Dwelling Place

Guest (Male): When you have a dispute with someone, what's the first thing you do? The answer should be, pray. Here's Pastor Al Pittman.

Al Pittman: When you're at odds against your brother, sister in Christ, if we're going to sustain a relationship, we must pray for one another. If you have a difference of opinion or whatever, or or maybe there's rumors going around about one another, we need to pray for one another. Pray rather than pick up the telephone. You know what I mean? We love to share with others. Sometimes in the midst of sharing in my own life, I find myself just going on and on because I love to talk. And God said, you know, if you just spend the last 30 minutes praying rather than giving your opinion, how much more do you think I could change the situation?

Guest (Male): Great to have you along for today's edition of The Dwelling Place with Pastor Al Pittman, senior pastor at Calvary Worship Center in Colorado Springs. There's a lot going on here at Calvary Worship Center, and we'd like to invite you to check out our website at cwccs.org. Today we continue our series through Colossians as we look at chapter 4 verses 2 through 4. Here the Apostle Paul gives some sage advice about prayer. Prayer is a wonderful gift from God, but it's wasted by far too many Christians. Can your prayer be described as vigilant? Here's Pastor Al to explain just what that means.

Al Pittman: Colossians chapter 4, we're going to be looking at verses 2 to 4. I'm going to be talking to you today about sustaining prayer, sustaining prayer. And I'll tell you why I'm calling it that in context of what we've been studying in the last 3 weeks. But read along with me verse 2 of Colossians chapter 4. Paul says, continue in prayer, being vigilant in it with thanksgiving. Meanwhile, praying also for us that God would open to us a door for the word to speak the mystery of Christ, for which I am also in chains, that I may make it manifest as I ought to speak.

Sustaining prayer. Paul has just finished talking to us about godly relationships, husband and wife, father and children, and then slave and masters, we would call it today, employer employee. But he's been talking about these relationships that ought to reflect the glory of God. And indeed they should. We see God's design for submission and authority in each one of those relationships, but that each all those all those relationships also possess a mutual edification of all parties involved. And then Paul turns his attention to prayer after talking about these relationships as if to say to us that if we are going to have relationships that are sustained, they must be relationships bathed in prayer.

Amen?

Guest (Male): Amen.

Al Pittman: You have to bathe your marriage in prayer, husbands and wives praying for one another. Do you pray for your wife? Do you pray for your husband? We have to bathe our relationships in prayer between brothers and sisters in the Lord, if indeed we are to have sustainable relationships. I was talking to some leaders uh in our community the other day about how to reach out to the working poor of our community and provide resources that are out there that people don't know about so that we can be a connection uh and connect them rather with those resources so that they can they can receive help, but we also talked about the fact that it's not just enough to give someone bread or or whatever, but also to have sustainable results.

I like that phrase, sustainable results. It's not enough just to come to church or or just to read the Bible now and again or whatever, but God requires that we have fruit that remains. And if we going are going to have fruit that remains in our relationships within the church, then we must bathe those relationships in prayer. The world desires to see sustainable results. People who are still walking by faith, who are still loving one another by faith in Christ. But like you, I know there's times that I've said and maybe you've said this yourself, when it comes to prayer, well, all I can do is pray.

Have you ever said that? Well, I I guess. All I can do, you know. As if it's some type of uh ineffective activity of our Christian faith. Prayer is power. If all you can do is pray, then you've done all you can do. Amen? It was D. L. Moody who once said, I'd rather be able to pray than to be a great preacher. Jesus Christ never taught his disciples how to preach, but how to pray. I mean, if the Lord thought it was that important, then how much more should we? But our response is many times, well, all I can do is pray.

You know. Jesus placed a premium on prayer. And so does Paul. In relationship to our relations with one another, Paul after revealing God's design for godly for godly relationships within the church now points to the necessary ingredient to the fruitfulness if you if I can say that, the fruitfulness of those relationships which is prayer. Prayer is that necessary ingredient, you know, in our relationships. When you're at odds against your brother, sister in Christ, if we going to sustain a relationship, we must pray for one another. If you have a difference of opinion or whatever, or or maybe there's rumors going around about one another, we need to pray for one another.

