For this cause we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you.
The knowledge of the Divine will
The petition asks--
I. For a bestowment of a knowledge of the divine will as attained by a spiritual understanding and wisdom. The faith and charity of the Colossians had been so reported to the apostle as to fill his heart with thankfulness, which took its habitual course, that of unceasing prayer. Blending the subject of his prayer with his purpose in offering it, St. Paul asks--
1. Generally that they may he filled, etc.
three terms which in their union signify an impartation from above of a thorough insight into the will of God as directing the practical life. Based on the eternal purpose of redemption, this will is the counsel of human sanctification. As a matter of request it is the Holy Spirit’s operation on our faculties making the knowledge experimental, rewriting the moral law on the heart, and making it there supreme.
2. Particularly the apostle connects with this the spiritual wisdom and understanding which bring Divine knowledge into the sphere of the human faculties. The Holy Spirit imparts it to the “understanding” which makes it the object of study, and aggregates the whole into wisdom, which is the practical application to life of the precepts which the understanding embraces. But both are spiritual. The unregenerate understanding may make the moral law an object of study, and arrange the whole into a system of rules for the wisdom of human ethics. But in the regenerate the precepts are studied in the light of the new nature, and the whole wisdom of holiness is the result of a teaching that is “from above” (James 1:17).
II. For practical conformity with that will in--
1. Fruitfulness
(1) in every good work. All the manifestations of godliness are the fruit of a Divine life within wrought by Christ indwelling by His Spirit. But the phrase “every good work” teaches us that the thoughts, words, and deeds of holiness are our own. In their secret source they have a heavenly origin, in their manifestation they are human. The wonderful completeness arrests attention. The tree brings forth all the fruits that the infinite diversity of the relations of life permit.
(2) The words “increasing in the knowledge of God” suggests that Christian fruitfulness knows no limitation. As the knowledge of God and His will grows, the fruits of obedience grow likewise, and with growing sanctity the notion of the Divine Being becomes more clear. But the general spirit of the prayer recommends the former, viz., that the enlarging knowledge of God’s will, as “proved” in its varying applications in daily life, leads to an unlimited increase in good works. To the Christian the interior law of God unfolds perpetually new obligations; and as it does this, the obedient life puts on new aspects of perfection.
(3) We now go back to the glowing words which precede “That ye might walk,” etc. Here is a twofold standard.
(a) Such a walk as should do honour to God.
(b) Such an aim to secure His approval as should win His complacency always and in all things.
There is a daring completeness in this sentence. There is no reservation for human infirmity, no undertone of deprecation of the Divine severity, no hint of a tolerant construction of our conduct.
2. Endurance presented as a passive patience combined with an active longsuffering.
(1) While the Divine knowledge is the instrument or energy of the holy life, it is the Divine power which is connected with the patience of that holiness. The strength of God of course accomplishes all; but that strength is “made perfect in weakness.” The interior discipline of religion is both endurance of what is imposed, and resistance of all temptation to rebel. Thus the grandeur of the Christian conflict is that the omnipotence of God is brought down into the secret arena of the struggle. He infuses every kind of strength--strength to bear the inflictions of the Divine will in the sorrows of life, its disappointments, the oppositions of evil, the inexhaustible varieties of the pressure of the one great cross; strength to resist temptations from without, in the assaults of Satan, the waywardness of men, persecution, etc.
(2) If this be the case, surely the believer should “count it all joy” to be undergoing temptation and that only in the feeling of victory. The very conflict itself is joyous, if Divine and human strength unite; the spirit feels most here what it is to be one with Christ.
3. Thanksgiving enters into all the other elements of the Christian life, and is not merely their supplement. It is here made to spring solely from the sense of redemption. But since the perfecting of the redemptional scheme all the benedictions of providence become redemptional. To pass from the kingdom of darkness into that of God’s dear Son is not to leave the kingdoms of nature and providence, but to add to them, as he shows further on, all the glory of the inheritance of the saints in light. (W. B. Pope, D. D.)
