Colossians 1:9-14
Here is the Word .doc for the following lesson. Colossians Study 3
The story is told about a small town in the south. For many years, this town had been “dry” in that no alcohol was ever sold or served there. But one day a businessman in the area decided to build a tavern. In response to this new tavern, a group of Christians from a local church became concerned and planned an all-night prayer meeting to ask God to intervene. Shortly after the prayer meeting that night, lightning struck the bar and it burned to the ground.
In the aftermath of the fire, the owner of the tavern sued the church, claiming that the prayers of the congregation were responsible for his loss. But the church hired a lawyer to argue in court that they were not responsible. After his initial review of the case the presiding judge began the trial with an official statement. He said: “No matter how this case comes out, one thing is clear: the tavern owner believes in prayer, and the Christians do not.”
As we begin this third of our studies in Paul’s letter to the believers at Colossae I feel compelled to confess to you how woefully unqualified I feel to be teaching this week’s study on prayer. You see, as we begin to deal with Paul’s prayer for the Colossian church, it’s not just something we read, groan a sound of assent and commend him for. It’s illustrative for us. It’s when the descriptive becomes the prescriptive. This is where I have had to do some heavy personal evaluation and criticism. Stick with me for a moment because you might be able to identify with me.
There was a time when I was sure of my powerful role to wield if not entirely control the hands of God by my actions and prayers. If there was a lost person, I possessed the subtilty of speech and sleight of hand to “get him saved”. If someone was spiritually immature, I knew the regimen of enforceable activities in order to get the desired outcome. Only those things that seemed truly out of my reach were items for prayer: A hurricane in the Caribbean that needed diverting, Bill Clinton’s salvation or maybe getting 3,000 people to Friend Day. But even in what would’ve appeared to be an act of dependence upon God, my prayers still possessed quite a bit of self reliance. I truly believed that God’s hands were tied without me.
God began to slowly but surely correct my understanding a few years ago. A sort of Copernican Revolution took place in my thinking. No longer was man the center of the universe, God was. If that lost person was saved, it was because God, apart from any and all human means saved him. If the immature grew in knowledge and faith, it was because of the superintending counsel of God the Holy Spirit. The small, impudent God that I had constructed in my own image had made Himself known to me. The ramifications of this were huge. One of them I immediately began to consider was the role of my petitionary prayers. How should I and for what things should I be making requests to God for, considering the fact that He is going to always sovereignly accomplish all that He intends to do. Or to put it more succinctly, “what’s the point”? If God is sovereign, why pray?
For a moment, consider these passages from Isaiah.
Remember the former things long past, for I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is no one like Me, declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things which have not been done, saying, “My purpose will be established, and I will accomplish all My good pleasure”; calling a bird of prey from the east, the man of My purpose from a far country. Truly I have spoken; truly I will bring it to pass. I have planned it, surely I will do it.
Isaiah 46:9-11
Here we have an example of God declaring his intentions from eternity past and the accomplishment of them by His own power. In other words, God providentially brings about in time and history what He has sovereignly ordained in eternity past. Paul said it this way, God “works all things after the counsel of His will” (Eph 1:11). Sure seems like we aren’t really needed in that whole transaction. And that is right, we aren’t needed, per se. But does that mean that we have no part?
We could very well spend weeks on this topic, but it’s really not necessary. We can be convinced of God’s intention for us by two infallible proofs.
- He has commanded us to
- He has ordained us to
Jesus instructed his disciples to “Pray, then, in this way” (Matt 6:9). The 18th chapter of Luke’s gospel opens with a parable that Luke tells us was told for the expressed purpose of inciting vigilant prayer in the lives of the disciples. Upon arriving at Gethsemane, Jesus told His men that they might escape temptation if they were to pray (Luke 22:40). At the end of this very letter we are studying, Paul will exhort the readers in 4:2 to “Devote yourselves to prayer”. The examples are too numerous to mention but you undoubtedly get the point and have no trouble bowing your mind to that truth. But what about your heart, your desire to pray. Sure I get it, I’ve been commanded to, and therefore I will submit myself to God’s command. But I’m still left with the heart of my question, why. You see, my query has nothing to do with obedience, i.e.
