Church: Reformed Baptist Church of Franconia | Text: Colossians 1:9-14 | Date: October 18, 2020 | Speaker: Fred Zaspel

Observations About Paul’s Prayer

I forgot entirely to mention something last week—just a couple of observations about Paul’s prayer. Verses 9 to 14 now record the prayer, but he introduces it at the end of verse 3 and then verses 4 and 5. But particularly—well, yeah. Verse 3: “We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and the love that you have for all the saints.”

A couple of observations here about Paul’s prayer, and then we’ll get into that in verses 9 and following. First of all, Paul says he heard of their faith. That’s an interesting expression. It’s not just that he heard that they’d made a decision, but there was something about these people that evidently Epaphras could report to Paul—that he hears about their faith and their love. These people have been transformed, and now Epaphras is back to the Apostle Paul telling him about what has transpired in the experience and the life of these people in Colossae. So their lives have been transformed by the gospel. We saw that last time, and that’s one expression of it. Their faith and their love was something that could be reported.

The other observation I wanted to make was, notice verse 3: Paul is thanking God, verse 4, for their faith and love. He’s not thanking them for their faith and their love; he’s thanking God for their faith and love. Why would you thank God for someone else’s faith? And of course, you’re at Reformed Baptist Church; you know the answer to that. But this kind of acknowledgement of God’s sovereignty over all things is just pervasive in Paul, so that when he sees transformed lives, he immediately thanks God for it. God has been at work in these people. God has given them faith. God has given them love. And so Paul thanks God for their faith and their love.

The Structure Of The Prayer

All right, then verses 9 and following that we’ve read through verse 14 record the content of the prayer that he gives. Let’s take just a minute and make sure we understand the structure of the prayer. Essentially here, Paul is praying that the gospel will prove effective in their lives. And it’s really rather one—it’s just one rather complex thought through the prayer. So let’s break it down before we work our way through the details of it.

Verse 9: he’s asking, praying, asking for something. Specifically, what he’s asking is that they be filled with the knowledge of God’s will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding. So that’s his request: praying that they will be filled with the knowledge of God’s will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.

But it’s not just an understanding that he’s after. There’s a goal to it. And that’s verse 10: filled with the knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, “so as,” that is, in order to, “walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to Him.” So he’s praying that they have an understanding of God’s will so that it shows up in their life.

Now the rest of the passage then unpacks what is it that this worthy walk looks like. And we have here four participles that describe this worthy walk. It’s the “ing” words there. So he’s praying, asking that God fill them with the knowledge of the will so they walk worthy of the Lord:
1. Bearing fruit in every good work.
2. Increasing in the knowledge of God.
3. Being strengthened with all power according to His glorious might for endurance.
4. Giving thanks.

So: bearing fruit, increasing in the knowledge of God, being strengthened, and giving thanks. That’s the fourfold description of the worthy walk that he’s praying they will have by means of a clear grasp of God’s will.

So that in a nutshell is what Paul is praying here. That’s the structure of the passage. Once again, he’s praying, verse 9, asking specifically that God fill them with the knowledge of His will, so that, verse 10, they can walk worthy of the Lord. And that worthy walk is described as bearing fruit, increasing in the knowledge of God, being strengthened, and giving thanks. All right, so that’s where we’ll go this morning.

Notice again, the prayer is for an understanding, but not just understanding for its own sake, but understanding the will of God so as to live accordingly. And he says in verse 9, he’s been praying this since the day he heard of it. Since the day, verse 3 and 4, that he heard of their faith and love, Paul has been praying for them in this regard. “Ever since I heard of your faith, this is what I’ve been praying for.”

Understanding God’s Will

All right, verse 9. Let’s start working through the details. “Asking that you might be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.” That expression “filled” obviously does not mean spatially filled. Filled with the knowledge of His will. The knowledge of God’s will is not a package that comes filling up the space of your body or something like that. Clearly, it’s a metaphor that means something like what you are filled with is that which becomes your dominant characteristic.

