Ephesians 3:14-21 - God's Strengthening
Sermon by Pastor Brent Kompelien
July 10, 2022
INTRO (SLIDE 1)
Side Note: We are working on expanding and growing our adult discipleship opportunities here at New Life. We’ve been prayerfully discerning how we can go deeper in Bible study, mentoring, training classes, and developing leaders. Just want you to know that we will be announcing some of these goals in the coming weeks.
We’re continuing our series called “Paul’s Prayers” and we’ve been spending the last two weeks in the book of Ephesians. This morning we are going to look at one of the most incredible prayers in the whole Bible, one where Paul prays that we would know the immensity and vastness and depth of Christ’s love displayed in the gospel.
ILLUST — Many of you know that I’m a space nerd. One of the realities about God’s creation that can be challenging to wrap our minds around is the vastness of the universe. The universe is so big that it can be difficult to define. (SLIDE 2)
Scientists say that the observable universe, the energy or light from stars that we can detect or see, is 93 billion lights years wide. That’s 28 billion parsecs, for all you Star Wars fans.
One light year = 5.9 trillion miles. I’ll let someone else do the math to figure out what 5.9 trillion times 93 billion is! That’s a lot of zeros!
To try to understand that vast distance, think about how far away our own sun is from earth. It’s incredibly far. But the sun is only 15/millionths of a light year away from earth.
It takes 8 minutes to travel at the speed of light from here to the sun. I usually complain because it takes me over 8 minutes to get to Target in Cottage Grove from my house in Hastings!
The vastness of the universe is more than we can imagine! For us to fully grasp something infinite is beyond the scope of our human ability.
But there is someone who not only understands the vastness of the cosmos, but who fashioned every square inch of it, and who placed every atom and every molecule in its place. It is God himself, who is infinite, perfect, all-powerful, and all-knowing, and always good.
You see friends, the vastness of the universe is not an accident. It is a reflection of God. It points to him and glorifies him and reveals his vastness and power.
(SLIDE 3) This morning, we are going to read a prayer where the Apostle Paul prays that we would know how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge.
ASK: In our finite understanding and in our limited knowledge as human beings, how can we know the measureless love of an infinite God? Answer: Not by your own power!
Remember, we’ve been learning in Ephesians about how the gospel is all about God. It's about his initiative, his power, his goodness, his work through Christ who died in your place, and his presence by the Spirit that transforms you.
PROP — In order for you to know the vast love of Jesus displayed in the gospel, you need God to reveal it to you by the Spirit’s power, you need God to make you able to grasp all the dimensions of his love, and you need God to fill you with his fullness.
Paul prays as an act of faith. To know Christ’s love in the gospel requires supernatural power to be brought to bear in your inner being. Paul trusts that God will do it.
ORG SENT — As we look at this passage from Ephesians 3:14-21, there are three central points to Paul’s prayer that highlight each person of the Trinity: (SLIDE 4)
Strengthened through the Spirit (vv. 16-17a)
Able to grasp the love of Christ (vv. 17b-19a)
Filled with the fullness of God (vv. 19b)
Let’s read our passage. READ Ephesians 3:14-21.
Now, before we get into the heart of this prayer, I want to make sure we understand why Paul launches into this prayer at this particular moment in the letter.
Background (SLIDE 5a)
This section, chapter 3:14-21, concludes the first half of the book. In this first half, Paul describes the gospel of grace. In the second half, he applies the gospel for how we live.
KEY: (SLIDE 5b) Our text this morning is the pivot-point between the proclamation of the gospel and the application of the gospel. At this critical juncture, Paul prays for the church to know the love of Christ in a personal, powerful, and intimate way.
If you look at verse 14, this prayer begins with the phrase “For this reason…”
What reason? This refers back to Ephesians 3:1 where Paul evidently started to pray, but then stopped to make a longer reflection from 3:2-13.
