Daily Bible Reading 29th May 2025 // Colossians 1:9-12
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 May you be 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.
Having returned thanks to God for the work of the Gospel among the Colossian believers he moves on (v 9) to intercede before God on their behalf. Thanksgiving and intercession are closely and intimately connected. Mingled with the joy Paul feels over the work of God clearly evident in Colossae is a real fear and a deep concern about the permanence of the flowering of the Gospel. Paul dreads the prospect of an alien teaching distorting or stunting the growth or causing, even, the tender young plants to wither altogether. To change the metaphor, Paul is concerned lest the influence of another spirit lay hold of this fine but vulnerable material and mould it awry. So it is that, since he received Epaphras' report, he has not stopped praying for the church in Colossae, struggling and labouring for them, crying to God on their behalf, bearing them up before the throne of grace with specific, pointed intercession. There is a real point of significance here. Not only is Paul, far away, in the secrecy of his prison house, interceding for the Colossian believers, he now tells them that he is praying for them; he tells them what he is asking of God, on their behalf, and he explains why he is asking for it. Once again, it seems Paul's intention is to encourage and to nurture the faith of these believers who are under attack. By writing out a summary of his prayer for them, Paul is seeking to exhort the Colossian believers to stand firm, to endure, to persevere. He is trying to build a bulwark so that this new teaching will not sweep them away.