“Since the day we heard it, we do not cease to pray and to ask.” He says that, unceasingly, with all zeal and intensity, in his prayers he asks God to grant them spiritual perfection.
“We did not spend one day, or two, or three in prayer, but we pray unceasingly. By this the Apostle shows both his love for them and lightly hints that they have not yet reached the end” (Saint Chrysostom), and that they need strong help.
“That you may be filled.” “He neither calls them altogether imperfect, nor calls them altogether perfect. Rather, he speaks as though saying, ‘You have something, but not everything’” (Blessed Theophylact).
“This is what the word ‘that you may be filled’ expresses. Notice the Apostle’s prudence. Nowhere does he say that they are deprived of everything. Everywhere he says that they lack something. This is what the present expression means, ‘that you may be filled.’ Again he says, ‘in all pleasing, and in every good work,’ and so forth. For the word ‘all’ is testimony that they had accomplished something, though not everything.
“He does not say, ‘that you may receive,’ because they had received. Instead, he reminds them of what is lacking by saying, ‘that you may be filled.’ Thus the reproof, the indication of imperfection, was not severe. And the praise did not let them fall into self-conceit and become careless, as though everything had been fulfilled” (Saint Chrysostom).
“In the knowledge of His will,” ten epignosin, so that you may become full and perfect in knowledge, or by knowledge of the will of God. Epignosis indicates knowledge that is deeply sunk into the object, and still more deeply sunk into the mind and heart.
He desires full, sound knowledge, so firm that it admits no wavering and not even objections. This is what they lacked, for they opened their hearing to the reception of interpretations that could undermine the very foundations of faith.
Blessed Theophylact understands by this word the application of fuller knowledge.
Knowledge of what will of God is being asked for? One must suppose it is the whole will of God concerning the salvation of men. This includes knowledge both of what comes from God for our salvation and of what is required from us for this.
It means that God did not spare His Only-begotten Son, but gave Him up for us. Having come and become incarnate, He died by death on the Cross. Having removed the curse from us, He opened in Himself access to the heavenly Father.
Then, having ascended into the heavens and sat at the right hand of God the Father, He opened the way for the Holy Spirit to descend to earth. He sent Him from the Father, that He might be with us forever (cf. Jn 14:16).
Through the word of the gospel, the Holy Spirit awakens faith. He regenerates those who believe to new life in the water of baptism. Having filled them with His grace, He makes them strong to do every known will of God, living in holiness and pleasing God.
Some suppose that here the Apostle means only the last part of the will of God, that is, the will which determines how we must live as Christians. But proper knowledge of this latter will requires knowledge of the former will, or of how God was pleased to order our salvation.
Besides this, the Colossians needed the completion and strengthening of knowledge in precisely this matter. Therefore one cannot think that Saint Paul did not have it in view when he prayed that the Colossians be filled with knowledge of the will of God.
Our commentators understand this in this way. Oecumenius writes, “What is this will of the Father? It is that men should have access to the Father through the Son, and not through Angels.” The same is found in Theophylact: “The will of God and the good pleasure of God is that the Son, and not Angels, should be given for us. The Apostle prays for the completion of knowledge of this will.”
Here are Saint Chrysostom’s words: “What does ‘that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will’ mean? It means that we must have access to Him through the Son, and not through Angels. You have learned that we must have access to Him. Now it remains for you to learn why He sent the Son. For if salvation were to come through Angels, He would not have sent and given up the Son.”
Yet when they speak this way, they do not exclude the thought that the will determining life and deeds is also meant here. Saint Chrysostom says, “The Apostle always joins life to faith.”
Ambrosiaster explains this side more fully: “The Apostle, having learned of the Colossians’ warm disposition, ready for everything in the faith of Christ, prays for them. He asks that fuller knowledge of the will of God be given to them, so that they may satisfy their piety in a more reasonable way than they learned when they first heard of this faith. For however great the power of faith may be, when something is done unreasonably and without skill, the fruit of labor perishes through this. Not zeal alone is required, but prudent zeal.”
Therefore we shall understand here the knowledge of every will of God, both concerning the manner in which our salvation has been ordered and concerning the working out of this salvation by us. In both parts the false teachers attempted to trouble the faith of the Colossians.
“In all wisdom and spiritual understanding,” en pase sophia kai synesei pneumatike. These terms are difficult to define with precision. Yet it is clear that they indicate different sides of full knowledge of the will of God, or the forms in which it appears in reality.
By wisdom, it seems, is meant rather a deepening into the object of knowledge. By understanding is meant rather its deepening in the heart and mind, for synesis properly means consciousness.
Under the will of God we have determined to understand both the manner in which God ordered our salvation, that is, dogma, and the manner in which we ourselves work out salvation, that is, life. Therefore we must indicate what meaning should be given in both respects to wisdom and to understanding.
In the first respect, wisdom seems to mean the ability, proper to full knowledge of the truth, to explain, prove, and defend it, and to repel every falsehood.
In the second respect, it means the ability, proper to full knowledge of the manner of Christian life, to order one’s life according to this norm. This applies both to oneself and to one’s outward condition, both in general and in particulars.
It means seeing what helps and using it, seeing obstacles and removing them, seeing crossroads and avoiding them. It means going evenly and straight toward the goal, turning neither to the right nor to the left, and not stopping.
Understanding, synesis, in the first respect, will be the reception of what is known into consciousness and feeling, and the tasting of it. In the second respect, it will be the reception of the norm of Christian life into the conscience.
Under the action of the fear of God, it establishes the movement of all the powers of nature according to this norm. In other words, it is the Christian inward moral and religious order.
Both wisdom and understanding are called spiritual, as fruits of the grace of the Holy Spirit. For they cannot appear or be established in anyone except after he has been filled with grace. Even then they do not manifest themselves in strength all at once, but grow and become strong gradually.
Perhaps Saint Paul deliberately added this word in order to indicate beforehand the unsoundness of the false teachers’ reasoning. According to that reasoning, they taught the use of certain elements and certain bodily practices as means to communion with the spiritual world.
THEOSIS