Speaking to God about others.

Colossians 4:2-6 –

“Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. ³ And pray for us, too, that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ, for which I am in chains. ⁴ Pray that I may proclaim it clearly, as I should. ⁵ Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity. ⁶ Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.”

    Our text falls naturally into two parts;

Prayer: Speaking to God about people (verses 2-4)

Evangelism: Speaking to people about God (verses 5-6)

    Let’s look first at how to speak to God about others. Verse 2 answers the question, “How do we pray?” We discover three helpful guidelines in this verse: “Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful.”

1. Pray with devotion. The word, “devote” means to “adhere firmly to.” It implies unrelenting persistence and is the opposite of “hit and miss.” It brings back to mind how steadfast the early church was in Acts 2:42: “They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.” In Luke 18:1, Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up; the Parable of the “persistent widow”.
    Being devoted in prayer is similar to cheering on your sports team, regardless of whether they are winning or losing. Paul is saying something quite simple: Keep praying. Don’t bail. Don’t give up. Be faithful. You may have dry times and days when you don’t know what to say but keep praying anyway. It may seem like God is not answering but keep praying until you get an answer.
    To be “devoted” to prayer also means to be “ready at all times.” In Mark 3:9, Jesus told his disciples to get a small boat ready for Him so that the people wouldn’t crush Him. This word “ready” is the same word that is translated, “devoted” in Colossians 4:2. So, Paul is saying, “Always be ready to break into prayer, and do it instantaneously, at all times.” That’s precisely the admonition in 1 Thessalonians 5:17 where we’re told to “pray continually.”

2. Pray with watchfulness. Verse 2 continues by saying that we’re to be “watchful” or awake when we pray. Paul told the believers in 1 Thessalonians 5:6 to not fall asleep but to instead be “alert and self-controlled” as the time approaches for the Lord’s return. This exhortation brings to mind the words of Jesus to His disciples the night before He was crucified in Mark 14:34, 38: “Stay here and keep watch…Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the body is weak.” Watchful prayer provides the spiritual fortitude to face down temptation. Because Peter could not stay awake when he was supposed to pray, he gave in to temptation and denied Christ a few hours later. It could also mean to be always watchful for things to pray for or people to pray with.

    Consider the difference between two military sentries. One is guarding an Armory here in the U.S… The other is guarding a platoon in Afghanistan. Which one is probably going to be more attentive? The one who realizes he’s in a battle. Friends, because we’re in a spiritual battle, we need to stay on high alert at all times. 1 Peter 5:8 paints a real picture of the war we are in: “Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.”

3. Pray with thankfulness. We should never pray without thinking of at least one thing to thank God for. Gratitude is a stimulus to prayer. When we see answers to prayer, we will pray more.
He’s given us so many things. Listen to how Paul puts his own preaching into practice in the Book of Colossians:

1:3: “We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you.”
1:12: “Giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the kingdom of light.”

2:7: “Rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness.”

3:15-17: “Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom, and as you sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.”

More on this next week...

Action Steps in Prayer

Colossians 1:9-13

    Martin Luther said, "To be a Christian without prayer is no more possible than to be alive without breathing. But, how can we pray prayers that will really make a difference… to us…and to those for whom we pray?

    Is there a difference between gossip and prayer requests? Someone once said; "Christians don’t gossip. They just share prayer requests!" Sometimes prayer requests are really prayer requests. But too often they are gossip wrapped in prayer shawls.

    One thing we find about Paul is that Paul cared about people. The primary way he showed his love was praying for them! One of Paul’s trademarks in his epistles is the assurance of his prayers on behalf of the recipients of his letters. To the Romans he said; "I remember you in my prayers at all times; and I pray that now at last by God’s will the way may be opened for me to come to you.” (Romans 1:9-10) To the Ephesians he wrote, "I...do not cease giving thanks for you, while making mention of you in my prayers" (Ephesians 1:15-16). To his beloved Philippian church, he writes, "I thank my God in all my remembrance of you, always offering prayer with joy in my every prayer for you all." (Philippians 1:3-4)

1^st. Action Step: Develop A Personal Prayer Journal.

Separate it into parts; prayer requests; people and family with needs; people and family that need God; church; pastor; work; world etc. Then highlight the name or prayer when God answers. (If you use a different color for each prayer, you will have a book of rainbows after a while.)

    Then keep a separate part of your journal for scriptural prayers. When you come
across scriptural prayers – like the ones we will look at today – write it down, write it out… Replace words like “you” and “your” with personal names.
2. Action Step - Pray more CONSISTENTLY.
Notice Paul says in Colossians 1:9b "we have not stopped praying for you." (NIV) Luke 18:1 says “Men always ought to pray and not lose heart."  

3. Determine a time and a place.

Seek to maintain a regular pattern of prayer. This may necessitate a set time and place where you can go to pray. You may have to be somewhat flexible in your scheduling, and that is okay, just know that prayer is a disciplined work. It will require your diligent, conscientious attention. If you don’t make plans to pray, you probably won’t!

3. Action Step – Pray more SCRIPTURALLY.

Take the time to search out scriptures that contain things you can make into personal prayers.

What happens after you begin to do this? 

