Timeless Prayer

Transcript

Rob McFarlane: 0:58

Today we're going to be looking at Ephesians chapter 3 and studying a prayer that Paul prayed for the church in Ephesus. And I've entitled this sermon, Timeless Pray. Let's read Ephesians chapter 3, verse 14 to verse 21 from the New Living Translation. When I think of all this, I fall to my knees and pray to the Father, the Creator of everything in heaven and on earth. I pray that from His glorious, unlimited resources, He will empower you with inner strength through His Spirit. Then Christ will make His home in your hearts as you trust in Him. Your roots will grow down into God's love and keep you strong. And may you have the power to understand as all God's people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is. May you experience the love of Christ, though it's too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God. Now all glory to God, who is able through his mighty power at work within us to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think. Glory to Him in the Church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen. The start and end of this prayer are important. They show us that this is a timeless prayer. Let's look at the start. When we read the start of this prayer, we see that we are praying to our Father and our Creator. Ephesians 3 verse 14 and 15 says, When I think of all this, I fall to my knees and pray to the Father, the Creator of everything in heaven and on earth. Think about that for a moment. When we're praying, we're praying to our Father, which speaks of a family, intimate, close relationship. We have a good Father who wants good things for us. And he wants us to come to him as our daddy. He wants us to come to him as our father. And then in verse 15, it tells us that he's the creator of everything in heaven and on earth. This is the God who created everything from nothing by the power of his word. This is the God who conceived everything beautiful in our world in his mind before he spoke it into being. And you and I have this wonderful privilege of coming to pray to our Father and our Creator. Let's now look at the end of the prayer. And I want you to notice as we read the last verse in this prayer, Ephesians 3 verse 21, that this prayer does not have an expiry date. It's not just for the church in Ephesus, it's for you and I today. Ephesians 3 verse 21 says this glory to him in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen. That includes you and I. You and I can be included in and participate in this wonderful prayer. Now there are three lessons from this prayer. It's a triple A rated prayer. You know, a triple A rated appliance or device is effective and efficient. And this is a very, very effective prayer. And I believe that it's a prayer that we can read over ourselves, our loved ones, our church family, and others that God lays upon our hearts. So we're gonna see three A's that we need to do from this triple rated timeless prayer. Number one, allow God to work. In Ephesians chapter 3, verse 16 and 17a, we read. Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him. I think that's just absolutely amazing. It's wonderful for us to consider that we can let our God work in our lives as we trust in him. We can tap into his unlimited resources. Friend, our God has unlimited resources. He wants you and I to trust that he will work in our lives, and that's what prayer is doing. Prayer is working in partnership with him, inviting him into situations in our lives, and he wants to work in our lives. I just think it's just wonderful as we trust in him. So the first A that we've seen in this timeless prayer is we need to allow God to work. Let's invite him in. Number two, we need to accept God's love. Let's read Ephesians chapter 3, verse 17b to verse 19. Your roots will grow down into God's love and keep you strong. And may you have the power to understand as all God's people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is. May you experience the love of Christ, though it's too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God. I think that's just so wonderful. God wants us to accept his love for us. Friends, you are loved by your heavenly father, and we should have a revelation of his love for us. Now, these verses tell us it's too great for us to understand fully, it's too awesome, it's too amazing to understand fully, but we still can experience it. Like a little child is aware of their father's love and their mother's love for them, even though they don't fully understand it. We don't have to understand everything about God's love to accept it and to live in that love. God loves you. One of the most important things for us to know is that God loves us. We need to know beyond all shadow of doubt that nothing in all creation, no height, no depth, no power, no force of any kind can separate us from the love of God that is ours in Christ Jesus. He loves us so much, and we need to bask in that love. We have a God who wants to invite us into his presence, a God who wants us to know that he is not just one who loves, but he is love himself. Thank you, Lord, for your great love for us. So the second A in our timeless prayer is we need to accept God's love for us. And number three, the third A is we need to anticipate God's answers. Let's read Ephesians 3 verse 20. It says, Now all glory to God, who is able through his mighty power at work within us to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think. God wants us to ask Him. He says, You don't have because you don't ask. I love the way this verse is put in one version of the Bible. It says, God is able to do exceedingly abundantly above, or we ask, think, or imagine. Now, for a moment, would you just think about a thing that's troubling you in your life? Now imagine that situation completely solved. Here he's telling us that God can do more than we ask, think, or imagine. I want to encourage us to pray this timeless prayer and ask him to do great and mighty things in our lives. God wants to do more than we ask, think, or imagine. Let's trust him. Let's trust him with those we we love, recognizing that he loves them even more. Let's trust him with our future, even though we might not know what the future holds. We know he holds the future. He promised he would never leave us, he would be with us always, and we can trust him. So, in conclusion, we've seen three things. Number one, in our prayer, we need to allow God to work. Number two, we need to accept his love for us. And number three, we need to anticipate his answers. I would like to read this prayer, this timeless, triple A rated prayer over us today. Why don't we pray this out together? When I think of all this, I fall to my knees and pray to the Father, the creator of everything in heaven and on earth. I pray that from his glorious unlimited resources, he will empower you with inner strength through his spirit. Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him. Your roots will grow down into God's love and keep you strong. And may you have the power to understand as all God's people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is. May you experience the love of Christ, though it's too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God. Now all glory to God, who is able through his mighty power at work within us to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think. Glory to him in the church and in Christ Jesus through all generations, forever and ever. Amen. As we close, I would like to speak the blessing over you from Numbers chapter six, verse twenty four to twenty-six. The Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you. The Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace. Thank you. The best is yet to come.