"Jesus Changes Our Strength (Ephesians 3:14-21)", Will DuVal | 10/6/24
Ephesians 3:14-21 | 10/6/24 | Will DuVal
Start with a question: What area of your life requires the most STRENGTH of you?
For ME, THIS - right here - PREACHING, is UP there on the list! And not just because of the public speaking - for 75% of people, it’s their #1 fear. But it’s not just that; it’s the WEIGHT of it. Preaching isn’t JUST “public speaking”; it is publicly speaking on behalf of GOD! I’m supposed to be the “mouthpiece of God” up here, week in and week out. That is a WEIGHTY responsibility. Preaching requires a strength that I don’t POSSESS, on my own.
How about YOU: What requires the most STRENGTH of you?
Maybe it’s a physical strength → Training for that marathon… Opening that pickle jar (takes strength!).
Maybe it’s more psychological → You battle an addiction that requires immense STRENGTH and WILL-power… or you suffer from crippling insecurity, and battle your own negative self-talk?
Maybe the strength you need is of the emotional variety → To LOVE your really difficult, really strong-WILLED child? To love your IN-LAWS? To forgive your OWN parents? Or your spouse…
It’s hard to compare, isn’t it, the POWER that each of those things requires. But according to God’s word, the single greatest test of our strength is SPIRITUAL, and the results are in: and we have ALL FAILED the test. You and I do NOT possess the strength, in and of ourselves, for this all-important task. God declares unequivocally: “you need MY help, my STRENGTH, for this one.” (“And oh by the way, it is ALSO the thing I desire most desperately FOR you”, God says!)
Even more than the strength to forgive others, forgive yourself…
Even more than the strength to LOVE others…
God’s GREATEST desire for you and me, is that we would have the strength to… WHAT? Anyone know? Do your HOMEWORK and read ahead before you came?
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Let’s see, and read it together now…
Would you STAND… Ephesians 3:14-21. Hear the word…
“For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, 15 from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, 16 that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, 17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, 18 may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, 19 and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.
20 Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, 21 to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.”
[This is the word of the Lord… Seated…]
So did you CATCH it? What is Paul’s deepest prayer for the church in Ephesus and for US (did you notice Paul is KNEELING here before God; that was NOT the typical prayer posture for a 1st c Jew. In 21st c children’s ministry, it’s “heads bowed, eyes closed, hands folded”. But in 1st c. Judaism, prayer was MOSTLY done STANDING, often with head and arms extended UPWARD to God. Yet here, Paul is “bowing [his] knees” before God; this posture was reserved for most INTENSE prayers; Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane… or Paul’s farewell prayer with the Ephesian elders in Acts 20…).
This is Paul’s DEEPEST prayer and even more importantly, it is God’s deepest desire for us: That God would give us the strength “To COMPREHEND (v18)… to KNOW (v19)… how broad and long and high and deep is…” What?
“The LOVE OF CHRIST” for YOU.
Church: that is game, set and MATCH. God’s deepest desire… every PASTOR’S prayer… every PARENT’S; I pray a LOT of different things for my kids. But the one prayer I pray EVERY night, for each ONE of them, is that they would know how much God LOVES them, as PROVEN in the person and work and GIFT of his Son JESUS for them. Because I know, like PAUL here knows, that if my kids have THAT - the knowledge of the LOVE of their heavenly FATHER, for them, in Christ Jesus - then I can be confident that everything else in their life is gonna fall into place.
When I let them down, as a parent; they’ll know: “It’s alright; I’ve got a HEAVENLY father who loves me perfectly and who NEVER lets me down.”
When HARDSHIP comes their way; they’ll know: “It’s alright; God is working all this together for my good because He LOVES me… He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for [me], how will he not also with him graciously give [me] all things?” (Rom 8:28,32) EVERYTHING I need; “My God will supply every need… according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus.” (Ph 4:19) Because he LOVES me.
