Pray Big by Alistair Begg

 

PRAY BIG by Alistair Begg

Introduction – Who we pray to

“I want to pray bigger and better.  I want you to, too.” So begins the introduction to this book.  I have to say ‘Amen’. 

 

What a man is on his knees before God, that he is and nothing more. Robert Murray McCheyne

 

Our conversation with others declares what is on our minds.  But our conversation with God in private reveals what is in our hearts.  Do you ask God for anything?  And when you do, are you asking him for big things?  Prayer does not come easy to most of us, in most seasons.  And when we do pray, our prayers often seek to do a deal with God, or they are tentative in their requests because we’re not sure God will come through; or they are, frankly so self-centred that they bring little pleasure to the Creator and Saviour of the world, as he listens to us present our shopping list of worldly requests to him.

 

Paul was a man who knew to whom he was praying.  It is distinctively Christian to speak of God as a Father and to therefore speak to God as a Father.  Paul could speak of the grace and peace that come “from God our Father” (Ephesians 1 verse 2).  The Christian knows that the Creator of everything is not a father; he’s their Father.  That’s a reality.

 

See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God and so we are. 1 John 3 verse 1

And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father.  Wherefore thou art no more a servant, but a son; and if a son, then an heir of God through Christ.  Galatians 4 verses 6 and 7

 

God sent his Son to make us his sons.

God sent his Spirit to enable us to relate to him – to speak to him – as his sons.

 

The word “Abba” is best translated “Dearest Father”.  It is the word we find on the lips of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane, at his moment of supreme anguish as he cried out to his Father – Mark 14 verse 36 and Luke 22 verses 41 – 44.

 

Paul knew that, through the death and resurrection of his Saviour, he knew God as his Father.  In prayer we do not only approach a majestic Sovereign or an impartial Judge we approach our Father in heaven and say “Dearest Father ...”  This is who we speak to when we pray.  It’s a truth that’s easy to understand but equally easy to forget in daily life.

 

What we say to him

What is it that my Father loves to hear from me?  What is it that I can best pray for my family, my church and myself?

 

Look at Paul’s prayers for his friends in the church in Ephesus, which he recounts in chapter 1 verses 15 – 23 and 3 verses 14 – 21.  Paul is writing from prison.  He’s setting them an example for their own prayers and ours.  This will motivate us to pray and help us to know what to say.  Paul clearly enjoyed prayer and was excited about it.  He expected his Father in heaven to hear what he said and to act in other people’s lives accordingly.  He prayed and then was “watchful in the it with thanksgiving” Colossians 4 verse 2, ready to see how God would be pleased to answer his prayers.  Paul prayed big prayers because he believed great things.

 

Ephesians 1 verses 15 – 23

 

Wherefore I also, after I heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and love unto all the saints. Cease not to give thanks for you making mention of you in my prayers.  That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him.  The eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that ye my know, what is the hope of his calling, and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints.  And what is the exceeding greatness of his power to usward who believe according to the working of his mighty power. Which he wrought in Christ when he raised him from the dead and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places.  Far above all principality and power and might and dominion and every name that is named, not only in this world but also in that which is to come.

 

Ephesians 3 verses 14 – 21

 

For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.  Of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named.  That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man.  That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith, that ye, being rooted and grounded in love. May be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height And to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God.  Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us.  Unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages world without end. Amen

 

 

CHAPTER 1 PRAYER IS DEPENDENT

 

To pray is an admission and an expression of dependence. The person who knows their heart before God – the person who knows the depth of their need of forgiveness and help from God – does what Paul does – they bow their knees.  He knew he had a privileged task – “Whereof I was made a minister according to the gift of the grace of God given unto me by the effectual working of his power.  Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ.” (chapter 3 verses 7 and 8)  Without God’s help it would be an impossible task.  So he prayed.  He recognised the direct link between his preaching and his praying – the first must be accompanied by the second.  He was aware of the fact that “unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labour in vain.” (Psalm 127 verse 1)  One plants the seed and another waters, but only God can make it grow.

 

In the gospels Jesus prayed to the Father all the time.  Jesus’ approach to life rested on dependent prayer.  And he said in effect “Father I am praying now that the things I have instructed my friends about and that they have come to understand as a result of my teaching, may actually be their experience as they go out into the world.”

