In Psalm 1:3, someone who is committed to the Lord is described as someone who is like a tree planted by streams of water. In Isaiah 61:3 those Jesus sets free are called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the Lord for the display of His splendor. The very thing that will be ours for the taking when God creates the new heaven and new earth will be the tree of life with leaves that are for the healing of the nations. Israel is often described as God vineyard. Jesus referred to us as the branches of Himself, the vine. (okay, that right there would be a humdinger of a study...hmmm, my brain is working!)
It is then, not surprising to see Paul use the same kind of language in Ephesians.
Ephesians 3:17b-19
And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power (there it is again) with all the saints (you and me) to grasp how
wide and long
high and deep
is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge-that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.
Holy. Smokes. That is some good eatin' right there.
We, when we come to meet Jesus, are firmly rooted and established in love. We don't get our spiritual ground from works, or how well we did in the Bible drill, or how cleaned up we can get. We are rooted, grounded, established, marked, fixed in L. O. V. E. There is no getting around it. You can't do enough right to get it, or be bad enough to lose it.
And there, right there where our feet are so entangled in the roots of love that we can't move out of it, there is where everything comes out. Those roots of love feed everything else we could ever want or imagine. Peace. Joy. Faith. Hope. Promise. Safety. Strength. Life.
Everything comes out of His love for us. And we can know this love that surpasses knowledge. Its doesn't make sense. We might not experience anything like it here on earth. It goes beyond knowledge down to the fleshy parts of who we are and it takes us to a place where we can be filled with God himself.
That kind of love wrapped around the feet of who you are will bring you to your knees so that you can be brought to a place of surrender and emptiness to be filled up with Him.
Did you catch that last part of the verse? ...that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.
Seriously. Let that sink in a minute.
I'll wait.
Read it again.
Oh Father, that we would be filled to the measure of all your fullness! Keep us rooted and established in love so that you are glorified, we are satisfied, and the kingdom magnified!
We love you Jesus and thank you for giving yourself so that we would have all of God. It's too much Lord. Too much. Thank you.
3 comments:
Roll call.
I pray Ephesians 1:17-19 3:16-19 over my family. This is what I crave for us. To really know the love of christ. That is really all there is.
Almost done blogging body image stuff, will let you know.
I just need to pray and so need the love of Christ today. It is a blundering day but I am rejoicing in it...tomorrow is a new day.
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