Today we will be looking at verse 17 of Chapter 1 of Ephesians...
"That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him:"
"That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him:"
God the Father is not only our God but also the God of our Lord Jesus Christ. This makes my brain hurt. I do not claim to even begin to understand it. Verse 2 of Ephesians, Chapter 1 begins with this verse: "Grace be to you, and peace, from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ." The bolded conjunction "and" indicates equivalence; that is, the Lord Jesus Christ is equally divine with the Father. So Jesus is God...He is equally divine with the Father and yet God is not only our Father but His as well. Jesus says this in John 20:17:
"Jesus saith unto her, Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father: but go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God."
Paul begins his prayer for these precious believers with thanksgiving. True faith cannot exist apart from true love. We can't love Jesus without loving His people. (1 John 5:1) Paul is rejoicing and thanking His God that the Ephesians had both. He then petitions God. Read the prayer again here...it is beautiful.
Paul prays here that the Ephesians saints would be given the spirit of wisdom and knowledge of Him so that their predominant mindset would be one of total comprehension of what they have been given in Christ. I so want that...I don't want head knowledge only...I want heart knowledge. I want the disposition of my mind and heart to be filled with Him. I want to really know...to really comprehend and appreciate the magnificent blessings that belong to me in Him. I want to truly "see" what I have in Him already...I don't want to waste time searching for what is already available to me. Instead, I want to remember to look to my God...He is the source of all I need...He is the Becoming One...the Great I AM. He has all I need...my job is to open my mouth wide and receive it. This is the mindset I am praying for!!! 2nd Peter 1 tells us that "His divine power has already granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence." We are in need of nothing else...
Colossians 2:8 See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men, according to the elementary principles of the world, rather than according to Christ"
Ecclesiastes 3:14 I know that everything God does will remain forever; there is nothing to add to it and there is nothing to take from it, for God has so worked that men should (reverence) Him"
So often we pray for what is already ours in Him. Do not pray for those things you have already been given as if God were withholding them from you...pray with the attitude Paul has here. Seek in prayer to appropriate what is already yours in Him. John MacArthur tells us that our problem as believers is not our lack of blessings, but lack of insight and wisdom to understand and use them properly and faithfully. Our blessings are so vast that the human mind cannot comprehend them. Only the Spirit who searches the deep things of the mind of God can bring them to our understanding. We can't comprehend them in our finite mind, but now we have the mind of Christ... and God has revealed them through the Spirit...for the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God.
1 Corinthians 2:9-16 But as it is written:
These things we also speak, not in words which man’s wisdom teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual. But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. But he who is spiritual judges all things, yet he himself is rightly judged by no one. For “who has known the mind of the Lord that he may instruct Him?” But we have the mind of Christ.
Wherefore I also, after I heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus, and love unto all the saints, Cease not 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 unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him: The eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that ye may know what is the hope of his calling, and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints, And what is the exceeding greatness of his power to us-ward who believe, according to the working of his mighty power, Which he wrought in Christ, when he raised him from the dead, and set him at his own 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 world, but also in that which is to come: And hath put all things under his feet, and gave him to be the head over all things to the church, Which is his body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all.--Ephesians 1:15-23
Paul prays here that the Ephesians saints would be given the spirit of wisdom and knowledge of Him so that their predominant mindset would be one of total comprehension of what they have been given in Christ. I so want that...I don't want head knowledge only...I want heart knowledge. I want the disposition of my mind and heart to be filled with Him. I want to really know...to really comprehend and appreciate the magnificent blessings that belong to me in Him. I want to truly "see" what I have in Him already...I don't want to waste time searching for what is already available to me. Instead, I want to remember to look to my God...He is the source of all I need...He is the Becoming One...the Great I AM. He has all I need...my job is to open my mouth wide and receive it. This is the mindset I am praying for!!! 2nd Peter 1 tells us that "His divine power has already granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence." We are in need of nothing else...
Colossians 2:8 See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men, according to the elementary principles of the world, rather than according to Christ"
Ecclesiastes 3:14 I know that everything God does will remain forever; there is nothing to add to it and there is nothing to take from it, for God has so worked that men should (reverence) Him"
So often we pray for what is already ours in Him. Do not pray for those things you have already been given as if God were withholding them from you...pray with the attitude Paul has here. Seek in prayer to appropriate what is already yours in Him. John MacArthur tells us that our problem as believers is not our lack of blessings, but lack of insight and wisdom to understand and use them properly and faithfully. Our blessings are so vast that the human mind cannot comprehend them. Only the Spirit who searches the deep things of the mind of God can bring them to our understanding. We can't comprehend them in our finite mind, but now we have the mind of Christ... and God has revealed them through the Spirit...for the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God.
1 Corinthians 2:9-16 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.”
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.
