God-Centered, Experiential Christianity

Introduction

Ephesians 3:14–21 ESV

For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom the whole family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to 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. 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.

RECAP- tell me what you remember so far

First half of Ephesians: no commands (doctrine/theology)

It’s easy for us to skip these parts and to go straight to the practical advice, but I think we miss the whole point if we do that. Christianity is not about doing the right things and not doing the wrong things. Christianity is about knowing God and about what He has done for us. So when we skip these sections and focus always on the practical side of things, we end up losing the gospel. The gospel is not about us saving ourselves, or about us doing the right things, the gospel is about God doing the right things for us.

“We foolishly think that the most important thing is to be practical. We agree that the practical is the most important; but the men who have accomplished most in this world have always been theologically-minded. A man who rushes into activity without studying theory is finally seen to be a fool. Think of a man who desires to begin to play with atomic power without knowing something about it!” -Martyn Lloyd-Jones

We need theology in order to be practical in our Christian lives. So I think what you’ll find is Paul knows this as he’s praying this prayer. You’ll notice that this prayer is utterly God-centered. It’s focused on Him and His character and His work, not us. He takes this doctrine that he’s been talking about and is still talking about and turns it into a prayer and praise of God.

Second half of Ephesians: practical next steps (how we should live in light of this theology)

This section is the transition

Theology- study of God

Doxology- praise to God

HAVE STUDENT READ PASSAGE

Prayer (vv. 14-19)

This is a long sentence, right? I know at least for me I read it and am thinking to myself “what?” So what we’re going to do is super briefly, with the time we have left, go through this passage and try to break it up to hopefully understand it just a little bit better. As I was reading and studying and praying through this passage, I’ve been struck with how deep this passage goes- there is so many riches here in this prayer, we could honesty spend hours upon hours considering everything in it and still not reach the bottom. Unfortunately, we don’t have hours upon hours, we have a few minutes. So, with the time that we have, my goal is to just do a brief overview of the prayer in order to figure out it’s base/what it’s at it’s simplest saying. That doesn’t mean we won’t talk about anything deep- this is a deep prayer after all- but it does mean that this is not the end. So I’d encourage you, go home and read through it again and maybe spend a few minutes just thinking about what we talked about and what else there is to be dug up in this text. Now with that being said, let’s begin with verse 14. READ VERSE 14

The first thing to notice is the phrase “for this reason”. Anytime you see something like this, such as “therefore” or “because of this”, we need to go back and look at the context before this passage to see what the author is referring to. In this scenario, Paul is actually continuing the prayer he started in Ephesians 3:1, where he begins the same way, saying “for this reason, I, Paul....” Verses 2-13 are a side thought, and in verse 14, the beginning of our passage, he returns to the thought he had at first and prays for the Ephesians. So, with the context not just of what came right before our passage but also what came right before Ephesians 3, the reason Paul is praying this is because of the fact that by grace, we have been given access to the Father, by the Son, through the Spirit. It’s the love and grace God has shown through Paul’s inspired writing in these first 3 chapters. And that truth- that theology of the work God has done for us in the gospel causes him to bow his knees. He falls down in humility before God, asking that this knowledge would become experiential to the Christians he’s writing to, which includes us.

So right here I want to pause and talk about this main idea that we see throughout this prayer, and I want to do that by teaching you guys a phrase, experiential Christianity. This phrase is not talking about basing our faith on our feelings- God is not a feeling, He is God. Rather, experiential Christianity, or experiential theology, at its root refers to Christ centered theology that the Holy Spirit applies to our hearts. It’s completely God-centered, yet it doesn’t leave out the reality that all of this theology needs to be something we don’t just know in our heads but experience in our hearts. That means it’s deeply affectional- our affections, our feelings, are deeply intertwined with this way of thinking about the Christian faith. This means that faith in Christ must apply to every area of our life, not just our heads or not just our actions. And as we’ll see in this passage, Paul brings this out by talking about being “filled with the fullness of God” and fully grasping the love of Christ Jesus towards us. So let’s continue on and see how this plays out.

In verse 15, Paul explains our relationship to “the Father” of verse 14. This phrase “from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named” is referring to all the believers of all ages. It can also be said from whom “the whole family”, which shows the unity of all believers. The phrase “is named” is talking about our adoption. God is like a Father to us in that for all those who place faith in Him, He adopts as His very own children. We are now made into one family with God as our head and each other as our brothers and sisters in Christ, meaning our name is now “child of God”. He goes on to say [READ VERSE 16]. In other words, according to the glory of God, Paul prays that Christians would be given a kind of strength that comes from God. There’s three things that He adds on to the second half of this prayer- (1) “with power”, (2) “through His Spirit”, and (3) “in your inner being”. There’s a lot we can talk about here, but I want us to notice something in particular- this strength does not come from us. This kind of strength comes from God’s power and God’s Spirit, not our own. So in other words, Paul is confessing complete dependence upon God here. We as believers are always in need of more strength to continue on in this life and continue on with our faith. Maybe you struggle to read your Bible, or you struggle to talk about God with your friends, or you struggle to want to come to church, or you struggle with lying, or cursing, or lust. Paul here sets an example for us that in the midst of our struggles, we should pray to God for His strength, saying “God give me the strength to want to read your Word” or “give me the strength to not lie or curse” or “God give me the strength to love You”. We need His strength for all things in life, and He promises to give us this strength if only we ask.

This next verse talks about another thing Paul is praying for, that is that Christ would dwell in the hearts of the Christians he is writing to. Have you guys ever heard someone say “you need to accept Jesus into your heart”, or when sharing their testimony, they talk about the first time they accepted Jesus into their hearts? Something that may be interesting to know is that this is the only time in entire New Testament where this idea of Jesus dwelling in our hearts is used. And if you look closer, you’ll realize He’s not actually talking about the first time a Christian places their faith in Christ. So what is he talking about? I would argue that Paul is praying for Christ, through the Holy Spirit living in believers, to transform the believers and to keep them persevering in the faith/to keep them strong in the faith. So here I want to pause and ask you again, are you struggling with your faith? Do you see your life slowly becoming more and more like Jesus over time, or does life look no different now than it did a year ago? When you think about God, or faith, or church, do you get excited, or do you kind of inwardly roll your eyes and move on to the next thing? If that’s you, let me encourage you to pray this prayer for yourself- to pray that Christ would transform you and give you the strength to continue on in life and in your faith, that you would love God more. And if you aren’t a Christian, or maybe you’re parents are Christian and bring you to church and you come to youth group but you aren’t really sure if you truly believe this for yourself, or if you really have the Holy Spirit inside of you, pray first that Christ would give you faith and that He would dwell in you by the Spirit for the first time. If that is you, make sure you also talk to someone, whether it’s a parent or a leader here- all of us would be overjoyed to help you think about all of that and pray for and with you. We need Christ’s power living in us and transforming us day by day.

So as we move on to the last section in Paul’s prayer, we see it focuses on the love of Christ.

Praise (vv. 20-21)

Questions

Why is it important to begin with knowing about God?