16 May He [God] grant you out of the riches of His
glory, to be strengthened and spiritually
[connected to God][1] energized with power [Holy Spirit
Power] through His Spirit [Holy
Spirit] in your inner self, (indwelling
your innermost being and personality), 17 so that Christ
may dwell in your hearts through your faith. And may you, having been (deeply)
rooted and (securely) grounded in love, 18 be fully
capable of comprehending with all the saints (God’s people) the width and
length and height and depth of His love (fully experiencing that amazing,
endless love); 19 and (that you may come) to know (practically,
through personal experience) the love of Christ which far surpasses (mere)
knowledge (without experience), that you may be filled up (throughout your
being) to all the fullness of God (so that you may have the richest
experience of God’s presence in your lives, completely filled and flooded with
God Himself). –Ephesians
3:16-19 (AMP)
We want to begin this week’s Blog with this definition of
God’s grace. “Grace describes the undeserved kindness by
which salvation is given, but it is also the power-word describing the
Holy Spirit’s operational means. Grace
is a force as well as a favor, a verb as well as a noun.[2] John 1:16, “And of His fullness we have all received, and grace for
grace.” “The
fact that John states that grace comes from His fullness teaches that grace is
more than God’s disposition or impersonal favor. It is God meeting us at our point of need in
the Person of Jesus Christ, including all His power and provision.”[3]
We first learn knowledge in our mind, but the understanding
becomes wisdom of the heart. We use Ephesians
1:17-18; Isaiah
6:10 and Proverbs
2:2 for our thoughts.
It is our understanding, the fullness of God is the
understanding in our hearts the incredible, magnificent, and glorious love God has
for us. God’s fullness is the fullness
of the Holy Spirit’s salvation by the regenerating work in us, born again, (Romans
10:9-10) and power (Acts
1:8) to give our hearts the understanding of His love and to do our
mission. God’s love is the full measure
of who we are in Jesus Christ (1
John 4:7-21).
In
Paul’s prayer he says, “to be strengthened and spiritually energized with power
through His Spirit in your inner self.” We quote John Piper, “The fullness of God is experienced,
he says, as we are given the ‘strength to comprehend’ the love of Christ in its
height and depth and length and breadth—that is, in its fullness. This is remarkable:
The fullness of God is the spiritual apprehension (experience) of the fullness
of the love of Christ. This love is the grace and truth that fills the Son of
God and pours out on us.”[4]
We
cannot experience the “fullness of the love of Christ” without the baptism of the
Holy Spirit’s power received on Pentecost.
By the power of the Holy Spirit, we can experience the breath-taking
miracle of God’s love.
We
are baptized by water in our confession of faith, we believe Jesus Christ is
the Son of God, lived, suffered, died, and was raised from the dead so that we
might know God the Father and eternal life with HIM. When
we received Jesus as our Savior, He cleansed us of our sins, and He came into
our spirit as life. Thus, because
Christ is in us, our “spirit is life because of righteousness.”
(Galatians
2:20; II
Corinthians 13:5; Romans
8:10)
When
we ask, we are baptized with the power of the Holy Spirit to do our purpose and
mission here on earth. When we receive
the power of the Holy Spirit (Acts
4:31) God’s presence gives us understanding in our hearts the love (I
John 3:1; 4:7) He has for His Children.
Let
us join in Prayer as Jesus’ followers joined in praise and prayer in Acts
4:31. Let us shake our very core by the power of the Holy Spirit.
[1] Charlsey’s
interpretation in brackets
[2] Spirit
Filled Bible, Note, p. 1647
[3] Spirit
Filled Bible, Note, p.1444
[4] John
Stephen Piper (born January 11, 1946) is an American Reformed Baptist continuationist pastor. Continuationism is a
Christian theological belief that the gifts of the Holy Spirit have continued
to the present age.
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