It's great to be with you here this morning. I'm Pastor Gordon Oliver from Bethel Church in Oosburg. And this morning we'll be looking at Ephesians chapter 3, verses 14 through 21. Ephesians chapter 3, verses 14 through 21. When Martin Luther's puppy happened to be at the table, he looked for a morsel from his master and he watched with open mouth and motionless eyes. Luther said, Oh, if I could only pray the way this dog watches the meat. All his thoughts are concentrated on the piece of meat. Otherwise, he has no thought, wish, or hope. Now, I must all admit that we have a problem focusing upon God the way Luther's dog focused upon a meat, or our dogs, if we have them focus on food when we dangle it in front of them. This may be because we focus upon ourselves more than the one who should captivate our attention. And Paul helps us focus our attention here on what is really important in prayer and what we should see when we pray for one another as a church, the things that God wants to do in our lives. Ephesians chapter 3 beginning with verse 14 down to 21. For this reason I kneel before the Father from whom his whole family in heaven and on earth derives its name. I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his spirit in your inner being so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power together with all the saints to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. 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, To him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations forever and ever. Amen. Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for your word. We ask as we look into it this morning that we would have eyes to see and ears to hear and that you would continuously mold us into the image of Christ our Savior. In his name we pray. Amen. When we look at Paul's prayer here, we notice that the theme of this prayer is not for physical needs. Now that's not to say that we shouldn't pray for physical needs. Jesus taught us as much in the Lord's Prayer, praying, give us this day our daily bread. But Jesus also taught us in that same passage to seek first God's kingdom and all these things, including food and clothing, will be added unto you. And so Paul, too, reminds us of the greater importance in prayer. And he prays for the spiritual needs of the body of Christ. And so he kneels before the Father. He comes face to face with God. Remember that when he writes Ephesians, he's in a prison cell. And so there in his prison cell, perhaps surrounded by guards, he prays. Nothing can stop him from communicating with Almighty God, and even if they were to cut his tongue out, his heart would still commune with his Heavenly Father. Now Paul begins by reminding us that our prayers are efficacious only by virtue of our relationship with God the Father, from whom his whole family in heaven and on earth derives its name, he says. We are members of God's family based on our position in Christ, John 1 12 yet to all who did receive him to those who believe in his name he gave the right to become children of God and so we are children of God together as saints in Christ because of the work of Christ and this includes in Paul's letter as we read earlier both Jews and Gentiles brought together in Christ and they become God's household fellow heirs including both those who have gone on to heaven and those who are here yet on earth. Together we are God's family, the family of the redeemed. There are two petitions in this prayer. One, the prayer for spiritual strength. And secondly, a prayer to know the love of Christ. And thirdly, he ends with this glorious doxology. And so Paul is praying for the church, and yet he's also praying for us as individuals as we interact as a church. He says in verse 16, I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. As a first, Paul assures us that his prayer on our behalf will be answered because of its source. It sources in the glorious riches of God. This seems to be a favorite theme of Paul, the riches of God's glory. They're a limitless and abundant source of spiritual strength for the Christian. His riches are abundant and they will supply your every need. All answers to prayer have their source in God's power and they supply to meet your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus, Paul says in his letter to the Philippians. And so, what are we strengthened with that Paul is praying for? With power through his spirit. As a Christian, you must realize that your power and your strength is not from within yourself, but that Jesus promised his disciples in Acts 1.8 that you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you. You will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth. That same power that was poured out on the early church lives in you. Now when we think of the power of God, often people think of the ability to do miracles, or to speak in tongues, or visions, have visions, or some great thing. But that's not what Paul is talking about here. We see that Paul is talking about the power that is enabling us to know and to understand the love of Christ. Now think of the power that is unleashed in a nuclear explosion. The destruction and the power that is unleashed there is noticeable to all. You can't miss it if it goes off near you. Now think of that same power in a nuclear