#DailyDevotion Only In The Love Of Christ Can We Bear What God Intends To Give Us
Eph. 3:14 For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, 15 from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, 16 that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, 17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, 18 may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, 19 and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.
When Paul writes this he is writing in Greek. Father is patera and family is patria. Well there’s your Greek lesson for today. Now Paul says, “for this reason.” What is that? The mystery of God, the Gospel, in Jesus the Jew and the Gentiles, the families of the earth have been saved.
Now according to the riches of his glory he prays you may be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being. This inner being is your new man, the new creation in Christ. He is in constant battle against the devil, the world and your own flesh. So we need to be strengthened by the Holy Spirit with power. The Holy Spirit enlivens you and empowers you to remember the good news of Jesus Christ and in that are we strengthened.
Through Faith, Christ comes and dwells in our hearts. Our bodies are the temples of God, temples not made with human hands. Jesus is always with us. His Spirit, his power, his name rests upon us and in us. If you want to get a good understanding of what you are, you should read the description of the Tabernacle in Exodus or the Temple in 1 Kings. As beautiful and wonderful the Tabernacle and the Temple were, they pale in comparison to you.
Our hearts then are rooted and grounded in love. God is love. It is him you are rooted and grounded in. Jesus is God and Jesus is the love of God. Looking to Jesus and seeing and understanding what God has done for us in Christ Jesus with our salvation, his innocent, suffering and death, it is that which gives us strength to comprehend the breadth, length, height and depth and know the love of Christ that surpasses human knowledge and wisdom to the purpose you may be filled with all the fullness of God.
You see as God’s temple, he intends to fill you with his fullness but this is no light thing. For St. Paul in 2 Cor. 4 tells us the sufferings, trials, tribulations and troubles are preparing us to bear the weight of eternal glory. Or as St. Peter also tells us in his second epistle, through the promises we participate in the divine nature. Only rooted in the love of Christ can we bear such a thing. It is too much for us in our fallen nature. But by God’s grace in Christ, through faith in God’s love for us in Christ, we are prepared to the temple of God who were once objects of his wrath.
Gracious God and Father, continually build us up in the love of Christ that we may prepared to be your temples, bear the weight of eternal glory, participate in your divine nature and be filled with your fullness at Christ’s revelation. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.