PRAYER FOR THE EPHESIANS
One day a young man found a genie-in-a-bottle. This young adult is walking down the beach and comes across an old Arabic looking lamp. He rubs it and out pops a genie. The genie says, "Thank you for freeing me from the lamp. In return I will grant you three wishes." The man says, "Great! I always dreamed of this and I know exactly what I want. First, I want one billion dollars in a Swiss bank account." Poof! There is a flash of light and a piece of paper with account numbers appears in his hand. He continues, "Next, I want a brand new red Ferrari right here." Poof! There is a flash of light and a bright red brand-new Ferrari appears right next to him. He continues, "Finally, I want to be irresistible to women." Poof! There is a flash of light and he is turned into a box of chocolates.
What is the moral of the story? We need to be careful about what we wish for! We also need to be careful for what we pray for. Today we are continuing in our series on prayer and I want us to take a look at a prayer that Paul prayed for the Ephesians.
Ephesians chapter 3 is a wonderful chapter. After taking the first two chapters to describe who we are in Christ, Paul begins by saying “For this reason I, Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus for the sake of you Gentiles …” and you can see him stop and then go off on a tangent. He talks about his own calling, his mission to preach Christ to the Gentiles. He talks about the fact that even though he is called to such a great task he is writing from prison. To encourage the church not to loose heart he prays this prayer;
Eph 3:14 For this reason I kneel before the Father, 15 from whom his whole family in heaven and on earth derives its name. 16 I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, 17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, 18 may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, 19 and to know this love that surpasses knowledge--that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. 20 Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, 21 to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.
Paul prayed that the Ephesians would have power. The word power is the Greek word DUNAMIS which means you CAN or are able to do something. Paul is praying here that the Ephesians would have the power or ability to do 3 things:
1. Power to Dwell (vs. 17) – make room for what He has revealed to you
Paul prays that the Ephesians would have power so that, through faith, they would have the ability to make room in their hearts for Christ. The word dwell means "to make a dwelling place."
On one level, Christ comes to dwell in our hearts when we receive Him by faith. However, Paul is writing here to the church in Ephesus - to Christians. As Christians, are we making room in our hearts for God? Not just receiving Him as savior, but making Jesus Lord of our lives? In this sense, the issue is not IF Christ lives in you, but how COMFORTABLE is He in our hearts. Is Jesus Lord of your life? Have you confined Him to a single room or given him freedom within your heart?
Inviting a person to stay in your house overnight is different than adopting a family member. Jesus is not a houseguest but the head of your household. You can clean your house to "entertain" guests but you can't do that with family.
Robert Boyd Munger in his very interesting booklet, My Heart- Christ’s Home. He says about this verse, “Without question one of the most remarkable Christian doctrines is that Jesus Christ himself through the Holy Spirit will actually enter a heart, settle down and be at home there. Christ will live in any human heart that welcomes him.”
This booklet pictures the Christian life as a house, through which Jesus goes from room to room. In the library, which is the mind, Jesus finds trash and all sorts of worthless things, and proceeds to throw out and replace w/ His Word. In the dining room of appetite He finds many sinful desires listed on a worldly menu. But in the place of such things as prestige, materialism, and lust He puts humility, meekness, love, and all the other virtues for which believers are to hunger and thirst. He goes through the living room of fellowship, where He finds many worldly companions and activities, through the workshop, where only toys are being made, into the closet, where hidden sins are kept, and so on through the entire house. Only when He has cleaned every room and closet within us can He truly settle down and be at home.
