Three Things God Wants You to Ask Him for Every Day

Therefore I also, after I heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, do not cease to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers: that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, the eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the working of His mighty power which He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places, far above all principality and power and might and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this age but also in that which is to come.

Ephesians 1:15-21

For this reason I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, from whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height—to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

Ephesians 3:14-21

When I was a new believer, the Lord led me to study and begin praying this prayer that we find in Ephesians. It changed my life. I prayed this prayer for myself almost daily for a long time. I still do I pray something like this: “I pray that the God of my Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to me the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him...” After seeking God daily through this prayer, I began to experience God’s revelation, God’s power, and God’s love. I want to share with you the power of this prayer!

This prayer was inspired by the Holy Spirit. Paul the apostle was led by the Spirit of God to pray for the Christian believers of his day, and he was led how to pray for them as well. Have you ever found yourself praying for someone, and maybe you started out with your own thoughts of how to pray, on a mental level, but after moving into the presence of God, after getting into the flow of that prayer anointing, you found yourself praying a prophetic prayer? By that I mean that a prophetic flow starts. You start receiving a flow from the heart of God, from the thoughts of God. The Holy Spirit is showing you what to pray for and how to pray it. It’s what He wants to do. You know you are praying according to the will of God for that person. You are not praying on your own; you are praying in partnership with God.

Well, that’s the kind of prayer this was. It was Paul’s prayer for the saints of Ephesus. This prayer was so inspired by the Holy Spirit that it was recorded in the Bible. This prayer reveals the heart of God for you, the perfect will of God for you. It’s a prayer that God wants to hear, and answer, for you!

The prayer begins in Ephesians 1:15. Paul is writing out his prayer. Then he slides into a teaching mode again going into verses 20 and 21. (That’s Paul!) By verse 22 he is in full teaching mode again. But he jumps back into the prayer in Ephesians 3:14. There he resumes, and completes, this inspired prayer.

If you look carefully, there are three main parts to this prayer. That is, there are three things that God wants you to ask Him for all the time. (Is that all? Just three? No, of course not – these are just the things we are learning about right now! But you already knew that, didn’t you?)

So, the three things are:

(1) Revelation

(2) Power

(3) Love.

The other members of this family are: wisdom, knowledge, understanding, counsel, etc. They’re all related. Likewise, power is part of a family. Power’s cousins are: strength, might, fortitude, perseverance, anointing, miracle power, healing power, etc. How about love? All the fruits of the Spirit (love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control [Galatians 5:22-23]) are branches on the tree of love. So, yeah, another family.

Notice that I said you should pray for these things all the time – maybe every day. Notice that Paul said, in Ephesians 1:16, “I do not cease to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers...” Do you think that Paul prayed this prayer for them often? I think so. That’s why he wrote it out, so that they would know how he was praying, so that maybe they could also pick up on these ideas and pray similarly for themselves, and for others. Did he pray this prayer word for word every day? Probably not, because Jesus warned us not to pray using “vain repetitions” (Matthew 6:7), spouting out memorized prayers as a religious ritual. You could train a parrot to do that. You could put it on a tape recorder and just play it over and over. No, God wants prayers from your heart. So I’m pretty sure that Paul prayed these ideas, these concepts, over and over for the Ephesian saints, and for the other churches he had founded.

Some prayers are answered progressively. If you pray for wisdom, will you get all the wisdom in the world downloaded to you all at once? Of course not. We grow into it as we seek and pray. That’s why Jesus said, "Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you.” (Matthew 7:7) The original Greek of this passage carries the idea of, “Ask and keep on asking, and you will keep on receiving; it will be given to you more and more in increasing measures.” The prayers that Paul prayed in Ephesians are like that. Increasing revelation! Increasing power! Increasing love! Good deal!

