Love First Love: That We Would Know the Fullness of Christ / Ephesians 1:15-23
Church, good to see you again this week. As you are grabbing a seat, go ahead and turn in your Bible to Ephesians chapter one. If you don’t have a Bible, just a reminder: stop by the iHub at some point. We would love to give you one as a gift to help get you set up with God’s Word.
We are in Ephesians chapter one again this week. Last week, Brad walked us through Ephesians 1:3–14. In that passage, we saw the Apostle Paul praising God for what He has given us as followers of Christ. Paul wrote that literally every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms has been given to you. If you are a follower of Christ, the assurance of that passage is that every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms is already yours.
Ephesians 1:3-14 (NASB)
Blessed [be] the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly [places] in Christ, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him. In love He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace which He lavished on us. In all wisdom and insight He made known to us the mystery of His will, according to His kind intention which He purposed in Him with a view to an administration suitable to the fullness of the times, [that is], the summing up of all things in Christ, things in the heavens and things on the earth. In Him also we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to His purpose who works all things after the counsel of His will, to the end that we who were the first to hope in Christ would be to the praise of His glory. In Him, you also, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation– having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is given as a pledge of our inheritance, with a view to the redemption of [God’s own] possession, to the praise of His glory.
What are those blessings? You have been chosen by God. You have been redeemed by Christ. You have been forgiven by His blood. You have been adopted as sons and daughters. No longer are you untethered out on your own island, eternally separated from God; He has literally brought you into His household as a son or a daughter. And as a son or daughter, you now have an eternal inheritance in the Father through Christ. It has been given to you, it is yours, and it has been secured and sealed by the presence of the Holy Spirit within you. That became a great anthem right out of the gate in Ephesians for what we have in Christ.
Introduction: From Praise to Prayer
This week, the Apostle Paul shifts gears. Rather than simply praising God for who He is and what He has done for us, he begins to pray to God on behalf of the church. His prayer is that we would walk more intimately in the things we have received—that we would enter into the deepest possible, fully satisfied relationship with Jesus Christ that He offers.
Outside of John 17, where Jesus prays for the church, Ephesians 1:15–23 is probably one of the most robust prayers in your entire Bible. This is a bowed-up prayer. As you read it, not only will you be able to pray it over your own life and over our church, but if you’re married, you can pray this over your spouse. If you have kids, you can pray this over your kids. If you’re single, you can pray this over your singleness. This is a fantastic prayer asking that you would meet God right where you are.
Let’s dive in at verse 15:
Ephesians 1:15-16 (NASB)
For this reason I too, having heard of the faith in the Lord Jesus which [exists] among you and your love for all the saints, do not cease giving thanks for you, while making mention [of you] in my prayers;
“For this reason I too, having heard of the faith in the Lord Jesus which exists among you and your love for all the saints, do not cease giving thanks for you, while making mention of you in my prayers.”
The Power of the Gospel in Ephesus
The first thing Paul does is say, “Ever since the gospel saved you and began its work of transforming you, I have not stopped thanking God for what He is doing in you.” And what was taking place in Ephesus was no small deal.
If you remember from week one in this series, Brad walked us through the background of the church at Ephesus in Acts 19. That city was laced with darkness. Many of the people had been walking in the occult, in witchcraft, magic, sorcery, and idol worship. The Holy Spirit wrecked shop and began instantly transforming hearts. All of a sudden, these people recognized they had been living for a lie. They found the ultimate truth in Jesus Christ, transferred their affections and trust to Him, and received salvation as a free gift in Christ.
Acts 19:18-20 (NASB)
Many also of those who had believed kept coming, confessing and disclosing their practices. And many of those who practiced magic brought their books together and [began] burning them in the sight of everyone; and they counted up the price of them and found it fifty thousand pieces of silver. So the word of the Lord was growing mightily and prevailing.
Remember what they did next in Acts 19? They went and gathered their magic books, spells, and incantations, brought them into the middle of the city square, and lit them on fire in front of everybody. They said, “No longer am I following that. I am following Jesus Christ. He has found me, saved me, redeemed me, and I am His.”
Not only that, but think about the idol makers—the craftsmen outside the temple of Artemis (or Diana) who made little silver trinkets and bobbleheads of the goddess for people to buy and worship. Suddenly, people who found redemption in Christ stopped buying those idols. Businesses began shutting down because their clientele vanished.
Every time I read Acts 19, I think: Oh, that that could happen in our communities today, right here in Fresno and beyond! Imagine if the gospel were preached with such power that lives were transformed to the point where the pornography industry in Fresno couldn’t survive—where those businesses had to pack up and leave because there was no clientele left. Imagine if human trafficking on Blackstone Avenue had to shut down because hearts were so radically changed by the gospel of Jesus Christ that nobody would exploit those girls anymore.
