"Paul's Prayer" (Part 2) - Colossians 1:9-14

Sir George Adam Smith tells how he and his guide were climbing the Weisshorn in the Swiss Alps. It was stormy and they were making their climb on the sheltered side of the peak. When they reached the summit, they were filled with the exhilaration. Sir George forgot about the fierce winds, leaped up and was nearly blown over the edge to the glacier below! The guide grabbed hold of him and exclaimed: "On your knees, sir. You are safe here only on your knees!"

And here we are today… many of us still struggling with prayer. For many today, we are so affected by the pragmatic philosophies of this world that the common response from honest people when asked why they do not pray… it does not work. This is a fundamental response of the philosophy of pragmatism. If it works great, if it does not toss it out. But we can’t because God wants us to pray. But He is not playing by the current culture rules. So again are we being affected by the culture in that we will decide value of something based on whether its works to accomplish the values of the world? But Shane I could spend an hour in prayer or I could get a lot of stuff I need to get done on my to do list. Many of us will choose to get stuff done instead. One person even told me that he can get more done in 1 hour of work then God can get done. But we in the scriptures that the beauty of prayer in not about what it will do for us as much as it is about what it will do to us.

Wisdom and understanding of the fullness of the knowledge of the will of God will not only help us to get the right perspective on prayer, but will also keep our prayers from being an abomination. Really?

Proverbs 28:9 NLT

God detests the prayers of a person who ignores the law.

Wow Shane that is even more discouraging. So I finally make time to pray and now your telling me that my prayers can even offend God when I do it. It is no secret, when we make offerings to the Lord we do not give the scraps and leftovers of our time. He desires the best. But Shane I am a busy person, God should be happy that He is getting any time from me at all. You can believe that, but the Bible is making it clear that even prayer can be an a front to the living God. But, prayer is pleasing to God. You bet. But not every prayer. Matter of fact there are many things that we think we do all day long that is pleasing to God, but my question today is… is it? Are you sure that what you are doing is pleasing to God?

Well the good news today is that the Apostle Paul is gonna help us with this. He is gonna give us some insight into what it is that really pleases God. Remember we do not take our cues from the World and its philosophy, but from the scriptures… the very breath of God. I mean is it just me or don’t you think that God would know what really pleases Him? So let’s let Him tell us.

Colossians 1:9–14 ESV

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, so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him: bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God; being strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy; giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light. He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

Walk in a Manner

The 4 Petals

Delivered and Transferred

The first thing we will look at today is the reason why the apostle Paul prays for wisdom and understanding of the will of God: To be pleasing to the Lord. Second, we will look the 4 things he lists to describe what pleasing God looks like. The 4 petals of the Colossian flower. Third we will find hope in the beautiful work of Christ in delivering us from the domain of darkness and transferring us to the kingdom of Christ.

Thesis: Though sin, the pattern of this world, and false ideals from current culture cause us to lose sight of what really is pleasing to the Lord, it is the truth of scripture and the power of the Holy Spirit that will cause us to see in fullness, the will of God and desire to please the Lord living lives worthy of the Lord because we have been delivered from darkness and transferred to the kingdom of Christ.

I. Walk in a Manner

- Walking in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him.

A. Are we able to do this today? Do we know how to do this today? But what does this even mean? The purpose of the the petition that Paul prays for the Colossians to be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and understanding is so that they will walk in a manner worthy of the Lord and be fulling pleasing to the Lord. What does this mean?

B. The way the original is showing is that Paul is telling us that to live a life that is worthy of the Lord is to walk in a way that fully pleases the Lord. But to illustrate this further lets look at something very close to my experience and upbringing. It is called a shame culture.

C. In a shame culture, like my Japanese culture, one of the worst things that you could ever do in life is to bring shame upon your family. There are clear no no’s when it comes to behavior and values that people in these cultures will go through extraordinary lengths to avoid because it would dishonor the family even to the point where it is better to die than to bring shame upon the family or village.

D. Dr. DA Carson writes, Not long ago a Korean student pursuing a research degree at a well-known British university approached me to ask if I could give him some advice. His problem was both simple and complex. At the simple level, he was failing rather badly in all his work, and it was clear the university was going to squeeze him out of the program. He needed to come to terms with this hard reality. Yet at a deeper level, he had to deal with his family back home in Seoul. His mother and father had sacrificed to send him to the United Kingdom, and they could not conceive of the possibility that their son would not make the grade. The student was utterly distraught. His parents and siblings were pressuring him to succeed in some way—to transfer to another university, perhaps, or to another program, or to another degree. If he were to return home without a degree, he would bring devastating shame on the entire family.