1. You learn scripture.

2. You increase your prayer vocabulary.

3. You will lose your fear of prayer.

Let’s start with this one; How many prayers can you find in this one prayer? (14)

Colossians 1:9-14 -

     “For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you and asking God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all spiritual wisdom and understanding. And we pray this in order that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and may please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God, being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience, and joyfully giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the kingdom of light. For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.”

How about Romans 1:8-16…

How about Ephesians 1:15-19…

How about 2 Thessalonians 1:3-12…

You see? You can search the scriptures and find many key words or phrases to enhance your own prayers. Eventually, the prayers will begin to flow and you will become more confident.

Prayer of Jabez - Part 4

    So far in this series on the Prayer of Jabez, we have considered first of all, that Jabez asked the Lord to bless him; Jabez wanted God’s best for his life so he could be a blessing to others. He wanted to be a channel of God’s blessings…and his motive was right. Second, Jabez asked the Lord to enlarge his territory …To expand his realm of influence…He was asking God to do something through him that was too big for Jabez to do it alone.  And, Jabez also knew that nothing could be accomplished unless God’s hand was upon him…so he prays “Let your hand be with me”.  He knew that if God’s hand was upon him he could not fail. Perhaps this is the same insight that inspired the pen of Paul to write; “I can do all things through Christ who lives in me.” Without God’s blessings; Without God working to enlarge our ministry; and Without God’s hand being upon us, we cannot accomplish anything.

    But, there is one more part; Jabez asks God to “keep me from harm so that I will be free from pain.” The Living Bible says “keep me from evil and disaster”…does that sound familiar?  Perhaps Jesus was thinking of Jabez when he gave us the Lord’s Prayer which says; “and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil…” And what about when Jesus prayed for his disciples in John 17:15 saying; “My prayer is not that you take them out of the world, but that you protect them from the evil one.”

    Jabez knew, as we should know, that evil or sin in his life would rob him of the very blessings he was praying for!  He knew that sin and evil would bring only harm and destruction and pain as consequences, so he prayed that God would keep him from these things. The sin of the pastor or even one of the leaders in a church will quickly destroy any and may-be all the blessings God has provided. We have witnessed it many times.

    I believe that because of his willingness to allow God’s blessings to flow through him, and his willingness to look beyond himself…And because of his willingness to work alongside of God whenever a direction or opportunity presented itself to expand or enlarge his ministry… Because God’s hand was upon him and he trusted God to keep him from evil and ever alert to Satan’s schemes to distract and destroy…the result was God answered his prayer.

    Just as a little side note here; I want us all to know that God answers prayer in three ways…and I am sure we have all experienced His answer in one or all of these three ways;

1^st. God has a way of carrying or bringing us to His answer. He will work in and through our thoughts, our desires, our circumstances, our health, our wealth, whatever it takes to bring us to His answer. 

2^nd. He has a way of bringing His answer to us.  He will work in the lives and circumstances of others to bring His answer to us. God will work in their thoughts and circumstances to provide the answer. And,

3^rd. God will just bring it to pass. Usually when this happens we say words like “out of the blue”…God personally ushers the answer to our prayer. He will confound the critics! He will dumbfound the doctors! He will upset the odds! He’ll just do it!  Even if your life has not warranted special arrangements, If He desires that we need it, He will bring it to pass.

    This is what prayer is all about. It’s a way of laying hold of the greatness and the glory and the power and the wisdom of God, in quiet, daily ways.  And, God will work through the normal everyday circumstances of our lives to accomplish His purpose and at the same time fulfill our needs and desires.

    We may call it living out our faith, or we can call it our ministry, but whatever it is, we are to use our gifts, our talents, our knowledge, our education, our vocation, our physical and material blessings to accomplish wonderful things WITH God!  Remember that the Bible says “with” God all things are possible.” Once again, let me repeat that we most often have the equation wrong; Our abilities; plus, our experience; plus our gifts; plus our finances; plus our knowledge = What we can do.  We say that we want God to work through us, but what we really mean is that we want God to put his stamp of approval on what we are doing.

    The right equation of course is; Our weakness plus our willingness plus God’s supernatural power = What God is able to do through us. Faith is believing there is a greater reality beyond this reality! …And that God works in and through both to accomplish the impossible.  I think this is something Jabez understood and it transformed his life and his ministry.

    This part of the Jabez prayer is of equal importance with the previous three requests. The reason is because when we are blessed, and when our ministry and our influence begin to enlarge, and when it becomes obvious that God’s hand is upon us, who do you think is going to get a little upset? (Satan)… And he will attempt to do everything in his power to cause us to take our eyes off what God is doing!  A tiny indulgence of pride or self-confidence or jealousy and envy or gossip can spell disaster. We need God’s protective power to keep Satan at bay!

    You know, it’s really encouraging to find few “super saints” among those through whom God has worked throughout history. They were all just ordinary - even easy to overlook - people who had faith in an extraordinary and miracle working God.  They came to find, know, and believe that God is who He says he is; And that God can do what He says he can do; They decided that they were who God said they were and what the world had to say or even Satan’s resistance and constant attempts to bring fear and discouragement wouldn’t change the fact that they were - as Joel Olsteen likes to say - victors and not victims… And finally, that they - and we - can do all things through Christ.

Our weakness + plus our willingness + plus God’s supernatural power = What God is able to accomplish in and through us!  This is the formula we have taken a stand upon… And it’s the only formula that works.