The disciples once asked Jesus to teach them how to pray.  He responded by teaching them what we know as the Lord’s Prayer.  But sometimes, Christians today have acted as though the Lord’s Prayer is the only prayer the New Testament teaches.  But this isn’t the case.  Today, we see that Paul interrupted his train of thought in his letter to the Ephesians, to offer a powerful prayer for those who face faith shaking circumstances in their lives.  For the Ephesians, it was uncertainty about what would happen to them now that Paul was in prison.  They wondered, if they would be arrested too?  Or, should they return to their old, safe false religions?  But, in the midst of this spiritual crisis, Paul prays to calm their worries and fears.  And in doing so, Paul teaches us to pray for those family members, those friends and acquaintances who are dealing with faith threatening situations.

Now when many in our society today hear that a person is going through a difficult time, we’ll often hear them say something like, “You’ll be in our thoughts”.  But what good can just our thoughts do – they have no power to change anything!  Instead, we Christians, can do better.

We can pray, “that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith…that you may be filled with the fullness of God.”  May you, “be filled with the fullness of God” is the climax to Paul’s prayer, but it also summarizes all that he has asked beforehand.  To pray that someone may be filled with the fullness of God is to ask that Jesus Christ dwell within that person.  And faith is the only way by which Christ dwells in anyone’s heart.  So, Paul is really praying that the Ephesians faith will remain strong, despite his imprisonment.  And the only way that faith can remain strong is by God strengthening it through the work of the Holy Spirit.  We know that the Holy Spirit works through the Word of God, yet far too often, when hearts are troubled and shaken, people turn away from the very thing, the Word, that could strengthen them!

If you see fellow Christians isolating themselves, you can offer more than, “I’m thinking of you.”  Or even just, “I’m praying for you.”  You can say, “I’m praying that God will fill you with the fullness of Christ!”  Nothing is as powerful as asking the Father to strengthen the anxious with His Spirit so that Christ would dwell in them.  For the indwelling of Christ can bring peace, forgiveness, life and salvation to those who are troubled by any fear or anxiety.

But Paul’s prayer goes even further.  He also asks that his hearers may have the power to grasp the magnitude of Christ’s love for them – “that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth”.  Often when we face difficult times, the question comes, “Why did God let this happen to me?”  But when we ask this understandable question, we very often approach it with our own limited understanding of God’s love for us!  Instead, the wise person who prays asks God to give anxious people the power to see beyond his or her condition to the greatness of Christ’s love for them.

Now, why would Paul pray that God would give his hearers the power to grasp the enormity of God’s love?  So, they won’t lose heart and be discouraged in this life!  The devil loves nothing more than to isolate us, to make us believe we are all insignificant, that God has better things to do, that He has better people to look after.  The devil wants us to ask, “Who am I among the billions of people in this world, that God should help or love me?”

The statistics say that North American Christianity is shrinking in numbers and influence.  That can make us feel insignificant, just as the Christians in Ephesus knew that they were insignificant number of people too.  Thanks to modern day advances in astronomy and physics, our understanding of the size of the universe continues to grow, but that can make us feel even more insignificant!  Yet God has given us His redeeming love.  It was for fallen humanity that God sent His Son to set things right between Himself, us, and all of creation.  The fate of all human history reached its climax when Jesus died on that insignificant little patch of land called Israel.  But the enormity of God’s love doesn’t stop with Jesus’ death and resurrection.  He sent apostles and missionaries throughout the world to get the Word of life out.  He gave faithful parents, grandparents, or friends that spoke of that love to generations of people throughout the ages!

“You’re in my thoughts”?  How about, “I’m also praying that God will help you see the enormous scope of His love for you, and that He is not limited in the way that he can help you.”

Yet, while Paul asks God to help the Ephesians understand the enormity of God’s love in all of its fullness, he also asks God to help them experience that love for themselves in Christ, so that they may have more than just a knowledge of it.  What such a prayer looks like is the difference between hearing about a great new car, and actually getting behind the wheel and being able to drive it!  For our Christian faith is not just a matter of knowing that God is love, (even the devil and the demons know that).  But it is also the experience of it that Paul prays for his hearers – “the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge”.

How and when does that experience take place?  Today people will jump around from church to church trying to find the experience that they are looking for.  But the experience of God’s love is not defined by a church’s size, worship, or its style.  It is found where Jesus speaks to us in the Scriptures each week as we meet together.  We experience that love as we hear Him speak forgiveness through Absolution, for Jesus said in Luke 10, “The one who hears you, hears me”.  We experience that love as we receive Him in the Sacrament as a pledge that He has given Himself completely for us.

“You’ll be in our thoughts”?  How about, “I’m also praying that you will experience God’s love as He gives it to you in worship and as the members of the Church care for you”?

With these bold requests, does Paul exceed the limits of prayer?  Does he ask too much of God?  Is it okay for you to pray this way?  Shouldn’t we be cautious and not ask too much from God?…  Not at all!  Paul ends our text with words that give us confidence to pray just as he did: “Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that was ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever.  Amen”.

Let your desire for people who suffer, who are in need, who are anxious or worried about life and all of its problems, (whether they be young or old) be that of St. Paul – that those who for whom you pray would be filled with the fullness of God as Christ dwells in their hearts through faith.  That God, working through His Holy Spirit using the Word and Sacraments may enable them to grasp the enormous scope of His love.  And that finally, you and they may experience that love in God’s family.  Amen.