Three of the Best Ways to Pray for Others

[Music] let's go ahead and open up our bible to the book of colossians chapter 1 colossians chapter 1 and today i want to talk to you about three of the best ways to pray for others three of the best ways to pray for people you know sometimes we uh we tell people hey i'll be praying for you or someone says hey will you pray for me and sometimes we just don't know how to pray but this particular chapter in the bible kind of gives a really simple way to pray for others and the things that paul prayed for for the colossian church are so powerful and i think if we can pray for one another in these ways it can really have an impact in all of our lives so today you're going to learn three ways three of the best ways to pray for others pray for one another so let's pray together before we start heavenly father open our hearts to your word i pray that the truths that are here would just kind of leap off the page and have an impact in all of our hearts we love your word we love you lord i pray that your holy spirit would now be here to teach us and instruct us and show us what you want us to know in jesus name amen well in colossians chapter 1 verse 3 paul says here we always thank god the father of our lord jesus christ when we pray for you when we pray for you see when we pray for you one of the things we want to do is always thank god the first prayer you can give for people is to give thanks to god for the work he's done you know we just heard a few testimonies here this morning about the work that god does in the lives of people it's often hidden from us we don't we don't even hear about it unless someone actually gets up and shares a testimony or tells us about it but god is always at work in the lives of people and so paul he says this we always thank god the father of our lord jesus christ when we pray for you since we heard of three things one your faith in christ two the love you have for all the saints and because of the hope laid up for you in the in the heaven in heaven so remember in first corinthians 13 paul mentioned there were three things that last forever how many remember what those are what are the three faith hope and love and so paul was speaking about those three things right here he says i want to thank god because i've heard about your faith in christ now here's an interesting thing paul never actually went to the collagen church he never ever visited there a guy named epaphras was like the missionary or the apostle who went and shared the gospel with this town but paul heard about it he said i heard about your faith in christ jesus and so when i think about you and i pray for you i thank god i'll tell you why in just a moment so he's he's heard about their faith in christ and i'm telling you what when you hear a testimony or just like what you just shared jerry your faith in jesus look how that happened i mean there was people praying for you and then all of a sudden you had this onslaught of people coming and it wasn't a coordinated effort it's not like these 14 people got together and said hey you on monday i'll go tuesday willie you go wednesday but each day of the week we're going to go over hit jerry up and share the gospel with him we're going to saturate him with the word of god and then maybe he'll get saved none of that happened it was just the work of god god was moving and so we thank god whenever i hear of anybody who puts their faith in jesus christ i say thank you lord because you did a work in that person's life also the second thing he mentioned is i heard about the love you have for all the saints i'm telling you this when a person becomes a follower of jesus one of the hallmarks that comes into your life is love i mean you actually begin to love your enemy has anybody experienced that yet where somebody who was an enemy and maybe you had a difficult time loving and all of a sudden you receive jesus christ there's something that begins to happen in your life again it's the work of god it's not that you you drummed this thing up or you try to make it happen god did something in your heart all of a sudden you find yourself loving an enemy that's god and when that happens we should thank god because he's doing the work the love you have for all the saints now i just mentioned about loving your enemy you know what sometimes is more difficult than loving your enemy loving all the saints who are the saints well that's the people sitting there beside you today at church or in the church down the street or all the churches around the world yeah it's okay god gives us a love for all the saints and sometimes it's easy for us to love the enemy than it is to love the saint because the saint might be the one who offended you or the saint might be the one who overlooked you or the saint may be the one who said something to hurt your feelings and so our love for them can grow cold so the love of god begins to work in your life and then finally he mentioned about this hope because of the hope laid up for you in heaven you know when you become a follower of jesus christ there's a there's a hope for eternal life that springs up in your heart there's just this confidence that you know that when my days are over i will be with the lord forever this is his promise of eternal life and he says there's this hope laid up for you in heaven and so those are the things that paul was thanking god for faith hope and love now i want to share with you a few scriptures out of colossians other places in the bible to show you that all these things are actually the work of god inside of us so in ephesians 2 verse 8 i'll have the scriptures up on the board here i think it says by grace you have been saved through faith and this is not your own doing what is it what does it say it is it is a gift of god i'll tell you what in the last year i have never become more aware just more acutely aware of god at work in the lives of people it doesn't rely upon us you know paul paul didn't really go to colossae but yet the lord was at work and the gospel was at work and the holy spirit was at work and he was able from afar to hear i heard about your faith i heard about your love i heard about the hope you haven't i just want you to know when i'm praying for you i just give thanks to god because i know it is god who is doing this work it is