 

My prayers – whether I pray, how much I pray, about what I pray – reveal my priorities.  And they reveal how much I really think I need God or whether I am, deep down, in fact self-assured and self-righteous.  If Paul knew that he needed to bow his knees before the Father what of us?  If Jesus Christ followed up his instruction by prayer what of us?  If Jesus Christ who was set on a mission that changed not just world history but all of eternity took time to pray what of us?  If Jesus Christ, the Son of God, knew that he needed to pray, what of us?

 

Will I pray before and after I hear God’s word preached to me next Sunday?

 

The way we come to listen to the bible and the way we go off after we have listened – both on our own and also as a church – matters.  And it is revealing.  We tend to teach our children to say thank you to God for a meal before they eat it and that you don’t just walk away from the table after a meal; you say thank you before you get down.  It’s just the same with the bread of God’s word.  You don’t just start the meal – you thank God for it and you ask him to use it to nourish you, spiritually.  Then you don’t finish the meal and run for your car; you finish the meal and you take some time to say “Thank you Father for the food.  It may not have been served the way I like it, it may not have been given the flavour I was hoping for; but I believe the pastor, whosoever he was, prayerfully prepared and delivered it as best as he could and I want to thank you for providing me before I head out.

 

We find Paul on his knees declaring his own helplessness.  Even his posture is dependent.  Jewish men by and large, prayed standing.  Paul knelt as an acknowledgement of who he was and who the Father he was speaking to is.  We come confidently but we do not come complacently.  We come to a loving Father but we do not come as his equal

 

One day at the name of Jesus every knee will bow as every tongue confesses that he truly is Lord, bringing glory to the Father.

 

Paul’s posture is an expression both of the wonder and the awe that he feels before God and of his earnestness in seeking God.  Paul’s decision to pray is driven by his awareness of his dependence and his posture in prayer emphasizes this awareness.  The posture of our hearts and not our bodies is the issue.  What matters is a dependent heart not a particular posture.

 

The Christian gospel says, “If you look into yourself, you will ultimately find only that which disappoints you and confronts you with your own ineptitude and your inability to fix even the simplest of the things that really matter.  The problem is inside of you.  It’s your fault.  And so the answer must come from outside of you and not rely upon you – so it is the most wonderful news that Jesus has come in order to fix your problem. He came to bring down the barrier between you and God and restore you to the relationship you were made for, enjoying God as your loving Father.”

 

This is why Christian prayer is uniquely dependent and humble; it’s also reflective of the cry of every human heart.  The more we realise our need, the more we will pray as Paul did; the more we will say, as he did “I bow my knees before the Father.”  It’s the heart attitude of dependence that counts, whether or not we express it physically by kneeling.  It’s an expression of our dependence upon God.  It is good to kneel.

 

We will not pray big prayers if we do not pray at all.  And if we are self-assured or self-righteous, our prayers at best will be irregular, impersonal, functional and prosaic.  Prayer reminds us who we are and who our Father is.  Prayer expresses our dependence and it reinforces our dependence.

 

CHAPTER 2 PRAYER IS SPIRITUAL (BUT NOT IMPRACTICAL)

 

Many of the matters that are the focus of my prayers are absent in Paul’s prayers – there is the absence of material issues.  This absence is especially striking when we consider that Paul was in prison in Rome.  But he doesn’t pray about his predicament; he doesn’t ask that he might be released.  Paul wrote in Philippians 4 verse 6 “Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything; tell God your needs and don’t forget to thank him for his answers.”   Paul wrote this and he believed it and so must we.  But we also need to acknowledge with Paul the fact that these concerns are not the ultimate concerns.  All that matters may be brought before God but what we bring before God is not always what matters most.

 

The believers in Ephesus had concerns for food and for clothes and for shelter.  They would have thought about and talked about and worried about being married or getting married ... being parents or wishing they were parents, or wishing some days they weren’t parents ... employment paying taxes, wealth, health ... but there’s no mention of these matters at all in what Paul prays for them.  Praying about health is rare – almost non-existent in the Bible.  We pray about our health because we don’t want to die, we want to live.

