Get Life Get LOVE - Ephesians 1:15-22; 3:1-21

“I ask—ask the God of our Master, Jesus Christ, the God of glory—to make you intelligent and discerning in knowing him personally, your eyes focused and clear, so that you can see exactly what it is he is calling you to do, grasp the immensity of this glorious way of life he has for his followers, oh, the utter extravagance of his work in us who trust him—endless energy, boundless strength!” (Ephesians 1:18-19 The Message)
 
In his letter to the church in Ephesus, Saint Paul shared why he prayed for the church and told them what he prayed for the church.  Why did he pray?  Paul wrote, “His intent was that now, through the church, the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms…” (Ephesians 3:10)  The phrase, “manifold wisdom” is interesting – the great scholar and bible commentator, John Stott notes that the lovely greek word polupoikilos means “many colours” and was used to describe flowers, crowns, embroidered cloth and woven carpets.  Stott writes in his classic commentary on Ephesians that, “The church as a multi-racial, multi-cultural community is like a beautiful tapestry…No other human community resembles it.  Its diversity and harmony are unique.  It is God’s new society.” (The Message of Ephesians, BST, 1979 p.123).
 
What did Paul pray for?  There was one thing Paul wanted for the church above all else: LOVE.  Because when diverse people from all walks of life and backgrounds, of all colours and languages are full of LOVE, there’s room for nothing else.  Paul prayed that LOVE would strengthen them, root them, establish them, empower them, delight them, fascinate them, and fill them – not just the kind of fullness we can imagine but the kind of fullness God can imagine. This would all be impossible if it were up to us.  But Paul knew that God alone is LOVE and that God is willing to fill us with himself, with LOVE beyond our wildest dreams.
 
Let’s pray today for the church in Bournemouth, that we would be united in LOVE.  Let’s pray we would be like a beautiful tapestry, holding out harmony and hope to our deeply divided world.
 
“I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge – that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.” (Ephesians 3:17-19