(1) Revelation

So let’s look at the prayer: “...that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him...” (verse 17). What is the spirit of wisdom and revelation? I believe he’s talking about the Holy Spirit, or at least an aspect, a manifestation of the Holy Spirit. Do you think there’s a bunch of spirits running around wearing T-shirts that say “wisdom” and “revelation” waiting to be assigned to people? Hmmm. Actually, God’s angels do go out on assignment, ministering to God’s people and helping them to accomplish the Great Commission, but still, I really think Paul is talking about the Holy Spirit, God’s Spirit. Why? Check out Isaiah 11, verses 1-5. It’s a Messianic prophecy, predicting the coming of Jesus Christ, a descendant of King David, the son of Jesse. It describes Jesus in this way (verse 2): “The Spirit of the LORD shall rest upon Him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD” Pretty clearly, we’re talking about the Holy Spirit. He is the “Spirit of wisdom and understanding...” All of this was fulfilled in Luke 3:21-22, when Jesus was baptized with the Holy Spirit as He began His public ministry.

So Paul prays that the Ephesians... OK, let’s make a change here. This prayer is for us, too! It’s for today, for you and me. So let’s say that...Paul prays for us, that we will receive the Spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of God. And we can pray this prayer for ourselves also.

The Spirit of wisdom? What is wisdom? One good definition of wisdom is making good decisions. Good decisions produce good fruit: success, prosperity, good relationships, strong marriages and families, fruitful ministries, a close walk with God, etc. Wisdom is the opposite of foolishness. Sometimes you can better define something by knowing its opposite. Foolish decisions produce bad results: failure, poverty, tragedy and disaster, damaged relationships, broken marriages and families, discredited ministries, a poor relationship with God, etc. I think I’d rather have wisdom.

The Bible even says that “...Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and men.” (Luke 2:52) Jesus increased in wisdom? Yup. Living as a man among men, as one of us, He prayed and walked with His Father, increasing as a man in wisdom, spiritual stature and favor. Wow. If it’s good enough for Him, it’s good enough for us!

Proverbs 9:10 says, “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding.” The “beginning of wisdom” here means something like the “entrance” or “open door” into wisdom. The fear of the LORD – the deep desire to please God, the deep dread of displeasing God - is the open door, the entrance into God’s wisdom. And all true wisdom is from God. All true foolishness is from man. We’re already good at that. So let’s ask God all the time for the “spirit of wisdom”, the way Paul showed us to!

Now, about the “spirit of revelation”... What is revelation? (I even love the sound of the word!) Revelation means an unveiling, an uncovering of something that was hidden. It already existed, but it was covered up. Now it’s “revealed”. Cool! The spirit of revelation is the ministry of the Holy Spirit, coming to show us the truth of God. He comes to reveal the kingdom of God to us. That’s easier said than done. Unsaved people are carnal and corrupted, spiritually blind and deaf. Actually, it’s worse than that. Ephesians 2:1 says that we were spiritually dead! Dead’s even worse than blind or deaf, don’t ya think? So the Spirit of God is trying to reveal Jesus to us, trying to reveal the kingdom to us, but we are kind of thick. God is Spirit. (John 4:24) Before we were saved, we were spiritually dead. We functioned OK mentally and physically, but we were corrupted by sin and selfishness. We were spiritually blind and deaf. When we accepted Jesus, we were born again. Our spirit was reborn. Our spiritual senses came alive again. Now we can truly begin to receive communication from God, because God mostly communicates spirit to spirit – from His Spirit to our spirit. But as born-again Christians, we are still more used to functioning mentally and physically than we are spiritually. We tend to “lean on our own understanding”. (Proverbs 3:5 says don’t do that.) We tend to be kind of dull and thick spiritually. God is trying to teach us, but it’s a challenge, even for Him!!

So the Holy Spirit is teaching us. That’s revelation! He’s teaching us the truth of God; He’s showing us God’s heart, God’s kingdom, God’s thoughts and plans and truth. He’s showing us all the things that are already written and established in the Bible - but without revelation, it’s just so much doctrine and religion to us. With revelation, it all comes alive to us!

I once mentioned to a Christian brother that God had given me revelation on something. He completely misunderstood and got mad. He said, “I don’t need any revelation; I have the Bible!” He thought I was talking about getting extra-biblical stuff. (That means stuff that’s not in the Bible, like New Age or Eastern Mysticism baloney.) I tried to explain that I believe in the Bible as the perfect and complete word of God. But the problem is, if we approach the Bible with just our minds, with just our mental capacities and our reasoning, we aren’t gonna get it. I mean, we’re not gonna get the life, the faith, the power, that God’s trying to give us through His word. Just more doctrine or religion. That’s how cults and false religions get started. The Holy Spirit is the Author of the Bible. (2 Peter 1:20-21) If He is the Author, then He’s the only One that can help me truly understand it. He’s the only One that can make sure that I get what He meant to give me when I read His Word.

