Epaphras, who is one of you and a servant of Christ Jesus, sends greetings. He is always wrestling in prayer for you, that you may stand firm in all the will of God, mature and fully assured.
Summary: Epaphras’s prayer is a wonderful model of what to pray for ourselves and each other.
In this passage, we learn a bit more about Epaphras.* Paul says he is “one of you” which I take to mean he is originally from Colossae. Somewhere along the line, Epaphras must have met up with Paul because Paul explains that Epaphras brought the Gospel to Colossae “on our behalf.”
To review, here is what we know about Epaphras:
- He is a Colossian
- He is a “fellow servant”
- He is a “faithful minister of Christ”
- He worked as a minister on behalf of Paul.
- He reported about the Colossian’s “love in the Spirit.”
- He is a servant of Christ Jesus.
- He is a prayer warrior.
Finally, there is his prayer for the Colossians. He wants his fellow believers in Colossae to “stand firm in all the will of God, mature and fully assured.”
Why?
Once, when Paul and his companions were in Philippi, he was thrown in jail for casting out a spirit out of a woman who had been following them around. When God arranged an earthquake and to have their chains loosened in the middle of the night, the jailer was terrified. When he came to his senses, he asked the most important question ever:
“Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” (Acts 16:30)
Paul’s answer was simple. He says, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved …” (Acts 16:31).
Believe and be saved.
It really is that simple, but there is a caveat. What if we have doubts? What if we are struggling with sin? What if someone teaches us something different than Paul’s gospel?
The answer is in Epaphras’s prayer.
He prays that “you may stand firm in all the will of God, mature and fully assured.”
There are four things here to consider:
- Standing firm.
- The will of God.
- Maturity in our faith.
- Assurance in our relationship with Jesus.
All four are related. If we don’t know the will of God, it is impossible to stand firm in it.
Maturity in our faith is the foundation for standing firm. If we don’t mature, we will struggle with our standing.
Assurance in our relationship with Jesus is an outgrowth of knowing the will of God, being mature in our faith, and standing firm.
If you need something to pray for, these four things Epaphras prays for the Colossians are a good place to start.
Application: Know the will of God so that you can mature in faith, stand firm, and find assurance in your relationship with Jesus.
Food for Thought: What does it mean to mature in our faith?
*We first visited Epaphras in our post on Colossians 1:7, “Two Servants”
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To mature in the faith is to grow up spiritually. It is to grow in an ever increasing relationship with Christ and become more and more like Him.
2 Corinthians 3: 18: And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate a the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.
Ephesians 4: 11 – 16: So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, 12to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up 13until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ. 14Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming. 15Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ. 16From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.
Thank you, Rich!
The 2 Corinthians passage offers us a practical clue:
“with unveiled faces contemplate a the Lord’s glory“
What does it mean to mature in our faith?
Our maturing as physical beings is a process initiated by God and limited to a predetermined period of time on earth. This physical housing for our spirits. Our genetic make up, culture and status in earthly humanity have each been determined by God.
God has placed an eternal spirit within each housing, and provides “His Holy Spirit” to all, insuring each and every person has knowledge of His standards of right and wrong, John 16:8.
How we each respond to the conviction of His Spirit, the choices we make, our actions as we exist, confined within these bodies, are all ours and will be judged by God as being of eternal value or temporary worldly vapor.
It is up to each person to choose whether we live by the desires of this temporary housing of flesh, seeking temporary gratification. praise of this world or receive and live lives feeding the eternal spirit being housed in these bodies. Growing less dependent on ourselves, our flesh, as in faith, we become increasingly dependent on Christ in us.
Thank you, Ron!
You sum up your comment well when you suggest we need to “become increasingly dependent on Christ in us.”