Even when they don’t FEEL his love; they’ll KNOW: “God showed (he PROVED) his love for [me] in THIS: that while [I was] yet a sinner, Christ died for [me]” (Rom 5:8). That is a FACT that transcends my temporal feelings: that Jesus DIED to make me his own. “See what kind of love the Father has given to [me], that [I] should be called [a child] of God!” (1 Jn3:1)
And when we KNOW God’s love for us - not just cognitively but experientially; not the way I know “1+1=2”, but more like the way I know that Ellery, Elijah and Bo are MINE; I don’t need a birth certificate to KNOW that; my love for them is written in every cell, every fiber of my BEING - and Church: when GOD’S love for us becomes that INGRAINED in us, when we KNOW, all the way down to the very CORE of our BEINGS that NOTHING, “neither death nor life, nor angels nor demons, nor things present nor things to come… not height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, [is] able to separate us from the love of God [for us] in Christ Jesus our Lord,” when we KNOW it, THEN we are SECURE. Safe. Joyful. Content, come what may.
That is Paul’s prayer for HIS church, my prayer for THIS church, and God’s will for EVERY church, every believer.
I’ve outlined this passage, as you see, in 6 bullet points; I think if I had to do it over, I’d simplify it to just THREE:
The GIVER of strength
The GIFT of strength
And the GOAL of strength.
OR:
Who is this power FROM?
What does this power DO?
And what is this power FOR?
We BEGIN with…
#1) The GIVER of our strength: the FATHER. (vv14-16a)
Now, Paul actually OPENS in v14 with the phrase “For this reason” again. Which does TWO things:
First of all, it takes us back to verse ONE, where Paul opened ch3 with that exact same phrase - “For this reason”. But you may recall that as soon as Paul mentioned his imprisonment for the sake of Christ, he felt it necessary to REMIND them in vv2-13, which was really just one long parenthetical last week for Paul to explain that his imprisonment is TOTALLY worth it, because his stewardship of the GOSPEL is just too important - Paul is willing to DIE if necessary , for the sake of Christ and his worldwide mission.
But Paul picks up his train of thought again now in v14, with this phrase “For this reason” which ALSO points us back even FURTHER- why did he open v1 that way in the FIRST place. What IS the train of thought he is now CONTINUING here?
Think back with me TWO Sundays ago to ch2: “you were dead in your sins… separated from Christ… having no hope and without God… But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ… God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us… made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved”.
Now, Paul says, “BECAUSE of what God has done for us in Christ Jesus, here’s what I AM doing in response…”
We could really outline the entire book of Ephesians in this way:
*chs1 & 2: What GOD has done for us in Christ
*ch3: How PAUL responds to what God has done for us
*chs4-6: How Paul calls US to respond to what God’s done
So we’re still in ch3 now: PAUL’s response. And how DOES he respond? Last week he responded to the gospel by giving his LIFE to its service and ministry, the stewardship of God’s grace.
And NOW, in vv14-21, Paul responds with what?
PRAYER. This passage is a PRAYER, from Paul for the Ephesians, and for US. And the prayer really boils down to this: “I’ve spent 2 chapters trying to explain how UNBELIEVABLY AMAZING this good news of the gospel is,” but Paul knows, “I have absolutely no power to cause you to RECEIVE it… BELIEVE it… REMEMBER it… recenter and “ROOT” your entire LIFE in it…
But I know the One who DOES have that power!” “So,” Paul says, “I’m PAUSING on the PREACHING for a moment to PRAY. To ask God to do what only HE can do, and cause this gospel seed - the good news of Christ’s love for you - to sprout and take root and EXPLODE in your hearts.” That’s his prayer here.
And it’s a prayer - like EVERY good, biblical, Trinitarian prayer - it’s a prayer TO God the Father, THROUGH Christ the Son, BY the power of the Holy Spirit. That’s gonna be points 1-3; really could’ve combined them, as I said, cuz there’s just 1 God, in 3 persons. But let’s parse it out:
For starters, Paul prays TO God the Father, because He alone is the GIVER of the strength we need, that Paul’s praying for.
“I bow my knees before the Father.”
The Bible says God is the “giver of EVERY good and perfect gift”, INCLUDING, Paul points out, the gift of “every family in heaven and on earth”. God’s powerful enough to CREATE us, Paul says, the giver of all LIFE; so I know he’s got the power for THIS job too.
“May He grant you to be strengthened with power”... in what MEASURE? What PROPORTION?
V16: “according to the riches of his glory”. Warren Wiersbe notes (NT Commentary, 603): “How marvelous that God does not give the Spirit’s power to us ‘OUT OF his riches,” but rather “ACCORDING TO” - which is a far greater thing. If I am a billionaire and I give you ten dollars, I have given you OUT OF my riches; but if I give you a MILLION dollars, I have given to you ACCORDING TO (in keeping with) my riches. The first is a PORTION; the second is a PRO-portion.”
