“Never stop praying” (1 Thessalonians 5:17 NLT)
”So let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious God. There we will receive his mercy, and we will find grace to help us when we need it most.” (Hebrews 4:16 NLT)
“Therefore I say to you, whatever things you ask when you pray, believe that you receive them, and you will have them.” (Mark 11:24 NKJV)
Let’s lay hold of the “Spirit of revelation” as we take time to read again Paul’s prayer for the believers in Ephesus…
…“Because of this, since I first heard about your strong faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and your tender love toward all his devoted ones, my heart is always full and overflowing with thanks to God for you as I constantly remember you in my prayers. I pray that the Father of glory, the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, would impart to you the riches of the Spirit of wisdom and the Spirit of revelation to know him through your deepening intimacy with him. I pray that the light of God will illuminate the eyes of your imagination, flooding you with light, until you experience the full revelation of the hope of his calling —that is, the wealth of God’s glorious inheritances that he finds in us, his holy ones! I pray that you will continually experience the immeasurable greatness of God’s power made available to you through faith. Then your lives will be an advertisement of this immense power as it works through you! This is the mighty power that was released when God raised Christ from the dead and exalted him to the place of highest honor and supreme authority in the heavenly realm! And now he is exalted as first above every ruler, authority, government, and realm of power in existence! He is gloriously enthroned over every name that is ever praised, not only in this age, but in the age that is coming!” And he alone is the leader and source of everything needed in the church. God has put everything beneath the authority of Jesus Christ and has given him the highest rank above all others. And now we, his church, are his body on the earth and that which fills him who is being filled by it!” (Ephesians 1:16-23 TPT)
Step 1: Probe the prayer under the light of the Holy Spirit.
As I have begun to probe Paul’s prayer it has already become glaringly clear that I need to step up my prayer life. Far too many of my prayers have followed the outline…
…Dear Heavenly Father,
Bless me,
Bless Ma,
Bless Cutie, and Pie.
Bless our store,
Our four, and no more,
Amen.
In order to break free of this pattern, let’s keep going. Paul already prayed for wisdom and revelation for the purpose of increasing intimacy with our heavenly Father in verse 17, now let’s probe verse 18…
… “I pray that the light of God will illuminate the eyes of your imagination, flooding you with light, until you experience the full revelation of the hope of his calling —that is, the wealth of God’s glorious inheritances that he finds in us, his holy ones!”
First, notice once again what Paul did not pray. As he continued to pray for the believers at Ephesus, he did not focus on their physical or material needs or wants. This was a very large group of believers in a city of approximately 250,000 – 300,000 people. There were undoubtedly many with the common needs of healing, financial breakthrough, emotional and relational issues, persecution, etc. Yet, Paul passes by all of the problems to go straight to the solution – “God’s glorious inheritances.”
When I am in an intimate relationship with my Father in which I see him as he truly is, I become positioned to see myself as he sees me – as I truly am. Only when I see my true identity will I be able to see the “glorious inheritance” that is within me. The thing that scares my enemy (the devil) the most is that one day I will wake up with full revelation of who I am and what I possess in Christ. He knows what will happen once I tap into the “inheritance” that is within me and begin thinking, speaking, and acting as the son of God that I was created to be – the real me.
Paul prayed that God would “illuminate the eyes of your imagination.” When God created the physical/material creation it began in his imagination. Imagination is the breeding ground for creation. It is the “brooding” place of the Holy Spirit. Imagination is a powerful tool for good or evil. It is the place in which the creativity of the Creator is deposited within me, however, it can also be the deceiving place of the enemy. He loves to shoot his fiery darts (thoughts and imaginations) into the ignorance or unfiltered openness of my mind. That is one of the reasons that I have been given the “helmet of salvation.” Wearing this helmet keeps out of my mind the enemies harmful imaginations and keeps in the life giving, creative imaginations of my Father.
The Holy Spirit will partner with my spirit (in which I possess the Mind of Christ) in order to breed and brood over creative imaginations and bring them to pass in the course of my life. He will flood me with light to illuminate my imagination, but I must open the door to my mind and let it in. My spirit is completely flooded with the light of God, but my soul (mind) has been darkened and needs for me to let in the light. This is part of the process of renewing my mind that Paul spoke of in his letter to the Romans.
There is a purpose for this light. There is a purpose for illuminating my imagination. It is so that I will “experience the full revelation of the hope of his calling.” Here is the definition that I believe most closely conveys the meaning of what I call “Bible Hope”…
…”Hope is the fervent expectation of the manifestation of God’s goodness in my life which I have not yet fully experienced.”
