eph 3:19 what is the fullness that god gives?any cross references?

Question

eph 3:19 to know the love of the Christ which surpasses knowledge, that YOU may be filled with all the fullness that God gives.

all my cross references just say fullness

one reference took me to romans 11:33
33 O the depth of God’s riches and wisdom and knowledge! How unsearchable his judgments [are] and past tracing out his ways [are]

Answer 1

We find in the Lord’s Word, at 1 John 4:11, these words: “Beloved ones, if this is how God loved us, then we are ourselves under obligation to love one another.” When a person becomes a Christian he has to develop deep roots. He must try to attain the fullness that God requires. Paul, in writing to the Ephesians, states it in this way: “With deep roots and firm foundations, may you be strong to grasp, with all God’s people, what is the breadth and length and height and depth of the love of Christ, and to know it, though it is beyond knowledge. So may you attain to fullness of being, the fullness of God himself.” (Eph. 3:18, 19, NE) The encouragement in God’s Word is for Christians to put forth an earnest effort to grasp the love shown through Christ and, in imitating him, to try to be like God. Christians must strive to do this.

Answer 2

The first part, "a" is an oxymoron - one cannot know that which surpasses knowledge. Phi. 4:7.
BUT, the saints 1 Cor. 13:12 are still moving toward that knowledge.
Which is what the second part "B" is about. It is a teleological or end time goal toward which we are moving.

I am thinking of starting a Bible study on line - 4 to 7 chapters a day cf. 1-6 Gen. Prov. 1 and Mt.1 it would be a background type study and not a verse by verse explication. What do you think?

Answer 3

wow, what a question! I just came back from a Christian conference in which one whole session was talking about the fullness referred to in that verse. This fullness is something really wonderful - it is in fact Christ Himself.

In the New Testament, the fullness is the expression through the completeness of the riches. This is the reason that in v8 Paul speaks of the unsearchable riches of Christ and that in 1:23 and then in 4:13 he speaks of the fullness of Christ.

Eph 1:23: "Which is His Body, the fullness of the One who fills all in all"
Eph 4:13 "Until we all arrive at the oneness of the faith and of the full knowledge of the Son of God, at a full-grown man, at the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ".

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 the riches of Christ are assimilated into our being metabolically, they constitute us to be the fullness of Christ, the Body of Christ, the church, as His expression. First in 1:23 this expression is the fullness of Christ, and then in this verse it is the fullness of God, for the fullness of Christ, the embodiment of God, is the very fullness of the Triune God.

Here are some more cross references:
Col 1:19 "For in Him all the fullness was pleased to dwell" - this is referring to that the fullness of God was pleased to dwell in Jesus's body
Col 2:9 "For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily"
John 1:16 "For of His fullness we have all received, and grace upon grace"

Answer 4

I would think the fullness of love and spiritual gifts as in 1 Corinthians 12 and 13

Blessings,
David T

Answer 5

The love of Christ is so great that it is beyond our understanding. The fullness of God is the abundance of gifts that flows from God.