Thursday Reading: Ephesians 3:13-19
Key Verse: Ephesians 3:17
17 that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love,
Devotion:
Being able to put in writing what is in your heart is a very special gift, one that I continue to seek with each day. The apostle was more anxious that the Ephesians should not be discouraged by the trials and tribulations that he had to suffer rather than what he actually had to bear and to emphasise this point he wrote these words. The first thing he does is to praise God and to lift his name up high – an example that we need to be proud to follow – but he also makes sure that they know that we can get more support through the Holy Spirit than we realise! Christ Himself told us that He would send back the Holy Spirit to indwell and strengthen us; the apostle reminds us.
It is through our faith that we can depend on The Holy Spirit because we cannot see Him. It is because of that faith that He will strengthen us. If we truly love Christ our King with all our heart and all our mind then we will surely know that He is with us always. Thankfully it is not based on our ability to continue to love Him in a righteous manner that He chooses to stay with us otherwise we would be alone after the first few minutes! God chose to make things possible in this manner because He knew of our weaknesses and He knew that we would not have the strength or the faith to bring Him into our lives. He chooses to come in because He knows we are lacking!
If our relationship with Christ was based on our abilities we would be in a big hole! Thankfully our relationship is based on Christ, our Solid Rock! We may not be able to understand the love that Christ has for us because we are fickle compared to Him, but we can depend on that love. The more that we walk with Christ, the more that we will continue to see the enormity of His love for us. The more that we see that, the more our faith will grow. You see, God had this all planned before we broke things. We need not worry about the things that face us but rather that we chose to encourage others in finding out this same saving grace that we know!
Points to Ponder:
How do you encourage others?
Do you fully rely on God?
