Prayers of the Apostle Paul

I’m thankful for the Bible, aren’t you?! The written word is a collection of historical records, poetry, prophecy and doctrine. I personally love getting to peek into the minds and hearts of the authors.

The Apostle Paul is an interesting person to study. We get to see his before and after Christ life, what a dramatic conversion! Of course Paul’s writings are where we get most of our New Covenant theology, but there is a specific aspect of his letters that are rich with insight, his prayers.

From time to time I like to look beyond doctrine into the human aspects of the people in the Bible, including Jesus. There are a few interesting things I noticed when looking at all the prayers of Paul, here is a complete collection of the prayers of the Apostle Paul.

Romans

First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith is being reported all over the world. God, whom I serve with my whole heart in preaching the gospel of his Son, is my witness how constantly I remember you in my prayers at all times; and I pray that now at last by God’s will the way may be opened for me to come to you. Romans 1:8–10

Brothers, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for the Israelites is that they may be saved. Romans 10:1

Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer. Romans 12:12

May the God who gives endurance and encouragement give you a spirit of unity among yourselves as you follow Christ Jesus, so that with one heart and mouth you may glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Romans 15:5–6

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. Romans 15:13

I urge you, brothers, by our Lord Jesus Christ and by the love of the Spirit, to join me in my struggle by praying to God for me. Pray that I may be rescued from the unbelievers in Judea and that my service in Jerusalem may be acceptable to the saints there, so that by God’s will I may come to you with joy and together with you be refreshed. The God of peace be with you all. Amen. Romans 15:30–33

1 Corinthians

I always thank God for you because of his grace given you in Christ Jesus. For in him you have been enriched in every way— in all your speaking and in all your knowledge—because our testimony about Christ was confirmed in you. Therefore you do not lack any spiritual gift as you eagerly wait for our Lord Jesus Christ to be revealed. He will keep you strong to the end, so that you will be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God, who has called you into fellowship with his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, is faithful. 1 Corinthians 1:4–9

The grace of the Lord Jesus be with you. 1 Corinthians 16:23

2 Corinthians

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God. For just as the sufferings of Christ flow over into our lives, so also through Christ our comfort overflows. If we are distressed, it is for your comfort and salvation; if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which produces in you patient endurance of the same sufferings we suffer. And our hope for you is firm, because we know that just as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our comfort. 2 Corinthians 1:3–7

But thanks be to God, who always leads us in triumphal procession in Christ and through us spreads everywhere the fragrance of the knowledge of him. For we are to God the aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing. To the one we are the smell of death; to the other, the fragrance of life. And who is equal to such a task? 2 Corinthians 2:14–16

This service that you perform is not only supplying the needs of God’s people but is also overflowing in many expressions of thanks to God. Because of the service by which you have proved yourselves, men will praise God for the obedience that accompanies your confession of the gospel of Christ, and for your generosity in sharing with them and with everyone else. And in their prayers for you their hearts will go out to you, because of the surpassing grace God has give you. Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift! 2 Corinthians 9:12–15

To keep me from becoming conceited because of these surpassingly great revelations, there was given me a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” 2 Corinthians 12:7–9a

Now we pray to God that you will not do anything wrong. Not that people will see that we have stood the test but that you will do what is right even though we may seem to have failed. For we cannot do anything against the truth, but only for the truth. We are glad whenever we are weak but you are strong; and our prayer is for your perfection. 2 Corinthians 13:7–9

Galatians

The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit, brothers. Galatians 6:18

Ephesians

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will—to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace that he lavished on us with all wisdom and understanding. . . . Ephesians 1:3

For this reason, ever since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, I have not stopped giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers. I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is like the working of his mighty strength, which he exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age but also in the one to come. And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way. Ephesians 1:15–23

For this reason, I kneel before the Father, from whom his whole family in heaven and on earth derives its name. I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen. Ephesians 3:14–21

Pray also for me, that whenever I open my mouth, words may be given me so that I will fearlessly make known the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains. Pray that I may declare it fearlessly, as I should. Ephesians 6:19–20

Philippians

I thank my God every time I remember you. In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. Philippians 1:3–6

And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ—to the glory and praise of God. Philippians 1:9–11

Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Philippians 4:6–7

The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit. Amen. Philippians 4:23

Colossians

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. 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. You learned it from Epaphras, our dear fellow servant, who is a faithful minister of Christ on our behalf, and who also told us of your love in the Spirit. For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you and asking God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all spiritual wisdom and understanding. And we pray this in order that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and may please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God, being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience, and joyfully giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the kingdom of light. For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. Colossians 1:3–14

Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. And pray for us, too, that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ, for which I am in chains. Pray that I may proclaim it clearly, as I should. Colossians 4:2–4

1 Thessalonians

We always thank God for all of you, mentioning you in our prayers. We continually remember before our God and Father your work produced by faith, your labor prompted by love, and your endurance inspired by hope in our Lord Jesus Christ. 1 Thessalonians 1:2–3

