There remains therefore a rest for the people of God. Heb 4:9 NKJV

When the Lord finished His works of creation, He rested. It was done. Complete. Perfect. He didn’t have to throw it out and try again. It wasn’t failure #3942. It was done once, and it was perfect. It was finished! The same truth He declared at the cross over your redemption and mine. It was complete, finished and all that remained for you and I was to rest. ‘For he who has entered His rest has himself also ceased from his works as God did from His.’ Heb 4:10 NKJV

Romans revelation sets the foundation for Ephesians – the rescue plan before the glory plan. In Romans you start with man in his lowest degradation then find God’s solution in the offering of the perfect Man. In Ephesians you have man promoted to his greatest glory at God’s right hand and collectively as His masterpiece, the Church, the temple of the living God. We talk about getting close to God. You can’t get any closer to Him than what is revealed in Ephesians. You simply have to learn to rest in Him. We live out of the place of rest!

How do I get to the place of rest? You receive it. You receive His righteousness, His redemption, His rest. You declare an end to trying to be good and just live out the goodness that you have in you. If you’re there at a place where you don’t condemn yourself – that’s good – 99% of the people around you never get there. But ask Him to take you higher. If you’re still not at the place of faith where you want to be, ask Him to take you higher. There’s more in God even for the most mature among us. There remains a rest for the people of God.

We must understand what we are in Him, and what He is in us. He is the Lion of Judah and the Lamb of God. We have His ‘lion’ characteristics of supreme confidence, boldness and authority as well as His ‘lamb’ characteristics of purity, righteousness, unoffendableness, gentleness and meekness as well. We have the Father’s nature of overarching love in both the Lion and the Lamb in us. In the hallway in my office hangs a picture of the Lion and the Lamb on one side all by itself, while on the opposite wall is pictures and stories of miracles where the Lion roared and the Lamb reigned in righteousness, so I’m reminded of Who is in me when I enter there. In that reality I rest!

Ephesians One through chapter Three builds on this idea of the finished work of Christ from Romans and takes us to the place of being filled with the fulness of God. Jesus said, he who has seen Me has seen the Father. I want people to see Him in me.  When I rest in Him, then His character, His love, His faith, His boldness comes out in me. Then prayer and worship become a lifestyle, not an obligation. Then the attractive power of the light and love of God draws men to us which we then bring to Him. Then ministry becomes a natural extension of who we are, sons and daughters of the living God.

For this reason I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,  15 from whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, 16 that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man, 17 that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, 18 may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height —  19 to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. Eph 3:14-19 NKJV

A tree as a living organism is an incredible structure. Some individual trees cover whole acres of space and are the largest single living creatures in nature. The nature of a tree with its root structure shows that we only see half of its size above ground. The huge maple in our backyard with four trunks must have an equally huge root structure given the tons of weight that it supports above ground. The idea of being ‘rooted and grounded’ and the fourth dimension of ‘depth’ in our prayer in Ephesians Three harkens to a tree and describes the greatest living spiritual reality of all, the love of God. All the weight of our redemption, even our life itself, is supported in the root structure of the love of God. What do you see when you look at a tree?

Then we get to the doxology in Ephesians Three. Doxology is a theological term made up from the Greek words DOXA meaning glory and LOGOS, meaning word or communication. A doxology is a communication, a declaration of the glory of God. Let’s dig into it!

Now to Him who is able to (Grk. DUNAMEI) do (GRK. POIEO) exceedingly (Grk. HUPER) abundantly above (Grk. HUPEREKPERISSOS) all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, 21 to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen. Eph 3:20-21 NKJV

Before I went to bible college, I used to really believe God. My old bible teacher said, What God is able to do, He is willing to do. I believed that! At one point I crisscrossed the state of Nebraska for a year, without support, with barely any money, seeing incredible miracles, planting house churches, teaching and ministering. Then I went to bible college and let my faith match what was expected of me, instead of really being free to soar. It took years to recover from that place!

