Ephesians

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Grasping Love by Faith

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“Love is layered throughout this passage and the dominate theme.  But none of our core samples of love are the same. In fact, this prayer passage itself suggests God’s diversity. The further away from the center of God’s fullness, the love textures become more dimensioned with reason and truth. They all have love in them but the closer we get to God’s fullness, the more dense is the love surrounding ‘fullness’.”  -GN

For this reason I bow my knees before the Father,  …  …  …

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,
That  you may be filled with all the fullness of God.    - Ephesians 3:14-19

We are continuing our look at this passage illustrated in the life of Elijah.  God exposed the breadth, length, height and depth of agape love through  power from where Elijah was standing inside the cave.  Watching God’s display,  protected by the cave, didn’t persuade. Elijah had just been God’s own instrument of power before Ahab and all Israel.  The wind, earthquake and fire may have been a reminder but not a revelation for Elijah. But it wasn’t God’s power he saw, it was His love. Fear had griped his heart driving him into the cave but he left  the cave in faithful submission to the lover of his soul.

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In Christ Jesus - March 22

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I was trapped! Trapped in my own cave, I couldn’t see how to get out of this passage. It’s a cave carved by Elijah’s scriptural experience and his human boundaries. How could this man experience God in such extreme, demonstrative ways, personally and graciously subjected to God’s power with the wind, earthquake and fire, go to the front of the cave, in response to God’s personal presence, and repeat the tripe justification of fleeing for his life after abandoning God’s station for him in Jezreel?  This is the “Elijah Complex”, and ours as well! It is being loved beyond our comprehension even though standing comfortably in our wobbly reasoning.

How often do we interpret our reason as God’s light? How often do we use God’s blessings to confirm our own desire? Even as we drill down within our own humanity, exposing frail vulnerabilities, we layer a veil over our heart, hardening against the effects of God’s wind, earthquakes and fire, His righteous love is administrating.  Without God’s mercy, without God’s grace, we are lost! We have no means to see God’s righteousness and even more blatantly, we are powerless to walk in His truth without continuous and constant grace. 

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In Christ Jesus - February 22

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We have been “Drilling Down” this past year unlocking God’s word in our heart and mind. It has been percolation time for God’s word within our very soul, “dwelling richly,” filling us with the fullness of God.  However, as we began looking at Paul’s Ephesian prayer, in chapter 3, we began “fracking”  from inside at different angles.  We recognized how variable is our own capacity according to God’s grace and purpose.  Now, we want to observe God’s spiritual geological formations surrounding His fullness. Paul paints a cross-section of love, in this prayer passage, that encapsulates God’s fullness.  Penetrating God’s love is a requirement. Filling our fullness is receiving love out of His fullness.   

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In Christ Jesus - Feb 1

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This isn’t our last probe into being “filled with the fullness of God.”  But we must start “drilling up” to the love of Christ surpassing knowledge (Eph. 3:14-19). The way Paul puts it, love is a condition for being filled with the fullness of God. But first, we want to be realistic about what Paul means by  “filled with all the fullness of God”. We won’t leave our discussion with all the answers but perhaps we can measure its meaning within our understanding.  As we journey in faith, God is ever increasing our capacity to receive more grace (Romans 5). So, since we are not removed from God’s spiritually organic activity, “being filled with all the fullness of God,” we focus our soul’s attention in other directions as God maintains His work within us. Let us not forget, it is God working within us, to will  and do according to His good pleasure (Philippians 2:13). His faithful work in us continues while our mind is otherwise engaged (Philippians 1:6). This is pictured for us in 1Kings 17ff as we probe this remarkable man Elijah. 

After about two years alone with the birds, the brook and God, Elijah is now ready to be strengthened in his faith and tempered for Ahab at Zarepath. First, the widow who did not have the resources to do what Elijah required. Exhausted of resources, the widow submits to God through Elijah and proves God’s faithfulness. Second, bringing back to life what God  had already promised to sustain. God seals Elijah by putting divine power into Elijah’s hand for use restoring life into the widow’s son.  God affirms Elijah showing His power to others through him and allowing Elijah to experience God’s reality in God’s service of love and judgment.

