Last Sunday, we were studying Paul’s wonderful prayer-report in Ephesians 3:14-21, and I suggested that we try praying it every day this week. It then occurred to me that it might be helpful to re-write it as a prayer – which might make it easier actually to pray!…
Our great Father,
You are Father indeed: Father of all your people, whether already in heaven or still on earth; in fact, there would be no fatherhood of any kind were it not for you.
So, we humbly kneel before you and ask you, out of the extravagant riches of the glory that is yours, and through your Spirit, to strengthen us with your power in our inner selves – in our hearts – so that, even while our bodies are wasting away, Christ may truly dwell within us more and more as we trust in him.
And we ask you, knowing that we are already grounded in Christ’s love, to give us strength to grasp the full extent of his love – wide enough to embrace the whole universe, long enough to keep us through eternity, high enough to lift us to heaven, deep enough to reach the worst of sins. Help us, along with all your people, to know more and more of his love, even though it is too great ever to know fully, so that we may become all you want us to be.
You, Father, have power to do all this and way more than anything we can ask or imagine, so we want the glory to go to you, both among your people and in Christ, throughout all of history and for all of eternity. Amen.