The Power at Work in You – Part 1

be equaled. Yet, since that, we've actually discovered forces that are more powerful, that make that force seem like kids play. We've discovered nuclear energy. The nuclear bombs today have much greater power than even the atomic bomb had in those days. And when we think of power, TNT, of dynamite, we

think of these devastating explosions. But yet that same power that can be used to explode a city or devastate a city is the same kind of power that can be used to produce electricity and make a city run and raise bridges and power up skyscrapers and provide the energy that gives the heating and schools. It's the same power. It's just one is a channeled power and another is an unchanneled power. Explosive power. Today, I want to talk to you about a power that's even greater than nuclear power.

A power that is at work within us. It's the power of God. And the Apostle Paul is about to speak about the power of God in this area. And I want you to turn in your Bibles to Ephesians chapter three. I'm going to begin reading in verse 14 of Ephesians chapter three, as the apostle Paul begins to pray and talk to them about what it means to have the power of God. So he says in verse 14, for this reason I kneel before the father, from whom the whole family in heaven and earth derives its name.

And I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through His Spirit in your inner being. This is a prayer. Verses 14 through 21 are a prayer, a prayer for power, a prayer that the power that's in us will be unleashed. So now notice Paul says, for this reason I kneel before the father. There's a lot of places in Scripture where people kneel. Some of you were raised in a tradition that every Sunday you knelt to pray some prayers. And there's actually

a lot of places in Scripture where people knelt. The Apostle Paul knelt, Peter knelt, the prophet Daniel knelt, Ezra knelt. Solomon knelt in the dedication of the temple. When people came to Jesus, they knelt to have requests from him. If I were to ask you here, when's the last time you actually knelt in a conversation? Most of you probably haven't. It's been a long time since you knelt down, right? Maybe when you asked your fiance to marry you, you may have knelt. How many of you guys did that?

You got on one knee with the ring? Okay. All right. A few of you did that. You. You know, you knelt down. It's almost. What are you saying with that? You're kind of begging. Please don't say no. Please don't. You know, that's kind of. I beg of you, say yes. You're kneeling down to say that it's it's kind of a sign of humility of, of of petitioning someone. But if we see someone kneeling, we feel like they're really

humbling themselves. I heard of a guy that, uh, was went to work bragging about that he had just had a fight, and his wife ended up on her knees, and he was like, uh, his friend asked him, so she ended up underneath. Yeah, she was on her knees. You know, that's how the fight ended up. And he said, well, what was she saying? And he said, well, she was saying, come out from under the bed, you coward. Come out and finish this fight. So but usually when we're on

our knees, we're requesting something. And so the Apostle Paul says, I kneel before the father. Now, there are times to kneel. And I think that we need to learn what it means to, uh, sometimes take different postures in prayer, um, folding our hands or kneeling or even being putting ourselves prostrate before God. There are signs of submission. There are signs of God. I'm really calling out to you. But

you know, you don't have to kneel to be praying, right? Uh, in fact, I encourage you to learn to pray throughout your entire day. And so, please, when you're driving, don't try to put your hands together like this while you're driving. Please don't raise your hands. And even worse than that, please don't close your eyes when you're driving and say, well, I gotta close my eyes to pray. Uh, so you you there's no natural, there's no special position that you

have to be in to prayer. But there's certain times where we really want to humble ourselves before God and we kneel or we throw ourselves on the floor before God. And it's a physical sign of God. I'm calling out to you in deep desperation and our posture becomes our prayer. Well, Paul is kneeling before God the Father. He says, I kneel before the father, from whom all of heaven, all of the whole family in heaven and earth derives its name.

