You know… Ephesians 1 is a really great way to pray for others!
Hi, I’m Joni Eareckson Tada, and on this edition of Joni and Friends, I want you to know that if you are ever at a loss for words as to how to pray for your Christian friends, or your husband or wife, the first chapter of Ephesians is full of great things to pray! Just listen to this verse. Ephesians 1:18-19 says, “I pray… that… you may know the hope to which [God] has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and his incomparably great power for us who believe.” Now, friend, that is a big prayer, and it tells us that for your family and friends, it tells us that for every believer, God is up to something big – very big. He wants your husband or your wife to grasp the hope that is theirs… the enormous riches we possess as co-heirs with Jesus… and the incredible power which is available to us through our Savior.
Now, when the apostle Paul wrote his Christian friends in Ephesus, he was not praying that they get the calling, or become heirs, or receive the power. No, he was saying that, oh, my goodness, you and I already have the calling, we already possess the hope. You already are an heir. The power of God is yours right now. The trouble is, you and I and our friends rarely tap into this hope, this inheritance, and this power as we should. Too many of us have such a small view of who we are in Christ and what we should do with all this hope and power…
We assume we’re doing okay if we just stay safe. We think that our role as believers is just to send out “raiding parties” into the world to return with a few converts where we can all hunker down within the secure confines of the walls of our churches until Jesus returns – after all, the world is going to hell in a handbasket anyway, so let’s just stay safe, let’s keep our kids safe, let’s make our home safe. But the Christian’s role is so much larger than that. Things aren’t going to hell in a handbasket; no, in the book of Revelation, we’re told that God wants to make the kingdoms of this world become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ.
It’s a huge vision he has, and you and I have all the hope, riches, and power needed to play a significant role in advancing Christ’s kingdom out into the world… we have rock-solid hope that God will triumph in the end… we have enormous riches of his grace to keep our spirits bolstered in the face of so much evil in the world… and power? Well, it’s the same power that raised Jesus from the dead – and that power is ours to go out into the world and push back the darkness and be bold for Christ and see our families and communities absolutely transformed.
So this month let your prayers for others – actually, even for yourself – let those prayers be large. Let your heart for the lost be large. May your compassion for the peoples of this world be big. Keep your vision huge; keep it God-sized, not eensy, weensy, man-sized… when it comes to what God wants you to be doing in this world, don’t be concerned about just staying safe… rise to the calling – the big calling.
And real quickly, before we go, don’t forget that the entire Bible is filled with large things you can pray for. We just have to dig for it and believe it. And that’s why I want you to visit my radio page before the day’s gone… visit me at joniandfriends.org and ask for your free copy of this great little 12-page foldout called “How to Study the Bible.” It’s filled with such great resources and tools for you to use in your study of God’s Word. Again, that’s joniandfriends.org.
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