TOMS: Colossians 4

For an introduction to this series, click here.

October 5, 2007

Paul wraps up his epistle with various instructions: 
"Continue steadfastly in prayer, being watchful in it with thanksgiving. At the same time, pray also for us, that God may open to us a door for the word, to declare the mystery of Christ, on account of which I am in prison— that I may make it clear, which is how I ought to speak. Walk in wisdom toward outsiders, making the best use of the time. Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person." (4:2-6)

How many times is my speech "always gracious, seasoned with salt?" It is so easy to hurl insults, even if they are spoken in jest. It is an incredible thing, the power of words, both written and spoken. Of course salt, in this context, harkens back to what Jesus said about us being the salt of the earth. All of our speech is to be encouraging and full of Christian grace and love, both toward the lost world around us and fellow believers.

"Tychicus will tell you all about my activities. He is a beloved brother and faithful minister and fellow servant in the Lord. I have sent him to you for this very purpose, that you may know how we are and that he may encourage your hearts, and with him Onesimus, our faithful and beloved brother, who is one of you. They will tell you of everything that has taken place here. Aristarchus my fellow prisoner greets you, and Mark the cousin of Barnabas (concerning whom you have received instructions—if he comes to you, welcome him), and Jesus who is called Justus. These are the only men of the circumcision among my fellow workers for the kingdom of God, and they have been a comfort to me. Epaphras, who is one of you, a servant of Christ Jesus, greets you, always struggling on your behalf in his prayers, that you may stand mature and fully assured in all the will of God. For I bear him witness that he has worked hard for you and for those in Laodicea and in Hierapolis. Luke the beloved physician greets you, as does Demas. Give my greetings to the brothers at Laodicea, and to Nympha and the church in her house. And when this letter has been read among you, have it also read in the church of the Laodiceans; and see that you also read the letter from Laodicea. And say to Archippus, 'See that you fulfill the ministry that you have received in the Lord.' I, Paul, write this greeting with my own hand. Remember my chains. Grace be with you." (4:7-18, ESV)

This is the rest of the chapter. There are some interesting names mentioned here. First Tychicus, who is also mentioned in several epistles. He probably delivered Colossians, Philemon and Ephesians. This passage is why some people believe the book of Ephesians was actually written to Laodicea. You notice that Paul suggests the Colossians read both letters, and Tychicus is mentioned in Ephesians 6:21 as the deliverer of the book.

Onesimus, of course, is the slave of Philemon whom Paul met in prison. Onesimus got saved and returned with Tychicus to Philemon. We will get more into his story when we get to the little epistle to Philemon.

Mark is the one who wrote the Gospel of Mark and who earlier caused the rift between Paul and Barnabas. That Mark was Barnabas' relative sheds a lot of light on why he wanted to bring Mark along. By this point, of course, the rift seems to be healed. Mark is one of Paul's trusted workers, and Paul encourages the Colossians to welcome Barnabas when they see him. And then of course there is Demas, who later left Paul. Perhaps he was not even saved. But we will not know until we get to heaven.

Likely Paul wrote a personal greeting at the end of his epistles in his own handwriting, which is why the last verse seems disjointed from the rest of the passage. 

We are flying through these short little epistles. We will start in Thessalonians tomorrow.

TOMS: Colossians 3

For an introduction to this series, click here.

October 4, 2007

Remember at the end of chapter 2, Paul told us that if we are dead with Christ, then we need to put off man-made regulations. Now Paul begins this chapter telling us things that we should be doing if we are alive with Christ: 
"If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God." (3:1-3) 

It is so easy for us to be focused on things of this world, but Paul says it is necessary for us to keep our eyes on heavenly things. 

"But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator. Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free; but Christ is all, and in all. Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him." (3:8-17)

This is how it looks when we set our affection on things above. Our lives will be characterized as Jesus' life was. You know, these things take a lifetime to completely see in our lives, and that is what Paul is aiming at. It is easy to follow a list of visible, man-made rules, but that is not true spiritual growth or maturity. The evidence of true spiritual growth is when we see these things listed above in our lives. I am blessed to know or have known a lot of people in my life who exhibit these characteristics, and they are the people that I want to be like.