Do you believe that could happen in our day and in our city? That is exactly what happened in Ephesus. Word spread across the entire region. People were saying, “Did you hear what happened in Ephesus? People are giving their lives to Jesus, and immoral businesses are shutting down!” Paul, who first preached the gospel there, says, “There has not been a day that goes by that I don’t thank God for what He is doing in your midst.”
Praying for Intimate Knowledge: Wisdom and Revelation
In verse 17, Paul dives into the heart of his prayer. What do you pray for baby Christians who have come out of that kind of deep darkness and are now being transformed from the inside out? You pray this:
Ephesians 1:17 (NASB)
that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of Him.
“That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of Him.”
Paul prays, “Oh, that you might know Him more intimately.” This is foundational. In chapters four through six, things get very practical. Paul will address how the Christian life fleshes out in the church, in your marriage, in your parenting, in the workplace, and in every sphere of life. But before we get there, it must start here: an intimate knowledge of who God is.
Before marriage will ever make sense, you must understand who God is in your life. Before parenting will ever make sense, you must understand who God is. Before your singleness will ever make sense, you must understand who God is. It all begins with knowing Him intimately.
What kind of knowledge is Paul talking about? Is he talking about mere academic head knowledge—Wikipedia knowledge where you cram before a test, spout out facts, and forget them the next day? Or is he talking about something purely emotive, where you bounce from spiritual high to spiritual high in an ecstatic experience? Notice the two characteristics he highlights: wisdom and revelation.
First, wisdom is the practical, lived-out application of who God is. It is not just collecting data and information. It is a lifelong, time-tested relationship with Christ where you acquire wisdom along the way.
I have three young daughters. Teaching each of them to ride a bicycle has been quite an experience. I could have sat them down in the living room, popped in an instructional video, and explained the mechanics of gear ratios and hand brakes versus pedal brakes. I could have brought in a physicist to lecture on kinetic energy and Newton’s laws of motion and gravity, and then said, “There you go, girls! You know how to ride a bike now. Have at it!” They would have looked at me and said, “There is no way I’m getting on that bike.”
Instead, I took them outside, put them on the seat, ran behind them, held on—and then let go when they thought I was still holding them. After some scraped knees, bruised elbows, and bloody chins, they learned how to ride a bike. That is experiential wisdom.
That is what Paul is praying for us. He does not want us to settle for academic data about God. He wants us to have a time-tested wisdom where we learn to trust Christ through every season—when life is smooth and when the wheels fall completely off. There is a massive difference between knowing about God and knowing God.
Second, Paul prays that this knowledge would be according to revelation. It isn’t just an emotional chase where we require spiritual goosebumps to feel connected to Jesus. The philosophers, magicians, and astrologers in Ephesus had their own ideas about god, but their pursuit was based on human guesswork and speculation. They were throwing darts in the dark, hoping to hit something.
For the Christian, God has not left us to guesswork. He has revealed Himself. He has revealed who He is, what He has done, and how we are to live. He has revealed Himself primarily through the person of Jesus Christ, and secondarily through the Word of God—the Scriptures. Paul prays for a knowledge rooted in both experiential wisdom and divine revelation.
Ephesians 1:18 (NASB)
[I pray that] the eyes of your heart may be enlightened, so that you will know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints,
Paul summarizes this in the first part of verse 18: “I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened.” In the Old Testament, the “eyes of the heart” refers to perceiving God not through abstract theory, but through a heartfelt, intimate relationship. God created you and saved you for that kind of relationship.
Three Results of Knowing God Intimately
When the eyes of our heart are enlightened, what does that intimate knowledge produce in us? In verses 18 and 19, Paul lists three specific realities:
- That you may know what is the hope of His calling.
- That you may know what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints.
- That you may know what is the surpassing greatness of His power toward us who believe.
Hope, inheritance, and power. Let’s look at each of these.
1. The Hope of His Calling
Hope in the world is always a “maybe.” It’s wishful thinking: “I hope she likes me,” “I hope it rains in Fresno sometime this decade,” or “I hope the 49ers win next season.” That is worldly hope—crossing your fingers and hoping for the best.
Biblical hope is the exact opposite. It is 100 percent assurance regarding a reality that is not yet fully realized. God is a promise-maker and a promise-keeper. What He has promised will happen.
What is the hope of His calling? It is everything you have received in your salvation—redemption, forgiveness, adoption—and everything we are still waiting for. Verse 11 told us our inheritance is waiting for us. Revelation 22 promises that when Christ returns, He will bring about the restoration of all things. Everything broken will be healed once and for all, and we will dwell in His presence forever.
