Ephesians 3:14-21 (ESV)
14 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 passage from Ephesians is, at its heart, a prayer. Paul is writing to the Christians in Ephesus and, like other parts of his letter, Paul is telling them how he is praying for them. I think this eight verse prayer of Paul’s is a prayer that we should be praying for ourselves and for all believers today. I think it’s worth praying for unbelievers as well, of course, so they too may come to know this love of God that we have received. But for the sake of this sermon, let’s be careful to look at this in the context of believers, as Paul wrote it.
Paul begins by saying that when he prays for them, he kneels before the Father. It used to be, in a lot of churches, that when the pastor led the congregation in prayer, the people would kneel to pray. In the Episcopal church my grandparents attended, each row of pews had a bench that could be folded down and knelt upon when it was it was time to pray corporately. When I started attending a Pentecostal church in high school, sometimes we were encouraged to kneel by either coming up to the front of the church to pray or to turn around and kneel in our seat. It has been many years since I have experienced that invitation at a church. It makes me wonder if kneeling to pray is something that has gone out of ‘fashion.’ Most modern-built churches do not have benches for kneeling anymore. Yet, we see in many places in scripture people kneeling to pray. For one example, in Luke 22:41, Jesus went to the garden to pray, “And he withdrew from them about a stone’s throw, and knelt down and prayed.”
I think that in the past, when people prayed, the common way of praying was to kneel. If we think of images of people praying, oftentimes the pictures show people kneeling by a bed or kneeling with head bowed. I wanted to look into this more and so I did a word search and found that the word that is translated as ‘worship’ in the Old Testament is actually the Hebrew word ‘shachah’ and according to Strong’s Concordance it means, “to bow down”. For example, in Psalm 86:9 is says, “All the nations you have made shall come and worship before you, O Lord, and shall glorify your name.” That word is shachah and could be translated instead as, ‘bow down before you’.
In the New Testament, the word most often translated as worship is proskuneó and it means “to do reverence to”. HELPS Word-studies says this: 4352 proskynéō (from 4314 /prós, “towards” and kyneo, “to kiss”) – properly, to kiss the ground when prostrating before a superior; to worship, ready “to fall down/prostrate oneself to adore on one’s knees”; to “do obeisance”.
I think this is important information, for I think for most people, when they hear the word ‘worship’ they think of singing. Yet, the word for worship is not singing, it is actually better understood as kneeling or bowing.
While Scripture gives multiple directives to praise the Lord with singing, I think we should be careful to acknowledge that differs from Biblical worship unless we are ‘shachah’ and ‘proskuneo’ while singing. Meaning, our songs and praise must be done with hearts that are ‘kneeling’ and ‘bowing’ before the Lord.
All that to say, when Paul mentions he kneels to pray, I think it’s important to note that and recognize that, not only was kneeling to pray the normative thing in the Bible and in the early church, but whenever we read the word ‘worship’ in Scripture, we should remember that word translates to kneeling. We should be careful to not swap out words for new words that have lost their true meaning over the centuries.
The reason Paul, and we, should kneel before God is because, as verse 15 says, the Father is “from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named,” and because of that, He alone is worthy of our worship.
Last week, we looked at Paul’s sermon at Mars Hill. In it, he explained all people are descendants of God. Here, he is making this same point. This is important, for there is only one race of people- one family of humankind. We are all descended from the Creator who made all people. The Greek word for family in verse 15 is patria which is defined by Strong’s Concordance as, “paternal descent, i.e. (concretely) a group of families or a whole race (nation) -- family, kindred, lineage.” It is the same word that we get the word for paternal from which means: from the father’s side of the family.
Not only is the idea that in most cultures, as it was in Paul’s culture, a family derives their name from the father’s side of the family, but Paul is also emphasizing that the ‘family’ spoken of here is the whole family of God. This speaks of the entirety of Christians who, from all time and into the future, make up the family of God. There is only one family of God.
Some people might use this passage to support their idea that therefore all people are children of God, and therefore, all people will be saved. They expand on this idea by saying that when Jesus died on the cross, He purchased salvation for all people and therefore all people will go to heaven. The word for that belief is universalism. This idea is incorrect though, for even though Jesus’ death on the cross made it possible for all people to be saved because He purchased salvation for all people, not all people receive that free gift of salvation. They reject it. Therefore, they are not saved. Like I mentioned last week, the Father is the Father of us all because He has created all people. But, the Bible says, we are the children of God only if we have trusted in Jesus Christ. In that same way that Jesus’ death on the cross purchased salvation for all people, we are all created by God. Yet, we are not all the spiritual children of God, as some people believe. It is only those who have come to salvation in Jesus Christ who are included.
Then Paul tells the Ephesian Christians how he is praying for them. He says he is praying to the Father, “that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—“.
The people Paul is writing to are already believers, so why would Paul pray that Christ would “dwell in [their] hearts through faith-“? Doesn’t Christ already dwell in their hearts? The word for dwell here in Greek is katoikeó, and it means “to inhabit, to settle.” In other words, be at home. I think the concept is for Christ to so completely dwell in their hearts that He has set up residence. He has moved in, remodeled, inspected and cleaned all the closets, so to speak.
Paul is praying that the believers would be strengthened with power by the Holy Spirit. This is the role of the Holy Spirit. Jesus said in John 14:26, “But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.” The Holy Spirit teaches us and helps us recall truth. He also leads us (Romans 8:14), and fills us with joy, peace and hope (Romans 15:13).
Paul’s prayer is that the Holy Spirit will strengthen the believers so that Christ will be completely at home inside them. All of this, of course, is accomplished through faith. It’s worth mentioning, again, that faith is the key, for that is how we become children of God, and how God comes to dwell within us.