This is the hope that comes from “the eyes of your imagination” as they are illuminated by the “light of God.” This hope is “the wealth of God’s glorious inheritances that he finds in us, his holy ones!” We need to park for a minute on the concept of inheritance. Please answer the following questions (feel free to sneak a peek at the Holy Spirit’s answer sheet, I won’t consider it cheating)…
…Who determines the size of the inheritance, the owner of the estate who died or the one still living beneficiary of the inheritance?
…When is the inheritance given, when the owner or the beneficiary dies?
These seem like easy questions to answer. However, when it comes to what Paul is praying about we have made them difficult. Obviously, it is the estate of the one who dies that determines the inheritance. The inheritance is distributed upon the death of the owner of the estate, not the death of the beneficiary. And yet, most of us in the Body of Christ have been taught that we didn’t receive our inheritance at the death, burial, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus. We have been told that we must wait until we die to get more than a small down payment. Somehow we have reversed the process, and the possessions involved, and made them depend upon us rather than Christ. We have been led to believe that the estate is locked up in a place called heaven far, far above us being kept in a heavenly trust for us until we arrive there. If you have never heard this before, please hear it now…
…You have received your inheritance in full – ALREADY!
…You have everything within you (in your newly created spirit) that you will ever be given – NOW!
…The Kingdom of Heaven (and all of its benefits/inheritance) is in your heart and in your hands – TODAY!
This is where “Hope” comes in. Hope, as Paul is using it, is not wishing and longing for some day. It is not that I am waiting in anticipation of the goodness of God as expressed in my inheritance to be released to me when I arrive in heaven someday. No, hope is fervently expecting the manifestation of the inheritance that I already possess into the experience of my life now.
Paul does not pray for me to hold on and hold out for a future inheritance. No he prays that the floodlight of God will shine on my imagination so that I will clearly see what I already possess. He prays that I will creatively imagine life as it is intended to be as I receive the “full revelation” of my “glorious inheritance.”
So here is where the rubber meets the road. Here is where life turns a corner. I no longer need to beg God to do what he has already done. For example…
…I don’t need to cry out for healing – it’s in my inheritance – I already have it!.
…I don’t need to beg for provision – it’s in my inheritance – I already have it!.
…I don’t need to wish for deliverance – it’s in my inheritance – I already have it!.
As a newborn baby, I cried out when I had a need. I cried when I needed a diaper change. I cried when I was hungry. I cried and my caretaker met my needs. Then, as I drank my milk I began to grow. As I grew I was taught and trained to allow me less dependency on my caretaker. I grew from being a baby to being a boy. Now I could take care of my own personal needs and feed myself, however I was still completely dependent on my caretaker for provision.
As a boy, I began getting some meat with my milk. I also grew into more advanced teaching and training. As I became more mature I was given more responsibility. As I handled the responsibility properly, and showed an aptitude for increase, I was given more freedom and granted more independence. Eventually I grew up.
As a man, I began to eat strong meat and grew strong in stature and wisdom. My relationship with my caretaker became more of a partnership in which I was guided into the fullness of adult life. For me, my caretaker that I refer to was a combination of a mom and dad. My mom has graduated to heaven, however my dad is still here with me. So he is now the focus of this partnership.
Today, my dad and I have an “interdependent partnership.” For example, when we go to the cafe for lunch each day he is the driver (pilot) and I am the passenger (co-pilot). He could get where he is going without me, yet he relies on me to assist him along the way. He could do everything he is going to do without me, and yet he allows me to assist him. He could enjoy his outing without me, and yet he claims that I add to the enjoyment of the day. As the result of his upbringing, I also could function on my own, however, he adds to my life in so many ways. Even when my dad goes to be with my mom I will still be in partnership with all that he has taught me. He will be as close as my imagination. In many ways, the same is true of my relationship with my heavenly Father.
My heavenly Father designed me to mature into a fully manifested son of God. He owns everything and yet he has given the earth to me (along with all of the descendants of Adam). He holds all power, authority, and dominion, and yet he has chosen to delegate a portion of all of that to me. It is his desire that I take dominion over all that he created. He created me to rule over nature and subdue the enemy. Even though he is dependent on nothing or no one, completely self-sufficient, beyond my ability to comprehend, he has chosen to enter into an interdependent partnership with me. I believe that it was with clear revelation of all of this that Paul prayed for the believers at Ephesus.
Paul prayed for these believers in a way that shows me what a great respect he had for their current level of maturity in their relationship with the Lord. This is not a “milk prayer” for newborn babies. It is a “strong meat prayer” for mature sons and daughters of God. Sadly, if I look at how I pray so much of the time, I am praying as if I am still a completely dependent infant praying for other babes in Christ.
What an eye opener!
Let’s take some time to allow the Holy Spirit to open the eyes of our imaginations as we mull over…
…Eric’s Life Lesson # 431: Praying With Paul – Ephesians 1:15-23 Part 5