Revelation 22:1-5 (NASB)
Then he showed me a river of the water of life, clear as crystal, coming from the throne of God and of the Lamb, in the middle of its street. On either side of the river was the tree of life, bearing twelve [kinds of] fruit, yielding its fruit every month; and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. There will no longer be any curse; and the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it, and His bond-servants will serve Him; they will see His face, and His name [will be] on their foreheads. And there will no longer be [any] night; and they will not have need of the light of a lamp nor the light of the sun, because the Lord God will illumine them; and they will reign forever and ever.
When you fix your eyes not on what is temporal, carnal, and finite, but on what is eternal and secure, it changes everything. Our culture is obsessed with putting hope in things that cannot last. People will camp out overnight outside an Apple store for the newest iPhone, hold it like Gollum holding the Ring, love it for two days, and then start Googling when the next model comes out because the current one didn’t satisfy.
Or consider the guy who peaked in junior high: “Man, back in ’82, I was third-string junior high football—I was the man!” If that is where you stack your identity, that is tragic. When you know Christ intimately, you understand that your hope is eternal and unshakable. You start living for things that carry eternal weight rather than things that are here today and gone tomorrow.
2. The Riches of His Inheritance in the Saints
Next, Paul prays that we would know “the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints.” Earlier, in verse 11, Paul spoke about our inheritance in Christ—that we are co-heirs with Jesus. Romans 8 reminds us that the greatest part of our inheritance isn’t even “God’s stuff” or streets of gold; our greatest inheritance is God Himself.
Romans 8:16-17 (NASB)
The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, heirs also, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with [Him] so that we may also be glorified with [Him].
Look closely at the wording here in verse 18. Paul flips it. He is not talking about your inheritance in Christ; he is talking about Christ’s inheritance in you. That changes everything. This speaks to your identity and value.
Psalms 28:9 (NASB)
Save Your people and bless Your inheritance; Be their shepherd also, and carry them forever.
Psalms 33:12 (NASB)
Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD, The people whom He has chosen for His own inheritance.
The Psalmist writes that the people the Lord has saved are His inheritance. Christ’s church is what the Heavenly Father bestows upon His Son as the reward for His suffering. Deuteronomy 26 says that God’s people are His treasured possession.
Deuteronomy 26:18 (NASB)
’The LORD has today declared you to be His people, a treasured possession, as He promised you, and that you should keep all His commandments;
Paul is praying: “Oh, that you would understand how deeply treasured you are by God!” You do not need to dig through the garbage cans of the world looking for affection, validation, and worth. You have it in Christ.
The Story of the Vest: Where True Worth Comes From
This reality hit me powerfully when I was in high school and junior college. I wrestled with my identity. I came from a broken home, my dad was out of the picture, and I didn’t know where I fit in. On top of that, I was a late bloomer. I was the last guy picked in athletics, clumsy and uncoordinated. I was pretty sure I was the last guy in my high school to go on a date, and the last to get chest hair—though now I’m like a Chia Pet and can’t get it to stop growing!
When I got into junior college, I went through a phase where I desperately wanted to fit in with the cool crowd. In Dallas at that time, the thing to do was to go clubbing downtown. People wore brands like Z. Cavaricchi, Girbaud, and structured vests—think old episodes of Friends or Seinfeld. I wanted to fit in, but our family didn’t have the budget for club clothes.
My mom loved me, and it broke her heart to see her son struggling with rejection. One day, I came home to get ready to go out, and she said, “I know you’ve been wanting one of those vests, so I made one for you.” My stomach dropped. I thought, Oh no. If I didn’t fit in before, I definitely won’t fit in now.
She pulled out this handmade vest. Not wanting to hurt her feelings, I put it on, walked out to my truck, took it off, and went downtown. When I got home, I put it back on, walked inside, and told her, “Mom, it was awesome—I was like a chick magnet!” Then I tossed the vest into the bottom of my closet, where it sat for years.
When I transferred to the University of North Texas, I was packing up my closet for Goodwill. I found the vest and threw it into the donation box. But as I looked at it sitting there, I couldn’t do it. A knot formed in my stomach. I pulled it out and packed it with my clothes.
During college, I moved to nine different apartments. Every single time, that vest moved with me. I’m turning forty in a few months, and I still have that vest right here today. It looks ridiculous on me now—like a fat guy in a little coat. If you take a picture of me right now, Evan, I know where you live! But seriously: why have I carried this vest around for two decades?
It did nothing for my social life. It didn’t make me cool. My wife didn’t marry me because of the vest. It has zero intrinsic value; you won’t find it in a clothing store. The value of this vest does not come from what it does or how it looks. Its value comes entirely from the one who made it. It represents the sacrificial love of my mother.