Paul is speaking about the fact that people that have gone before and died, and people that are currently living, we are all connected as a family, and we have one father, and he's the father of us all. Our spiritual father, and we're connected to them. By the way, I think this is a real important lesson. There are churches in Chicago that worship in a way that's very

different from us. But if they are life giving churches and have the Spirit of God inside of them, they're part of our same family, their churches in Chicago that have for our services, Uh, you know. And, um, there are churches in Chicago that have 59.5 minute services, and the entire prayers are read. The messages are read. Uh, I preached at a church, uh, in fact, we I swapped pulpits with a pastor that actually preached here and did a great job. Uh, Dan Meyer at Christ Church

of Oakbrook. I went and preached in Oakbrook, which is a very far cry from the southwest side of Chicago and but but but Christ Church of Oakbrook is more of a high church place. And so they um, at the second service, pastor Myers, he wears a robe when he preaches. And then when they read the word, they climb up to this podium and you have to read the word from the podium, and all the prayers are read, and their service is exactly an hour long. Well, that's

a whole different culture than I'm used to. But here's what I know. They are part of the family of God because the gospel of Jesus Christ is preached there. There are people are coming to Christ, and so they are part of the same family of God that we are a part of. That's why I've taught you over and over that with life giving churches in Chicago. We are not in competition, but we are in cooperation. Now, not every church is a life giving church. Some churches

lead people astray. Some people, some churches don't preach the truth. Some people, some churches deny Jesus. And so I don't link my arms with those churches and sing Kumbaya. I'm blessed and pray. I pray that they would get straightened out in what they're doing. But if their life giving church and they love the Lord and they follow the Bible, I bless them, I encourage them, and I see ourselves as part of the same family. Paul says, I kneel before God the Father, of whom his whole family in

heaven and on earth derives its name. Verse 16 I pray. And here's the prayer that he he starts praying for these people. He says, I pray that out of his glorious riches he may. He may strengthen you with power through His Spirit in your inner being. So there's a couple of things about this prayer that we need to understand. Number one, we need to understand that he's he's praying that God would tap in to his glorious riches. Here's the thing I want you to understand about God. God

is never, never in a recession. Heaven is not touched by a crashing stock market. There is no such thing as God being short on something. He is not affected by our earthly recessions. He is not limited when we are limited. He is unlimited in resources, unlimited in power, unlimited in his ability. He has glorious riches. And what Paul is saying is that God is tapping into his

glorious riches. He's tapping into this incredible resource that he has, and he's taking some of this resource of his glorious riches. And he takes it and he shares it downward with us. Oh, some of you should be encouraged by that.

to be in fellowship with one another. So if you'd like to connect with us and other listeners just like you, join us in our social media platforms. You'll find us on Facebook and Instagram. And every day we hear from listeners who leave comments telling us how much of a difference this program makes in their daily lives. And we recently heard from this listener who said, Mark Jobe, I simply turn on bold steps in the car whenever I can. I cannot begin to express how much the Lord has

used your ministry in my life. Timely, life giving words and godly perspectives that have impacted every area of my life better than any professional counselor could ever do. Well, thanks for reaching out to us and I hope you will on Facebook and Instagram. We look forward to sharing more stories in the coming weeks. But right now, let's get back into the second half of Mark job's message. The power at work in you.

our day. Their daily bread is. It's. Give us today God the resources that we need today. Jesus taught us to pray for resources that we need for today. He taught us to pray that our needs would be met, that we would have the resources that we need to operate. And in other places in Scripture, he tells us to pray that we would have enough not only to supply our own needs, but enough to be able to give to others as well. So God is not. It's not

God's will that you operate and live in scarcity. Now, there are times in life where you may struggle financially. The just and the unjust go through times like that. So I never want you to feel like if you are going through a rough financial time, that is because you're less spiritual or don't have faith, or because there's sin in your life. Because sometimes we go through those seasons,

whether we're doing good or bad. But I do believe that the ultimate will of God in our life is not that you live a life in scarcity, but that you live a life in a place where you have not only enough to meet your own needs, but you have abundance to be able to give, and that we ultimately, as believers, not become simply recipients of other people, but that we become resource people, that we become the people

that give. That we become the people that resource that we become, the people that share the people of God become those people. And so Paul says, out of God's glorious riches, he may strengthen you with power. Now there's two words that are used there strengthen and power. Both of these words in the Greek have to do with power, but they have a different meaning to them. The word strengthen means to become strong or to increase in force

or capability. The word for power in the Greek is the word dunamis, where we get the word dynamite from. And that has to do with strength, force, capability. So what Paul is saying is, I pray that God, out of his glorious riches, may help you increase the power that's already present in your life. The power is there. You have power, or you have more power than what you know you have. There is a power in your life, a latent power in your life that makes nuclear power pale.

