(Continued from p. 158)

CHAPTER THREE

"For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner man; that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God" (Ephes. 3:14-19).

The above quotation connects with verse 1 of the third chapter and the closing verses of the second chapter. Verses 2-13 are a parenthesis in the argument, "The Ministry of the Mystery," and are epitomized by Lange:"Ver. 2; The apostolic Office is a gift of grace. Vers. 3 and 4, The method of communication. Ver. 5, The period and persons concerned in the communication. Ver. 6, The purport of the mystery. Vers. 7-13, The ministry and unworthiness of the recipient." Let us, however, each one for himself, carefully analyze this important passage, that our Hearts may be the more completely attuned to the lovely solemnity of the Apostle's second epistolary prayer. When the spirit is prayerful the atmosphere is worshipful, and it is only as worshipers that we may thread our way amid the sacred arcana of God's great heart of love.

The temple of the second chapter is the dwelling of a God who "is love," and the love of Christ is the sweetest incense in its worship. The prayer may thus be regarded as fulfilling a similar office to that of the 13th of 1st Corinthians in the activities of the Assembly. If we treat it in that way, it is with the understanding that is far from being its sole purport. Such treatment however, will, we trust, be fresher because of the different viewpoint.

The Apostle is seen falling on his knees, sensible of his own and the Ephesians' incompetence and God's greatness; the immeasurability of a measureless deep stretches before him; the finite spirit expands before the infinite with intensest longing that all the fulness of God may flood it. Who of us is not possessed with a similar longing? May our ardent prayers keep company with Paul's for the Ephesians, that even in this day of sad declension a refreshing revelation of Christ may fill heart and mind to overflowing. Here is the most potent antidote to the poisonous atmosphere that threatens to asphyxiate us. Here is the only resource that will afford us a "garment of praise," when the spirit is heavy with long discouragement.

Can we learn a lesson from the words of old Ma-moteke, of whom "Coillard of the Zambesi" speaks? She was an old woman who first prayed to God when she heard that He would understand her language. She poured out her heart in Zulu. From that day "she advanced in Christian life by leaps and bounds. From being stupid she became remarkably intelligent, she seemed to renew her youth like the eagles." She died in 1876. "During her illness she saw a little grandchild, about eleven years old, was weeping about her soul. The old woman turned round and said, 'What do my ears hear? that you are longing after the Lord Jesus? It is the sweetest word I have heard-Long for Jesus all your life!' "
The sole exhortation in the Bible to kneel before God is found in the 95th Psalm. It opens with the exhortation to, "Sing unto the Lord." Then the sixth verse breaks forth:"O come, let us worship and bow down:let us kneel before the Lord, our Maker. For He is our God, and we are the people of His pasture, and the sheep of His hand." Then the words, "To-day, if ye will hear His voice, harden not your hearts," clang out, like bell upon a reef, a solemn warning. Obvious indeed is its necessity. God feeds us, God guides us, yet the whole temple may be wrecked if the spirit of prayer and praise, the moving power of its worship, grows inarticulate and dies away.

The third chapter of Hebrews injects this "hard-heartedness" into a similar though slightly different context. Christ is there presented in all His faithfulness as Priest over the house of God, a tabernacle and temple where God is worshiped in the "rejoicing of hope." That rejoicing is one of the very foundations of the house, as we noticed in our last meditation. Hardness of heart alone may destroy it. Singing and kneeling are the response to Christ's faithful care in High-priestly character, as they are, in the psalm, to that of the Shepherd.

Now in the third of- Ephesians the context is similar to that of Hebrews 3 and Psalm 95. The Holy Temple, the "habitation of God through the Spirit," rises glorious and stately in the second chapter. The parenthesis of the third chapter displays God's shepherd care reaching out to us Gentiles, through the instrumentality of Paul, a noble sub-shepherd and apostle.. "The unsearchable riches of Christ," like pastures of tender grass, spread themselves out, till, on the far horizon, they blend in the heavenly blue of "God's eternal purpose." Immediately following, the sub-shepherd is seen upon his knees that the love of Christ, the surest remedy for hard-heartedness, might increasingly be revealed to us. The temple must be filled with the smoke of its incense. If we are not to "leave our first love" (Rev. 2:4) then Christ's love must ever keep ours burning.

In a small Catholic chapel, there is, near the door, a crimson-colored heart, filled with oil, wherein floats a lighted wick, at which the worshipers kindle the little tapers in their hands as they kneel at the inner shrines. The chapel is known, because of this heart, as The Chapel of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. We deprecate such ceremonial, but let us give heed to its obvious lesson.

