Praise to Prayer
Notes
Transcript
Good Morning
David got married yesterday afternoon. I spent $5oo dollars on a limo found out the fee doesn’t include a driver.
I spent all that money and have nothing to chauffer it.
Today we are going to be in Ephesians 1:15-23.
Last week we talked about our inheritance we have in Christ. Paul told us again that we were predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to His will.
Then Paul tells us that in Christ, the church is unified. There are no Jews or Greeks, we are all children of God. We all heard the truth of the Gospel and responded to it and repented and believed in Jesus. When we believed in Him, we were sealed with the Holy Spirit, who is given to all believers as a down payment of our inheritance we are to receive when we get to glory. As great and wonderful the Holy Spirit is, He is only a down payment, there is more for us in heaven. When we are in glory, we will get to see God with our own eyes, we will get to walk with Him like Adam did in the garden. It will be infinitely better than anything we can imagine! God loves us so much and He knows that it is hard here on earth, so He gives us a taste of what is promised in the Holy Spirit. He knows what it is like on earth, because He walked this earth and lived a life on this earth. Jesus was not just a form of God, He was God. He has been through everything we have and will go through. He understands our trials and temptations. Because of that, He sends the helper, the Holy Spirit. We are so valuable to God. We mean so much to God that when we sinned and severed our relationship with Him, He gave His only Son to restore that relationship. Don’t for one second every think that you are not valuable. Jesus died because of your value, He suffered so that you could be restored!
All that we talked about last week, was done for the glory of God. Christ’s work on earth and His resurrection was for His glory. Our redemption and justification was for His glory. Our lives that we live in Christ are for His glory. That should be our main focus, glorifying God.
Today we are going to look at what happens when you spend time praising God, it leads to prayer. Paul, after verses 3-14, begins a prayer for the Ephesians. He shares a prayer of thanksgiving. Paul just got through listing blessings we have in Christ, and that lead him to pray a prayer of thanksgiving. Just like Paul’s long sentence in 3-14, verses 15-23 is another long sentence in the Greek. Paul prays that the church will gain deep insight into the Lord’s powerful working and rich gifts in Christ.
Here is a list of all the blessings that Paul mentioned that we have in Christ Jesus.
v3 - every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.
v4 - He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy (set a part) and blameless before Him.
v5 - In love He predestined us for adoption to Himself as sons and daughters through Jesus Christ
v6 - He has given us His glorious grace, with which He has blessed us in Jesus.
v7 - we have redemption through the death and resurrection of Jesus. The forgiveness of our trespasses according to the riches of His grace
v8 - He lavishes that grace upon us.
V9 - He makes known to us the mystery of His will, according to His purpose, which He set forth in Christ.
v10 - In the fullness of time, He is going to unite all things in Him. All things in heaven and all things on earth.
v11 - we have an inheritance in Him (Jesus)
v12,13 - His church is unified in Christ, and we are sealed with the Holy Spirit at the moment we repent and believe in Jesus.
v14 - we are guaranteed to receive our inheritance in glory.
That is a long list of blessings that we have in Christ.
Please stand as we prepare to hear God’s Word.
15 For this reason, because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints, 16 I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers, 17 that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him, 18 having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, 19 and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the working of his great might 20 that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, 21 far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come. 22 And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, 23 which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.
Pray
Paul begins by saying that because of two characteristics that he has heard about the Ephesians, he prays for them.
What are those two characteristics? I’m glad you asked.
The first and most important characteristic of any believer is their faith in the Lord Jesus. This is the main characteristic of a believer and it is through this one that all the others flow out of. It is only through faith in Jesus Christ that we can have the other characteristics of Christianity. Faith is first, then the others come.
The second characteristic is love toward some saints. Remember that a saint is just a fellow believer in Jesus. We must love ALL saints. This is not a option for the believer. Jesus tells us this Himself in John 13:35
35 By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”
our love for one another is our ID that shows who we belong to! If we don’t love each other and all the saints, then I would argue that you are not a believer.
9 Whoever says he is in the light and hates his brother is still in darkness. 10 Whoever loves his brother abides in the light, and in him there is no cause for stumbling. 11 But whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness, and does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded his eyes.
14 We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brothers. Whoever does not love abides in death. 15 Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him.