 

“God being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ – by grace you have been saved – and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming age, he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.” (Ephesians 2 verses 4 – 7)

 

All that matters may be brought before God but what we bring before God is not always what matters most.  When the eyes of our hearts are opened to our future it changes our lives now – it reorders our priorities and our prayers.  We pray less about the practical details of this life and first and foremost about the spiritual realities of our eternal life.  Eternal matters matter more; the concerns of today less.

 

Paul has his eyes fixed on eternity.  His prayers are spiritual.  We need to make ours so too.  To do that we need to erase the 2 words that shut most of our prayers down – “Be with”.  Jesus said “Behold I am with you always to the end of the age” (Matthew 28 verse 20).

 

Example – Nehemiah – chapter 1 verses 4 and 5.  He got spiritual before he got practical.  He knows the issue of the walls in Jerusalem is a metaphor for the real spiritual condition of  the people.  The reason that the wall is collapsed and broken down is because of the spiritual needs of their hearts.

 

Example – Daniel – chapter 9.  In the middle of the oppression of God’s people, as chaos surrounds the people of God, he doesn’t pray about practicalities.  He prays about the grandeur and glory of God and his kingdom and the fact that he is sovereign.

 

All that matters may be brought before God but we must always bring before God those things that matter most.

 

Matthew 6 Jesus talks to his followers about legitimate practical concerns – their food, their clothes, their lives.  And he doesn’t rebuke them for caring about those things.  “Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness.” (verse 33).  That’s prioritizing spiritual things – “and all things will be added to you.”  In other words he says, “If you take care of my things, I’ll take care of your things.”

 

The hub – the centre of our lives and our actions – is always spiritual.  The reason that Paul bows his kneels before the Father who is in heaven and prays in this way is because he wants to show the Ephesians that this is what really matters.  And so spiritual matters are what the focus of our prayers – not the entirety but the focus – must be.

 

When the spiritual hub of my life is solid, then the practical spokes will be strong.  We tend to live as if and pray as if, what we most need is help with this practical issue of that specific life problem.  We all have particular situations that we need divine help with and divine transformation in.  But it’s as we grow in our appreciation of the gospel that our lives will change to reflect that gospel.

 

Ephesus was a city that was prosperous as a result of its ability to trade, and prominent on account of being the site of the great temple of Artemis or Diana, one of the 7 wonders of the ancient world. That temple both drove pagan, magical worship and underpinned the local economy.  It was in that setting that Paul turned up and proclaimed the lordship of Jesus.  Day after day, month after month, he “spoke boldly, reasoning and persuading them about the kingdom of God ... so that all the residents of Asia (modern day Turkey) heard the word of the Lord, both Jews and Greeks.” (Acts 19 verses 8 and 10)

 

Ephesus was a spiritual battleground.  New believers were leaving a life dominated by the occult and by the power of spiritual forces (verses 11 – 17).  And that spiritual transformation led to practical change – verses 18 – 20.  The Christians burned their books of magic together and burned them in a public forum.

 

Your hub – your spiritual belief system and view of God – drives your practical actions.  Paul tells them and us – what we really need to know is the truth of the gospel.  Who we really need to know, is Jesus.  We need to know with assurance all that is ours in the Lord Jesus Christ.  We need to know what is true of us now and we need to be aware of what will be true of us on the day when all things are wrapped up.  Paul says I’m praying for that.  You’ll stand firm if you know truth. 

 

What we need more than anything else is to be made experientially aware of the truth and reality of the Lord Jesus Christ – we need to know “the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe.”

 

Jesus wears a crown that infinitely outshines and eternally outlasts any and every other power.  If we know this Jesus we will each have a firm hub in the centre of our lives and we will each pray.

 

We need to start to pray spiritually – then as we move on to our practical concerns in our prayers, we need to let the way we pray about them flow from the spiritual truths we’ve prayed about.  All that matters may be brought before God but we must always bring before God those things that matter most.

 

CHAPTER 3 PRAY FOR FOCUS

 

What do I say when I pray?  5 great qualities:

 

·       Pray for focus

·       Pray for hope

·       Pray for riches

·       Pray for power

·       Pray for love

 

Your heart is the very centre of your existence – your core.  It’s the headquarters of who and what you are – your mind, your emotion, your will.  And you need the eyes of that heart opened wide and focused well.

