aust all that Christ is to us, viz. the work that He
wrought for us upon Calvary; or to take a step further, the work that He
is now carrying on for us as our Intercessor and Advocate in the
heavens. You who listen to me Sunday after Sunday will not suspect me of
seeking to minimise either of these two aspects of our Lord's mission
and operation, but I do believe that very largely the glad thought of an
indwelling Christ, who actually abides and works in our hearts, and is
not only for us in the heavens, or with us by some kind of impalpable
and metaphorical presence, but in simple, that is to say, in spiritual
reality is in our spirits, has faded away from the consciousness of the
Christian Church.

And so we are called 'mystics' when we preach Christ in the heart. Ah,
brother! unless your Christianity be in the good deep sense of the word
'mystical,' it is mechanical, which is worse. I preach, and rejoice that
I have to preach, a 'Christ that died, yea! rather that is risen again;
who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for
us.' Nor do I stop there, but I preach a Christ that is in us, dwelling
in our hearts if we be His at all.

Well, then, further observe that the special emphasis of the prayer here
is that this 'indwelling' may be an unbroken and permanent one. Any of
you who can consult the original for yourselves will see that the
Apostle here uses a compound word which conveys the idea of intensity
and continuity. What he desires, then, is not merely that these Ephesian
Christians may have occasional visits of the indwelling Lord, or that at
some lofty moments of spiritual enthusiasm they may be conscious that He
is with them, but that always, in an unbroken line of deep, calm
receptiveness, they may possess, and know that they possess, an
indwelling Saviour.

And this, I think, is one of the reasons why we may and must distinguish
between the apparently very similar petition in the previous verse,
about which we spoke in the last sermon, and the petition which is now
occupying us; for, as I shall have to show you, it is only as
'strengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner man' that we are
capable of the continuous abiding of that Lord within us.

Oh! what a contrast to that idea of a perpetual unbroken inhabitation of
Jesus in our spirits and to our consciousness is presented by our
ordinary life! 'Why shouldst Thou be as a wayfaring man that turneth
aside to tarry for a ni