E. With some exceptions like some of my upbringing and others, our culture is not a shame culture, but rugged individualism reigns true. We do celebrate and applaud when we break away from and exert independence from the norms and values of our heritage. If you want to more on this, I have a chapter where I deal with individualism in my book Gospel Shaped Community. But in a shame culture, you have got to be worthy.

F. But in a shame culture, people are taught that they must be worthy of their family’s name, worthy of their country, worthy of their heritage. And many of the cultures of the 1st century, including Colossae, have similar patterns to that of a shame culture, but Paul does not arouse them with living a life worthy of the church or our church family, but to live up to the family’s Lord! This is huge.

G. In our culture to live a life worthy of the Lord would be understood as one way to live; an option so to speak. Something to consider. Something to try to implement. Not necessarily as something to prefer death over.

H. One commentator writes, But in Paul’s world, to be a Christian, to confess Jesus as Lord, meant to adopt a worldview in which you are bound to please him in every way. Not to do so would be to bring shame on him whom you have confessed as Lord. And it is better to die than to let this happen. Today do we look at our walk with Christ as something of this sort? Would we rather die than bring shame to our Lord? Is all our motivation to live and breathe to please Christ in all things? Does my speech and conduct pleasing to the Lord or does it bring shame to Him? What pleases my Lord and what doers not bring to Him shame? Paul does not leave it abstract or theoretical. He tells us.

II. The 4 Petals

- The 4 petals of the Colossian Flower.

A. For the most part flowers are pleasing. Even as a man who can grow a beard, I think that most flowers smell good and gives off a pleasing oder. And the Apostle Paul actually gives us four things that will bring pleasure to our Lord and not shame Him. I like to see them as petals of a flower a Colossian flower to help me remember. He gives us four participles to show us what it is to be pleasing to the Lord. Quickly, these are not the only traits of a believer, but these are in fact 4 things that really are pleasing to God, we do not have to guess. Petal 1.

B. Bearing Fruit. Bearing fruit is what happens when we become Christians. There must be fruit and bearing fruit pleases the Lord.

Ephesians 2:10 ESV

For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

C. God is pleased when He sees works as a result of the fruit of the spirit working in the lives of His people.

Galatians 5:22–23 NLT

But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things!

D. These characteristics are not unclear, pretty plain, and hard to dispute. You either see it or not. Its either there or its not. And if it is there then it is pleasing to the Lord.

E. The second petal is Growing in Knowledge of God. Like bearing fruit, christians are supposed to grow. A life worthy of Christ is one that is growing in the knowledge of God. Are we learning about who God is? Are we learning all that the scriptures reveal about God? Oh but Shane why do I gotta learn doctrine and theology and all that stuff. Because growing in knowledge about God is pleasing to Him. We got so many questions in our world about why He does what He does, but no real knowledge about who He is and what He has already done.

John 7:17 NLT

Anyone who wants to do the will of God will know whether my teaching is from God or is merely my own.

F. The third petal is endurance and patience. What is amazing about this, is how being strengthened is pictured. Paul is praying for power. He is praying for the Christians in Colossae to be empowered by God. Paul prays that God will give them power. And we see from a quick purview of the Greek that it is the same power used to describe the power used for the resurrection of Christ. And what is striking here… Paul says that there demonstration of this power would not be signs and wonders, the miraculous, or even the actual raising people from the dead…but it will be demonstrated by their endurance and patience.

G. The picture is the kind of stamina and patience that will get under a burden and carry it with fortitude. It is the kind of stamina that can keep a person under the weight of suffering and trouble. The kind of endurance and patience that will cause a person to withstand the winds and waves of trial and tribulations. And in our day and aid we don’t not want to endure suffering we run from it. We don’t want to exercise patience with joy we want answers and solutions now. We are running away and undoing all that we see right here in the scriptures as that which pleases the Lord.

H. I heard one preacher this week say that suffering and hardships is not the will of God. God does not want this He finds no pleasure in it. Preachers are saying this and have been saying it for years. We get some difficulty in life. We got some problems in life. We got things happening that cause us great suffering and instead of seeing this as an opportunity to do what is pleasing to the Lord. We eject. We run. We blame God. We do not take joy. When we are enduring the Lord is taking joy in us. You wanna be pleasing to the Lord? Endure your suffering show great patience in all the circumstances you are facing right now. I can prove it to you right now.

Revelation 2:2–3 NLT

“I know all the things you do. I have seen your hard work and your patient endurance. I know you don’t tolerate evil people. You have examined the claims of those who say they are apostles but are not. You have discovered they are liars. You have patiently suffered for me without quitting.

