A Prayer That You Would Know

Grace and peace to you who read this today, whether your faith is strong as an oak or thin as a thread. Sit with me a while over these words I once wrote to the saints at Ephesus, for they were a prayer before they were a letter, and I would have them become a prayer in you.

I had just finished pouring out that great blessing — how the Father chose us before the foundation of the world, redeemed us by the blood of his Son, sealed us with his Spirit as the guarantee of an inheritance. And having said all that, I could not simply move on to instruction. My heart turned to thanksgiving. "For this reason, because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints, I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers" (Ephesians 1:15-16).

Hear what moved me: their faith and their love. Not their cleverness, not their numbers, not their reputation. Faith toward the Lord Jesus and love toward all the saints — these are the marks of a soul that God has touched, and wherever I saw them I gave thanks without ceasing. I want you to know that this is still how the kingdom is measured. If Christ has become precious to you, and if your heart has begun to open toward his people — even that is cause for thanksgiving to God, who alone works such things.

But notice what I ask for them. I do not pray first that their troubles would lift, or their purses fill, or their days grow easy. I pray "that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened" (Ephesians 1:17-18). This is the deepest thing I know to want for anyone: that they would know God — not know about him, but know him, with the inner eyes of the heart pried open and flooded with light. You may hold the truth in your head like a coin in a closed fist and never feel its weight. I pray you would see. And seeing is a gift; it comes from the Spirit, which is why I am on my knees and not merely at my desk.

And I tell you exactly what I long for you to see — three things, held out like three lamps in a dark room.

First, "that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you" (Ephesians 1:18). You were called. Behind your faith stands a summons that went out before you ever answered, and that call carries a hope — a settled, certain expectation of what is coming. When the days press hard, and they will, I want you to know that you are not walking toward nothing. You are walking toward everything.

Second, "what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints" (Ephesians 1:18). Consider the wonder of the words. It is his inheritance — the saints are God's own treasured possession, his portion, his glory. You, who feel so ordinary, so tarnished, so easily overlooked — you are counted among the riches of God. Let that undo the low thoughts you carry about yourself.

Third — and here my prayer strains toward its height — "what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe" (Ephesians 1:19). I heap up the words because one will not carry the load: immeasurable, greatness, power, working, great might. I want you to know how strong is the hand that holds you. And lest that remain an abstraction, I show you exactly where this power was displayed.

It is "according to the working of his great might that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places" (Ephesians 1:19-20). Here is the measure of the power at work in you: it is resurrection power. The same might that reached down into the tomb, that laid hold of a dead man and stood him alive, that lifted him from the grave to the throne — that is the power directed toward you who believe. Do you fear you cannot change? Cannot hold on? Cannot be forgiven, cannot be raised at the last? The God who emptied the grave of his Son is not short of strength for you.

And see where he set him: "far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come. And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church" (Ephesians 1:21-22). Every power you fear — seen and unseen, the things that oppress this age and the things you cannot name — Christ reigns over them all, and they lie beneath his feet. There is no authority in heaven or on earth that is not under him.

Then hear the tenderness folded into all this majesty. God gave him as head over all things to the church — "which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all" (Ephesians 1:22-23). The cosmic Lord, throned above every power, is joined to his people as a head to its own body. You are not a spectator of his glory; you are joined to it. He is not a distant emperor but your living head, and you his very fullness. What belongs to the head flows to the body.

So what shall you do with this today? Do not merely read it — pray it. Ask the Father of glory to open the eyes of your heart, for that seeing is his gift and he delights to give it. When you rise into a day that frightens you, remember the hope you are called to. When you despise yourself, remember you are his inheritance. And when you face what you cannot overcome, remember that the power holding you is the power that raised Christ and seated him above every name — and that this reigning Lord is your own head, and you his body.

I have prayed this for people I never met with my eyes, and I pray it now for you. May you know him.

Grace and peace be with you.