The prayer is that Christ will be so at home inside each believer, “that [they] being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge,”.
Paul is praying that the believers will understand Christ’s love. Not in some intellectual manner only, but to really know Christ’s love. He says he is praying that they will be rooted and grounded in love. That means that the love of Christ will go deep into their core. Deep into the very foundation of who they are.
He wants them to comprehend, or understand, the breadth and length and height and depth of the love of Christ. We could restate that to say: Paul wants them to three-dimensionally know the love of Christ. Meaning, he doesn’t want them to simply know in their minds the love of Christ, but to know it tangibly. To know the love of Christ so fully that they could grasp it physically, surpassing just head knowledge. In other words, his prayer is for them to experience the love of Christ.
I think Paul really understood how important experiencing the love of Christ is, for Paul wrote this letter while he was in prison. I would think that knowing just how much Christ loved him would have been the thing that sustained him and comforted him while he was imprisoned. For I am convinced that the more we understand just how much God loves us, the less we worry and the more we trust God.
When we understand the totality of God’s love for us, then we let Him into all the areas of our lives. Then we don’t hold anything back from Him. Then we open ourselves to Him and trust Him with all of our heart. That is what Paul is praying for, for when they tangibly know the love of Christ, then they will “be filled with all the fullness of God.” We should pray the same for ourselves and each other.
Paul’s prayer is that they would experience everything that God is- all of His qualities. Colossians 2:9 says about Jesus, “For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily,”. That means that Jesus, because He is God, contains all of God within Himself. He is the full expression of God. He is the perfect, complete, total illustration of what it means to be filled with all the fullness of God. We, of course, not being equal with God, cannot attain to that measure. But we see Paul praying, even so, that the believers would be filled with the fullness of God. For he is praying that all the qualities and attributes of God would fill up the believers. I think this would include the Fruit of the Spirit. All of those key characteristics: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control.
But because we cannot perfectly embody all that is God, like we see in Jesus, we receive the fullness of God, rather than attain it. In John 14:23, we read, “Jesus answered him, ‘If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.’”
That, I think, is what Paul is talking about when he says that his prayer is for Christ to dwell in the believer’s heart. He is praying that God makes His home with them, dwelling with them, taking up residence, thus filling the believer with the fullness of God. Then, through the power of the Holy Spirit, all that God is, expressed in Christ, overflows from His presence, into the life of the believer.
I remember hearing someone pray in time of corporate prayer, a prayer that went something like this. The pastor prayed that God would ‘stand up’ inside of us, so that He would take up all the room inside of us and completely fill us. That image of God ‘standing up’ has stuck with me. It created such a clear visual in my mind. Rather than God merely filling my ‘heart’, I imagined Him standing up and filling me in such a way that His ‘hands’ filled out my hands, His ‘feet’ filled my feet. I’ve found myself praying that same prayer over the years. Praying that God would stand up inside me, and take up all the room, shoving my sinful nature aside.
The goal of every Christian should be this: to be “filled with all the fullness of God.” This should be what we are striving for. We see this theme and directive all throughout Scripture. Whether it is in the Old Testament and Moses is giving the Israelites God’s Commandments as a way for them to mold their behavior to reflect more of God’s character. Also, the examples of the prophets and leaders who were anointed and filled with God’s Spirit. People like Joshua who, as Deuteronomy 34:9 says, “was full of the spirit of wisdom, for Moses had laid his hands on him. So the people of Israel obeyed him and did as the Lord had commanded Moses.”
Or, in the New Testament, we see this theme even more clearly. Later, in Ephesians 5:18, Paul says, “do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit,”. In Philippians 2, we are instructed to be so filled with the Spirit of God that we have the mind of Christ and behave like He modeled for us — living unselfishly and humbly. Ephesians 5:1-2 says, “Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.” And Romans 12:2 which says, “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind,”.
While those verses don’t specifically instruct us to “be filled with the fullness of God,” those verses and many others are showing us what that phrase means. Which is: our goal as believers is to let the Holy Spirit fill us so fully that He transforms us more and more each day into better reflections of the God who dwells inside us.
The good news is, God promises to do this exact thing if we allow Him to do this. He will be faithful in doing this work inside of us, molding us more and more into His image. Philippians 1:6 says, “And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.”
Then Paul concludes this passage by giving praise to God. He says, “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, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.”
God will do far greater things in us than we can even think to ask for. Not only can He provide for us, take care of us, do greater things through us than we could imagine, if we allow Him to work through us, but He can also do more in transforming us into His image than we might think possible. If we let Him. Habits, hang-ups, patterns of thought, fears, short-comings, whatever doubts and flaws we find within ourselves, He can heal us and transform us and set us free from all these things and more. If we let Him fill up all these places within us. He can work miracles beyond our limited imaginations, if we let Him.
Our prayer today should be this very prayer. We should pray that: God so fills us with His presence that He transforms our hearts and minds and that He helps to experience His deep love for us on an even greater level than ever before. So that the love of God will overflow from us and we can share that love with everyone we meet, so they too might be filled with the love of God.
Pray: Heavenly Father, we bow to You, on our knees, asking You to strengthen us with power through Your Holy Spirit. Strengthen us in our inner being, so that the love of Christ may dwell in our hearts through faith—that we, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all believers, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, of the love of Christ toward us. Help us to truly understand this, not merely know this in our mind, but to experience the love You have for us. Please fill us with all of the fullness of Jesus. We know that You are able to do even more than we can comprehend, so we look to You to lead us and guide us. We give You all the glory and praise, and pray that You would be lifted up through all generations, forever and ever, amen.
Click the above link to hear a song about this idea of God taking up all the spaces inside of us. Tomorrow by Company of Saints
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