The Epistle to the Ephesians contains several passages about filling and fullness. It speaks of believers being filled with the fullness of Christ, the fullness of God, and filled with the Holy Spirit. The amazing trinitarian nature of this fullness is what struck me in my most recent reading of this letter. The foundation of our fullness is of course Jesus Christ and his fullness. The fullness which we are said to obtain is for a purpose and there is something required of believers for this fullness to be experienced.
The nature of God’s plan for the world is that in the fullness of time he would unite all things under Christ as head (1:10). This makes sense given that the world was made for Jesus and through him (Col 1:16). But this is also explained in other ways. Every part of God’s plan is found to be in Christ. Look at 1:3-14: in Christ we are blessed, in Christ we are chosen, in Christ we are predestined to adoption, in Christ we receive grace, in Christ there is redemption, the purpose and will of God is in Christ, in Christ we are chosen in conformity with the will of God, in Christ we are for the praise of God’s glory, in Christ we are given the seal of the Spirit.
This plan of God is in some sense already fulfilled. Jesus Christ already “fills all in all” (1:23). And “He [Jesus] who descended [to the earth in his incarnation] is the one who also ascended far above all the heavens, that he might fill all things” (4:10). Since Christ fills all things, he is able to give gifts to the church (4:7, 11-12), which is his body. He fills the universe, but he is most glorified by first filling the church. The universe is passive in being filled by Jesus Christ. But the church is made up of those who deliberately seek to have Christ fill them. The church is also the instrument of God in regard to his plan to have Christ fill all things.
So what does God want the church to actively do in regard to the fullness of God which is found in Christ? First of all the church is called the body of Christ (1:22-23; 2:16; 3:6; 4:4, 12, 15-16, 25; 5:23, 30). This is incredible in itself, since it is another way of saying that the church is the bride of Christ (5:28, 31-32). But being the body or bride of Christ entails being the fullness of Christ. “And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all” (1:22-23). There is something complementary about the body of Christ that makes it the fullness of Christ. Jesus cannot be without his body. His body, the church, is that people for whom he died and was raised again from the dead. The church is filled by Christ and Christ is completed by his church.
Since the church is actively being filled by the fullness which is in Christ, how does that play out? What are we to actively do? The goal is that the church might be filled with all the fullness of God (3:19). This is the first aspect of fullness, the fullness of God the Father. How is this accomplished? The mystery of God’s grace has been revealed in the coming of Christ. It has been made known to God’s apostles and prophets (3:2-5), and because of that it is recorded in the apostolic testimony to Christ in the New Testament. But this revelation is in itself insufficient for the church to be filled with the fullness of God. Paul understood that more is required so he wrote, “For this reason I kneel before the Father” (3:14). He prayed for the church so “that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith–that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God” (3:16-19).
There are active things to do here. The fact that Paul prays for these things implies that they cannot be accomplished without the active work of the Holy Spirit in the believer. But there are also actions of the believer here. Love, faith and knowledge are not nouns as such, but verbs. They are actions. We must actively exercise love, actively have faith in Jesus Christ and actively seek to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge. These actions are enabled by the Spirit, but not done without our active participation. Since there are actions here, we must suppose that being filled with all the fullness of God requires our active participation.
The fullness of Christ is the second aspect of fullness. God’s goal for the church is that “we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ” (4:13). The preceding verses explain how this happens. Here the fullness hinges on unity in the knowledge of the Son of God. The Spirit gives unity to the body of Christ (4:3), a unity that must be maintained. The oneness of the body is a given because there is one Spirit, one hope, one faith, one baptism, one Lord and one God (4:4-5). But so that the church can grasp the immensity of these things, Jesus has given gifts to his church. These are not spiritual gifts (as in 1 Cor 12), but leaders – apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers. When these leaders do their work the body of Christ becomes mature and attains “to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ”.
Again, there is an objective work of God through the Spirit that makes the body united. But there is also an action required of the church in order to attain to the fullness of Christ. The leaders of the church must rightly exercise their roles as the gifts that they are. They must each do what they are called to do faithfully. The church must recognise the importance of these leadership roles. The church is to be equipped for service and thereby become mature. The service of God, then, is an active part of the maturity process. If the church is to be filled with the fullness of Christ, the church must actively participate in the service of Christ, in various ways in the world. The church is not an end to itself, but Christ’s body on the earth. We do not wait to be filled with the fullness of Christ for our own sake. We go out to minister on his behalf and in doing so are filled with his fullness.
The final mention of fullness in Ephesians is in 5:18. “And do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit.” This is a command, not a passive receiving of something. It falls within the context of an exhortation to be wise not foolish and to know what the Lord’s will is (5:15-17). It is followed by an exhortation to use the mouth rightly: speak and sing the word of God in the community of faith and praise and thank God in the name of Jesus (5:19-20). The fullness of the Spirit is not a feeling but something concrete that is associated with actions and speech. It is needed because believers are not isolated individuals but the body of Christ. We must live together and speak with one another. Our lives must be godly and encouraging for others. What follows is a long section about how to “submit to one another out of reverence to Christ” (5:21; 5:22-6:9). This is something that cannot be done without the fullness of the Spirit.
So God’s desire is that the church would be filled with the fullness of Christ, the fullness of God and the fullness of the Holy Spirit. We cannot receive these blessings passively, but must actively work to experience this fullness. It all begins with submission to Jesus, since the fullness of God is found in him. In addition, prayer, faith, love, knowledge, an active desire to do the will of God, and a realisation that we must live together as the body of Christ are required if the church is to experience the fullness which God offers.