Gen 25:21, And Isaac prayed to the Lord on behalf of his wife, because she was barren; and the Lord answered him and Rebekah his wife conceived. 
	We are deep in our consideration of effective, intercessory prayer as God’s people in this realm. We have seen that the ministry of prayer is at the heart of God’s living testimony on this earth. While we are using this passage as the starting point of this deliberation, we have looked at many other scriptures, quotations, and Biblical examples of true intercessory prayer. 
Last time, we dealt with the Prophet Ezra’s prayer that the Lord would move the heart of His Chosen people to repent and to devote themselves wholly unto God in putting away all those things that were not pleasing the Lord. We saw that God immediately answered that prayer with the willing hearts of the people to do all that was required of them. This is the same prayer that we hold forth for God’s Chosen saints today, a full-hearted devotion and dedication unto Him in all that we say and do and think. 
	We ended last time with the example that the Apostle Paul put forth of Epaphras unto the Colossian Church. He was one of their very own and that is important for us to recognize. So often we think of the great men of God, such as the Prophets and the Disciples as the true prayer warriors. We put them on a pedestal and think that we can not possibly be expected to be the prayerful saints that they were. However, the Apostle Paul presents to us an example of one like as ourselves, a born-again believer whom the Holy Spirit chose to highlight as to what our pray life should entail.
Once again we read Col 4:12+13. Epaphras, who is one of your number, a bondslave of Jesus Christ, sends you his greetings, always laboring earnestly for you in his prayers, that you may stand perfect and fully assured in all the will of God. For I bear him witness that he has a deep concern for you and for those who are in Laodicea and Hierapolis. 
 We began to see that Epaphras prayed constantly for those beloved saints in Colossae, Laodicea, and Hierapolis. He was not so caught up in the strain and the stresses and the anxieties of this realm that he could not pray at all times. As a matter of fact, it is in constant prayer that we find relief and deliverance from those very elements of our daily life that beset and disappoint and place such rigorous demands upon us. As we are in constant communion with the Lord, lifting up those whom He puts on our hearts and minds, we will find that we are not so focused on our needs, but very earnestly seeking the Lord’s intervention for others. Our stress will not be on our lack of anything, but fully set on the magnitude and the grace and the mercy of God’s love for others.
The next element of the example of Epaphras’ prayer is that he prayed fervently. Quote, The word used here means "agonizing." It is the same word used for our Lord's praying in the Garden (Luke 22:44, And being in agony He was praying very fervently; and His sweat became like drops of blood, falling down upon the ground). We get the impression that prayer was serious business with Epaphras! This Greek word was used to describe the athletes as they gave themselves fully to their sports. If church members today put as much concern and enthusiasm into their praying as they did into their…games…, we would have revival! End quote. (from The Bible Exposition Commentary. Copyright © 1989 by Chariot Victor Publishing, and imprint of Cook Communication Ministries. All rights reserved. Used by permission.)
	Epaphras gave himself wholly to prayer on the behalf of those upon his heart. He did not approach prayer as just something that had to be done because it was simply the right thing to do. Neither was it just a casual and occasional thing to do when the times were difficult or filled with intense and stressful circumstances. No, he prayed constantly and he prayed fervently or earnestly. This was his very life unto the Lord and he approached it with all the reverence and the dedication and the preparation required to do it properly and with commitment. He took to heart the fact that He was coming before the Lord God Almighty and that he had to be serious and direct and honest with God in such a face-to-face, heart-to-heart, and spirit-to Spirit obligation.
	How many of us could truly state that we are fervent in our prayer lives before God? Do we pray with all the heart and soul that is fully committed to the holy task of coming unto God in earnest and dedicated prayer? The idea that we would so completely give ourselves to prayer as athletes give themselves to their sport is a very sobering reality of what is lacking in the modern Church. Not many, if any, could find ourselves so marked out in the heart of prayerful dedication unto God, yet He deserves nothing less. He far supersedes any other commitment that this life contains, and yet we so consider Him with such little regard and preparation in our practical application of prayer.
	The next truth of his prayer life is that Epaphras prayed in a very personal manner. Quote, Epaphras did not pray around the world for everybody in general and nobody in particular. He centered his intercession on the saints in Colossae, Laodicea, and Hierapolis. No doubt he mentioned some of them by name. Prayer for Epaphras was not an impersonal religious exercise, for he carried these people in his heart and prayed for them personally. End quote. (from The Bible Exposition Commentary. Copyright © 1989 by Chariot Victor Publishing, and imprint of Cook Communication Ministries. All rights reserved. Used by permission.)
	He knew those for whom he prayed. This does not mean that he did not lift up others, but his concentrated efforts and earnestness was for those people and their situations unto whom he was intimately acquainted. 
Many times the Holy Spirit will put on our hearts those whom we do not know. We may not know their names, but the Holy Spirit brings them to our heart, such as someone whom we might have seen or just met or whom we have never met such as ministers and missionaries around this world. These are very legitimate responses of our hearts in intercession. 
However, the vast majority of our prayers will be concentrated upon those whom we know in a very personal manner. In the case of Epaphras, this meant that he could envision each one as he brought them before the throne of grace, and He could enter into each specific and individual request with knowledge and an understanding of what was involved in the every situation. 
So it is in our prayers as we lift up our loved ones, our friends, our acquaintances, our teachers, our bosses, and especially our fellow saints in Christ Jesus. Intercession is a marvelous time in which to see each face and to enter into each session with hearts that are open and earnest after the best that the Lord has for everyone of those whom we know and love. 