‘Able to do’ is DUNAMEI POIEO. Who is able to do? Him, meaning the whole Godhead of Father, Son and Spirit. The whole Godhead is invested in you and I as the Church operating in the power of God (1 Cor. 12:4-6). DUNAMEI is a form of DUNAMIS which is the inherent power of God in Christ in you, the same power that created the universe and raised Christ from the dead. A form of POIEO which is POIEMA is translated ‘workmanship’, or perhaps better translated ‘masterpiece,’ in Ephesians 2:10. Our God is able and willing to create a masterpiece for us!

You are going to see the DOXA, the glory, in this doxology! This next statement is one of the strangest and most wonderful that I know of in the Greek NT…

‘Exceedingly abundantly above.’ HUPER…HUPEREKPERISSOU. HUPEREKPERISSOU is actually three words compounded together; HUPER meaning super or above, EK meaning ‘out from’ and PERISSOU meaning ‘superior in quality or preeminent.’ Put it all together and its something like ‘super superiority out from or above all others in quality and preeminence.’

‘Now to Him, the Godhead, who is able and willing to give us a masterpiece that is of such super superiority that it is above all that we could ask or think in quality and preeminence…’

Meditate on that for a minute.

I think Michaels twins, Samalie and Samuel Kevin – now five years old, can you believe it? – fit a case for what is described above. He and his wife had been childless for over twenty years in a culture that despised barrenness. They had suffered personal heartache and great indignities at the hands of their friends and neighbors for being childless. When the Lord told me to get involved I had no idea what would happen. Unbeknownst to me, Michaels wife had been praying for twins for years, even doing prophetic acts like packing baby clothes in small bags and then sleeping with them like they were babies. She would wash and dry those clothes on the line. We prayed weekly and walked together for two years through almost constant harrowing circumstances until those babies were successfully conceived and born. The births rocked the nation! Javier’s healing might fit the category. In the hospital on a ventilator with covid, on two separate occasions, involving a doctor and then a nurse, he was told he would die. God overruled and with months of focused prayer the prayer team prayed him through to victory. Today he is healthy and whole!

‘…according to (Grk. KATA) the power (Grk. DUNAMIS) that works (Grk. ENERGEO) in us…’

Why doesn’t Ephesians 3:20 just work automatically for every born again one in every circumstance all the time? Because of this phrase. Freedom implies responsibility and accountability. It was an Ephesians 3:20 moment in the OT when Israel left Egypt with 600K households and not one feeble knee among them, from babies to my geezer MZUZU (‘moo-zee’ in Kiswahili) brigades. But that wholeness was contingent upon them being obedient to the Word. We have a GREATER covenantal relationship with the Lord than even Israel had. We are sons by birth and by adoption. Imagine if you found a church body somewhere where everyone was healthy, everyone was blessed? Won’t that be amazing!

What energizes the DUNAMIS in us?

Our old music albums would get scratched and start repeating themselves which is one reason I can’t understand the current craze for vinyl. People would say, ‘You sound like a broken record!’ if you started to repeat yourself or if you preached the same message over and over. So, dear one…spin that old album because here it comes again – the answer to my question: praying in tongues in love! It builds up your inner man. It strengthens your inner man with might. It builds up your faith. Jesus declared that all of His saints should do it. Paul said he did it more than the whole Corinthian church. I know…yada, yada, yada! But for those of us who do it – boys and girls, men and women the world over – we see JESUS bigger and bigger all the time. Just saying…don’t cancel me!

‘…to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen…’

Amen indeed! Our God is so wonderful! We are such a blessed people. My prayer is that you and I say, ‘I want to live Ephesians 3:14-21!’ He promises that if we seek Him with all of our hearts we will find Him and be found by Him. 2023 should be our Ephesians 3:20,21 year. We don’t have to prophesy it, but just declare it and claim it and go after it with all of our hearts. I can’t wait for your miracle testimonies! Amen? Love you!

Remember dear ones, we must be about our Father’s business…