I. The Lord commends the church in Ephesus for their patient endurance. He is pleased that they are suffering and not quitting. Get it together today. Do we really know what it is to be pleasing to God. The things we are doing as being taught from pulpits in America today is not pleasing the Lord but offending Him and making him sick to his stomach.

J. We are to bear fruit and bear the fruit of the spirit of motivations and characteristics of love joy peace patience kindness goodness faithfulness and self-control. We are to grow in the knowledge of God and we continue to be a culture more and more biblically illiterate and theological lightweights if at all. And instead of preaching endurance and patience with joy through suffering, we life coach our way out, divorce our way out, buy our way out, manipulate our way out, we even try to pray our way out. God we cannot take this get us out, do your job, you promised us, you owe it to us. But you enduring hardship and showing patience with joy is what pleases me. Its not what pleases me. Are we pleasing the Lord in the modern evangelical church today? Are we really?

III. Delivered and Transferred

- The beauty of the gospel of Jesus.

A. The last petal of the Colossians flower is thanksgiving. Are we displaying thanksgiving to the Lord. To not be thankful is to display one of the most horrendous things we could as Christians. To do this is to act as those who have completely forgotten that He has given us a share of the inheritance of the kingdom of Christ.

B. What Paul is saying is that to live a life worthy of Jesus Christ, our Lord, is to overflow with joyful and meaningful thanksgiving in the light of the salvation we have received from the gift of His Son given so much. Don’t you think that if we have been transferred out of the dominion of darkness and into the kingdom of the risen Lord Jesus, our only appropriate response should be joyful gratitude. Don’t you think?

C. But today, lots of what we hear in the modern church is more ingratitude in the sense that we feel God to display ingratitude. How do we figure? We are disappointed in Him. He gave the greatest gift ever given, but it is not enough He needs to give us more. So in many ways we feel like the Lord is not grateful for all that we have done for Him.

D. But follow me here, we feel that God owes us. I was reading something I thought illustrates this well. A dog was laying on the carpet disappointed with His ungrateful owner who left him home alone again. The dog thinks why did my human abandon me again does he not understand all that I have done for him. The UPS guys came many times over the years to kill them and I barked with all I got to scare them away. Not too mention the FedEx guy and the murderous mailman that I scare away to keep them safe on a daily basis. I saved their lives so many times… they don’t even give me a bite of that wonderful smelling steak they made last night. Why are they so ungrateful?

E. We do the same. By our actions we show that we accuse the Lord of being ungrateful. This is why we are disappointed. We even feel like God is not grateful that we have been grateful to Him all this time. I have given so much to His church. I have studied my Bible all my life. I have been nice to people. I put up with a lot in life. I did not divorce my mean and nasty husband. I have gone to church every Sunday for years now. I volunteered for a lot of community outreach programs. I do and I do and I do and He does not give back. He does not help. I didn’t ask for much. Why. He let me down. He does not care. He is so ungrateful.

F. Our problem today is not just that we are ungrateful, but by our actions accuse the Lord of being ungrateful. He has given us the greatest gift that could ever be given and we have so much in store for us. Have we forgotten all that Christ has brought to us today? Have we forgotten the astonishing salvation He has brought to us today?

G. Do we need to be reminded that Christ came into this world to seek and save that which was lost. Reminded that Jesus died for our sins according to the scriptures and he was buried and he was raised on the third day according to the scriptures. The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance that Christ Jesus came into this world to save sinners. He personally carried our sins in his body on the cross so that we can be dead to sin and live for what is right. By his wounds you are healed. And now we add...

Colossians 1:13–14 NLT

For he has rescued us from the kingdom of darkness and transferred us into the Kingdom of his dear Son, who purchased our freedom and forgave our sins.

H. We have an inheritance in Christ. We have a kingdom to be a part of. We have life and life more abundant in Christ. But in sin we want to give it all away for fleeting and sinful things. Give away a birthright for a bowl of stew. But there is salvation for us.

I. The Bible says that if we confess with our mouths that Jesus is Lord and believe in our hearts that God raised Him from the dead you will be saved. All who call upon the name of the Lord will be saved. Believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of the living God and you will have life in His name. Repent and believe. If you confess your sins He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

J. So today I pray that you will add this prayer from Paul to your prayer list. And we will pray as he does. Praying that we will receive form God the complete knowledge of His will consisting of the wisdom and understanding that the Spirit gives so that we will lives worthy of our Lord Jesus pleasing him fully in that we bear fruit, grow in the knowledge of God, be strengthened with power for great endurance and patience with joy and being thankful for the astonishing salvation he has given us in Christ. Pray that we will be a pleasing smell of the Colossian flower… lives worthy of the Lord.

"On your knees, family. You are safe here only on your knees!"