Pray for One Another

we have not ceased to pray for you…

Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. And He who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. Romans 8:26-27

Continuing with Paul’s Prayers…

As we pray for one another, not just those we know personally, but for Christians spread throughout the world, let us learn from Paul’s examples:

Persistence – we have not ceased to pray for you,

Thankfulness – We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you,

and the specifics of his requests which help us understand that it’s through God’s power and strength that lives are changed.

Colossians 1:3-5a, 9-14

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 of the love that you have for all the saints, because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. 

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.

Notice the similarities of Paul’s requests and his continued reliance on God to work in the life of believers in this Prayer from Ephesians.

Ephesians 3:14-21

For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of His glory He may grant you

  • to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in your inner being,
  • so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—
  • that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge,
  • that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever.  Amen.

Yellow Flowers with Bible verse, For we do not know what to pray for as we ought

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