to the improvability of the human soul, so there can be no bounds set to the saving influence which God will dispense to the heart of every believer. We may ask, and we shall receive, and our joy shall be full.
In his letter to the Colossian believers, Paul speaks of Jesus Christ and says, “For it pleased the Father that in Him all the fullness should dwell” (Colossians 1: 19). Later, he writes, “For in Him [that is, in Christ] dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily; and you are complete in Him, who is the head of all principality and power” (Colossians 2: 9-10). To the degree that Jesus occupies every portion of your and my life, to that degree we are filled with all the fullness of God; because all the fullness is found in Him. As Paul elsewhere writes, “Christ is all and in all” (3: 11).
Application (vs. 20 – 21): Now, Paul concludes with, “Unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen.” Now the Authorized Version says “through Christ,” and of course that’s a truth, but really its glory in the church and in Christ Jesus. The Apostle gives proper thanksgiving for this great work.
There is a story I like about Paganini, the great violist. He was playing in a concert, and while he was playing on his violin, one of his strings broke. He kept on playing, another string broke. And he played on, and another string broke. He had one string, but he played nevertheless, and he played beautifully. And of course when he finished, the audience gave him a tremendous applause.
Well God doesn’t have much when he works with us – one string at best. But he’s better than Paganini. And he can produce the music of God in the life of every one of us. And Paul concludes, “Unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus unto”—this is one of the most magnificent expressions that he wrote—“unto all (the generations of the age of the) ages” – no ordinary expression is sufficient – “throughout all the ages (of the ages of the ages)” he’s going to lead his flock from pasture to pasture, from fountain to fountain, to the glory of our great God in heaven. You can see why Ephesians is called Paul’s Grandest Epistle. May God help us to respond to the encouragement that the Apostle gives us.