Pray rather than pick up the telephone. You don't want me to go there. You know what I mean? We love to share with others. Sometimes in the midst of sharing in my own life, I find myself just going on and on because, you know, I love to talk. And I'm just talking, oh, I love to give advice. And God said, you know, if you spend the last 30 minutes praying rather than giving your opinion, how much more effective you do you think you know, or how much more do you think I could change the situation?

Sometimes I have to stop myself and go, shut up. That's me talking to myself, you know. Just shut up and pray. Well, it's all I can do. Well, that's the most you can do. Pray. Because prayer sustains relationships. Prayer is power. Now today what I want us to do within the context of our text today is to look at two things. I pray that they would be an encouragement to you and will help to identify what sustaining prayer looks like. We're going to look at the characteristics and the heart of an effective prayer life. There's a lot to be said about prayer.

Great books have been written on it, so this is just going to be not even scratching the surface, but hopefully will encourage you to understand, Lord, this is what I need to to do. This is the kind of prayer I need to pray. This is the type of prayer I need to initiate in my life in order to sustain re relationships that bring glory to God. The first character the thing we find here is that the characteristics there are three characteristics of an effective prayer life. And we see them all three listed in in verse 2 where Paul says, continue earnestly in prayer, being vigilant in it with thanksgiving.

What's the first characteristic? Well, it is faithfulness. Effective prayer is a faithful prayer. We have to continue to pray. Paul says, continue earnestly in prayer. In other words, be steadfast. Don't quit. That's what the enemy wants you to do. Communication is the key to any military campaign. And any military strategist will tell you that if you can disrupt the communication lines, you can defeat your enemy. And Satan loves to come in and to get you to stop praying. If he can disrupt our communication between our the the our father who is in heaven, between us and the father, then he knows that we can he can seriously affect our hinder rather our effectiveness within the world on Christians rather who do not pray are ineffective Christians.

We must pray and the and the enemy of our souls knows that the Holy Spirit knows it. That's why he inspired Paul to write in 1 Thessalonians chapter 5 verse 17, pray without ceasing. Keep the communication lines open. If we're going to have an effective prayer, prayer that sustains relationships to the glory of God, then we have to pray faithfully. It was George Müller, the famous missionary who once said, and I quote, it is a common temptation of Satan to make us give up the reading of the word in prayer when our enjoyment is gone.

Nobody likes to pray when they're down. But that's really the time you really need to continue to pray. He goes on to say as as if it were of no use to read the scriptures when we do not enjoy them. And as if we were there was no use rather to pray when we have no spirit to pray. The truth is that in order to enjoy the word, listen to this, we ought to continue to read it. And in the in in the same way, to obtain a spirit of prayer is to continue praying. The less you we read the word of God, the less we desire to read it.

and the less we pray, the less we desire to pray. Close quote. Isn't that the truth? The more I read the word, the more the word gets in me, the more that I desire to to read it. The more I pray, the more I I make it a habit to come and pray, the more I desire to pray. It's not a drudgery. It's not something that I you know, that I just dread. I desire to pray and be more in the presence of God. Well, see Satan understands that because he knows that if you're in communion with God's word and you're in prayer, the communication lines are open and the Lord can warn you and he can equip you to stand against the schemes of the devil.

He can reveal to you his schemes and the enemy knows that. But if we're not praying or reading his word, then how can we effectively communicate not only with God but with one another?

Guest (Male): We'll pause right here, but Pastor Al will be back in a few moments with part two of today's message in Colossians chapter 4. But first, I want to thank you for being a faithful listener to the dwelling place. And we would ask you to pray for this radio ministry as we seek to reach the world with the gospel. And to do that, we could use your help. Would you pray about partnering with us financially? To join our support team, please give us a call at 844 221 3363 or visit our website at cwccs.org. And we have a brand new address to share with you for Pastor Al's podcast.

It's anchor.fm/cwccs-podcast. That's anchor.fm/cwccs-podcast. Now let's return to today's message in Colossians chapter 4. Here's Pastor Al Pittman.

Al Pittman: So prayer number one has to be faithful. Continue to read God's word. Continue to pray is the lesson there. The more we pray, the more effective we will be. The second characteristic that I find here in verse two is effective prayer is watchful prayer. As Paul says in verse two, being vigilant in it, vigilant in prayer. The word vigilant means watchful. It was our Lord Jesus who said in Matthew chapter 26 verse 41, watch and pray lest you enter into temptation. Why? Because the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. My flesh hates to pray.

