As is our custom at the evening hour, we take the harmony of the Reformed standards to guide us through the study of God's Word and God's providence. We come to question 192 in the larger catechism. which you'll find reproduced in your bulletins. What do we pray for in the third petition? In the third petition, which is, thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven, acknowledging that by nature we and all man are not only utterly unable and unwilling to know and do the will of God, but prone to rebel against his word. to repine and murmur against his providence, and wholly inclined to do the will of the flesh and of the devil, we pray that God would by his Spirit take away from ourselves and others all blindness, weakness, indisposedness, and perverseness of heart, and by his grace make us able and willing to know, do, and submit to his will in all things with like humility, cheerfulness, faithfulness, diligence, zeal, sincerity, and constancy as the angels do in heaven. I'd like us this evening to take as our text words that we have already read from Paul's letter to the church in Ephesus, Ephesians chapter 5 and at verse 18. But we'll read from verse 16 for the sake of the sense. I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers. The God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and of revelation and the knowledge of him, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you. What are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints? And what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe? These words from Ephesians chapter 1. Now if it is your purpose later, perhaps this evening or the course of this week, to reflect upon what you have heard through the preaching of God's Word, then happily at least tonight, if not always, you will find the three sections of the sermon set out for you by Paul as he expands upon what it is that he is praying for the saints in Ephesus. And really just in passing perhaps what we should note is that he doesn't merely say I'm praying for you as you and indeed I will quite often say to someone who is afflicted, well I'll remember you in my prayers. We are so thankful to our God that in the inspiration of the Holy Spirit not only does Paul say I'll be praying for you, the brethren, the saints whom he loved at Ephesus, but then expands upon that so that we here, a matter of almost 2,000 years later on, are still being blessed by the prayers of the Apostle Paul. And that we can see how he opened out his heart before the Lord and desired that the eyes of their understanding should be open. In other words, that though we are, as it were, naturally those who are born spiritually blind, we might even say born spiritually spiritually dead, yet our prayer guided by our forefathers in the faith is to pray that the Lord would open our eyes to see, and that not only might we pray that prayer for ourselves, but for our neighbors, our colleagues, our friends, even members of our family who are outside the kingdom, that God, with his grace and mercy, open their eyes to see Christ as Savior, and seeing him, be bold to ask for forgiveness of sin and newness of life. Well, as the writers of the Westminster Standards pondered this particular line from the Lord's Prayer, and we draw to our attention how we should take it up and apply it to ourselves, be done on earth as it is in heaven. There is a recognition immediately that that is not a prayer that comes naturally to us. Why not? Because we are those who are wholly inclined to murmur, to complain, and to find fault with ourselves sometimes, but even more easily to find fault with others. So here let me give you, with a confession of heart, an illustration of this principle that we find at work in our hearts, and which I certainly find at work in my heart. As I entered the church building this morning, my first thought was, my, it's cold in here this morning. And as I entered the church building this evening, my first thought was, my, it's rather warm in here this evening. And as I reflected even briefly upon that, I thought to myself, the poor deacons can never get it right. And there will always be those who will enter into a church and find it a little bit on the chilly side, while others are rejoicing that at last it's a decent temperature. And others that will come in thinking to themselves, it is far too hot, and think to themselves, at last the church is warm enough for me to be able to listen to the sermon without murmuring. I know my own heart, how easy it is to fall into complaining when it's not exactly as I want it. And of course we see that surely in the lives of the children of Israel as they were released from the land of bondage. You would think that that would be a wonderful and glorious time for the people of God having been set at liberty from oppressors who made their life a misery. but they are no sooner with their feet upon the path that leaves the land flowing with milk and honey, and they are complaining. What is the nature of that complaint? Did you bring us out here to die? Well, let's not think that it's any small complaint against the leadership of Moses. Let's go straight to make it as bad as we can possibly imagine. Moses, you brought us out here to die in the wilderness. Do you not remember how when we were back in Egypt we had onions and cucumbers and fish and the oppression of slave drivers? No, we don't remember that. We remember the good things and we start to complain about the bad things through which we are passing. And it's the wisdom here of our fathers in the faith to draw attention to that. Thy will be done. a recognition that we are all very prone to rebel against his word, murmur against his providence, wholly inclined to do the will of the flesh and of the devil. And so, as we would instruct our own hearts and learn at the feet of Jesus himself, who gave us the Lord's Prayer, we would inquire from Scripture, how might we improve upon our understanding For surely it was never the intent of Jesus that we should merely repeat the words from memory without ever thinking about the content. It is not merely an exercise of our memories, it's an exercise of our hearts. And we're thankful for those who have spent hours in the study of God's word, days, years, a lifetime, and have given us the fruit of their labors and the catechisms