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With the Scriptures as our guide we cannot question the obligation or value of prayer. The qualities here spoken of are —

I. STEADFASTNESS (RV.) (Acts 1:14; Acts 12:5). The word means earnest adherence and attention, whether to a person or a thing. How weary we grow of prayer! How glad some formal worshippers are when the benediction is pronounced. This is a word against —

1. Neglectors of God's worship.

2. Forgetters of private devotion.

II. WATCHFULNESS (Ephesians 6:18).

1. Against wandering thoughts.

2. Against unbelief.

3. Against dulness and heaviness.

III. THANKFULNESS. St. Paul's idea of this duty may be gathered from the fact that the word he here employs, although rare elsewhere, is found thirty-seven times in his writings, and is often joined to prayer. To be always asking and never thanking cannot be right. Whenever we pray we must utter thanks.

(Family Churchman.)

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KJV: Continue in prayer, and watch in the same with thanksgiving;

WEB: Continue steadfastly in prayer, watching therein with thanksgiving;