Ephesians 3:19b says, “That you may be filled unto all the fullness of God.” When Christ makes His home in our hearts so that we, being rooted and grounded in love, are able to apprehend with all the saints the dimensions of Christ and to know by experience His knowledge-surpassing love, we will be filled unto all the fullness of God, which is the church, the corporate expression of God for the fulfillment of His heart’s desire.
The fullness of God implies that the riches of all that God is have become His expression. When the riches of God are in God Himself, they are His riches. But when the riches are expressed, they become His fullness (John 1:16). All the fullness of God dwells in Christ (Col. 1:19; 2:9). Through His indwelling, Christ continually imparts the fullness of God into our being that we may be filled even unto all the fullness of God to be the practical manifestation of the church, in which God may be glorified in His expression.
In the New Testament the fullness is the expression through the completeness of the riches. The riches of Christ are all that Christ is and has and all that He has accomplished, attained, and obtained. The fullness of Christ is the result and issue of our enjoyment of these riches. When we enjoy the riches of Christ, these riches, having been assimilated into our being metabolically, constitute us to be the fullness of Christ, the Body of Christ, the church, as His expression. First, in Ephesians 1:23 this expression is the fullness of Christ, and then in 3:19 it is the fullness of God, for the fullness of Christ, the embodiment of God, is the very fullness of the Triune God. Hence, to be filled unto the fullness of God is the issue of the believers’ deeper, higher, and richer experience of Christ.
The last aspect of our enjoyment and experience of Christ living in us in the grace of the Triune God is that we may be built up in Him. Colossians 2:7 says that we have been rooted and are being built up in Him. This shows that, like plants, we the believers are living organisms. As such, we have been rooted in Christ, our soil, our earth, that we may absorb all His riches as nourishment. These riches become the element and substance with which we grow and are built up. To be rooted is for the growth in life. This rooting has been completed already. To be built up is for the building of the Body of Christ. This is still going on. Both these matters are in Christ.
This verse puts rooting and building together, indicating that rooting is for growth, and growth is the genuine building. Growth is not only for building, but is actually the building itself. Since we have been rooted in Christ, we need to remain in our spirit to absorb the nourishment of the riches of Christ that we may grow. By this growth we are transformed into precious stones (1 Cor. 3:12) for the building of the church, the Body of Christ.
When we experience and enjoy Christ living in us in the grace of the Triune God, He enables us to do all things in Him who empowers us. He empowers us from within that we may be content in whatever circumstances we are and that we may live out all kinds of virtues to express His human virtues. He also causes us to have Him making His home in our hearts. We need to be strengthened into our inner man that He may spread in us, from our spirit to our mind, emotion, will, and conscience, so that He may fill and occupy our every inward part and thus settle down, make home, in our heart. He also causes us to be rooted and grounded in love. This indicates that we believers experience Christ for life and building. When Christ saturates all our inward parts with Himself through the divine dispensing, we are being rooted and grounded in His love; that is, we are growing in His life and are being built up. He also enables us to apprehend with all the saints His breadth, length, height, and depth that, step by step, our experience of Him may be a solid “cube.” He enables us also to know His knowledge-surpassing love. The love of Christ is knowledge-surpassing; it is beyond the understanding of our mind. However, we can know the love of Christ in our spirit through our experience and enjoyment of Him. He enables us also to be filled unto all the fullness of God. Through His indwelling, Christ continually imparts into us the fullness of God, which dwells in Him, that we may be filled unto all the fullness of God, which is the church, the corporate expression of God. Finally, He enables us to be built up in Him. We have been rooted in Christ as the good land, and we are absorbing all His riches as our nourishment. By this we can grow and be transformed into precious stones for the building of the church, the Body of Christ.