Ephesians Lesson 6 – Hope and Riches Eph 1:15-19

Theme: God’s grace
Aim: To study Paul’s prayer, and to learn from it how to focus prayer and to grow in prayer.

Discussion Questions:

1. Paul prays for 3 particular things for the Ephesians. How can we pray these same things for our fellow Christians?
       1 the hope of the divine calling
       2 the riches of God’s glorious inheritance in the saints
       3 the immeasurable greatness of his power towards us who believe

        We can pray that Christians will truly have confidence in the promises of God which will fill them with hope, so they may live lives of hope filled people.

2. Is the hope of which Paul speaks here simply wishful thinking? (I hope it rains today) or something else? If so, explain.

        No, this hope is not wishful thinking. It is an assurance of the reality of what we have not fully experienced. It will not disappoint us. WE can be sure because the love of God has already been poured into us through the Spirit. He is the guarantee of our final inheritance.

3. Why is this hope such a priority in Paul’s prayers for believers?

        Because how we live the Christian life is in large measure determined by how we view the future.  The purpose behind God’s revelation about the future is to transform the way we live in the present.

4. What about the hope of this future, should transform the way we live the Christian life?

        The Lord will return in glory and judgment.  Knowing that he will come again should lead us to live each day in the light of his return and to treat others in the light of his final assessment of our lives.

5. Has the Church lost this sense of the practical implications of the hope of the gospel? If so, why?

        “Yes, I think so.”, Sinclair Ferguson says.  It may be because of too much crystal ball gazing, suspicious of too may maps and charts about ‘the end times’, uncomfortable with so much speculation accompanied by so little practical life transformation.

         I would add that many Christians have bought into the ‘once saved, always saved’, I walked an aisle, said a prayer, signed a card, got baptized, now I just go on living like the world with no life transformation at all. No, fight the fight of faith; laying hold on life, fighting the good fight as Paul speaks of.

 6. Do you think Christians are ‘too heavenly minded to be any earthly good’, or are we too ‘worldly-minded’, to much like the world to be able to promote transformation?

        I think for the most part we are too worldly-minded rather then heavenly minded.  If we were really heavenly minded, we would have the mind of God himself, and we would love him and our neighbor, transforming the world in his name as many who have come before us.  Especially in America, we have fallen in love with the world. It is our idol, comfort, stuff, our rights, the constitution. We Christians are so much like the world, we don’t look any different.  Look at the election we just had. Perfect example.  We have shamed ourselves and been a bad witness for Christ.

7 . What ‘riches’ was Paul praying for the Ephesians?

          The riches are God himself. He is our inheritance. This should give us dignity and security.

 8. What example does Sinclair Ferguson give for the Ephesians commitment and hope in the future with Christ and their abandonment of the riches of this world?

          The burning of the occult literature  which brought them income.

 9. What sins in your life get in the way of your trusting God’s promise for your future? How can they be rooted out and destroyed?

          In 1 Tim 6:10 Paul writes that ’the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil’. What does that mean? I can think of many sins that have nothing at all to do with money.  Does it mean that the sound of tinkling coins or green paper in your pocket is the root of all kinds of evil?  I don’t think so.  What is money, what does it represent?   John Piper says, “Money is simply a symbol that stands for human resources. Money stands for what you can get from man, not from God!” “Ho everyone who thirsts, come to the waters. He who has no money come buy and eat!” (Isaiah 55:1).  Money is the currency of human resources.

          So the heart that loves money is a heart that pins its hopes, and pursues its pleasures, and puts its trust in what human resources can offer.  So the love of money is virtually the same as faith in money — belief (trust, confidence, assurance) that money will meet your needs and make you happy.

         Therefore the love of money, or belief in money, is the flip side of belief in the promises of God. Just like Jesus said in Matthew 6:24 “… you cannot serve God and money.”  You can’t trust or believe in God and money.  Belief in one is unbelief in the other.  A heart that loves money — banks on money for happiness, believes in money — is at the same time not banking on the promises of God for happiness.

          So when Paul says that the love of money is the root of all evils, he implies that unbelief in the promises of God is the taproot of every sinful attitude in our heart.

          So, my inner struggles anxiety, bitterness, grudges, despondency, covetousness, envy, as well as my outer struggles, gluttony, impatience and pride, are rooted in unbelief in the promises of God.  So I, as Paul prays, must have the eyes of my heart enlightened , that I may know what is the hope to which he has called me.  I need to see with my heart the riches of the inheritance I have in Christ.  I need to pray and ask the spirit of God to root out the unbelief that remains, the love of the world and it’s currency for worldly happiness so I may rest in Christ alone and love God and my neighbor as Christ did, grounded in the promises of God and his immeasurable power towards us who believe.