So, for example, in Romans chapter 1, Paul describes the lost as filled with unrighteousness. That’s their dominant characteristic. Or in Romans chapter 15, Paul prays that they will be filled with peace. That becomes a dominant characteristic in their lives. Or Romans 15 verse 14: filled with goodness. So goodness becomes the dominant characteristic. Or in Philippians chapter 1, Paul prays that the Philippians will be filled with the fruit of righteousness. So that’s what dominates and characterizes them. So that’s the idea: to be filled with something is to have that become the dominant characteristic. So filled with the knowledge of His will, that is, characterized by—praying that you will be people who are characterized by an understanding of what God wants for you.

And then he says—he really packs it out here—”in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.” Now, we’ve just had some studies in Proverbs. You’re familiar with the concept of wisdom in scripture. It means a skill; particularly, wisdom in biblical thought is the skill of living under God, the skill of living successfully for God, and so on. Spiritual wisdom and understanding. That pair of virtues is used several times in the Old Testament. We actually read into it recently in Pastor Boyd’s messages on Exodus, where we have Bezalel and Aholiab. I just have to hesitate before I pronounce those so I get it right. I still may have it wrong. Bezalel and Aholiab, remember, these are the guys that built the furnishings and built the tabernacle. They were filled with spiritual wisdom, wisdom and understanding by the Spirit of God. David prayed for the same for Solomon, that this would be characteristic of him, that he would have wisdom and understanding.

And there’s one place in the Old Testament where it shows up that I think is particularly significant. If you’d like, turn there—we’ll be right back to Colossians—but look at Isaiah chapter 11. Here we have a famous messianic prophecy. Isaiah chapter 11, let’s look at verses 1 to 4:

“There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse, and a branch from his roots shall bear fruit. The spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord.”

Now notice the result of this. The Messiah will be endued with the spirit of wisdom and understanding, counsel and might, the knowledge and fear of the Lord. Notice what happens as a result:

“His delight shall be in the fear of the Lord. He shall not judge by what his eyes see or decide disputes by what his ears hear, but with righteousness he shall judge the poor and decide with equity for the meek of the earth.”

So when Messiah comes, this branch of David, when he comes, he’s going to be in a ruling position, and when he judges, his judgment is not going to be muddied by silly excuses, deflections, or anything else, but he’ll see clearly what God requires and he’ll render judgments accordingly. Such a commitment and such an insight to God’s will and what God has commanded that his judgments will be infallible. So he’s talking here about the ability to discern what is right and what is wrong and then make decisions accordingly. That’s what Messiah will do. Paul now is praying for that with us—that we will have that kind of a grasp of God’s will that is not muddied by other considerations, lazy excuses, or whatever, but will have a clear grasp of God’s will.

Verse 10: for this purpose, “so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to Him.” So again, not learning for learning’s sake, but it’s a life-oriented kind of learning: learning God’s will so that you may walk. That’s that Pauline metaphor of life. So that you may live, have a manner of life worthy of the Lord and fully pleasing to Him. That is a life that reflects a knowledge of God, an understanding of His will, and a life then that pleases Christ in every way. Such a clear grasp of what God wants for you that it shows up in the way you live. That’s the essence of the prayer. And in fact, “fully pleasing to Him.” In every way, pleasing to Christ. So the prayer is that we’ll understand what God wants so that we may live accordingly and serve Him.

All right, verses 9 and 10. He prays that they will be characterized by an understanding of God’s will so that they can live accordingly. I should make an aside here. At least in the generation of evangelicalism and fundamentalism that I grew up in, there was just a lot of misunderstanding about this expression, “God’s will.” What is God’s will? And almost always when you hear it in popular Christian context, it has to do with some individualized life decision. Should I buy this car? Should I marry this girl or this guy? Looking for God’s will. And most often in those contexts, God’s will was some kind of a secret that he’d hidden in a bush somewhere, and it was your job as a faithful Christian to find it—what God’s will is.

I had a young man one time years ago; he found a really great gal, asked her to marry him, and right up until almost the day of the wedding, he was just tortured by the question, “Is this God’s will?” And I had a terrible time trying to rid him of those kinds of thinking. “Well, what does God say what you want in a wife? Does she meet that? Okay, what’s your question?” But yeah, “But is this God’s will for me?” And you torture yourselves with questions like that that the Bible never asks you to torture yourself with. God’s will in scripture is always like we find here: find out what He tells you to do and do it. And if you want to make decisions within that, that’s great. The same God that has given you a mind does not intend for you to forego the use of it. But within this framework that God has given you, that’s God’s will.