It's the power of the Holy Spirit. Now notice what it says, that he may strengthen you with power. Through what? Through his spirit in your inner being. What God is trying to do is God is trying to take his power that is already inside of you view and increase that power. That power has come to your life via the Holy Spirit, capital S and the Holy Spirit is strengthening what some versions call the inner man or the spirit man. Every person here has two man, so to speak.

If you're a woman, I guess two women, you have the inner man and the outer man. The outer man is your physical body. The inner man is your spiritual body. Do you realize that you can be in shape in your outer man, and way out of shape in your inner man? You can be a £400 cut in shape big linebacker in your outer man and in your inner man. You can be this little weakling of a person in your inner man. Although your outer man may look like

it's strong. And on the other hand, you may be a 90 year old, frail little lady that you think if you just sneeze at her, you're going to break one of her bones? And she's, you know, in the church with her little cane, just walking really carefully. But you don't know that if you were to be able to put on some glasses and see in the spiritual realm, you just ran into a Hulk Hogan of a woman. I mean, you just ran into a champion, a powerful woman. Don't mess with her. I mean, she may be frail

on the outside, but inside she is a warrior. She is powerful. Has might. So never confuse the outer man with the inner man. And what Paul is saying is, I want you to strengthen your inner man through the power of the Holy Spirit. Now, I taught you this before, but I just want to make sure you understand this, because a lot of Christians, I think, get a little confused. If you are a believer in Jesus Christ, a follower of Christ, you have the Holy Spirit inside of you.

There is no such thing as a follower of Jesus Christ that does not possess the spirit. You cannot be saved without the spirit. The spirit is the agent of salvation. He is the agent of regeneration. So you can't say, well, I'm a Christian, I just don't have the spirit. No, if you're a Christian, you have the spirit. Now, you may not be walking in the power of the spirit. You may not have manifested all the gifts of the spirit,

but you do have the spirit inside of you. Okay, so if you're a believer here today, you have the Holy Spirit inside of you. Now listen to what Paul says. He prays three things. Verse 17, he prays that they'd be strengthened in the power of the spirit, so that verse 17, Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. If you're taking notes, write this down. Number one, they need power to embrace the life changing presence of Christ.

new bold step gift. And Mark, let's talk about that gift.

But the core problem is that we are envious of other people's success.

people behind their backs. And it really starts to just disrupt our relationships. It can ruin a small group and it can split churches. It is really an explosive sin, and we don't often identify it like we ought to.

are envious of this man. It really is true that it's everywhere, and it is the fountainhead of all kinds of problems in our lives.

820 North LaSalle Boulevard, Chicago, Illinois 606 ten. By the way, when you choose to give a financial gift each month, we'll add your name to our a growing list of bold partners, and you'll receive a signed copy of Mark's book, unstuck Out of Your Cave and into your call. Plus several other perks like the biweekly Bold Partner Post, video, email. Plus, when you choose to give $30 or more each month, you'll qualify for a 50% discount off items from the

Moody Publishers online store. Thank you for your generous investment into the media ministry of Bold Steps. Sign up to become a bold partner today when you visit Bold Steps. Org. I'm Wayne Shepherd. That's all the time we have today. Join us again tomorrow when Mark concludes this message on the power at work in you. It's from our series. When you believe everything changes and you'll hear it Thursday

right here on Bold Steps with Mark Joe. Bold steps is a production of Moody Radio, a ministry of Moody Bible Institute.