Joseph Bau was born on June 18, 1920, in Krakow, Poland. He became a young man just in time to experience the German invasion of Poland. He was one of three boys in a prosperous middle-class family that lived in one of the wealthiest neighborhoods. Joseph had always been good at art, and at the age of 18, he enrolled in the University of Arts at Krakow. But the war interrupted his studies. His family was forced to move to the Jewish Ghetto, and then later to the Plaschow concentration camp. Because of Joseph’s partial education in Art before the war, and because of his talent for Gothic lettering, the Nazis employed him in producing maps and signs for the camp. Joseph’s job also enabled him to save more than 400 Jews by forging false documents and identity papers that secured their release from the camp. Joseph Bau would have been killed in the concentration camps had it not been for Oskar Shindler. At the end of the movie Shindler’s List it is Bau himself who places the stone on the grave. When asked after the war, why he did not forge documents for himself, he replied, “Then who would have done it for the other Jews?”
When Jesus was hanging on the cross, we hear a similar question, “He saved others; He cannot save himself?” And Jesus answers, “What shall I say, ‘Father, save me from this hour’? No, it was for this very reason I came to this hour.” Jesus went to the cross for us. He was obedient to the point of death. He gave up everything for us. We must be willing to do the same, to lay down everything for Him.
I pray that you would have the power that Christ may truly dwell in your hearts through faith. Not just that He would be savior in your life but that He would be Lord.
2. Power to Grasp (vs. 18) – understand that He has rescued you
Paul’s second prayer is that the Ephesians would have a clear understanding of the sacrificial love of God. The word grasp is KATALAMBANO and comes from the Greek word meaning “to take”. Paul is praying that we would be able to see the dimensions of God’s love and TAKE it to be our own. E.g. taking out a stump in the back yard. What seems easy grows quickly! Only in God’s power are we able to truly comprehend the greatness of God's love for us because the love of God is infinite. How big is God's love for us? To understand that you have to understand the price that Jesus was willing to pay for your sin.
John 3:16 "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
John 15:13 Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.
You may never have realized how much you need a savior but you do. If you didn’t need a savior, Jesus wouldn’t have come to earth and died on the cross for you. Remember when the angels at Christmas came and announced Jesus’ birth and they said, “Rejoice! A Savior has been born to you in Bethlehem.” You needed somebody to rescue you. E.g. wearing seatbelts – the kids may now think they need them but you love them enough to keep them safe.
Jesus often told stores to teach truths about God. One time He did something very unusual. He told three stories in a row with the exact same point. In rapid fire He told the same story in three different ways. It’s in Luke 15.
The first one is the story of the lost sheep. He left the 99 saved to go after just one. He searched high and low and up and down and finally he finds the lost sheep and brings him back safely home and throws a party.
The second is the lost coin. She loses one of the ten coins and so she searches high and low for this coin, turns her house upside down. Finally she finds the lost coin and is so excited about it that she calls her neighbors, brings them all over and throws a party.
The third is the story of the prodigal son. The son runs away but then comes home and, when his father sees him a far way off he runs out to meet him. He hugs him and kisses him on the cheeks and says “We’re going to kill the best calf and we’re going to have a party.” What was Jesus trying to teach in these three stories in a row? The common denominator is that in each story something valuable was lost. The sheep really mattered to the shepherd. And the coin really mattered to that woman. And obviously, the son really mattered to the father. The point is that you matter to God. In each of these three stories there was no rest until that which was lost was rescued.
God’s love is LONG. It is long enough to last forever. That’s what makes it different from human love. Have you noticed human love wears out? That’s why we have so many divorces. God’s love will never stop loving you. It is long enough to last forever.
God’s love is WIDE. Wide enough to be everywhere. There is no place that you could go in life that God’s love is not with you. You will not always feel it. In fact, sometimes you’re going to FEEL ALONE. But you will never BE ALONE. That is because God’s love is everywhere. There’s no place that you can be where God isn’t. It’s wide enough to be everywhere.
God’s love is DEEP. Deep enough to handle everything. There is no problem, no pressure, no stress, no difficulty. You say, “I’m in the pits right now!” There is no pit so deep that God’s love is not deeper still.
God’s love is HIGH. High enough to overlook all your mistakes, no matter how big that mistake may have been. God loves to forgive. He loves to help you start over.