 

Paul is praying here that those who have come to faith in Jesus may have the eyes of their hearts enlightened, so that they might see clearly.  Paul has been assuring his readers of all that is theirs in the Lord Jesus Christ – in 11 verses.

 

·       They are chosen to be holy and blameless in God’s sight – verse 4

·       They were predestined to be God’s adopted children, loved as his eternal Son is loved – verse 5

·       They are redeemed by the blood of Jesus, so that they can enjoy the reality of knowing that although they are sinners, they are forgiven sinners – verse 7

·       They have been brought into the great plan of the Father to bring all things into unity and perfection under the glorious rule of his Son – verses 9 and 10

·       They have an inheritance of eternity with him ahead of them, and the Spirit from him dwelling in them, guaranteeing that they will reach that place – verse 11, 13 and 14

 

We should be surprised to be part of God’s people.  After all, he did not choose us because of anything we brought to his team.  All you and I brought were our transgressions.  Even the faith we placed in Christ to forgive us was a gift from him – Ephesians 2 verses 8 and 9.

 

Paul was unceasingly thankful for what God had done for the Ephesian Christians – he purposefully remembered them in his prayers, giving thanks for their faith.  And we must be thankful too, for ourselves and for those we know who have faith – for truly, God has blessed his people “with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places” verse 3.  The problem is – we so often don’t see it.

 

In verse 15 Paul moves from praise to prayer – and in verses 16 and 17 he prays that these Christians might really see what they have.  They of course don’t see it so Paul said “I’m praying for you, that the eyes of your hearts may be opened.”

 

Paul’s praying not for new sight but for focused sight.  He’s praying not for his readers to become Christians but to enjoy all that is theirs as Christians.  He knows about their “faith in the Lord Jesus” and their “love toward all the saints” verse 15.  He’s giving thanks that God has opened their eyes to see who Jesus is.  But Paul’s not settling for that.  He wants more for them.  Faith in Christ is first of all a decisive act and then it is a sustained attitude.  It is to have your heart-eyes opened to who Jesus is and what he has done; and then it is to have your heart-eyes more and more focused on the glory of Jesus, so you live more and more in light of that.  Paul wants the Ephesians to understand and enter into the benefits they have already received.

 

Paul says to the Ephesian Christians, You need to know, you need to see, that you have been given “every spiritual blessing.”  Not one.  Not some.  Every one.  That’s what transforms you, both inside and outside.  So Paul says, It is my prayer that the eyes of your hearts will be illuminated, so that you might know what you are looking at.  And supremely you are looking at Christ.

 

It is in Jesus that all our spiritual blessings are given.  It is in the Son that the Father has made himself known.  The more clearly you see Christ, the more wonderful he will seem to you and the more gloriously our life in him will be revealed to you.  That’s what Paul wants his friends to see – he wants “the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory (to) give you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him.” (verse 17)  You need God to do this for you.  It is the work of God the Father Almighty, through the work of the Spirit of God, to bring home the benefits that he has made available to us through the Son of God, so that the people of God might become all that he desires for them to be.

 

Knowing God by seeing God.

 

Paul wants for you what you most need.  What you really need, he says, is a spirit of wisdom and revelation that leads to a greater, deeper knowledge of him.  You need to know God.  You need to look at God.  You need to know God.  You need to know there is a Creator and a Sustainer of everyone and everything and that is your kind Father.  You need to know that he is slow to chide and he’s swift to bless.  You need to know that he understands your needs and that he answers your prayers.   You need to know that he chose you, he adopted you, he secured your destiny, he forgave you and he sent his Spirit for you.  You need to see all that you have in Christ, in glorious full-colour focus.

 

The most transformational thing you can do today is to look clearly at Christ with the eyes of your heart.

 

Pray that “the eyes of your heart may be enlightened” so that you could truly say of yourself “I was blind to him but now I see him – more and more and more!

