TUESDAY June 4th
Ephesians 1:15-16
‘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’.
It has been difficult to know how to break down this prayer in verses 17-23, and in the verses which we will eventually get to in chapter 3:14-21, but we see that Paul desired for the believers to know what it was to grow in Christ and to develop into spiritual maturity.
To note first is that he addresses his prayer to ‘the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory’. At first, if you haven’t stopped to think about this, why the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, when Jesus himself is also God? I am going to answer this two ways, these are my own thoughts from my personal meditation on these verses, there might be other reasons, but the first I considered is that by praying to ‘the God of our Lord Jesus Christ’, it is a declaration that the God of Jesus is the true and the living God, as opposed to the many other gods that the unbelieving folk in Ephesus and the surrounding areas called out to. They, that is the other gods were unable to answer, for they were mere idols.
Secondly, I am going to see it by being linked to what Paul says in Timothy concerning Jesus as being the one who is the mediator between man and God, and what is written in Hebrews which is that we have access to the Father through the Son, who has become our great high priest and Paul knew that we come to God through the Lord Jesus Christ and he is making this prayer in Ephesians to God, that is the true and the living God, the Father and through Jesus the Son.
These are the verses: 1 Timothy 2:5 ‘For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus’ and Hebrews 4:14-16 ‘For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.’
Before we move on, we have the same access! Because the One who Paul knew as his great high priest, is also our great high priest. His name is Jesus, he is the One who has made access for us into the presence of almighty God, he is the One who has given us permission to come and to call on his Father, God, our Father who is in heaven.