THE SECOND PART: A BIRD’S-EYE VIEW OF THE NEW TESTAMENT
The Epistle of Paul to the Ephesians
Message Three—Christ Making His Home in Our Hearts
Scripture Reading: Eph. 3:14-21
I. God’s eternal purpose is to work Himself into us as our life and our everything so that we may take Him as our person, live Him, and express Him; this is the desire of God’s heart and the focal point of the Bible—Eph. 1:9; 3:11; Phil. 1:20-21a:
A. God’s economy according to His heart’s desire is to build Himself into man and to build man into Himself—2 Sam. 7:12-14a; Eph. 3:17a.
B. God’s unique work, His central work, is to work Himself in Christ into His chosen people, making Himself one with them—Gal. 4:19.
C. We need God to build Himself in Christ into our humanity, working Himself into us as our life, our nature, and our person—Eph. 3:17a.
D. God’s intention is to work Christ into us as the Spirit, that Christ may be expressed through His Body and head up the whole universe under His headship—Eph.3:16-19; 1:22-23, 10.
II. In 1:15-23 Paul’s prayer is for the saints to receive revelation concerning the church; in 3:14-21 his prayer is for the saints to experience Christ for the church:—Eph. 1:15-23; 3:14-21:
A. The spirit in 1:17 is for revelation, whereas the inner man in 3:16 is for experience.
B. In 3:16 our spirit is a person, the inner man, for us to experience Christ for the church; by this person we can experience Christ that the church may be built up.
C. As a person, our spirit is for us to live by and experience what we have seen.
III. In order to experience Christ in a subjective way, we need to be strengthened with power into the inner man—Eph. 3:16:
A. The inner man is our regenerated spirit with God’s life as its life.
B. We need to be strengthened into the inner man with the power that raised Christ from among the dead, that seated Him in the heavenlies, that subjected all things under His feet, and that gave Him to be Head over all things to the church—1:19-22.
C. The more we are strengthened into the inner man, the more the parts of our inner being are brought back into our inner man.
IV. Paul prayed that we would be strengthened into the inner man with the result that Christ could make His home in our hearts and thereby occupy, possess, permeate, and saturate our whole inner being with Himself—Eph. 3:17a:
A. Since our heart is the totality of our inward parts, the center of our inward being, and our representative with regard to our inclination, affection, delight, and desire, when Christ makes His home in our hearts, He controls our entire inward being and supplies and strengthens every inward part with Himself.
B. The more Christ spreads within us, the more He settles down in us and makes His home in us, occupying every part of our inner being, possessing all these parts, and saturating them with Himself.
C. In order for the revelation in Ephesians 2 concerning the new man to be practical in our daily life, we need to let Christ make His home in our hearts.
D. For Christ to make His home in our hearts means that He is transmitted into us in a full way—1:22.
V. When Christ spreads into our hearts, He becomes our person—3:17a:
A. We need to take Christ not only as life in our spirit but also as the person in our hearts.
B. The only way for Christ to be our person is for Him to make His home in our hearts.
C. If we take Christ as our person, allowing Him to spread into our hearts, the person living in our hearts will not be the self but Christ—Gal. 2:20.
VI. The Christ who is making His home in our hearts is an unlimited, immeasurable Christ—Eph. 3:18:
A. As Christ makes His home in our hearts, we apprehend with all the saints the breadth, the length, the height, and the depth; these are the dimensions of the universe, the dimensions of the immeasurable Christ.
B. Although Christ is immeasurable, He is nevertheless making His home in our hearts.
C. Christ is the universal cube, and our experience of Him in the Body must be “cubical,” three-dimensional.
VII. When Christ makes His home in our hearts, we will be filled unto all the fullness of God—Eph. 3:19:
A. The fullness of God is the Body of Christ as the expression of the Triune God to the uttermost, the ultimate consummation of the corporate expression of the Triune God.
B. The Body of Christ is the unlimited expression of the unlimited Christ.
C. If we let Christ make His home in our hearts, we will be filled with the Triune God to such an extent that we will become His full expression.
