Is There Grass On Your Path?
Colossians 1:7 As ye also learned of Epaphras our dear fellowservant, who is for you a faithful minister of Christ;
Colossians 4:12 Epaphras, who is one of you, a servant of Christ, saluteth you, always labouring fervently for you in prayers, that ye may stand perfect and complete in all the will of God.
There isn’t necessarily a whole lot we know of Epaphras. You can read a lot of thoughts on what he may have done in the ministry at Colossae. There is even some thought that he spent time in prison with Paul. We can find him mentioned in Philemon so we at least know he was an important part of starting a work there. Regardless of any of that I want to look at the importance here in Chapter 4 and verse 12. It establishes the fact that he is “one of you.” How much more do we tend to favor someone who’s not an outsider so to speak? We tend to be drawn to people who are more like us. It also mentions he is a “servant of Christ.” A desire we should all have: that it can be said of us that we are a servant of Christ. The last thing here in verse 12 we see it is said, “always labouring fervently for you in prayers.” What a statement. I don’t believe God has anything penned down by accident. He didn’t just have it written that he prayed for them, but laboured fervently for them. Could the same thing be said of us? How important is praying for one another to us? How sincere are we in those prayers? How burdened are we with those prayers? How often do we commit time to those prayers? It is said that in a region of Africa that early converts to Christianity were very diligent in their prayers. They would have a special place outside of their village that they would personally go to to pray in solitude. They would visit these places so often that they would wear out a personal path to the spot they would pray. It is said that you could then tell if someone hadn’t been to pray as often as the grass would begin to grow back in the path. These Christians were so concerned with one another that if this was seen they would go to that person and tell them that there was grass on their path. Hence the title and the question I’ll end today with. Is there grass on your path?
God bless you today! Bro. Josh Richardson
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