23 And this is his commandment, that we believe in the name of his Son Jesus Christ and love one another, just as he has commanded us. 24 Whoever keeps his commandments abides in God, and God in him. And by this we know that he abides in us, by the Spirit whom he has given us.
It is very clear that we are to love all believers. It is not an option. Love is commanded of us. If we don’t love our brothers and sisters, the Bible says we are not adopted into God’s family. Jesus came down to earth to show us how to love, He is our example and the only example that we should use. Jesus loved the ones the world called unlovable! Jesus loved people enough to tell them the truth, to sit with them and not affirm their sins but to call them to stop sinning. We can see it through the Gospels. The woman at the well, the prostitute that they brought to Him and He said for the sinless to cast the first stone. We are commanded to have the same love that He had.
We can’t say that we can’t love like Him because He was God. God is in us who are His. The Holy Spirit who is God is in us as His children. He enables us to love like Jesus. We just have to let Him have control of our hearts.
v16 It was because of these two characteristics that lead Paul to give thanks and pray for them. Paul says that he not only prays for them but that he doesn’t cease to give thanks for them and remembers them in his prayers. When Paul is talking about his prays, he is likely referring to the Jewish custom of praying three times a day (morning, noon, and evening). He was a devote Jew before his conversion. He likely prayed more than just these times, but these were predetermined times that he would pray. Paul also tells us in 1 Thess 5:17 to pray without ceasing, so Paul obviously prayed more than just those 3 times. Paul is giving us a good principle for prayer. A good prayer life is both ongoing and planned. The ongoing, we should always have an attitude of prayer. We should pray no matter what we are doing, we should always be praying. I needed to hear this this week. I will do things and then when I am done and a lot of times much later I will think and remember, I didn’t pray!!! I know it is hard to believe that your pastor is not perfect! Part of leading is letting you see my failures and admit when I fall short. There is nothing that we do that we should be praying about it. We should also be ready at any moment to pray for a need or a person when asked or we see a need. Prayer is one of the greatest blessings that God has given us. We as sinners, once we repent and believe in Jesus, we are allowed to approach God with confidence as one of His children and talk to Him. Prayer is how we get to talk to our Father and it is how we fight the battle against our enemy. It is also one of our most unused tools that God has given us.
Not only do we pray ongoing, we should have planned prayer times where we set aside time to talk to God and then sit and be still and quite and listen for Him. These should be non-negotiable times that we do not let them get pushed aside. Our scheduled prayer time with God is vital to our growth and maturity as a believer. Jesus modeled this for us. He would frequently go out by Himself and pray to the Father. It is good to have some place and time where we can spend unhurried and unhindered moments in prayer with our Father.
Paul is showing us that it is good and right to recognize grace in others. It is easy to be critical, it takes a mature believer to recognize grace in others, mainly faith and love. Let us encourage the saints when we see traces of grace in their lives! Do you wear the glasses of grace or the glasses of self-righteousness or self-centeredness?
v17 Paul reveals some of the content of his prayers for the Ephesians. In verses 17-20, Paul is praying for God to give the Ephesians divine illumination about Himself. Paul petitions God to give them Spirit of Wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of Him. Paul asks God to reveal Himself to the believers in Ephesus. He is not asking for God to give them special revelation, no what Paul is asking is for God to reveal Himself to them like He has to him. He wants the Ephesians to know God the same way the he does. That should be the wish of every mature believer.
Without God revealing Himself to us, we could never know Him.
Exalting Jesus in Ephesians Ask God for Divine Illumination (Ephesians 1:17–20)
It is absolutely necessary that we seek the Spirit’s help in understanding His truth. God’s mind is revealed in Scripture, but we need “Holy Spirit glasses” to understand it accurately and deeply
Spurgeon said that apart from the Spirit, it is easier to teach a tiger vegetarianism than an unbeliever the gospel. Luke gives us a great example of Jesus opening the eyes of the disciples. Road to Emmaus
31 And then their eyes were opened and they recognized Him; and He vanished from their sight. 32 They said to one another, “Were our hearts not burning within us when He was speaking to us on the road, while He was explaining the Scriptures to us?”
Then Jesus appeared to the disciples right before He ascended to heaven.
45 Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures,
Just as Jesus opened their minds, God opens our eye’s the moment we repent and believe. Like He did with Lydia. You can read that in Acts 16.
