We come to the third of our sermons on the Epistle to the Ephesians, and this morning it’s chapter three, verses 14 to 21.
This is one of Paul’s prayers; the second he prays in this epistle for the Ephesian Christians. Here we see his love and his concern for these Christians; he’s worried for them, but as he prays he becomes more confident and bolder. His prayer goes up, as it were, in a series of steps, like a prayer ladder, and the last clause in the prayer, as we come to look at it, we shall see that is’s so bold that it almost staggers belief- what Paul is praying for. It’s a request qhich some commentators have tried to water down, but which in its obvious sense is something mind-blowing!
Paul begins in verse 14 by saying For this reason I kneel before the Father. But, for what reason? I think that to understand the prayer and its meaning, its meaning for us, what we can draw from it, we need to understand the reason for Paul praying thus. Paul is, almost, with his pen, allowing us to read in what he’s praying the Father for the Ephesian Christians. And he begins:
For this reason I kneel before the Father. Some commentators would have us look back to chapter two, but I think that’s misleading. Paul says, For this reason. That surely suggests something which has he’s just written. We need go back no further than verse 13: I ask you therefore not to be discouraged because of my sufferings for you, which are for your glory. Paul is concerned that these Ephesians Christians with whom he spent so much time, so much love, so much care, so much effort, that they might now be dismayed and even deflected from their goal by what Paul is suffering for his faith
Paul was aware, too, that this Ephesians community was going to coem under suffering, going to come under attack. Paul on his third missionary journey had spent three years with the Ephesians. He then travelled on to other places, but on his way back to Jerusalem he stops off in Ephesus. He wants to give some final words of advice to the leaders of the Ephesian communtiy. Just listen to what he says to them, as recorded in Acts chapter 20:
I know that after I leave savage wolves will come in among you and will not spare the flock. Even from you own number men will arise and distort the truth in order to draw away discples to them. So, be on your guard. Remember that for three years I never stopped warning you day and night with tears. Now I commit you to God and to the word of his grace which can build you up into the inheritance among all those who are sanctified.
This is Paul’s reason for this prayer. We shall understand this prayer much more as we bear this in mind.
A little while ago, I liekened this prayer to a ladder, and I drew that thought first and foremost from two commentators: from John Stott and from James Montgomery Boice. I would follow Boice in saying that there are six steps on this ladder, so I would want us to see, briefly, what Paul prays for on each step of the ladder.
1. He prays that believers woule be strengthened through the Holy Spirit. I pray that out of the glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being.
Paul is praying for these Ephesian Christians in face of the suffering they may encounter and their discouragement at his own. It’s because of that that he prays that they may be strengthened through the Holy Spirit; he wants Holy Spirit strength and power to be at work within them. So that they may come triumphantly through this time of trial and testing. And that prayer surely applies to all Christian who have to face times of suffering- that they would be strengthened by the Spirit of God in their lives; strength in the face of suffering, strength also in the face of all kins of circumstances; strength in the face of temptation. We’re all tempted at times, but Paul tells us elsewhere that with every temptation, God provides the way of escape, and it’s through the Holy Spirit in our hearts. The Holy Spirit is the One who warns us, who gives us the grace to turn aside, to flee if need be.
But there can be other things too. Perhaps we are somtimes inclined to go in one direction, to make a certain choice, but we know such a choice would be morally wrong. We need the power of God’s Spirit then, so that w3e don’t just make the easy, attractive choice but the one we know God would have us make. John 16 tells us of the ’paraklete’, the Holy Spirit as the one who draws alongside.
2. Having prayed that the believers would be strengthned by the power of the Spirit, Paul goes on to pray so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith.
There seems, almost, toi be soemthing anomalous in that prayer! It seems like talking about "wet water"! Surely, every believer is indwelt by the Spirit of Christ. In Romans chapter 8 Paul, putting the negative side of the coin, says:
If anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ he does not belong to Christ. Everyone who is born of the Spirit has the Spirit of Christ within them. So, why is Paul praying thus? Surely Paul is praing that their possession by the Spirit will be deepened and strengthened. There are two Greek words which can imply a matter of dwelling. One word means to dwell in a place as a stranger, but the word used here has the sense of residence. Much as we dwell in Newark- we aren’t just visitors; this is our home town. Paul prays that Christ will ever more firmly take up his residence in our hearts. Surely, it’s a Christ takes up that dwelling that we are the more able to face up to times of difficulty and trial and temptation.
3. Having prayed that Christ will take up this dwelling in us, he goes on I pray that you, being rooted and established in love.
Paul wants love to be the foundation of Christian living. There can be so many other forces and motives at work in the life of a Christian; so easy to become self-interested and self-preoccupied. Then love is not paramount. Famously in 1 Corinthians 13 Paul says that without love all he is and does is worthless. That is, of course, put to test especially in the times of trial and tremptation and disappointment.
4. Paul wants that foundation of love, but he goes beyond that. He goes on to ask for something more. So that, with all the saints, you may be able to grasp how wide and long and deep and high is the love of Christ.
First of all, this grasping of the love of Christ is something done with all other Christian people. It’s only there, it’s only with other Christians that we can fully know the love of Christ. A Christian in isolation, suffers some impoverishment is his or her life. They don’t know that community of love. That is where we learn the measure of the love of Christ. We learn it as we go theough times of trial and difficulty.
How much can be press the spatial analogies? I think we can go along with John Stott: "The love of Christ is broad, broad enough to encompass all manking; long, long enough to last through all eternity; deep, deep enough to get right down to the depths, the depths where the most degraded sinner has fallen; and high enough to exalt us to heaven." James Boice quotes an anonymous hymn-writer:
Could we with ink the oceans fill;
were the skies of parchment;
were every stalk on earth a quill;
and every man a scribe by trade.
to write the love of God above,
would drain the oceans dry.
For could the scroll contain the whole,
though stretched from sky to sky.
I think that as Paul advances into the last stages of this prayer, Paul almost assumes all he has already prayed, and know the power of God in their lives to sustain them.
5. So he goes on to pray so that you may know this love which surpasses knowledge. It’s a love that, were we to know all about it that would not suffice. Knowing about the love of Christ is only scratching the surface. It’s knowing and experiencing the love of Christ. That is what is filling Paul’s vision now. That their experience may be filled with the knowledge of Christ, and the knowledge and experience of his love. That, like all else comes only through the power of God’s Spirit. How we need the power of the Spirit! How futile is all else, if we close ourselves off and try to manage all ourselves! Without, we can have no experiential knowledge of the love of Christ.
6. It’s from this point that Paul launches out into that final and extravagant prayer claim. He asks that you may be filled to the measure of all the fulness of God.
Can Paul really mean that? Many commentators hedge in what Paul appears to say with all sorts of caveats. Overwhelming as it seems, Paul is praying that we and all other Christians may be filled up to all the fulness that is in God himself. The fulness of God is, of course, something infinite. In that sense, we can’t be filled, and yet, Paul seems to be praying that we will be filled with it!; filled with that infinite fulness of God. Paul prays that we will go on being filled and filled and filled and filled...! That God’s infinite resources would fill us. Come what may we will be triumphant.
As Paul says in Romans 8:37 we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. and then on in verses 38 and 39 that nothing in all creation can separate us from the love of God which is ours in Christ Jesus. There’s the prayer our Lord Jesus Christ prayed and is recorded in John chapter 17. At the very end our Lord prays:
I have nade you known to them that the love that you have for me may be in them.
That we would have the same love for Jesus as the Father has.
Extraorinary prayers. Incredible prayers. Prayers we hardly dare to name. But dare we name less than that we would be filled with all the fulness of God himself.
