Rooted and Grounded in Fullness An Exegesis of Ephesians 3:1419

NT 614: The Captivity Letters of Paul Rev. Peter Grover, OMV

Paul M. Nguyen Congregatio Oblatorum Mariae Virginis December 3, 2012

Nguyen 2 The Letter to the Ephesians, which scholars now agree was written by a post-Pauline community, presents a strong message of unity and hope in building the new church. The first half of the letter closes with the passage we endeavor to study: an intricately-woven prayer that calls attention to the ongoing construction of the young church of Christ and calls it back to its proper roots in the love of God. The letter is constructed with an opening section that reviews the progress of the church up to the present and a latter section that gives guidelines for how to proceed in fidelity to Christ, aware of the powers that will oppose the church on every front. 1 In this context, we approach the pericope, absorbing each simple phrase and delving into its rich meaning for the church of every age. Here is the text of the passage of Ephesians 3:1419. In our treatment, we will use our own translation of the Greek, guided by the NRSV where necessary. New Revised Standard Version 14 For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, 15 from whom every family in heaven and on earth takes its name. 16 I pray that, according to the riches of his glory, he may grant that you may be strengthened in your inner being with power through his Spirit, 17 and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love. 18 I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, 19 and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

Ralph P. Martin, Ephesians, Colossians, and Philemon, Interpretation (Louisville: John Knox, 1991), 610.

Nguyen 3 Greek New Testament (UBS v4) 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 , 19 , .

The passage has a strong organization based on a clear introduction and a parallel construction that includes a strengthening of what is presented in each successive strophe. The elements of prayer become immediately present: purpose ( , which relies on the preceding material), posture ( ), and the addressee of the prayer ( ). The prayer does not, however, include any words of asking or beseeching, rather the action of bowing down on the knees is done in order that () the subsequent petitions be fulfilled. One further phrase is given to clarify the speakers relationship to the father: . This expression of his relationship to all people, that all are named for him, informs the rest of the prayer and gives it a domestic quality in keeping with the overall tone of the letter. 2 The substance of the prayer follows. We may group the prayer into three petitions, all introduced by the conjunction and one subordinate petition that uses the subjunctive mood but is not introduced with .3 The first is that he may give to you, according to the riches of his glory, with power to be strengthened through his spirit into the inner man (v16). Already the
2 3 Martin, Ephesians, Colossians, and Philemon, 13. Margaret Y. MacDonald, Colossians and Ephesians, Vol. 17, Sacra Pagina, ed. Daniel J. Harrington (Collegeville: The Liturgical Press, 2000), 27576.

Nguyen 4 message that divine gifts are not merited but flow from the glory of God and touch man to his core, giving him power and strength. The subordinated petition follows, echoing the first: [that] he may dwell (Christ), through faith, in your hearts, [you being] in love rooted and grounded (v17). As in the first petition, having spirit within may be equated with life and dwelling, but this petition exposes a note about the mans disposition: it is through his faith that Christ may dwell within him. The terms for being rooted () and grounded () both occur as perfect passive participles modifying the addressed plural you, suggesting that this establishment, perhaps the assent of faith in God, is a permanent state of being. By placing before them, there is a stress on the love in which they are rooted and grounded. The second petition maintains the theme of strength and power and incorporates a superlative knowledge of love. More than a gift of strengthening, this petition begs that you may be empowered to understand the following two complementary things. The first is to comprehend with all the holy ones what is the breadth and length and height and depth, which we understand as consistent with the completeness of knowledge: when we know something, we grasp all of what we know. The second is to know the love of Christ, surpassing knowledge, which we would certainly require strengthening to be able to know. The emphasis in this phrase is on the love of Christ, as it is placed at the end with only the definite article () holding its place as the direct object of knowledge. The author wanted the reader to understand that what is to be known actually surpasses knowledge, and only once that quality is acknowledged, is the object of knowledge given. The final petition summarizes what was presented before, giving a still grander picture of what is at hand: that you may be filled into all the fullness of God. The bottom line, then, in this prayer, is not that we should strive to contain God, for this is impossible. Rather, the author

