All right, brethren, Ephesians
chapter 3. I just want to focus on this
20th verse, verse 20 and 21. Ephesians 3 verse 20 says, now
unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we
ask or think according to the power that worketh in us. Unto
him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages,
world without end. Amen. Our subject is God's ability. God is able to meet every need
we have. He's able to work in his people
and to work mightily by his power and to do above all that we can
ask, all that we can even think. That's what God's able to do.
Notice the progression. He says, to him that's able.
Now that's a great thing. God is able. He says, to him
that's able to do exceeding abundantly above. Now you would think that
might be as far as he would go. But then he says, to him that's
able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think,
all that we ask or think. God's infinitely able to supply
every need that his people have. Now, if God will bless us to
remember this, it will cure our doubts and our fears and it'll
cause us to ask God for bigger things and expect bigger things
from God. He's a mighty big God and he
does mighty big things. Now obviously, I'm setting myself
up for failure here because he's able to do exceeding abundantly
above all we ask or even think. So we're gonna take a thimble
and dip it in the ocean right now. because this is beyond me,
but notice what Paul prayed to the Father for, for the Lord's
people. He prayed there that they would
be strengthened with might by the Spirit in the inner man,
that we might know Christ's presence in our hearts by faith, that
we might be rooted and grounded in His love, that we might be
able to comprehend these dimensions of His love. that we might know
the love of Christ which passes knowledge, that we might be filled
with all the fullness of God. Now, that is a mighty large petition
to make. That is a big thing to ask God.
And so Paul says, now, in case you think this is impossible,
Our Father is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we
ask or think according to the power that works in us. We don't
know how to pray as we ought, the scripture says, and one of
the reasons we don't know how to pray as we ought is because
God's able to do above all that we can even think. That's one
reason we don't know how to pray as we ought. God's able to do
above all that we can think about. and ask him for. But whatever
our need is, God knows it. He already knows it. He knows
it. He's known it from eternity.
He knew it before we knew it. And he's able to exceeding abundantly,
go above and beyond to supply whatever our need is. He's able. And he does it all according
to his own will, according to his purpose now, Get this word
first of all in our heart, God is able. God is able. He's all powerful. He's all knowing. He's absolutely sovereign. He's gracious, abundantly gracious
to whom he'll be gracious. And he's working the counsel
of his own will in everything that's coming to pass, everything. And for that reason, the Spirit
of God constantly in the scriptures reminds us that God's able. God
is able. We saw Sunday in 2 Corinthians
9, 8, or maybe it was a week or so ago, but we saw God is
able to make all grace abound towards you, that you always,
having all sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good
work. In fact, that's the only way
you're gonna have all sufficiency in all things to abound to every
good work, is because God's able to make that happen. He's able
to. Here's what we gotta remember.
Look down at Ephesians 3, I mean Ephesians 4. Paul's application
to this message in chapter 4 is we're gonna have to walk worthy
of this vocation, and here's how you do that, with all lowliness
and meekness and long-suffering, forbearing one another, endeavoring
to keep the unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace. And here's
why. He says the body's one, he goes
through all the ones there that he speaks about, but look at
verse seven. But unto every one of us, each of us individually,
is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ. See, God's able to do exceeding
abundantly anything we could ask or think, but he only gives
a measure to each person. So what does that mean? We're gonna have to be lowly and meek
and long-suffering and forbearing, because he doesn't give this
to everybody. He doesn't give the same measure to everybody.
And we're terribly prone to think because somebody don't measure
up to ourselves that they don't measure up. But God's able. He's able. What you have, God
gave it to you. You wouldn't have it if he didn't
give it to you. What I have, God gave to me. We wouldn't have
it if he didn't give it to us. He doesn't depend on us to ask
him. He doesn't. He doesn't depend on us to ask
him. We didn't ask him. We didn't even think about asking
him when God chose whom he would before the world was made. We
weren't around. We couldn't have asked him, but
he didn't depend on us to ask him. That was something exceeding
abundantly beyond what we'd have even thought about. Ask natural
man how he'd have done it. Well, I'd give everybody a chance.