reactor. That same power exists, but it's not evident in the same way that it is in an explosion. To believe that a reactor, however, is less powerful than a bomb is simply because its power is less obvious would be a mistake. Real power does not need to be apparent or visible. It is also a mistake to assume that the power of God must be evident in some spectacular or miraculous ways. At Pentecost, the Holy Spirit was poured out. The sound of mighty wind and the tongues of fire and acts of the power of the Spirit shook buildings, healed the sick, raised the dead, and cast out demons. But to limit God's power to the spectacular, and that alone, would be a great mistake. Simply the same as denying that the power in a reactor is there simply because it does not explode. If we think like this, we're forced then to assume that the Holy Spirit isn't really present in our lives. And Paul helps us see that this is not true. That the Holy Spirit is powerfully active in us even if we do not notice immediate results. And we see this where Paul says we're being strengthened. It's not our physical bodies, but Paul prays that God may strengthen you with power through His Spirit in your inner being. Paul tells us earlier about our former condition in chapter 2, that we were dead in trespasses and sins, that we were hopeless and helpless but for the hand of God to condescend to us and to make us alive in Christ. Without that, we have no hope or ability to make ourselves alive. And Paul prays that we would be strengthened in our inner being. That we would be strengthened daily by the Holy Spirit. He says in 2 Corinthians 4, verse 16, Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. Outwardly, we are all getting older. We feel the effects of aging on our bodies. We are getting slower. We cannot do the things we used to do when we were younger. The mind is not as sharp and susceptible to those senior moments we talk about. The world, though, places all of its emphasis on youth. Staying young. Do what you can to remain young. Don't let age get you. And so some will go to great extremes and great measures to keep themselves looking young. Plastic surgery and and trying to maintain a youthful appearance. But the Bible emphasizes the inner man, the inner person, with things as maturity, growth, and wisdom, the things that come often with age. So physically, however, our ultimate hope is in the resurrection of the body. But until that time, the Holy Spirit strengthens our inner being. So why do we need this strength from God? Why do we need this inner strength? that we are strengthened, in verse 17, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And notice the Trinitarian appeal in Paul's prayer here. Paul prays to the Father that we may be strengthened inwardly through the Spirit so that Christ may dwell in our hearts. I want to point out that Paul is not praying for the salvation of these Ephesian Gentiles. They're already saved, so why is he asking that Christ may dwell in their hearts through faith? The person is a Christian. Isn't Christ already dwelling in their hearts? The answer is yes. So what's Paul praying for? Well, the verb to dwell has the meaning of take up permanent residence. It can be read that Christ will make his home in your hearts. When we receive Christ by faith as Savior and Lord, we are like a house under repair. I use this illustration in the past of a person or family buys a house and immediately begin to make it their home. They need to fix it the way they want to be fixed. They paint and decorate it the way they want it to be. The point is they make it better than it was and it takes on their character. However, this illustration is not completely adequate because in our lives, as we are that house, our hearts, we've pretty much vandalized our home. We broke down the doors, broke the windows, kicked down the doors. We have made a mess of our lives and so Christ comes in to our hearts and does a massive renovation. Now there are things about us that are part of the image of God that remain. And those things are renewed in true righteousness and holiness. But all the sinful bad habits and addictions and wrong thinking has to be done away. And Christ begins a work in our heart and cuts away those things. Just like in a house that's been vandalized, you cut out the bad parts and replace them. And Christ is doing that in our lives. He is working in us. and making us more like him. And so he's strengthening us in our heart. The heart in the New Testament means the whole person, excluding the physical. But it means not just the emotions that we often think of heart, but rather the mind and the understanding, the will and the desire, the whole personality. And Paul is praying that these faculties would be controlled and dominated and directed by Christ. Now, faith in the Lord Jesus Christ is not the end of our Christianity, rather it is the beginning. The end is the fullness of God. And to be able to say, as Paul says in Galatians 2.20, I have been crucified with Christ, and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. To see ourselves totally in Christ. Now this does not happen instantaneously, it's a process that we call sanctification. Question 35 in our Shorter Catechism asks what is sanctification? Sanctification is the work of God's free grace whereby