Paul says, “I don’t want you to have a LITTLE strength; I want God to MAKE IT RAIN on you “ACCORDING to” the immeasurable RICHES of his GLORIOUS power!”
How much power does God HAVE? From which to GIVE?
Well, “he upholds the [entire] universe by the [mere] word of his power,” Hebrews 1:3 tells us.
According to Romans 1:20 he’s got “ETERNAL power”...
Jesus declared, “with God all things are possible.”” (Mt 19:26)
Jeremiah 32:27 “Behold, I am the Lord, the God of all flesh. Is anything too hard for me?”
In other words, to quote the 20th c. theologians and Eurodance sensation “Snap!”: “I got the power!”
“You better BELIEVE I got the power”, God says; “so go ahead and ASK me for it. “You have not because you ASK not” (Jas 4:2).
“I LOVE giving good gifts to my kids,” God says, “and the very best gift of ALL is the knowledge - the deep, personal, INTIMATE knowledge of my love for YOU - I WANT that for you, every moment of every minute of every DAY; now do YOU want it? Are you ASKING me for it?”
Paul says, “I’m asking God for it on your BEHALF: may God grant you to be strengthened with power”.
He will END this letter with an almost IDENTICAL prayer in ch6: “be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might.” (6:10)
And how DOES God strengthen us? What is the MEANS by which this gift of his power COMES to us?
#2- The MEANS of our strength is the (Holy) SPIRIT. (v16b)
God “strengthens [us, v16] with power through… his Spirit in your inner being”.
If God the Father is the generator, the power plant, then God the Holy SPIRIT is the CURRENT, the electricity, the transferred manifestation of God’s power now at work, within US.
In our INNER being. Some of the most spiritually powerful people I know, in their INNER beings, they are often the most physically, materially weak people, in their “OUTER” beings. There is often an inverse relationship between the two, sort of like how blind people usually have the strongest sense of HEARING and smell - this is PART of the reason, by the way, that we FAST, from food; as we become physically weaker, we are FORCED to rely more and more on GOD for our strength, and we grow spiritually stronger.
Jesus said, “Man lives NOT by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.”Paul says elsewhere, “We do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day.” (2 Cor 4:16)
And the SOURCE of that inner, spiritual renewal and POWER is the Holy SPIRIT.
Acts 1:8 “you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you”.
1 Thess 1:5 “our gospel came to you… in power and in the Holy Spirit”.
2 Tim 1:7 “God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power… AND love” (and as we’ll see, the two are really synonymous, because Christ’s love IS our strength).
So God offers us spiritual power, in our inner beings, through HIS Spirit… for what PURPOSE?
Well, for LOTS of purposes!
*For EVANGELISM: “you’ll receive power from the Holy Spirit… and you will be my witnesses” (Ac 1:8)
*For DIRECTION: “[My Spirit] will guide you into all the truth” (Jn 16:13)
*For SERVING: He gives us spiritual gifts to build and bless the church (1 Cor 12:6-7)
*For HOLINESS: As far back as the OT, God promised in EZEKIEL a coming day when “I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and… obey my rules.” (Ezek 36:27)
SO many important dimensions of the Spirit’s power at work within us…
But perhaps the MOST important, and Paul’s prayer specifically here in Ephesians 3, is that we would receive power for the purpose of knowing Christ’s LOVE for us, as we’ll see in just a moment.
But first… we need strength FROM God the Father (the power plant)… THROUGH His Spirit at work in our inner being (the electrical current)… But how does God’s Spirit get “installed” in our hearts in the first place?
It is only “IN” Christ JESUS. ACCESS to God’s power is only available to those who are IN Christ.
#3) The SOURCE of our strength is the SON. (v17)
And if you have your Bibles, and a PEN handy - I don’t often do this, but I’m gonna encourage you to actually cross out the words “SO THAT” at the beginning of v17, if you’re using the same ESV translation as me. The word for “so that” - hina - does not appear in the Greek in v17, and it’s misleading to add it in.
For one thing, it makes it sound like Christ dwelling in our hearts is a CONSEQUENCE of God’s Spirit empowering us. “I pray you’ll be strengthened with power through his Spirit… SO THAT Christ might dwell with you.” – NO! That is NOT what Paul’s saying here!