VIII. The genuine church life is the issue of the unlimited and immeasurable Christ personally making His home in our hearts—Eph. 3:17a; 4:16:
A. The content of the church is the Christ whom we take as our person, the Christ who is wrought into our being.
B. If we would have the reality of the Body of Christ, we must allow Christ to make His home in our hearts.
C. In order for Christ’s word in Matthew 16:18 concerning the building up of the church to be fulfilled, the church must enter into a state where many saints allow Christ to make His home in their hearts, possessing, occupying, and saturating their entire inner being.
D. The more Christ occupies our inner being, the more we will be able to be built up with others in the Body—Eph. 2:21-22; 4:16.
Ministry Excerpts:
TO BE STRENGTHENED INTO OUR INNER MAN
Verse 16 also says that we are strengthened into the inner man. The inner man is our regenerated spirit with God’s life as its life. It is our spirit regenerated by the Spirit of God (John 3:6), indwelt by the Spirit of God (Rom. 8:11, 16), and mingled with the Spirit of God (1 Cor. 6:17). In order to experience Christ unto all the fullness of God, we need to be strengthened into the inner man. This implies that we need to get into our spirit, where we can be strengthened through the Holy Spirit.
Because human beings are souls, not spirits, our personality or our person is in our soul. This is the reason the Bible refers to men as souls (Exo. 1:5; Acts 2:41). Both the body and the spirit are vessels used by the soul. Therefore, as souls, we have an outward vessel, the body, and an inward vessel, the spirit. When we repented and believed in the Lord Jesus, the Lord came into us and regenerated us with Himself as our life. Before we were regenerated, there was no life in our spirit; we simply had our human life in our soul. But through regeneration we now have the divine life in our spirit. Therefore, our spirit is no longer merely a vessel; it has become our person with the life of God. But what about our human life and our old person in the soul? The old person, the soul with the human life, has been crucified on the cross, and now our new person is the spirit with the divine life. Our spirit regenerated with the divine life is now our inner man.
It is very difficult to remain in the spirit. We all are accustomed to going out from the spirit, not to going into the spirit and staying there. According to my experience, I can testify that I am not inclined to stay in the spirit. Because it is so easy for me to get out of the spirit, I am still learning to remain in the spirit. Whenever we stay in the spirit, we are strengthened; but whenever we go out from the spirit, we are weakened. Have you ever noticed how easy it is for your mind to wander when you are praying? When you are not praying, you may not think of certain things. But when you begin to pray, you may suddenly find your thoughts dwelling on one thing and then another. You may even make a fast trip to another part of the world. This is the reason we need to be strengthened into our inner man. The more we are strengthened, the more the parts of our inner being are brought back into the spirit, into our inner man.
We need to be strengthened in order to stay in our spirit and not to be distracted by thoughts regarding so many things. In order to pray without being distracted, we need to be strengthened into our inner man. Oh, how we need to be strengthened so that our whole being may come back to the inner man and stay there!
The revelation in chapter three of Ephesians can be seen only when we are in the spirit. As verse 5 says, the mystery is made known to the apostles and prophets in spirit. Being strengthened into the inner man is the secret of seeing the revelation of the mystery. We need to be strengthened so that our whole being might be brought back to our spirit.
In our spirit we are also filled with the riches of Christ unto all the fullness of God (v. 19). The Greek word rendered “unto” in verse 19 means “resulting in.” Our being filled with the riches of Christ results in the full expression of God. This is the fullness of God.
CHRIST MAKING HIS HOME IN OUR HEART
The first part of verse 17 says, “That Christ may make His home in your hearts through faith.” Our heart is composed of all the parts of our soul—the mind, the emotion, and the will—plus our conscience, the main part of our spirit. These are the inward parts of our being. Through regeneration, Christ came into our spirit (2 Tim. 4:22). Subsequently, we should allow Him to spread Himself into every part of our heart. Our heart is the totality of all our inward parts and the center of our inward being; therefore, when Christ makes His home in our heart, He controls our entire inward being and supplies and strengthens every inward part with Himself.
In verse 17 Paul says that it is through faith that Christ makes His home in our hearts. Faith is the substantiating of things unseen (Heb. 11:1). Christ’s indwelling is mysterious and abstract. We realize it not by our physical senses, but by the sense of faith.