	This leads to the next reality of Epaphras’ prayers, that they were very specific and definite in scope and request. Quote, If you had asked Epaphras, "What are you praying for?" he could have told you. His great desire was that the believers in those three assemblies might mature in their Christian faith. Paul used four significant words to summarize the prayer of Epaphras, and these four words also summarize the message of the Book of Colossians: "perfect – complete – all - will." 
Epaphras was concerned that these Christians know and do the will of God. But he wanted them to be involved in all the will of God, not just in part of it. (All is a key word in Colossians, used over thirty times.) He also wanted them to stand perfect and complete in God's will. The gnostic teachers offered these Christians "perfection and maturity," but they could not deliver the goods. Only in Jesus Christ can we have these blessings. "And ye are complete in Him," for only in Christ does the fullness of God dwell (Col 2:9-10, For in Him all the fulness of Deity dwells in bodily form, and in Him you have been made complete, and He is the head over all rule and authority).
This request carries the thought of being mature and perfectly assured in the will of God, and parallels Paul's prayer burden (Col 2:1-3, For I want you to know how great a struggle I have on your behalf, and for those who are at Laodicea, and for all those who have not personally seen my face, that their hearts may be encouraged, having been knit together in love, and attaining to all the wealth that comes from the full assurance of understanding, resulting in a true knowledge of God's mystery, that is, Christ Himself, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge). "Full assurance in the will of God" is a tremendous blessing! It is not necessary for the believer to drift in life. He can know God's will and enjoy it. As he learns God's will and lives it, he matures in the faith and experiences God's fullness. End quote. (from The Bible Exposition Commentary. Copyright © 1989 by Chariot Victor Publishing, and imprint of Cook Communication Ministries. All rights reserved. Used by permission.)
This should be the heart with which we lift up each one of those in our sphere of influence. We should be praying constantly and with all earnestness that every one of those so brought before the Lord would come into this deep and abiding personal relationship with Him. Our heart’s prayer should be that all would come into spiritual maturity in Jesus Christ. Because we know something of what that entails, we so lift up these beloved ones in the very specific reality of whatever the road, whatever the means, whatever the cost, let Jesus Christ being livingly established as the very essence of their life and of our life. 
	This, then, leads to the final aspect that we will consider of Epaphras’ prayer life, the truth that he prayed sacrificially, with great zeal or much distress. Quote, Real prayer is difficult. When Jesus prayed in the Garden, He sweat great drops of blood. Paul had "great conflict" (agony) as he prayed for the Colossians (2:1), and Epaphras also experienced "much distress." This does not mean that we must wrestle with God in order to get Him to answer. But it does mean that we must throw ourselves into our praying with zeal and concern. If there is no burden, there can be no blessing. To rephrase what John H. Jowett said about preaching: "Praying that costs nothing accomplishes nothing." End Quote. (from The Bible Exposition Commentary. Copyright © 1989 by Chariot Victor Publishing, and imprint of Cook Communication Ministries. All rights reserved. Used by permission.)
    	When we consider our prayer life, what do we see? What is its consistency? How much does it really matter to us in the terms of what it entails in its burdens and struggles and distresses? Are we approaching it with the heart that is open to anything that is required of us from the throne of grace and mercy? You see, prayer is not just a one-way type of communication. It is not just laying requests before God and then walking away!. Real prayer, effectual prayer, useful prayer requires that we await the very response from God. It means that we willingly set aside our ideas of what the answer should be and trust and wait for the reality of how God will answer from His throne of Sovereignty and Majesty. 
	So often we try to tell God what He has to do in answer to our prayers. We insist that He abide by what we think is the appropriate and the proper means of dealing with the given situation. We almost demand that He respond as we dictate from our limited human scope of understanding and intellectual capacity. But that is not what God will do! He may answer in some semblance of what we think. Or, He may completely blow apart everything that we understand in answering our prayers according to His will, to which we may not yet be privy. 
	This is why it is so imperative that we wait upon Him and ask Him to do everything in accordance to His will, His plan, and His purpose! We give ourselves to that with all our being. We do so with a heart that is willing to be sacrificed for the sake of what will please Him alone, whether we understand or even appreciate it at this point in our lives. When this is our heart, we will know what it means to pray as did Epaphras. 
Please keep in mind that, even though he was a prayer warrior, he was as we are in this life. He was a man from the Colossian Church with all the struggles that we daily face. Yet, with all that was a part of his everyday life, he still gave himself to prayer with all his mind and heart and being. 
	Let us join our hearts together with the desire that the same would be true of each one of us in this room. We are all called to this ministry of prayer, no matter what our age, no matter what our occupation, no matter what our duties on this earth. Prayer is the single most important reality of our spiritual life because it is our life-line with God the Father, in Jesus the Son, by the Holy Spirit. Let us seek Him to make it the most valuable aspect and reality of our lives on this earth. So be it.
	And Isaac prayed to the Lord on behalf of his wife, because she was barren; and the Lord answered him and Rebekah his wife conceived. Amen.
This morning’s benediction is 1 Chron 29:11-13. Thine, O Lord, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the victory and the majesty, indeed everything that is in the heavens and the earth; Thine is the dominion, O Lord, and Thou dost exalt Thyself as head over all. Both riches and honor come from Thee, and Thou dost rule over all, and in Thy hand is power and might; and it lies in Thy hand to make great, and to strengthen everyone. Now therefore, our God, we thank Thee, and praise Thy glorious name. Amen.