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INNER CIRCLE: All Filled with the Fullness?

INNER CIRCLE: All Filled with the Fullness?

Last updated on: August 21, 2026 at 6:47 am by Keith Giles

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INNER CIRCLE: All Filled with the Fullness? 2026-08-14T18:53:47+00:00 Keith Giles

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Ephesians 1:17-23

“So that the God of our Lord Jesus, the Anointed…might give you a spirit of wisdom, and of revelation by a full knowledge of him (the Christ)…so that you should know…what the extravagant glory of his power toward us who have placed our trust in (Christ)…(by) raising him from the dead and seating him at his right hand in the heavenly places…and has given him headship over all things in the assembly (ecclesia), which is his body, the fullness of the One who fills everything in every way.”

The Apostle Paul begins his letter to the Ephesians with a very long and expository introduction about the relationship between Christ (the Anointed One) and the Church (ecclesia).

The most astounding thing he has to say here is nearly buried in the superlatives that he continually adds to every other phrase, and so I have attempted to mark out the most important sections in order to help us follow his train of thought.

What we might miss is the idea that God has revealed the Christ and filled us with the Christ, so that we are now “the fullness of the One who fills everything in every way,” or “the plentitude of the One filling all in all” as New Testament scholar David Bentley Hart phrases it.

Try to take that in. God revealed the Christ in the person of Jesus so that, now, you and I can be filled with the fullness of Christ who fills everything, everywhere.

This is why the idea of limiting the Oneness of Christ and humanity (as we discussed in the previous chapter) borders on the absurd. How can anyone possibly explain how the Oneness of Christ could be limited to a select group of people if Christ is said to “fill everything in every way”? Or, how can we be called “his body” if we are also called “the plentitude of the One filling all in all”?

Understand, Paul is not saying that Christ is the One who fills everything in every way. He is saying something much more astounding. He is saying that the body of Christ (that’s all humanity) is “filled with the fullness of Christ who fills everything in every way.”

We are filled with the fullness. That fullness fills everything. Not just a few things: everything. And this fullness doesn’t fill everything in a certain way, or in a limited way, but “in every way.”

So, Christ cannot fill everything in every way if only a few people are filled with the fullness of Christ. That doesn’t make any sense. Either Christ is not the One who fills everything in every way, or the One who fills everything in every way fills everyone, everywhere. You can’t have it both ways.

If Christ only fills a select group of people, then Christ cannot be said to “fill everything in every way,” or to be “the plentitude…filling all in all.” Christ cannot also be said to be “the One in whom we all live, and move, and have our being,” if some (or a majority) of us are not included in that group. And, in fact, it is more than significant that the Apostle Paul intentionally told idol-worshipping Pagans in Athens that they had their being in this same Christ whose name they did not know.

So, there can be no doubt. Paul believed and taught that everyone, everywhere was in Christ, and that Christ filled everyone, and everything. What can be said of Christ can be said of all of us, because Christ is all and is in all.

My new book, The Quantum Gospel of Philip and the Valentinian Christ is now available on Amazon in Print and Kindle. Audiobook coming soon.

Keith Giles is the best-selling author of the Jesus Un series. He has appeared on CNN, USA Today, Coast To Coast with George Noory, BuzzFeed, and John Fugelsang’s “Tell Me Everything.” He co-hosts the Heretic Happy Hour Podcast.

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