Well, God don't do it by chance. God chose whom he would. He didn't
ask us. He did an exceedingly great thing. He chose a people for himself.
It was not our asking him. It was God's exceeding abundant
ability that sent his son into this world. We wouldn't have
done it this way. We wouldn't have given our son.
Not for death row convicts There's nothing in them that would even
remotely make you attracted to them. That's you. That's me. We don't see how bad we are before
God and He gave His only begotten Son who laid down His life for
us. Is God able to do exceeding abundantly
above all that we ask or think? The Son of God took flesh The
son of God whose spirit came down and took flesh like unto
his brethren and dwelt on this earth amongst us. Can he do what
we'd ever thought about that? We'd have never thought that
and he did that. Is God able to do exceeding abundantly
above all that we ask or think? The lawgiver didn't come and
condemn us. He had every right to, he's holy,
he's just, he's right. He didn't come condemn you. What'd
he do? He came to you and fulfilled
the law for you, laid down his life for you, satisfied the law
you broke. He filled it for you and put
your sin away. We'd have never thought that.
We'd have never asked that. He did that. Is he able to do
exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think? Well, what
appears to us to be total failure is a substitute on the cross
being crucified by vile, God-hating rebels like you and me. But it
was in reality him accomplishing the redemption of all his people.
He didn't ask us. It was exceeding abundantly above
anything we'd have asked or thought. That's what he did. Three days
later, he showed his ability to do exceeding abundantly above
all that we ever would have asked or thought. And right now, the
God-man glorified is seated at the throne of God, doing exceeding
abundantly above all that we could ever ask or think. We didn't ask him to give us
spiritual life. In fact, we didn't want anything
he had to give us. And yet he came and sent the
gospel to us, and sent his spirit and created life where there
was no life. Brought life out of nothing by
his presence. And you know that power that
he's talking about, that mighty power he works in us, Back, he's
been talking about that power all through Ephesians, and he
talked about it back in Ephesians 2.19. It's the exceeding greatness
of his power to us who believe the same power that he wrought
mightily in Christ when he raised him from the dead. That's the
power it takes to raise a dead sinner and quicken him and regenerate
him. That was the power. The same
power that raised Christ is the power that gave you spiritual
life. Talk about exceeding abundantly above all that we can ask or
think. When he gave us faith and he brought you to care on
Christ for the first time, did he not give you exceeding, abundant,
more forgiveness and mercy than you'd have ever thought he'd
have given you? More than you were even asking
for. We didn't even see the depths
of our sin. We didn't even know the depths
of what He gave to us at the time. And He just continues to
show you how exceeding abundantly He's forgiven you and forgiven
you and forgiven you and forgiven you. A self-righteous Pharisee don't
see that. He don't. He don't know. He don't know what forgiveness
is. He don't know the depths of what He is. He don't struggle with sin. A dead man don't struggle. And so, when you came to Him, you found
out, like the Hebrew writer said, He's able to save them to the
uttermost that come to God by Him. He's able. Some mother is
probably sorrowing over her child thinking he's too far gone in
sin and it's beyond hope. That's never the case. God is
able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think.
As long as he's alive, there's hope that God could do exceeding
abundantly above all that we ask or think. How often have
we found His ability to comfort us to be exceeding abundant above
all we ask or think? You just can't get comfort. He has removed every worldly
carnal thing from you so that you can't get comfort anywhere
else. And He comforts you. He comforts you. In the midst
of whatever you're going through, He can comfort you. more than
you ever would have thought because in that he himself has suffered
being tempted, he's able to succor them that are tempted. I know
some brethren that are going through really, really serious
trials. I mean some real serious trials.
