I use this prayer for my family and friends, using the words that St. Paul wrote in his letter to the Colossians. It can be found in the New Testament of the Bible in his letter to the Colossians. chapter 2: Verse 2.


This is what I have asked of God for you: (here I insert my families names) that you will be encouraged and knit together by strong ties of love, and that you will have the rich experience of knowing Christ with real certainty and clear understanding.

These words are from The Living Bible which is a paraphrase. It is a good idea to look up a modern translation such as The New International Bible or The Good News Bible, as they all say the same thing in a different way. It is very interesting and helps to grasp the true meaning and what I think of as the 'flavour.'

Here is the same prayer from The New International Version.

My purpose is that they may be encouraged in heart and united in love, so that they may have the full riches of complete understanding, in order that they may know the mystery of God, namely, Christ,

Try this from The Message. This Bible is written in ordinary, contemporary language, from the original languages, crafted to present its tone, rhythm, events, and ideas in everyday speech. By Eugene H. Peterson.

I want you woven into a tapestry of love, in touch with everything there is to know about God. Then you will have minds, confident and at rest, focused on Christ, God's great mystery. All the richest treasures of wisdom and knowledge are embedded in that mystery and no where else. And we've been shown that mystery!

The Jerusalem Bible is a favourite translation of mine, because of the style of language.

It is all to bind you together in love and to stir your minds, so that your understanding may come to full development, until you really know God's secret in which all the jewels of wisdom and knowledge are hidden.

Now for the Amplified Bible , I get great enjoyment from the abundance of different words in the English language to say the same thing, but not the same???!? Well read this and you will know what I mean.

The same verse from Colossians.

For my concern is, that their hearts may be braced, comforted, cheered, and encouraged, as they are knit together in love, that they may come to have all the abounding wealth and blessings of assured conviction of understanding, and that they may become progressively more intimately acquainted with, and may know more definitely and accurately and thoroughly, that mystic secret of God, which is Christ, the Anointed One.

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