god who has given you love it is god who has given you faith it is god who gives you hope and it wasn't based upon what the apostle paul did at all it was the lord's work it was the lord's doing and i've seen the lord work i mean we heard a testimony here this morning about god just working in the hearts of people without us him just doing it by himself and so this faith this grace that we have to be saved it is actually a gift from god it's not like one day i finally had enough faith to believe it's a it's a gift that god gave to us as we heard the gospel here's a scripture in john 6 44 it says this is jesus speaking listen to what he says no one can come to me unless the father who sent me draws him can you hear that you might say hey i shared the gospel the other day and someone gave their heart to jesus nobody comes to jesus unless the father draws him so when we hear about a person having faith in christ one of the things we can pray is lord thank you that you worked in his life or her life thank you that you drew them to yourself thank you that you opened their heart to believe that you gave them this gift of grace this gift of faith because it wasn't like i was trying to convince them i wasn't like this great orator it was god's work in that person's life and so paul is saying we thank god every time because we recognize the work that god has done in you jesus said no one can come to me unless the father who sent me draws him and i will raise him up on the last day so what about love well look at first thessalonians 4 9. first thessalonians 4 9 says concerning brotherly love you have no need for anyone to write to you for you yourselves have been taught by the pastor to love one another how many people the bible says that you have been taught by god to love one another it's like you're in the school of jesus you you get saved you you have faith in jesus christ and all of a sudden this love begins to grow because why you're being taught by god god's teaching you to love and he's able to do it in such amazing ways like i said we can even love an enemy and so paul's writing to these these people in thessalonica saying hey i just want you guys to know i don't really have anything to say to you about brotherly love because god has been teaching you god has been doing this work in your life and so when i see your love all i can do is say thank you lord thank you father for the work you're doing in my brother or my sister it's a prayer i can pray thank you god thank you for the love that you're working in my brothers and sisters thank you for the faith that they had to believe you liz i thank you for the faith i see in your life kim and i just met you guys man i just met you guys i just thank thank god for the work i see that he's done in you but you know that was god doing that nobody else can take the credit all we can do is sit down and say thank you lord thank you for the faith of my brothers and sisters and when i see someone show the love of god whether it's through an act of kindness or a good word or whatever it may be i can say thank you lord for working your love in the heart of my brother or my sister it's god doing this god teaches us to love one another romans 5 5 the second part of that verse says that god's love has been poured into our hearts through the holy spirit who's been given to us you know what i'm saying by that is again i don't have to work it up when i get saved i don't have to somehow try to gin up this love for people because god's love is poured into me i mean so it's almost like i could almost say that if you don't love people you probably don't really have a relationship with jesus god is love and he who loveth is born of god when you become a follower of jesus this miraculous event happens god's love is poured here and if god's love is here you're able to overcome those other prejudices or hatreds or whatever you have toward other people and say i want to love you with god's love and that's the work of the lord and that's one of the things that paul was writing to the colossians i i heard about your faith and i heard about the love that you have for all saints and all i can say is thank you father thank you father for doing this work in these people and then finally what about the hope well philippians 1 verse 6 says i am sure of this that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of jesus christ i'll tell you what if there's any if there's any scripture that should give you confidence about god being at work in your life it should be this one he who began a good work in you how many here had the lord begin to work in you he will bring it to completion he is at work in our life constantly changing us motivating us stirring us drawing us closer challenging us convicting us all these different ways that god deals with us but he is definitely at work in every one of us and he says he who began this work will perform it until the day of jesus christ i tell you what i've known the lord now for i guess 40 seven years how many years ruth 46 years we don't know more than 25. long time and i'm just confident that god has has been working in me whatever good is in my life i can point to him and say hey look what the lord's done and i can look at the same in your life and even though i've walked with the lord for 47 years i still have room to grow i still have places to change but i know this that he who began a work in me is going to perform it to the day of jesus christ he's going to continually work in me so one of the one of the ways i can pray for you or you can pray for me is to simply say lord thank you for working in my brother's life thank you for working in my sister's life and paul mentions these three things there could be hundreds of other things we can bring up here but the faith they have the love they have and the hope they have i thank you for it verse 5 it says of this you have heard before in the word of the truth the gospel when i was studying this i i just noticed the word heard in here a few times and paul said he heard about their faith he heard about their love he heard about their hope but then he said in verse 5 you heard the gospel see it is it is the hearing of the gospel that brings about this work of god in the life of someone they have to hear it paul heard about what what the gospel did but he mentions here