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Fullness of God

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I’m still in AZ … until Tuesday and we are still doing the “fullness of God” in Paul’s prayer for the Ephesians. Last week we offered a thought on the subject in lieu of our regular GN-SR. This week we would like to do the same plus offer last week’s comment, edited!

There is another very important aspect of this passage requiring our attention. The translation,”filled WITH all the fullness of God” give us the sense that we can be filled with all that God is. This is not what the Greek text wants to convey. It is generally agreed by scholarship that what is intended is “with respect to God.” In other words man can not contain all that God is but there attributes of God that can be conveyed to people while others cannot. For example, God is everywhere at the same time while man cannot experience this state of being. God is immutable, unchangeable, while people are not only fickle but change to accommodate their knowledge and God is already all knowing.

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In Christ Jesus - Dec 21

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We began a  “reverse drill down” last week on the following prayer of Paul to saints in Ephesus: 

 For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according 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 – that you, 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, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.
– Ephesians 3:14-19.

Paul is giving us the things necessary to be “filled with all the fullness of God”.  This is the climax of his prayer so if we start with the premise that, indeed, we do want to be filled with the fullness of God, lets reverse engineer Paul’s prayer from the “fullness of God”, working our way backwards to where Paul kneels in prayer for the saints. In this way, we can identify the hinge points, the markers Paul uses, from praying on his knees to being “filled with all the fullness of God.”

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In Christ Jesus - Dec 14

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This is one of Paul’s prayers for the saints in Ephesus:

 For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according 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 – that you, 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, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.
– Ephesians 3:14-19.

This is a marvelous prayer. It is spiritually layered from bowing on Paul’s knees to that upward place of being “filled with all the fullness of God.”  On the surface it may seem artificial or symbolic. How many people do you know who are filled with all the fullness of God?  Yet, Paul didn’t speak in euphemisms. He was focused on being a pastor rather than a theologian. His constant desire was people to experience life in Christ Jesus in very practical ways. The early Christians were actually called people in “the way” (Acts 9:2).

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In Christ Jesus - Nov 23

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Our life in Christ operates in two scriptural modes. One is grace, the other is faith. Grace is God’s love to us and faith is our response. It is God’s power that makes both effective. 

We have been drilling down the terms in 1 Corinthians 1:30 giving us an In Christ Jesus focus. We considered wisdom from a human point of view, i.e., being able to discern God’s truth.  Then, we considered righteousness as the vital 2 Corinthians 5:17 union of a believer with God. Righteousness is God the Father’s nature birthed into each of His adopted children. Last week we reviewed sanctification as God’s purpose for us in Christ Jesus and our own purposeful commitment making His righteousness in us visible to others. Sanctification is the work of the Holy Spirit. 

Now we come redemption, the third term in our verse. The verse puts it this way. “And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom of God, righteousness, sanctification and redemption.” Jesus Christ became to us the wisdom of God. Wisdom is made known to us through righteousness, sanctification and redemption. This is God’s wisdom coming through Jesus Christ because we are in Him. Our wisdom focus is from our human perspective but the verse’s concern is righteousness, sanctification and redemption in Christ Jesus. 

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In Christ Jesus - Nov 16

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Our union in Christ is much more than an association with Jesus.  An association with Jesus is, in essence, having a “position” in Christ because we are justified. This popular seminary explanation of being in Christ tells us little, it is limited and lacking (l&l). When you hear, “It is our ‘position’ in Christ”, it is a hollow sound ringing out a warning.  The noise is academia creating structure for the church where Christ’s life is not seen yielding His power in resurrected lives. 

We are not challenging the validity of our position in Christ, it is most certainly true and does speak to our justification. Like many things containing truth, we get a warped sense of our identity when this is all we hear. We would go so far as to say, it actually vitiates our effectiveness, creating a skeleton without any tissue and mussel.

Justification will be more central to our discussion on righteousness in Christ, but we need to provide some mediation for our harsh observation. Yes, we are judged righteous through God’s sacrifice of Jesus for our sin, as expressed in the Greek aorist tense (Romans 5:1), telling us it was a completed act.  It is also expressed in Romans 3:24 in the continuous present tense, telling us justification is also ongoing for the believer who is justified once and forever in the aorist tense. In other words, our justification or our “no condemnation” in Christ (Rom. 8:1) is also our resurrected Lord living in our mortal bodies giving ongoing righteous life, justifying us as sure as He is in us and we are in Him. So, while we are positionally, in Him justified, He is also working his righteous work in us so that the essence of who we are is also being expressed through our polluted souls as we are glorifying Him. No, we are not talking about sanctification, this is in addition to sanctification. 