The first three chapters of Ephesians are on the church, and the last three chapters are on the walk worthy of God’s calling for the church. However, actually only the first two chapters are on the church, for chapter three marks the beginning of Paul’s exhortation concerning a walk worthy of God’s calling. In Ephesians 3 Paul presents himself as a pattern of one who could carry out God’s eternal purpose concerning the church. If we had only chapters one and two without chapter three, we would have the teaching and even the vision regarding the church, but we would not have the way to fulfill the vision. In chapter three we see how the church is constituted and realized in a practical way. This chapter is concerned neither with the revelation of the church nor, strictly speaking, with the walk worthy of God’s calling for the church; rather, it is concerned with the practical experience of the church being constituted.
The church life is constituted of those in the pattern of the Apostle Paul. We all need to follow Paul in receiving the revelation in our spirit and in being strengthened into our inner man. When Paul bowed his knees to the Father, he was so strong in his inner man that nothing could shake him or disturb him. Because his whole being was in his spirit, nothing outward could trouble him. We also need to be strengthened to such an extent that nothing will be able to carry us away from our inner man. Furthermore, we need Christ to make His home in our hearts so that we may be wholly occupied and possessed by Him.
When we are strengthened into our inner man and Christ makes His home in our hearts, we are abl to see the revelation. We need to receive the same revelation given to the leading apostles and prophets. Paul could not receive this revelation for us; we must receive it ourselves personally and subjectively by being strengthened into our inner man. This revelation concerning Christ and the church is the economy of God, the hidden mystery. Whether or not we are today’s apostles and prophets depends on whether or not we have seen the revelation. If we do not have the revelation, then we cannot be apostles and prophets. If I had come to this country without this revelation, all my speaking would have been in vain. But I did come with a revelation, and I have spoken according to this revelation. This made me a follower of the apostles and prophets in God’s New Testament ministry. Today all the saints, including the young people, can be such followers.
When we were saved, Christ came into our spirit. Now we must give Him the opportunity to spread Himself throughout all the parts of our inner being. As we are strengthened into the inner man, the door is opened for Christ to spread in us, to spread from our spirit to every part of our mind, emotion, and will. The more Christ spreads within us, the more He settles down in us and makes His home in us. This means that He occupies every part of our inner being, possessing all these parts and saturating them with Himself. As a result, not only do we receive the revelation, but we also are filled with Christ. Then wherever we may go, we shall be the apostles, the sent ones, and the prophets, those who speak for Christ. (Life-Study of Ephesians, msg. 32)
THE STEPS TO APPREHENDING CHRIST’S DIMENSIONS AND
TO KNOWING HIS LOVE
In verses 16 through 19 the word “that” is used four times: “that He would grant you…to be strengthened…into the inner man,” “that Christ may make His home in your hearts,” “that you…may be strong to apprehend…and to know,” and “that you may be filled unto all the fullness of God.” In each case the Greek word rendered “that” may also be rendered “in order that.”
The first “that” is the result of Paul’s prayer. Paul bowed his knees unto the Father and prayed that He would grant us to be strengthened into our inner man (vv. 14-16). Thus, the result of Paul’s prayer is that the Father would grant us such a strengthening.
The second “that,” found in verse 17, is that Christ may make His home in our hearts through faith. This is the result of being strengthened into the inner man.
Some may say that the third “that” is parallel to the second, but I agree with those who claim that it is a further result. This means that the second “that” is the result of the first, that the third is the result of the second, and that the fourth is the result of the third.
In chapter three Paul prayed that we would be strengthened. If we have been strengthened into the inner man, Christ can then make His home in our hearts with the result that we are strong to apprehend with all saints what is the breadth, length, height, and depth of Christ and to know the knowledge-surpassing love of God. The result of all this is that we are filled unto all the fullness of God. Here we see several steps. From Paul’s prayer we go on to being strengthened; from being strengthened we proceed to Christ’s making His home in our hearts; and from this we progress to the apprehending and the knowing and finally to being filled unto all the fullness of God. It is by these steps that we can apprehend the dimensions of Christ and know His knowledge-surpassing love.
