Colossians 1:3-6

Colossians 1:3-6
We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all the saints-the faith and love that spring from the hope that is stored up for you in heaven and that you have already heard about in the word of truth, the gospel that has come to you.

A few things stand out to me here.
"We always thank God..when we pray for you..."
Paul exhibited a consistent pattern of prayer (1 Thessalonians 5:17), staying in supplication for fellow believers. This is challenging to me because many times when I pray I'm focused on myself or those immediately connected to me. Paul prayed for believers all over the world; he prayed for the entire church. I don't know what exactly he prayed for when he prayed for them. That might be something I find elsewhere. Praying for the church would be a very good habit to get into. We can see the in-fighting that occurs within the church among demoninations, churches, Christians, etc. - none of which is becoming to followers of Christ. If we pray for each other we are exhibiting love and concern for one another. If we have love and concern for one another, we have unity. As Jesus said, "By this all men will know you are my disciples, if you love one another." (John 13:35). I guess that ultimately this becomes a lesson that we NEED to love one another to be the people Jesus called us to be. Love is not something that comes naturally of our carnal selves. Love comes from a relationship with the Father. Relationship is achieved through prayer to the Father. This reminds me of 2 Peter 1:3: "His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness." God gives us what we need to have love for one another through Him, and only through Him. This shows how dependent we must be on God for the success of our Christian walk; it is accomplished through relationship with Him.


"...because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus..."
Paul said he is thankful for their faith. I've never thought of thanking God for another person's faith. I think in our human minds we get accustomed to the whole story of sacrifice and forgiveness and become desensitized/numb to it. We have to be constantly reminded of how great it is that we have this gift; that we, as sinful men who have shunned God, can simply take what He has freely offered, and become His sons and daughters that He loves. To keep the wonder alive, we have to stay focused on Jesus: "Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God." (Hebrews 12:2).

"...and of the love you have for all the saints..."
The Colossian church was doing it right. They had love for each other. So much love that Paul had HEARD of it from other people. When was the last time we heard this about ANY body of believers?? In today's society we are overly self-centered. We follow this lifestyle of self-dependence rather than interdependence on each other. This causes us to strive to get ours first, and if there's nothing leftover, too bad. This goes in direct contradition to Phillipians 2:3 & 4: "Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others." There is no way that the Colossians could have been self-centered (as we are in our society) and still have gained this reputation of loving each other. What kind of change can we bring about in ourselves and in our churches to gain this kind of reputation and fulfill what Jesus said in John 13:35?

"...the faith and love that spring from the hope that is stored up for you in heaven..."
This goes back to earlier where we see a sort of fulfillment of 2 Peter 1:3. Our love for one another springs from a relationship with Jesus. We HAVE to have this RELATIONSHIP.

Colossians 1:6
"All over the world this gospel is bearing fruit and growing, just as it has been doing among you since the day you heard it and understood God's grace in all its truth."
If the previous focus was on prayer, the focus here is on the gospel, i.e., the Word of God. The gospel was bearing fruit and growing because people were living it. It wasn't something they passively read or studied then continued in their normal life. It was something that when they heard or read it, it kicked off a deeper yearning for more. It triggered something in their spirit that caused them to realize that they needed God. They started living the gospel, they made it integral to their lives, and it brought about massive change in their hearts, minds, and actions. It was transformational (Romans 12:2). I think another piece of what brought about such a powerful transformation in their lives is they saw how people like Paul were living it, how the Word shined through in their lives. They realized that they needed it in their lives by seeing it active in others. How is the Word active in our lives? Is it integral? How are we living it?
Another thing I noticed at this point was that the KJV says "knew" instead of "understood." Of course if we look back at Genesis, we see that Adam "knew" his wife. In essense, this is indicative of a very intimate familiarity. After some studying, I found that "knew/understood" in this verse is interpreted from the Greek word "ἐπιγινώσκω" - "epiginōskō". It means "to become thoroughly acquainted with, to know thoroughly, to know accurately, know well". The word epiginosko is rooted in "γινώσκω" - "ginōskō", which is more suggestive of the intimate sense of understanding or knowing. So what we can draw from all of this is that the Colossians were intimately familiar with "God's grace in all its truth", i.e., the gospel, which is the Word. We know that the Word was something that was central to their lives and was something of utmost importance to them; they loved it.