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them. How much we need the help of each other, even when it comes to the question of
finding the Will of God for our own personal problems.
The walk which is worthy of this highest of all callings is very lowly: with lowliness
of mind, with patience and forbearance, with mutual concern, simply living a very
ordinary everyday kind of life, but doing so `as unto the Lord, and not unto men', living
clothed with the Lord Jesus Christ that our lives may be governed by His might, praying
always for all saints.
Perhaps it may all be summed up in the first two verses of chapter 5::
"Be ye therefore followers of God, as dear children; and walk in love, as Christ also
hath loved us, and hath given Himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a
sweetsmelling savour",
or again, as Paul puts it to Titus, `adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour in all things'.
No.9.
The Worthy Walk---Colossians (1).
pp. 32 - 36
In the last study we saw how the `worthy walk' reflects the will of God for the
member of Christ's Body, as that walk is outlined for us in the Epistle to the Ephesians.
In the present study we wish to see how His will for us is reflected in the outline of the
worthy walk in Colossians. There are re-statements of a number of the factors involved,
together with new thoughts and expansions.
Paul's prayer in Col. 1: 9 onwards is pertinent to our subject. As in the case of the
prayer in Eph. 1:, so here the prayer is `on account of' their `faith in Christ Jesus, and of
the love which ye have to all the saints' (Col. 1: 4, 8). He prays `in order that ye might be
filled with the knowledge of His will': completed with the knowledge of His will. It is
not, however, simple knowledge (gnosis), but `upon-knowledge' (epignosis) which is
sometimes taken to signify `further knowledge', sometimes `acknowledgment'. There
seems to be no good reason why both thoughts cannot be included here. So far, the
knowledge these Colossian believers had, had resulted in `faith and love', but faith
without further knowledge can be `blind' faith, mere credulity: uninformed love can
mislead. It is worth noting that in both the other main prison epistles the initial prayer is
concerned with epignosis: `may give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the
knowledge of Him' (Eph. 1: 17), `that your love may abound yet more and more in
knowledge' (Phil. 1: 9). The latter reference leads up to that tremendously challenging
third chapter with its call to emulate the Apostle Paul in his desire `to know Him' (to get
to know Him). There is also in this prayer in Colossians the same inference: Paul `asks
that ye might be completed in the knowledge of His will', and after enumerating the
glories of Christ in chapter 1: 13 onwards, he concludes (2: 10) "And ye are complete in
Him". It seems clear then that the knowledge of God's will is found in the knowledge of