But they're not going through anything that Christ didn't go
through and he's able to comfort them and he's doing it. I'm hearing
it. I'm hearing them speak about
it, how he's comforting them. And you could look at him and
think, there's nothing else that could give him comfort right
now. And yet they speak of how he's able to comfort them. We
can rest assured he's able to keep us and bring us to glory
with him. He's able and he won't lose any. Paul said, he's able to keep
that which I've committed unto him against that day. Jude said,
God is able to keep you from falling and to present you faultless
before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy. He's able
even to subdue all things to Himself. Right now, He could
make you a perfect man if He wanted to. He could make you
perfect. You would have a bit of sin if
He wanted to. He's able. He's able to subdue everything
to Himself. Why doesn't he do that? Because
he gives grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ.
Because he's teaching us what lowliness is, and what meekness
is, and what longsuffering is. He's able. He's able. So when it comes to petitions
to God our Father in Christ, remember, he possesses omnipotent
ability to give. Omnipotent ability to give. He's
absolutely sovereign to bring his will to pass, and if it's
not coming to pass, it's not God's will. And that's just, that's ultimately
the thing. It's not his will. And he's able to put down and
raise up and work everything together for the good of his
people. That's what he's gonna do. That's what he's gonna do. He might have to bust our kneecaps
out from under us to do it. But that'll be a good busting
of the kneecaps. We need it. And he'll do it. But it's good. He's gracious,
he's generous, he's able to do exceeding abundantly above all
that we ask or think. James said he gives to all. Liberally. Liberally. Now, here's the question. Do you believe he's able? That's
what Christ said. Do you believe I'm able to do
this? Whatever is for God's glory, whatever is for the good of his
people, God's not only able to do it, he's willing to do it.
If it's going to You know, you think, you look at saints in
the scriptures and scripture tells us their end was better
than the beginning. Now when we think of that, we
start thinking of material, carnal things. If God gives you repentance
and he brings you into a closer union with Christ and brings
you in with stronger faith to cast your care on Christ and
to walk looking to him alone, it don't matter what carnally
he does to you. The end's been better than the
beginning. Because in the end, when we get to the ultimate end,
it's not going to be any of this carnal stuff that's going to
be what we consider the blessing. All this is going to be gone.
The blessing is you're going to be with Christ, face-to-face
with Christ and have Him. So whatever He does now, spiritually,
what He's done for you that was better than what was before,
the end's been better than the beginning. No matter what the
outward is. The problem for us is our faith
is so small. Now that's a problem for us,
but that's not a problem for God. The problem is we can't
see anything but out of these eyes most of the time. And that's the problem with us.
The Lord told Abraham, he said, Sarah's gonna have a child, and
I'm telling you exact time, this time next season, she gonna have
this child. And Sarah heard that, and she
thought how old she was, and she thought, I'm way past the
age of childbearing. That's impossible physically.
And it was. It was. And she laughed about
it. And God said, is anything too
hard for the Lord? Is anything too hard for him? And exactly as the time that
God said, she conceived Isaac. Just like God said she would.
God's able, it's our unbelief that causes us to doubt. That's
it. It's our unbelief. Whatever mountain
we perceive as impossible to remove, that's God's mountain. That's God's mountain, he put
it there. And it's nothing for him to move
it. But we see it as just this unconquerable
Obstacle, because why? We're using our five senses,
that's why. That's not faith. He's able to
do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think. I need
faith. I need God to give me faith.
Solomon asked for an understanding heart. You know, that was so
why. He said, I want an understanding
heart. And God gave him, not only supplied him with that,
he gave him what he didn't ask for. He gave him riches and honor
on top of it to show him he's able. But an understanding heart,
that's the gift right there. Nebuchadnezzar threatened Shadrach,
Meshach, and Abednego and he said, now if you don't bow to
these idols, now you think about this, are you strong enough to
do this? I'm not. None of us are. Why did they answer the way they
did? This king who had more power
than anybody in the world at the time, he said, if you worship
not, you shall be cast the same hour into the midst of the burning,
fiery furnace. And who is that God that will
deliver you out of my hands? Now you're standing there, you
can feel the heat of this furnace burning like one of them smelting
furnaces over in Pittsburgh, and you're standing there and
the heat's blazing to you, and the mightiest king in the world
is telling you, if you don't bow down to my idols and worship
them, I'll fix to throw you in there. And ain't no God in this
world gonna deliver you out. You know what I'd have done?
