The Power to Know Love

Surely you have heard about the administration of God’s grace that was given to me for you, that is, the mystery made known to me by revelation, as I have already written briefly. In reading this, then, you will be able to understand my insight into the mystery of Christ, which was not made known to people in other generations as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to God’s holy apostles and prophets.

This mystery is that through the gospel the Gentiles are heirs together with Israel, members together of one body, and sharers together in the promise in Christ Jesus.

I became a servant of this gospel by the gift of God’s grace given me through the working of his power. Although I am less than the least of all the Lord’s people, this grace was given me: to preach to the Gentiles the boundless riches of Christ, and to make plain to everyone the administration of this mystery, which for ages past was kept hidden in God, who created all things. His intent was that now, through the church, the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms, according to his eternal purpose that he accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord. In him and through faith in him we may approach God with freedom and confidence.‌

I ask you, therefore, not to be discouraged because of my sufferings for you, which are your glory.

For this reason I kneel before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name, constantly praying that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.”

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Introduction

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(Introductory Activity):

- Me: Jesus loves me, this I know,

o Congregation: for the Bible tells me so.

- Me: Little ones to him belong; they are weak,

o Congregation: but he is strong.

- Me: Yes, Jesus

o Congregation: loves me!

- Me: Yes, Jesus

o Congregation: loves me!

- Me: Yes, Jesus

o Congregation: loves me!‌

- Me: The Bible

o Congregation: tells me so.

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Give yourselves a hand that was awesome!!!... How many of you actually remember learning and singing that in Sunday School, as children? I remember certain instances of singing that song. Do you want to know what else I remember? “Jesus loves me this I know… but if I dishonor my parents I wont have long life…” “Little ones to him belong… and if you lust after that cute girl in the front row you’re committing adultery and God disapproves of you.”… “…But he is strong,… strong enough to save but also condemn the sinners who don’t repent, believe in Jesus, come to the front row in front of a ton of strangers and be expected to disciple themselves even though many churches back then were more focused on evangelism and growing numbers rather than teaching people the heart of God, the ways of Jesus, and thus making disciples of Christ rather than shallow Christians who would later question their faith rather than lean on the heart of Jesus…..” Some of you may not remember that version of the song, but that’s okay there is grace for you today, amen?

I grew up in the church. I grew up going to many churches, serving under many pastors and leaders, and I’ve been poured into by many philosophies and theologies that had no harmonies in between. I was a good kid for the most part, but I still had my moments where I acted out and my parents, meaning well, used Scripture to encourage obedience and proper behavior in their house. My pastors, meaning well, wanted people to know the Gospel, wanted their leaders to represent them and the church well, so naturally they would use Scripture to encourage a certain way of living, leading, serving and behaving in their churches. All the while, on the other hand they would be proclaiming the message of grace, God’s mercy, especially the story of this man Jesus who died on the cross, was buried for three days, and rose again from the dead, conquering death and hell forever.

Early on, my faith was about doing the right things to please God. It was about trusting in my discipline of faith and obedience to the church and my superiors so that I would have God’s approval. Naturally, my heart developed a desire to do everything I could to please God and close the distance. I had believed that distance would only grow smaller if: I did my best, kept my sinning to a minimum, listened to my parents, and did good in school… but deep in my heart, in my soul, the view I had of God was that he was a wrathful harsh god who would never approve of me, let alone love me. What that lie created was a super small view of who God really is.

When I met Pastor Tim Norton, one of the hardest questions he always was, “How is your soul today?”… That’s a great question, Tim, ya rascal. It would always trip me up. How do you answer that question when you know your soul isn’t where you want it to be?... If you asked me the question not that many years ago, I would be terrified of confessing the answer. God had called me to ministry, but deep down I still struggled with being part of God’s family and wondering, am I loved by God? If that’s my foundation, it’s already hard enough to be a Christian, let alone be a leader in a church. It was already hard enough believing deep down that God’s first instinct is judgement and wrath, let alone be somebody to tell others to obey and repent “don’t worry, Jesus will protect you.” It was already hard enough to deal with the toxicity of certain dynamics with close relationships in my life, as I struggled with wanting connection and to feel love, and then to tell others of Jesus and all that a relationship with him entails like restoration or being made whole?

I can’t help but repeat Paul’s prayer over and over, “to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us,” because today I stand before you as one who knows what it is like to do with all my strength to please God, as an outsider of the holiest among us, I also stand here today as one who knows what it is like, to be thrown down to the ground, with all the broken shards of sin’s deception and lies around me, as I beheld Jesus having compassion me, looking upon me with love in his eyes, and revealing to me this simple but profound truth: by his blood, all believers were made one in him, and all believers are incomprehensibly loved by our Lord and God, Jesus the Christ.

