You can go ahead and start, Bonnie. Colossians chapter four. Our Lord, thank you for this
opportunity this morning to gather in your name and to hear from
your word. Lord, remove doubt from our minds
and hearts that we may open them fully to your word, drive out
every distracting thought that for this relatively short period
of our time, we may truly focus on our Lord Jesus Christ and
all that comes to us by him. We pray this in the name of Jesus
Christ, amen. Verse two. Devote yourselves
to prayer, being watchful and thankful. Now prayer is one of
the most blessed but least used privileges that's given to the
child of God. It says in the book of Hebrews,
let us boldly approach the throne of grace that we may receive
mercy to help us in our time of need. Now, that's approaching the throne of grace,
come boldly into the throne of grace. That's just a way to talk
about prayer. And of course, to come boldly
into the throne of grace is actually coming to the one who sits on
that throne. And so when we're praying, we
are spiritually speaking, coming before our Lord, our God. And He sits on a throne, and that's
good, because why pray to Him if He's not in charge? Why pray to Him if He is not
the one who controls everything? I heard one of the common objections
to a belief in the absolute sovereignty of God is this, if God is sovereign,
why pray? And someone answered this way,
if he isn't, why pray? You know, I imagine that if someone
were in trouble with the law, I mean the law of the land, they
were going to go to trial for a horrible crime, they wouldn't
call on me to do anything for them. Why? I have no power to
help them. Well, when we approach or when
we pray, when we approach the throne of grace, we are coming
before our Lord who works all things together for the good
of them who love God, who are the called according to His purpose. We come to a throne of grace. You see how important each of
these words is because if it were just a throne, it would
be good that it was a throne. But what if it's a throne of
wrath? There is such a thing. Our Lord will be dealing in wrath
with some people. He rules all things. to move
them to their destined end. And if they come before him,
they're not going to receive mercy to help in time of need. We come to a throne of grace. And this throne is the depository,
or the one who sits on it, is the depository of God's mercy. All of God's mercies are in Christ.
and they are in Christ as the sovereign of the universe. So
we're moved to come to him by our need,
when we feel a sense of need, that moves us there. We feel
as though it's useful to go there because it's a throne and the
person who sits on it is sovereign. And we believe that our prayer
will be heard and answered to our welfare because it's a throne
of grace. So he says now, devote yourselves
to prayer. We're back in Colossians 4.2. Paul shows the importance of
prayer by using the word devote. In other places, it's translated,
be steadfast in. So what we're seeing is that
prayer is not something you do on accident. Now, there's prayers
that you might utter out of a sudden sense of danger, such as when
Peter was walking on the water, and he started to sink. And he
just, Lord, save me. He didn't think it through or
anything like that. Generally speaking, we don't have to be
taught to pray in such circumstances as that. The urgent sense of
our need moves us to pray. He's talking about continual
prayer. Now, for a little English lesson,
I didn't say continuous prayer. There's a difference between
continual and continuous. Continuous means always without
stopping. Like the water goes over the,
the falls continuously. But you can say, I pray continually,
and that just means it's your habit to pray somewhere along
the way. And so that's the kind of prayer
he's speaking of, and it's prayer we do that requires us to discipline
ourselves to do it, to think about it, and to not be distracted
from it. Now, I'm saying all these things
and every one of these points hits me. I wake up in the morning. As soon as I get up, I've got
several things that I do. You know, everybody's got a morning
routine. And before I know it, I'm into the flow of the day
and moving on. And I haven't thought the least
bit about prayer. And I come to the end of the
day. And it's late, so I head to bed, and I lay down, and I
fall asleep. Now we, as a policy, as a general
policy, we reject the idea of habitual religion. You know,
we don't think it's a good idea, you know, just to be religious,
because that's your habit. Nonetheless, there's nothing
wrong with disciplining yourself to a habit that is good for you. I mean, we are in this flesh
and we must discipline the flesh to follow what the spirit wants
to do. And if the flesh is accustomed
to habit, okay, give it a habit. This is a habit from which, well,
you're allowed to have it. You can be totally addicted.
