The Productive Prayer Life of Paul-Ephesians 3.14-21 (Doctrinal Bible Church in Huntsville, Alabama)

Doctrinal Bible Church

Pastor-Teacher Bill Wenstrom

Wednesday December 10, 2025

Prayer Series: The Productive Prayer Life of Paul-Ephesians 3:14-21

Lesson # 30

Ephesians 3:14 For this reason I kneel before the Father, 15 from whom his whole family in heaven and on earth derives its name. 16 I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, 17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, 18 may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, 19 and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. (NIV)

Ephesians 3:14 resumes Paul’s thought from Ephesians 3:1 because he interrupts his thought in order to present an autobiographical digression in Ephesians 3:2-13.

“For this reason” marks the contents of Ephesians 2:11-22 as the basis or the reason for Paul’sintercessory prayer in Ephesians 3:14-21.

This indicates that this second intercessory is based upon the Father’s eternal purpose of creating a new humanity, which is composed of both regenerate Jews and Gentiles, who are under the headship of His Son, Jesus Christ.

In Ephesians 3:16, the noun ploutos (πλοῦτος), “riches” is used in a figurative sense to refer to a spiritual and material abundance of material and spiritual possessions and spiritual resources possessed by God the Father or in other words, it is used figuratively of the spiritual and material wealth or prosperity of the Father.

The noun doxa (δόξα), “glorious” refers to the honor, which is accorded to that which characterizes the Father and the splendor which characterizes Him and speaks of the fact that the Father is a transcendent being in that He exceeds the limits of human and angelic understanding and experience.

Paul is praying that the recipients of this letter will be strengthened in their inner being or new nature according to the wealth produced by the Father’s glory, i.e., the manifestation of His transcendent character and nature which was accomplished through the work of the Son and the Spirit, “by means of” power through the personal intermediate agency of the Holy Spirit.

Now, in Ephesians 3:16, the noun pneuma (πνεῦμα), “Spirit” refers of course to the Holy Spirit and is the object of the preposition dia (διά), which functions as a marker of personal intermediate agency, which indicates that the Father will strengthen the recipients of this letter with power for the benefit of their new Christ nature “through the personal intermediate agency of the Spirit.”

The noun anthrōpos (ἄνθρωπος), “being” speaks of the unique person of history, Jesus Christ, who is the head of the new creation in contrast to the head of the old humanity whose head is the first human being, Adam.

This word is modified by the adverb of location esō (ἔσω) which identifies the location of this new humanity or the new head of the human race is located, namely, within the human body and soul of the church age believer.

The noun anthrōpos (ἄνθρωπος) is the object of the preposition eis (εἰς), which indicates that it is “for the benefit of” the inner new humanity of these church age believers that they are strengthened by means of power through the post-justification work of the Holy Spirit.

Paul’s Spirit inspired desire that the Father would cause each one of the recipients of this epistle, to be given strength by means of power through the personal intermediate agency of the Holy Spirit, would result in this new nature of Christ gaining more and more control over the hearts of these Christians and thus, the old Adamic sin nature would have less control over their hearts.

This is why Paul asserts in Ephesians 3:17 that as a result of the Father answering this prayer request, Christ will dwell in their hearts through faith.

In Ephesians 3:17, the verb katoikeō (κατοικέω), “may dwell” speaks of the power of Christ taking possession of their thoughts or mental activity, their frame of reference and memory center as well as their vocabulary and classification of thoughts, including their conscience and subconscious and lastly, their volition.

The noun pistis (πίστις), “faith” does not refer to justifying faith but rather to the post-justification faith in the Spirit contents of this epistle by the recipients of this epistle, which is indicated by the fact that Paul is writing to those Gentile sinners who have already been declared justified by the Father through faith in His Son.

This noun is the object of the preposition dia (διά), which functions as a marker of means, which would indicate that the post-justification faith of the recipients of this epistle is “the means by which” the power of Christ dwells in their hearts.

The noun agapē (ἀγάπη), “divine-love” refers to the exercise of divine-love because it originates from the character and nature of the triune God (1 John 4:8) and is also reproduced in the believer by the Spirit when the believer exercises faith in the Spirit inspired contents of Scripture and in context, the Ephesian epistle (Gal. 5:22-23).

This post-justification faith provides the church age believer the capacity to practice the command to love another as Christ loves them.

The noun agapē (ἀγάπη) is the object of the preposition en (ἐν), which indicates that the practice of the love of God is “the means by which” the recipients of this epistle are rooted and grounded spiritually or in other words, strengthened spiritually to execute the Father’s will for their life.