“Don’t put your head in the oven son, but I want to know why”. I both know and trust that God’s commands are good. My “why” question has to do with effect. Are my prayers effectual? Do they bring anything to pass that wouldn’t already happen without me? Let me make plain my intentions here. I under no circumstances believe that God is under any obligation to answer my ‘why’ questions. I do not want to find myself in the unenviable position that Job found himself in.
Then the LORD said to Job, “Will the faultfinder contend with the Almighty? Let him who reproves God answer it.” Then Job answered the LORD and said, “Behold, I am insignificant; what can I reply to You? I lay my hand on my mouth.
Job 40:1-4
We understand plainly that God commanded it, now I want to look at the 2nd. God ordained it. Or said another way, God has ordained prayer as a means by which He accomplishes His eternal purposes. Consider this for a moment. Scripture teaches us that God has determined the ends of all things from eternity past and yet you are instructed to pray in order that those ends be brought about. If you’ve never meditated on that, you need to. Is it a seemingly contradictory statement? Sure it is. No more so that Jesus saying in Matt 16:18 that “I will build my Church” and then turning around in chpt 28:19 and commanded us to “make disciples of all nations”. But I thought you said you were going to build your Church, we might say to Christ. The scripture answers us as if to say, I am by means of your disciple making. The same paradigms can be presented for the justifying and sanctifying works of salvation.
God’s plan is so comprehensive that it not only includes the final destinies of things but also includes the secondary, creaturely processes that work together to accomplish these ends. For instance, God does not simply ordain light to shine on the earth each day; He also employs the sun, the moon, the stars, and countless other things to accomplish that end. God does not merely determine that someone will recover from a disease; He uses doctors and medicine to accomplish the healing. As the playwright of history, God did not simply write an ending for the book of time. He wrote every word on every page so that all events lead to the grand finale (Richard Pratt, Pray With Your Eyes Open, 109-10).
I promised you Biblical examples, here is one from Jeremiah. Unfortunately this is one of those verses that we are twisting and contorting to suit our needs, but God is speaking of the future of Israel and His intentions to restore her in 29:11. ‘For I know the plans that I have for you,’ declares the LORD, ‘plans for welfare and not for calamity to give you a future and a hope.
Intentions is a bad word, they are fixed plans. God has planned their future restoration, “for welfare and not for calamity to give you a future and a hope”. So what is going to happen in the future to precipitate this renewal?
“Then you will call upon Me and come and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart. And I will be found by you,” declares the Lord, “and I will restore your fortunes and will gather you from all the nations and from all the places where I have driven you,” declares the Lord, “and I will bring you back to the place from where I sent you into exile” (vv. 12-14).
The prayers of His people are going to bring about this restoration. Did their prayers thwart God’s desire to further punish them? Of course not! They accomplished precisely what God had pre-determined. Let me leave this introduction with this thought. Perhaps we are asking the question incorrectly. Our original question “If God is sovereign, why pray?” should be replaced with the question, “If God is NOT sovereign, why pray?”
So as we turn our attention back onto Paul’s letter, let’s remember that up to this point we have gotten a look into the heart of the apostle as he pours forth praise and thanksgiving to God for all that he has accomplished and will continue to accomplish in the little town of Colossae. The fruit of the Gospel is marvelously manifesting itself both in their lives and the world. Their “faith, love, and hope” give resounding evidence that they have been genuinely converted and are showing forth the sanctifying fruits of the Holy Spirit’s work.
Lest we mistakenly begin to think that this epistle is but a syrupy, warm fuzzy, joy-joy letter, we’d do well to remember why Epaphras has made the 1,000 mile journey to Rome. There is trouble at home. False teachings are making their rounds and are threatening to undo the good work that has been done over the previous few years. So couched in Paul’s introduction is a real heartache for those whom he can’t personally visit. He knows the dangers and struggles that they are undergoing and apart from the plain instruction that he will give later in this letter, he is left to do all that he can do. Which is the greatest and best that he can do, and that is pray.