In fact, one of the places where this same word that's translated
devote here, another place, it's talking about how some people
were very sincere and continual in helping other believers. and
the way it's put in the Bible, they were addicted to the service
of the saints. So be addicted to prayer. Make it something that is so
much a part of your routine, you feel as though something's
missing if you haven't prayed. Now he shows how neglectful we
are in this matter simply by reminding us. Now you would think
that if someone had a right to go into the presence of God anytime
he wants to, he would make good use of that. And yet, how little use of that
privilege we make. And so he reminds us, devote
ourselves to it. You look down in verse 12, it
speaks of a man named Epaphras. who is one of you and a servant
of Christ Jesus sends greetings, he is always wrestling in prayer
for you. And then it says in Acts chapter
6 verse 4, this is when the job of deacon was set up in a church
because there were so many widows to feed, to care for. And some
in the church were grumbling that it wasn't being done with
justice, that really it came down to Jewish widows were being
treated better than the Gentile widows. And so they came to the
apostles about it. And the apostle says, we shouldn't
leave what we've been called to to wait on tables. So you
appoint some men. You choose some men out from
among you. They can handle this work for
us. They can handle, you know, the
care of the widows. And he goes on, he says, that
we might devote ourselves to the word in prayer. And so we see here with Paul,
he says, devote yourselves to prayer. The apostles, early on
in the book of Acts, realized that their job required that
they be allowed to devote themselves to the word, the gospel, and
prayer. And then he goes on and says,
devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful. That word means
to be awake, like a guard who's guarding something. Doesn't do
it too good to have a sleeping guard, does it? A lack of prayer
reveals a slumbering heart, and he who sleeps is exposed to danger. I think it's 2 Peter, but anyway,
it says to be sober, be vigilant, for your adversary, the devil,
goes about as a roaring lion seeking whom he may desire or
devour. And sleeping things are easy
to catch. So being watchful in prayer,
and then with thanksgiving, let us not be always asking and never
thanking. The Bible says, let your requests
be known unto God, whatever they are. But then always be thankful. And be thankful when he gives
you what you ask for, and it proves a blessing, and it will.
And also be thankful if he answers no. Because you can be thankful that
you are able to go to someone and make your request known,
and he's wise enough to know whether or not it will be good
for you. You know, not everything we want is good for us, even
if we think it would be. My mother used to say in children's
Bible classes she would teach, she said, when we pray, we get
one of three answers. Yes, no, or later. But prayer, in order to truly
be prayer, it must be an act of submission. You don't pray
to someone who you can boss around. You
just tell them what to do. You don't pray to someone on
whom you can put demands. You pray to someone who has the
power to give it to you and the authority not to. And so we pray in submission.