Now, in Ephesians 3:17, the verb rhizoō (ῥιζόω) refers to these Gentile church age believers “being firmly rooted” or “strengthened spiritually” by the practice of the love of God in their lives as a result of obeying the Lord’s command to do so.

It functions as a participle of cause, which indicates that these Gentile church age believers would be able to comprehend with all the saints, what is the breath, length, height and depth of Christ’s love for them “because” they have been firmly rooted by means of obeying the Lord’s command to love one another.

Now, in Ephesians 3:17, the verb themelioō (θεμελιόω) expresses the idea of these individuals being established or stable in their souls as a result of practicing the command to love one another.

Thus, in Ephesians 3:16-18, Paul prays that the recipients of this epistle would be given strength by means of power through the personal intermediate agency of the Spirit for the benefit of their inner being, i.e., the indwelling nature of Christ.

Namely that, the power of Christ would dwell in their hearts through their post-justification faith in the Spirit inspired contents of Ephesians.

The purpose of which is that they would be to fully able to comprehend with all the saints what constitutes being the breadth, length, height and depth of Christ’s love for them.

The reason why they are able to fully comprehend the four dimensions of the Lord’s love for them is that each and every one of them are firmly rooted, yes specifically, because all of them without exception are firmly established by means of the practice of divine-love.

In Ephesians 3:18, the verb katalambanomai (καταλαμβάνομαι) pertains to grasping the nature, significance or meaning of a particular subject, which in our context are these four dimensions of Christ’s love for them.

The noun platos (πλάτος), “wide” describes the person of Jesus Christ who is the incarnate love of God because He is the incarnate Son of God, who as to His nature, is love and His life, in which He always fulfilled the requirement of the Mosaic Law to love God with one’s entire being and neighbor as oneself.

It describes Jesus Christ suffering the wrath of God on the cross for all of sinful mankind, which demonstrated or manifested the love of God for God’s enemies, i.e., unregenerate sinners who are enslaved to Satan and the indwelling Adamic sin nature.

The noun is mēkos (μῆκος), “long” describes the love of the Lord Jesus Christ for the believer as being eternal.

The noun hypsos (ὕψος), “high” describes Christ’s love for the church age believer from the perspective that because of His love for all of unregenerate humanity, He left the throne of His heavenly Father in order to become a human being and suffer the wrath of His Father on the cross for all of unregenerate humanity.

The noun bathos (βάθος), “deep” describes Christ’s love for the believer from the perspective that out of His love for every believer, He was willing to die physically and descend into Hades, which contains the compartments of Torments and Paradise, in order suffer the wrath of God for all of humanity (Eph. 4:8-10).

In Ephesians 3:19, the verb ginōskō (γινώσκω) speaks of “knowing” the Lord Jesus Christ’s love for them “experientially” in the sense of personally encountering this love through the process of experiential sanctification (i.e., fellowship) as this love is revealed in the pages of Scripture and in prayer by God the Holy Spirit.

It also involves being affected by this encounter with the Lord’s love for them resulting in the gaining of practical spiritual wisdom and more of the character of Christ.

The verb hyperballō (ὑπερβάλλω), “surpasses” expresses the idea that Jesus Christ’s love for the church age believer is impossible to comprehend without the aid of the Holy Spirit and tus, it is impossible for unregenerate human beings to comprehend.

The noun gnōsis (γνῶσις), “knowledge” speaks of the church age believer’s experiential knowledge of Jesus Christ’s love for them.

Therefore, in Ephesians 3:19 when Paul speaks of the church age believer knowing Jesus Christ experientially and yet describes it as knowledge which is incomprehensible, it appears a contradictory statement.

However, this experientially knowledge of Jesus Christ’s love for the church age believer is not incomprehensible to the child of God who exercises faith in the gospel of Jesus Christ and accepts Him as Savior, which enables them to first experience this love.

It is continually experienced by the child of God who continues to exercise faith in Jesus Christ after justification, which enables them to practice the command to love one another.

The noun plērōma (πλήρωμα), “fullness” pertains to the totality and completeness is related to the Father’s attribute of love, which was perfectly manifested by His Son in relation to the church age believer.

The verb plēroō (πληρόω) is expressing the idea that by the recipients of this epistle causing themselves to know Jesus Christ’s love for them experientially, the Holy Spirit would enable them to experience the fullness of God, i.e., the fullness or totality of the Father’s love for them.