 

CHAPTER 4 – PRAY FOR HOPE

 

“Hope” in the New Testament knows nothing of uncertainty.  God wants us to know what is the hope to which he has called you (Ephesians 1 verse 18).  To know this hope is to know the assurance of a reality that you have not yet fully experienced.  It is not something that is in doubt.  It is something that has been promised by the God of truth.  It is a secure hope.  It is a hope that breeds confidence.  It is a hope based on the knowledge that “those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son" (Romans 8 verse 29) and "he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion.” (Philippians 1 verse 6)

 

Paul does not simply mean only an intellectual knowledge; he means knowing both intellectually and experientially.  Hope is objective – it is a reality based on truth.  And hope is subjective – the reality is something I take hold of with my heart.  Biblical hope is what enables our hearts to remain calm when we think “I ‘m going to die one day.”  Biblical hope means our hearts respond to the thoughts of our own death by saying “Jesus is risen.  My faith is there, in him.  He’s my hope.  He won’t fail you.”

 

Know God, know hope.

 

The hope of the gospel is real.  It is certain.  And it needs to be embraced emotionally as well as understood intellectually.

 

The story of the bible is the story of a God who seeks out people who are hiding from him.  He’s been doing that since the first humans rebelled against him and hid in the garden he’d made for them to enjoy with him.  God didn’t say to Adam and Eve.  Well, OK – you go ahead and do what you want.  No he came.  He spoke.  He called out to Adam.  And he comes still today, to those who are hiding from him.  What’s the plan?  If the hope is not Jesus, what’s the plan for that day, whose date is fixed, when you have an appointment with God, whose verdict is final and eternal?  If the love of God won’t draw you off the fence, then let the fear of death and beyond scare you off it.  God is seeking people, asking people, to come into a real, living, hope filled relationship with him.  He comes to find lost sinners.  You need to ask God to open your heart-eyes to it.  You are going to live forever.  The only question is where.  We know that death isn’t the end of the best time of our life; it’s the start of it.

 

Christ has gone ahead and Christ has prepared your place.  It’s hard to see day by day.  Even when we understand intellectually, we may give in to fear emotionally.  That’s why you need to ask God to make your hope real to you and ask God to make it real to those around you.

 

CHAPTER 5 PRAY FOR RICHES

 

One day we are going to be very, very rich  That’s because we have an inheritance ahead of us.  In Ephesians 1 verse 14, Paul says the Holy Spirit dwelling in God’s people is “the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it.”  Our inheritance is already ours, but we have not taken ownership of it all.  There is more that yet awaits us, and we’ll enjoy it when we enter into glory.  For you to benefit from an inheritance, a death is required.  Usually, it’s someone else’s death.  Here, it’s yours.

 

And so Paul prays that you and I will know what we will one day own and experience: that the eyes of our hearts would be enlightened to “know ... what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints.” (verse 18)

 

This kind of prayer was clearly a habitual one for Paul.  He prayed in similar manner for the church in Colosse to “be strengthened with al power, according to (God’s) glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy, giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light.” (Colossians 1 verses 11 and 12)

 

Your inheritance is unfading.  It is never going to dissipate or disappoint.  It will be there exactly as God has planned, ready to be entered into on the day when God, who is shielding you on your journey, gets you to that destination.

 

What is so good about this inheritance?  Why is it so wonderful that it can bring us joy and perseverance on the journey towards it, though “you have been grieved by various trials” (verse 6)?  The answer is that the inheritance is so glorious, the riches are so glittering, because the inheritance is God; God himself.  The riches we stand to inherit are what Paul calls in Ephesians 3 verse 16 “the riches of his glory”.

 

What is the glory of God?  The glory of God is the summation of his being.  The glory of God is the sum and substance of all that he has revealed to us of himself, which our limited minds are able to glimpse and that our perfected minds, will one day grasp is always more of him and more about him to appreciate and to enjoy and so his company is unimaginably perfect.  And he is your inheritance.  The greatest gift of God to his people is God.  The greatest joy of heaven is God.

 

It is to God, into the vast reservoir of the riches of his glory, that we go first, and out of the abundance of his provision and in anticipation of one day living in his full, unshielded glory, the other things fall into line.  Our inheritance is God.  And God’s inheritance is ... us.

 

Paul is referring to the fact that the Father has promised the Son, an inheritance – and that inheritance is made up of all who are in Christ.

