Ever since I first heard of your strong faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for God’s people everywhere, I have not stopped thanking God for you. I pray for you constantly, asking God, the glorious Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, to give you spiritual wisdom and insight so that you might grow in your knowledge of God. I pray that your hearts will be flooded with light so that you can understand the confident hope he has given to those he called—his holy people who are his rich and glorious inheritance.
Ephesians 1:15-18
Okay, so just as I appreciated the NLT version of the last section of Ephesians I tackled, today I find it somewhat lacking compared to the NASB, especially the latter part, verse 18. Here's the NASB take on verse 18:
I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened, so that you will know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, . . .
I realize that the NLT was trying to get away from the somewhat poetic (and potentially confusing) "eyes of your heart" phrase, but that's the very thing I like about the NASB version. I appreciate the image it conjures up in my mind, of our heart seeing the truth of our hope and knowing our hope in Christ, being flooded with the light of understanding like a 1000-watt flood light blinking on over our heads.
So there ya go, one of the reasons I like to read from several different translations of the Bible. I get the best of both worlds, so to speak, and since I don't speak Greek or Hebrew or Aramaic, by comparing English versions it brings me closer to understanding what the writer was really trying to say, or so I believe and hope.
I started to take this post in one direction, but as so often happens, I have found my thoughts sidetracked. And as I have learned to do here, I will follow the sidetrack wherever it leads me.
The phrase that sidetracked me is in verse 16, "I have not stopped thanking God for you. I pray for you constantly..." And it's appropriate, I guess, because the whole thrust of this section is Paul's prayer for the folks in Ephesus. As you probably know, he almost always includes this sort of section in his letters, a prayer for the people he's addressing. Paul had a lot of people for whom he was "constantly" praying!
How does that work? When did he have time to write his letters if he was sitting around praying all the time like that? Am I supposed to pray constantly, too?? According to 1 Thessalonians 5:17, we are supposed to "pray without ceasing" or to "never stop praying," depending on which version we're reading. Some folks I've talked to have suggested that means that if we're praying 5 minutes a day, we should never stop doing that. Personally, I think that's sort of a copout, and believe he really does mean that we are supposed to be praying at all times. Paul says that he prays constantly, and I assume he would strongly suggest that we follow his example. (See Philippians 3:17.)
So again, how does that work? Well, to me, praying without ceasing or being constantly in prayer simply means being in constant communion with God. Being with God. It means to realize and recognize that God is constantly with me, right beside me, within me no matter where I am or what I'm doing. And his desire, his will, is that I acknowledge his presence and simply talk to him, communicate with him, commune with him, be with him.
Then, whenever someone or something comes to mind that concerns me, I can immediately hash it over with my good friend, the Creator of the Universe. Paul alludes to this in his letter to the Philippians when he says "Every time I think of you, I give thanks to my God." He is in constant prayer, so he prays about anything that comes to mind, whether it's the Philippians, the Ephesians, or his ingrown toenail. It's a continuing conversation between two loved ones, and that's the kind of relationship God longs to enjoy with all of his children.
It's sometimes referred to as Practicing the Presence of God, but personally, that sounds a little too mystical to me. I'd rather just think of it as simply being with God. But it is something that requires practice, no doubt. It's so easy to go on as if God isn't even there. It's so easy to get distracted by life and to find myself ignoring the one who gave everything for me, who loves me beyond comprehension, who never shouts at me but rather whispers to my heart and speaks to me through his word and guides me with his creative hand, the one who is always with me even when I fail to be with him.
I just need to be aware of him, to know the truth of his presence, to have the eyes of my heart opened in order to see and comprehend his constant love and the confident access we have to him, in him. As we grow in that comprehension and as we learn to be constantly with him, all of our concerns naturally turn into prayer. Constant, unceasing prayer.
One more thing, though. Notice that Paul prays that God will open the eyes of the Ephesian's hearts. He doesn't tell the Ephesians to do that because they cannot. And neither can I. It has to be God's work and we simply need to surrender to him. In prayer. And we have confident hope - an assured hope, hope in a sure thing - that he will do what he says.
Father, open the eyes of my heart to the confident hope I have in you and let me be constantly in prayer, constantly in conversation with you, constantly with you.