I'd tell you exactly what I'd have done without the grace of
God. I'd have hit my face before that idol. You would have to. But God was doing exceeding abundantly
with them and they said, oh Nebuchadnezzar, we're not careful to answer you
in this matter. We're not even going to be careful
about it to answer you. They said, if you throw us into
that furnace, our God, whom we serve, is able to deliver us
from the burning, fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of
thy hand, O king. And listen to this. They said,
but if he's not pleased to do it, we're still not bowing to
your idols. Those were just sinners like
me and you, brethren. How did they answer that way?
God's able to do exceeding abundantly all that you can ask or think.
And not only that, God threw them in there. I mean, Nebuchadnezzar
threw them, well, God threw them in there. And Christ was in there with
them, and they came out, and they not only weren't burned,
there wasn't a hair's sense, and they didn't even smell like
smoke when they came out. You believe that happened, or
is that just a fable? I believe that happened. That
happened. God is that exceeding abundantly
He's able to do more than we think he can do. Now notice the
ability here is according to his power that worketh in us
mightily. Now that's what I'm talking about.
God works in his people mightily. That's what we saw with those
three. He worked in them mightily. Now,
go to Romans 4. You know, over in the Old Covenant,
Abraham, He was full of unbelief too, and that was just his sinful
flesh. God will let you get in your
unbelief to show you just what you'll do without his power working
in you. And we can do things that we're
saying we're doing in the name of God in total unbelief. And
we can do immoral, lewd holitary in total unbelief. And both of
them are just as wicked. But here's the thing. What Abraham
did in not believing God was Abraham. It was his sin. He didn't
believe God. But when God worked in him, that's
when you believe God. And here's what he did, Romans
4.18, who against hope, believed in hope that he might become
the father of many nations. According to that which was spoken,
so shall thy seed be. And being not weak in faith,
he considered not his own body, now dead when he was about a
hundred years old, neither yet the deadness of Sarah's womb,
He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief, but
was strong in faith, giving glory to God, and being fully persuaded,
fully persuaded that what God promised, God was able also to
perform. And therefore, it was imputed
to him for righteousness. Now, what was the difference
between Abraham taking Hagar in complete and total unbelief
and putting his hand to the work and trying to help God alone
because God wasn't moving fast enough. What was the difference
between that and God saying he was fully persuaded that what
I promised I was able to perform? What was the difference? God
worked in him faith to see God's able. That's the difference.
The other time, God said, now let me show you what you are,
Abraham, and he led him. put his hand to it. Do you believe
if Uzzah had not reached up and touched that ark, do you think
that ark would have fallen? There ain't no way that ark would
have fell. There ain't no way it would have fell. When we as believers doubt God,
it's our sinful unbelief. That's what it is. It's just
our flesh. That's all it is. We find it
throughout the scriptures. We find it. Now Zechariah, he
had those scriptures. He knew about Abraham. He knew
about Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. He knew about all those
wonderful things God had done. And the angel came to him and
said, Elizabeth's going to bear a son who's going to be the forerunner
for Christ. And he said, I'm old. My wife's
well stricken in years. I wonder how many times he had
heard about Abraham and heard about Sarah. How many times do
we hear these scriptures, and we hear God's word, and we hear
it, and we hear it, and we hear it, and when the trial comes
to us, well, that can't happen. And the angel struck him dumb
to where he couldn't speak, and he said, it's because of your
unbelief. And he just held his tongue until the child was born,
and he loosed it. You know what he did? He praised
God. He said, God's able to do exceeding abundantly above all
that I ever even asked him or even thought about asking him.