And we also thank God continually because, when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men, but as it actually is, the word of God, which is at work in you who believe. For you, brothers, became imitators of God’s churches in Judea, which are in Christ Jesus: You suffered from your own countrymen the same things those churches suffered from the Jews, who killed the Lord Jesus and the prophets and also drove us out. They displease God and are hostile to all men in their effort to keep us from speaking to the Gentiles so that they may be saved. In this way they always heap up their sins to the limit. The wrath of God has come upon them at last. 1 Thessalonians 2:13–16

How can we thank God enough for you in return for all the joy we have in the presence of our God because of you? Night and day we pray most earnestly that we may see you again and supply what is lacking in your faith. Now may our God and Father himself and our Lord Jesus clear the way for us to come to you. May the Lord make your love increase and overflow for each other and for everyone else, just as ours does for you. May he strengthen your hearts so that you will be blameless and holy in the presence of our God and Father when our Lord Jesus comes with all his holy ones. 1 Thessalonians 3:9–13

May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The one who calls you is faithful and he will do it. 1 Thessalonians 5:23–24

The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. 1 Thessalonians 5:28

2 Thessalonians

We ought always to thank God for you, brothers, and rightly so, because your faith is growing more and more, and the love every one of you has for each other is increasing. Therefore, among God’s churches we boast about your perseverance and faith in all the persecutions and trials you are enduring. 2 Thessalonians 1:3

With this in mind, we constantly pray for you, that our God may count you worthy of his calling, and that by his power he may fulfill every good purpose of yours and every act prompted by your faith. We pray this so that the name of our Lord Jesus may be glorified in you, and you in him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ. 2 Thessalonians 1:11–12

May our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father, who loved us and by his grace gave us eternal encouragement and good hope, encourage your hearts and strengthen you in every good deed and word. 2 Thessalonians 2:16–17

And pray that we may be delivered from wicked and evil men, for not everyone has faith. But the Lord is faithful, and he will strengthen and protect you from the evil one. We have confidence in the Lord that you are doing and will continue to do the things we command. May the Lord direct your hearts into God’s love and Christ’s perseverance. 2 Thessalonians 3:2–5

Now may the Lord of peace himself give you peace at all times and in every way. The Lord be with all of you. 2 Thessalonians 3:16

1 Timothy

I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who has given me strength, that he considered me faithful, appointing me to his service. 1 Timothy 1:12

I urge, then, first of all, that requests, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for everyone—for kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness. This is good, and pleases God our Savior, who wants all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth. For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all men—the testimony given in its proper time. . . . 1 Timothy 2:1

2 Timothy

I thank God, whom I serve, as my forefathers did, with a clear conscience, as night and day I constantly remember you in my prayers. Recalling your tears, I long to see you, so that I may be filled with joy. I have been reminded of your sincere faith, which first lived in your grandmother Lois and in your mother Eunice and, I am persuaded, now lives in you also. For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God which is in you through the laying on of my hands. For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline. 2 Timothy 1:3–7

May the Lord show mercy to the household of Onesiphorus, because he often refreshed me and was not ashamed of my chains. On the contrary, when he was in Rome, he searched hard for me until he found me. May the Lord grant that he will find mercy from the Lord on that day! You know very well in how many ways he helped me in Ephesus. 2 Timothy 1:16–18

The Lord be with your spirit. Grace be with you. 2 Timothy 4:22

Titus

Grace be with you all. Titus 3:15

Philemon

I always thank my God as I remember you in my prayers, because I hear about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints. I pray that you may be active in sharing your faith, so that you will have a full understanding of every good thing we have in Christ. Your love has given me great joy and encouragement, because you, brother, have refreshed the hearts of the saints. Philemon 4–7

The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit. Philemon 25

Where Soul Meets Spirit, the Dwelling Place of the WORD of God

What is The WORD of God?

• Through the WORD of God, all things were made and continue to consist -

• The WORD became flesh so it/he could empathize and become like humankind to set humankind free from sin and death - Hebrews 2:14-15

• The WORD of God is alive and active in the innermost being of mankind -

• A heart that is receptive to the WORD of God will be pruned, taught, transformed and brought to rest in Christ -

Based on all this, the WORD of God sure seems important, what is it exactly?

The word of God is not just the written word...AND it's not just the spoken word. The Greek word for "word" is logos. In Greek philosophy, Heracleitus, Plato and Aristotle agreed on the basic meaning of logos, which is; the divine reason implicit in the cosmos, ordering it and giving it form and meaning.

Essentially, the Logos was the order and structure behind nature. Philosophers for thousands of years have looked at nature and recognized there's an order to things; a tree bears fruit, rainwater nourishes the plants, humans are sustained by the food that grows, etc...

In some cultures, the logos is called "The Way." Taoism, an ancient Chinese monotheistic religion, looks at the "intelligence" behind the natural world and recognizes that there is order and even design. In fact, in the Chinese Bible, John 1 says, 'in the beginning was the Way."