Paul ends this chapter with some advice to the family and servants: 
"Wives, submit to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord. Husbands, love your wives, and do not be harsh with them. Children, obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord. Fathers, do not provoke your children, lest they become discouraged. Bondservants, obey in everything those who are your earthly masters, not by way of eye-service, as people-pleasers, but with sincerity of heart, fearing the Lord. Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ. For the wrongdoer will be paid back for the wrong he has done, and there is no partiality." (3:18-25, ESV)

I guess I had never noticed that the last three verses are a continuation of the instructions to servants. They are a good instruction to all of us, but I guess more specifically, they are addressed to those of us who work for someone else. Like I have mentioned before, I don't think it is fair to Paul and to the Scriptures to extrapolate from passages like this that Paul approved of slavery. He was trying to address people in whatever situation they found themselves, and in 1st century Rome, that would include slaves. Obviously slavery is wrong, but it also would have been wrong for Christian slaves to lead a revolution against the system in place. Just like them, today we need to try to improve our lives and our situations, and not try to change the things we have no control over.

TOMS: Colossians 2, part 2

For an introduction to this series, click here.

October 3, 2007

It looks like I bit off a little bit more than I could chew yesterday. Yesterday morning was kind of strange. Anyway, we will finish chapter 2, going back to part of the section we tried to finish up on yesterday.

"Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink, or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath. These are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ. Let no one disqualify you, insisting on asceticism and worship of angels, going on in detail about visions, puffed up without reason by his sensuous mind, and not holding fast to the Head, from whom the whole body, nourished and knit together through its joints and ligaments, grows with a growth that is from God." (2:16-19)

This passage and the passage that follows are quite liberating. Legalism, the adding of extrabiblical rules to the Christian life, takes many forms. It would be easy for me to dump on some fundamentalists, because that is what I know. But you can find examples of this attitude in a lot of places. Most of the time, these ideas start with the best of intentions. Somebody comes to the conclusion that for them, it would be wrong to do a certain thing, and so they don't do it. Then they tell others about it, and before long either the person who started it or their followers or admirers begin to teach the rule as a Biblical fact. But Paul says this attitude of asceticism is wrong. God has given us many good things in life to enjoy, and it seems in our time we have more and more good things. It is not wrong to enjoy these things; the Lord wants us to be happy.

Notice at the beginning of the passage Paul mentions "food and drink." Now there may be something I am not aware of, but as far as I know the only drink that there has been a long-time controversy about is alcohol. Clearly the Bible condemns drunkenness. Now there are verses about not being deceived by alcohol in Proverbs, but there are also verses in Proverbs where the writer says it is good to drink wine. You will not find one instance in Scripture that absolutely forbids the drinking of alcohol, yet you will find lots of preachers and Christians who believe that it does. 100 years ago, of course, there were enough Christians who believed that to get the sale of alcohol banned in the U.S. for 14 years.

"If with Christ you died to the elemental spirits of the world, why, as if you were still alive in the world, do you submit to regulations— "Do not handle, Do not taste, Do not touch" (referring to things that all perish as they are used)— according to human precepts and teachings? These have indeed an appearance of wisdom in promoting self-made religion and asceticism and severity to the body, but they are of no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh." (2:20-23, ESV)

Christ has made us free from these things. It is interesting to note that Paul's argument here is that we are dead to these things, so why are we concerned with them? As Christians, we are not to place any value in the things of the world. We are supposed to be indifferent to them. Paul says that those whose emphasis is on following man-made rules are carnally minded. They should be more concerned about fostering true spiritual growth in the lives of those who follow them than about adherence to this sort of nonsense. It's easy to get sidetracked, because spiritual growth is a frustrating process sometimes. It is easier for us to judge someone based on externals, since we cannot see a person's heart.

At the beginning of the next chapter, we will see what we should be doing "if we are risen with Christ" instead of following man-made rules.

TOMS: Colossians 2, part 1

For an introduction to this series, click here.