According to his mighty power. Christ made the apostle Peter
walk on water. Peter said, let me come. He saw
the Lord walking on water. Our Lord walked on the water.
And he said, Lord, let me come to you. Peter said, the Lord
said, come on, Peter. And Peter stepped out of that
boat and he walked on water going to God. And when did he start sinking
down? When he started looking with these eyes at the wind and
the waves. He started sinking. And the Lord
told what the problem was. He said, O thou of little faith,
wherefore did you doubt? We gotta have God's mighty power
to work faith in us. Think of what our Lord's done
by his power. Think of this. What can he do? Look how tiny you are. Next time you're out and you're
in the yard and you see a little ant, just think about the fact
that you're way smaller in comparison to you and that ant and you and
God. God in eternity determined every
single thing that's coming to pass in this world. Even the
very hairs of your head And he purposed and he predestinated
and he entered a covenant with his son to save his elect and
everything he ordained to happen, he's bringing it to pass. He
declared the end from the beginning, from ancient times of things
that are not yet done, saying, all my counsel shall stand. And
he's been ruling in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants
of the earth in the midst of all our rebellion and sin and
everything, bringing everything exactly to pass, exactly like
he would have it come to pass. He is working all things together,
the good, the bad, and the ugly, all together for the good of
those that love God, them that are called according to His purpose. And you think about His power
to create. When He got ready to work all
this, He just spoke everything into existence out of nothing.
And He upholds it all by the word of His power. And it's by
the word of His power that everything consists. And of course Peter could walk
on the water. The Lord made the water. He made
the wind. He made the waves. And he was
controlling all of it. And what we call the law of nature
is God. It is Christ. Of course he could
walk on water. You could walk on water right
now if God wanted you to. Look to his power and redemption.
The power of Christ's blood redeemed a multitude no man can number.
You and I are gonna be amazed at how many people he saved. Power of his blood. Is anything
too hard for the Lord? And here's the thing now. When
that rich young ruler came to the Lord Jesus, and he went away
sorrowful, the Lord said, it's easier for a camel to go through
the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom
of God. And they were astonished out
of measure. And they said, who then can be saved? Because we're all rich men. We're
all rich young rulers. Who then can be saved? And the Lord said, with men it's
impossible, but not with God. For with God all things are possible. When we were dead in sins, we
were the rich young ruler. We were rich in our goodness,
our so-called thinking we're good, rich in our work, rich
in our self-righteousness. We were young, we were strong,
we thought our strength is how we were going to do everything,
and we were a ruler. We were the ruler of our domain
determined that we were not going to let Christ have dominion over
us. And if he would have left us in that state, it would have
been impossible for us to be saved. And the Lord came and
showed us that with him all things are possible. Now brethren, I know how I hated God and I
know that God came and made me believe him. And I know God has
kept me believing him all these years. I should not doubt God being
able to do anything else, anything else. Can you say that? If He saved you, look at you.
If He saved you, do you doubt He can do anything else? If His invincible power subdued
these carnal minds that just enmity against God. I'm not going
to do it God's way. I'm going to do it my way. And
he subdued that and made you say, Lord, do it your way. He
can do whatever if he did that to us, brethren. God's able to
do exceeding abundantly all that we think. If his holy power,
he comes in his holiness and just seeing God holy, if that
made you and still makes you hate your so-called goodness, you're the harlot, I'm the harlot.
Do we know what that means? Is that just doctrine? Is that
just a picture in scripture we hear? Do we realize that's what
we are? Do we realize how bad we are
before God in ourselves if it wasn't for Christ? Do we know
that? Really, what would you have done
to that harlot that he brings in adultery and caught in adultery?