Paul is asking God to give the Ephesians eyes to see who they are. He wants them to be able to see that they are a new creation in Christ. The old is gone and they have a new life in Jesus. Paul prays for God to let them know Him better!
This may seem elementary, but is there anything more important? What could be more important than knowing our God better.
D.A. Carson said it best, “What is the greatest need in the church today?… the one thing we need most in the Western Church is a deeper knowledge of God. We need to know God better!” I couldn’t agree more.
I love this quote from Spurgeon “I go back home, many a time, mourning that I cannot preach my Master even as I myself know Him, and what I know of Him is very little compared with the matchlessness of His grace. Would that I knew more of Him, and that I could tell it out better!” Spurgeon is considered on of the greatest preachers to every live. He is called the Prince of preachers.
I hope that this will be all of our prayers, that God will open our eyes that we may know Him better!
In verse 18-20 Paul prays that they may grasp certain truths about salvation. Paul prays that they would know God, the God who has saved them and given them every spiritual blessing in Christ. Paul mentions 3 blessings specifically that he wants God to enlighten them about.
Exalting Jesus in Ephesians To Know the Blessings of the Gospel Better (1:18–20a)
• “what is the hope of His calling” (v. 18a);
• “what are the glorious riches of His inheritance among the saints” (v. 18b); and
• “what is the immeasurable greatness of His power to us who believe” (v. 19).
Paul asks God to open their eyes to know the hope to which He has called them to. God has called us in eternity past. He chose us before the foundation of the world. Then we believed in the present. We heard the truth of the Gospel and repented and believed. Remember that predestination doesn’t stop us from having to respond to Jesus. We still have to repent and believe. Our hope also has a future dimension. We look forward to God uniting all things in the end. When Jesus returns, all things will be made new and the curse of sin will be gone. That is our hope, the coming back of our King! The time when God will wipe out the old heaven and earth and create new ones for us to live in with Him for eternity. We have a hope that is rich. God has called us to a distinct way of life with a glorious future hope. When we hold out the gospel to people, we are essentially holding out hope to people. That is what the gospel does, it gives hope where there was none! Jesus is our hope. There is so much suffering in this life. Jesus doesn’t say that believe in Me and all that will stop. NO, what He tells us is that when we repent and believe in Him, we can have a hope that one day, we will not have any suffering, we can have a hope that glory is coming!
Paul mentions our inheritance we have in Christ. He wants their eyes to be opened to the glorious riches of His inheritance among the saints. Paul is letting us know how much God values us. God considers us glorious riches. We are His inheritance and He loves us deeply. It is because we are in Christ that we have this value assigned to us. God called in eternity past in Him, we are saved when we are in Him. It is in Christ that we have value. It is because God has given us so much worth, we should live our lives for Him and His praise, and we should declare God’s praise to the nations.
The last of the three blessings that Paul calls out is the immeasurable greatness of His power to us who believe!! It blows my mind to think that God gives me, His power. God’s almighty power is available to His saints! Only by God’s power will we be able to engage in the spiritual battle that Paul will talk about in chapter 6. It is only by His power that we have assurance that we can arrive safely into His heavenly kingdom. His power is given to us who believe.
Think about where some or most of these Ephesians were coming from. Some were formerly caught up in magic, the Artemis cult, astrology, and emperor worship. Their lives were dark and perverted until Christ saved them. The people of this culture lived in fear of hostile spiritual forces. Paul is assuring them that God’s power is supreme over all their enemies!
We do not need to fear when we have a superior power. The power of the risen Christ is ours to do battle against worry, temptation, doubt, and demonic warfare. Why do we fail to rely on this awesome power that has been given to us? To often we think we can do it ourselves, and we also let the enemy talk us out of using it. He tells us that we are not good enough, or how can God really love someone who has done what you have done. The enemy is good at what he does, lie and steal and kill.
Exalting Jesus in Ephesians To Know the Blessings of the Gospel Better (1:18–20a)
The evil one and his host hate us. They hate our faith. They hate the church, our marriages, and our mission. That is why we must lean into Christ and pray for His resurrection power to strengthen us and empower us to live for God’s glory.
We know that God loves us, His Word tells us over and over. We can believe it. He forgives us and never remembers our sins again.
