Wanting More …

In the rush of the metropolis (even a couple of thousand years ago urban life was not relaxed) we seldom pause to consider what is actually important.  As we live among the demands of city life (even two millennia ago the city was a ruthless environment) we can be so conditioned by the prevailing culture that we can’t imagine a different way of urban living.   But the writer of our letter does.

The previous sentence of this letter to the city-dwellers was a prayer that they would know God.  That may have left us a bit breathless: space for God in an aggressively human world?  Now he keeps praying for them to know more, to be enlightened. 

This is not the Western enlightenment of merciless materialism.

He wants them to find the “riches of God’s glorious inheritance in his holy people”.  The wealth that he wants for his readers is nothing to do with markets or economies; it is not about possessions or position or progress.  Rather he longs for them to discover the transcendent things that God will give them.  And, even more unlike the materialist vision, these gifts are given communally – to the collective of those who belong to God, not to individuals who somehow achieve more than others.

Nor yet is it the Eastern enlightenment of dedicated detachment.

He wants them to experience the “hope to which God has called them”.  Hope for our writer is not an unreliable wish, but the certainty of something that is coming.  This confidence-for-the-future does not originate in a cosmic mechanism of reward for those who eventually achieve the criteria.  Rather it is available to everyone, immediately.  It has nothing to do with a desire to be absorbed into the universal; it is living in confidence that God will bring about the things he has promised, and that people can participate.

Not even the Southern enlightenment of mystical manipulation.

He wants them to realise “God’s incomparably great power for those who believe”.  This is far removed from the chosen individual undergoing arduous ascetic training in order to achieve supernatural control in the unseen world.  This power is not vested in us at all; God is the one who is powerful.  However God is involved in each of our lives (great privilege!) enabling each one to live a more fruitful life, a life that matters.

Our writer is expecting that astounding things will happen in the lives of those who choose spiritual life through Jesus.  We could contemplate this sentence our whole lives and not get bored!

The Bible: Ephesians 1:18-19

http://www.biblica.com/en-us/bible/online-bible/?translation=niv&book=ephesians&chapter=1his level 2011-2013