When Jesus came into the region of Caesarea Philippi, He asked His disciples, saying, "Who do men say that I, the Son of Man, am?" So they said, "Some say John the Baptist, some Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets." He said to them, "But who do you say that I am?" Simon Peter answered and said, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." Jesus answered and said to him, "Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but My Father who is in heaven. And I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it. And I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven." Then He commanded His disciples that they should tell no one that He was Jesus the Christ.

Matthew 16:13-20

Jesus asked the disciples what the conventional wisdom of the day was. What are they saying about me? And what do you think?  Simon got it. He said, “You’re the Messiah, God’s Son.” Jesus said, “Congratulations, Simon! And I’m changing your name (your nature) to Peter – solid as a rock. It’s all because you got the revelation. My Father in Heaven was able to get through to you. He revealed to you who I am, and you received it!”

When Jesus says, “I will build my church upon this rock,” He means that He reveals Himself to people – by revelation – and then adds them to His church, His body. A revelation doesn’t have to be a great thunder and lightning experience. All you need is the KNOWING from the Holy Spirit, in your heart, in your spirit, that Jesus really is your Savior, your Lord, God’s Son. If you have that KNOWING in your heart, no one can ever take that away from you. Hold on to it! Bottom line – you can’t even get saved without a revelation from God, but every time someone turns their heart to Christ, in sincerity, in surrender, in trust, the Holy Spirit can give them that revelation and add them to the family of God.

Jesus continues building His church on that rock of revelation. When we seek Him, He gives us more revelation. When you get a revelation that Jesus is the Baptizer in the Holy Spirit, or the Healer, or the Provider, or any other thing He reveals to you, then you have something that no one else can take away from you. You have something that you can share and give away and use to build the kingdom. Oh, yeah! Go, Jesus!

Then the seventy returned with joy, saying, "Lord, even the demons are subject to us in Your name." And He said to them, "I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. Behold, I give you the authority to trample on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall by any means hurt you. "Nevertheless do not rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you, but rather rejoice because your names are written in heaven." In that hour Jesus rejoiced in the Spirit and said, "I thank You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You have hidden these things from the wise and prudent and revealed them to babes. Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in Your sight. "All things have been delivered to Me by My Father, and no one knows who the Son is except the Father, and who the Father is except the Son, and the one to whom the Son wills to reveal Him."

Luke 10:17-22

Jesus had just sent a bunch of His disciples out to announce the kingdom of God, to heal the sick and to cast out demons. When they came back, they were ecstatic. It worked! “In that hour Jesus rejoiced in the Spirit...” I think He probably danced around, shouting, “They’re getting it! They’re getting it!” They had cast out demons, they had healed sick people, and they had preached the kingdom - all in His name! Then Jesus said, “I thank You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You have hidden these things from the wise and prudent and revealed them to babes.” God apparently hides things from people who consider themselves self-sufficient or smarter than everyone else, because it seems right to Him. He hates pride and arrogance; it’s repulsive to His nature. He apparently reveals things to babes. That means He reveals kingdom truth, kingdom reality, kingdom authority and kingdom power to people who have a childlike teachability, to people that will trust Him and obey Him. I can’t get this revelation with my own understanding, with my own mental capacities, no matter how good they are. I can study the Bible until I drop, but I still need that Spirit-to-spirit flow of revelation from God to really get His kingdom, to really operate in His authority and power. That’s why we ask for the spirit of revelation in the knowledge of God, as Paul taught us!

But as it is written: "Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for those who love Him." But God has revealed them to us through His Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God. For what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God.

1 Corinthians 2:9-12

“Eye has not seen? Ear has not heard?” What’s Paul talking about? He’s quoting from the Old Testament. God was saying that no man could ever, by his human senses or human reasoning, see or understand or even imagine the things that God has prepared for those who love Him. What has God prepared? His plan was to make us His sons and daughters, to raise us up in Christ and seat us at His right hand, beside Him on His throne (Ephesians 1:20 and 2:6) as the body and bride of Christ, that we should reign and rule with Christ forever. (That’s all in the Bible!) Pretty good plan, huh? Man would never understand it. It’s an unfathomable love. It’s an unimaginable grace.