(SLIDE 5c) So, if you look at 3:1 and 3:14, there are two “for this reason” statements. In order to understand what prompted Paul to pray, we need to look at what occurs immediately prior to these two “for this reason” statements, because this is where Paul emphasizes what is achieved through the gospel.
What are the two “Gospel Prompts” that inform Paul’s prayer:
(SLIDE 5d) First Gospel Prompt: We are a New People (2:19-22) — READ 2:19-22.
Because we have saved by grace through faith in Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross even while we were dead in our sin, we are now citizens of God’s Kingdom.
We are also a members of his household.
And we are being built into a holy temple where God lives by his Spirit.
(SLIDE 5e) Second Gospel Prompt: We live in a New Reality (3:10-12) — READ 3:10-12.
In the gospel, the church displays God’s wisdom in the face of the powers of evil in this world. Evil and sin no longer enslave us!
We also have access to God’s personal presence, and we can approach the God of the universe with freedom and confidence!
KEY: We are a new people who live in a new reality. This is what prompts Paul to pray this specific prayer in Ephesians 3:14-21.
Let’s look at those three central points of Paul’s prayer.
MAIN 1 — Strengthened through the Spirit (vv. 16-17a). (SLIDE 6a)
This word “strengthen” means to (SLIDE 6b) “encourage someone to stand firm or to keep going”.
ILLUST — The Stanley Cup finals just ended last week, and if you’re a hockey fan you’ll know that by the time two teams get to the finals the players usually have played over 100 physically grueling hockey games in about 9 months. That’s averaging one game every-other day for almost 40 weeks straight.
At the end, you can see how physically and mentally exhausted the players are. They are literally collapsing after its all over.
Along the way they have to encourage one another, pick each other up when they’re hurt, pat each other on the back when they fail, and they strengthen one another through adversity. That’s what this word “strengthen” typically means.
The only problem with this illustration is that the Christian life is NOT about you trying harder on your own effort to follow God, and then the Holy Spirit merely comes alongside you to pat you on the back along the way!
No! Paul had just said in Ephesians 2 that you were dead in your transgressions and sins, but because of God’s great love for us, he made us alive with Christ!
And so, the “strengthening” here by the Spirit of God is not merely telling you that you’re doing a good job. (SLIDE 6c) The strengthening here is fundamentally an infusion of divine power in your inner being so that the risen Christ dwells within your heart through faith and transforms everything that you do.
You see, this word “dwell” is very important. It means “to take residence”. (SLIDE 6d)
ILLUST — A pastor I knew shared about moving into a fixer-upper. He and his wife were young and newly married. They bought a small house on the edge of town that really needed some work. After signing the papers, they moved in; they took up residence in the house. It was theirs. And through the coming months and years, they gradually changed things to make it their own. They fixed up the kitchen, they replaced windows, they fixed leaks. Some parts were dirty and moldy and stank. Other parts were shabby or broken. But eventually they made things right and cleaned everything up and it began to be a very pleasant home.
This pastor friend realized that this just like Jesus taking up residence in our inner being. When he moved in, we are his. He signed the papers. We belong to him. And yet through the Spirit’s work in our hearts, our beliefs, attitudes, and actions are remodeled to reflect the new owner: Jesus Christ. (SLIDE 6e)
This is what Paul is praying for: That you would be strengthened with power through the Spirit so that Christ may take up residence in your heart and remodel your life.
MAIN 2 — Able to grasp the love of Christ (vv. 17b-19a). (SLIDE 7a)
Let’s pick it up in the middle of verse 17. Paul gives a second prayer point. READ vv. 17b-19a.
“Rooted and established in love” are agricultural and engineering metaphors. They are all about being solid and secure, with staying power and longevity. (SLIDE 7b)
ILLUST: I spent many of my years growing up in California. The Sierra Nevada Mountains are famous for the Giant Sequoias, (SLIDE 8) which are the world’s largest trees. Trees such as the “General Sherman” stand as high at 275 feet, with trunks as wide at 40 feet. These trees grow in groves and have extensive root systems that entangle with each other. They grab on to granite and to other trees to hold themselves steady. Their root systems spread out in a web as large as an acre! These trees are unbelievably solid and secure!