it's because you have heard before in the word of the truth the gospel which has come to you as indeed in the whole world it is bearing fruit and increasing as it does among you since the day you heard it and understood the grace of god in truth what happens when someone hears the gospel somehow i mean again it's it's not that you have these convincing words but somehow this word of the gospel carries its own power its own ability and these people who did not know the lord who were in darkness who were blinded to the truth of jesus when they heard this the bible says their understanding came alive and what did they see he said you heard it and you understood the grace of god in truth that's what began the process of god working in their life simply by hearing this gospel and paul says you learned it from epaphras see paul wasn't the guy it was epaphras you learned it from epaphras our beloved fellow servant he is a faithful minister of christ on your behalf and has made known to us your love in the spirit so let me say to you this the things i just spoke about people who have this faith in christ or people who have this love of god growing in their hearts or people who have this hope of eternal life the seed of all that is the gospel you've understood this he said because you've already heard this word of truth the gospel look at this scripture in romans 1 16 paul says i am not ashamed of the gospel for it is the power of god what is the gospel the gospel itself carries a power when you go and you speak it and you share with somebody just like epaphras did to these people in colossae he simply opened up his mouth spoke some things about the gospel of jesus christ all of a sudden their understanding was enlightened god drew them to himself god gave them faith to be saved god put his love in their heart and god stirred a hope of eternal life inside of them this all happened because epaphras came and said hey let me tell you about jesus let me tell you about this one who changed my life and that message whatever it was he spoke was the seed that caused all these things to happen where paul could now say man i'm hearing about what god's doing in your life and all i can say is thank you so i tell you brothers and sisters there's nothing like the power of the gospel it's so good to go out and minister in our neighborhoods and it's so good to go out and do acts of kindness and so many in the church in the world today we we kind of give ourselves to these acts of kindness and those are great but people have to hear the gospel that's what happened here paul heard about them but they heard the gospel so i encourage us as a church let's not just settle for acts of kindness yes let's do acts of kindness and let's reach out to our neighbors and show the love of god in in all the different ways but let that become a bridge to actually telling them the good news of jesus because it is the hearing of the gospel that has the power did you read that again there romans 16 116 i'm not ashamed of the gospel it is the power of god for salvation it is the power of god for salvation i know whenever i open my mouth to speak the gospel of jesus christ his power is there again it's not because i'm some great one or any of us it's because the gospel has power inherent in itself to bring salvation now what's the second prayer you can pray verse 9 colossians chapter 1 verse 9 and so from the day we heard it we heard about you we heard about your love we heard about your faith we heard about your hope 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 the second prayer we can pray for anybody is that they be filled with a knowledge of god's will here's an important thing to know is that when you when you become a follower of jesus christ when that person has that faith and they receive christ that's just the beginning point that's not the end that's where it all starts now it's a matter of learning how to walk with him and so paul says hey all these great things god has done in your life the faith the hope the love but now i'm praying for you that you can be filled with the knowledge of his will how many of you have ever prayed to know the will of god i think almost everybody has lord i just want to know your will i mean some of that we get obviously when we read the scriptures and other times god will speak to us as we pray but what what a great prayer to be able to pray for anybody dave i'm praying for you that you would know the will of god i mean the best thing for dave in his life is the will of god i pray for you ruth and willie i pray that you would know the will of god understand the will of god for your life it's a simple prayer but just think what our lives would be like if every one of us were walking in the will of god 24 7. what would that be like what would the world be like what would the church of jesus christ be like if we were just kind of set in our hearts to say lord i want the will of god for my life but i want it for my brothers i want it for my sisters i'm thankful lord for the work i see you've done in them and i give thanks unto you you are the one only you could do this but now i pray for my brother my sister i pray they be in the will of god not my will not what i desire not what i want show them your will lord put them in the center of your will what a beautiful prayer what a simple prayer and so paul says from the day we heard about you we have not ceased to pray asking that you could be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding um i'm thinking about it let me find it here real quick turn in your bible i don't have the notes on this here but in the last chapter in colossians uh looks like chapter 4 verse 12. you know this guy epaphras he was the one who came to colossae and shared the gospel with them initially and now epaphras is with paul part of his team there's a list of people mentioned here in this last chapter but here's what he says about epaphras epaphras who is one of you meaning he's from that city or a gentile epaphras who is one of you a servant of christ jesus greets you always struggling on your behalf in his prayers that you may stand mature and fully assured in all the will of god for i bear him witness that he has worked hard for you and for those in laodicea and hieropoulos isn't that a great a great scripture about this man epaphras yeah