“But God has revealed it all to us through His Spirit!” (verse 10) He revealed it to the apostles and prophets. It was recorded in the Bible. Obviously we have to read and study the Bible to begin getting this revelation. That’s where God put it – so we can find it. We can read it and try to understand it, but we only really get it when God reveals it to us! That’s why this passage says that God has given us His Holy Spirit so that we might really know and understand – by revelation, by Spirit-to-spirit communication – the things that have been freely given to us by God. “Freely given? Freely given?” If God is freely giving us things (things like His love, His forgiveness, salvation, healing, eternal life, restored authority and dominion, anointing and power, a kingdom inheritance, a place on the throne with Christ, etc.), I’d like to have a lot of revelation on that, wouldn’t you? And that’s why we pray for the spirit of revelation in the knowledge of God, like Paul taught us!

In the next part of the prayer, Paul prays that “the eyes of our understanding would be enlightened”. Of course, “understanding” is part of the family of wisdom and revelation and knowledge. But Paul is also alluding to the idea that you can have your spiritual eyes opened to “see” things that you could not see before.

There was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to Him, "Rabbi, we know that You are a teacher come from God; for no one can do these signs that You do unless God is with him." Jesus answered and said to him, "Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." Nicodemus said to Him, "How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?" Jesus answered, "Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.

John 3:1-6

When Nicodemus came to find out who Jesus really was, Jesus answered a question that hadn’t even been asked. (Jesus does that a lot.) He said, “You must be born again.” Jesus is speaking spiritually, and Nicodemus is thinking physically. (Again, the need for God’s revelation to get through our thick carnality.) Jesus said that if you aren’t born again you can’t enter the kingdom of God. He also said that if you aren’t born again you can’t see the kingdom of God. Many of us, if we had some bad religious training, might think, “I’ll enter the kingdom of God, and I’ll see the kingdom of God, when I go to heaven. Or when Jesus comes back.” But that’s not what He’s talking about. He means that the moment you get born again, you enter the kingdom of God. Right now. You’re in – if you’re born again. He also means that, if you are spiritually alive and your spiritual senses are opened, you can see the kingdom of God right now.

When Jesus began His ministry, He announced, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand!” (Matthew 3:2) What did He mean? Jesus saw the kingdom. He carried the kingdom. He demonstrated the kingdom. He was all about the kingdom. He was a one-man invasion force. He was the kingdom of heaven all flowing through one Man. The kingdom of God was in Him, and He came to invade and take over. He came to reconnect earth to heaven, to be a bridge or an open door between the two. What the first Adam lost through his sin, the second Adam (Jesus) would re-establish through His obedience. The kingdom of God was reality, alive and flowing through Jesus Christ.

The person who doesn’t know Christ is spiritually dead, blind and deaf to the reality of God’s kingdom advancing in our midst. But when you are born again, you can see God’s kingdom working among us. You see what others are blind to. But we see in different measures. What one Christian sees, another is still blind to. (Baptism in the Spirit? Healing? Miracle provision?) What one Christian sees clearly, another sees dimly. The more you see, by revelation, by opened spiritual eyes, the more you can personally operate in the kingdom with Christ’s authority and power. That’s why we ask for the spirit of revelation, like Paul taught us! That’s why we ask that the eyes of our understanding would be enlightened!