Let’s read our text:
“And so, from the day we heard, we have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God. May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy, giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light. He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. ” (Colossians 1:9–14, ESV)
These six verses express the heart of the apostle as he sits in his prison cell in Rome. Though the Colossian church is under grave attack of various damnable heresies and he is unable to come to them personally, you will not find any desperation in his voice. He is confident in both the preserving power of God and the effective means of prayer. Prayer was not a mundane exercise for an apostle, but one of his two primary ministries.
“But we will devote ourselves to prayer and to the ministry of the word.”
Act 6:4 NASB
We will split our text in half and form our two sections for tonight. Verses 9-11 consist of Paul’s petition, while vv. 12-14 form his praise.
Petition
Paul’s petition is purposeful. That is to say, he was asking God to perform what he knew the Colossian Church most needed. I’m reminded of an interview question I was stumped on several years ago. It goes something like, “what one thing would you do, if you knew you would not fail”? I stumbled and sputtered searching for an answer that I thought a potential employer would like to hear, but was never settled on the thoughts that it started in me. So as Paul answer the question of “what are the Colossians most in need of”. The answer is revealing. Revealing not only in what we are most likely in need of ourselves, but also in the things we most often pray for. There were undoubtedly sick and unemployed believers in the Church but we find no mention of temporal conditions as he prays. In fact, throughout the NT epistles there is little to no acknowledging of the items we as modern-day believers most often concern ourselves with.
In Paul’s petition we will answer three questions:
- What prompted him to pray?
- What did he specifically pray for?
- What was the purpose of his praying?
What prompted him to pray?
Verse 9 opens up to us the event that brought Paul to prayer in the first place. Namely, the report that he has received from Epaphras. As we have learned, Epaphras travelled well near 1,000 miles to bring news and seek help for the church that has grown up in the little city of Colossae. Their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and love for the brethren have marked them out as a body of believers. Since hearing and understanding the Gospel, their lives have been marked by spiritual growth in that they are bearing fruit in their lives. Though Paul didn’t start this church, nor has he ever visited it, he is overjoyed with the news and has not ceased praying for them.
What did he specifically pray for?
As we will learn later on this letter, the Church at Colossae is facing some pretty heavy-duty threats. Most, if not all, coming from within their own ranks. With that in mind, let’s look at the specific requests that Paul makes on their behalf. It’s actually a single request, that they be “filled with the knowledge of His will”.
The word plerothete (filled) means to be completely filled, or totally controlled. It is used throughout the NT. Here are but a few. When Jesus told the disciples of His imminent departure, he observed that “sorrow has filled your heart.” — John 16:6. After he had healed on the Sabbath the Pharisees were “filled with rage” – Luke 6:11. And in Acts 4:31 the disciples were reported to be “filled with the Holy Spirit”. So as Paul prays for their filling, it is the substance of that filling that is of importance to us.
“the knowledge of His will”
So what do we understand about that? Does that mean they are no longer wondering about which job to take? Or whether to buy that new car? Did “the knowledge of His will” clear all those things up for them? Is that the knowledge we are longing for?
The word Paul chose here is the compound, epignōsis. It consists of the normal Greek word for knowledge, gnosis with the added preposition epi on the front for intensification. So what you have is a deep, thorough knowledge. Knowledge is a central theme in Paul’s writings.