we are renewed in the whole man after the image of God and are enabled more and more to die to sin and to live under righteousness. And that's the picture, we are renewed in the whole man after the image of God, those things that we retain. are made more and more like Christ, but yet we die unto sin, those things that we've collected in our lives over the years, the bad habits, the bad thinking, that begins to die and we begin to live unto righteousness, unto Christ, more and more, as His Spirit is strengthening our hearts. And that's Paul's prayer, that we would be strengthened in our inner being, so that we would be more like Christ. Scripture always presents growth Christ is a process just as Peter Paul in Hebrews uses the illustration from withholding solid food from a baby Hebrews 5 12 through 14 says by this time you ought to be teachers you need someone to teach you the elementary truths of God's Word all over again you need milk not solid food anyone who lives on milk being still an infant is not acquainted with the teaching about righteousness but solid food is for the mature and who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good and evil. So there's a growth process there as we know Christ and as we come to Him in faith. And we are growing in those things and starting with the milk of the Word and growing on, hopefully, and the Hebrews were not, and they needed to be scolded for that. But as Peter says, like newborn babies crave pure spiritual milk so that by it you may grow up in your salvation. now that you have tasted that the Lord is good." And so we see that we are to be growing in our faith in Christ and in our knowledge of Him. And so Paul's prayer is that we be strengthened in these ways and that we see the goals to be filled, as we'll see, with the fullness of God. And we're not dormant in this growth process. We attain it through faith. And by faith we rest in Christ. And as we grow, in Christ we become more and more like him. But sometimes sin is in the way, isn't it? And we battle and we struggle. And sin, if we are not growing, then maybe we are allowing sin to dominate in our hearts. And we're not allowing Christ to dwell there fully. If that's the case, then we need to pray another great prayer in Scripture, Psalm 8611, give me an undivided heart that I may fear your name. That we may get away from the things that pull us away from Christ and pull us away from thoughts of Him and focus our attention on the things that we shouldn't focus upon. But that our desires would be for Christ so that He would dwell in us fully and completely and that He would have preeminence in our lives. So the first petition is a plea for spiritual growth and that we may grow in Christ and be strengthened in Him, that we not remain immature in our faith and our knowledge of Christ. The second petition and the second thing that we should be praying for is to pray to know the love of Christ. He says, And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power together with all the saints to grasp how wide and how long and how high and how deep is the love of Christ. And to know this love that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. Now Paul speaks of the goal of Christian maturity is to grasp the love of Christ. And it is foundational to that is being rooted and established in love. And he gives two words here to illustrate the strength of this love. It's kind of a mix of metaphors here. Rooted and established. There's one in agriculture and one from construction. And rooted means to be firmly planted, like a giant tree. We want to be firmly planted. It's not going to fall down in the wind, but rather it's going to be rooted deep. It also says to be established, and that word has the idea of laying a foundation, something that's not going to be moved. And so we are to be grounded and founded in love. And a person cannot understand the love of Christ if their life is characterized by self-interest. You cannot grasp the love of Christ if you cannot love other people. Love for one another is essential to Christian doctrine in life, and you cannot reach maturity in Christ if you are not rooted and established in love, Paul is saying. Paul says in chapter 4, verse 2, be completely humble and gentle, be patient, bearing with one another in love. See, when we're doing that, we show that we're rooted and established in love. And in chapter 5, verse 1 and 2, he says, Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children, and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and a sacrifice to God. That's what he's saying to us. If we are rooted and established in love, then we are going to live a life of love. It's going to be reflected as we imitate God, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us. Paul's prayer is also that we may have power together with all the saints to grasp how wide and how long and how high and how deep is the love of Christ. The word Paul uses for knowledge is translated here, grasp, in the NIV, to grasp, literally to lay hold as to possess as one's own. You know, those of you who have raised small children, you've seen them grasp things. They want that. Sometimes they want things they shouldn't have, and you've got to take it away from them, and they let them grab it back. And Paul is saying we want to grasp, possess