The Prayer of Paul

A prayer composed from the prayers of Paul in Ephesians 1 & 3, Philippians 1 & Colossians 1

O Lord, with praise and thanksgiving, I come before you - the God of my Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father - and I ask for a Spirit of wisdom and revelation so that I can know you intimately. I ask, too, that you will illuminate the eyes of my heart so that I can know the hope to which you are calling me - the hope that is my glorious inheritance in the saints - and so that I can know the tremendous power that is available to me as a believer.

I ask also that from your store of glorious spiritual riches you will strengthen my inner man with power so that Christ can live in me by faith. I pray that I will have the superhuman ability, together with all the Christians who are rooted and established in love, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ. I want to know that love by experience-the kind of love that surpasses knowledge - and I want this so I can be filled in all of my being with God himself. I realize, too, that there is a Spirit in me that is able to do beyond all I can ask or imagine. Lord, may that Spirit arise in me and bring glory to Jesus!

I pray that as I experience a fresh revelation of your love, Lord, that this love will mature in me and grow more and more in knowledge and wise insight. May I be able to recognize the highest and the best and to live blameless until the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ.

Lord, in all of this, let me see things from your point of view, something I can do through the spiritual insight and understanding you have promised to give me. Above all, let my outer life bring credit to you and let me bring joy to your heart by bearing true Christian fruit.

I ask this in the wonderful and powerful name of Jesus and I thank you that no weapon formed against me or the fulfillment of this prayer will be successful.

Amen.