It says, stay in bed. You deserve a break today. And and you know, I I I love that. I just you know, sometimes I just sleep in or whatever. We all do it from time to time when we have a chance. Nothing wrong with that. But don't forget to pray because prayer helps us to keep our eyes open as corrective surgery to our eyes or or uh eye glasses or to our eyes. So prayer is to the vision of the believer. It helps us to remain on watch. In fact, we could say that if you're not praying, you're not watching.

If you're not praying, you're not watching. And you're you're you're you're you become a candidate for deception because the enemy can come in and deceive you with a lie. Continue to pray. To pray is to watch. In fact, in the book of Nehemiah, when Nehemiah was rebuilding the walls and the gates of Jerusalem, the Bible tells us in Nehemiah chapter 4 verse 9 that Nehemiah said this. He said, nevertheless we made our prayer unto our God and set a watch against them, speaking of his enemies, day and night. It's not just enough to watch during the day, but you've got to watch at night.

We set a watch against it. We prayed unto God, yes, but we set a watch. Prayer and watching goes hand in hand. With my hand on the sword and my prayers, my petitions going up to God, my eyes are now open and I'm able to combat the enemy of my soul. But prayer means watching. It opens our eyes. True prayer however in watching it's not sort of a laxadaisical approach to prayer where well, I'm watching uh you know, watching but I'm not expecting anything. I'm not looking for the goodness and the graciousness of God. I'm just kind of hanging out.

That's not the kind of watching he's talking about. When we watch, when he talks about being vigilant, it means being vigilant with a spiritual energy and alertness. My eyes are open. I'm awake. It's hard to be awake Sunday morning, but we got to be awake. Amen. But our eyes spiritually speaking are open. We're awake. We're alert to receive from God and also to be aware what the enemy is trying to accomplish. It was Warren Wiersbe who said this, noted author and commentator on the Bible, he said, there is no power in dull listless praying. If there is no fire on the altar, the incense will not rise to God.

You can come to church with a whole bag of incense, but if your heart is not consecrated to the Lord, the fire speaks of purity and consecration to God. If there's no fire on the altar, you can dump incense on there all you want, programs and everything else, all kind of you don't want to's and what have you, but we have to be first consecrated to God before the incense can burn and the smoke will rise up to the nostrils of God as a sweet smelling aroma to him. If there's no fire on the altar, then everything that I'm saying this morning means nothing to you.

And you may have good intentions, but do you have the fire of God? A desire in your heart to please him. That must kindle that must that fire must be kindled on the altar of our hearts. And then when the incense is applied, there is an effectiveness, there is power, there's an energy, there's an alertness, there is a sweet aroma that comes from our lives. Why? Because we desire by watching through prayer to please him. Prayer is watching, but not just a laxadaisical attitude but an alertness and a spiritual energy and awareness of our God.

And also an awareness of the trickery of the devil. A watchful prayer, I would say, is an expectant prayer. The Bible says that if we will come to God, we must believe that he is and that he's a rewarder of those who diligently seek him. I'm not watching saying, well, I hope God shows up. I hope God that no, God's going to do something. Sometimes I'm walking by faith. My body is not cooperating. I don't feel like it, but but in in the my spirit, man, I know my God is a faithful God is going to do a work and I'm looking, Lord, to you as David said, Lord, you are my expectation.

Not going by what I see in the faces of people. I'm going by what I see in the face of his word. I'm watching. Prayer is watching. If we're going to have relationships that are sustained in the Lord, then we need to pray. We need to watch, be watchful in our prayers, expecting God to manifest his power in the life of that other person in the midst of the our sanctuary and our congregation, expecting God to move. We've got to have an attitude of expectation, watching, looking for the Lord. The third characteristic that I find here in verse two is that effective prayer is a thankful prayer.

Paul says, we ought to continue earnestly in prayer with being vigilant in it with thanksgiving. But I always throw that in there, you know, it's kind of pray with thanksgiving. Now why do I say that? Why can't you just say pray? Because thanksgiving is an act of love. Pray with thanksgiving. You see the absence of thanksgiving in our prayer is evidence of selfishness in our prayers. Let me say it this way. I I I I read where one author put it this way. He said, in fact, when we thank God is is is it's it's better to thank God for that which he has given to you than sometimes to thank God for the things that are in front of us.