“...that you may know what is the hope of His calling...” (verse 18)

God wants you to know what is the hope of your calling. Not just doctrine. Not just religion. He wants you to know – by revelation - that you are called and destined to be conformed to the image of Christ. (Romans 8:29, 1 John 3:2) God wants you to know that you are called to reign and rule with Jesus in His eternal kingdom. (2 Timothy 2:12, Revelation 3:21, Revelation 5:10, Revelation 20:6, Revelation 22:5) God wants you to know that you are called to live with Him in eternal glory. (Romans 8:17, Romans 8:30, 1 Corinthians 2:7, Hebrews 2:10) God wants you to know that He has an eternity of goodness and love already planned and prepared for you, things beyond your wildest imagination. (1 Corinthians 2:9, Ephesians 2:7) No floating on clouds playing harps, no no no! Why all this? According to Ephesians 2:7, it’s so that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. God’s heart is full of love. He wants someone to love, someone to pour out His goodness on. It’s His nature! He wants to do it! But it must be someone who chooses Him, who loves Him. (1 Corinthians 2:9) Our God is a jealous God. (Exodus 34:14, Deuteronomy 4:24) He wants your whole heart. He wants your total surrender and your total love. He doesn’t want to have to compete with anyone or anything for your devotion. "For the eyes of the LORD run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to show Himself strong on behalf of those whose heart is loyal to Him..." (2 Chronicles 16:9)

If you know “the hope of your calling”, if you really get it deep in your heart, you can go through any trial or any test with flying colors. That’s why we pray for the spirit of revelation! That’s why we pray for the eyes of our understanding to be enlightened!

“... what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints...” (verse 18)

Let’s dissect this a little bit. What’s an inheritance? It’s something that you are going to get. It’s coming to you. You’re waiting for it. And it’s very valuable! You’re almost crazy with anticipation to get your inheritance! The Bible says that we are the heirs of the kingdom of God. (Matthew 25:23, Romans 8:17, James 2:5) So we have a great inheritance. But this passage is not talking about our inheritance – it’s talking about God’s inheritance! “His inheritance in the saints...” What is God’s inheritance? It’s you and me – it’s the saints. It’s all those who have been washed in the cleansing blood of Jesus Christ, God’s Son. It’s all those who trust that Jesus paid the penalty for their sins with His own life on the cross of Calvary. It’s all those who believe that Jesus rose from the dead, victorious over sin and death. We are God’s anticipated inheritance! That makes you and me pretty valuable! Not only are we His inheritance, but it says we are “the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints...” We are the riches of the glory of His inheritance! What does that even mean? It means that you are so valuable and so important to God that He would pay any price to redeem you back from the fall. In fact, He did. He paid the life of His Son to win you back. (Romans 8:32) If you receive Christ, God cleanses you from all sin and begins working in you to restore you, to transform and conform you to the image of Christ, to bring you into “the hope of your calling”. He wants you to know that you are “the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints”.

Many people in this world struggle with a deep sense of rejection and worthlessness. This world system, under the influence of Satan, is designed to make you feel like worthless, rejected garbage. However, God wants you to know how precious and valuable you are to Him. Let the revelation of your worth and value to God lift you up and make you walk like royalty. Do a little Bible study. Read Exodus 19:5, Deuteronomy 7:6, Deuteronomy 14:2, Malachi 3:16-17, John 17:23, Ephesians 2:4, 1 Peter 2:9. There are lots more, but that’ll start your motor!

(2) Power

“...and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the working of His mighty power which He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places, far above all principality and power and might and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this age but also in that which is to come.”

The second part of this prayer focuses on power. Jesus said, “But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” (Acts 1:8) The word “power” is the Greek word “dunamis”, which is where we get the word dynamite! Jesus is talking about miracle power, healing power, and great boldness! God wants to fill you with His power, the anointing of His Spirit. He wants to send you out into the world around you as a witness for Jesus Christ, but you need power! The gospel must be demonstrated, not just explained!

When Jesus began His ministry, He demonstrated the power of God as He preached His message of the kingdom. And Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing all kinds of sickness and all kinds of disease among the people. (Matthew 4:23)  Acts 10:38 also says, “...how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power, who went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him.” He didn’t bring a powerless message, but He drove out demonic affliction and sickness to show the reality of the God’s love and power for people. Later on, He expanded and multiplied His ministry - He trained 12 disciples and gave them power. And when He had called His twelve disciples to Him, He gave them power over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal all kinds of sickness and all kinds of disease... (Matthew 10:1) Then He sent them out to do everything He Himself had been doing. "And as you go, preach, saying, ‘The kingdom of heaven is at hand.’ "Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out demons. Freely you have received, freely give. (Matthew 10:7-8) After that, He trained and sent out seventy more! After these things the Lord appointed seventy others also, and sent them two by two... (Luke 10:1) He gave them power, and told them to do the same stuff. "And heal the sick there, and say to them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you.’” (Luke 10:9) Do you think the show was all over then? No! After His resurrection, He said, “But you (all) shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you (all) shall be witnesses to Me...” (Acts 1:8) He wants us all to receive power! He wants us all to do this stuff!