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In Christ Jesus - Nov 9

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There are two scriptural modes in which our life in Christ operates. One is grace and the other is faith. Grace is God’s ministry of love to us and faith is our response to his grace. It is God’s power, however, providing context for God’s love through grace and faith. 

We are discussing the amazing gift of righteousness given to every believer in Christ Jesus (Romans 3:24). This is Paul’s theme in Romans where he proves we are no longer condemned since we have been made righteous, created into a union with God through Jesus His Son. We also became sanctified but sanctification is totally different and separate from being righteousness in Christ. It is important, however, to view righteousness outside the scope of sanctification because it is!

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In Christ Jesus - Nov 2

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There are two scriptural descriptions for the modes in which our life in Christ operates. One is grace and the other is faith. Grace is God’s ministry of love to us and faith is our response to God’s love and grace. It is God’s power, however, providing context for love-grace and faith. 

Last week we looked at discernment-wisdom as our response to God’s provision of love-grace. The same principal of love-grace and faith apply as we switch our focus to righteousness. Love and grace are constant companions for believers in Christ. No one can snatch us out of the Father’s hand (John 10-29). Love and grace are fundamental to our relationship in Christ and the fullness of our faith.  Our faith effects (not affects) knowledge, wisdom, behavior and hope including the smile on our face. 

Grace and faith are context shepherding our focus on righteousness.  Because of God we are in Christ who became our righteousness.  We alluded last week to the relationship between justification and righteousness. 

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In Christ Jesus - Oct 26

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There are two scriptural descriptions for the modes in which our life in Christ operates. One is grace and the other is faith. Grace is God’s ministry of love to us and faith is our response to God’s love. It is God’s power, however, providing context for love-grace and faith. 

Last week we looked at discernment as our response to God’s provision of wisdom. God’s wisdom is contained within His measure of grace. Discernment is a skill set we have responding to God’s grace. In other words, discernment is God’s grace upon grace as we acquire God’s wisdom in faith.

Faith is “willing” our soul into action. Notice, discernment is a skill set we acquire through action we take. “Our powers of discernment have been trained by constant practice” is the way the writer to the Hebrews put it in 5:14. Our “will” is key in responding to God’s grace. Some default to mind’s reason and let “facts” rule our behavior. Others default to feelings or our heart’s desire to prejudice what we do. Our soul follows what we ”will” it to do. Either way, it is our responsibility.

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In Christ Jesus - Oct 19

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Our union in Christ is much more than an association with Jesus.  An association with Jesus is, in essence, having a “position” in Christ because we are justified. This popular seminary explanation of being in Christ tells us little; it is limited and lacking (l&l). When you hear, “It is our ‘position’ in Christ”, it is a hollow sound ringing out a warning.  The noise is academia creating structure for the church where Christ’s life is not seen yielding His power in resurrected lives. 

We are not challenging the validity of our position in Christ; it is most certainly true and does speak to our justification. Like many things containing truth, we get a warped sense of our identity when this is all we hear. We would go so far as to say, it actually vitiates our effectiveness, creating a skeleton without any tissue and muscle.

Justification will be more central to our discussion on righteousness in Christ, but we need to provide some mediation for our harsh observation. Yes, we are judged righteous through God’s sacrifice of Jesus for our sin, as expressed in the Greek aorist tense (Romans 5:1), telling us it was a completed act.  It is also expressed in Romans 3:24 in the continuous present tense, telling us justification is also ongoing for the believer who is justified once and forever in the aorist tense. In other words, our justification or our “no condemnation” in Christ (Rom. 8:1) is also our resurrected Lord living in our mortal bodies giving ongoing righteous life, justifying us as sure as He is in us and we are in Him.

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In Christ: The Mystery of Grace

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Peter tells us the angels in heaven look at us in wonder because we have a salvation completed in Christ Jesus Himself (1 Peter 1:12).   In fact, as we read the first chapter of 1Peter, we cannot turn away without being awe struck by God’s grace, which we possess in Christ Jesus.  We are the benefactors of God’s love in such an astounding way, a way we actually distort trying shape it and size it into our inadequate capacity to understand.

