Praying with Paul

This devotional is written by Sirine Hammami. All things students, all things French. 

A Prayer for the Ephesians

14 For this reason I kneel before the Father, 15 from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name. 16 I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, 17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, 18 may have power, together with all the Lord's holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, 19 and to know this love that surpasses knowledge--that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

20 Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, 21 to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.

First of all, I want to acknowledge how beautiful this passage is and it's a prayer which we should come back to especially at times when struggling, forgetting God's goodness/faithfulness.

Today I want to focus on verse 20, "now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine". I have been thinking about this verse during lockdown and even before wondering what it really means. I am someone who would say that when I pray I have faith that God is who he says he is and who knows that prayer is powerful and can shift things. I would approach God with boldness and have confidence in Jesus' resurrection where he defeated death. I am also aware that we live in a broken world, "the now and not yet kingdom" and so there are times when I have prayed with faith and confidence for a situation which I felt was unjust and the answer wasn't the one wished. There were other times when I prayed and the outcome was bigger than I could have imagined.

I think for me, what I came back to when reading this verse is the foundation of our faith: the cross and the resurrection. Indeed, Jesus' love for the world stopped at nothing and His want to reconcile us with Him and give us fullness of life meant that He sacrificed Himself on the cross and also rolled away the stone, any stone that will come in the way of it. That is more than we could have ever imagined in itself.

While we are living in the in between, we need to realise our hope isn't in something we see but in someone we know and so always have faith in Him no matter what the answer (disappointment, anger), knowing and being confident that God's in the bigger picture. When you look back, I pray that you can see how far He has brought you and continues to take you. See that it was and will be more than you could ever have imagined.

He is not finished yet and He will always make all things works for His Glory, forever Amen!