THE FULLNESS OF GOD
The fullness of God is the expression of God. We have pointed out that the Body is not the riches of Christ, but the fullness of Christ (1:23). As the riches of Christ are being digested and assimilated into us, they are metabolized. By this process of metabolism we become the fullness of Christ as His expression. Many Christians regard the riches and the fullness as synonymous. The riches of Christ are the various aspects of Christ for our enjoyment, whereas the fullness is the result, the issue, of the enjoyment of these riches. For example, when we eat and digest the riches of American foodstuffs, we become the fullness of America. As the fullness of America, we are the expression of America. Ephesians 3:19 does not say that we are filled with the riches of God, but that we are filled unto the fullness of God. This means that we are filled with the result that we become the expression of God. The expression of God today is the church, which is the Body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all. Hence, the fullness of God in 3:19 is the fullness of Christ, which is the Body, in 1:23. The Body is constituted through our enjoyment of the riches of Christ.
Chapters one and two cover the revelation of the church, and chapter three covers the constitution of the church. In chapter three we see that Paul, who was a leading one and a pattern, received the revelation and enjoyed the riches of Christ. These riches were metabolically constituted into his being to make him a part of the Body. All who would follow him to be today’s apostles and prophets must be the same as Paul in these matters. Then the church will be constituted to become the fullness of Christ and the fullness of God. In order for this to take place, Paul prayed that we might be strengthened into our inner man with result that Christ could make His home in our heart and thereby occupy, possess, permeate, and saturate our whole inner being with Himself. In this way we are filled with Christ, and we become strong to apprehend the dimensions of Christ and to know the knowledge-surpassing love of Christ. Eventually, we shall be filled with Christ to such an extent that we become the fullness of God.
As we pass through all these steps, we need to apprehend the dimensions of Christ. The Greek word translated “apprehend” means not only to know, but also to grasp, to lay hold of intensively. In order to grasp the dimensions of Christ, we need all the saints; for this we must lay hold of Christ corporately.
THE UNIVERSAL DIMENSIONS OF CHRIST
The dimensions of Christ are the breadth, the length, the height, and the depth. These dimensions are the dimensions of the universe. Only God Himself knows the measurements of the universe. We can measure the distance from one point in the universe to another, for example, from the earth to the moon, but we cannot measure the universe itself. Now the very dimensions of the universe are also the dimensions of Christ.
Christ is our real universe. Elsewhere we have pointed out that Christ is our earth, our good land, and also our sun and morning star. Now, according to verse 18, we have the boldness to say that Christ is our universe, for His dimensions are the dimensions of the universe. Ephesians 1:23 speaks of the fullness of Him who fills all in all, and 4:9 and 10 reveal that He who descended into the lower parts of the earth also ascended far above all the heavens that He might fill all things. When we enter into the new heaven and the new earth to dwell in the New Jerusalem, we all shall realize that Christ the Lord is our universe. (Life-Study of Ephesians, msg. 33)
FILLED UNTO THE EXPRESSION OF THE TRIUNE GOD
In these verses in chapter three of Ephesians concerning the economy of God resulting in the fullness of God, we see the Triune God. The Father (v. 14) answers and fulfills the apostle’s prayer through the Spirit (v. 16) so that Christ, the Son (v. 17), may make His home in our hearts. Thus, we are filled unto the fullness of the Triune God. This is the dispensing of the Triune God into our entire being that we may become His expression.
According to Ephesians 3, the Triune God is not to be the object of doctrinal debate; He is for the dispensing of Himself into the believers so that they may be filled unto the fullness, not only of the Father, nor only of the Son, nor only of the Spirit, but of God. Paul prayed that the Father would strengthen us through His Spirit so that Christ might make His home in our hearts and thereby fully occupy our inward being with the result that we might be filled unto the expression of the Triune God. How glorious and how marvelous! This is God’s economy, God’s dispensation. This is also God’s New Testament revelation, our ministry, and the Lord’s recovery.
THE CHURCH AS THE CORPORATE FULLNESS OF GOD
We have seen that the fullness of God is the expression of God. According to John 1:16, the fullness of God came with Christ who is the embodiment of God’s fullness (Col. 2:9; 1:19). With Christ, the expression was an individual matter. This expression, therefore, needed to be enlarged, to be expanded, from an individual matter to a corporate matter. The church today is to be the fullness of God in a corporate way. In the church God is not expressed through an individual; He is expressed corporately through the Body, through the believers who have together been filled to the brim with the riches of Christ. Therefore, the fullness of God is embodied in the church. The church as the embodiment of the fullness of God is the expression of the Triune God. This is the church in the Lord’s recovery today. (Life-Study of Ephesians, msg. 34)