“For I testify about them that they have a zeal for God, but not in accordance with knowledge. ” (Romans 10:2, NAS)
“that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of Him. ” (Ephesians 1:17, NAS)
“And this I pray, that your love may abound still more and more in real knowledge and all discernment, ” (Philippians 1:9, NAS)
“Paul, a bond-servant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ, for the faith of those chosen of God and the knowledge of the truth which is according to godliness, ” (Titus 1:1, NAS)
The scripture does not view the intellect as the enemy of faith. Understanding is not somehow a betrayal of dependence upon God. In fact, Paul argues quite the opposite. It is the increasing understanding of God that increases both the strength of our faith and our dependence upon God. There is error on both ends of this spectrum. There is the man who in his never ending search for information believes he has eclipsed the source and diviner of all truth. He has become the fool. There is also the simpleton who in his fear of believing that he will find an untruth or contradiction in the decrees of God never asks or searches. Both betray the great gift that God has bestowed upon his creatures. Namely, the ability to forever think upon and endlessly desire the greatest object that our minds can never fully appreciate and comprehend, God Himself.
In light of the controversy to come later in the letter, this knowledge stands in stark contrast to the mystic teachings of Gnosticism. Knowledge is not something that is acquired to achieve enlightenment, but something God-given to those whom He has chosen to already enlighten. It is this knowledge that directly leads the believer to “spiritual wisdom and understanding”.
Though the terms wisdom and understanding may be synonymous, sophia (wisdom) may be the broader of the two terms. It refers to the ability to collect and concisely organize principles from Scripture. Sunesis (understanding) could be a more specialized term, referring to the application of those principles to everyday life. Both sophia and Sunesis are spiritual; they deal in the nonphysical realm and have the Holy Spirit as their source.
Believing, submissive Bible study leads to the knowledge of God’s will. A mind saturated with such knowledge will also be able to comprehend general principles of godly behavior. With that wisdom will come understanding of how to apply those principles to the situations of life. That progression will inevitably result in godly character and practice.
MacArthur, J. (1996). Colossians (29). Chicago: Moody Press.
What was the purpose of his praying?
Paul was purposeful in how he prayed for people. He knew that the knowledge of the Holy would result in certain actions in the lives of the believers in Colossae. The knowledge of God’s will that brought about wisdom and understanding would unavoidable produce 5 things.
- Walk Well — “so that you will walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, to please Him in all respects”.
Whether your translation reads “walk” or “live”, the word is used throughout the NT and its Hebrew equivalent in the OT to denote one’s pattern of daily conduct. A mind controlled by knowledge, wisdom, and understanding produces a life worthy of the Lord. Though we understand we are unworthy of Christ, Paul nevertheless commands us to live worthily.To the Thessalonians he wrote “walk in a manner worthy of the God who calls you into His own kingdom and glory” (1 Thess. 2:12).
He exhorted the Ephesians to “walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called” (Eph. 4:1).
He told the Philippians to “conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ” (Phil. 1:27).
- Bear Fruit – “bearing fruit in every good work”
Fruit bearing is always the product of righteousness. Christ said in John 15:8 “By this is My Father glorified, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be My disciples”. Scripture defines fruit in numerous ways. Hebrews 13:5 says praise is a fruit. Paul spoke of converts being fruit in Romans 1:13. And of course we have the attitudes given to us in Galatians 5:22-23 that we commonly refer to as the “fruit of the spirit”. - Growth – “increasing in the knowledge of God;”
Another result of knowledge is more knowledge. Or better said, growth. So what is emphasized here is a continual process of filling our minds with God enhanced understanding of all things. We never arrive or learn, grasp and rejoice fully on this earth. So we continue to long for more of Christ. - Strength – “strengthened with all power, according to His glorious might”
We enjoy a continuing strengthening because God in His incredible wisdom and goodness has seen fit to minister to and through us by the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit. It is said this way in Eph. 3:16, “strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man”. - Perseverance – “for the attaining of all steadfastness and patience; joyously.”
They were in the midst of difficult times and more of those awaited them. There is no sugar-coating trials and sufferings. The writer of Hebrews said as much in 12:11 “All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.” It is the hard, painful, refining work the persevering faith allows us to endure that produces the joyous dependency upon God that Paul is praying for them here.
Paul is only half done with his prayer for this church. It is very short, no wasted words or fluffy platitudes. But consider this. What he has asked God to do for them would prepare them temporally on this Earth and eternally in Heaven to joyously worship and walk with God.