 

Paul is praying that we will “know” this.  We need to pray this for ourselves an others.  We need to look up from our present problems, mistakes, regrets and sadnesses and look forward to that future inheritance.  We will need God’s help to do that – to get our heart-eyes open and focusing on our future.  So Paul teaches you to ask God to open your heart-eyes to see much further and see much better, to the riches of your eternity.

 

CHAPTER 6 – PRAY FOR POWER

 

Paul told the church in Corinth on his first visit to that church “I was with you in weakness and in fear, and much trembling.” (1 Corinthians 2 verse 3) And so says Paul to the church in Ephesus, I’m praying that you might know “the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe.” (Ephesians 1 verse 19).  He’s praying for power.

 

What kind of power is this, which is available to us who believe?  Paul takes us to 3 places:

 

1.     The resurrection – “the working of his great might that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead.” (verses 19 and 20)

2.    The exaltation of Jesus: God “seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places.”

3.    The dominion of Jesus: he is “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.” (verse 21)

 

Paul says that you and I need to have an understanding of the comprehensive nature of the triumphant victory of Jesus and that the power that accomplished that victory is the power that is available to you and me – powerless, frail clay pots that we naturally are.

 

At the very heart of our Christian testimony is the resurrection of the Lord Jesus: a resurrection which was testified to by a tomb that was empty, and that could not be (and never has been) explained away.  The fact of the matter is that the only reasonable explanation is that it happened just as Jesus said it would happen.  But the resurrection does not stand alone.  Jesus has not only been resurrected but he has been exalted to the right hand of the Father in the heavenly places.  He has now returned to the place from which he had come.

 

The Bible writers see the resurrection and the ascension as just one movement.  Jesus is both the risen Lord and the ascended King.  The ascension is a display of his amazing power just as much as the resurrection.  The ascension completed the work of Christ by proving the full acceptance of the Father for Christ’s one sacrifice for sin

 

Jesus is at this moment sitting down, at the right hand of God, his sacrifice for sins lying in the past, his preparing of a place in glory for his people lying in the past, his sending of his Spirit to gift and empower the church lying in the past.  Jesus is governing the universe.  In his power, the Father has “put all things under his feet and (given) him as head over all things.” (Ephesians 1 verse 22)  Jesus is seated at the right hand of the Father not to rest but to rule.  God “gave him as head over all things to the church” (Ephesians 1 verse 22).  As he governs all things he works in all things for the good of those who love him, his church.

 

So when we approach the heavenly throne in prayer, embarrassed by our sin, bedraggled by our burdens, weakened in our inadequacies, we discover it to be a throne of grace.  We approach it in the awareness of the fact that the One who upholds the universe and governs his church helps its members.

 

Without the power that comes from God’s Spirit the disciples could do nothing.  With that power, they could do anything in the cause of God’s Son.  This was the power that raised Christ from the dead and it was the power that drove the mission of the church out from Jerusalem and throughout the Roman world within one generation.  That is the power that is available to you and me.  That is the power that can energize our wholehearted action, which can see us stand up and speak up for Christ.  Paul prayed that his Ephesian friends would know that power, and live as though that power were real because they knew the resurrection was real.

 

It is the supremacy of Christ which is the basis of safety and security for the Christian.  Christ’s position and presence and power are the antidote to our fears.  We experience the power of God keeping us going and keeping us growing, keeping us obeying and keeping us witnessing, not when the band is playing and everybody's marching but when the music has faded and we are crawling about.

 

When you come to the end of your power, that is where you find his.  And when you do, you’ll find that it is immeasurable and therefore that it is enough.

 

We have a power that comes from beyond our fallen minds and frail bodies.

 

CHAPTER 7 – PRAY FOR LOVE

 

 Paul prays not that God would begin to love these Ephesians, but that he Ephesians would grow in their comprehension of that love.  Paul wants them, and us, to experience the joy of knowing the unknowable - of knowing how loved we are.

