Message of the Week

The Little White Community Church

Scripture: Eph. 5: 15-20 Feb. 25,2024

Message: “Filled to the Full!”      by Pastor George Gnade

Intro.: 1. Today we are considering another familiar passage that we have actually studied before. Yet today the Lord opened my eyes to a new way of understanding it. 

a. That is because this time, having studied the book as a whole, I discovered how it fits into the book as a whole.

b. In Eph. 5: 18, it says: “Be not drunk with wine, which leads to debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit.”

2. In Chapter 4 and 5, Paul has been encouraging us to stop doing what is wrong and to replace it with what is right. Many people enjoy getting drunk, but no one ever knows what they might say or do under the influence. 

a. So God tells us to exchange this wrong behavior with God’s way of experiencing joy, by singing songs of praise and by making “music in our hearts to the Lord.”

b. The reason this comes toward the end of this book is because the better we know our God, the more our hearts will want to praise Him.

3. But that reminded me of something Paul said in Eph. 1: 15-23 where Paul prayed for their “spiritual eyes to be opened” so they could know God better.

a. In that passage, to get to know God better we must get to know Jesus better.

b. Why? Because God raised Him up and sat Him down next to Him to rule over the entire universe. And in vs. 22-23, Jesus is called the head of “His body (the church), the fullness of Him who fills everything in every way.” 

4. Suddenly I realized chapter one started with Jesus filling His church to the full, and in Eph. 5:18, discussing how the Holy Spirit was given to the church to do the same thing, to fill us to the full with all Christ has for us.

a. And as we grow in our relationship with Christ, and get to know Him better and better, the more the Holy Spirit will fill us and the more we will want to praise Him.

b. This morning I want to show you four ways we all need to grow in Christ to appreciate Him and grow to the place where we will find ourselves praising Him.

A. To begin with, to grow in Christ, we must come to know the greatness of His power for those who believe (Eph. 1:19).

1. This is not something that happens in a moment. This growth in our faith happens over our lifetime as a Christian. God wants us to learn to trust Him more and more. 

2. As we trust Him more and more, we become more and more aware of “the exceeding greatness of His power.”

a. The proof of this power was the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.

b. God wants us to grow in our faith till we realize that the very power that raised Christ from the dead is now available to us.

3. That includes the promise that all those who put their trust in Christ shall also be raised up to live with Him forever. His miracle will be repeated in each of us. 

4. In the meantime, God wants us to discover how that same power is at work in our lives as we face problems every day. It is all a matter of growing in our faith and growing to trust Him more and more.

B. Secondly, in Eph. 3: 14-21, Paul prayed another prayer.

It starts the same way. He prayed we might be “streng-thened with power by the Spirit in our inner being, so that Christ might truly dwell in our hearts through faith.”

1. But this time, Paul prays Jesus’ presence in us will cause  us to “become rooted and grounded in love.” 

a. In fact, in vs. 18-19, he prays “you will have power with Christians everywhere” to “grasp how wide and high and deep and long is the love of Christ, and to know this love surpasses knowledge – that you may be filled to the measure of the fullness of God.” 

b. Once again notice this call to be filled to the full. But this time we are growing in the love of Christ so that we might be filled with this love of Christ.

2.  In Chapter one, we were called to grow in faith and the power available to us through faith. In Chapter three, Paul is calling us to the lifetime journey of the Christian to grow in love.

a. This certainly includes a greater appreciation for the unsurpassable love of Christ demonstrated on the cross.

b. But this growth in Christian love is also a spiritual growth that should take place in us as we learn to become more and more like Him.

c. At least in part, this is a growth in the joy of giving and helping others. It truly is ‘more blessed to give than to receive.”

3. So up to this point, we have been encouraged to grow in faith and to grow in love. Or to put it another way, it is the growth in our understanding of the power of faith and the power of love experienced through the presence of the Holy Spirit of Jesus living in our hearts.

C. Thirdly, in Eph. 4: 11-16, we are made aware of another need we all have, another way we all need to grow in our Christian lives.  This time it a growth in knowledge. 

1. Paul explained how Christ has given us the Word of God and all kinds of spiritual leaders including pastors and teachers to teach us what the Bible says.

a. Every child is taught the need and value of getting an education so he can function effectively as he grows up and has to accept more and more responsibility.

b. So the Bible makes clear that there is a lot to learn about God and the Lord Jesus Christ so we can properly prepare ourselves to serve Him (II Tim. 2: 20-21).

2. We all must learn what the Bible says about Jesus and how God expects us to live “so that we will no longer be like young children, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming” (Eph. 4: 14).

3. Satan is an expert at deceiving us.  And it takes time to study and learn all we can so we will not be pulled off God’s trail to enjoy the world instead. Anyone who knows God’s Word knows it requires the help of the Holy Spirit to understand spiritual things and “to grow up into Him who is the head, that is, into Christ.”

4. So this is the third leg of our spiritual journey. To grow in faith and to grow in love we must also grow in our knowledge of Christ and His Word. Believe me, there is always more to learn.

D. Finally, we come to our passage in Eph. 5: 16-20. This time we are commanded to grow in our understanding “of the Lord’s will” so that we prayerfully seek to do the Lord’s will. To do that, we need to pray each day to be “filled with the Holy Spirit, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs…always giving thanks to the Father” (Eph. 5:19-20).

1. The best way to do that is to fill our hearts with praise. The more we learn to praise Him, the more mindful we will be to put Him first in our lives and do what He wants.

2. As we grow in Christ, I pray we will be filled to the full.