Is not this what our Lord did in the Garden of Gethsemane after
pouring out his heart and the agonies that were in his heart
as he thought about what's going to happen? And he ended it with,
nevertheless, not my will, but your will be done. So, we ask and we are thankful for
his answer. Thankful for the knowledge that
he hears. Now verse three, and pray for
us too that God may open a door for our message so that we may
proclaim the mystery of Christ for which I am in chains. Pray that I may proclaim it clearly
as I should. Now here is, he says, add or
include within your prayer prayers for us, Paul and the entourage
that went around with him. And then he says in verse four,
pray for me specifically. Now notice that his prayers were
not about his day-to-day needs. He wasn't praying about, you
know, he was in bonds at that point, he was in jail. at that
point. What I'm saying is he didn't
bring up any of the things that so often move us to prayer. Not
that it's wrong for us to pray for those things, but he wasn't
consumed with a desire for prayer for things pertaining to this
life. He said he wanted an open door
for our message. It's interesting, that word translated
open actually means open again. Open again. It starts with a
preposition, which can be used as a prefix, and it's the same
one used when our Lord says, you must be born again. Born
again's all one word, and it starts with this A-N-A at the
beginning. And so here it's the word open
with that A-N-A in front of it. Well, what he's saying, basically
he is saying, pray that God will get me out of these bonds, not
simply because he doesn't like being in a jail cell. He says
that he may open a door for our message, our word, so that we may proclaim the mystery
of Christ. Now Paul was in the habit of
proclaiming that mystery to whoever was there. But there's only so
many people in jail. And not only that, you know,
he had a heart. He wanted to go around to the churches which
he had helped establish. He wanted to visit others that
had never seen his face. There were many things he hoped
to do. And so he says, pray for us also that God may again open
a door for our message, our word, so that we may proclaim the mystery
of Christ. Now, it's a mystery for several
reasons. There are, in the mystery of
Christ, there are things that we'll never be able to get our
minds wrapped around. And a mystery can refer to that,
something that is essentially un-understandable. For instance,
Christ is God manifest in the flesh. We can say it, we can believe
it. No way we can understand that. Nonetheless, that's part
of the mystery of Christ. But mystery also simply means
something that won't be known unless someone else tells you.
It's a mystery until you're informed. And Christ was that kind of mystery
as well, because particularly in the Gentile world where Paul
ministered, they hadn't ever heard of Christ. The Jews, if they had been given
ears to hear, it was all through their Bible. He's all from Genesis
to Malachi. was set forth Messiah, Christ,
in one form or another. And so, it was not a mystery to them,
but it was a mystery to the Gentiles that God would come in the person
of a man and do for men what they could not do and what they
dare not do. They could not live a life pleasing
to God, and they dare not go before God in their sins. And
that's exactly what he did in behalf of his people. Verse four, pray that I may proclaim
it clearly as I should. Not that Paul would lack the ability to do
that, Or I would say for the most part,
you know, I don't think courage would have been a problem. Though
he may have had some of that in mind, after all, he's already
been arrested and he's in chains. So he realizes that everywhere
he goes, it's trouble. And he would have much less trouble
if he could just take the edge off of what he was saying. the
offense of the cross and then people won't be offended and
he won't end up in jail or he won't end up getting killed or
whipped or whatever. But you see the offense of the
cross is the very power of the Gospel. And I don't mean by that
that offending people is the power that saves them. Maybe
it would be better to say it this way. Those truths that make
up the offense of the cross. Truths like we're sinful and
unable to do anything to commend ourselves to God. Offensive in
that we're talking about a salvation that did not come by what appears
to be a heroic overthrow of some powerful enemy, but rather was done by the crucifixion
of a relatively obscure Jewish prophet. All of these things. And the
truth that there's no way, I'm so wretched there's no way that
God can save me apart from the slaughter of his own son. Those
are offensive things to people. And what good is a gospel that
doesn't tell those offenses? So he wanted the courage to do
that, but I think also obvious Paul was a man of great
intellect and he said, I want to proclaim the mystery of Christ
simply, clearly. That I not get bogged down in
all these interesting little details that do not do anything
to reveal the gospel. Now verse 5, Be wise in the way
you act toward outsiders. Make the most of every opportunity. When we go out into the world,
we are coming into contact with those who do not believe what
we believe. They may be very religious. They
may be completely irreligious. If they are not true believers
in our Lord Jesus Christ, trusting him and him alone, they are what
Paul calls outsiders. Now he says, let your walk, is the way it's put specifically
in the Greek text, the way you walk around, which is just your