he was instrumental in bringing many in that city to christ sharing the good news of jesus but after he was done he labored in prayer for them lord i pray they would stand mature in the will of god they would know the will of god walk in the will of god for your children parents grandparents pray for your children that they would understand and walk in the will of god it's the best thing for them and so he says i pray that they can 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 what happens when we're in the will of god we're walking in a manner worthy of the lord we heard some things today about wanting to please the lord about wanting to you know have a have him have a heart toward us like we have toward him or the vice versa but he says when you have this knowledge of god's will it's for the purpose of walking in a manner worthy of the lord fully pleasing him not just pleasing him fully pleasing him how many of you want to please the lord fully please him well if you know his will if you know his will it enables you to walk in that and in doing that it's like he's happy fully pleasing him bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of god what a what a beautiful outcome of knowing the will of god when we know the will of god and begin to put our you know apply ourselves to it our life changes christianity isn't done the day you get saved it starts there but the rest of our life is one where we're growing and increasing in the knowledge of god we're growing to become more fruitful in good works and we're fully pleasing him because our life our manner of life is one that's following his will it's a beautiful prayer philippians 2 13 says this about that it is god who works in you both to will and work for his good pleasure you know even even this what i'm saying to you i'm saying to us let's let's set our hearts to be in the will of god but i just want you to know that that's also what god is doing you know god is it's the work of god to give you the desire how many here want to be in the will of god well turn the turn the next slide over back one do you see what this scripture says it is god who works in you both to will and to work for his good pleasure and so if you have stirring in your heart i want to be in the will of god you just need to know that's god's work in you god's doing that he's stirring that thing within you i want to be in the will of god i want to do god's will thank you lord that you're doing that work inside of me and then finally the third prayer you can pray is found in verse 11. paul said here may you be strengthened with all power according to his glorious might for all endurance and patience with joy i just want to talk to you for a moment about endurance you know we see the story that jesus gave about the sower and the seed and he talks about some seed falls in the rocky soil and it begins to spring up and it starts to have life but then the sun comes up and because these plants have no root we talked about having a deep root today because these plants have no deep root they wither up and die it says they endure for a short time some of you may know christians who have sprung up like that the seed was planted life came but then hardships came and the plant withered and died how many know people just like that so one of the things we can pray for is help my brothers and sisters endure help them endure because suffering will come hardship will come conflict will come all these things none of these things are taken out of the way just because we're following jesus sometimes they even increase in our life but i pray for my brother in christ i pray for my sister that you help them to endure whatever it is they have to face in this life give them the ability to endure to have those deep roots that even though the sun may come out and try to wither that plant up the roots are so deep it's getting moisture and it's alive and it's just full of life help them to endure and so he said may you be strengthened with all power according to his glorious might again it's not me trying to work it up it's not me saying boy if i just wish i have more strength he said it's his glorious might lord give me your strength give me your endurance give me your power to be able to endure whatever it is i'm going through today and then giving thanks to the father who has qualified you the father qualified you to share the inheritance of the saints he has delivered us from the domain of darkness how many are glad about that who did that god did it he delivered us from this domain of darkness and he transferred us to the kingdom of his son right now you're in the kingdom of his son transferred out of darkness in the kingdom you're there now god did that thank you lord and in whom we have redemption the forgiveness of sins so what i'd like to do this morning as we close is i wonder if everybody could take a minute and grab a partner take a partner and try to pick somebody who's not your spouse just find somebody and i would like you to pray three prayers for them and have them pray three prayers for you what are they what are the what are the three prayers who remembers the first prayer god i'm thankful for the work you've done in my brother or my sister you know it doesn't have to be anything more than that and if you know something about it then maybe you can say something more but i pray and i thank you father for the work that you did they're here today because you did a work in them and what's the second prayer what was it i can't hear you that they would know the will of god so pray father i want to pray for this person here beside me that they would just know the will of god they would know the will of god for their life and begin to walk in it and what's the third thing that they would endure father i pray no matter what they have to face in this life you give them the power and the strength to endure to be strong with you clear to the end i'm going to take just five minutes or three or four or five minutes you pray for somebody and have someone pray for you but those three little prayers and this will be our first stab at walking in obedience to the things we learned today

Channel: Alliance Christian Center

Views: 49

Rating: 5 out of 5

Keywords: Kirk Martin, Prayer

Id: 2rNwA3hTKQk

Length: 33min 37sec (2017 seconds)

Published: Sun Sep 12 2021