Now, might God have a particular will for somebody to do? Did God call particularly William Carey to the mission work that he had? I suppose he did. But I don’t think it’s a matter of “is this or is this not,” and it’s a discovery that I have to find confirmation, but if God wants you to do it, then do it. Usually, in my experience as a pastor, this “God’s will” thing has—Pastor Boyd, Pastor Greg, I’ll bet you you could affirm the same thing—it seems like most of the time when it is, it’s someone who’s wanting to get out of doing something. They don’t want to serve anymore. “And I prayed about it and sure enough, that was God’s will. He told me. And so I’m not going to do that anymore. I’m not going to teach. I’m not going to go to church” or whatever it is. “It’s God’s will because He told me.” And it’s just a use of the “God’s will” idea that’s foreign to the New Testament. What we’re to do is look and see what does God require of us and do it. And don’t be puzzled over other kinds of considerations. Any questions before I go on on that?

Yeah, Pastor Boyd. Absolutely. Well, you can’t argue with it. God gets blamed for a lot of things. I remember having a neighbor years ago whose daughter wanted to go to University of Pennsylvania. And of course, the tuition was outrageous. And her dad, our neighbor, was going to be footing the bill. And he really didn’t want her to go there; it was too much money. But then she laid this on him: “I’ve prayed about it, Dad, and this is God’s will.” And he said to me, “What am I supposed to say to that?” I told him, I said, “Well, you should say that if it’s God’s will for you to go there, then He better tell me it’s His will for me to pay for it somehow.”

It’s like that time when Spurgeon, Charles Spurgeon, was walking up the steps to the Metropolitan Tabernacle one Sunday morning. Some young man came running up to catch him on the steps and he said, “Mr. Spurgeon, Mr. Spurgeon,” caught up to him. “God told me to tell you that I was to preach today.” Spurgeon looked at him and said, “Yeah, but God told me to tell you that He changed His mind.”

There’s a lot of mysticism that goes on. And my point in bringing this up is just to show that that’s not the way the New Testament uses the expression of God’s will. Theologians have distinguished two wills of God. There’s the decretive will of God—God decrees—and then there’s the commanding or preceptive will of God—God commands you to do something. So “Let there be light”—there’s the decretive will of God. That’s not quite the same as “Thou shalt not kill.” So there’s decretive and a preceptive will, but we don’t find this mysterious, mystical way in the scriptures.

Yeah, Ian. It’s—yeah, the terminology is not used in that way either. It does get—some questions do get a little subjective. But my point is I don’t think we should get to this torturous aspect. Lloyd-Jones, for example, to follow up on that kind of illustration, Lloyd-Jones said when somebody, when a young man would tell him he thinks he’s called to preach, his advice to him would be, “I don’t think you should do it unless you have to.” I think that’s pretty good advice. If you could be happy doing something else, God’s not pointing to that.

Myself as an example, I never really wrestled with going into the ministry on that level. I wrestled with it on another level. When I was in high school, I desperately wanted to learn the word and I wanted to minister the word. I was deeply convinced that I was completely incompetent to do it. I saw what my dad did in ministry preaching and teaching, and I thought, “I can’t do that. There’s just no way I can do it.” I struggled on that level. Finally decided—it’s really funny—I finally decided on the basis of 1 Corinthians 5: “Faithful is he who calls you who also will do it.” Then okay, if God calls me to this, He’ll equip me for it. What I didn’t realize at that point is that that verse really has nothing to do with that. So I went into the ministry on a misapplication of a verse.

But I do think that there is that broad principle that Paul’s dealing with. And so maybe put it this way: I don’t think William Carey said, “I really am burdened to take the gospel to the foreign places where they’ve never heard it. But I’m not sure God wants me to do that.” No. “I’m burdened to do this, and I’ve got to do it.” And he did what he wanted to do because God had given him that burden to do it. I don’t think you have to wrestle on that mystical level of “is it or is it not.” If there is the ability, if there is the giftedness, and there’s confirmation of that, if there’s opportunity… Many a young man has been convinced that he had the gift of preaching and couldn’t quite understand that no one else had the gift of listening. And there’s confirmation ways like that, so. But yeah, my main—oh yes, Renee.