ILLUST: Similarly, one other less-loved feature of living in California is the reality of earthquakes. I’ve experienced multiple earthquakes and they are terrifying. Well, the church were I grew up was built on the side of a hill and in order to secure the sanctuary, the engineers had to drive 85 foot piles underground to find bedrock. Then they tied the foundation to these steel piles in order to secure the building in case things started shaking.
You see, Paul is praying that your roots would be grounded in God’s love and that the foundation of your life would rest on the solid bedrock of God’s love displayed in the gospel of Jesus Christ.
How are we to know this love that surpasses knowledge? (SLIDE 9a, b)
The same principle holds true here as it did with the prayer for strengthening: it is not by your own ability or understanding, but by God’s power that you could come to know his love for you! (SLIDE 9c) It is a work of the infinite and perfect God to help you grasp the infinite and perfect dimensions of his love for you in the gospel!
ILLUST — One of my favorite old hymns is the classic song “The Love of God is Greater Far”. The second verse beautifully describes the surpassing love that God has shown us by sending his Son to die for us.
“Could we with ink the oceans fill, and were the skies of parchment made, were every stalk on earth a quill, and every man a scribe by trade, to write the love of God above would drain the oceans dry, nor could the scroll contain the whole, though stretched from sky to sky.”
Friends, my on-going pray for you is that you would spend your life mining the depths of God’s love, that you would discover how vast and glorious is his compassion and care for you.
KEY: The love of Jesus isn’t fluffy and trite. It is displayed in his death and resurrection! It is costly and sacrificial. (SLIDE 9d) There’s a weightiness to it! That’s why Paul describes it with such dimension and depth.
When God begins to reveal to you the richness of his love, it leads right into the last part of Paul’s prayer.
MAIN 3 — Filled with the fullness of God (v. 19b). (SLIDE 10a)
This final line of Paul’s prayer is really a summary of the whole goal of the prayer: The intended outcome of being strengthened by the Spirit and given power to grasp the limitless love of Jesus should result in fullness, in maturity. (SLIDE 10b)
Last Sunday, one of the things I shared was the reality that “You can’t merely know God theoretically; you have to know him personally.”
KEY: The personal knowledge we need is GOD’S LOVE DISPLAYED IN CHRIST. (SLIDE 10c)
But this cuts across the grain in our culture. We can be so self-focused or self-sufficient that we are willing to know God theoretically, but knowing him personally can feel like a threat to our autonomy. You can’t know God personally and pretend that you can control him.
ILLUST — Pastor and theologian Don Carson commented on this: “Part of our deep ‘me-ism’ is manifested in such independence that we do not really want to get so close to God that we feel dependent on him, swamped by his love…When we are drawn in a little closer to the living God, many of us want to back off and stake out our own turf. We want to experience power so that we can be in control; but Paul prays for power so that we will be controlled by God…our self-centeredness is precisely why it takes the power of God to transform us…to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge.”
You see friends, if you want to know the costly and self-giving love of Jesus displayed in the gospel, to truly come closer to God to be strengthened in your inner being to move toward maturity in the Christian life, just ask him! (SLIDE 10d) He must be the one to do it, and only he has the power to redeem you and change you.
Paul ends his prayer with a benediction that contains a promise: READ vv. 20-21.
KEY — When it comes to the redemption and transformation of your life, (SLIDE 10e) God’s capacity for giving far exceeds our capacity for asking or even imagining!
Ask him to transform your life. Cry out to him for help. Open your hands to receive his transforming power to strengthen you and to reveal his great love for you through Jesus.
Because the gospel is all about a mighty work of God to bring you from death to life, and to change every part of who you are, he gets the glory and is deserving of our praise.