Blaise Pascal, the 17th Century French mathematician and Christian philosopher, once wrote these words (rough paraphrase from his Provincial Letters) when writing to a friend:
“I’ve written you a long letter because I didn’t have time to write a short one.”
This statement reminds us of the difficult task of editing!
When I was a journalism major at Georgia State University, one of the more challenging tasks I had to learn was the ability to cut down the number of written words in a news story. News print is all about getting as many words onto a page as possible, so the economy of words and crafting of words, or “word-smithing,” is an important part of the writing process.
You write a draft, then you write another draft, and still another, all the while trying to say the same thing each time in as few words as possible.
What the Apostle Paul communicates here in Colossians 4:2-6 strikes me as a very succinct, yet thorough, statement about Christian living. Paul could have written much more—and indeed he has elsewhere!—but here in these five verses Paul provides a short, concise, yet relatively comprehensive statement on what we could call “Christian Living 101,” or, “The Basics of Christian Living.”
2 Continue earnestly in prayer, being vigilant in it with thanksgiving;
3 meanwhile praying also for us, that God would open to us a door for the word, to speak the mystery of Christ, for which I am also in chains,
4 that I may make it manifest, as I ought to speak.
5 Walk in wisdom toward those who are outside, redeeming the time.
6 Let your speech always be with grace, seasoned with salt, that you may know how you ought to answer each one.
Let’s frame our study of this passage around four participles—praying, sharing, living, and speaking.
**Four Basics of Christian Living:
Grateful Praying
Prayer: What most Christians talk about, but few actually do.
Continue earnestly in prayer, being vigilant in it with thanksgiving; (verse 2)
Note that praying and thanksgiving go hand-in-hand. They go together. There is no meaningful prayer apart from thanksgiving—and thanksgiving itself inspires us to talk to God, to thank Him for what He has done.
Paul states that Christians are to continue “earnestly” in prayer, “being vigilant” in it. This is a call for consistency and urgency.
Sam Storms wrote that “the easiest thing about praying is quitting.”
Many of us, when we come to passages like this, begin to feel guilt and shame because we feel we do not pray enough.
Of course prayer is given for our good. We must remember that our Lord said to the disciples:
Matthew 26:41, “Watch and pray, lest you enter into temptation (cf Mark 14:38; Luke 22:40, 46).”
So one of the benefits of prayer is that we avoid falling into temptation. And there are other benefits, like just the whole idea of spending time with the Father! Spending time in communion with the One, True God!
I love when I make time for prayer. I really do. I have to make time, to be sure, but I love when I do! I love when I make time for prayer because I feel and sense the Father’s presence when I pray to Him.
This is one answer to the question, “Why pray if God knows what we need before we speak?” Sometimes even Christians ask this. “What’s the point of praying if God already knows what we’re going to say?”
Well first of all, God loves to be asked! Proverbs 15:8 says, “The prayer of the upright is His delight.” He loves to hear His children talk to Him.
But again, what about our experience in prayer? Prayer is a two-way communal time of sharing. We are in His presence. We fellowship with Him in prayer. This to me is the most important aspect of Grateful Praying: The presence of God.
Communing in God’s presence also helps us to think Christianly about so-called “unanswered prayer.” Why does God seem unwilling to answer every prayer? Hear again from Storms:
Steadfast endurance in coming again and again to the throne of grace is God’s way of cultivating in us a sense of absolute and utter dependence upon him. We are by nature self-reliant, self-sufficient folk. If God were instantly and at all times to answer our every prayer we would gradually lose our sense of urgency. Truth be told, most of us would soon lose sight of the fact that it is God alone who is the source of all good. By suspending his response, God is saying to each of us: “Just how desperate are you? How conscious are you that I am your only source, your sole and all-sufficient supply?”
Sam Storms
Continue earnestly in prayer, being vigilant in it with thanksgiving;
Grateful praying. And Paul tells the Colossian Christians specifically how they can pray for him. He writes:
meanwhile praying also for us, that God would open to us a door for the word, to speak the mystery of Christ, for which I am also in chains, that I may make it manifest, as I ought to speak. (verses 3-4)
Paul is saying, “Pray for us, pray for me, pray that God would give us receptive hearts—an open door to share the Word of God, to share the Gospel,” which Paul refers to as, “the mystery of Christ,” the unveiling of the glorious plan of God to save sinners through Jesus Christ.
Paul says in verse 4, “Pray that I will make it manifest—or make it clear—as I ought to speak.” In other words, “Pray that I say the right thing when I share the Gospel.”
It’s always wise to ask someone to pray for you specifically when you are sharing the Gospel! Call or text a friend something like: “Hey, pray for me at 3:30. I’m going to be speaking to John about Jesus Christ. Pray, ‘that I may make it manifest, as I ought to speak.’”
This brings us to the next action: Gospel Sharing. We’ll talk more about that in the next post. For now…
What About You?
- Do you have a regular time of daily prayer? If not, don’t languish in guilt, just start today. Put it on your calendar and begin.
- What is it about prayer that causes us to sense the presence of God?
- What happens when we fail to talk to God regularly in prayer?
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