There are two statements about the greatness of God’s power in the book of Ephesians. In those two statements, Paul comes from two different angles. In chapter 3 and verse 20, he talks about what this power can do through us. under the pay attention to me okay what this power can do through us. In chapter 1, verses 19 to 22, his focus is on what this power can do for us.
From Acts 19, we know that the members of the church in Ephesus had witnessed what the exceeding power of God could do through an anointed person. They witnessed it in the ministry of Apostle Paul. When he wrote the letter to them, Paul wanted them to understand that they could experience the same exceeding power of God since they were filled with the same Holy Spirit.
In chapter one, when he talks about the exceeding power of God, it comes at the end of Paul’s prayer we see from verses 17 to 21. Paul is expressing his desire that the Ephesian believers would realize what this exceeding power could do for them.
To make sure they grasp what he is trying to say, Paul uses a period in the life of our Lord Jesus Christ in chapter one, verses 20 and 21. This is after the death of Jesus. Paul breaks it down to four stages.
1. It raised him from the dead. (1:20)
Paul writes about the role of Holy Spirit in the resurrection of Jesus in Romans 8: 11 also. But in Ephesians, Paul draws a contrast between the short time before this power began to move in Jesus vs what happened after that. Immediately after Jesus gave up his ghost (Mathew 27:50), his body became limp like any other dead body. He did not feel it when a soldier pierced his side with a spear (John 19:34). When Joseph of Arimathea came to bring his body down from the cross, Jesus did not know. Neither did he know when they wrapped his body in sheets and placed it in the sepulcher.
That situation lasted only until early Sunday morning, when the exceeding power of the Holy Spirit flowed mightily into his mortal body and made it alive again. His heart began to beat again. His blood began to flow again. His brain started working again. All the nervous system connected again. Jesus came back to life.
During that short period he was dead, everyone changed their opinion about Jesus. They concluded that he will never come back again. This is clear from the statement of the disciples traveling to Emmaus. “But we were hoping that it was He who was going to redeem Israel” (Luke 24:21). They were already talking about Jesus in the past tense!
We may go through similar seasons in our lives. People will write us off and conclude that this is the end. But they do not know the power that we have access to. To borrow from Paul, we have a power that is not our own (2 Cor. 4:7). Once that power takes over, the dead situations in your life will become alive again. Just like Jesus defeated death and resurrected with a greater glory, your latter days will be greater that the former.
2. It elevated Jesus to the right-hand side of God (1:20)
The second point Paul makes here is that then the same power elevated him to the right-hand side of the Father. There are two aspects to this elevation. Immediately after Jesus died, his spirit also went to Hades, over which Satan had authority at that time. Satan had authority over death and Hades at that time. Satan thought he won the battle when the spirit of Jesus reached Hades. He did not know that it was a set up. Jesus was there with a multifaceted mission. Part of the mission was to destroy the power of death by defeating the devil and taking away the key of hades from him (Hebrews 2:14,15). Jesus declared in Revelation 1, “I am He who lives, and was dead, and behold, I am alive forevermore. And I have the keys of Hades and of Death” (Rev. 1:18).
The second part of Jesus’ mission in Hades was to share the good news of his death to the Old Testament saints who were waiting for him to complete their salvation. (Eph. 4:8,9).
Jesus ascended to ‘far above all the heavens’ from the Hades with the spirits of the Old Testament saints. When he was raised up, it was with the power over death and Hades.
The second part of the elevation happened when Jesus ascended to heaven with his resurrection body from the Mount of Olives and was seated on the right-hand side of Father God ‘far above all principality and power and might and dominion, and every name that is named.’
The simple truth is that, just like in the life of Jesus, elevation follows where this power flows. It is the story of us Pentecostals. There are 800 million Pentecostals and Charismatics in the world today. I read somewhere that 85% of them were dirt poor when they embraced Pentecostalism. Because God is a faithful God, and He has promised that He will honor anyone who honors Him (1 Samuel 2:30), Pentecostal communities across the globe has seen financial prosperity. He raises the poor from the dust and lifts the beggar from the ash heap, to set them among princes (1 Sam. 2:8).
3. It gave Jesus dominion (1:21)
When Paul spoke about the elevation that followed resurrection, he spoke about the special dimension of it in Ephesians 4 and the spiritual dimension of it in Ephesians 1. When he says Jesus was elevated ‘far above all principality and power and might and dominion, and every name that is named’ it is talking about the dominion Jesus has over these spiritual realms.
‘Principalities and powers’ are a favorite expression of Paul when he talks about demonic powers. He uses the expression five times in his letters (Eph. 3:10, 6:12, Col. 1:16, 2:15, Titus 3:1). It refers to earthly power only in Titus. There is no doubt that Paul was using a language familiar to his contemporaries. Principality is the English word for the Latin word Principate. The Principate was the form of imperial government of the Roman Empire from the beginning of the reign of Augustus in 27 BC to the end of the Crisis of the Third Century in AD 284, after which it evolved into the Dominate. Spiritually, it represents the kingdom of Satan. When Paul says Jesus was given dominion over principalities, it is an expression that the authority of resurrected Jesus has authority of the entire kingdom of Satan. That is why Jesus declared, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth” (Mat. 28:18).
The “powers” referred to here are those with miraculous powers, whether false teachers and prophets or the very demonic entities that empower them. They may manifest their power, but only until the power of the Holy Spirit manifests. We see this in the ministry of Apostle Peter (Acts 8) and Apostle Paul (Acts 16).
Might is another word for the spiritual realm where the power of Satan manifests. Dominion is the privilege to exercise power. It represents a territory or sphere of influence or control. Under the British rule, it was a self-governing nation under the nominal rule of the British monarch. Spiritually, it shows Jesus can exercise his authority over any realm of demonic powers since his authority supersedes their authority.
The church has access to whatever authority Jesus possess today. That is why he told his disciples, “In My name they will cast out demons…. they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover” (Mark 16:18,19).
4. It extends to the world to come (1:21)
Paul tells us that when Jesus was raised up and seated on the right-hand side of the Father and was given dominion over all the realm of spiritual darkness, it was not for a limited time. That authority would remain for the rest of this human epoch and will continue into the next one to come. We know that Jesus is coming back in that authority as King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Now his authority and dominion are in the spiritual realm. It will extend to the physical realm when he returns to rule the earth. You may remember that during the temptations in the desert, Satan offered him ‘all the kingdoms of the earth.’ When Jesus returns, the angel will cry out, “The kingdoms of this world have become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ, and He shall reign forever and ever!” (Rev. 11:15).
We as children of God can also rest assured that the blessings of God in our lives are not temporary. It will stay with our generations. There is a continuity in God’s blessings. Our God is a God of generations. He never chose a family in history for just one generation. His promises are for generations. “As for Me,” says the Lord, “this is My covenant with them: My Spirit who is upon you, and My words which I have put in your mouth, shall not depart from your mouth, nor from the mouth of your descendants, nor from the mouth of your descendants’ descendants,” says the Lord, “from this time and forevermore.” (Isaiah 59:21).
Let this exceeding power of God begin to flow through us. Let it change everything in our lives. Let it renew things in our lives. Let us live a life of promise.