of our church. What is it we pray for in the third petition? We pray that God would, by his Spirit, take away from ourselves and others all blindness. We recognize that we must pray this for ourselves, that the Lord would take away from us that blindness which is natural to our darkened hearts. Have you ever, at a particular moment in time, when the burden of this world has fallen heavily upon you, perhaps in the sorrow of the loss of someone dear to you, exclaimed before God, I don't deserve this, I expected something better? Or if your health is not as you would desire it to be, You wonder why God has dealt with you in such and such a way, murmuring against his providence. Well, let us see the antidote that is presented to us in the prayer of Paul. He's praying for the church in Ephesus, and if he were with us to this day, would his prayer be substantially altered for us? And should our prayer not be even as we read in Scripture for ourselves and for others, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened that you may." Now, boys and girls, we've come across this formula of words in the past in reading through Scripture. It's what we might call a purpose clause. I don't want to get sidetracked into particulars of the English language or the Greek language. But when you see that you may, then you are given to understand by the very structure of the Word of God that's being presented to you that the purpose of, at this point, the purpose of God is being unfolded. Paul is saying, I want your eyes to be opened. and that you may see fully, that you may know, and here's the first point, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, the hope to which he has called you. Now Paul expresses it in a particular way, that you may know the hope to which he has called you. And right at the beginning we must recognize that this is not some sort of a Christmas wish list. May you have everything that you hope for. What is on your list of things that you desire? whether it be health and strength, reputation, wealth, success in your particular chosen field, whatever else it might be. Those things are not being pointed to, at least not in this particular passage, that you may know the hope to which you have been called. There is the hope of God, as it were. He says, this is what I'm promising you. And in that hope there is the promise of eternal life, and of being yoked together with Christ, and to know him, and to be with him, to know his fellowship, to walk with him day by day. When we compare what God has promised us in his word, and the hope that we have in Christ, and then would compare it perhaps to our Christmas wish list. We put the two side by side and we say, how pathetic is our own personal wish list. We are embarrassed even to mention it in the context of what God is promising us in Christ. And any deep or even superficial reflection would surely bring us to the point of saying, if I can only have one, I must have what Christ has given me in the promise, the hope of my calling. That is what I truly desire. Indeed, I would count all the things of this world but done for the excellency of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord. And surely that makes us thankful that God is promising us that which is on His list and does not necessarily, except by His grace from time to time, out of His love and care for us, perhaps grant us some of the things on our list. The idea that we should be coming into God and presenting our wish list, name it and claim it and have that here and now, when what is set before us is not our wishes and desires, but God's wishes and desires for us. And any manner of reflection upon that would surely say, I want what God wants for me, who loves me infinitely and perfectly. and has promised himself to me in Christ Jesus, why would I want that which is on my list of desires, when God who has promised us to give us exceedingly, abundantly, beyond what you're able to ask or even think? And it is great love towards us. We might even say I will cast aside as being of no value all those matters which are upon my personal wish list and pray only that God would give me that which He has promised me in Christ. We may ask for health for today, but what does God promise us? Eternal life. And better than that, What could be better than eternal life? Well, God is always better than you can imagine. He has promised you eternal life, and that life will be filled with abundance. Life in abundance. How good is the God whom we adore. we might ask for freedom. If we had been held in bondage in Egypt, if the children of Israel had been held in bondage, no doubt we would have cried out, even though we would recognize that perhaps our memories would be no longer than the children of Israel and would quickly repine, murmur against Moses. We would ask for freedom, freedom In our context, freedom from the bondage to sin. And any warm-hearted believer knows something of that bondage when we fall into sin. And our consciences are convicted within us. Oh, that our hearts would be melted within us to confess those sins speedily before the throne of grace. When you weep for your sins, what is the promise that God gives you? But freedom that is in Christ Jesus. But here let me lay it upon you that God is always better than you can imagine. Does God merely say, you were held in bondage in Egypt, bondage to sin, and now I will set you at liberty. What else does our God do for us? He adopts us into his family. He has not appointed us to be slaves in his household. Jesus says directly and explicitly to his friends, I do not call you servants, I call you friends. and brothers, brothers of the Lord Jesus Christ. So we are prompted by Scripture to see that the promises of God, our hope that is in Christ to be exceedingly and far greater than what we might desire for ourselves. We ask for our daily bread and rightly so. We have not yet come to that petition in the Lord's Prayer, but will do, I trust, shortly. But is it not true, brethren, that not only do we receive our daily bread, but even as we bow our heads before the meals, remember that not only does God put bread upon the table, but he feeds us with that bread that came down from heaven that a man may eat thereof and not die. Do you see how the simplest and the most basic elements of each day are turned to good effect