Jesus Christ- king of the cosmos, head of the Church. (3)

Deity Determined.

Hook: In 1995 49er quarterback Joe Montana announced his retirement.

Jesus was the greatest man whoever walked the earth because Jesus is God.

Book: Col. 1:15-20

Colossians 1:15–20 (ESV)

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.

Pray.

Illustration:

More and more I’m noticing on TV that movies and TV shows and producers are bringing back to life things like Greek mythological gods and even some of the eastern pluralism which means many guards because they are just confused. And I don’t watch a lot of TV or movies, I used to but I just don’t have time anymore. So, in the very few interactions I’ve had I’ve noticed that Hollywood, seems to be grasping at straws when it comes to a concept of God.

In a way that’s a good thing, we know the one true God and can speak into the situation. We can point people to Jesus who was the full manifestation of God in the flesh.

I think we get worried about saying anything when we are in conversations because we feel like we don’t have all the answers to the questions that might come up after we make a statement about God. It is my belief that it is enough to simply point people to Jesus.

People will often say the Bible does not actually claim that Jesus was God but that is simply not true. The Bible does say Jesus is God in many ways, the original audience of the letter we are about to look at new exactly what they were reading. The religious leaders of the day when Jesus walked the earth, knew exactly what Jesus was claiming when he did things like forgive sins.

All we have to worry about when it comes to evangelism, we don’t all have the event gift of evangelism but we can all say the name Jesus. I believe that is enough for the Holy Spirit to work with.

When my wife was in New York as a missionary, they had a saying that you just put a pebble in a person shoe. If you can get a pebble in their shoe, sooner or later they’re gonna stop and investigate what it is that is causing their foot to be bothered. I believe the pebble can be as small as the word Jesus.

What we are looking at is the most condensed collection of claims about the deity or divinity of the person we know as Jesus Christ, in all of the Bible.

This paragraph, is one of the many diamonds embedded in this book of rare and exquisite gems that we hold in our hands. It shines bright amongst stars. And I am so excited to jump into it with you this morning.

Because of how rich this section is in doctrine of the deity of Christ we gotta work through this one line by line.

There is so much here we could literally never leave it and never run out of things to say about the deity of Jesus. So we will work through it, and it will take us three weeks. This week we will look at verse 15 and 16.

IMAGE OF GOD: Beginning with verse 15 “he is the image of the invisible god”.

The word image “eikōn” and it is used for things like the image on a coin, or a statue, or a portrait. Today it would be like the image in a photograph.

This word is used in other passages like 2nd Corinthians 4:4

2 Corinthians 4:4 (ESV)

In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.

The same concept is relayed in the letter to the Hebrews 1:3

Hebrews 1:3 (ESV)

He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature

In the face of Jesus we see the image of the invisible God.

Jesus has made visible that which was invisible, namely God.

This sentence in Colossians could literally read, “Jesus, Himself, has made VISIBLE the iINVISIBLE God by APPEARING to us in flesh and blood”.

As the one and only Son of God, that being a title for the second person in the Trinity. Father, Son, Holy Spirit, Jesus was able to make comments like “if you have seen me you have seen the father”. and “I and the Father are one” or “the Father is in me and I am in the Father.” “Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am”.

“If you have seen me you have seen the Father” - John 14:9

“I and the Father are one” - John 10:30

“the Father is in me and I am in the Father.” John 10:38

When Jesus was in front of the religious leaders he told them…

“Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am” - John 8:58

And the religious leaders picked up stones to stone Him because they knew He was claiming to be God.

In fact many of the characters in the Bible made it clear that they believed Jesus was God.

Thomas, one of his closest followers thought believed He was God, John 20:28

John 20:28 ESV

Thomas answered him, “My Lord and my God!”

Paul thought He was God, Titus 2:13

Titus 2:13 ESV

waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ,

Peter thought He was God, 2nd Pet. 1:1

2 Peter 1:1 ESV

Simeon Peter, a servant and apostle of Jesus Christ, To those who have obtained a faith of equal standing with ours by the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ:

Jesus’s own flesh and brother James thought he was God, James 1:1

James 1:1 (ESV)

James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ,

And finally God the Father thought He was God, Heb. 1:8

Hebrews 1:8 (ESV)

But of the Son he [God the Father] says,

“Your throne, O God, is forever and ever,

the scepter of uprightness is the scepter of your kingdom.

Jesus is the visible manifestation of the invisible god.

And we see God when we look into the face of Jesus Christ because we are literally looking at God in the face.

FIRSTBORN: Not only that but he is the firstborn of all creation.

The word “firstborn” gets used by those who would like to disprove the deity of Jesus.

They say how could he be God if he was born? Jehovah Witnesses use this to place God the Father as the only one worthy to receive worship. That is a major misnomer, however.

The word “firstborn” is a title for status. In the greek it is “prototokos” in the Hebrew it is Bekōr

It was generally referring to the firstborn son who would receive a double portion of the father’s property or goods when he died.

However, it was not always the first child who wound up with that status.

In the Ancient Near East and in the Bible, we see that often it was used synonymously with being first of rank within a family.

It signified a few things: priority in relationship to God. It signified leadership of the family. It signified receiving a special inheritance. Certain privileges and responsibilities were exclusive to the firstborn.

That the younger would receive the blessing of “firstborn” status was not uncommon in the stories of the Old Testament.

