Paul speaks of "the inner man" being strengthened, and Christ forbids all outward titles of authority — Rabbi, Father, Master. Read psychologically, these two passages converge on a single radical proposition: that the locus of genuine authority is not any external person, institution, or teaching, but a living presence that must be born inside the structure of one's own being. These reflections explore that proposition not as theology but as a map of inner transformation, relevant to anyone who has felt that the mechanical personality cannot be the whole story of what a human being is.
First reading
Ephesians 3:14-19
For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man;
That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, May be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height;
And to know the love of Christ, which passes knowledge, that you might be filled with all the fulness of God.
Gospel
Matthew 23:8-12
But be not you called Rabbi: for one is your Master, even Christ; and all you are brethren.
And call no man your father upon the earth: for one is your Father, which is in heaven.
Neither be you called masters: for one is your Master, even Christ.
But he that is greatest among you shall be your servant.
And whosoever shall exalt himself shall be abased; and he that shall humble himself shall be exalted.
— Interpretation —
Let us begin with a phrase that is easy to pass over. Paul prays that believers may be “strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man.” Notice that he does not say “in the man.” He says “in the inner man.” This is a distinction of the most extraordinary importance, and unless we pause over it, the whole passage collapses into devotional sentiment — beautiful, perhaps, but without operative meaning for us.
What is this inner man? It is not the man we already know ourselves to be. It is not the personality that bears our name, that has opinions and preferences and habits of reaction. Paul distinguishes, throughout his letters, between what he calls the natural man and the spiritual man, between the outer and the inner, between the first Adam and the second. And here, in this prayer, he reveals something essential about the inner man: it can be strengthened. It can grow. It is, therefore, not yet fully formed. It is something nascent, something that requires nourishment, something that can be starved or fed.
Now this connects directly with the Gospel reading, though the connection is not obvious at first glance. Christ says: “Be not called Rabbi… call no man your father upon the earth… neither be called masters.” We must ask what this means psychologically. Taken literally, it seems merely a prohibition against titles. But Christ is not legislating about social etiquette. He is speaking about something far more interior.
Consider what it means to call someone Rabbi, or Father, or Master. It means to place the source of truth, the source of authority, the source of one’s understanding, outside oneself — in another person, in an institution, in a tradition. And the entire thrust of Christ’s teaching, when understood in its inner dimension, is that this will not do. Not because teachers are unnecessary — Christ himself teaches — but because the aim of all genuine teaching is to awaken something within the listener that can eventually receive truth directly. The teacher points inward. The moment the student fixates on the teacher as the permanent source, the inner development stops. The inner man is not strengthened. It remains infantile, dependent, mechanical.
This is why Christ says, with such quiet force, “One is your Master, even Christ.” Now we must be very careful here. If we read this as meaning that the historical person of Jesus is the one external authority to replace all others, we have merely substituted one outer Rabbi for many. We have changed the name on the door but left the room unchanged. The Christ of whom he speaks — the one Master — is precisely the principle that Paul describes as dwelling “in your hearts by faith.” It is the inner presence. It is the seed of higher being that can grow in a person when the conditions are right.
And what are those conditions? Paul gives them plainly: being “rooted and grounded in love.” Not in argument, not in correctness of doctrine, not in the accumulation of spiritual knowledge, but in love. And this love is itself described in a remarkable way — it has “breadth, and length, and depth, and height.” It is dimensional. It is spatial. Paul is reaching for a way to express that this love is not a sentiment but a kind of space that opens inside a person — a new capacity for experience, a new dimension of awareness that the mechanical mind, however clever, cannot enter.
He then says something that borders on paradox: “to know the love of Christ, which passes knowledge.” To know what passes knowledge. This is not careless writing. Paul is pointing to a form of knowing that is not intellectual. It is the knowing that belongs to the inner man, not to the outer. The outer man knows through categories, through comparison, through memory. The inner man knows through direct reception, through what we might call conscious feeling — a feeling that is simultaneously understanding.
And then the Gospel’s final inversion: “Whosoever shall exalt himself shall be abased; and he that shall humble himself shall be exalted.” This is the law of inner growth stated as simply as it can be stated. The outer personality, the first nature, which loves to be called Rabbi, which loves to be the authority, which loves to be seen — this must become quiet. It must become the servant. Not destroyed, but placed in its right relation. It must serve the inner man, not rule in his place.
The greatest among you shall be your servant. This is not moral instruction. It is a description of the architecture of a transformed human being — one in whom the outer life has learned to serve the inner, and the inner has at last found room to grow, to breathe, to receive what “passes knowledge,” to be filled, as Paul dares to say, “with all the fulness of God.”
That fulness is not added from outside. It is uncovered within. And it has been waiting there, patient and quiet, all along.
Photo by Ben Griffiths on Unsplash
Scripture: King James Version
