To Plumb the Unfathomable A Three-minute Bible Study Print, Study and Apply Title: To Plumb the Unfathomable Keywords: "love of Christ” Welcome to eXXit, the web site designed to help you stand strong in the face of sexual temptation. The following passage includes one of the Apostle Paul's great prayers for believers. In it, he requests certain things from God for our benefit. We'll take a few days to explore this prayer and see how it might help us stand strong in the face of sexual temptation. Passage: Ephesians 3:14-19* 14. For this reason, I bow my knees before the Father, 15. from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name, 16. that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man; 17. so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, 18. may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, 19. and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fulness of God. Question Why do you think Paul used the fourfold terms of measurement he did in verse 18 to describe Christ's love for us? What do those terms, taken together, mean to you?   Practical help Think of the broadest expanse you can imagine. Stretch a long line from sea to shining sea and take in all of the United States, or consider the length and breadth of human emotion from fear to anger to joy to anxiety to depression. Jesus' love expands beyond the borders of that length and breadth. Think of the deepest part of the deepest ocean (the Arianas Trench in the Pacific — some 35,000 feet below sea level) and the highest peak on the planet (Everest, at 29,000-plus), and then consider the highs and the lows of human experience: • Job promotions and demotions, • Weddings and divorces, • Births and funerals, • Victory and defeat, • Family bliss and family dysfunctionality. Jesus' love soars with us to our highest highs and never leaves us at our lowest lows. You and I are often thrust into situations where we are tempted to lose hope. We don't, though, because we have a lifejacket strong enough to keep us from sinking. That lifejacket? "Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so." Remembering what He did for you — His sacrifice on the cross, His resurrection from the dead — is beyond comprehension. The more we discover of His love, the more we discover that there are yet more facets to consider, the more we learn about Jesus' love, the more we are amazed by it. Yet our assignment from Scripture is to learn more and more and more about that great love! Knowing we will never plumb its depths, we are told to keep digging. Knowing that we will never fully comprehend it, we are to keep pursuing it. The love of Jesus is purer than a mother's love at its purest, stronger than a father's love at its strongest, more passionate than married love at its most passionate, deeper than any human expression of love we could think of at its best. Knowing that when we are captured by the incomprehensible love of Christ, our friendships and marriages and Internet habits will be informed by that love, Paul prays that you and I will enter more and more fully into a comprehension of that love. The cart of moral purity follows the horse of Jesus' love. Explore and allow yourself to be taken by the glory of Jesus' love, and watch the stranglehold of Internet porn lose its grip. And if you are skeptical that you will ever be controlled by the awesome love of Christ, the good news is, it's ultimately not up to you! God is able! Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us, to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen. — Ephesians 3:20-21* eXXit homepage Index of three-minute studies Copyright 2003 by eXXit *Scripture taken from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE®, © Copyright The Lockman Foundation 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995. Used by permission. ----