Always Struggling

“… always struggling on your behalf in his prayers, that you may stand mature and fully assured in all the will of God.”

Our New Testament preserves four letters Paul wrote during his first Roman imprisonment. From these epistles and from the last chapter of the book of Acts, we learn that in Rome the authorities allowed him to stay “by himself” under guard for two years in what was probably a rented dwelling, awaiting trial. There, he was able to receive visitors and preach and teach unhindered.

During this period he had both “fellow prisoners” and “fellow workers”. Epaphras was one of the former.

From Colossians and Philemon, we learn that Epaphras had come to Rome from Colossae, and was likely either the founder of that local church or one of its most prominent early teachers. The apostle refers to “the day you heard [the gospel] and understood the grace of God in truth, just as you learned it from Epaphras our beloved fellow servant.” He adds, “He is a faithful minister of Christ on your behalf and has made known to us your love in the Spirit.” How Epaphras ended up imprisoned with Paul is a mystery we’ll have to ask him about when we meet him; scripture doesn’t tell us, but the fact that that his faith cost him his freedom tells us a fair bit about his level of commitment to the service of Christ.

The statement I’ve quoted above comes from the last chapter of Colossians, and it’s about Epaphras. Having taught the word of God to a group of Gentiles, then left them for Rome, he never stopped “struggling” on their behalf in prayer, committed to their maturity in Christ and knowledge of God even when he was no longer present to aid in producing it.

The word Paul uses for “struggling” is agōnizomai, which requires little explanation in English. It means what it looks like: to contend earnestly, to fight as a soldier fights in battle or an athlete contends in a contest to the point of stressing one’s body, or, metaphorically, one’s mind and heart. Epaphras was not playing around in prayer. For Epaphras, this must have been a daily ritual, getting down on his knees on behalf of those he mentored in the way of Christ. Paul writes, “always struggling”, as opposed to “regularly” or “occasionally”. The man simply would not quit.

I’m trying to remember the last time I agonized in prayer. Oh, it’s happened, and more than once. But it’s usually happened over my concerns for my own problems or over someone in a rare moment of acute crisis, not as a daily, disciplined, stressful exercise on behalf of others. I’m afraid my prayers for the maturity of those I love tend to be repetitious and regular, but comparatively casual. Not perfunctory, but definitely not a conscious exercise in spiritual combat.

I share that by way of self-rebuke. Sometimes the scripture stings a little.