October 2, 2007

Paul has a lot to say in this chapter, and he gets started by explaining why he is writing this letter: 
"For I want you to know how great a struggle I have for you and for those at Laodicea and for all who have not seen me face to face, that their hearts may be encouraged, being knit together in love, to reach all the riches of full assurance of understanding and the knowledge of God's mystery, which is Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. I say this in order that no one may delude you with plausible arguments." (2:1-4)

Man's desire for knowledge often leads him astray. The gospel is quite simple, yet so many people add on to it, adding their own ideas or thinking too hard about irrelevant verses and coming up with odd doctrines. Paul wants the Colossians to be very careful to remain faithful to the simple truths about Jesus. They are not simple in that they are easy to understand completely, but they are simple in that God does not hide them from us in dark language.

Paul reiterates his warning again later in the chapter: 
"See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world, and not according to Christ. For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, and you have been filled in him, who is the head of all rule and authority. In him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ, having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised him from the dead." (2:8-12)

Verse 9 is one of the most important verses to prove the deity of Christ. Paul is very clear that the "whole fullness of deity dwells" in Christ. In the first century church, of course, circumcision was a big deal, and Paul points out that spiritually, believers have been set apart in Christ the same way that circumcision set Jews apart physically.

"And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross. He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in him. Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink, or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath. These are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ. Let no one disqualify you, insisting on asceticism and worship of angels, going on in detail about visions, puffed up without reason by his sensuous mind, and not holding fast to the Head, from whom the whole body, nourished and knit together through its joints and ligaments, grows with a growth that is from God." (2:13-19)

There is a pattern of thought that says the first part of the above passage, which talks about nailing the record of debt to Jesus' cross, has to do with the record of our sin. Of course it is a true statement that our sin debt was paid in the work of Christ. But when you read verse 14 in the KJV, it becomes more clear that Paul is talking about more than our sin debt being nailed to the cross: "Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross;" Paul is talking about the Old Testament law. It better explains why Paul spends most of the rest of the chapter talking about legalism. "Asceticism" is any sort of denying of yourself in order to make yourself more holy. Modern-day asceticism runs the gamut from Amish teaching to monasteries, but also can include rules about enjoying the things that are available to us.

I am going to stop here for now. I am very late. I will finish this up later, either by editing this blog or by posting a new one.

TOMS: Colossians 1

For an introduction to this series, click here.

October 1, 2007

This is another of Paul's prison epistles. This would have been written from Rome, probably about the same time as Ephesians, Philippians and Philemon. In fact, it is likely that the same man delivered all four letters.

Anyway, the opening of all of Paul's letters are virtually the same, so let's skip ahead a little bit: 
"May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy, giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light. He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities- all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross." (1:11-20)

This is an important passage theologically, which means it has a lot of good stuff in it. Notice first of all how Paul brings the redeeming work of Christ together with the creating work of Christ. This passage is very clear that Jesus Christ made the universe. It is important that we understand all these things about who Jesus is. I am afraid that in many of our churches Jesus is a great guy that we all worship, but we don't sit down and systematically teach all these things. We assume that because people have been in church for years, we know these things. Well honestly, I didn't understand these things until I went to Bible college. And I think a lot of other people are in the same boat I was.

"And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him, if indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard, which has been proclaimed in all creation under heaven, and of which I, Paul, became a minister." (1:21-23)

It's amazing what the power of God can do in the life of a believer. I never cease to be amazed at the change God brings. These people experienced that same thing. They were hostile in their mind toward God, but they were changed by His power.

"Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in Christ's afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church, of which I became a minister according to the stewardship from God that was given to me for you, to make the word of God fully known, the mystery hidden for ages and generations but now revealed to his saints. To them God chose to make known how great among the Gentiles are the riches of the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory." (1:24-27, ESV)

Paul talks about the "mystery" of Gentile salvation here. The Old Testament saints did not understand this, nor did the first century Jews who experienced this. The Old Testament prophets speak of Gentiles coming to know God, but this seems to be an outgrowth of the earthly, visible work of the Messiah. This is what Paul means by a "mystery." It is something that was hidden or obscured in previous revelation but is now made clear in the age of the church.