Scripture: "With all prayer and supplication praying at all seasons in the Spirit, and watching thereunto in all perseverance and sup¬plication for all the saints."—EPH. vi. 18 (R. V.).
Notice how Paul repeats the words in the intensity of his desire to reach the hearts of his readers. "With all prayer and supplication praying at all seasons, watching thereunto in all perseverance and all supplication." It is, "all prayer, all seasons, all perseverance, all supplication." The words claim thought, if they are to meet with the needed response.
Paul felt so deeply the unity of the Body of Christ, and he was so sure that that unity could only be realized in the exercise of love and prayer, that he pleaded with the believers at Ephesus unceasingly and fervently to pray for all saints, not only in their immediate circle, but in all the Church of Christ of whom they might hear. "Unity is strength." As we exercise this power of intercession with all perseverance, we shall be delivered from self with all its feeble prayers, and lifted up to that enlargement of heart in which the love of Christ can flow freely and fully through us.
The great lack in true believers often is that in prayer they are occupied with themselves, and with what God must do for them. Let us realize that we have here a call to every believer to give himself without ceasing to the exercise of love and prayer. It is as we forget ourselves, in the faith that God will take charge of us, and yield ourselves to the great and blessed work of calling down the blessing of God on our brethren, that the whole Church will be fitted to do its work in making Christ known to every creature. This alone is the healthy and the blessed life of a child of God who has yielded himself wholly to Christ Jesus.
Pray for God's children and the Church around you. Pray for all the work in which they are engaged, or ought to be. Pray at all seasons in the Spirit for all God's saints. There is no blessedness greater than that of abiding communion with God. And there is no way that leads to the enjoyment of this more surely than the life of intercession for which these words of Paul appeal pleadingly.