Nguyen 5 prays that those who read these words may be granted that God will dwell both with and within them, and that they might have a share in Gods life, that they might continually receive more of Himan overflowing fullness.4 Having seen the prayer in its entirety, earlier elements are more clearly informative of later ones. As the perfect passive participles for in love rooted and grounded reflect, the audience is deemed to be both rooted and in the process of being continually rooted in love and likewise grounded in love. These terms cover the spatial reference in the following verse: the roots cover the depth (), and being grounded (as a cornerstone or foundation) 5 covers the lateral extension ( ) and, that foundation having been laid, the rising up into the structure that the roots and foundation support (). 6 When this notion of complete extension meets the final verse of the prayer, the hope to be filled, and that the readers would be filled with the fullness of the love of God takes on a richer significance. Foster argues further that this filling traces its roots to the LORDs occupation of the Mosaic tabernacle and the Solomonic temple. If this is the case, the Old Testament roots would inform the present text with the notion of Gods presence displacing any idols or profane things in the hearts of the people, as well as His pleasure with them for their fidelity. 7 There seems to be support for this argument in that this very letter has already included architectural language as a metaphor for the growth and development of the church (cf. 2:1922), formerly the physical temple,8 and the Pauline corpus also uses similar language similarly (cf. 1 Cor 3:1112).9 The

4 5 6 7 8 9

Robert L. Foster, A temple in the Lord filled to the fullness of God: context and intertextuality (Eph 3:19), Novum Testamentum 49, no. 1: 8889. Rudolf Bultmann and Dieter Lhrmann, themlios in Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, abridged, ed. Gerhard Kittel and Gerhard Friedrich, trans. Geoffrey W. Bromiley (Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1985), 322. Martin, Ephesians, Colossians, and Philemon, 4445. Foster, A temple in the Lord filled to the fullness of God, 8991. MacDonald, Colossians and Ephesians, 276. Rudolf Bultmann and Dieter Lhrmann, themlios in Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, 322.

Nguyen 6 roots that Foster identifies are associated with the tabernacle or temple at the completion of their construction, the foundation having been laid and the structure having risen upon it. 10 And so this tightly-knit deeper meaning shows forth, and the language of spatial extension (cf. 3:18) once again reinforces this understanding of a building project now consecrated to and by God himself. The letter to the Ephesians, in its encouragement of the young church, yields as effective a message to the church ever-young, as seen from eternity. We face now, as before, sources of division from within, deserving the call to unity. We face persecutions now as before, worthy of the encouragement to stand firm. And we face a plenitude of distractions, whose remedy is that return to our roots, our foundation. The prayer to bend the knees before the father and plead that He show us Himself, dwell in our hearts through faith, strengthen us to know the love of Christ, and fill us with His fullness is, in our own day, so very welcome, indeed. When Christ returns to the earth, we hope that these prayers are answered, and that we are found faithful, rooted and grounded in all the fullness of God.

10 Foster, A temple in the Lord filled to the fullness of God, 8991.

Nguyen 7 Bibliography Achtemeier, Paul J., ed. Harpers Bible Dictionary. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1985. Bultmann, Rudolf and Lhrmann, Dieter. Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, abridged. Edited by Gerhard Kittel and Gerhard Friedrich. Translated by Geoffrey W. Bromiley. Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1985. Foster, Robert L. 2007. A temple in the Lord filled to the fullness of God: context and intertextuality (Eph 3:19). Novum Testamentum 49, no. 1: 85-96. ATLA Religion Database with ATLASerials, EBSCOhost (accessed November 30, 2012). MacDonald, Margaret Y. Colossians and Ephesians, Vol. 17, Sacra Pagina. Edited by Daniel J. Harrington. Collegeville: The Liturgical Press, 2000. Martin, Ralph P. Ephesians, Colossians, and Philemon. Interpretation. Louisville: Knox, 1991.