To have power
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G1840 means to have enough strength or ability for a stated action. Its one governed New Testament occurrence is Ephesians 3:18, where Paul prays that believers may have strength to comprehend, together with all the saints, the breadth, length, height, and depth named in the prayer.
Reader summary
Full entry for ἐξισχύω (G1840) · Open the biblical lexicon
G1840 means to have enough strength or ability for a stated action. Its one governed New Testament occurrence is Ephesians 3:18, where Paul prays that believers may have strength to comprehend, together with all the saints, the breadth, length, height, and depth named in the prayer.
The BSB source-word alignment has 1 aligned row for this entry. Common renderings include will have power (1).
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Ephesians 3:18. Its strongest book concentrations include Ephesians (1).
G1840 means to have enough strength or ability for a stated action. Its one governed New Testament occurrence is Ephesians 3:18, where Paul prays that believers may have strength to comprehend, together with all the saints, the breadth, length, height, and depth named in the prayer. The verb identifies the capacity Paul requests; it does not by itself explain the source of that capacity or define the dimensions.
The surrounding petition supplies those claims: Paul asks the Father to strengthen them through the Spirit in the inner being, speaks of Christ dwelling in their hearts through faith, and describes them as rooted and grounded in love. Teachers should therefore keep the lexical claim modest and let Ephesians 3:14-21 provide the theological frame.
Ephesians 3:18 contains the only local G1840 occurrence. The verb belongs to a purpose or result clause inside Paul's prayer, not to a command for believers to manufacture spiritual power. Verse 16 asks God to grant strengthening through the Spirit, verse 17 speaks of Christ dwelling through faith and believers being rooted in love, and verse 18 then names the requested ability to comprehend with all the saints.
Verse 19 immediately acknowledges that Christ's love surpasses knowledge. The passage joins genuine growth in understanding with humility before inexhaustible love.
You may have power, together with all the saints, to comprehend the length and width and height and depth
This is the sole direct lexical occurrence. The ability is requested in prayer and directed toward communal comprehension, while the surrounding verses identify divine strengthening, faith, love, and fullness as the larger setting.
That He may grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in your inner being
This verse supplies the prayer's stated source of strengthening. It is immediate context, not another G1840 occurrence.
And to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge
The next verse prevents comprehension language from becoming a claim of exhaustive mastery. Paul prays for real knowledge of a love he also calls knowledge-surpassing.
BSB source-word alignment connects this entry to exact verse rows, English rendering, source form, transliteration, and parsing.
How English Renders ItA compact distribution from source-word alignment before the full evidence tables.
Greek word. to have power
to have strength enough, to be quite able: with inf., Eph.3:18.
Textus Receptus witness, full corpus Greek token appearances from Scrivener 1894 Textus Receptus in the full New Testament corpus.
1 Greek text appearance shown. Linked morphology labels have verse guides.
I have strength for, am perfectly able
Read verseFull New Testament corpus: 260 chapters, 7,957 verses, 140,628 tokens. Data source: honza/textus-receptus (data only), with authority check against byztxt/greektext-textus-receptus.
How mood, tense, and voice shift the force of this verb in context.
This verb appears through different tense, voice, mood, or stem patterns. Those forms help readers see how the action is presented in context.
Verse guides are not available for this word yet, so verse references remain plain evidence markers.
How this verb appears across 1 occurrences in the NT discourse index (MACULA Greek SBLGNT).
Aspect reflects grammatical form — not authorial emphasis. Participles and infinitives are verbal adjectives and nouns respectively.
Clause data: MACULA Greek (Clear Bible, CC BY 4.0) · SBLGNT (Logos/SBL, CC BY 4.0)
The verb helps a teacher follow the grammar and movement of Paul's prayer. G1840 names ability for the action that follows, but Paul does not leave that ability unexplained. The prayer begins with the Father's gift, continues through strengthening by the Spirit and Christ's dwelling through faith, and reaches toward communal comprehension of Christ's love. This keeps the sermon from turning the verse into a demand to become intellectually stronger by private effort.
It also keeps comprehension from becoming mastery. The very next verse says that Christ's love surpasses knowledge. Paul can pray for believers to know truly without suggesting that they will know exhaustively. A faithful application therefore invites dependence on God, rootedness in love, and shared growth among the saints. It does not rank believers by how intense their experience feels or promise unrestricted power for unrelated tasks.
Eph.3.18
G1840 is an aorist active subjunctive in Ephesians 3:18 and introduces ability for the following infinitive, to comprehend. The form belongs to the prayer's purpose or result movement. The lexical evidence supports having sufficient strength or ability; it does not require an etymological claim that the prefix creates maximal or unlimited power.
The companion remains anchored to Ephesians 3 because G1840 occurs only there. Other biblical prayers for wisdom, endurance, and divine strengthening may illuminate a broader canonical pattern, but they are parallels rather than additional evidence for this verb. Paul's own nearby prayer in Ephesians 1:15-23 is the safest book-level comparison: both prayers ask God to enable believers to know what divine grace has already given.
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