Ephesians Featured

A Powerful Prayer (part 2)

(Ephesians 1:18-23) What if you had the universe's greatest power within you? The Apostle Paul tackles the incomparable power of Christ within you.

Jordan Hopkins

Sep 27, 2022 • 3 min read

Image created with photography from Guilherme Stecanella on Unsplash

The source of power

Time travel.

Bending the space-time continuum.

And my favorite — light speed!

Science fiction loves messing with time and space. But how each story does it is a little different. Each vehicle or time machine in these stories require power. Massive power through some kind of source: generators, nuclear fission, hyperdrives, etc.

Back to the Future’s answer was stolen plutonium powered by the “Flux Capacitor”…

Finger pointing to a pulsating "Flux Capacitor" within the time travelling machine from Back to the Future. — Flux Capacitor GIF By Back To The Future Trilogy - GIPHY

What it really did…no one knows. Even Marty McFly, when running a systems check, commented, “Flux Capacitor…fluxing,” in confusion.

And that’s the limits of Science Fiction. It imagines great power, yet it can’t offer a good explanation for how it works.

At the end of day, it’s only imagined, unrealized power.

Knowing real power

Paul concludes his epic prayer with a reflection on power. Real power. One that cannot be contained by anything, including death itself…

I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people, and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is the same as the mighty strength he exerted when he raised Christ from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is invoked, not only in the present age but also in the one to come. And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.

Ephesians 1:18-23 (NIV)

Paul talks about knowing real power. The same power behind the resurrection of Christ. The moment which reversed death.

Think about all the ways we attempt to bend space and time for ourselves to preserve our lives or expand our power. But there’s something I can’t control. Something you can’t control.

And that’s death.

We all know it is inevitable. We fight the tides of aging and sickness with all that we got. We throw money at it and surround ourselves with things we feel our powerful…all to slow death.

Yet, we are powerless to it.

But not God.

Paul reminds us of the “incomparably great power for us who believe” and of the complete “fullness” of Christ for all things. This is a life-changing power for you and for each person who trusts in the risen Messiah.

Thank goodness we don't trust in Flux Capacitors

Marty McFly gazed at the “Flux Capacitor” having zero idea of how it worked. Yet, he trusted it to get him to his destination.

Thankfully, we don’t stare at the risen Lord and wonder How? like Marty with the Flux Capacitor. We get to stare in wonderment, knowing Jesus has already accomplished the very thing He will do again: reverse death at the resurrection.

Now that’s a power you can trust.