First you will not comprehend the love of God in Christ in isolation from “the saints”.  The family of God in Ephesus was made up of Jews and Gentiles.  The family of God in the average congregation today is made up of people from different backgrounds, different ages and stages of life, different standings socially and so on.  It comprises male and female, young and old, rich and poor.  We glimpse Christ’s love as we sing of that love together, as we affirm it together, as we hear of it in his word together, as we encourage one another in it, as we see it displayed in each others’ lives.  We grow in our appreciation of his love together.

 

Second you experience it by both comprehending it with your mind and knowing it with your heart.  We need to learn to think properly.  One of the dangers attached to love of any notion or sort is that we immediately think in emotional terms.  The path to our hearts leads through our minds.  The bible engages both our thoughts and our affections and we will have an impoverished experience of the love of Christ if it does not both engage the first and stir the second

 

Third, the love of Christ is surprisingly comprehensive.  Paul comes up with 4 dimensions – the breadth, the length, the height and the depth.  Christ’s love is measured by contemplating the depth to which he went to secure our salvation and the height to which he was then exalted.  But whatever way we seek to try to get our heads further around the love of Christ, the main and the plain thing is surely obvious: his love is limitless, in every way.

 

This is why comprehending the love of Christ is a matter of knowing the unknowable.  Paul prays that the Ephesians would “know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge.”  Our knowledge of the love of Christ, in our heads and our hearts, is an experiential knowledge, but it can never be an exhaustive knowledge.  We cannot exhaust the knowledge of the love of Christ.  There are dimensions to his love that will always remain beyond us, even as we come to appreciate more and more how vast it is.  Paul prays for and that we too can and should pray for.  You have the provision of God to you and his love shed abroad in your heart by the Holy Spirit.  You have the evidences of it, the indications of it, you see it see it in the lives of one another ... but ultimately there’s always more; and even as you enjoy this divine love, accurately describing or adequately defining it is always beyond you.

 

We cannot measure the love of Christ.  But we can observe its effects.  Paul prays for the Ephesian Christians to “know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.” (verse 19)  This doesn’t mean that we become divine; it does mean that we become the beneficiaries of all that God has promised to us in Jesus.

 

The Christian is fully, finally, irrevocably adopted by God the Father.  And we will spend the whole of our lives – the whole of eternity – developing and discovering the glory of this filial relationship with the creator.  Adoption is not an end in itself; it is just the beginning.

 

There is nothing greater that can be known or heard or experienced than that this God is your Father and that you are his child – that you can say you belong to him and are loved by him, that you can know you can come to him, can run to him, can pray to him.

 

There is an intimacy here – it’s not something that is simple cerebral or mechanistic.  It is the work of the Spirit, leading us into an ever-deepening response to God, causing us to wonder that we are God’s children by adoption, bringing us to look to God as our Father and enabling us to live as children of that father.

 

Paul wanted his friends to know the unknowable love of Christ and the intimate fatherly closeness of God.

 

CHAPTER 8 – CAN ALL THIS REALLY HAPPEN?

 

How could you possibly have an understanding of God’s power in your inner being?  How could you really have your eyes fixed on Christ and upon eternity?  How could you know God in such an intimate way?  How could you be filled up with all of his fullness?  How could your brothers and sisters in your church experience all those things?

 

By the ministry of the Holy Spirit you can change, as the Spirit, co-equal and co-eternal with God the Father and God the Son, goes to work to strengthen you “with power ... in your inner being” (Ephesians 3 verse 16).  The Christian changes as the Spirit brings home to their life and makes real in their life, the truth concerning God.  And knowing this, and trusting this, will prove more effective in bringing us to pray bigger and better than any new resolution or new routine ever can.  We need to know the power of the Spirit.

 

The work of the Spirit does not stop at conversion, that is just the start.  The “promised Holy Spirit” is not only “the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it” (Ephesians 1 verses 13 and 14); he is also the guarantee of our ongoing transformation, until we reach that inheritance. So it is the ongoing ministry of God the Holy Spirit that means that what Paul prays for the believer – for you and me – is possible.  And because it is possible, it is worth praying for.

 

We will need the Spirit to overcome our propensity to become distracted.

 

What will really set us free is an understanding of the immensity of the riches of God’s grace and glory in Christ, because then we are so transfixed with these that the sights cease to dazzle so brightly and the sounds stop proving to be so tempting.