‌By his blood, all believers were made one in him, and all believers are incomprehensibly loved by our Lord and God, Jesus the Christ.

‌I’m going to speak a lot about Paul for a moment, and please don’t misunderstand me: to us, Paul was an amazing apostle who suffered much for the glory of Christ, but as we look into his life and his letter to the church, let’s bear in our hearts that he is only our brother in Jesus, he points all believers and saints to look to Christ as the ultimate Lord and Teacher and Savior of us all. Paul was simply an instrument, a pen and paper if you will, to share with us the heart of Jesus for his people. Amen?

With that said,… I love Paul. My man was absolutely transformed by Jesus and the church throughout the ages has benefited from his ministry, from his heart to guide the churches along the true path of discipleship, and thank God he was on our side because not only was he brilliant, but he fell in love with Jesus and lived his days declaring the love of Jesus for all mankind.

Paul’s experience and my resonance with him

I want to emphasize the prayer at the end of chapter 3 of Ephesians for today’s message, but before we read that again, I want us to align our hearts with Paul’s intentions for this letter. First, let’s think about what Paul says in Ephesians 3, that he is “less than the least of all the Lord’s people.” In many ways I resonate with that statement. Paul, was a religious elite, Pharisee of Pharisees, and saw fit to persecute the church for the glory of God, to do what he thought was best to earn God’s stamp of approval. But what happened not too long after the events of Easter?... He was met with the risen Lord Jesus, thrown on the ground and his whole worldview was shattered and rebuilt in the light of Jesus. Can anyone resonate with our brother Paul today? At first, he doubted and struggled with the message of Christ to the point of persecuting the church. Then with his own eyes he witnessed the Lord. From that point, he would spend time with the disciples, hear the whole Gospel for himself, and be called out to not just the Jews but the Gentiles to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Think about that:… I am willing to bet, if I can say that behind the pulpit, that Paul was a witness at the cross, he might’ve have spit on Jesus with the rest of the Pharisees on the way to the cross. He had made up his mind and went his way as Christ died a most gruesome death. What in the world takes a man like that and moves him to the man we find saying these words in Ephesians? Nothing other than what he writes in his own words, Ephesians 2:3-6, “[We] deserved, by nature, the wrath of God. But, because of God’s great love for us, because of God who is rich in mercy, he made us alive with Christ even though we deserved death. By grace we have been saved. By grace, God chose to raise us up with Jesus and we were seated with him in glory in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus.”

What that means is that in Christ Jesus, we see the full picture of the God we serve. This old picture of a God who is first judgmental and wrathful then maybe merciful is actually the opposite. God has such a great love for us, he is so rich in mercy, (and who knows that if we’re talking about God’s riches, there’s no end to his riches), but God in his great love and mercy for us, made us alive in Jesus Christ and saved us all because of his grace. Not because anything I have done, not because of anything you have done, but because of the grace, mercy and especially the love of God.

*MIND EXPLOSION*

Let me tell you, there came a point in seminary when I encountered a moment I’ll call: the “I’ve been living a lie” moment. Remember how I mentioned that for many years I had this underlying picture of God that was harsh, mean, doomsday, fire and brimstone… and then Jesus had to be the one to say, “ Father, please, take a chill pill on my homies.”

The moment I realized how wrong I was in thinking that was when I began to slow down and really read my Bible, specifically, the Old Testament,…specifically, the first five books of Moses…

The Old Testament Perspective of God

Maybe I’m the only one here, but is anyone else ever intimidated when they do their annual, “let’s try to read the whole Bible in a year plan” and arrive at Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy? I’ve read through them plenty of times and they don’t stop being intimidating, but I will say, the more you spend time with the Word of God, it will always positively change how you feel about the God we serve.

The moment came in Deuteronomy 7:6-12: “For you [Israel] are a people holy to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession, out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth. It was not because you were more in number than any other people that the Lord set his love on you and chose you, for you were the fewest of all peoples, but it is because the Lord loves you and is keeping the oath that he swore to your fathers, that the Lord has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt…”

I don’t know about you but whenever I read the Lord loves you in the Old Testament it still shocks me. It’s the way I grew up thinking about the Bible that God doesn’t show his love until the new testament and yet right here, Moses tells his people how much the Lord loves them and how he showed it by saving them from their misery from Egypt. “The Lord loves you,” even after the doubting, the complaining, the idolatry, the spiritual infidelity,… “Israel, the Lord loves you”…

Three chapters later I ended up reading this in Deuteronomy 10:17-20,

“…For the Lord your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God, who is not partial and takes no bribe. He executes justice for the fatherless and the widow, and loves the sojourner, giving him food and clothing. Love the sojourner, therefore, for you were sojourners in the land of Egypt. You shall fear the Lord your God.”

