COLOSSIANS 4:12 – Epaphras, who is one of you, a servant of Christ Jesus, greets you, always struggling on your behalf in his prayers, that you may stand mature and fully assured in all the will of God.
THEME OF THE DAY: THE WARFARE IN PRAYER. The theme of today’s nugget might be interpreted in two ways. Both are accurate and apply in the Christian life.
First, the warfare in prayer that is required to fight spiritual battles. Jesus would model this in the Garden of Gethsemane in the battle against Satan. It was a battle fought on His knees – And Jesus came out and went, as was his custom, to the Mount of Olives, and the disciples followed him. And when he came to the place, he said to them, “Pray that you may not enter into temptation.” And he withdrew from them about a stone’s throw, and knelt down and prayed, saying, “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done.” And there appeared to him an angel from heaven, strengthening him. And being in agony he prayed more earnestly; and his sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground” (Luke 22:39-44). The Apostle Paul would end his list of the Christian’s spiritual armor with the exhortation to ensure all is put on with prayer – praying at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end, keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints (Ephesians 6:18). Prayer is an indispensable discipline against the forces of evil. The prayerless Christian will be the defeated Christian and the prayerless church will be a powerless church.
The second interpretation and application of today’s scripture, and particularly the example of Epaphras, is the warfare when one commits to building an effective prayer life of intercession. The Apostle Paul describes the intercessory prayer life of Epaphras as struggling which means “to exert much effort, expend much energy.” True prayer will always be a raging battle against our flesh and the devil. Our flesh wants ease and comfort, but an effective prayer life requires tremendous self-discipline to put the flesh to death. It will require denial of comfort. It will require time, alone time away from distractions. Without the fight against our bent toward easy, we cannot develop a prayer life that makes a difference.
As for the devil? He will attack the prayer lives of a Christian and church more than any other area because it is the most important to both. But there is something else about the struggle of intercessory prayer. We are selfish. We likely pray more for ourselves and our interests than those of Christ and others. Look at Epaphras. He struggled in prayer for the Colossian believers to grow in spiritual maturity. He was focused away from himself and that will always be a struggle. Yet, we model not only great saints of the Bible and church history with a consistent life of prayer for others, but the Lord Jesus who always lives to make intercession for us (Hebrews 7:25). May the Lord help us become prayer warriors by entering into the warfare of prayer.
PRAYER: “Father, may I learn to fight the warfare of prayer in the discipline of prayer.”
QUOTE: “Prayer is not easy for it is the area most attacked by our spiritual foes in the Christian life.”
In the affection of Christ Jesus,
Pastor Jim