JMD Devotional 250 Ephesians 3:16-19 Substance of the Spirit

May He grant you out of the rich treasury of His glory to be strengthened and reinforced with mighty power in the inner man by the [Holy] Spirit [Himself indwelling your innermost being and personality]. May Christ through your faith [actually] dwell (settle down, abide, make His permanent home) in your hearts! May you be rooted deep in love and founded securely on love,
That you may have the power and be strong to apprehend and grasp with all the saints [God's devoted people, the experience of that love] what is the breadth and length and height and depth [of it]; [That you may really come] to know [practically, through experience for yourselves] the love of Christ, which far surpasses mere knowledge [without experience]; that you may be filled [through all your being] unto all the fullness of God [may have the richest measure of the divine Presence, and become a body wholly filled and flooded with God Himself]!

The hardest work I ever did was filling sandbags in anticipation of a hurricane. It would have been easier to fill them with puffed rice; but that would not have kept my house from flooding. Sand is dense and heavy and has the substance to form a reliable barrier to the storm. In a figurative sense, self-reliant people are full of puffed rice. When real trials come they find their own resources hopelessly soggy and without substance. How ironic that God, who is Spirit, has genuine substance when it comes to life and that the material things that lost people rely upon are superficial and totally without ‘spiritual’ substance! Stack all of the social status, wealth, power, popularity, lifestyle and things of any Hollywood Idol against any withered old Saint clinging to her faith on her deathbed, and the Saint has something tangible; and in my book, wins hands down!

Dear God,
Sometimes I need You to refocus my attention on that which is real. May our eyes not be deceived by fantasies without substance; may we not envy retched lost people. Help us to remember how rich we are in Christ; how powerful and victorious we are in Him. The world does not yet know it is defeated; but we know. It cannot touch us at all or pry us out of Your hands. Our worth is measured in the blood of Your Son. May Your saints live well and die well; never alone; resting in You, full of hope and confidence. When You came to live in us, You gave us EVERYTHING!
Amen

All (but*) quotes are from The Amplified Bible, published by
the Lockman Foundation. (AMP)
Copyright © 1954, 1958, 1962, 1964, 1965, 1987 by The Lockman Foundation
*New International Version (NIV)
Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society
**Scripture taken from The Message. Copyright © 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002. Used by permission of NavPress Publishing Group. (Eugene Peterson's easy-to-read, contemporary Scripture translation)

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