Four Dimensions of Love

August 31st, 2026
by Gary Cheaney

A Love Too Big for Any Single Dimension

SCRIPTURE:
Ephesians 3:17-19 CSB - …I pray that you, being rooted and firmly established in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the length and width, height and depth of God's love, and to know Christ's love that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

OBSERVATION:
In his second prayer for the Ephesians, Paul prays that they would be rooted and grounded—firmly established—in love.

Two expressions are used: ‘rooted,’ like a living tree which lays hold upon the soil, twists itself round the rocks, and cannot be upturned; ‘grounded,’ like a building which has been settled, as a whole, and will never show any cracks or flaws in the future through failures in the foundation. – Charles Spurgeon

Our foundation and roots as believers are love. We should be rooted in God’s love so that we might comprehend it and build a solid foundation upon it—enabling us to love others. If we have a wrong understanding of love, our roots will not go deep, and our foundation will be unstable.

Length, Width, Height, Depth: Paul gives us the four dimensions of God’s love to further illustrate how important love is. He helps us understand that there are many facets of God’s love that we should not only live in but also demonstrate to others.

In this measurement, may you and I be skilled. If we know nothing of mathematics, may we be well-tutored scholars in this spiritual geometry, and be able to comprehend the breadths and lengths of Jesus' precious love. – Charles Spurgeon

In the last century, when Napoleon’s armies opened a prison that had been used by the Spanish Inquisition, they found the remains of a prisoner who had been incarcerated for his faith. The dungeon was underground. The body had long since decayed. Only a chain fastened around an anklebone cried out his confinement.

But this prisoner, long since dead, had left a witness. On the wall of his small, dismal cell, this faithful soldier of Christ had scratched a rough cross with four words surrounding it in Spanish. Above the cross was the Spanish word for height. Below it, the word depth. To the left, the word width. To the right, the word length.
Clearly, this prisoner wanted to testify to the surpassing greatness of the love of Christ, perceived even in his suffering. – James Montgomery Boice

APPLICATION:
As we consider the four dimensions of love, may we be drawn to the cross.

As we ponder the length of God’s love for us, let us love others in the same way.
As we ponder the width of God’s love, let our love be wide enough for all to see.
As we ponder the height of God’s love, may we understand that His love reaches the heavens and goes far beyond our sin—and may we love in the same way.
And as we ponder the depth of God’s love, may we, like David, be reminded of the miry clay and the pit from which we were rescued, and reach a hand out to those who are in the place we once were.

PRAYER:
Jesus, thank You for the cross and for all four dimensions of Your love that You have shown me. May I live in a way that shows I have—and still am—comprehending, with all the saints, the Length, Width, Height, and Depth of Your love.

God's love isn't just deep enough to rescue you — it's long, wide, high, and deep enough to root you, establish you, and flow through you to everyone around you.

Posted in 10 - Ephesians