He uses two parallel aorist infinitive verbs of purpose to say: “I’m praying TWO things for you: 1) to be STRENGTHENED in your SOULS by the SPIRIT… and 2) to be INDWELT in your HEARTS by the CHRIST.
Neither is subordinate to or derivative from the other.
In fact, if Paul was gonna put EITHER of them first, theologically - he puts “the Spirit’s strengthening” first grammatically only because he wants to EXPOUND on the AWESOMENESS of Christ’s indwelling; that’s why he lists it second here - but THEOLOGICALLY, we know you don’t get access TO that power from the Spirit UNTIL you’ve got Christ dwelling in your heart through FAITH.
To continue the illustration I’ve been using, GOD is the power plant, and his SPIRIT is the power… but what are we still MISSING? How does all that power make its way FROM the plant INTO my home, my “inner being”?
You need… power LINES! (And transformers… and substations… I THINK; I don’t really know anything about electrical power; I’m sure all of you electrical engineers are shaking your heads, and you’ll set me straight after the sermon… One sermon, a few months ago, I tried elaborating on Paul’s metaphor of the Christian faith being like a BUILDING… built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets… Christ is the cornerstone… the church is a pillar and buttress of the truth… I tried expanding the metaphor to explain what doctrines and elders and deacons are like, and after the sermon, Andrew Campbell - civil engineer - came up to me, and said, “...You really don’t know ANYTHING about construction, do you?”
I know Andy Scott’s wondering the same thing this morning about ELECTRICITY, and the answer is NO. I know NOTHING. But it’s never stopped me before, so…
You got the POWER PLANT (God the Father)… sending out the POWER (Holy Spirit)… but you still need some kind of power infrastructure to actually CONNECT me - my home - TO the source of that power.
Remember what Paul said about our spiritual condition back in chapter 2: “You were once CUT off… SEPARATED from Christ and therefore “without God in the world” – the POWER LINES were down. But Paul went on: “But now through Christ, you have gained ACCESS to God the Father”.
That’s why Jesus said, in John 15 - and I know the metaphor HE was using there was more agricultural, but it still works: “ABIDE in me”. “I am the vine, my Father is the vinedresser” / “I’m the power line, my Father is the generator”. “As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me” / “As the HOME cannot produce or enjoy POWER by itself, unless it abides in, remains connected to the POWER LINES, neither can YOU…”.
Now ALL of this should have us asking an important question, though: “Why would Paul be praying for Christ to dwell in these people’s hearts through faith… if they’re already BELIEVERS?! Remember, he’s writing this letter (ch1, v1) to the “SAINTS” in Ephesus. Don’t they already HAVE Christ dwelling in their hearts through faith?
Here’s how Warren Wiersbe explains it (603): “The verb ‘dwell’ here literally means ‘to settle down and feel at home’. Certainly Christ was already resident in the hearts of the Ephesians… What Paul was praying for was… for Christ to settle down and feel at home in their hearts - not a surface relationship, but an ever-deepening fellowship.”
See, there are TWO related verbs in the Greek - to paroikeo means “to VISIT”. My mom and sister are in town for the weekend. They are paroikeo-ing with us. That’s NOT the verb Paul uses here. He uses
KAT-oikeo - to DWELL, to put down ROOTS. Ellery, Elijah, Bo… they KAT-oikeo in our home.
This text confronts us with a QUESTION this morning: which of those verbs better describes Christ’s presence in YOUR life? If you’re honest, do you treat him more like a GUEST? Perhaps you don’t WANT him to get too comfortable, cuz he might start rearranging the furniture… peeking in your junk drawers and those closets where you tried stuffing all your MESS when you first invited him into your life.
Here’s the thing: there is NO house so messy that Christ refuses to come in. But friends: there is ALSO no house so PUT TOGETHER that Christ is willing to LEAVE it just the way he FOUND it. Did you GET that?
Some of you have kept Christ at bay for too long now because you’re CONVINCED that the MINUTE you opened the door, he’s gonna see your mess before he even steps foot in the FOYER, and he’ll RUN for it - “SORRY! Wrong house!” But you’re wrong - those are EXACTLY the kinds of homes Jesus LOVES to come in and fix; he is ONLY interested in “fixer uppers”. “I came not for the righteous but for SINNERS,” he said! “The healthy don’t NEED the doctor…”
Houses in perfect condition don’t NEED Chip and Joanna Gaines! They’re in the “fixer upper” game.