God is addressed as "The Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom every family in heaven and earth is named." Here recurs a note from the second chapter, as to "the household of God." I understand a great lack of the "family feeling" prevails in some of the large gatherings of professing Christians of the day. Scarcely acquainted with one another, the members greet each other distantly, or not at all. Surely this must be a great damper on the worship and praise. Paul in his prayer manifests a sense of such a need in us all. This feeling may be one- of the reasons for the phrase, "of whom every family in heaven and earth is named," not only linking every several family with the others through their common origin, but heaven with earth also. The temple of old was to our Lord still "the Father's house"(John 2:16).

The thought of "the Father gave the Son" permeates the praises of this other temple. It is the great aisle that leads to the altar of incense. Well may the vast throng sing, in ever increasing wonder:

"What was it, blessed God,
Led Thee to give Thy Son?"

The next clause in the prayer is that we may be "strengthened with all might" by the Spirit "in the inner man." The blessed Spirit of God is the power for the enlightenment that leads to true worship. He "takes of the things of Christ and shows them" to us. Read 1 Corinthians 13, 14, and note how the Spirit should control all worship and service in the Church. He taps for us every vein of golden ore in God's unfathomable mines of truth. Those that are led by Him are "the sons of God" (Rom. 8:14), and in them is title to this wealth. It is therefore very much in accord with the Apostle's teaching elsewhere, that he should make his first petition for the Spirit's power. To officiate in God's holy temple apart from the Spirit is to render spiritless its worship. We are not the priests of a ritual nor the puppets of ceremonial procedure. We are not to fill the sacred silences of God’s house with the murmur of untaught words. The "Selahs" of the Psalms are preludes of further praise. The instruments of music wake to life again all the more sweetly for the "rests." In the presence of God "who is in heaven" the words of those "on earth" should be few. In these sacred silences of the sanctuary the peace of heaven settles down upon the heart, as once the blessed Spirit, with dove's wings, upon the Christ. Then indeed we await the heavenly voice, "This is My beloved Son," and every cranny of our being grows warm at the '"In whom I am well pleased." Such is indeed the Spirit's power to permeate the "inner man." Does not God Himself keep "silent in His love?"

The thought of our need of the Spirit, moreover, is emphasized in the expression, "with might." The act of worship is a wonderful act.. Spiritual might, and nothing less, is requisite for true worship. Spiritual might, and nothing less, is necessary for the dwelling of Christ within the heart through faith, for there are a thousand things without and within us that might hinder this indwelling. Spiritual food is the fuel that keeps the fires of spiritual life burning. Thoughts of His love, of His power, of His wisdom, of His purity, should ever be awakening adoration within the temple. Christ is "glorified" by the presentation of these through the Spirit. We sing,

"We praise, we worship, we adore,
As round Thyself we meet,"

but we may doubt our "gathering to Him" when our minds are not occupied other than perfunctorily with Him.

This, I take it, is the force of "Christ's dwelling in the heart" by faith. It is feeding upon Christ. "Faith" is the doorkeeper of our hearts. It is, without raising theological questions, our contribution to the Spirit's work. When you get into Love's company, you may be sure that Faith has prepared the way. It is Faith that first links us with the divine Saviour. It flings wide the "Beautiful Gate" into God's temple. It clears away the mists from our spiritual eyes that we may behold the Lord "high and lifted up" (Isa. 6:1). It heartens the spirit to cry, "Here am I, send me," as we leave the sanctuary.

"Rooted and grounded in love" applies both to individual and assembly. Tradition says that the Apostle John, carried into the Ephesian assembly in a dying condition, poured out a last exhortation:"Little children, love one another." True, or untrue, it was just like John, and the Ephesians needed it. Such love comes from Christ dwelling in the heart by faith. His love to us and our love to Him and one another are the subsoil of all spiritual growth. They also become a measuring rod, whereby we strive to "comprehend what is the length and breadth and depth and height," infinite task for infinities of time, deep calling unto deep in a ceaseless interplay of feeling. To make an apropos quotation:"So in all the play and counter play of love between Christ and us, and in all the reaction of knowledge and love, this remains true, that we must be rooted and grounded in love ere we can know love, and must have Christ dwelling in our hearts, in order to that deep and living possession, which, when it is conscious of itself, is knowledge, and is forever alien to the loveless heart. If you want to know the blessedness of the love of Christ, love Him, and open your hearts for the entrance of His love to you. Love is the parent of deep true knowledge."

Commentators tell us that the "comprehend" of our text is more intellectual, the "know" that follows, more experimental. Intellect invested in experiment is the basis of true Science. So the two coalescing, "all saints" join in experiment far more entrancing than any known to Physical Science. The "universal Church" engages in an exploration vastly more extensive than astronomers searching the pathless fields of the heavens. The great Congregation unites in an emprise in which supernatural powers alone are competent and still may fail. "The love of Christ surpasseth knowledge." Who can know it? Yet in stretching out to know will all our being be flooded with the inflowing tides of God's great fulness. F. C. Grant

(To be continued, D.V.)