17 August 2005 Devotion for Today “Epaphras- A Man of Prayer” Colossians 1:7
Once and a while I have a memory of an aged, godly man on his knees that comes to my mind. Uncle Copeland “Copie” Palmer was the deaf-mute brother of my great-grandmother. Both were born back in the 1880’s. Grandma Palmer cared for him until she died. I can only remember visiting their home twice as a young child. Both times I wandered around the house and peered into Uncle Copie’s room. The door was open. There was Uncle Copie kneeling beside his neatly-made bed, his hands folded in prayer, his eyes closed. Once he became aware that someone was at the entrance of his room and his eyes opened. He smiled and motioned for me to come over and kneel beside him. He made unintelligible noises and babbled when he talked, and then went right back to praying. I knelt there for a while until my knees hurt, and then got up and went off to play somewhere. But I will never forget the example that he gave me- just a brief moment was all that was needed to stick into my mind. He was probably my first impression of a man that close to God.
It has surprised me that as we look over the great Christian leaders of the late 20th and 21st centuries how few come out on top as men as prayer. We hear and read about women of prayer, we hear about men as great preachers and great church builders, gathering purpose-driven and seeker-sensitive congregations by the thousands but I don’t often hear about the prayer efforts which went behind these efforts except perhaps as a footnote; relegating prayer to the margins and to the fringes of Christian life in this new century. In the modern-day church it seems we spend more time learning keying up power-point presentations and putting together web pages than we do in prayer. Prayer meetings are being done-away-with as churches shuffle their programs and add choir practices and cell-group meetings instead.
In Colossinas Paul used two phrases to describe Epaphras. In Colossians 1:7 he was Paul's "dear fellow-servant," and in Colossians 4:12, he is described as “one of you, a bondservant of Christ, greets you, always laboring fervently for you in prayers, that you may stand perfect and complete in all the will of God.”
We can learn a lot about the necessity of prayer from men like Epaphras. We know he was faithful and while Paul had never been to
What would happen if we would all pray for our church as this man prayed for his? Perhaps we would no longer be living in the post-christian age. May the Lord help you to be a person of prayer today.
Have a blessed day.
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