Ephesians 3:19 - Love That Surpasses All Understanding Is Found In Christ.
Ephesians 3:19 - Love That Surpasses All Understanding Is Found
In Christ.
Ephesians 3:19 (KJV) And to know the love of Christ, which
passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fullness of
God.
Ephesians 3:19 (NLT) May you experience the love of Christ,
though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made
complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God.
Ephesians 3:19 (EAV) [That you may really come] to know
[practically, through experience for yourselves] the love of Christ, which far
surpasses mere knowledge [without experience]; that you may be filled
[through all your being] unto all the fullness of God [may have the
richest measure of the divine Presence, and become a body wholly filled
and flooded with God Himself]!
WORD STUDY
GOD'S LOVE is total, says Paul. It reaches every corner of our
experience. It is 'wide'--it covers the breadth of our own experience, and
it reaches out to the whole world. God's love is 'long'--it
continues the length of our lives. It is 'high'--it rises to the heights
of our celebration and elation. His love is 'deep'--it reaches to
the depths of discouragement, despair, and even death. When you feel
shut out or isolated, remember that you can never be lost to God's
love. [Life Application SB]
SURPASSES KNOWLEDGE; Not unknowable, but so great that it cannot
be completely known. [NIV SB]
"THE FULLNESS OF GOD" is fully expressed only in Christ
(Colossians 2:9, 10). In union with Christ and through his empowering
Spirit, we are complete. We have all the fullness of God available to
us. But we must appropriate that fullness through faith and through
prayer as we daily live for him. [Life Application SB]
OVERVIEW
The Apostle Paul began his prayer for the Christians at Ephesus
with these words. Well might we follow his example when praying for
ourselves and for others. Praying for others is vital to our own
spiritual growth. If we pray for them at all we often get bogged down
with the material or the trivial and do not move on to the spiritual
and the eternal. We need to pray that others will: realize their
present exalted position in Christ; present themselves as living
sacrifices; be filled with the Holy Spirit; be regular and systematic in the
study of God's Word; have the mind of Christ; grow daily in Christian
maturity; appropriate the full armor of God; be alert to satan's strategy;
not love the world system; have a spirit of brokenness and humility;
have a servant's heart; build a scriptural family. Today is a great
day to begin praying for ourselves and for others! [In His Time;
Walk With Wisdom]
APPLICATION COMMENTARY
Have you ever seen a toddler answer the question, "How much
does daddy love you?" Having been well coached, the child spreads her
arms as wide as she can and says with great delight, "THIS much!"
So how much does our Father God love us? Apparently words can
barely describe it, for Paul knows that the love of Christ "is too
great to understand fully." But Paul attempts a description anyway:
God's love is so wide that it reaches around the whole earth, offering
salvation to any who are willing to believe; so long that it stretches
from the creation of the world to the return of Jesus, surrounding
all people across all of time; so high that it stretches from earth
right up to heaven; so deep that it reaches into the depths of our
struggles, depression, and grief--no darkness is so deep that God's love
cannot shine into it.
So how much does God love you? Jesus spread his arms as wide
as he could and had them nailed to a cross. That's how much you are
loved. [The One Year Bible for New Believers re Eph.3:18, 19]
Before we can have any right idea of the love of Jesus, we must
understand His previous glory in its height of majesty, and His incarnation
upon the earth in all its depths of shame. But who can tell us the
majesty of Christ? When He was enthroned in the highest heavens He was
very God of very God; by Him were the heavens made, and all the hosts
thereof. His own almighty arm upheld the spheres; the praises of
cherubim and seraphim perpetually surrounded Him; the full chorus of the
hallelujahs of the universe unceasingly flowed to the foot of His throne: He
reigned supreme above all His creatures, God over all, blessed forever.
Who can tell His height of glory then? And who, on the other hand,
can tell how low He descended? To be a man was something, to be a
man of sorrows was far more; to bleed, and die, and suffer, these
were much for Him who was the Son of God; but to suffer such
unparalleled agony - to endure a death of shame and desertion by His Father,
this is a depth of condescending love which the most inspired mind
must utterly fail to fathom. Herein is love! and truly it is love
that "passeth knowledge." O let this love fill our hearts with
adoring gratitude, and lead us to practical manifestations of its power.
[Charles Spurgeon; Time with God devotional SB]
We shall understand God's compassion just in proportion as we
appreciate His sacrifice for us. As we search the word of God in humility
of heart, the grand theme of redemption will open to our research.
It will increase in brightness as we behold it, and as we aspire to
grasp it, its height and depth will ever increase.
Our life is to be bound up with the life of Christ; we are to
draw constantly from Him, partaking of Him, the living Bread that
came down from heaven, drawing from a fountain ever fresh, ever
giving forth its abundant treasures. If we keep the Lord ever before
us, allowing our hearts to go out in thanksgiving and praise to Him,
we shall have a continual freshness in our religious life. Our
prayers will take the form of a conversation with God as we would talk
with a friend. He will speak His mysteries to us personally. Often
there will come to us a sweet joyful sense of the presence of Jesus.
Often our hearts will burn within us as He draws nigh to commune with
us as He did with Enoch. When this is in truth the experience of
the Christian, there is seen in his life a simplicity, a humility,
meekness, and lowliness of heart, that show to all with whom he associates
that he has been with Jesus and learned of Him. COL128-130
CONCLUDING THOUGHTS
This prayer is not asking God for more head knowledge about
his love but that we would understand and comprehend it - that it
would really sink in and go from being head knowledge to heart
knowledge about how very much he loves us. Most of all, it asks that we
would experience for ourselves the love of Christ. Knowledge isn't
enough. Great speeches or sermons won't suffice, neither will hearing
what the Lord did in someone else's life. It takes God's Spirit
imparting power to each of us to fathom the depth and length and width,
the incomparable nature, of God's amazing love for us in Christ
Jesus. Just as Paul was praying earnestly for the Ephesian Christians,
we are to ask that our roots would go down deep into the soil of
God's marvelous love. And as we continually pray this
life-transforming prayer, we will drink deeply of God's love. When we receive and
experience the love of Christ in our own hearts, his love can flow through
us to others.
LORD JESUS, I want to understand and experience your love in a
deeper way than I ever have before. May your love be my anchor as your
Spirit causes my roots to sink deeper in you. Grant me the power to
understand the limitless extent of your love. Be the center of my life and
reveal yourself to me today! [Praying Through The Bible By Fuller re
Eph. 3:17-19]
We must daily come and drink at the fountain of divine love.
Herein lies the purpose of all prayer. Margaret Therkelsen
Christ's Passion:
http://www.abible.com/animations/53.swf
The Cross:
http://www.abible.com/animations/walk_1john4_10.swf
The Blessed Hope:
http://www.abible.com/animations/ee.swf
