2 Corinthians 1:10-12 English Standard Version

10 He delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will deliver us again. 11 You also must help us by prayer, so that many will give thanks on our behalf for the blessing granted us through the prayers of many. 12 For our boast is this, the testimony of our conscience, that we behaved in the world with simplicity and godly sincerity, not by earthly wisdom but by the grace of God, and supremely so toward you.

I have reservations about using the word must. I do not have the right to tell anyone what they must do. But then again I am not Paul and I have not established multiple churches throughout the known world. He has a relationship with these people that is well established.

What is hidden within verses 11 and 12 is the gracious blessings that come from the use of many prayers from many people. It is a mystery that is not often revealed because remote prayers are now so widespread that the blessings that come are only seen by a few in places that few visit. The world was smaller then.

It is difficult to bear witness to the supremacy of grace in our midst when others that need it never recognize His authority. People the world over believe without submitting themselves to our Lord’s authority. Some do not feel they have been saved from deadly peril because they did not feel the danger. Maybe they feel the love and the love is enough to believe. Hope needs to believe but if they do not understand the promises correctly, they hope for the wrong things.

Paul’s prayer speaks to a people and a time in which God’s blessings were experienced under different circumstances than we live in today. Poverty still exists but it is a different kind of poverty. There is a spiritual poverty that few feed and even fewer hunger for today.

The world was simple in the 1st century church. The world is larger and much more complex. As large as it is, we feel the dangers that source themselves in cruelties unimaginable because the media shows us how ugly the world is in real time. Focus on that and we fail to address the real danger, sin.

The only danger to our eternal salvation is sin. People don’t want to talk about that. There are far too many interesting and important things going on today. Children stare into the void of their phones and entertain themselves in the distractions of the day and ignore the pain of the person beside them that just needs a word of compassion and communion.  Ignoring the need for compassion in those lives allows sin to fester and express itself in sudden and violent outbursts.

Some just need an ear to listen, understand, and offer a hand of friendship. It is not the whole truth but at least in that way you have found someone to listen where grace is given by the Lord that lives. Proverbs 15:23 A man has joy by the answer of his mouth, And a word spoken in due season, how good it is!

Colossians 1:9-14 English Standard Version

9 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, 10 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; 11 being strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy; 12 giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light. 13 He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, 14 in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

This is the prayer that sparked my interest in biblical prayers and what they mean to us.

Has anyone prayed this prayer over you? It is a great example of effectual prayer and I would add this prayer right now.

Father, I pray this prayer over everyone who reads it here, right now. Amen

Since we are to be sanctified in truth, in His Word, then this is His Truth, His Word and this is what God the Father has done for us and in us because our Lord Jesus Crhist consecrated Himself to the work on the Cross which made all this possible.

Believe His Word. Believe the Father has kept His Word. He has made it possible to walk in a manner worthy of our Lord because His Spirit goes with us in power to strengthen us when we are weak.

Paul covers a lot of ground in this prayer and the foundation for this prayer is found in the gospels that preceded it. Granted the gospels had not been gathered together into our Holy Bible at that time, but the God that inspired those Gospels inspired Paul.

Our God knows how to encourage us to do good works and these prayers are meant just as much for us as they were to the first century saints. Their power has not diminished over time because truth is timeless and is as powerful today as it was the first time it was spoken.

They are worthy of repeating.