That is what Paul wants you to understand about your worth in Christ. Your value is not determined by what the culture says about you, how you look, how you perform, or what others think. Every human being has inherent value because we are created in the image of God. But as a follower of Christ, your value is doubled: you are valued not only because He made you, but because He bought you with the precious blood of His own Son. You are His inheritance.
3. The Surpassing Greatness of His Power
Finally, Paul prays that we would know the surpassing greatness of His power toward us who believe.
Ephesians 1:19-20 (NASB)
and what is the surpassing greatness of His power toward us who believe. [These are] in accordance with the working of the strength of His might which He brought about in Christ, when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly [places],
Paul wants us to experience God’s transforming power so that we don’t live as an impotent group of people who profess faith with our lips while our lives remain completely unchanged. A seminary professor once described the difference between an electric eel and an electrician: both interact with electricity, but one merely produces a shock while the other harnesses and lives by its power.
In the church, some people merely know the data of God’s power in their heads, while others yield to that power and are transformed by it. Notice what Paul says about this power in verses 19 and 20: it is the exact same power that God exerted when He raised Jesus from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places.
Romans 8:11 (NASB)
But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.
Think about that. The Holy Spirit who indwells you possesses the very power that conquered the grave. In Romans 6, Paul explains that we were once dead to God and alive to sin, but now through the Spirit we are dead to sin and alive to God. The gospel is not merely “fire insurance” so you can avoid hell and live however you want. The resurrection gives you new life, and the Holy Spirit provides the power to transform you from the inside out.
Ephesians 1:21-22 (NASB)
far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come. And He put all things in subjection under His feet, and gave Him as head over all things to the church,
Paul adds that this power is “far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come.” For the Ephesian believers, who had lived in terror of demonic forces, magic, and occult powers, this was liberating news. The power of Christ in them was infinitely greater than Artemis, Diana, or Zeus.
Today, whether the name is Buddha, Muhammad, or any spiritual or earthly power, there is no name higher than Jesus Christ. As 1 John 4:4 reminds us, “Greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world.”
1 John 4:4 (NASB)
You are from God, little children, and have overcome them; because greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world.
When you go back to a difficult home situation, an antagonistic workplace, or a hostile school environment, you do not have to walk in fear. God has fully resourced His bride for the mission He has called her to.
The Power Unleashed in the Church
Notice how Paul concludes this prayer:
Ephesians 1:22-23 (NASB)
And He put all things in subjection under His feet, and gave Him as head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all.
“And He put all things in subjection under His feet, and gave Him as head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all.”
Of all the institutions God could have chosen to turn the world upside down with the gospel, He didn’t choose the financial system, politics, higher education, or social service organizations. As beneficial as those institutions can be, God chose the local church. He chose broken, redeemed sinners, sealed them with the Holy Spirit, filled them with resurrection power, and sent them into the world.
There is nothing on earth more powerful than the local church walking in the fullness of Christ. Students, young adults, families—tether your lives to the local church. This is God’s plan A for displaying His glory to the world.
Conclusion and Application: Praying This Over Your Life
How are you doing in your walk with Christ? Are you living on mere academic knowledge—gleaning facts from sermons, classes, and books, but knowing God no more intimately than you know Abraham Lincoln? Or are you chasing sensational, emotional highs that cannot sustain you when trials come?
God wants you to know Him. He wants you to experience the reality of His hope, the security of your worth as His treasured inheritance, and the resurrection power of His Holy Spirit.
I encourage you to take Ephesians 1:15–23 and pray it over your life every day this week. Wives, pray this over your husbands. Husbands, pray this over your wives. Parents, pray this over your children. Singles, pray this over your singleness—that Christ would be your ultimate satisfaction.
Closing Prayer
Father, You have blessed us with every spiritual blessing in Christ Jesus. You have withheld nothing from us. We ask that we would not simply look back at what Christ accomplished in the past, but that we would experience Your ongoing, transforming work in our lives today.
Lord, I pray for The Well Community Church. Teach us what it means to know You intimately—tethered to both wisdom and revelation. Enlighten the eyes of our hearts so that we grasp the hope of Your calling and stop living for temporary things. Ground our worth in the blood of Your Son rather than our own performance, resting in the truth that we cannot make You love us any more or any less than You already do in Christ.
Unleash Your resurrection power through this church. May we worship, share the gospel, and put sin to death in the confidence that the same Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead lives within us. Wreck shop in our lives, transform our hearts, and send us out as agents of Your kingdom in Fresno and across the world. In Jesus’ name we pray, Amen.