Ephesians 1:15 - Meaning and Application

We have now reached the closing part of this chapter, Paul’s earnest prayer to God for the Ephesians. We should pray for the people we thank God for. Paul first blesses God for what He had already done for them, and then he asks God to do even more. He gives thanks for spiritual blessings, and he prays for more of them, because God has chosen to give these blessings in answer to prayer.

God has stored these spiritual blessings for us in the hands of his Son, the Lord Jesus. But he has also appointed us to draw them out by prayer. We have no share in them beyond what we claim by faith and prayer. One reason Paul prayed for them was the good report he had heard about them, especially their faith in the Lord Jesus and their love for all the saints, that is, all God’s people (Ephesians 1:15). Faith in Christ and love for the saints will go together with every other grace.

Love for the saints, simply because they belong to Christ, must include love for God. Those who love saints as saints love all saints, even when some are weak in grace, low in the world, or hard to live with. Another reason for prayer was that they had already received the earnest of the inheritance, that is, the first payment or guarantee of what is to come. This is suggested by the word “therefore” in the passage. Someone might think, “If they already have the pledge, then they must be satisfied and need no more care.” But Paul’s response is the opposite. Therefore, he says, I never stop giving thanks for you, and I mention you in my prayers (Ephesians 1:16).

While he thanks God for giving them the Spirit, he also keeps praying that God would give them more of the Spirit, greater measures of his work (Ephesians 1:17). Even the best Christians need prayer. And when we hear good things about Christian friends, we should feel bound to ask God to help them grow and increase more and more.

What does Paul ask for on behalf of the Ephesians? Not release from persecution, and not riches, honors, or pleasures in this world. The main thing he prays for is that their minds would be opened, and that their knowledge would grow and deepen. He means a practical and real knowledge, not just an idea in the head. The graces and comforts of the Spirit come into the soul through the light of the understanding.

Satan works in the opposite way. He gains power through the senses and the passions. Christ gains power through the understanding. This knowledge must come from the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, who is also the Father of glory (Ephesians 1:17). The Lord is a God of knowledge, and no true saving knowledge comes from any other source. So we must look to him for it. He is the Father of glory, meaning all glory belongs to him, and he is the source of all the glory his saints have now or will have later.

God gives knowledge by giving the Spirit of knowledge, because the Holy Spirit teaches the saints and gives wisdom and revelation. We may have the Spirit’s revelation in the Word, but that will do us no good unless we also have the Spirit’s wisdom in our hearts. If the same Spirit who gave the Scriptures does not remove the veil from our hearts and help us understand and use them, we will not truly benefit from them. Paul is asking for the knowledge of Christ, or the acknowledgment of Christ, not only a study of Christ and what concerns him, but an obedient response to his authority, helped by the Spirit of wisdom and revelation.

This knowledge begins in the mind. He prays that the eyes of their understanding may be opened and enlightened (Ephesians 1:18). Those who already have some light in the things of God still need more. Their knowledge should become clearer, more exact, and more lived out in experience. Christians should not be satisfied with warm feelings alone. They should work to have clear minds too. They should aim to be knowledgeable and thoughtful Christians.

Paul then names three things he especially wants them to know more deeply. First, he wants them to know the hope of God’s calling (Ephesians 1:18). Christianity is our calling, because God has called us into it. There is hope in this calling, because when people deal with God, they must trust him for what they cannot yet see. It is a good thing to understand the hope that belongs to our calling, the great privileges God’s people have, and the future they expect from him and from heaven. That kind of knowledge helps us become more faithful, patient, and steady in the Christian life.

Second, he wants them to know the riches of the glory of God’s inheritance in the saints. Besides the heavenly inheritance prepared for the saints, there is also a present inheritance in the saints, because grace is glory already begun, and holiness is happiness starting to bloom. There is a glory in this inheritance, rich and weighty glory, that makes the Christian more honorable and more excellent than those around him. It is good to know this by experience, to understand the principles, joys, and power of the spiritual life. This may also mean the glorious inheritance among the saints in heaven, where God displays the fullness of his riches to make them happy and glorious. Whatever the exact sense, even a small taste of this on earth is deeply desirable and delightful.

So let us seek to know as much of heaven as we can by reading, meditation, and prayer. The more we know of it, the more we will long to be there. Third, Paul wants them to know the exceeding greatness of God’s power toward those who believe (Ephesians 1:19). A practical belief in God’s complete sufficiency and in the power of his grace is absolutely necessary if we are to walk closely and steadily with him. It is a precious thing to know, by experience, the mighty power of grace that begins and carries on the work of faith in our souls. It is no small thing to bring a soul to believe in Christ and to trust everything to his righteousness and to the hope of eternal life. Only almighty power can work that in us.

Paul speaks here with great fullness and force, yet even so he sounds as if words fail him. He wants to express the surpassing greatness of God’s mighty power, the same power God showed when he raised Christ from the dead (Ephesians 1:20).

That was indeed the great proof of the gospel’s truth to the world. But the copy of that truth in ourselves, meaning our sanctification, our being made holy, and our rising from the death of sin to match Christ’s resurrection, is the great proof to us. This cannot prove the gospel to someone else who knows nothing about it, there the resurrection of Christ is the proof. But when we can speak from experience, like the Samaritans, saying, “We have heard him ourselves, and we have felt a mighty change in our hearts,” then we can say with full confidence, “Now we believe, and are sure that this is the Christ, the Son of God.”

Many understand the apostle here as speaking of the very great power God will use to raise believers’ bodies to eternal life. It is the same mighty power he showed in Christ when he raised him from the dead. How desirable it is to come at last to know that power, by being raised through it from the grave to eternal life!

After saying something about Christ and his resurrection, the apostle briefly turns aside from his main subject to speak more honorably of the Lord Jesus and his exaltation. He sits at the Father’s right hand in the heavenly places, as Ephesians 1:20-21 says. Jesus Christ is raised above all, and he has authority over all, with all things made subject to him. All the glory of the upper world, and all the powers of both worlds, belong entirely to him.

The Father has put all things under his feet, as promised in Psalm 110:1. Every creature is subject to him. They must either obey him sincerely or fall under the weight of his rule and receive their judgment from him. God gave him to be head over all things. This was a gift to Christ, considered as a Mediator, meaning one who stands between God and people, because he was given this rule and this body that belongs to him. It was also a gift to the church, because it has been provided with a head who has such power and authority.

God gave him to be head over all things. He gave him all power in heaven and on earth. The Father loves the Son and has given all things into his hands. But what brings the greatest comfort is that he is head over all things for the church. He has been given all power so that he may direct all the affairs of God’s rule in a way that serves the purposes of his grace for the church. With this we can answer the messengers of the nations and say that the Lord has founded Zion.

The same power that sustains the world sustains the church. We can be sure he loves his church, because it is his body, his spiritual body, and he will care for it. It is the fullness of him who fills all in all. Jesus Christ fills all in all, meaning he supplies everything lacking in all his members, filling them with his Spirit and even with the fullness of God, as Ephesians 3:19 says. Yet the church is also called his fullness, because Christ as Mediator would not be complete if he did not have a church. How could he be a king if he had no kingdom? So this serves to honor Christ as Mediator, because the church is his fullness.