The Prayer of Thanksgiving

Continue in prayer, and watch in the same with thanksgiving (Col. 4:2 KJV)

There are different types of prayer according to 1 Timothy 2:1, including thanksgiving, alongside supplications and intercessions and Ephesians 6:18 exhorts us to pray with all prayer. We will need to engage in different types of prayers at various times as the Spirit leads us. Thanksgiving is listed as one of the types of prayers. The usual understanding of this is that you can choose at a certain time to pray and give thanks to God and at other times to pray and intercede for someone. However, there is more to the prayer of thanksgiving than this basic application.

Colossians 4:2 above urges us to continue in prayer and be watchful and thankful in it. Thanksgiving is not merely one of the types of prayers we do at a particular season when God has done something for us. It is a type of prayer that permeates or accompanies all other forms of prayer. We give thanks in intercession. We give thanks while making our petitions to God. We give thanks while praying in the Spirit. Our prayer life is interwoven with thanksgiving. In fact, our entire life, outside of our prayer closet, is a life of prayer and thanksgiving!

Learn to thank the Lord always. Avoid the temptation of waiting to thank God after He does that miracle you are waiting for. This is a very big mistake we must not make. On the contrary, learn to look for reasons to thank Him always and remain in that atmosphere of thanksgiving all day, 24/7.

MEDITATE

Can you think of one reason why the Lord instructs us to thank Him even while we are still asking for something? ( Mark 11:24).

APPLY THE WORD

Thanksgiving is a spiritual wonder. Those whose hearts and mouths are full of thankfulness seem to pull heaven’s resources to make them even more thankful, while those who complain, are ungrateful or bitter in life seem always to attract more reasons to be bitter in life. Choose thankfulness, and enjoy God’s presence and an endless flow of the supernatural.