Title: TO KNOW HIM BETTER
Focus: To know God better calls for deepening our awareness of God’s being and God’s work—who he is; what he is about.
Function: To encourage the people to express in prayer our growing awareness of God’s being and work in our lives.
Text: Ephesians 1:15-23
When I was a child, I was at times amazed at my mother’s ability to figure me out. I would do something behind her back, but it was like she had eyes in her back. She knew what I was up to, or she knew where the trouble was coming from. Do you, children, have a mother like that?
When I grew up as a teenager, I tried to figure out who I was and what life was all about. More often than not, I was confused about things, and I could not always put things together in my life. But I had an aunt. Aunt Mary had the amazing ability to stand by me and help me sort out my confusion about life. She showed a lot of common sense. But more importantly, I always felt that she understood me or knew me. Do you know of someone like that?
When Rosanne and I married in 1977, I thought I knew her. Well, I learned a whole lot more about her—and they are all good things. In fact, Rosanne has gotten to know me a whole lot better as well, so much so that I think that no one else on earth knows me better than my wife, Rosanne. And we are still getting to know each other better day by day.
Ever since I was born, I grew up in a home where God was acknowledged. So, you could say that I’ve known God now for 58 years. But how well do we know God? Do you think that Paul’s prayer focus in Ephesians 1 is right for you or does it not apply to you and me? For you see, Paul’s desire is that we know God better.
Here is the gist of my message to all of us tonight: If we are to know God better, then we need to deepen daily our awareness of God’s being and God’s work: who he is, and what he is all about.
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Let’s explore the passage together. First of all, we observe that Paul’s prayer concern is rooted in his awareness of God’s work of election. In fact, Paul’s focus of prayer is a response to God’s saving work in Christ Jesus. Listen: (vs. 15) “For this reason, ever since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, I have not stopped giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers.” The phrase “For this reason,” refers back to Paul’s doxology in the previous verses. In those verses Paul sang God’s praise for his work of election and saving grace in Jesus Christ.
Thus Paul’s prayer focus in verses 15-23 rises from Paul’s reflection upon God’s saving work. It is reflection upon God’s actions that leads to Paul’s response of prayer for the church in Ephesus.
Furthermore, we note that Paul’s prayer focus is also a response to God’s work in the lives of the believers in Ephesus. For Paul makes reference to the believers’ faith in Jesus’ Christ, and Paul is excited about the expressions of love these believers have for one another.
Thus Paul’s prayer observations in verses 15-23 are in response to God’s saving actions in Jesus Christ, and in response to God’s saving work in the lives of the Christians at Ephesus. To know God better, I think, calls for a deepening awareness of God’s actions and God’s being.
Secondly, Paul’s prayer pattern in the text is Trinitarian in structure. For example, in verse 17 Paul makes reference to God, the Father of all glory, saying, “I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father….”
Then, in verse 20 Paul makes a particular reference to God the Father’s work in God’s Son, the Lord Jesus. Speaking of God’s power, Paul reminds us that God exerted that power in “…Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms….”
And throughout this passage, Paul alludes to the pervasive work of God, the Holy Spirit, whom Paul refers to in verse 17 as “…the Spirit of wisdom and revelation….” Thus we note that Paul uses a Trinitarian pattern in his prayers for the church in Ephesus. I think that to know God better calls for a deepening awareness, not only of God’s actions but also God’s being.
Thirdly, the essence of Paul’s prayer focus is that we may know God better. The true knowledge of God—relational, experiential, and objective knowledge—is very much a Pauline concern. For example, in Ephesians 3:18 Paul says, “…I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ and to know this love that surpasses knowledge….” Note: to grasp!
In Colossians 1:9 Paul says: “For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you and asking God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all spiritual wisdom and understanding.” And in his letter to the church in Philippi Paul writes: “…this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight…” (Phil. 1:9).
Knowledge of God is high on Paul’s radar screen of prayer. Paul’s desire comes out in the text when we read: “I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ…may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better.”
The next observation from the text concerns three fundamental truths of Christian teaching. These truths function like cement or mortar in Paul’s prayer focus for the church. Listen to Paul: (vs. 18,19) “I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which (God) has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and his incomparably great power for us who believe.” We can bring these truths together (cf. John Stott) under three headings: (a) The hope of God’s call; (b) The glory of God’s inheritance; and (c) The greatness of God’s power.