And frankly, I suspect far MORE of you here - we may have one or two who are afraid that their mess will scare Jesus away - but I suspect there are MORE of you who wouldn’t dare admit it out loud, but you aren’t really sure why Jesus is still hanging around, with his toolbelt on. Like, “Ya know, I invited him in, when I was 6, and I know he forgave me for that one time I lied to my Mom about sneaking the extra cookie from the pantry, but I mean… look AROUND, Jesus. Place looks pretty good to ME…”
Which probably just means that YOUR mess is just hidden even DEEPER. Mold in the drywall, CRACKS in the FOUNDATION - you willing to let Jesus get his JACKHAMMER out? Do some demolition?
Cuz He WILL, if you let him make himself AT HOME - katoikeo. Set up PERMANENT shop, in your heart. If you DO, here’s what he promises to do for you; v17b now: to the extent that Christ DWELLS, puts down ROOTS, makes himself AT HOME in your heart, he promises that you TOO, in turn, will “be rooted and grounded in love”. “Abide in me and I WILL abide in YOU,” he says.
Allow ME to be rooted in YOUR heart, and then YOU will be rooted in my LOVE! And Paul purposely MIXES the agricultural and construction metaphors here: be ROOTED, like a sturdy tree; be GROUNDED, or “founded” - it’s the Greek word for “laying a foundation”; Jesus told a parable once about a foolish man who laid his foundation in SAND - the shifting, swirling, sinking SAND of the world; that’s ALL this world has to offer you, as foundation: SAND. Jesus said, “Why would you wanna build there? When I am the ROCK. The WISE lay their foundation in ME” (Mt 7:24-27).
So if you prefer the SIMPLIFIED, 3-point outline, that was really all point 1: the GIVER of strength. Spiritual power comes FROM God, THROUGH the Spirit, IN Christ.
Now we’re ready for point #2 (or 4):
#4) The OBJECT of our strength. And the OBJECT, the AIM, the INTENDED TARGET of our strength is: the LOVE OF CHRIST. (vv18-19)
Paul is praying that we’d have the strength… the power… for WHAT? “to comprehend - to KNOW (and remember, that word “know” is INTIMATE, personal in the Bible; “Adam KNEW his wife Eve, and she conceived…”; Paul prays that we might KNOW - with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth… [of] the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God”. SO much we could say about those 2 glorious verses, but for the sake of time, I’ll limit myself to FOUR COMMENTS:
FIRST, we might once again ask, “Well, don’t we, as believers, ALREADY “know… the love of Christ”? Isn’t that what it MEANS to be a believer - we believe the gospel good news of God’s love for us in Christ Jesus. That God SO loved the world, that he gave his only Son to DIE that I might have life.”
Paul says, “Yeahhh, but you don’t REALLY know. If you REALLY knew, if you really GRASPED his love for you - that’s what the word translated “comprehend” here means: “to SEIZE, to CAPTURE”, it’s almost VIOLENT imagery; it’s used elsewhere in the Bible to describe the PLUNDERING of villages after battle - Paul says, I want you to TAKE HOLD of God’s love for you in Christ. And I want IT to take hold of YOU!
Tim Keller (“Ephesians 3:14-21” sermon) used this illustration; he says: Imagine you discovered that you had received a vast inheritance. And years later you fall on hard times, but you’re still living like a POOR person. Paul’s saying: that is so OFTEN the situation we find ourselves in SPIRITUALLY. Remember, ch1: God has “blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places” (Eph 1:3). Here’s the way Paul puts it in 1 Corinthians 3, he says EVERYTHING belongs to God. But “you are Christ's, and Christ is God's… [therefore] all things are yours”!! (3:21-23)
If we’re God’s adopted CHILDREN, then we’re HEIRS; we stand to inherit it ALL.
And YET, Church, do you know that of all our blessings - a whole UNIVERSE worth of spiritual RICHES - by far the RICHEST of them ALL is the love of CHRIST for us.
GRAB it. SEIZE it. CHERISH it. MEDITATE on it, day and night. Let it TRANSFIX and TRANSFORM you, day by day, from one degree of glory to another.
