Wrestling Prayer

Epaphras, who is one of you, a servant of Christ Jesus, greets you, always struggling on your behalf in his prayers, that you may stand mature and fully assured in all the will of God. For I bear him witness that he has worked hard for you and for those in Laodicea and in Hierapolis. Colossians 4:12-13 ESV

              A Singaporean pastor spoke in my church several months ago, and he said something that really struck me. It wasn’t a shocking fact that I hadn’t known, nor was it something I had previously disagreed with. It was something I surely knew, but was far from demonstrating in my own life. He said, “The best thing you can do for a person is to pray for him.” Too often for me, prayer has become a formality, a stale spiritual grace, a tongue-far-from-heart affair. Although if anyone had asked me about the power of prayer, I would no doubt have answered “PRAYER DOES GREAT THINGS! Without prayer and communion with God, nothing will be effective in our labour for Him,” this conviction didn’t show up in my own prayer life. In effect, much of my ministry and service to others involved me going solo, saying I go in God’s name and power, but sluggishly ignoring the need to pray. How ironic – to forget the most important element of ministry: constantly communing with the very One whose work we are sent to do. We become like electric appliances that foolishly pull the plug and disconnect ourselves from our very source of Power and effectiveness.

1 – How to pray

              Epaphras was Paul’s representative to the church in Colossae; he is considered the founder of that local church. I hadn’t thought much about this verse before this, probably because it comes at the end greetings of one of Paul’s epistles, which generally seem to look the same, letter to letter. Sometimes I just skim through it, treating it merely as a less meaningful letter formality. Nevertheless, that’s not a right approach, and it’s really important to pay attention to every detail of the richly meaningful Scriptures.

The NIV translates “struggling on your behalf in prayers” as “wrestling in prayer for you”. I’m sure you know how aggressive and passionate a wrestling match is. Does that passion correspond with this image? – Epaphras simply mumbles a few words of prayer for the Colossians at the end of daily devotions, or merely writes “Colossians” as a bullet point in a prayer journal and waits for an unoccupied moment in his day to ‘get it over and done with’ with that prayer point. It surely doesn’t. Epaphras’ prayer was a wrestle and struggle. The Greek (ἀγωνιζόμενος) means contestant, contender, struggler. This sentiment is the passion of prayer that rises from a broken, aching, willing heart – a heart that despises any possibility of the Colossians straying from God’s will or stagnating in their maturity. Have you ever reached a crisis or emergency where you are pushed out of all options and have to just kneel and pray for divine help? There are people who reach this point, and have needs so inexpressible coupled with faith so fixed on the power of God to intervene – so much so that English words just don’t cut it. They cry out, they remain silent and still, they wail before God, they pray in tongues. That is a wrestle – a struggle – a plea that shows Epaphras’ earnest cry: “The Colossian Christians must stand mature and fully assured in all the will of God, and I will wrestle and struggle, aching painfully, to see it happen.”

Of course, wrestling in prayer doesn’t mean running out of words every time. Paul did say that he would pray with his Spirit and also with his mind: and that doesn’t mean “Forget the words” every time. Praying earnestly, habitually and sincerely for someone daily is a sign of a wrestling prayer warrior or contender. God doesn’t call for us to be so earnest and sincere in our prayers only when we’re all out of human options, only when we feel we really don’t know what to do. He wants us to be so passionate in prayer every time, refusing to let this beautiful privilege go stale from our sinful distractions and disbelief. Prayer is vital: We go solo at our own peril.

2 – When to pray

I skimmed through By Searching (Isobel Kuhn) in my shelf this morning. I haven’t read the whole thing, but I came across a page in Chapter 7 where Isobel refers to Hudson Taylor’s biography: “Anyone who knows The Growth of a Soul will recognise the gold mine it was to me. Hudson Taylor went much deeper in his searchings, of course, and came out with definite maxims for life and conduct. ‘Learn to move man, through God, by prayer alone’ was one of the many that I eagerly noted down, and it has blessed me all my life.” The power of prayer is probably the most important of unnatural beliefs that we people have to come to terms with. As humans we love being independent and fixed on material things we can see: To believe in the surpassing power of prayer seems humanly unnatural to most. But it’s vital that we work on it.

Hudson Taylor did say “prayer alone”, but I don’t think he meant that prayer should operate, literally, “alone”. I think prayer naturally operates with action that follows it. If we pray for the forgiveness of sins and the power to repent, that works in tandem with our following effort to turn away from sin. If we pray for the Colossians to mature in God, that works in tandem with our effort to do whatever we can do to teach and serve them thereafter. In Colossians 4:13, Paul vouched for Epaphras that he had been working hard in ministry for the Colossians, as well as for those in Laodicea and Hierapolis. Indeed, hard work should never exist on its own, a solo mission. Hard work should be saturated with ceaseless prayer, with habits of silent still prayer in a closet or with others – everything done prayerfully. That is what Hudson Taylor means I think (although I’ve never read The Growth of a Soul so pardon me if I’ve taken this totally out of context). He emphasises the absolute importance of PRAYER, and how everything else that is done or said in ministry should operate on that foundational spiritual grace: which is to PRAY. When I speak, I pray before, during and after it. When I write, I pray throughout. When I serve others, I pray ceaselessly and zealously. And not just any prayer, but desperate, wrestling ones, knowing the eternal stakes. So let’s do everything in prayer.

Therefore: wrestle, often. If you’re leading a cell, wrestle passionately in prayer that those under your care will flourish in knowledge of God, and wrestle daily. If you’re feeling dry or distant from God, struggle in faith-fuelled prayer that God will shepherd you to drink deeply from the Holy Spirit, to rekindle your relationship with God – and struggle daily (if not hourly, or every moment). Let’s take Epaphras’ cue, and despise the undermining of the power of prayer.
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A nugget of inspiration from Gladys Aylward's autobiography: "Night after night I prayed for hours for them [the prisoners to whom I ministered]. Often when I should have been sleeping I was out on the hillside with a Christian leper, walking and praying, never daring to stop because he was 'unclean' in body, but how truly clean in heart." This is a devoted woman praying diligently, wrestling passionately, with hard work and active ministry done prayerfully. 

*Just a note: I take it for granted that we understand the purpose of prayer – communion with God, whether adoration, confession, thanksgiving or supplication are expressed; it is not to talk to a powerful genie; it is not inserting prayer tokens into a vending machine; it is not to make prideful, foolish demands of God and forgetting He is Lord over all and we are His humbled servants.

John 15:7 “If you remain in me, and My words remain in you, ask whatever you wish and it will be given you.”