Unceasing Prayer in Counseling | Part 1
In counseling, what punctuation mark would best characterize your actual prayer life: “Prayer matters?” or “Prayer matters!”? Colossians 1:9-14 is a prayer that both informs our prayers for others as well as informs others in how to pray; by implication addressing the motive, frequency, and fervency of our prayer. Concerning Paul’s prayer in Colossians 1:9-14, Kent Hughes wrote: “His prayer was a beautifully constructed tapestry that makes a perfect model for the fabric of our own prayers. His examples tell us how to pray for the knowledge, and then for the conduct, of the Church.”¹ We’ll consider Paul’s prayer in Colossians 1:9-14 in three parts. This blog will be part 1 and will address the root of Paul’s prayer in Colossians 1:9: “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.”
Colossians 1:9 starts out, "And so, from the day we heard.” What had Paul and Timothy heard? Verses 1-8 tells us they were thanking God in their prayer for the believers at Colossae because they had heard that the believers at Colossae were demonstrating the evidence of saving faith in Christ Jesus. Yet it was not enough for Paul to encourage them that he and Timothy had been praying for them, Paul shows his love for them all the more in the opening of his letter by sharing with them his prayer for them.
Caring for and Counseling Others Involves Unceasing Prayer (Colossians 1:9a)
Paul demonstrates his genuine concern and care for the Colossians in praying for them. He writes in Colossians 1:9, “We have not ceased to pray for you.” Unceasing prayer is a recurring theme and calling upon believers in Paul’s writings (Colossians 4:2; 1 Thessalonians 5:17; Philippians 4:6; Ephesians 6:18). So what does it mean that Paul and Timothy had “not ceased to pray” for them? Did they literally stay on their knees 24/7, neglecting food, sleep, and everything else as they did nothing but continually voice prayers? Obviously it does not mean that the next time you drive, you put your hands together, close your eyes, and verbally talk to God while you seek to drive by faith, not by sight.
Rather, John MacArthur summarizes well what it means "to pray without ceasing” in his twofold description:
1) Unceasing Prayer Means We Live All of Life with a God-Consciousness
To pray without ceasing means that we have an awareness of God in all things. Whether we eat, drink, or whatever we do, we seek to do all for the glory of God in the realization that apart from Christ we can do nothing (1 Corinthians 10:31; John 15:5; Philippians 4:13). Through prayer we acknowledge God is worthy and we are needy. So whether it be suffering, struggling with personal sin, or seeking to redeem the time, we look to God for wisdom and grace to live unto Him who for our sake died and was raised (2 Corinthians 5:14-15).
Unceasing prayer means we not only view all circumstances in relation to God, but also:
2) Unceasing Prayer Means We Live All of Life with a People-Consciousness²
In writing to the Colossians, Paul had been made aware not only of their faith and love for all the saints but also the false teaching that was seeking to lead them astray. According to his knowledge of the saints at Colossae and their needs, he prayed unceasingly for them. It has been said, “If you love someone you will pray for them, and the more you pray for them the more you will love them.”³
Paul exemplifies the most loving thing that we can unceasing pray for as he continues in Colossians 1:9, “asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will.” Think for a moment, how important is knowledge in our lives? In a basic sense, would it not be unsafe and unwise for a young person with no driving instruction, who has never been behind the wheel of a car, to one day jump in the driver’s seat with the intent to drive across the country? Knowledge matters! We cannot function properly without it. The knowledge that matters most is the knowledge of God (Proverbs 7) and His prescribed will for us (2 Timothy 3:16-17). How do we come to know God’s prescribed will for our lives? It is discovered in God’s sufficient, authoritative Word by which the Spirit of God reveals the Father and Son and the worthiness of our Triune God to be worshipped in every aspect of our entire lives.
Note that Paul not only prays they would have the knowledge of God’s will but also that they “may be filled with the knowledge of God’s will.” To be filled by something as portrayed in Scripture is to be totally under the control of what one is filled with. In a negative sense, we see this in the scribes and Pharisees toward Jesus in Luke 6:11, “But they were filled with fury and discussed with one another what they might do to Jesus.” In a positive sense, we see this in Stephen in Acts 6:8 as he is described as “full of grace and power, [he] was doing great wonders and signs among the people.” In both instances, what they were full of had every implication upon what they said and how they acted. Paul’s prayer in Colossians 1:9 is that the believers would be “full of the knowledge” of what? “God’s will.” Paul knew there were worldly influences upon those at Colossae as there are upon us today, and proper worship must be informed by proper knowledge (Romans 12:1-2). What believers need—then and now—remains the same: to be filled, not with the world but filled with the Word of God.
Paul prays that they would be filled with God’s will or God’s Word, because they had been set apart unto Christ and therefore must learn to live for Him in accordance to His Word. Is this not what Jesus prayed for His people in John 17:17? “Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth.”
Continuing in Colossians 1:9, it is vital for our own lives and in our counseling that we take note of the next phrase: “asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.” What kind of wisdom and understanding? Spiritual! First Corinthians 2:14 says, “The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.” For the unbeliever who does not have the Spirit of God, the Word of God is either despised or distorted and used as a means of personal gain. Perhaps you have known someone who has distorted God’s Word for selfish gain or to create their own form of false spirituality. In contrast, the believer knows his or her dependence upon the Holy Spirit for “all spiritual wisdom and understanding.” Jesus said in John 16:13, “When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth.” Therefore, we must pray for the Holy Spirit to give both us and our counselees “all spiritual wisdom and understanding,” which Douglas Moo describes as the “ability to discern the truth and to make good decisions based on that truth.”⁴ For believers to reflect their union with Christ, we must pray for the grace to walk by the Spirit (Galatians 5:22-24).
Both the counselor and counselee are dependent upon God’s wisdom to live in light of the gospel. What an encouragement we thus have in James 1:5: “If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him.” James 3:17 then gives us a description of the fruit of spiritual wisdom: “But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere.” This is what we aim to see in our lives and in those whom we help, therefore we must continuously pray for the work of the Holy Spirit to grant the filling of knowledge of God’s will. To that end, A. W. Pink wrote: “It is not sufficient to have a general, superficial knowledge of the Word: it must be translated into practice, and spiritual insight is required for that, so that we may perceive when and where and how to perform each action.… Only that wisdom which comes from above will enable us to order our lives in every relation and situation according to the revealed will of God.”⁵ As we hold out the Word of Truth to others, there is biblical hope for change and perseverance (Romans 15:4, 13) as we “continue steadfastly in prayer, being watchful in it with thanksgiving” (Colossians 4:2).
¹ Kent Hughes, Preaching the Word (Crossway, 2013), 219.
² John MacArthur, Colossians & Philemon Commentary (Moody, 1992), 27.
³ Source unknown.
⁴ Brian Hedges, Christ All Sufficient: An Exposition of Colossians, quoting Douglas Moo (Shepherd Press, 2016), 39.
⁵ A. W. Pink, Gleanings from Paul (Banner of Truth Trust, 2006), 314.