At week’s end, let’s leave the gospel and look at the epistle reading appointed for Sunday, from Paul’s letter to the church at Ephesus. There may be more than one letter contained in this document, as this section from the end of chapter 3 is a clear sign-off. (Chapters 4, 5 and 6 start new threads.) This “sign-off” is a beautiful, doxological prayer from the heart for Paul’s listeners – and, I think, all those who would be followers of Christ. So let’s hear these words for ourselves: "I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth takes its name."
Paul begins as all prayers should, acknowledging the One to whom the prayer is made, the One who often has inspired the prayer in the first place. This naming of God, Father, Source roots us in the relationship of which our prayer is an expression. Then Paul asks of that Source specific gifts for his beloved: "I pray that, according to the riches of his glory, he may grant that you may be strengthened in your inner being with power through his Spirit, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love."
How wonderful to think of being strengthened on the inside, that Christ might dwell in our hearts as we are rooted and grounded in love. Let’s stay with that for a moment – if Christ dwells in our hearts, we are rooted and grounded in love. Not rooted in condemnation or grounded in despair – rooted and grounded in love. Wow. Christ does dwell in us, by virtue of God’s promise to us in baptism, activated by our faith – so love is our foundation. Think about starting each day with that knowledge.
Yet Paul knows how hard it is to hold that knowledge and live in it, so next he prays that his listeners – and all the saints, which includes us – may have the ability to grasp the full extent of that love:
"I pray that you may have the power 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, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God."
“To know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge.” Our minds alone cannot know the fullness of God’s love; our minds are too small to contain such a mystery. We need to know it in our bodies, in our senses, in the beauty and intricacy and grandeur that surrounds us in this world, and in our spirits. And we really only begin to grasp the extent of that love in community with others trying to know it. I daresay only in community can we be filled with the fullness of God.
“To know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge.” Our minds alone cannot know the fullness of God’s love; our minds are too small to contain such a mystery. We need to know it in our bodies, in our senses, in the beauty and intricacy and grandeur that surrounds us in this world, and in our spirits. And we really only begin to grasp the extent of that love in community with others trying to know it. I daresay only in community can we be filled with the fullness of God.
So Paul ends with this doxology, recognizing that we are entirely reliant upon the power of God to know and to act out of the fullness of that love: "Now to him who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen."
God’s power – the power that made the heavens and the galaxies and the complexity of each cell – is at work in each of us. And that power, not our own, enables us to accomplish things far beyond the realm of the possible, even more than we can imagine. Only one thing is up to us, really: to invite and release that power, to believe that God can accomplish abundantly more than we can ask or imagine. If we just leave it sitting inside, nothing in this world will change. But if we let it out – look out! Love can change everything.
To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here.
No comments:
Post a Comment