normal life, He says, do that with wisdom when you're around
people that are outside of the faith. Now, I would imagine that
at this point, he would be saying, make sure that your public life
does not deny the gospel that you claim to believe. It's pretty difficult to tell
someone about the beauty and wonder and glory of Christ when
they watch you and it seems like you're taken up with all these
other things. Or, you know, outright what even
the world would call sinfulness. We have to behave wisely toward
them. Also, I think some of this would
be in light of the fact that the world does not care for believers. It is wisdom not to enter in
to useless debates with them that only provoke more hatred
and animosity. And we need not go around with
a bumper sticker that says, I'm a Christian. Why? The unbelieving world looks at
that and it looks like a statement of pride. In other words, behave in such
a way that if an opportunity arises for you to tell the gospel,
they won't be surprised to learn what you believe. And then he says, make the most
of every opportunity, redeeming the time. You know, there's no
way to store time. Time goes by. And once it's gone by, you know,
it's gone. You can't go back and do something
yesterday that you should have done but forgot about. The opportunity's
been missed. And what it's saying, and I like
the way our translation puts it, even though it isn't a real
strict translation, it said, make the most of every opportunity,
redeeming the time. If you behave yourself decently,
humbly, approachably, in the presence of outsiders, When they
become concerned about their souls, they will count you as
one who is approachable about it. But if instead of walking
in humility and love towards them, even as you tell them the
truth, if instead you're always showing disgust at what you think
is the sins in their life, if you're being judgmental towards
them, If your message toward them has
primarily been, you're wrong, well, what you've done is put
a wall up between you and them. Better to say, if they are wrong
and you wish to correct them, better to say, well, you know,
I read in the Bible, da-da-da-da-da, and that doesn't seem to be the
same thing you're saying. Peter put it this way, always
be ready to give an answer for the hope that lie within you. You're open enough about what
you believe that they know you have a hope. And someday they
may ask you about it. Be ready to give an answer. And
then he says, let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned
with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone. Now,
in the King James Version, the word conversation normally means
what we see in verse five when it talks about how we act. And
I guess back in the 16 and 1700s, that's what conversation meant,
your day-to-day life, your public life. But here, it's actually Let your
word, he's actually talking about talking. Let your word be always
full of grace. When you speak to someone about
the things of God, make sure that your message is full of
grace. Because if it's not full of grace,
it's not God's message. It may be half of God's message,
but it's not the whole message. And then also, it can be taken
this way, speak graciously. I'm constantly getting asked
to join this or that group, and it has to do with, generally
speaking, Baptists that believe in sovereign grace, like us. And almost always, You get in
those groups and before long they're talking about who's wrong.
They are bashing people that don't agree. That's not gracious conversation. Season with salt to make it more
palatable. Now the offense of the cross
is offense enough without us adding to it the offense of our
personality. We should try always, as we speak
to people, to speak in tones of love and concern, plainly. I mean, we're gonna tell them
things they don't wanna hear. But when we talk to people about
being sinners, we shouldn't do it as though we are above them
declaring their sinnerhood. In fact, as we declare to others
that they are sinners, be a good time to say, and so am I. That's why we need Christ, you
know. That's to speak graciously. And therefore the person is not
made, or his pride is not raised up because he feels he's being
humiliated by you. Now if your speech is always
full of the truth of grace and seasoned, with the salt of grace,
then you will always know how to answer everyone. If, even while you're not talking
about the gospel, you speak to people in gracious and kind tones,
then when it comes time to speak about the gospel, it will be
natural to you to talk that way. All of us have had to work for
people who, when they spoke to us, there
was no grace in the way they spoke. They were harsh. They
were indignant. They tried to keep their employees
in line with intimidation and humiliation. That's tough, isn't
it? And you know, with a boss like
that, if you're having some real struggles in life, Would you
go to him and talk about it? No, you wouldn't approach him
for anything. You'd try to stay away from him. Well, the same
thing happens in the minds of unbelievers. If they are, every
time they confront someone who claims to be a Christian, it's
like they just put their face in a blast furnace. Speak with
grace concerning everything. You can even learn to speak with
grace regarding the social matters and the political matters of
our day. And if you do that in all situations,
when a gospel situation comes up, piece of cake. That's the
way you talk all the time. And you will know how to give
them a good answer. All right, we'll hopefully finish
up Colossians next week. You're dismissed.