Yeah, right. Right. Yep. It gets silly. I had a youth pastor once say that he was debating on the decision whether or not to come and he opened his briefcase and a pen rolled out and it landed straight up where it said “Meadow Hills Baptist Church.” He said that was God’s signal to me. I think the point is find what God has commanded. If He has burdened you to serve, serve. If there’s a decision to make in it, make the decision. But don’t add the complicating factor of “Does God really want this or not?” If it’s within what He has commanded, yeah. Now, if there’s reasons not to, then don’t. But don’t complicate it with all that. I thought it would be. It’s all right.

Well, I think you have to consider the biblical principles of all. That’s what I had in mind earlier when I said usually people use this for a way to get out of service. I think it’s the same as with the New Testament idea of giftedness. How do you know if you’re gifted for something? Is there opportunity? Am I able? Is there confirmation of that? Am I supposed to serve the Lord? Yeah. How can I serve the Lord? Well, here’s the gifts I have. I’m going to do it. That must be God’s will. I think it works like that. And if you’re going to say, “I’m serving the Lord in this particular capacity, but now I don’t want to,” I think it’s a cop-out to say, “Well, God has led me away.” What are the circumstances? Where will I serve God? How will I serve Him? Things like that. OK.

Actually, there are a plethora of books on finding God’s will that were written, particularly in the last generation. And a lot of them just, I think, make it more complex than it needs to be. There have been two or three really good ones that I think are helpful on that. One was by Bruce Waltke that attaches this mystical idea that we have in Christian circles back to pagan ideas and shows how it’s just incompatible with the biblical teaching. But there’s another one by Sinclair Ferguson that’s very helpful. And it just deals with these broad principles that the New Testament gives. Make your decisions within that. And don’t complicate it by factors that you can’t know.

Yeah, Joe. I’m sure I wanted to go here about one Christian radio show I listen to—he does a good job, but he kind of puts it this way. He says, OK, someone will ask me, “Well, I’m at this job. Is it God’s will for me to be at this job?” And he says, “Yes.” How do I know that? You’re there. That’s right. That’s right. Am I wrong, or does that not leave any room for disobeying God’s will and going somewhere where you’re not supposed to go, like a Jonah or something?

Well, in the case of Jonah, you have direct revelation—God telling him. I don’t think we can count on that today. So it’s a different category. But let’s take the job idea. Is it God’s will for you to be there? Yes. Is it God’s will for you to switch jobs? Could be. What would you like? How do you think it would fit best with your abilities? How do you think it would fit best with your providing for your family? You make those decisions accordingly, but not based on “I’m gonna pray and God’s gonna zap me and yep, that’s it, got it now.”

Pastor Greg. Oh, Pastor Boyd, okay. Right, that’s right. But God makes no precept as to whether you should work at Hatfield or at the competitor. There’s no precept involved and there’s just wisdom for you to make your decision. That’s right. If I can do this for the glory of God and fulfilling the guidance and the commands that He’s given me in His word, then I can do it with confidence. Job choice, marry this girl or not, whatever. Yes?

“In that I have a missionary friend who I hadn’t thought of for a while, and I suddenly got what we would call a burden to really pray for this person. Well, obviously, praying is within God’s realm. So I prayed for this person, I jotted their note, I sent their letter, and within a week, the country they’re ministering in was in major civil upheaval. Is there a place—or I’ve had some times—that God can use our, what we call, emotion to direct people within Him? Absolutely. To create them. Absolutely. Or is that just coincidence?”

Absolutely. With this caveat: can I at that moment say, “God has told me”? I could be mistaken. Right. But I’ve tried to make it a practice decades ago. When I was first entering the ministry, my dad gave me some, I thought, really good counsel. If you feel a prompt to pray for someone, you should do it. And you stop at that moment and you pray. And can God do unusual things? Yeah, He can do unusual things too.

I remember one time—this will freak you out, and this is going to put us into another category entirely, and I shouldn’t bring it up—but I remember this is probably 50 years ago, more than that. We were living in Bartonville, Illinois. I was just a little boy. My dad was driving home from somewhere, and he got the notion—who knows from where—he’s going to drive around the block before he comes home. He drives around the block, and he sees this old man sitting up on his porch. “I should go talk to him about the gospel.” You know, you shake your head. “All right, I’ll drive around the block again.” He drives around the block again. Well, by this time, you’re having this wrestling of conscience. “Is it God’s will” and all of that? “And I’ll drive around again.” I think it was four times or something. He drives around the block, and he finally decided, “Okay, Lord, if he’s still there, I’ll go talk to him.”

