3:17
“So that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith”. Paul is praying for us to become ever more Christlike. Then he prays for them to be “rooted and grounded in love”. We should always remember that when the Bible speaks of love it is rarely the sentimental tosh that we often mean! It is a far stronger and substantial thing, it is the love that enabled Christ to go to the cross. We should look for Christ to dwell in our hearts, that where we are weakest, we find a transformation taking place.
3:18
Paul prays that we may have strength, but strength for what? To comprehend the breadth, length, height and depth of Christ’s love. And that we may have this with all the saints. Knowing the love of God is not just an individual thing, but a corporate thing. Why do we need strength in order to do this? Because the way of the world is against the love of God, it makes it hard to know the love of God. Let’s look at a current example of this. To promote Biblical teaching on sexual morality, especially LGBTQ+ and related matters leads to us being branded as haters, or transphobes, or homophobes. The response of a lot of the church has been to give in to the world, this demonstrated a complete lack of strength. Equally unbiblical is just to go in for condemnation. Promoting Biblical teaching is actually being loving towards people who practise sexual immorality, or identify as some branch of the LGBTQ spectrum. For Biblical teaching does not condemn, but points out our sinfulness in order that we can repent and receive forgiveness. We need strength in order to do this.
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