Second note, and related: Paul offers us these “four magnitudes” now in v18 - “the breadth and length and height and depth” - to try and put into words his prayer and PLEA that we “go DEEPER into Christ”; “I know you’re planted, but be ROOTED! I know you “know his love”, but I want you to “CAPTURE and to BE captured by his love”!”
I like how Kent Hughes (Ephesians, 115) exposits these four magnitudes; he observes that Christ’s love is “1) A love WIDE enough to embrace the world (Jn 3:16). 2) A love that is LONG enough to last forever (1 Cor 13:8). As Spurgeon said, “It is so long that your old age cannot wear it out, so long your continual tribulation cannot exhaust it, your successive temptations shall not drain it dry; like eternity itself it knows no bounds.” 3) [Christ’s is] A love that is HIGH enough to take sinners [all the way up] to Heaven (1 Jn 3:1,2). 4) And it is A love that is DEEP enough to take Christ to the very depths to reach the lowest sinner (Ph 2:8). In OTHER words, Hughes summarizes, these Four Magnitudes - the breadth, length, height, and depth - describe an INFINITE, incomprehensible love.”
Which brings us to the THIRD observation to make about Paul’s prayer that we “know Christ’s love”: the PARADOX.
Some of you probably caught it and CHUCKLED, as we were reading the passage earlier: may you “know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge”.
May you COUNT your spiritual blessings that are WITHOUT number, in Christ. May you SEARCH Christ’s UNSEARCHABLE RICHES (v8 said last week). May you MEASURE God’s grace toward you in Christ that Paul described in ch2, v7 as “IMMEASURABLE” grace.
And now: may you KNOW Christ’s UNKNOWABLE love for you.
But here’s the thing: you do your best, with God’s POWER, to know Christ’s unknowable love for you, and far from feeling FRUSTRATED or DEFEATED - Rajveer Meena holds the Guinness World Record for memorizing 70,000 digits of pi. But PI is an INFINITE number that “SURPASSES KNOWLEDGE”; to date, the MOST of it we know is 105 TRILLION digits, thanks to a super computer and a bunch of nerds with nothing better to do; seriously - can you imagine memorizing 70,000 digits of a number… or developing a program to calculate 105 TRILLION digits… and realizing you’re really no closer to the END, to actually KNOWING “pi”, because it’s infinite. What a GIANT waste of time.
But friends: knowing Christ’s “surpassing all knowledge” love for you isn’t like that at ALL! With every new “DIGIT” you DISCOVER, you unlock a whole new appreciation for just how INCREDIBLE - literally un-thinkable - his love is. “Wait a minute, Jesus; I thought I was getting CLOSE to understanding it, to exhausting your love for me with that last digit; but you’re saying you love me even MORE?! not “THIS” much, but THAT much?!”
And according to God’s word - running that spiritual data-crunching program, in the software of your heart - it takes a lot of POWER! You hear about how much ENERGY it takes to mine like 1 bitcoin: “an estimated 1,449 kilowatt hours (kWh) of energy… The same amount of energy a typical US household uses in about 13 years.” Now, speaking of things that I don’t understand - I’m not even gonna TRY and use BITCOIN in my sermon illustrations! - but here’s my point: mining for the DEPTHS and the LENGTHS of Christ’s LOVE for you: it takes even more power than THAT! And yet, God’s PROMISE is that the more of it we DO grasp and “take hold of”, the more we will - v19B now - be “filled with all the fullness of God.”
That ALMOST sounds HERETICAL to pray! If it wasn’t an explicitly BIBLICAL prayer, from Paul… if I got up here on a Sunday and prayed, “God, would you FILL me with all your FULLNESS, that “in ME the whole fullness of your deity might dwell bodily” - that’s what Colossians 2:9 says of JESUS! You’d all STONE me as a heretic! “Filled with all the fullness of GOD” - who do you think you ARE, praying like that?
Like Paul, I know who I am. But like Paul, I ALSO know who I’m praying to BECOME. I am PRAYING, “attaining to… the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature [spiritual] manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ” (Eph 4:13). To be FILLED with his FULLNESS.
And friends, the way you GET it, is by being filled with his LOVE for you. Here’s the thing: you can only pour out as much as you’ve been FILLED by. You can only LIVE as Christ-like, and walk in as much holiness, as you’ve received, from Him. You can only GIVE as much LOVE as you yourself have RECEIVED.
