07-03-25

“Making Christ Feel at Home”
Ephesians 3:14-21

I.   Introduction
In a popular painting by William Hunt, we see Christ knocking on a door which can symbolize the door of the Church or the door of our hearts, a door that can only be opened from the inside out. In this morning’s Bible study passage, we overhear the Apostle Paul praying. One major thrust of his prayer is that Christ would dwell, would settle into, would abide, and would feel at home in our hearts. Yet I suspect that many of you often struggle like I do with always allowing Christ full access to every area, every room if you will, of our life. So let us discover this morning God’s empowering invitation throw open every door in our heart so we can live lives filled to overflowing with the love and light of Christ.

Let us pray…
Scripture Reading: Ephesians 3:14-21.

II.   Exposition
The themes of Paul’s prayers.
This passage records the apostle Paul praying for the Christians in Ephesus. However, since this prayer is recorded in Scripture it becomes a Holy-Spirit-inspired prayer for all the people of God throughout the ages, you and I included here this morning.

Since this is inspired Scripture, it does us well to examine the content of this prayer as if God considers this prayer worthy to be included in the Bible, then surely what is being prayed for is of utmost importance, and we can learn from it how we are to pray as well.

If you study the prayers recorded in the New Testament, especially those of the apostle Paul, you discover some common themes. One key theme is that Paul’s prayers are Trinitarian. His pattern is to often directly mention the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, as in our study passage, and the norm is to pray to the Father, through the Son, in the Spirit.

As for content, of all the things that could be prayed for, these prayers, as seen in our study passage, center on what is most important in our Christian life, namely that we would be filled and refilled with the fullness of the Holy Spirit so that we can:

A. Live life in the power of the Holy Spirit
“…be strengthened in your inner being with power through his Spirit…”

The Christian life is a life lived in the power of the Holy Spirit. It is not a life driven primarily by being morally or ethically good. It is not a life primarily of character, skill, or gift development. It is not of life primarily of doing good works. All of these can be done without being Christian at all. Being a Christian goes far beyond being good or doing good. We can be people who are holy not just good, and who are used by God to do super-natural, extra-ordinary works that manifest and advance God’s kingdom on earth. Being such super-people requires being filled and refilled with the Holy Spirit so that we…

B. Allow Christ’s life to flow through us
“…that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith…”

And this happens as we…

C. Live a life of growing and obeyed knowledge of God and the Word
“…I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth…”

The Greek word means “to lay hold of so as to make one’s own, to seize, take possession of.” As this becomes a defining reality, we…

D. Live a life of ever-increasing agape love
“…to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.”

This love surpasses knowledge, gnōsis (γνωσις), it is an “experiential knowledge,” not an academic, “head” knowledge.

So one critical question that arises out of this truth is this: How often do you pray to be filled afresh with the fullness of the Holy Spirit?

Another critical question is this: How do we live a life that is increasingly more empowered by the Holy Spirit so that the love, life, and power of Christ flows through us?

Paul mixes two metaphors to help us understand and be empowered by our calling to live life in the Holy Spirit:
1. We are to be deeply rooted in the faith of Christ, an agricultural metaphor.
The Greek tense here indicates that this is both already true of us, and should be an ongoing reality.
2. We are to be firmly grounded in the love of Christ, a building metaphor.
If you want to build high you have to first go deep in your foundation.

   All this happens as Christ dwells in our hearts.......
E. Making Christ feel at home, settled, comfortable

Now this word “dwell” includes the idea of being fully at home, comfortable, settled, in, not just a short visit, or an unwelcome quest, but offering to someone the best possible hospitality. So are you extending to Christ that kind of stay in your heart?

Now Christ is a unique guest in that He is never content to just be confined to the quest room! He wants to take over the whole house. Imagine that! Now if this were anyone else but Christ, this would be down right rude.

But our creator God has so designed us that we discover our deepest fulfillment, our highest joy, and become more of who we really are only when Christ takes full possession of our life and being! Remember, being fully animated by the Holy Spirit does not makes us puppets or pawns, but participants with Christ, and more fully human, more fully alive, and more fully the “you” that you were created to be!

C.S. Lewis puts it this way: "The Christian way is different: harder, and easier. Christ says "Give me All. I don't want so much of your time and so much of your money and so much of your work: I want You. I have not come to torment your natural self, but to kill it. No half-measures are any good. I don't want to cut off a branch here and a branch there, I want to have the whole tree down. I don't want to drill the tooth, or crown it, or stop it, but to have it out. Hand over the whole natural self, all the desires which you think innocent as well as the ones you think wicked-the whole outfit. I will give you a new self instead. In fact, I will give you Myself: my own will shall become yours." -- Mere Christianity, 1952

"Lower Room" & "Upper Room" Illustration

So if this is true, and living fully surrendered to Christ is so powerful and wonderful, why do we resist? Well, there’s this big barrier called sin, our flesh that wants to remain in control.

Let’s run with this metaphor of our heart being Christ’s home and borrow some helpful illustrations of how we can turn over every room of our life to Christ.

Let’s first look at a way of talking about the barriers in our sinfulness and fallenness that helps us to understand how they keep us from living a fully surrendered life in the fullness of the Holy Spirit. Larry Crabb talks about the furnishings of the upper and lower rooms of our heart. The lower room is our fallen nature, our sinful self, that remains in us even as Christians. The upper room is who we are in Christ as born-again, new creations with New Covenant power now defining and empowering us, it’s the flesh versus the spirit.