it as our own, the knowledge of Christ's love, how wide and how high and how deep is the love of Christ. It is cognitive knowledge. It means to perceive and understand, to use our mental faculties to apprehend the limitless dimensions of Christ's love. This is the highest attainment of Christian knowledge, to know the love of Christ. It's not necessarily a matter of knowing more Bible facts than the next person. You can be very knowledgeable in the Bible, but be ignorant of the love of Christ. So in our study of the Word, in our corporate worship, and so forth, we should be seeking to grasp the love of Christ. How do we do this? We do this by considering the dimensions of Christ's love. How wide, how long, how high, how deep? How do you measure what is immeasurable? Some have looked at the dimensions of Christ's love, such as the width and the length as the removal of sin as far as the east is from the west, the depth of His love as His humbling and dying upon the cross becoming sin for us, the height as His rising and raising us up with Him. We certainly cannot grasp His love if we don't look to Calvary, right? We've got to look to the cross. where God demonstrated His love for us, and that while we were still sinners in that state of sin, and while we were still dead in trespasses and sins, Christ died for us. And when we have embraced Christ, when His Spirit has made us alive, He has raised us up with Him. As Paul begins this letter saying that we are seated already in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus. The love of Christ, Paul says, yes, the dimensions are limitless, measureless. How high, how wide, how deep is the love of Christ? Paul tells us it's beyond knowing, and yet we grasp to know it. We grasp to understand it, even though we will never fully know it in our lives. We will spend our entire lives pursuing the love of Christ, to find that we've only just started to understand it. The beauty is, though, that I know in part, then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known, when we see Christ face to face. And so we must make it our goal to apprehend and experience the love of Christ through our relationship with him. We grow in the knowledge of Christ as we progress in our sanctification. We can kind of liken this to human relationships with our spouses. When you're first going out, you don't know the person very well, you're getting to know them a little bit. You're getting to find out who they are. And as that grows, then comes the next level, engagement. And in that period, you get to know one another even better. And of course, when you're married and you spend your life growing and getting to know one another even more, in a more intimate way, growing in your knowledge and love for that other person. It's the same with our relationship with Christ as He is our husband and we are His bride. Paul prays for us that we would have the power as we grow in Christ to grasp and understand more and more the dimensions of Christ's love. Well, it almost seems like something that's impossible, isn't it? To know the dimensions of Christ's love. The third thing that Paul does is he tells us here how this is actually possible. And it's because Christ has done more than we could ever hope or imagine in our lives. And the goal in this, knowing the love of Christ and its dimensions, he says that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. This is the highest measure which a Christian can attain, the fullness of God. It's not perfection in this life. It is not perfection. Paul's not talking about becoming perfect in this life, but rather that we become mature Christian people. The fullness of God, that we've reached Christian maturity. Paul says later in this letter, in chapter 4, verses 11-13, it was Christ who gave some to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, and to prepare God's people for the works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up, until we all reach unity in faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God, and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ. So what he's saying is together, because his prayer is for the saints, is together as saints we grasp the dimensions of Christ's love and there's help with one another through pastors and teachers and that we work together through the works of service that God has for us to build one another up in faith and in unity to become mature. And he says, in this instance, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ. Paul's prayer is that we be sanctified through the indwelling Christ and be strengthened with power to grow in grace in the knowledge of Christ. Again, attaining to that whole measure of the fullness of Christ. Now you think that Paul would have said everything possible here, but he goes on again to tell us how this is possible. How can we do this? How is this prayer on our behalf going to happen? It says in verses 20-21, Now to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than we all could ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us, to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations forever and ever. Amen. So the third thing we see is that we are in our prayer life to praise God that He is able to do more than we could imagine. Again, we're talking about spiritual growth. Some