Paul the apostle also moved in great power as he preached the gospel. And my speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of human wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, that your faith should not be in the wisdom of men but in the power of God. (1 Corinthians 2:4-5) Paul preached with demonstration of the Spirit and power. What does that mean? People were healed and set free as Paul preached to them and prayed for them. God’s power was at work, demonstrating the reality of the gospel message. Paul didn’t want people trusting in a gospel of words only, or of explanations only. He wanted them to have faith in the power of God. He said so!

Many of our churches and ministries today are powerless. Words, words, words. For the kingdom of God is not in word but in power. (1 Corinthians 4:20) So we must pray for power, for the flow and manifestation of God’s power through us! (See Acts 4:29-32.) Paul prays in the prayer for the Ephesians that they – and we – would receive the revelation of “the exceeding greatness of God’s power toward us who believe...” In other words, if we believe in Christ, if we believe in the power of God, then His power is available to flow in us and through us. He clarifies that it is “the working of His mighty power which He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead...” It’s the resurrection power of God! It’s the power of God to heal the sick, to set the captive free, to open blinded eyes! We’re supposed to pray for a revelation of that power. We’re supposed to pray that that power will flow in our lives, our prayers, and our ministries! And we must keep praying until we see the breakthrough, until we see works of God’s power confirming our message of the gospel.

For this reason I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, from whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith...

Paul continues his prayer in Ephesians chapter three, verse fourteen. We’re still talking about power, but now we’re talking about other members of the power family. The prayer is that you might be strengthened with might through His Spirit in your inner man. In other words, that God’s Spirit would flow into you, strengthening and fortifying you in your spirit. Why? Because this world is enemy territory. We know that we are of God, and the whole world lies under the sway of the wicked one. (1 John 5:19) Thank God, He who is in us is greater than he who is in the world. (1 John 4:4) We are advancing the kingdom, and some day Jesus will come back and take over completely, but we are still in enemy territory for now. And in this world there are troubles and attacks and persecutions and trials and tribulations. Jesus said there would be. (See John 16:33) So Paul teaches us to pray that we might be strengthened, every day, by the power of the Holy Spirit, so that we will not give in or give up or give out. If we don’t pray, we don’t stand!

(3) Love

...that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height—to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

The third thing that Paul prays for is love. Why? Because God is love. (1 John 4:16) It’s His nature. It’s His essence. If you don’t know God’s love, you don’t know God at all. Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. He who does not love does not know God, for God is love. (1 John 4:7-8) If we miss God’s love, it’s all just empty religion; there’s no point at all. God has loved you with an everlasting love. (Jeremiah 31:3) The whole reason for the gospel is God’s love for us. (John 3:16)

Because we live in enemy territory, because we are product of the rebellion of Adam and Eve and the fall of the human race, because we are dominated as a race by a hateful rebel archangel called Satan, we are love-starved. The human race was mostly cut off from God. (Isaiah 59:2) That means we were cut off from the flow of His love. It wasn’t His fault; it was ours – back in the Garden of Eden. After the rebellion, after the fall, His love didn’t flow into our world, into our nations and our culture, into our marriages and our families. So we are love-starved. We have a love deficit – a shortage. Living in the world, we get used to it. We harden our hearts. We put on masks. We pretend we are tough and we don’t care. We make war. We hurt. We medicate ourselves with drugs and sex and entertainment and money and power. But we are still love-starved. We are a shadow of what we were meant to be.

Human beings were designed to run on love, just as a car is designed to run on gas. We were created in the image of God. God is love. We were designed to freely receive and give love. A person who doesn’t receive love doesn’t know how to give love. You can’t give what you don’t have. And so the chain continues, generation after generation, until someone breaks the chain - until someone accepts Christ, and gets reconnected to God, the source of love and healing and wholeness. When we get born again and reconnect with God, His love can flow into us, healing and restoring us. But many Christians aren’t getting it.