Paul uses the resurrection of Christ to illustrate the mighty power of God. In the Old Testament they measured power by creation or by the exodus, but now there is another greater picture of power, the resurrection of Jesus Christ! Now Christian, this same power that raised Jesus from the grave is ours!
Paul said in Romans 8:11
11 If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you.
This power is ours to witness, to overcome sin, to pursue holiness, to fight against the schemes of the devil, and to have great faith for missions. It is in Him that we are more than conquers. We need to start using this power that God has given us and that the devil is terrified of!
In verses 20-23 Paul is expanding on the power of God in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. God, with His infinite wisdom and power, has done what no man can do. He raised Jesus from the grave! Death is no little bug to squash. It is a bitter enemy we will all face. It had a sting, but because of the resurrection of Jesus, we do not have to fret that sting anymore. We do not have to fear death, all that death can do to the believer is send them home!
Because of the resurrection, life has meaning. Our labor is not in vain. The resurrection of Jesus testifies to the fact that Jesus is the Messiah. It is because of the resurrection that we have the hope that we have and the power that we are given. Because of these two things, we should live our lives serving and glorifying our God!
Paul explains where Jesus is right now. He is at the right hand of God, seated in the seat of honor and glory. Jesus is alive and not just alive, He is alive and reigning forever at the right hand of the Father. What does this mean for us? It means everything. Everything is under the reign of the seated King! With Him in this position, we can trust Him with our problems, great and small. Our hope is not in a political election but in the seated King of glory!
Next Paul talks about the supremacy of Jesus. Jesus as the risen, seated King, is now superior to every competitor. His throne is above everything, the principalities and powers. He is above creation. He is above satan and his system of demons. He is above every ruler and every person. He is over all earthly powers, He is over every title and name. God has put all His enemies under His feet. This is a sign of authority and rule. Paul is explaining that not only is every power inferior to Christ, they are also subject to Him. There is no power that is over Him.
Paul ends by telling us about Jesus’ headship. Jesus is over the church. Paul tells us that the church is the body of Jesus. Nothing else is given this distinction. Only the church, this shows the importance of the church both to God and to us. The church is so important that Jesus identifies Himself with it. He is head over it. I think most believers know this intellectually, but some church members put their pastor in this position. It is to often that a large number of the church members will leave a church when the pastor does. The church is not about a man, it is about Jesus Christ the Messiah! He is the head of the church.
The church is also the fullness of Christ. Paul is saying that Christ fills us, not the other way around. Paul is telling us that Jesus, as head of the church, is filling the church in a special way with His Spirit, grace, and gifts. The church is His fullness.
This must have given so much encouragement to the house churches in the region of Ephesus. It should give us the same amount of encouragement.
Just before WWII in the town of Itasca, Texas, a school fire took the lives of 263 children. There was scarcely a family in town that was not touched by this horrifying tragedy. During the war Itasca remained without school facilities. But when the war ended, the town, like many others, began to expand and in fact built a new school that featured what was called “ the finest sprinkler system in the world”. Civic pride ran high. Honor students were selected to guide citizens and visitors on tours of the new facility to show them the finest, most advanced sprinkler system technology could supply and money could buy. Never again would Itasca be visited by such a tragedy. With the postwar boom the town continued to grow, and seven years later it was necessary to enlarge the school. In adding the new wing it was discovered that the sprinkler system had never been connected!
This is an incredible story. Its folly strains our belief. It is a parable of what has happened in so many Christian lives. There is untold power available for every believer in Christ, but so many never hook up, and their lives are thus impotent and shamefully useless.
This is the very reason Paul wrote this letter. We have so much power in Christ, yet it is left untapped. We have to make sure that we are connect to the source of the power!
A light bulb does no good if it isn’t connect to the power!
We are no good to God if we are not connect to Jesus!
There is only one way to be connected. That is repentance and belief in Jesus.
Are you hooked up?
If you are not hooked up, you can be. All you have to do is tell God that you have sinned and that you do not want to live in your sin anymore. You want to turn from the sin in you life and that you believe that Jesus is your Son and He came to earth and was crucified and raised on the third day and now sits at your right hand.
If you do that, you will be connected to the power source.
Can we believe it?
Can we rest in it?
Are we connected?
Are we using what God has already given us?
Let’s make sure we are plugged in and powered up! It’s a dark world out there and we are the flash lights that God will use to shine the light of His Son!
Let’s pray.