And sure enough, the guy’s still there. Dad pulls in the guy’s driveway, walks up to the porch, and he introduces himself. “I’m a pastor at the church down the road here. I just felt like I should come and talk to you about the gospel.” The guy started crying. He said, “I don’t know anything about Christ, but I’ve just been telling the Lord that I need to know—I’m getting old, and I need someone to talk to me.” And he came to Christ. Understand that, yeah, God can do it. But at the same time, I don’t think Dad could have said with confidence, “It is God’s will; He has told me that I’ve done.” He could have just as well been wrong. Like I said, I shouldn’t have opened up that can of worms.

Yeah? “I’m looking for a job and I’m frightened about it. Are you? You’re going to leave the school? So I make a decision, I choose that job—after the fact, now I know it was God’s will to put me in that job.” Yeah, His decreed will. “How do I respond to that worldly view that says, ‘Well, you just used free will to make that decision, and now you say God put you there’?” Well, you have used your will. God works through your will. Am I missing something? Just like when you’re saved. Did you believe? Was that you believing? Yeah, of course it was. Did God give it to you? Yeah. They come together.

Pastor Boyd. I think a lot of times when Christians think about God’s decreed will, then they think that eliminates our liberty to make choices. That just isn’t the case. You know, we may say, “Well, I don’t understand how that’s even…” That’s OK. There’s lots of things I’ve got here. That’s right. Same with regard to prayer and divine sovereignty. Why pray if He’s going to do it? If nothing else, because He said to. There’s more to it, but if nothing else, it’s that.

Pastor Greg. I was just going to say that Paul is actually praying that very thing: that the will and the mind—Exactly. I think that’s great. He’s saying here that he wants you, His people, to have such an insight into what God wants that, as he says, in every way, at every turn, they say, “Here’s how I can serve God. Here’s how I can serve God.” It’s just that we shouldn’t confuse it with unknown factors. I don’t know how to say it more precisely.

For me, just as an encouragement to young people, I know when you’re young and you’re thinking, “What profession, what job am I going to choose? Where am I going to live? Who am I going to marry?” These seem like huge things, and you can be gripped. This may sound impious, but I never wrestled at all about whether or not I should marry Kim. I never once thought, “Lord, is this your will?” To me, I was pretty clear it was. I love it. But you know, here’s a girl who is 1, 2, 3, 4, 5—she meets it all. This is all that God has ever asked of me. And yeah, I want to. Done. Will she do it? Well, we’ll find out.

Yes? “Subjective decision that God wanted them to go to seminary and God wanted them to be in dentistry. And then they have this horrible experience and that never unfolds in God’s promise. And they have lost the income all over the years. They have not prepared themselves for another field of work. It’s one of the great tragedies of this idea.” Yep, your generation and mine. I always loved Master Martin’s statement to the young man. He said, “If you want to become a man, God wants you to preach. He knows where you are.” Yeah, that’s right. That’s right. Your generation and mine had a heavy emphasis on that in the pulpit—that if you’re a young man who wants to serve the Lord, you’re supposed to go in the pastorate. And a lot of guys with wonderful hearts and wonderful intentions went into something that they weren’t gifted for. Yep. Yep. Yep. Yep. Yep.

Laura. “And relying on Him and seeking His will in prayer in terms of giving me the wisdom to make the right decisions. And I found sometimes I feel like I’m too far that way and I don’t have that communion that I was looking for in that personal relationship with Christ.” I’m glad you brought that up because there’s everything, Blake. And so I might pray, “Lord, direct my feelings, direct me in my decisions. This is where I think I should go.” But I don’t add that extra mystical factor: “Well, I want to, and it seems right, but I’m just not sure—God hasn’t told me yet.” That’s a complicating factor that the New Testament never lays on us.

All right. I thought I would open a can of worms; I didn’t know it would take the rest of the lecture. Okay, well now I want to work through the characterizations of this worthy walk. And we don’t have time for it, but notice them again: bearing fruit in every good work, increasing in the knowledge of God… records of your will to be sure. 9 to 12 or false prayer.