as we see God's grace and mercy poured out upon us? Well, let me press on. Paul not only says that we should know, he desires for the church in Ephesus, and by extension to us, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you. But then secondly, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints? The previous element points back to the time in which we first believed and the hope that was granted to us in Christ Jesus. And now Paul is pointing us towards that which shall be ours. As Paul says, there is henceforth laid up for me a crown. Paul was looking towards the future as he wrote to Timothy. He was nearing the end of his ministry. Not long after he wrote the letter, the powers of the state would sever the head of Paul from his body. And he knew that his days were numbered. But being a faithful and a godly man, one who walked with the Lord all his days from the day of his conversion, he then looked towards the future. and knew that the sufferings of this present hour are not worthy to compare with the glory which shall be revealed in us. Or as Peter talks about our inheritance, imperishable, unfading, kept in heaven for you. Our bodies are indeed sown in corruption but raised in incorruption. This perishable body will put on imperishability. The mortal will be clothed with immortality. Now our minds strain to illustrate such a great and wonderful truth. We do pray, and I believe rightly so, that God in his grace and in his wisdom would pour out blessings for us in this world. I trust that we are not so carnally minded that we would put a dollar amount on God's blessing or any such tawdry thing, but we do desire that God would make himself known to us in our fellowship with him and that there would be such a nearness of the presence of God in our daily walks as that we are assured, assured. that whatever we face, whatever difficulties may overtake us, however difficult the path along which we must tread might be, that we are assured that we walk hand in hand with our God, and that this too will result in a greater blessing for us. And so how do we pray? That the Lord, within His grace and His mercy, unlock the treasure house of heaven, those in our imagination, those enormous boxes filled with the blessings of the Almighty God, and that He would burst open the lid and scoop out the blessings and pour them down upon our heads. Well, I trust that we know something of those blessings. Surely, if we are believers in the Lord Jesus Christ, we're able to say, I have come as a sinner into the presence of a holy God, and forgiveness has been given me. I who deserve nothing but his condemnation, deserving to be cast off for an eternity, and now may bold to approach the throne of grace and address him as my Father in heaven. The blessings of the Almighty God have already been showered upon me, but I am emboldened. Because I know that the God in whom I trust is far greater than I can imagine, I am emboldened to ask of Him that He will pour forth still greater blessings. And I do not look for them in terms of the blessings of this world, but the blessings of knowing Christ Jesus, the excellence of knowing Christ Jesus as Lord. against which everything that this world has to offer seems but as dung. I wonder if when Paul's letter was first read to the church in Ephesus, there was a kind of a collective intaking of breath. Did Paul really say that? Well, the word in the original is not as polite as the word dung. It is, if you go into the stable and you want to clean out the stable, what is it that you are shoveling out of the stable? Well, that's what Paul talks about in comparison with the excellency of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord. Now, what is Paul pointing us towards? He's not saying that life in this world will be easy and comfortable, but he says God has set your feet upon a path, and that path will lead you where? To the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints. that which is laid up for you, which you and I cannot begin to conceive, the blessings of an eternal and almighty God being prepared for us, the riches of His glorious inheritance in the saints. Well, how rich is the richest man? Well, I suppose you can put some sort of fiscal quantity upon it. How rich is God! How infinitely rich is God! But do not make it something tawdry as money. The riches that we have in Christ Jesus and the greater riches by far that will be ours. Here is how Paul is praying for the church in Ephesus. the place that would have had him stoned if God's protecting hand had not been upon him. Oh, that you might not only recognize the hope to which you were called, but that you would also see the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints. Now, this is not presumption on our part to think on these things. If we doubt this, what are we doing? Well, there's two things that we might be doing. We might be doubting God, and I do hope that that is never something that even for a moment flits across our minds, that God has played some kind of cruel joke upon us to promise that which he has no intention of fulfilling, or perhaps he has no power to fulfill, as so often we have made promises to others and then found that we've broken our word. Why? Because we found ourselves incapable of keeping our words. God is not so lacking in power, nor is he lacking in love towards us to be cruel, to promise us that which he will not fulfill. Perhaps the doubt, though, rests in ourselves. And we think to ourselves, but I don't know that I am strong enough that I will make it ultimately, and the enemy of our souls plays upon that weakness. They're not doubting God's strength, it's doubting our own strength. But here, think on this. It is not your grasp on God that is important. It is God's grasp on you. Do not allow the enemy of your soul even so much as a toehold in your thinking. I lean wholly upon Christ and I trust Him for my salvation. It's not about what I have done, what I might yet do. I have given myself wholly to Christ. and he has accepted me and given me joy unspeakable and full of glory. He has promised me eternal life and those whom he promises eternal life he will never turn away. It is our confidence not in ourselves. We are not bold in ourselves. We are bold in Christ to say that he has indeed loved me. And as Paul opens up the letter to