What Paul prayed for the Colossian believers has become our own powerful pattern for praying. Let’s see it here again from the King James Version, then we will learn what we can from the more simple wording found in the New International Reader’s Version.

Colossians 1:9,10—For this cause we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to desire that ye might be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding; that ye might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God...NIrV—That’s why we have not stopped praying for you. We have been praying for you since the day we heard about you. We have been asking God to fill you with the knowledge of what He wants. We pray that He will give you spiritual wisdom and understanding. We pray that you will lead a life that is worthy of the Lord. We pray that you will please Him in every way. So we want you to bear fruit in every good thing you do. We want you to grow to know God better.

DEAR JESUS, I thank You for the examples left for us in the Scriptures of people who came before us in praying. What a pattern we find in one after the other of them. Most of all, I thank You, dear Redeemer, for what You have taught us about prayer. And, Oh! Your greatest prayer was when You prayed, “Father, not my will, but Thine be done.” Teach me, and these with whom I fellowship to humble ourselves in praying the same.