The reason why is because if I'm praying, God give me that job, God give me that car, God give me that spouse, give me that person in my life, Lord, or whatever, then that thing becomes sort of the focus and my thanksgiving is withheld until God gives it to me and then I'll thank God. And of course, God can always say no. Then what happens to my thanksgiving? You see faith and love is thanking God after God even says no. Now on the back side of no, a lot of times we we're glad God said no because we see the results.

If I had gone that route, Lord, thank you, Lord. I'm glad you said no. But initially when God says no, what's our reaction? Are we thankful? I'm not. I I'll say it. Some of you debating it, I'll say it. I'm not because I you know, I think, Lord, this is good. This is great, Lord. If you just give me this, oh, this would be wonderful, Lord, if you would just do it this way. And Lord, of course I'll I'll be careful to give you the praise. Just let me win that lottery, Lord. I'll just praise you all the way to the bank.

And God says no. And we start to sort of pout spiritually, acting like children. That's why the Bible calls us children of God and not adults of God. How do your children respond when you say no? And you go, I can't believe my he threw a temper tantrum and I just can't believe he was acting like that. We act like that with God. Oh, we may have our suits on and whatever our clothing and stuff, but inside we're just kicking. Many times we do that rather than be thankful unto God, realizing that he knows best.

But when God is giving us a blessing and we stop and we come back and say, thank you, Lord. How many times has the Lord blessed you and you prayed about that coal or or when you remember when you didn't have that job and well, I can tell you stories about things that God has done for my wife. We first went to New Mexico. Boy, I tell you we you know, it was tough. You know, it was like, you know, we don't know what we're going to eat next week. Um you know, there wasn't any money or whatever, you know, just seeing how God provide put money in your bank account when you didn't have no money, you know, stuff like that.

Coming home and you know, bags and bags of groceries sitting on your front step and you haven't told anybody about your situation. I mean, God just doing things like that and how many times we just we're so busy enjoying the blessing that we forget to go back and say, thank you. Remember the lepers that Jesus healed in the Bible? There was 10 of them, I believe, and only one came back and said, thank you. And Jesus said, I thought there were 10 of you. Where's the other nine? You see that's a response of love, thanksgiving.

Yes, I offer my prayers, but remember to thank God yes on the front end but also thank him on the back end of those prayers. Regardless of what answer he has given to us, thanksgiving is an act of love. Philippians chapter 4 verse 6 says with thanksgiving, make your request known to God. With thanksgiving, make your request known. Yes, make your request known with thanksgiving, but have thanksgiving before and thanksgiving after the request is received. That is an act of faith. That is an act of love.

Guest (Male): You've been listening to The Dwelling Place with our Bible teacher Pastor Al Pittman, the pastor of Calvary Worship Center in Colorado Springs. As we close things out today, we want to remind you that you can hear today's message from Colossians again at our website cwccs.org. We can also supply you with a CD copy when you call 844 221 3363. That's 844 221 3363. And while you're at it, listen to our free podcast by going to anchor.fm/cwccs-podcast. We always enjoy hearing from our listeners. Whether it's a prayer request, comment or question related to the study, we want to hear from you.

Email us today at amen at cwccs.org. That's amen at cwccs.org. At The Dwelling Place, we pray that your walk with Jesus Christ has been strengthened by these messages. And we're grateful to those who choose to partner with us to see this ministry continue and even expand. To make a secure donation, drop by cwccs.org or text the word give to 719 354 2778. That's give to 719 354 2778. You can also write to us at Calvary Worship Center 505 Castle Road, Colorado Springs, Colorado 80904. If you missed any of that, it's all available at cwccs.org. If you're in the Colorado Springs area, visit us at Calvary Worship Center.

We'd love to welcome you this weekend. Join us at our west side campus or our creek side campus. You can find service times and directions for both on our website. And we hope to see you soon. This has been The Dwelling Place with Pastor Al Pittman, a presentation of Calvary Worship Center in Colorado Springs, Colorado.