The apostolic prayer
Chrysostom said to those who would realize the classical allusion more vividly than we do, “that as in the games we urge on those who are near victory, so Paul here prays for an increase of Christian attainment for the Church that had already attained so much.” Hence he says, “For this cause.” We should rightly consider this prayer for such increase:--
(1) Because it teaches us what we should seek in our intercession for Churches. Our standard of Church prosperity is convicted by such a prayer; our right plans for Church increase are here inspired.
(2) Because it teaches us what we are to seek and expect for ourselves: what is really worth aiming, struggling, praying for. Paul prays--
I. That their knowledge may increase--doubtless partly because of the error that was confusing some, but also because knowledge is always good. Three expressions describe it that are frequently used in combination in Scripture, and which Aristotle denotes as intellectual virtues.
1. Knowledge. This is descriptive of acquaintance with any subject. He has it who has information. It is essential as the basis of culture, but is only the basis.
2. Wisdom is higher than knowledge, and includes both that and understanding. Newman well calls it “Reason exercised upon knowledge.”
3. Spiritual understanding the application of knowledge to practical detail, the following out of its processes to daily duty and to the spiritual realm.
II. That as a result of their knowledge their character may ripen. The knowledge of God’s will must result in action, or it is valueless. The character resulting from this knowledge includes--
1. Walking worthily of the Lord. The Christian life is an activity, a progress tested by the highest standard.
2. Increasing in the knowledge of God. So knowledge increases. This time it is more than knowledge of God’s will, it is knowledge of God’s self. Obedience is the organ of spiritual knowledge.
3. Being strengthened with all might. Energy, inner energy, inner energy of the highest sort for endurance.
4. Giving thanks to the Father. Life shall have music in it--the highest music of praise. For what?
(1) Fitness for blessedness, “meet for inheritance.” An inheritance is allotted to those who are ready for it.
(2) Emancipation from the power of darkness--rescue from the tyranny of confusion, ignorance, peril, evil.
(3) Settlement in an empire of liberty, order and honour.
(4) And through and above all for Christ as the means to blessing, and Himself the chiefest blessing. (U. R. Thomas.)
The power of unceasing prayer
“If I was ever brought into the kingdom of God,” said a venerable Christian lady, “it was owing to the intercessions of old Dr. L. He married me, and he used often to call and speak a few earnest words to me about my soul. ‘You are now a wife and a mother,’ he would say; ‘do not delay to give yourself to the Lord, and to pray for grace to fulfil your duties. I shall never cease to plead for you.’“ The thought that a man of God was pleading for her before God, as well as pleading with her at the bar of her own conscience, was the point which seems to have made the impression.
Sanctified knowledge
Sanctified knowledge is the Holy Spirit’s greatest helper. “It carries the torch before faith; it opens the door of eternity to hope; it presents love with a perfectly beautiful object; it furnishes joy with its sweetest melodies; it supplies patience with the strongest motives, and resignation with the noblest patterns.” (S. Charnock.)
Spiritual knowledge
The difference between believers and unbelievers is not so much in the extent, as in the manner of their knowledge. An unbeliever may know more, and be able to talk more of Divine things than many believers, but he knows nothing spiritually and savingly, with a holy, heavenly light. A believer may comprehend less, but he apprehends more. (G. S. Bowes.)
The best knowledge
Many there are that are accounted deep scholars, great linguists, excellent mathematicians, sharp logicians, knowing politicians, fine rhetoricians, sweet musicians, etc. These may be good or bad, as the case may be, but he is certainly the best grammarian that has learnt to speak the truth from his heart; the best astronomer that hath his conversation in heaven; the best musician that hath learned to sing the praises of his God; the best arithmetician, that so numbereth his days as to apply himself to wisdom; he is knowing in ethics, that traineth up his family in the fear of the Lord; he is the best economist who is wise to salvation, prudent in giving and taking good counsel; he is the best politician, and he is a good linguist that speaks the language of Canaan. (J. Spencer.)