For Israel to fear the Lord their God meant to love others, even people outside the community of Israel, and to give them food and clothing and take care of them as God took care of Israel.

I wonder if there is a few us here today who needed to be shown for the first time, or reminded, that from the beginning of the Scriptures, God shows us who he is and has never, nor will ever change. What we find Paul revealing to us in Ephesians then is two-fold, God from the beginning had not only Israel on his heart, but also the people of the world, and what he had in mind for them would not be fully realized until the incarnation of the Son of God.

‌‌By the blood of Jesus, all believers were made one in him, and all believers are incomprehensibly loved by our Lord and God, Jesus the Christ.

There were many hints throughout the Old Testament of what God had in mind for all the nations of the world , the Gentiles, I had planned to read many passages for us today, but let’s be honest, MOSES GOTS TO EAT SOON… So I invite you to look at Genesis 12 and 17, Exodus 34, Deuteronomy 32, 2 Samuel 22, 1 Kings 8, Psalms 18 and 117, as well as Isaiah 11and 56, to name a few. As Paul mentions, there was a grand mystery God had in mind that he only hinted under the Old Covenant, and was fully realized when the New Covenant was inaugurated and sealed by the precious blood of Jesus.

God has never changed. Paul writes to a church, a perhaps a group of churches, who are struggling with the intermingling of Jews and Gentlies, the intermingling of circumcision or uncircumcision, intermingling of strict religiosity and liberal, self-fufilling living…. And he tells them that under Jesus, through faith in him, we are not a myriad of different groups vying for God’s attention… we are made one, united, connected, with no more outsiders.

Ephesians 3:8-9 Paul calls it a “grace given to [him]: to preach to the Gentiles the boundless riches of Christ and to make this mystery so plain to everyone”…. What is he trying to make plain? Chapter 3:12, “That in God, in Christ Jesus our Lord, in him and through faith in him, we all (Jew and Gentile, men and women, all the people of the world, regardless of your background, regardless of your history, regardless of whether or not you like traditional or contemporary worship in church) in Jesus we all may approach God with freedom and confidence…”

Remember, that at the start of chapter 3, Paul says, “For this reason…” he repeats that reason, the hope and joy for the Gentiles, we are one family, brothers and sisters, redeemed and made whole, but Paul is leading the church to understand what his hope is for the church, to grasp, to understand, to internalize something deeper and wider than anything else that involves Jesus Christ.

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Closing - The Prayer for strength

Ephesians 3:14-19, in the Greek, is one long sentence, and I would translate it like this:‌

“For this reason I constantly bow my knees [in prayer] before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that out of the riches of his glory he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, in your soul, so that Christ may dwell and build his home in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength [the power through his Spirit] to comprehend, to grasp more and more everyday, with all the saints [all the Lord’s holy people] how wide and long and high and deep is love of [Jesus] Christ, and [I pray that you may have the strength to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, [all so] that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.”

I have no idea how to simplify that or make it any more clear. If I could make the bold attempt to give you my simplified summary: “For this reason, I am always praying for you that God, through his Spirit, would give you the strength you need to fully grasp and to fully know just how much Jesus loves you.”‌

Paul is most likely under house arrest in Rome as he wrote this. As he writes to the church, picture him wondering what he should say to them, what is the key truth he desires them to know and live into. The church is experiencing some conflict and inner turmoil due to some important leaders arguing and disagreeing leading the whole church to be divided, whatever the issue is. And in light of that, Paul’s deepest desire and priority for them, for all the saints, is that they would be filled with strength, with power, to comprehend the vastness of the love of Jesus for them.

You can’t comprehend fully what is incomprehensible. We are weak and incapable of grasping fully anything that relates to our Holy God. But in his grace, in his mercy, in his love, the Holy Spirit reveals to us, and gives this weak, sinful, mortal man, strength and power to rise, to look up, and to behold a God who loves me, a God who sees me and knows me and loves me. And this love is so vast, it’s like if I were to try to measure the boundaries of a lake only to realize I’m walking along the shore of the ocean with no end in sight. It’s like trying to capture the sky in a painting, but each time I look up, the sky increases in height and depth.

This love is for you today. Brothers and sisters, on this Lord’s day a week after Easter, I want you to know that the risen Lord Jesus did not die for the perfect, for the holy,… As Romans 5 says, “For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly… God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”

He is alive, he is risen. And he loves you beyond your wildest imaginations. There is nothing you can do to change his love… How would your life change if you began to pray for power to grasp just a little bit of how much God loves you?

‌‌By the blood of Jesus, all believers were made one in him, and all believers are incomprehensibly loved by our Lord and our God, Jesus the Christ.

Amen?

Would you pray with me?

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