What would you have done? If she walked in here and you
knew she was just a carlet that everybody in this neighborhood
knows and sat down right beside you on that pew, what would you
do? Honestly, would you scoot over a little bit? That's somebody Christ died for.
That's somebody he laid down his life for. That's somebody
that's righteous. It don't much matter what you
think about him. You ain't that much to be thinking
about him. We need to get serious here about
what we really are. What are we? Are we Pharisees? Are we sinners? I think God's fixing to do some
I think he's doing something in this country. He make you stop coming in here
in the gospel because of a mask? What's his purpose in all this?
Verse 21, unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout
all ages, world without end. If we're true believers, we want
God in Christ to have the glory in his church throughout all
ages. And I pray God make us want that.
That's what the people that crucified Christ said they wanted. They
were calling on the name of God, claiming glory to God, and nailing
the spikes in his hand. Lord, make us really, really
want your glory. Well, it's gonna be by his power
working in us and causing us to experience his ability in
what he's able to do. What have you sacrificed? What
have you sacrificed and really done without and really uprooted
and done, you know, and like really for the cause of Christ
so that you can experience something of His providing. If we experience that, it's going
to encourage us to ask Him. expecting him to do exceeding
abundantly above whatever we ask or think. Whatever, we can't
see it, we can't think it, we don't know, but we're gonna go
to him and say, Lord, you're big, you're God, you're able,
you're mighty, and I expect you to do exceedingly great things. He said, open your mouth wide
and I'll fill it. He said, prove me now. Come test
me, He said. See if I won't open up the windows
of heaven and pour you out a blessing that won't be room to receive
it. And experiencing that ability
and experiencing that power, He's going to make you pray submissively. Not to be seen. Not trying to
rally everybody else together to pray. No, he'll make you just
go to your closet yourself and you really pray submissively. And really pray humbly and really
pray patiently. When our Lord began to suffer, And he said, now is my soul troubled. And he said, what shall I say?
Father, save me from this hour. But for this cause came I unto
this hour. Father, glorify thy name. That's submissive, patient, expectant,
waiting prayer. Whatever the hour is you come
to, It's your Father's will that you come to that hour. And am
I gonna say, Father, save me from this hour? Father, glorify
your name. However he does that, I'm fine
with it. However he does that. He could
put me out of this pulpit, or he could do something else. And
whichever one he does, I'm fine with it. because God'll do it. And I expect
it to be good. If God turns this into the Metropolitan
Tabernacle, it'll be a good thing. And if he strikes me with cancer
and I got six months to live, it's gonna be a good thing. What are you going to say? He's
in control of everything. And the whole thing of this is
to let you fall, let you sin, or let your brother fall, let
your brother sin, and teach you by how you react to it. That's
what this is about. That's exactly what it's about.
And the devil wants you to say, oh, don't do that. Don't trust
God. Help God out. I pray God, just
look at chapter four. I therefore the prisoner of the
Lord beseech you that you are worthy of the vocation wherewith
you call with all lowliness and meekness. You know what that
means? There's probably going to be
somebody high and mighty opposing you. With long suffering, that means
there's going to be somebody you're going to have to suffer
along with. forbearing one another in love. With all lowly endeavoring,
striving to keep the unity of the spirit and the bond of peace.
Why? Why do we have to do it this
way? Because unto every one of us is given grace according to
the measure of the gift of Christ. Well, I just don't think that
brother, he just don't act like a believer ought to act. What's that look like? Could
you tell me? And if he is a believer now,
where'd he get the grace he does have? And who am I to criticize
it? Come on now. If you, somebody else don't have
the grace you have, if I say, if I criticize them for not having
the grace I have, you know what I'm saying? I'm boasting as if
I didn't get this grace from God. And I'm criticizing God for the
grace he does have. And ain't no two ways around
that. So we just have to say, Lord, work your will. He gonna do exceeding
abundantly above what you can ask or think. And expect it,
expect it. Amen.