Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen. Ephesians 3:20, 21 (NKJV)
The Apostle Paul concluded the third chapter of Ephesians with an inspiring doxology that reads like a hymn glorifying God. To gain a sense of why Paul closed Ephesians 3 with this doxology, think of reading or hearing Ephesians without chapter or verse division. It’s like listening to an inspiring sermon progressively moving to a stirring climax that has you on your feet praising God! That’s how to comprehend the impact of Paul’s message from Ephesians chapter 1 through 3.[1]
Before we look at Paul’s dynamic language in Ephesians 3:20, take another moment and remember some of the life-changing themes we have read:
- We are “blessed with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ” (1:3).
- “We have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace” (1:7).
- God is giving us “the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him” (1:17).
- We can know and experience “the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints” (1:18).
- God is “rich in mercy” (2:4).
- We “sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus” (2:6).
- God wants to “show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus” (2:7).
- We are “fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of Go” (2:19).
- There are “unsearchable riches of Christ” (3:8).
- God will strengthen us “according to the riches of His glory” (3:16).
- We can “know the love of Christ which passes knowledge” (3:19).
These are just twelve of the themes found in these chapters that build to the crescendo of Ephesians 3:20, 21. Imagine you are listening as the Apostle Paul dictates this letter. Can you hear the cadence of his speech? Do you hear the rise and fall and the rise again of his voice as he emphasized certain themes? Can you hear his passion when he speaks of himself in the first person as “the prisoner of Christ Jesus for you Gentiles” (3:1)? Your heart is stirred because you know in Christ you are no longer “dead in trespasses and sin” (2:1). You have heard Paul’s voice speak of the love of Christ and by the Spirit you are enabled to comprehend with all the saints “what is the width and length and depth and height” of God’s love in Christ for us (3:18). If you’re in first century Ephesus Pentecostal house listening to this you are shouting “Hallelujahs” while “Amens” fill the room.
You think you have heard it all and there is nothing more to be said. But now, Paul reminds you that what you have heard, what you have prayed for, what you have thought in your mind, is not even close to all that God has provided and can do in Christ Jesus.
In Ephesians 3:20 Paul used the verb form of the noun dunamis which we have seen through the first three chapters.[2] Usually translated as power, Paul announced that God has the power, the inherent ability, to do “exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think.”
“Exceedingly abundantly” is a term Paul used only three times in his letters, twice in 1 Thessalonians (3:10; 5:13), and here in Ephesians. The Greek transliteration is: huperekperissou. The noun is perissos which means “extraordinary, abundant,” and the adverb means “exceedingly, beyond measure.”[3] Paul added two Greek prefixes to the main word: ek and huper. When the Ephesians listeners heard or read this word, they knew immediately that Paul was describing the unimaginable power of God to do whatever He desired in and through them!
This is a paradox. God can do far more than we can ask or imagine but God also tells us of His amazing power to do this through us. This is God’s power that “works in us” to accomplish His redemptive will on the earth. This power is available to us by faith. We don’t control what God will do. But we are invited to participate in God’s ability to do more than we imagine or ask.
Think of this, we don’t know how to pray or ask God for things for His glory in and through us. But we can come to Him knowing that He is able to work beyond our lack of vision, our inability to imagine the impossible. This is not a license for self-aggrandizement or self-promotion. Rather, it is invitation to trust God beyond our own understanding and knowledge.
Before we leave this word, I want us to briefly look at how Paul used it in 1 Thessalonians. Many commentators believe that 1 Thessalonians is Paul’s first written letter that we have and written from Corinth about 51 A.D. (Acts 18:1-18). The first use is in 3:10 where Paul prayed exceedingly “night and day” for the new believers in Thessalonica. By using this word, Paul told them they cannot imagine how much he is praying for them. The second use is in 5:13 where Paul encouraged the Thessalonians to honor those who work among them. He wanted them to honor these Christian laborers in ways that are more than they can imagine but that God will reveal. This honoring is not about Christian laborers becoming wealthy or elevated in statute as superior to others. That flies in the face of the Biblical call to walk humbly before the Lord. Instead, it is honor that focuses on what God is doing in the lives of laborers for our sakes. It is a genuine spirit of submission, respect to God, and gratitude for the Spirit’s gifts among those who serve us.
Finally, just as Ephesians 3:20 began in English with “Now to Him (God in His triune fullness),” so Ephesians 3:21 begins with “to Him (God in His triune fullness)” there be “glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.” The church, the body of Christ in the world from generation to generation, language to language, culture to culture, is called to glorify God in all that she says and does. The closing Amen is an expression of “Yes, we agree, let it be according to Your Word, O Lord.”
[1] I’ll write more in the next essay about Ephesians 4 and its connection to Ephesians 1-3, particularly considering the metaphor of hearing Ephesians as a sermon.
[2] Dunamis is used in 1:19a; 3:7, 20. The New King James translates “power” in places where exousia is used in Greek, denoting a realm of authority as in 1:21 and 2:2.
[3] Brown, Arndt, Gingrich, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament, 657. Discussion of the range of this word begins on page 656.