Understanding the mystery of being in Christ, and becoming an effective minister in our “niche” capacities, is one of our challenges. Paul tells us through his letter to the Ephesians, “speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into Him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love” (Ephesians 4:15-16). 

The three New Testament passages used for teaching spiritual gifts for believers are 1 Corinthians 12, Romans 12 and Ephesians 4. The first two are more “list” focused and the Ephesians passage, which I prefer, is more “function” focused.

While it is important to express our “niche” capacities in spiritual ministry, our primary focus is to grow up into Christ who is the head of His body.  Maturity in Christ gives us a far better yield of our fruit we bear and enables us to grow in faith.

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In Christ: Prologue

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My ministry “niche” has been identified by a local Pullman pastor.  

I didn’t take offence, but I did give it some later thought.  How easy it is for us to put physical form to spiritual character. But the message I distilled from his comment has more to do with the shape our gospel takes in our mind because we dimension the Spirit.  When we do this, it takes us immediately out of faith into spiritual management.

This was a constant problem for the disciples and Jesus’ response? “Where is your faith?” (Luke 8:22-25), “Is your heart hardened?” (Mark 8:17)  Whatever does not proceed from faith is sin (Romans 14:23b).

The Bible was not written to defend the deity of Jesus, or to prove the trinity. It is not intended as a thesis for theological debate. It is God’s own living Word from Creator to creation. More specifically, it is written to those whom God loves.

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Milt to Maturity: Spiritual Anatomy - 7

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We are remiss exiting this spiritual anatomy discussion without connecting to scriptural teaching about the Body of Christ (1 Corinthians 12:27). We tend to focus exclusively on being “individual members of it.” 

Jesus Himself makes the point for us in John 17:21,

“That they all may be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me.”

Our connection to the Body of Christ seems secondary because we are insecure about our primary relationship in Christ. Grace is a relationship! The “Body” is interpreted as the church, where we gather to satisfy social needs while becoming spirituality religious. Nurturing a relationship with a living Person is not a religion.

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Milk to Maturity: Spiritual Anatomy - 4

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Our anatomy discussions have been focusing on discernment, not just good v. evil but spiritual “things” exposed in our temporal and corporeal experience.  In Adam, we are spiritually dead and totally bonded to time and space references. This all changes when we are born again. Our essence becomes eternal and we are faced with dilemmas of blending spiritual realities into corporeal experience. 

Our spiritual “things”, however, turn into genuine, quality realities as we move from drinking milk and begin digesting spiritual meat. The “things” in our life turn out to be elements of deep relationships and the “things” become tools in growing out of circumstances into grace by faith. 

Paul tells us in Romans 5 that since we have been justified by faith we not only have peace with God but we also have access by faith into grace in which we now stand. It is this moving into our grace relationship by faith that changes circumstances into opportunities for moving from milk to maturity. The important “things” in our natural life, our temporal and corporeal life, becomes a smaller part of a much bigger reality challenging our comfort zones.

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Lord, give me a Doxology!

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I attended 4th Presbyterian Church in Spokane, Washington during my Junior High and High School years.  We sang the doxology every Sunday.

        Praise God, from whom all blessings flow;
        Praise him all creatures here below;
        Praise him above, ye heavenly hosts;
        Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost! 
        Amen.

I was a young 2 Corinthians 5:17 Christian, naïve and completely unaware of the snares and pitfalls of life.  I rushed through open doors and experienced successes and black belt punishments.  I didn't know I was justified, sanctified or holy but suspected I was called to bear the name of Jesus.  I played ball, ran track and tried to stay out of trouble.

Singing the doxology every Sunday was a comfort but I didn’t know why.  I didn't know theology or the meanings behind the gospel message.  Why  was I being protected, nurtured and gently guided by God?  I don't know,  perhaps the fruit of praying grandmothers.  

Years later, in Menlo Park, CA., I ran into Helen Asazawa. She was passing through the neighborhood the spring of 1964 heading for grad school in Seattle.  I needed someone special … and she was very special and so much more.