Prayer & Proclamation

We began by talking about the place of prayer in the life and ministry of the servant of God, and we talked about the place of prayer in our personal life, in our pastoral leadership.

And this morning, I want to talk about the place of prayer in our proclamation of the Word of God.

And I want you to turn, if you will, to Colossians chapter 4, and let's read the second, third, and fourth verses of that chapter.

Verse two begins, Paul said, "Devote yourselves to prayer, keeping alert in it with an attitude of thanksgiving, praying at the same time for us as well, that God may open up to us a door for the Word, so that we may speak forth the mystery of Christ, for which I have also been imprisoned—in order that I may make it clear in the way I ought to speak." Now, Paul is simply saying in this passage, he says, "Here's my prayer request." He said, "First of all, devote yourselves to prayer." That isn't just hop down, pray a little bit, and hop up and on your way, but make it a lifestyle.

And he says, "Here are my two requests.

First of all, you would pray that the doors of opportunity might be open.

And secondly, you would pray that I may know how to present the truth in such a way they will hear it, understand it, and be impacted by it." So that's exactly what I want to talk about this morning, and that is this matter of the place of prayer in the proclamation of the Word of God.

And I want to begin where I believe most of you are concerned, and that is praying about the opportunities to proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Paul was requesting that they pray for doors of opportunity to be opened.

And I want to challenge you this morning, you need to begin praying now.

"Lord, you open your door of opportunity.

Not some place that somebody else thinks ought to be, but God, where you have prepared me." Now, I want to give you a little warning.

The place God opens for you to preach and proclaim the Word of God will be partially determined by the degree to which you prepare yourself to preach it.

You cannot afford to be lazy, slothful, and get by.

You're dealing with the souls of men.

You're dealing with the will of God.

You're dealing with the purpose of God, the plan of God, what He had in mind for you before you were ever born.

You cannot afford to be sloppy, negligent, and with the attitude of just getting by.

If you're gonna pray for God to open a door of opportunity for you, you need to remember something.

You cannot afford to ask God to give you a great door of opportunity unless you have given yourself away to Him as best you know how in preparing to preach the gospel.

And I want to give you several illustrations of that, that, um, of personal things that happened to me in my own life, because I think they're so apropos to what we're talking about.

And Paul was saying to these Colossians, he says, "You pray for doors of opportunity to be opened." And so we should pray for that, and we should ask other people to pray for us.

But I want to assure you of something this morning, that first of all, if God has called you, He already has your place picked out.

If you will obey Him and you will trust Him, don't worry about whether you're gonna have a place to preach or not.

In fact, I've never been anywhere I was particularly wanted, to be honest, except the first church.

We began by talking about the place of prayer in the life and ministry of the servant of God, and we talked about the place of prayer in our personal life, in our pastoral leadership.

And this morning, I want to talk about the place of prayer in our proclamation of the Word of God.

And I want you to turn, if you will, to Colossians chapter 4, and let's read the second, third, and fourth verses of that chapter.

Verse two begins, Paul said, "Devote yourselves to prayer, keeping alert in it with an attitude of thanksgiving, praying at the same time for us as well, that God may open up to us a door for the Word, so that we may speak forth the mystery of Christ, for which I have also been imprisoned—in order that I may make it clear in the way I ought to speak." Now, Paul is simply saying in this passage, he says, "Here's my prayer request." He said, "First of all, devote yourselves to prayer." That isn't just hop down, pray a little bit, and hop up and on your way, but make it a lifestyle.

And he says, "Here are my two requests.

First of all, you would pray that the doors of opportunity might be open.

And secondly, you would pray that I may know how to present the truth in such a way they will hear it, understand it, and be impacted by it." So that's exactly what I want to talk about this morning, and that is this matter of the place of prayer in the proclamation of the Word of God.

And I want to begin where I believe most of you are concerned, and that is praying about the opportunities to proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Paul was requesting that they pray for doors of opportunity to be opened.

And I want to challenge you this morning, you need to begin praying now.

"Lord, you open your door of opportunity.

Not some place that somebody else thinks ought to be, but God, where you have prepared me." Now, I want to give you a little warning.

The place God opens for you to preach and proclaim the Word of God will be partially determined by the degree to which you prepare yourself to preach it.

You cannot afford to be lazy, slothful, and get by.

You're dealing with the souls of men.

You're dealing with the will of God.

You're dealing with the purpose of God, the plan of God, what He had in mind for you before you were ever born.

You cannot afford to be sloppy, negligent, and with the attitude of just getting by.

If you're gonna pray for God to open a door of opportunity for you, you need to remember something.

You cannot afford to ask God to give you a great door of opportunity unless you have given yourself away to Him as best you know how in preparing to preach the gospel.

And I want to give you several illustrations of that, that, um, of personal things that happened to me in my own life, because I think they're so apropos to what we're talking about.

And Paul was saying to these Colossians, he says, "You pray for doors of opportunity to be opened." And so we should pray for that, and we should ask other people to pray for us.

But I want to assure you of something this morning, that first of all, if God has called you, He already has your place picked out.

If you will obey Him and you will trust Him, don't worry about whether you're gonna have a place to preach or not.

In fact, I've never been anywhere I was particularly wanted, to be honest, except the first church.