Lower Room Furniture Upper Room Furniture
Sinful Passions	The Driving Force	New Covenant Passions
Passion for self	“Give me what I need”	Passion to worship & serve
Passion for control	“I’ll make it happen”	Passion to trust & obey
Passion to perform	“I’ll try to be good, but why can’t You just let me do what I want”	Passion to live in grace & surrender
Passion to maximize pleasure and minimize pain	“This is life. This is death”	Passion to live in faith, hope, & love

This model is what I base all my counseling and spiritual direction on. So if you want to explore how these dynamics play out in your life, please call me and we can explore this.

"My Heart, Christ’s Home” Illustration

So how do we live a life wherein these New Covenant passions are increasingly becoming more in control than our sinful passions? We live a life of what I call “active surrender.”

This is not a “Let go and let God” spirituality. Why? Because those sinful passions that we just discussed are so deeply rooted in us it takes radical surgery to continually uproot them! This is warfare!

And if we are not waging war, then it is guaranteed that that sinful passions will be in control. And so we engage all of God’s given weapons—God’s means of grace— that weaken the flesh and strengthen the spirit. Like Paul declares in our verse, we do so “that we may be strengthened with power in our inner being so that Christ may dwell in our hearts through faith.”

For Christ to feel at home, to take up residence in every area of our life, we must continually be actively engaged in fighting against all these sinful passions that refuse to open the door, to submit to Christ and so allow the love, light, and power of Christ to flow in and through us.

C.S. Lewis puts it this way; "Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what He is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on: you knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently He starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one you thought of — throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were going to be made into a decent little cottage: but He is building a palace. He intends to come and live in it Himself." -- Mere Christianity, 1952

So what are theses “weapons of our warfare” that kill the sinful self and energize the spiritual self? What are these “means of grace,” these spiritual disciplines that brings us into closer union with Christ so that we participate more and more in the life and ministry of Christ?

- Meditation & memorization of Scripture          - Submission
- Prayer                                                            - Hospitality
- Fasting                                                           - Service
- Studying Scripture                                          - Confession
- Simplicity                                                       - Worship
- Solitude                                                         - Spiritual Direction
- Celebration

Now it just so happens that we have just started a new adult Sunday School studying how to engage in these disciplines in a practical manner.

Now here’s the sobering truth. If you are severely ill and the doctor gives you medicine, but you refuse to take the medicine, and so continue to stay ill perhaps even die, whose at fault?

Well, our Lord Jesus has given us these means of grace as His medicine to become spiritually healthy. Your growth in grace and truth, and your closeness to Christ will be directly related to how well you use these spiritual disciplines.

Still another helpful way of illustrating this reality of Christ wanting to feel at home in every room of our house is discovered in a little devotional writing that has been around for about 50 years so no doubt many of you have been enriched by this piece. It is called, “My Heart Christ’s Home” by Robert Boyd Munger in which he likens Christ going to each room in his heart and life and bringing conviction, repentance, and then His grace and presence.

Let’s go through these rooms now, and invite the Holy Spirit to bring Christ into every room in our life and house. We are going to prayer a prayer together of surrender to Christ in each of these areas, and I am going to invite you to make a commitment to engage in the corresponding spiritual disciplines to foster ongoing surrender, healing, and growth in each of these areas.

* The Library
   o   Letting Christ into the room of your mind
   o   Prayer of consecration of the mind
   o   Will you commit to increase the time you spend in the means of grace of studying, memorizing, and meditating on God’s Word?

* The Dining Room
   o   Letting Christ into the room of your appetites and desires
   o   Prayer of consecration of our passions
   o   Will you commit to increase the time you spend in the means of grace of prayer and fasting?

* The Living Room
   o   Letting Christ into the room of your time priorities to allow for private worship and devotions
   o   Prayer of consecration of our time and priorities
   o   Will you commit to increase the time you spend in the means of grace of private and public worship?

* The Work Room
   o   Letting Christ into the room of your career, talents, and spiritual gifts
   o   Prayer of consecration of our talents and gifting
   o   Will you commit to increase the time you spend in the means of grace of simplicity and service?

* The Rec Room
   o   Letting Christ into the room of your hobbies and recreation
   o   Prayer of consecration of our hobbies and recreation
   o   Will you commit to increase the time you spend in the means of grace of hospitality, solitude and celebration?

* The Hall Closet
   o   Letting Christ into the room of your secret sin and hidden pain
   o   Prayer of consecration of our secret sin and hidden pain
   o   Will you commit to increase the time you spend in the means of grace of mutual submission, spiritual direction, and confession?

III.   Closure

Let us close with praying together the same prayer that Paul prayed, that we just studied. I adapted a version of this pray from the Bible translation called “The Message.”

Our response is to get down on our knees before the Father, this magnificent Father who parcels out all heaven and earth. We ask him to strengthen us by his Spirit—not a brute strength but a glorious inner strength—that Christ will live in us as we open the door and invite him in.

And we ask him that with both feet planted firmly on love, we will be able to take in with all followers of Jesus the extravagant dimensions of Christ's love. Let us reach out and experience the breadth! Test its length! Plumb the depths! Rise to the heights! Live full lives, full in the fullness of God.

Our God can do anything—far more than we could ever imagine or guess or request in our wildest dreams! He does it not by pushing us around but by working within us, his Spirit deeply and gently within us.

   Glory to God in the church!
   Glory to God in the Messiah, in Jesus!
   Glory down all the generations!
   Glory through all millennia! Oh, yes!