We are like orphans off of the street who get adopted and taken into a wealthy, loving home. We are now hooked up with wealth and love and healing, but we can’t get over feeling like we are still orphans on the cold, lonely streets. We don’t dare open our hearts to receive the love because we afraid that it might not be real. We are afraid that, as soon as we begin to let that love in, it might disappear. We might be thrown out into the street again. That’s what a love deficit will do to you. Satan’s kingdom is a love void, a vacuum. We are used to it.

We must understand that God’s love is real. We are reconnected with the Source. He will never fail us. We can lower our guards, open our hearts, and trust Him. We can take down our walls, cast off our orphan mentality, and receive His love. We can be filled day after day with His healing love. We can bask in it, be saturated in it, rest in it, and rejoice in it. Our hearts are like dry sponges. We can come and soak in His love. When we have enough, we can begin to pour out His love on others. We can begin to love, unconditionally, as Jesus loved. Freely we receive, freely we give. (Matthew 10:8) We will come to know what it means that we love Him, because He first loved us. (1 John 4:19)

Jesus came to freely pour God’s love into this love-starved world, as someone might pour water onto a desert land to watch it spring into bloom. As human beings, we can’t manufacture love; we can only receive it and then give it. All love is from God. And so, Paul prays that we would be “rooted and grounded in love”. God is a poet. He uses beautiful imagery and symbolic language to make His point. His point here is that we are like a tree. If we put our roots (our born-again spirit-man) deep down into God’s love and soak it in, we will be healed and we will be fruitful. We will be restored to our original design and purpose. That’s why we pray to be rooted and grounded in God’s love!

Paul also prays that we would be able to “comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height of the love of God.” The word comprehend speaks of mental understanding, of being able to wrap your mind around something. Comprehending the dimensions of God’s love is a little like trying to wrap your head around the oceans. Good luck with that one! Nevertheless, as born-again people, we have the mind of Christ. (1 Corinthians 2:16) So let’s try it!

Then Paul prays that we might “know the love of Christ which passes knowledge.” In other words, he’s acknowledging that we can never really wrap our mental understanding around the immensity of God’s love, but he prays that we might know that love which passes knowledge. The word “know” here means to know by personal experience and relationship. It’s not mental comprehension; it’s an intimate, personal knowledge of that love. It’s something you get by walking with the Lord day after day, year after year. Through tests and trials, through beautiful encounters and victories, you grow more and more deeply rooted in His faithful love. That’s when you become a tree of righteousness. That’s when you can claim to really know God. That’s when you can claim to be a spiritual father or mother in the body of Christ, one who brings God’s healing love to the wounded and love-starved of this world. (1 John 2:12-14)

After praying that you might “know the love of Christ which passes knowledge”, Paul continues, “that you may be filled with all the fullness of God”. Apparently, there is a direct connection between “knowing the love of Christ by personal relationship and experience” and “being filled with all the fullness of God”. It’s a cause and effect thing. Do you want to be filled with God’s presence? God’s anointing? God’s power? Pursue His love! Surrender to His love! Soak in His love! Be transformed by His love! Yeah!!

Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

And so the prayer ends. God is able to do “exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us.” So... if He is able, why doesn’t He just do it? Why doesn’t he save everybody? Why doesn’t He heal everybody right now? “According to the power that works in us...according to the power that works in us... according to the power that works in us...” Hmmm. Is God limited by us? Has God, in His sovereignty, chosen to limit Himself to only what He can do through us? Has God, in respect and honor for us as His covenant people, His church, His body, chosen to only work through us according to the measure of faith that we have in Him? According to the measure of our obedience? According to the measure of His power that we have pursued and received? If so, isn’t that a demonstration of His true partnership with us? Of His love and commitment to us? Of His respect and honor for us as His covenant people? To Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

That’s why we should pray for the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him! That’s why we should pray for the revelation of the exceeding greatness His power toward us who believe! That’s why we should pray to be rooted and grounded in love, comprehending the immensity of His love, and personally knowing by relationship and experience the love of Christ which passes knowledge, that we might be filled with all the fullness of God. That’s why God wants you to ask Him for these three things every day!