In addition to being used to describe the order and design upholding nature, Logos is also defined as the logic, order, intent, character and reasoning behind that which is spoken or written. It refers to the character, logic and integrity of the person who has spoken or written those words.

Now let's use this understanding to gain a bigger picture of the WORD of God.

The Word of God became flesh, what does this mean? It means that God's integrity, character, a way of thinking and doing things, became a human. This human is Jesus. Jesus is the exact physical representation of what it looks like for God to be on this planet in human form. The way Jesus treats people is the way God would treat people, the way Jesus conducts himself with the natural elements of the earth are the way God would, the way Jesus teaches is the way God would, etc...

The Word of God was not contained alone in Jesus, it's bigger than him in a sense because it was still holding the universe together while Jesus was in human form. So the Word is in all things and upholds all things. This living essence of God is very similar to spirit in nature, in a sense it is spiritual. You could say spirit gives life to the word.

What does this mean for us?

What do we do with this word? It's obviously more than something that you read. The letters, poems and historical accounts of God's dealings with mankind are certainly an important part of the expression of the living word of God, but it must be more than that for us as humans. It must be a source of influence to which we yield to teach us how to be human, as God intended. 

4:12 NLT For the word of God is alive and powerful. It is sharper than the sharpest two-edged sword, cutting between soul and spirit, between joint and marrow. It exposes our innermost thoughts and desires.

We know that God's goal for us is that we are conformed into the image of his dear son, Jesus. We now that God gave us his spirit to insure salvation and our eternal inheritance. We know that transformation happens through mind renewal. Given those things, in light of the Word exposing our innermost thoughts and desires, we can assume that it's for the purpose of transformation so we'll be more like the kind of human Jesus is.

Jesus gives us more insight as to how this Word works in us. He basically says that the receptiveness of your heart to this Word determines the degree to which it will bear fruit after its kind in your life. The Word bears kingdom of God fruit, spiritual fruit. If those things are not in your life, the word of God is not fruitful in your heart in those areas. It's pretty simple really, the seed isn't growing due to the cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches and the lust of other things.

When you want something in the world more than what the word of God can yield into your life, you will stop the growth of the Word into your life in pursuit of the worldly thing. This is the continuation of eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, we seek to establish our own will and desires rather than yield to the influence of God's logic and character within us, which will establish his will and bear the fruit that fulfills that desire in a way that's consistent with his logic, integrity, intention and character.

The Word Will Do Its Job

The only thing you can really do in harmony with the way God created the world to actually function is yield to it, tune yourself in your mind to it. Believe it, trust it, co-labor with it. But the paradox is the way you believe, trust and co-labor is to rest.

The author of Hebrews gives us insight to the intent of the word through a story about the Hebrews wandering in the desert for 40 years. We know God's intention for delivering the Israelites was so he could have a people group on this planet through which to reveal himself and bless the entire world. The Hebrews were the people God picked to establish his spiritual kingdom into this physical world.

Rather than just saying ok and letting him do that, they looked at what was in the world and questioned if God could really do those things. They looked at their present circumstances and questioned if he would do those things for them. This caused their hearts to be desensitized, hardened or untrusting toward him so they quit following/obeying him. Because they didn't just allow him to lead them they eventually came to a place in their minds and hearts where they simply could not receive his leading and therefore could not enter into the blessing that he wanted for all nations through them.

The author of Hebrews admonishes the believers of his time to not be like the Hebrews. Don't look at the condition of your lives and the world to determine what you think God can and will do. In fact, he gave you a tradition in the Sabbath to ready your mind to receive the real Sabbath he wanted for you, which is to cease from your labors for righteousness and blessing from God.

This part of the letter of Hebrews applies directly to us. We too should not look at our lives and circumstances in the world to determine what God can and will do. The reason is beautifully constructed in the first 4 chapters, bringing us to the conclusion that God, who made everything and upholds everything, because human, to empathize with us and set us free from this limiting physical world so he could bring us to a place of rest in Him and so his people would be the conduit through which he blesses all nations. He still wants that.

That is Logos, God's desire and intention to live through us and give life to all creation. When we reject that we will not and cannot participate in that life, on this planet and in the afterlife. You have to let God's logic, integrity, wisdom, character, power and understanding live in the innermost part of your being so he can establish his will in you. His will for you is life, peace and blessing in his grace all the days of your life and all throughout eternity.

Reading the Bible

So when you read the Bible, it should testify of God's power and intention. Yes, there is doctrine to understand and instruction to apply but there is a bigger picture. There is a stream of consciousness to engage with, there is a wisdom that is born of the ancient of days that you can walk within, there is a level of character and integrity that you can be empowered by to display to the created world what it looks like for a human to yield to God.

The Word of God is alive and powerful, able to sustain and transform you into the vessel he always wanted humans to be. Don't allow a temporary, fallen world system determine how you'll think about God. Lift up your minds higher than that, set your eyes on Jesus and allow that logic to infiltrate everything you understand. Think on what's eternally true and bring that level of consciousness into this realm.

Trust God and allow him to glorify himself through you!!