{"id":5518,"date":"2013-04-22T09:09:09","date_gmt":"2013-04-22T16:09:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.blueletterbible.org\/blb\/?p=5518"},"modified":"2024-03-26T12:35:29","modified_gmt":"2024-03-26T19:35:29","slug":"prayer-for-resurrection-power","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.blueletterbible.org\/blb\/2013\/04\/22\/prayer-for-resurrection-power\/","title":{"rendered":"Prayer for Resurrection Power"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"20130422_prayresurrection\"<\/p>\n

Today’s post is adapted from a course at the Blue Letter Bible Institute<\/a>, titled God’s Sufficiency for Godly Living. It is taught by Bob Hoekstra (1940-2011), former board member at Sowing Circle Ministries and author of the popular Day By Day By Grace devotional<\/a>.<\/span><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Therefore I also, after I heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, do not cease to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers: that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, the eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the working of His mighty power.
\n(Ephesians 1:18-19<\/a>)<\/p>\n

Notice Paul prays that the church would know three things in this short passage:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. the hope of Christ\u2019s calling.<\/li>\n
  2. the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints<\/li>\n
  3. the exceeding greatness of His power toward us.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    I want to talk about the third portion, but note the very thrust of the prayer. It is a prayer that the eyes of the believers\u2019 understanding would be enlightened that they might know fully of certain things (the hope, riches, and power of Christ). Day by day, God wants His people to know and experience these things.<\/p>\n

    God wants us to know what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe. Too much of the time, too many believers are drawing upon the sufficiency of man to try and live the Christian life. They look to human power to make each day work as Christians. That is not what God wants the believer to learn for it is something all men already know. We first saw that in Adam. It is in man\u2019s very nature (corrupt as it is) to bear down, get tough, bite the bullet, and reach deep inside for the strength to carry on. This is nothing more or better than simply man drawing upon the insufficient resources of man rather than upon the abundant resources of God.<\/p>\n

    Rather than have His children focusing on their inner strengths, the Lord wants them to know what is the exceeding greatness of His power towards them, working on their lives. In fact, according to the working of His mighty power\u2014<\/p>\n

    “Which He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places.”
    \n(    Ephesians 1:20 NKJV<\/a>)<\/p>\n

    The power God wants His children to know about, to increasingly understand, and to walk in day by day is this great resurrection power that works toward His people. It is available to work upon their lives and then in and through those same lives. This is His power. This is the working of His mighty power that He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead. It is resurrection power.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Today’s post is adapted from a course at the Blue Letter Bible Institute, titled God’s Sufficiency for Godly Living. It is taught by Bob Hoekstra (1940-2011), former board member at Sowing Circle Ministries and author of the popular Day By Day By Grace devotional. Therefore I also, after I heard of your faith in the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5518","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-misc","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.blueletterbible.org\/blb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5518","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.blueletterbible.org\/blb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.blueletterbible.org\/blb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.blueletterbible.org\/blb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.blueletterbible.org\/blb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5518"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.blueletterbible.org\/blb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5518\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9111,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.blueletterbible.org\/blb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5518\/revisions\/9111"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.blueletterbible.org\/blb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5518"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.blueletterbible.org\/blb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5518"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.blueletterbible.org\/blb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5518"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}