Deeply Rooted
"Let your roots grow down into him, and let your lives be built on him. Then your faith will grow strong in the truth you were taught, and you will overflow with thankfulness." Colossians 2:7 (NLT)
by Alexandra Copeland
Throughout the Gospels, there is little doubt that most of us Christians are acquainted with the extraordinary miracles, signs, and wonders that our blessed Savior performed. He just loved people so much, and he had such compassion on them. Through Jesus Christ we are able to see the Father’s heart. God doesn't want us getting hurt and struggling through life. His intention is that all of us are healed, have wonderful relationships with Him and the other people in our lives, and He wants us to have abundance—good jobs and plenty of money in the bank. When we have our needs met, we are then in a better position to bless and help others in a greater capacity, just like Christ did. We know this in our heads, but in our hearts this piece of good news isn’t yet deeply rooted.
Throughout the Gospels, there is little doubt that most of us Christians are acquainted with the extraordinary miracles, signs, and wonders that our blessed Savior performed. He just loved people so much, and he had such compassion on them. Through Jesus Christ we are able to see the Father’s heart. God doesn't want us getting hurt and struggling through life. His intention is that all of us are healed, have wonderful relationships with Him and the other people in our lives, and He wants us to have abundance—good jobs and plenty of money in the bank. When we have our needs met, we are then in a better position to bless and help others in a greater capacity, just like Christ did. We know this in our heads, but in our hearts this piece of good news isn’t yet deeply rooted.
In the second half of Ephesians 3, Paul
prayed a prayer for the church that should be so firmly
etched in our consciousness that we breathe it in and out
daily. In this prayer he asked for the very best spiritual
blessings imaginable for the people of God. In verse 16 he
prayed, “I pray that
from his glorious, unlimited resources he will empower you
with inner strength through his Spirit.” This
inner strength that the Apostle is referring to is strength
in the innermost part of our beings. The indwelling Holy
Spirit doesn’t need to be strengthened. He is a perfect gift
from God, and has all the strength he needs.
We are three-part beings, you and
I—spirit, soul, and body. In his letter to the church at
Thessalonica, Paul wrote in 1Thessalonians 5:23
(NLT), “And the very
God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole
spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the
coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.” Once we become born
again, we receive the gift of indwelling Holy Spirit, and we
become new creations in Christ, but we do not receive a new
soul, heart, or mind. We are spiritual beings in Christ, but
at the point of our new birth conversion we still have the
same body, thoughts, behaviors, feelings, and attitudes that
we’ve always had.
These are the things that make us
unique individuals, but that doesn’t mean we don’t have to
change some of them. God tells us in 2 Corinthians 5:17
(NLT), “that anyone
who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life
is gone; a new life has begun!” This means that our old
nature is dead. It contains habit patterns and old ways of
thinking that are not a part of our new nature in Christ. To
the extent that we want to please and honor God, we’ll need
to strip away those dead things and stop lugging them
around. Heavenly Father has commanded us in Romans 12:2
(NLT), “Don’t copy the
behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform
you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then
you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and
pleasing and perfect.” God isn’t going to
change the way we think, but He will transform us into new
people as we change our thoughts to line up with the mind
and thoughts of Christ.
He tells us in Ephesians 4:23 to renew
our minds to His Word; if we don’t, our old nature, which is
dead and corrupting, will continually hold us back and keep
us from enjoying the privileges of being a King’s kid. So
the opening of Paul’s prayer in Ephesians 3 is that God will
empower us to be mightily strengthened in our hearts, minds,
and souls, because these are the places where we need a
higher degree of God’s grace.
These are also the places under our
free-will agency. We make the choice as to whether we’ll
renew our minds or not. The Apostle Paul knew our propensity
to ignore God’s Word and wisdom. He knew that we don’t
always make decisions and choices in the best interest of
our spiritual growth and well-being, and this is why he
prayed so fervently that God would help us to realize the
strength of His provision.
In Ephesians 3:17 (NLT), Paul informs
us of the end result of being empowered with inner strength
through God’s Spirit. He said,
“Then Christ will make
his home in your hearts as you trust in him.” Recently,
I heard a story told by a pastor that had enjoyed great
popularity among many churches in his area. He said that he
was so well-liked and respected that he was sure God had a
special place for him in heaven, and he was also pretty
confident that he had done all that was required to make
Christ at home in his heart. One day, he took ill and
prayed fervently for healing. This illness troubled him
because he had been what he considered a faithful servant of
God. He became quite vexed about it, so he questioned God
about why it was that he had succumb to such a troublesome
fate.
Most of us think very highly of
ourselves. It’s true. Even the most humble person struggles
with the monster we call
‘ego’. Some of our best intentions are motivated by self-interest,
and sometimes it is on a very subconscious level. We don’t
fully know our hearts and intents, nor could we ever know
them as well as the Father knows them. There are things
lurking beneath the surface of your inner being right this
very moment that hinder you from walking in faith as
masterfully as you could. You may not have a clue, but our
Heavenly Father knows you through and through. These things
will cause you great harm or keep you from moving forward in
God’s divine purpose. This is why Paul’s prayer is so
important, because he was well aware that God is preparing
and strengthening us today for what awaits us in our
tomorrows. We need to trust what God is doing so that we do
not work against His plan for us, but have confidence that
all things are working together for our good.
The pastor who was ill never considered
that he had become very arrogant as a result of his
popularity, and that he had harbored feelings of resentment
in his heart against others. God did not cause the pastor’s
illness, but his refusal to repent had festered and taken
root in his inner being, causing him to manifest it through
sickness.
1 John 4:18 ESV tells us,
“There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has
to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been
perfected in love.” God doesn’t force His love upon us.
He stands at the door of our hearts and knocks. It is our
privilege and responsibility to open up and let Him in. You
and I have been given the charge to make room for Christ, to
move the old stuff out so that he can make his home in our
hearts. This means that we have to give fear it’s walking
papers.
When we see this word
‘fear’, perhaps we
think of ferocious animals or scary things that go ‘thump’
in the night, but resentment, pride, envy and other
negative and sinful behaviors and feelings are just as
deadly. The root of all sin is fear, and fear is also the
root of why we hold on to toxic feelings, relationships, and
situations that do not help us to grow in our relationship
with God. Our faith and commitment to surrender and release
this old stuff is the thing that increases space for Christ
and throws out the welcome mat for His love.
Every possible treasure that we could
earnestly want for our lives is available to us, but we must
understand that God designed everything in the universe to
cooperate with His love. The level of blessings and bounty
that we glean in this life is directly proportionate to the
amount of His Word that we live and breathe. His love is the
key that opens the heavens and causes us to continually bask
in His glory, and this is what Paul wanted us to understand
on the deepest level possible. In Ephesians 3:19 (NLT) he
prayed ,
“And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should,
how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is.”
We must strive to be deeply rooted in the knowledge of
Christ, because the more we walk upon it day by day, the more
convinced we
will be of God's deep and abiding love for us all.
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Scripture quotations are from the
Holy Bible, English Standard Version, copyright © 2001, 2007
by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used
by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations marked (NLT)
are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation,
copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House
Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights
reserved.
Scripture taken from the New King
James Version. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used
by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture taken from The Message.
Copyright ©1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002. Used by
permission of NavPress Publishing Group.
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