the church in Ephesus, he loves us from the first of time. He loves us to the last. And so we are confident of the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints. And then thirdly and finally from our text, having announced at his prayer that they might know the hope to which God has called them, that they might know what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints. And then thirdly and finally, that they might know what is the immeasurable greatness of his power towards us who believe. The immeasurable greatness of his power towards us who believe. Paul gives three illustrations, and as scripture would tell us, a three-cord rope is not easily broken. So he provides an illustration and with this he is drawing us into a certainty that we will definitely attain what God has promised us in Christ Jesus. His promise is first of all that the immeasurable greatness of his power towards us who believe. And here's the first illustration. According to the working of his great might that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead. How are we to understand the immeasurable greatness of the power of God in our lives? Well, says Paul, let me point you to Jesus Christ who was raised from the dead. Now it may be that in our age, with the technology that is available to us, the understanding of the workings of the human body, that we recognize that those who are clinically dead can be resuscitated and brought back to life. But that's not what Paul is talking about here. He's not anticipating the work that is done in ER, emergency rooms, length and breadth of the land, as those who suffer a heart attack are resuscitated by the paddles being placed against their chest. No. He's talking about the resurrection of Christ Jesus from the dead. The fact that he was not just clinically for a moment defined as dead, but dead in the tomb for a period of three days. That he had endured the consequences of sin. That he who knew no sin became sin for us men. Well, we do thank the Lord our God that he has provided the remedy for our sin. else we would go to a lost eternity. But what is it that Paul is saying about the immeasurable power that God has? He has the power to raise Jesus from the dead. In other words, the penalty of sin has been fully paid in the Lord Jesus. And in token of that, the grave could not hold him. And so he is raised from the dead, not merely resuscitated, that resurrected. He has been before the just judge of all the world and has, as we might say, gathered up his people in his arms and presented them in his own person before his Father And the Father in his immeasurable power has raised up his Son, and we who are in Christ raised up with him to newness of life. Then secondly, Paul talks about the immeasurable greatness of his power. in that he was seated, seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places. God the Father has given him rule, and he is ruling even now, until the last enemy, even death itself, is placed under his feet. What Paul is pointing us to here is that the immeasurable power of God the Father is to be made known in the rule of Christ as he is seated at his right hand above all rule, King of kings, Lord of lords, all things under his feet. the absolute sovereignty of Christ. And then the third illustration comes to us. Far above all rule and authority and power and dominion and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come. And he put all things under his feet and gave him as her head over all things to the church. which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all. Now can we just note in passing here the significance, the importance of the church as the body of Christ. And to say that the church is no longer of any validity is to say that the head has no body. Now that's not how Paul speaks about the church. Indeed, here is what we are to be encouraged about. As Paul is praying for the church in Ephesus, I want your eyes to be opened. I want you to know the hope to which you were called. I want you to know the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints. I want you to know the immeasurable greatness of his power. And that that power is to be demonstrated not only in his rule, his sovereign rule over all things, but that finds its ultimate fulfillment in the church of Jesus Christ. He put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all. What a wonderful description of the work of Christ in the church. The fullness of him who fills all in all. Are you not thankful for Paul's detailed description of what he's praying for? And is that not what we should be taking upon our hearts and minds? You and I know we're not great experts in prayer. I've never heard anyone tell me, there's one thing that I can really do, I can really pray. I may not be good at other things, but prayer, well, I'm probably the best person at prayer that I know. Well, such vanity would quickly be undone. I suspect we all know in our hearts that it's an area in which we want to improve. And so we're thankful for the wisdom of our forefathers in the faith, that they go through the Lord's Prayer and explain it, expand it, expound it. What is it that we pray for in the third petition? We pray that God would, by His Spirit, take away from ourselves and others all blindness, that we may know what is the hope to which he has called us, that we may know the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, that we may know what is the immeasurable greatness of his power towards us who believe. Let's pray together. Our gracious God and our heavenly Father, we do thank thee that thou hast brought us together at this evening hour, and we pray that as we would recognize what progress we still need to make, long to meet, make in the place of prayer, that thou would lead us and guide us in the study of the Lord's Prayer so that we may be better equipped that we may not merely mouth the words without reflecting upon their intent, but meditating upon the Lord's prayer may see that it is filled with such riches and glorious truths. May we pray that thy spirit may take away our blindness. May we pray, Father, for those who even now are lost. Thou wouldst remove the scales from their eyes and show them Christ. So bless, O God, we pray, the study of Thy Word to our hearts. For this we ask in Jesus' name and for His sake. Amen.