Reading: Eph. 1:7-14; 3:14-21.
There is a phrase at the end of the third chapter of the
letter to the Ephesians which I feel we are led to
consider: "...the power that worketh in us". If you look
back to verse 16 you find these words: "...that ye may be
strengthened with power through his spirit in the inward
man". There is a very great deal hanging upon that
clause, "the power that worketh in us". It is something
which is called upon to carry a very great responsibility;
but, blessed be God, it is well able to carry it.
The connection, as we see from these passages to
which we have referred, carries us into things eternal.
Mark the phrase in verse 11: "According to the eternal
purpose". Mention is made of Divine purpose more than
once in this letter. Again, mark the words in verse 19:
"...that ye may be filled unto all the fulness of God".
There you have some intimation of what that eternal
purpose is. Then, as within that great compass, there is a
great deal of need, a many-sided need. That need in its
various aspects is touched upon in the two prayers of the
Apostle; the need for the spirit of wisdom and revelation
that we may know - and what things they are to be
known! What immense things to be known! - and then in
relation to that knowledge, that vast, wonderful, spiritual
knowledge, which is the content of the eternal purpose,
and in relation to all the fulness of God, one central need,
namely, to be strengthened with might, not only to know,
but to do. So we are led to what form the first words of
chapter 4: "I... beseech you to walk worthily of the
calling wherewith
ye
were called". What a context! If
we spent all the rest of our days, even though they were
many, we should never fathom these wonderful
intimations, all that hangs upon this little phrase
"the
power that worketh in us". As we have said, it is well
able to carry that burden.
Before going any further, I want to make this
observation, that this power transcends all His other
power. This is what is termed "the exceeding greatness
of his power to us-ward who believe". It is the power
that worketh in us. That "us" relates to a particular
people,
and there is a particular power related to that particular
people, and that particular power is the exceeding
greatness of His power, that which exceeds in greatness
all His other workings of power. I think that must lie
behind the superlative terms employed. It is a
comparative term. "The exceeding greatness of his
power" means that there are other expressions of His
power, but this one is its exceeding greatness; and it is
to us-ward who believe, it is the power which worketh in
us.
Now that is a great statement, and it leaves us with
much to think about, if it be true; and it is true: "...the
power that worketh in us", which is, as we have seen,
power through His Spirit in the inward man; and that is
the power and the means by which God reaches His end
in us. God has a great end in us, even that we should be
conformed to the image of His Son: "foreordained to be
conformed to the image of his Son..." This is the means
by which that end is reached in us. God is doing
something in us by the exceeding greatness of His power,
deeper than our senses, deeper than our recognition,
than our perception. There is something there which God
has done, and is doing, which is settled beyond the
interference of all the fluctuations and variations of our
more superficial life. We live so much in that superficial
realm, in what we call our soul realm, where we register
all the influences and sensations which come from
without, where we react to all such influences and
impacts, and where we have a world of our own feelings,
our own consciousness; this terrible world which is so
rarely quiet and calm for any length of time together. It is
the realm where all the fret is, all the anxiety, the worry,
the care, the forebodings, and everything that can make
us believe that it is the most real and positive and solid
and true world in God's universe.
When we are in a
mood, that mood is the most real thing to us, and if any
tell us it is only a mood, and not to be taken seriously,
we have little patience with such people. To us it is the
most real thing. We are passing through something that is
in the realm of this natural, this human life, and while we
are passing through, it is terribly real. Yes,
it may have a physical basis, it may rise from some
disorder; it may be anything in this natural life, and this
natural life is a terribly real thing to us, and very often we
are dangerously near believing that it is the most real and
ultimate thing, and that with it we stand or fall. Now
what I want to say is that that is not the deepest thing in
the child of God. There may be physical disorder and
mental derangement, and there may be all the most
positive sensations of which this complex nature of ours
can be conscious, but there is a deeper thing than that
which is not touched, not moved. Right down in the
depths of our being, if we are children of God, there is
something which survives all that. You know that it has
survived a thousand such moods and experiences. You
have again and again thought that it was the end; that
now you were going to be swamped and submerged,
now the finish had come, through despair, melancholy,
misery, or for some other reason, and you have survived
that kind of thing again and again; you have come
through, you have come out, you have come up. There is
something there in a child of God which is deeper than
that, more abiding, inviolable, a foundation of God
unshaken. Any power that can survive what we
sometimes have to go through in the realm of our own
souls is a very great power indeed; and, believe me, this
power that worketh in the Church is going to survive all
the accumulated sensations of all the members of the
Body of Christ.
Now bring all your misery together, bring all your
despair together, all your sensations, all the helplessness
of the outlook, and, if you are a child of God, there is a
power that worketh within which is more than sufficient
to meet and counter and triumph over all that. That is the
means by which God reaches His end in us, and if His
end in us is conformity to the image of His Son, then the
power that worketh in us is more than enough to meet
and overcome all that which is contrary to His Son in us.
Do you believe that? Not always! If we really
believed that in a thoroughgoing way we should never be
found occupied with ourselves, we should never be
depressed because of our imperfection, there would be
no room for any question as to our standing. Oh, if we
did but believe this, what triumphant people we should
be; for is it not true that the greater proportion of our
trouble, of our despair, of our unhappiness is due to the
consciousness of our own imperfection, all that we are
that we would not be and should not be, and all that we
are not that we feel we ought to be. His eternal purpose
and His exceeding great power are linked together. Do
not forget that. We are the object, of both, and His
exceeding great power is at work within us to effect the
purpose.
First published in "A Witness and A Testimony"
magazine, Mar-Apr 1939, Vol 17-2