people take a verse like this and think, well, I pray for a million dollars, they'll give me a hundred million. The wealth gospel and so forth. So Paul is saying it all. He's talking about spiritual growth and maturity in the church. That's what God desires for us, that we grow together as a body of believers in unity and love for one another and growing together in our love for Christ. And Paul says, This is attainable, because God can do more than we could ever ask or imagine. Immeasurably more. There are two words here in the Greek that are used for immeasurably. NIV translates it with just that one word. King James translates both as exceeding abundantly. And we think that's overkill, but Paul doesn't think so when it comes to God's power and ability. And so he says, literally, exceeding abundantly. God will do exceeding abundantly more than you can ever ask or imagine. We cannot out-imagine God when we think of spiritual growth. We cannot out-ask Him. There's no limit to our prayers or what God wants to do through His church. We cannot ask something that's beyond His power. We often sing, Thou art coming to a king. Large petitions with thee bring. For His grace and power is such that none can ever ask too much. God is omnipotent, and there are no degrees of difficulty in our requests. We don't level our prayers. Well, that's got a huge level of difficulty. Because God is all-powerful, and that's what Paul wants us to know. It's according to His power that is at work within us. It's already there. God has placed it in you through His Holy Spirit. This is the third time that Paul mentions the power of God working in us in this passage. It's the fourth time actually in the entire letter so far. And it's not the last time he mentions it in Ephesians either. So if Paul lays this much emphasis upon the power of God in us, then you better believe that it is there in you. And believe that he will strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being and empower you to grasp the dimensions of the love of Christ and fill you to the measure of all the fullness of God. This is Paul's own experience being turned from Saul of Tarsus to Paul. Turned from a persecutor of the church to a faithful brother of the church. Being turned from an enemy of God to a child of God. Being turned from a blasphemer of Christ to an apostle of Christ. Being turned from a hater of the gospel to one who spreads the gospel. God can do more than we ask or imagine. We see these examples in Scripture, in people's lives, how He's changed and made us mature through following Him and growing in Him. So Paul did what, probably in the early church, he figured was impossible. He told the early church, you know that guy Saul who's going around persecuting, he's going to become one of the greatest Christians. No, that's not going to happen. But God did it and He shows His limitless and immeasurable power in doing so. Finally, let's remember the reference point For God doing exceedingly abundantly more than all we can ask or imagine, we see that in verse 21. The final verse we're looking at this morning gives us that reference point. It is for that there be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations forever and ever. That there be glory in the church. You know, the church, humanly speaking, should not even be here today. Humanly speaking, the church would have been stamped out back when Saul of Tarsus was persecuting the church and going about getting rid of it. Persecutions and false doctrines should have taken care of the church long ago. Why is it even still here? Because Jesus said to Peter, upon this rock I will build my church and the gates of hell will not prevail against her. We're here because we received the power of the Holy Spirit. It has come upon us as it did in Acts, and that we are strengthened with the power through His Spirit in your inner being. And we pray that we may be rooted and established in love, that we may grasp the dimensions of Christ's love, and be filled with all the fullness of God. And just one more thing, how do we know that God will work immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine? We know that because He's already done it. He did it for us in Christ Jesus. When we were dead in transgressions and sins, we had no hope at all, but God sent His Son to the world to open our eyes, to pay the penalty for our sins. How could we ever have asked and imagined that we who are undeserving sinners would be given salvation, and be given life in Christ, and have the wrath of God that we deserve poured out on His Son, so that we may have eternal life. God has already done it immeasurably more than we could ever ask or imagine. And now as we have embraced Christ and we are growing in Him, He will continue to do more than we ever ask or imagine in His church. May God bless you. Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for your word. We thank you for these wonderful promises. We ask, Lord, that you would help us to maintain a focus in our prayer life. Yes, Lord, we acknowledge that we need to pray for physical needs, but Lord, let us not remember those important needs of spiritual growth and grace in the knowledge of Christ, that we may be filled with the full measure of God and you may have a mature church. We thank you in Jesus' name. Amen.