 

I need to see Jesus in his glory.  And that is the work of the Spirit.  He can work in us to stop us being distracted, and instead be entranced by our Lord.

 

Christianity is about the work of the Spirit to call you, convert you and change you.

 

That starts not skin deep but heart deep – or, as Paul puts it, “in your inner being” (Ephesians 3 verse 16).

 

It’s the core that God is interested in and goes to work on because it’s the foundation of everything you are and all that you do.  It’s the part of you that isn’t obvious to people, it’s the real you.  It’s you on your own, it’s you in your bedroom, it’s you in your car and it’s the part of you that lasts forever.

 

Paul is saying that the Spirit’s power is at work in our inner selves.  The means that God uses to complete his purposes are these: preaching, prayer, fellowship and the proper use of the sacraments.  The truth is that when we choose to reject God’s chosen means by which the Spirit works, then we ought not to be surprised if we discover in our lives an absence of the strengthening power for which Paul prays. If we neglect the means, we miss out on the provision.

 

God is able – able to do what we ask.  He is able – able to do what we think of asking but aren’t sure that we can.  He is able – able to do far more than we even thought of asking.  There is nothing you can ask for, or think of asking for, about which he does not say, I am able to do better than that.

 

The encouragement (and command) is to come to God and ask him for big things.  Ask to be filled with his fullness, to be able to grasp the unknowable love of Christ, to live for the treasures of your future inheritance.

 

EPILOGUE – WHO WE PRAY FOR

 

We should have 3 sorts of people in mind when we pray:

 

First – ourselves.  Not for your health and wealth – not for an easy day or a promotion at work or respect from your kids – but for bigger things?

 

Second – those around us.  Our prayers reveal our priorities and our preoccupations; and as we listen in on Paul, we realise that his focus is on those who have become the objects of his concern and of his affection.  Paul prays for those he knows and loves who do not know and love Christ and eternal life through him; speaking of his Jewish relatives and countrymen, he tells the Roman church “Brothers, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for them is that they may be saved” (Romans 10 verse 1).  Paul prayed and his prayers surrounded the churches to whom he wrote.  He prayed big, spiritual, ambitious prayers for them.  It is always good to be praying more for others than for ourselves.  This reminds us that we are not the centre of the world and that our needs are not necessarily the most pressing in our churches.  Paul told the Ephesian church to “keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints, and also for me, that words may be given to me in opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of the gospel.” (Ephesians 6 verses 18 – 19

 

Time spent in prayer is never time wasted.

 

Pray for people’s salvation and their sanctification.

 

Thirdly – the third person for whose sake we pray is the One who is in focus at the end of Paul’s prayer in Ephesians 3: "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.” (Ephesians 3 verses 20 and 21)

 

Paul closes his prayer with a doxology – theologically informed praise of God.  He finishes by praying that God would get the glory he deserves.  He is the God who is perfect, powerful and infinitely, eternally praiseworthy.  Supremely, Paul is asking God to do it for God’s sake.  For, just as God’s glory was, is, and will be revealed “in Christ Jesus” so his glory is seen “in the church.”

 

It means that the communicable attributes of God – those qualities in God’s character which he also works to grow in his people – are displayed through his people.  His love and his faithfulness and his compassion and his goodness and his forgiveness and so on can be and should be seen in his church, so that throughout all of the ages in the church of Jesus Christ, men and women will encounter the glory of God.  God’s glory – his perfection which are invisible – are made visible in the transformation, that he has brought about in the lives of ordinary, redeemed men and women.

 

When a church is gripped by God’s grace – when its members focus their heart-eyes on Jesus and on eternity; when the buffeting of circumstances don’t shake their hope, and they live for the riches of knowing God rather than the fleeting treasures of this world; when they look to and live out of a power greater than themselves – then the glory of God is revealed in the Bride, just as it is in the Bridegroom.

 

So we pray big prayers.  We pray like Paul.  We pray for our own sake, for we are dependent creatures and we need the help of the God who is able to do what we are quite unable to do.  We pray for the sake of others, because what they most need from us is our prayers.  And, most of all, we pray for God’s sake; that the God who made us and died for us and rose for us and rules for us and will return to us might be glorified in our lives and in our churches.