The hope of God’s call to us points to the beginning of the Christian life. For example, God calls people to belong to Jesus Christ and to find life and fellowship in him. (Rom. 1:6; I Cor. 1:9). God calls believers in Christ to be saints, to live holy and pure lives. (Rom. 1:7; I Cor. 1:2; I Peter 1:15); Also, God calls us to freedom—freedom from the burden of keeping the law of God perfectly. In contrast to the slavery to God’s Law, God calls us to a freedom that is found in the Spirit of Christ. Not a freedom to indulge the sinful human nature, but to serve one another in love (Gal. 5:1,13).
Yes, God has also called us to experience and suffer, at times, the opposition from an unbelieving world. Unjust suffering and patient endurance are part of God’s call. And that call comes to us with hope, for it leads to God’s kingdom and glory (I Thess. 2:12; I Peter 5:10).
The next great truth that holds our prayers together is the glory of God’s inheritance. That truth points to the future of the Christian life. Paul prays that Christians may know the riches of God’s glorious inheritance in the saints. Over the years as a pastor, I have heard many times a subtle resistance among parishioners to contemplate the new heavens and earth, to cherish the things that are to come. Usually, the resistance is couched in terms of “we don’t know for sure, so why speculate?”
But Scripture gives us many little windows through which we may peek already today and begin to ponder and embrace, by faith, the riches of eternal life with God living in our midst on the restored creation.
Such contemplation and knowledge are not only to be experienced by Christians on their deathbed (as some seem to imply), but also by Christians on their knees, in prayer and praise to God. To know God better includes knowledge or reflection and insights to the glory of God’s inheritance.
Here is the third great truth that synthesizes or unifies our knowledge of God: God’s great power. This is a truth that points to our present lives. For we are to know that power more and more as we live by faith and consider what God has done and is doing through Christ and his Spirit in us and through us.
Listen to the text: “That power is like the working of his mighty strength, which he exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given not only in the present age but also in the one to come.”
Paul refers to that power of God as being wrought by the Spirit in our lives. That power is seen in Jesus’ resurrection from the dead, in Jesus’ ascension to the throne room of God the Father, and in the formation and establishment of the Church on earth—the church of which Christ is also its head. Listen again to Paul: “And God placed all things under (Christ’s) feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.”
Clearly, Christ’s victory over death, Christ’s lordship over all, including the rebel powers that oppose God’s kingdom or influence, and Christ’s formation of a new creation, as seen by the formation of the church—all these expressions of God’s power are for us to know, to observe, to experience, and to draw strength from.
So, let me say it once more: if we are to know God better, then we need to deepen daily our awareness of God’s being and God’s work in Jesus Christ: who he is, and what he is all about.
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In light of Paul’s prayer focus, let me suggest to you one particular way by which we can deepen our knowledge of God: Learn to pray to God and talk to God in a Trinitarian mode.
Here’s how: Remember that God reveals himself as God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. God is indivisible, One in divine essence, yet he reveals himself in three persons.
Scripture teaches us that in our prayers we must approach God the Father through the mediator God the Son, by the power of God the Holy Spirit. For it is by the power of the Holy Spirit that we cry out “Abba! Father!” and it is through Christ that we come to the Father. As Jesus has said, “No one comes to the Father except by me” (John 14:6b).
So, to know God better then begins with an awareness of God’s being and EXPRESSING that awareness in our prayers. (Ex. “Blessed are you, O God—Father, Son, and Spirit—for you are the Creator, Redeemer and Restorer of all things!” “…resting in your powerful Spirit, O God, we appeal to you in the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord”).
And then, in our praying to the Triune God, we do well to weave in our prayers an awareness of God’s work in Christ. Thus we thank him for Christ’s resurrection and giving us the hope and comfort of resurrection when we sorrow and go through the valley of the shadow of death.
And thus we thank God for the Lordship of Jesus, whereby we may share and draw upon the blessings that are to come--our glorious inheritance. And we express confidence in Jesus’ abiding presence as the head of the church.
Thus praying to God in a Trinitarian mode is a good way to come to know God better. And surprise, surprise and just as important is this: when we pray Trinitarian prayers we also come to know our own place before God.
For praying Trinitarian prayers leads to a deeper awareness of God’s mysterious, glorious majesty and divine being. It also leads to gratitude and humility in our hearts, for we recognize God’s greatness—and our own insignificance or smallness before God. Reverence, awe and respect will shape our soul, and deepen our knowledge of God.
To know God better! That’s a worthwhile thing to do. Now and always! Amen.