Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction:

Have you ever been in a situation where you just weren’t strong enough to do something?

Maybe it was a stubborn rusty bolt.

No matter how hard you worked on it, it just wouldn’t budge.

Maybe it was a piece of furniture you wanted to move - but you just didn’t have the ability to get it where you wanted it to be.

Maybe it was trying to lift weights or run and you just couldn’t get that last rep or run that last lap.

I am sure all of us have experienced the significant limitation of not being strong enough many times in our lives.

Today we are going to be talking about how we can be empowered and strengthened by our wonderful God in order to serve Him.

Our flesh may fail, but our God’s power never runs out.

Join me as we read today’s Scripture in Colossians 1:9-11:

Let us pray.

Prayer

Today we are going to discuss three things we can do through the empowering work of God in our lives.

The first is:

I. Through the Empowering Work of God You Can… Be Filled Fully (9)

We start off with from the day we heard.

What day is he referring to?

Paul is referring to the day he heard from Epaphras how the church in Colossae was doing.

From that day on he regularly prayed for the Colossian church.

Obviously we know Paul didn’t pray for them every waking second.

But we see that Paul made it a priority to regularly pray for this church.

It could be more accurately understood, we continue to pray for the church of Colossae.

I think Paul’s statement here can be a bit convicting for us today’s church cant it?

Are we regularly praying for others?

Or do our prayers often end up being mostly about ourselves?

Paul is lifting up these Colossian believers on a regular basis, and it is also interesting to see how he is praying for them.

He prays that they are filled with the knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.

We understand what it means to be filled with knowledge.

But what kind of knowledge are we talking about.

The knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.

The two Greek words for wisdom and understanding are sophia and synesis (sune-a-seas).

These two words are very similar in nature and have a spiritual definition.

They both have the Holy Spirit as their source.

These concepts go beyond knowing the right thing to do.

Believers with spiritual wisdom and understanding...

Spiritual Wisdom and Understanding:

Do the right thing at the right time in the right way.

Doing the right thing at the wrong time comes from a lack of wisdom and discernment.

We see this played out in Numbers 14:40-45

Israel has just sent spies out to check out the land of Canaan.

Joshua and Caleb and ten others come back and it is only Joshua and Caleb that give a good report.

The others are fearful because of the power of some of the people there - especially some people that are giants.

Because of the bad report from the other 10, Israel refuses to go and take the Promised Land and receives a judgment from God that all but Caleb and Joshua will die in the wilderness during the next 40 years because they did not trust the Lord.

So now, some of the men of Israel decide they will go ahead and do the right thing.

Too bad that it is just at the wrong time.

Moses warns them that God will not be with them and they go anyway and are defeated decisively.

Wisdom would have understood that although that was the right thing to do before - that it was not the right thing at this point because the Lord was not with them.

Anytime the Lord is not with us - you can bet it is the wrong move at the time!

On the flip side - Doing the wrong thing may stem from either not having the knowledge or understanding to begin with or frankly, by being disobedient.

Lot’s wife found this one out the hard way as she disobeyed God despite His clear command.

As God’s judgment was preparing to rain down on the wicked cities of Sodom and Gomorrah, Lot’s wife decided to look back even though she had been forbidden to do so:

And a terrible consequence ensued because of this disobedient and unwise choice:

Remember how important it is to:

Do the right thing at the right time in the right way.

Getting back to the beginning of verse 9 and seeing how Paul prays for these people is very convicting in multiple ways.

First, like we just said, how much are we really praying for others?

Second, however, is when we do pray for others, what kind of praying are we doing?

Is it usually superficial or is it spiritual?

Not that it is wrong to pray for someone to be healed or for someone to get a job or for someone to have a great day as these are important prayers - But how often do we pray for spiritual depth and learning or wisdom and understanding for others?

How often do we pray that someone else might grow closer to the Lord and obey Him more fully?

How often do we pray for someone to have the knowledge of God’s will?

This is convicting to me as well.

Note that Paul doesn’t pray for physical or material blessings here.

He prays for spiritual wisdom and understanding!

Paul understood that the things of this world - health included - would fade away eventually.

All of our stuff and yes, even our bodies will waste away eventually on earth.

Yet the spiritual wisdom and understanding God grants is eternal.

Note that he wants them filled with this knowledge of God’s will as well.

This word filled, Greek being plēroō (play-er-o-o), means to be filled completely, made full, and made complete.

Paul desires for these men and women to be so full of the knowledge of the will of God that the things of this world are all pushed out.

Our minds are too often filled with the garbage of this world every day.

Worldly ideas and philosophies are shoved at us through media outlets, schools, universities, and even liberally-minded churches.

In order to combat this we must continually be filled with the knowledge of God.

We must be in the Word daily and walking with the Lord in prayer so that he can continue to renew our mind day after day.

Romans 12:2 says:

How is our mind renewed?

Through the power of the Holy Spirit and the Word of God.

We can only discern the will of God through the work of God in our lives through His Holy Spirit.

It is only through the Word of God and the Spirit of God that we can be filled fully through the empowering work of God.

Next we see...

Scripture References: Numbers 14:40-45; Genesis 19:17,26; Romans 12:2

II.

Through the Empowering Work of God You Can… Walk Wisely (10)

Paul wants these believers to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord as we see in verse 10.

This is such a difficult statement.

“To walk in a manner worthy of the Lord.”

This is an impossible task for us on earth, but we are to continue to strive for it.

We need to continue to strive for obedience and bearing fruit.

We need to continue reading the Word of God so that we can grow in the knowledge of God.

It is not enough to just know God’s will or possess wisdom or understanding as we saw in the last verse.

We must walk with Christ in faith.

In order to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to Him - we must exercise faith in Jesus Christ alone.

May we again note Paul’s prayerful emphasis is on their spiritual health and not as much on their physical health.

He wants to see them bearing fruit and increasing in the knowledge of God.

He wants to see them growing spiritually.

Next we see Paul mention bearing fruit in every good work.

Brothers and sisters, the Bible is clear that true believers bear fruit.

Sadly, many people have misinterpreted the Bible to say that one can be a believer through a single decision with your head and then you can be saved.

It is almost simplified to the point of picking the right stock to invest in.

Pick this sure thing and then you’ll be good to go!