In Jacob’s life alone we see two of those examples, he both stole the blessing, being the younger brother to Esau.

And, then later Jacob blesses Ephraim over Manasseh when he gives the blessing to Joseph’s younger son.

In the Old Testament the word Bekōr “firstborn” begins to be used of all of God’s chosen people- Israel.

Israel had special privileges and responsibilities compared to all other nations.

In the New Testament, in the book of Hebrew’s, the church appears to take on this special relationship to God as the bride of the “firstborn”. Heb. 12:23

Hebrews 12:23 (ESV)

and to the assembly of the firstborn [prōtotokos]

We are the church of the firstborn, or the bride of the firstborn.

Six times throughout the NT Jesus is identified as “prototokos”.

Romans 8:29 (ESV)

For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn [prōtotokos] among many brothers.

Hebrews 1:6 (ESV)

And again, when he brings the firstborn [prōtotokos] into the world, he says,

“Let all God’s angels worship him.”

And finally in the OT Psalms we see a prophetic word about Jesus and how he is the “Bekōr” the same word for “prōtotokos” in Psalm 89:27

Psalm 89:27 (ESV)

And I will make him the firstborn [Bekōr],

the highest of the kings of the earth.

How is Jesus gonna be firstborn, even of God’s people, if He isn’t gonna be born till hundreds of years later? Its a status title.

In this case it has nothing to do with the order of birth and everything to do with the special relationship to God, which these original readers would have understood perfectly.

Vs. 16- as if we needed any more convincing that Jesus is God’s Son, 2nd person of the Trinity we see in vs 16 that all things were created through Him and for Him and that he is before all things.

Colossians 1:16–17 ESV

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.

I looked up the word for all things and guess what it means? It means all things.

It means everything. Everything that is created was created by Jesus.

Remember Paul was writing this letter in part to refute or combat the false teachings. Those teachers who said very cunningly that Jesus Christ wasn’t quite enough. He was prominent, but not pre-existent and pre-eminent. He was important, but not all sufficient.

Here we see that Jesus created everything there is and therefore, no other spiritual entity is needed for salvation. He created a spiritual entities!

Everything that we can see and even the things we can’t see were created by Jesus. There are thousands of pine thousands of angels you have such great power that they can wipe out entire city, just one or two angels, and there are thousands upon thousands of them, both good and bad, that he created and that exist only because they have received power from him to exist.

We see in the next verse, he is before all things and in him all things hold together. Creation, both seen and unseen, only exist because he continues to hold it in existence.

The creation that we can see was spoken into being and continues to exist, as the author of Hebrews puts it, “according to the word of his power” - Heb. 1:3

Hebrews 1:3 (ESV)

He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power.

This entire creation is being held together by Jesus at all times.

Think about what happens when atoms split in something like uranium or plutonium. Just one atom and a chain reaction- nuclear bombs. How about all the atoms in the universe separating at once?

Jesus holds them all together… He has a very strong grip on things.

Praise the Lord we have a powerful God in Christ Jesus!

Not only that but we’re going to see how Jesus being the creator of this creation is also the redeemer of this creation. This text is going to move from Jesus as Creator to Jesus as re-creator. He is creating a new creation both within us and within the cosmos.

But that we will look at next week, enough for this week is that Jesus is the Creator God. That in an of itself is an amazing truth to think about.

Took:

This Cosmic Christ, Lord over every sphere of Creation means that we cannot separate our lives into spiritual and material. All of life comes under the Lordship of Christ.

In my very first class in Bible-School they had us read a paper that would have changed the trajectory of my life had I read it before coming to Bible school. It had to do with selling oranges.

I’ll do my best to capture the overall gist of the story for you.

It goes like this, a farmer and his wife sold oranges on the side of the road for a living.

They then took the proceeds that were left over from their normal bills and used that money to purchase gospel tracks.

They handed out those gospel tracks for free to people they met in various places.

Handing out those gospel tracks was their way of serving the Lord.

But the article revealed that this couple, as good as their intentions were, had missed the point.

Since all of creation, every square inch, is already under the Lordship of Jesus Christ, even their growing of oranges and selling the oranges was service to their Lord.

By saying that Christ is firstborn of all creation it is saying he has the highest status and is Lord over all of creation.

The oranges we grow and sell are not our own, they belong to him.

We are not our own, we ourselves belong to him.

We serve him in doing all things as if we were doing them unto the Lord.

Why that article may have swayed me from a career change is because I knew as I read it I had also missed the point along the way. I could have served God just as faithfully running my construction business than I do now as being a pastor.

I believe it was providence that I didn’t read that when I did, but I also know that we can miss the point and think it’s only when we go to church, it’s only when we read our Bibles, it’s only when we pray, it’s only when we do a mission trip, or volunteer for community outreach or serve in our church, that we are serving God. But that is missing the point of “firstborn of all creation”.

When we really grasp that Jesus is Lord over every inch of creation, we realize everything is his and that everything we do can be an act of spiritual worship when we do it for him.

Look:

Is there some area of our lives that we have mistakenly believed we are Lord of? This week, let’s take inventory of the little things: how we talk to people, washing dishes, taking out the trash, recycling, cleaning the house, writing a letter, watching a TV show, reading a book, making a phone call, all these things and the choices we make within these activities should be done in such a way, by God’s grace, that we are saying Jesus Christ is God.

Benediction:

2 Corinthians 13:14 ESV

The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.