“Continue steadfastly in prayer, being watchful in it with thanksgiving.”
Colossians 4:14
I would suppose all faith filled prayer holds a note of thankfulness.
Knowing Him, whom you are bringing the request before, brings a thankfulness for His goodness, mercy and love.
Being confident about His words and ‘your ask’ gives assurance and joyful expectation of fulfillment.
If we begin with His “Yes and Amen” we can be confident about the end. Our job then becomes to continue watchfully over our prayer. A double mind man is unstable in all his ways. Being watchful in it, with thanksgiving, constantly holds check over our hearts state. Is there evil unbelief lurking? Are there weeds that need pulling, rocks needing removal?
Where there is no thanksgiving there can be no believing.
Thanksgiving is simply acknowledging that God is at work to will and do His good pleasure. He is working all things together for His good for those who love Him and are called according to His purpose.
Thankfulness is the appropriate response of believing.
The Apostle Paul seems to have a theology regarding thankfulness. We are hard pressed to find it absent in his letters. His thankfulness to the Father for those he watches over is paramount in his prayers.
Our discipling around prayer had taught us to pray His word. From Old Testament to New there is someone’s prayer written covering every known condition that could be met this side of heaven. When we found ourselves in a place of not knowing — ‘We don’t know what to do but our eyes are on you' (Jehoshaphat from 2 Chronicles 20). We were taught to lean into the Holy Spirit who knew the perfect will of the Father. These two dynamics have stood our test of time these forty plus years of ministry.
‘We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you….…’
Paul’s places of thankfulness were around his disciple’s growth, their increasing love for one another and their faithfulness to Christ in the midst of sufferings. This moved Paul to continuing in prayer on their behalf, often labouring until Christ was formed within them.
“And so, from the day we heard, we have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him: bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God; being strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy; giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light. He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.”
Col 1:9-14
Like Paul, our desire is for Christ Jesus to be received as Lord. Our walk being rooted and built up in Him, established in the faith, as we are taught, always abounding in thanksgiving.
With this place of watchful, consistently thankful prayer, I am confident we are able to continue stedfast in prayer, never losing heart!