Robert Shannon tells us about a man in Dayton, Ohio, who found a unique way to propose to his girlfriend. He hired an airplane to fly over the city towing a banner that read, "Judy, I love you. Will you marry me?" Judy accepted his proposal by asking, "How can you say no to love like that?" When we look at God’s love for us, especially as it is expressed in Christ and his cross and ask, "How can you say no to a love like that?"
In Christ We Have:
A love that can never be fathomed
A life that can never die
A righteousness that can never be tarnished
A peace that can never be understood
A rest that can never be disturbed
A joy that can never be diminished
A hope that can never be disappointed
A glory that can never be clouded
A light that can never be darkened
A purity that can never be defiled
A beauty that can never be marred
A wisdom that can never be baffled
Resources that can never be exhausted.
Robert Lavelle says it well: “No one can be apathetic in the face of God’s love -- it is the most powerful force there is.”
More sky than man can see, more seas than he can sail.
More sun than he can bear to watch, more stars than he can scale.
More breath than he can breathe, more yield than he can sow.
More grace than he can comprehend, more love than he can know. -- Ralph W. Seager
3. Power to Know (vs. 19) – experience the relationship He wants with you
Paul’s third prayer is for not only an understanding but a true experiencing of God’s love in the lives of the Ephesians. The love of God surpasses knowledge which means it is not just about understanding (mentally) but taking and experiencing. To know is the Greek word GINOSKO which means more than intellectual agreement. It is the same term used of a husband’s understanding of a wife. E.g. to know your wife before and after your wedding day.
God loves you so much that He wants to have a relationship with you. You’re on this earth not to make money, retire and die. You were put on this earth because God made you to love you. You were created as an object of God’s love, put here to have a relationship with Him.
One of the things that made the religious leaders of Jesus’ day so ticked off at Him because He taught that we could refer to God in intimate, loving, personal terms. We could say, “Our Father in heaven,” not, “O thou almighty greatest potentate.” If your kids came home to you and said, “O thou almighty great procreator of our family,” you’d think… huh? Jesus said you can talk to God and say, “Our Father.” In Aramaic it’s ABBA which literally means “daddy”. We can call God daddy. We can call Him friend. You can have a personal warm intimate loving relationship with the creator who made you.
Maybe you are thinking to yourself, "I'm a Hindu or a Muslim". It is not about religion it is about having a personal relationship with God. You may think that you are the number one atheist in the world. God still wants to have a relationship with you.
You may think you have committed the unpardonable sin, beyond redemption. God wants to have a relationship with you. You may have done something you’re so ashamed of and regret, but God wants to have a relationship with you. You may have committed adultery. You may have had an abortion. You may have stolen to support a drug habit. You may have gotten involved in homosexuality. God still wants to have a relationship with you.
There is nothing you can do that will make Him love you any less. Nothing you can do that will make Him love you any more. His love is based on who He is not what you’ve done. You may feel unworthy. You may feel it’s hopeless. You may feel you’re too old, too young. But God wants to have a relationship with you.
Do you know that Jesus loves you? Have you truly experienced that love. Often the world may think that the church is all about rules and regulations, but that is not it at all. The heart of the Gospel is the truth that God loves you and longs that you would experience His love.
An atheist lived in a certain village. He was not a terrible person, he just had no interest in going to the boring, traditional church that was the only one in the village. One day the church building caught on fire, and the whole town ran toward it to help extinguish the flames, including the village atheist. Someone called out: “hey, this is something new for you, it is the first time we’ve ever seen you running to the church!” He replied, “It's the first time I have ever run to the church because it is the first time I’ve ever seen the church on fire!”
Jesus said that the world would know that we are Christians by our love. In order to communicate God’s love to others you have to first know it yourself. My prayer for you this morning is that Christ would dwell in your hearts through faith, that Jesus would truly be Lord of your life. I pray that you would not only understand or grasp God’s love but that you would know that love in a powerful and personal way.