1 Jn 4:19 “We love because HE FIRST loved US.”That’s why Jesus told us to “love your neighbor AS yourself”.
And if I may be so bold: some of you PROVE how little love you have RECEIVED… or I should say: APPREHENDED; how little of Christ’s love for you that you have actually GRASPED, and TAKEN HOLD of, and allowed IT to take hold of YOU - you prove the answer is “Not very MUCH” by how little you love OTHERS.
Some of you still view yourself through the eyes of your distant, emotionally unavailable EARTHLY Father. Your hyper-critical mother. Your disapproving spouse. Your “treats-you-like-just-a-cog-in-the-machine-and-not-like-a-human-being” boss.
And you’ve spent SO much time listening to THEM, letting THEM tell you who you are and how LITTLE you are loved, that you’ve become spiritually fragile, frail, flaccid. Insecure.
And I’ll confess: I’m just about the LAST person to be throwing stones here, but hey, like Paul said last week: “To me, though I am the very least of all the saints, this grace is given, to preach to [you] the unsearchable riches of Christ”. The ALL-SURPASSING-ness of his love for you. And He DOES, brother, sister - Jesus really LOVES you THAT much… **[cross] THAT much! Now RECEIVE it! ENJOY it! LIVE like it!
They say, “Hurt people hurt people.” Wounded people wound people.
But LOVED people LOVE people! If you are in Christ Jesus this morning: you are a LOVED person. A BELOVED CHILD of GOD, your perfect heavenly Father. LIVE like it!
I’m tired of writing these sermons on Saturday nights because I spent Monday thru Friday meeting with your spouses, who were in my office CRYING, because you’re borderline ABUSING them, emotionally. But then you sit here and take diligent notes on Sunday; put the pen DOWN and pick up the CROSS!
“Do nothing from selfishness… but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. 4 Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. 5 Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, 6 who… emptied himself, taking the form of a SLAVE… he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” (Phil 2:3-6).
You can only GIVE as much love as you have received. When you first came to Christ, you barely had an INKLING of how much he loved you; you only BARELY understood the depths of your sin, the heights of God’s HOLINESS, and the INFINITE CHASM that lay in between, that Christ had to BRIDGE for you.
But brother, sister: it’s time to GROW UP. To throw away the sandwich-sized ZIPLOCK you’ve been carrying around to fill with Christ’s love the day, and pick up the BUCKET. Better yet: start digging the POOL! And not the cheap, above ground kind, that BURST when they get overfilled; I know they make for funny TIKTOK videos, with the whole family floating down the backyard - No, I’m talking a REAL pool. A POND? A man-made LAKE? Scratch that - CAN’T be MAN-made; it takes the power of GOD, to grasp the heights and depths and lengths…
Look: Jesus has an INFINITELY VAST OCEAN of grace and love he wants to give you, and not JUST you, but to give OTHERs THROUGH you!
Will you RECEIVE it? And will you GIVE it?
“May you KNOW the love of Christ… that you may be FILLED with all the FULLNESS of God.”
That’s the climax of the passage. And I’ve already gone over time. But let’s finish with our last 2 points, briefly:
#5) What are The LIMITS of our strength, FROM God, IN Christ, THROUGH the Spirit? Not Applicable. (v20)
We know God is “able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask [him] or even think to ask him, according to His power at work within us”. I can do ALL things through Christ who strengthens me.
And lastly, #6) What is The GOAL of all this spiritual strength God wants to give us: HIS OWN GLORY! (v21)
“to him be glory in the church”. God gets GLORY not only from SAVING rebel sinners like us, but from SANCTIFYING us, and FILLING us with HIMSELF, and with deeper and deeper manifestations and revelations of his unfathomable LOVE for us. Rajveer Meena wasted his LIFE trying to plumb the depths of the digits of PI. But God gets GLORY when we give our lives to plumbing the depths of his love for us in Christ.
So I can’t think of any better CONCLUSION to a sermon like this than to simply pray Paul’s prayer here over YOU, West Hills:
May you be given STRENGTH…
BY God the Father
THROUGH God the Holy Spirit
IN Christ the Son
TO KNOW the heights & depths & length & breadth of God’s LOVE for you
BEYOND what you could even ask or imagine
SO THAT God would be glorified.
“throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.”