Complete in Christ

Colossians 2:11–14 (NASB95)

and in Him you were also circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, in the removal of the body of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ;

having been buried with Him in baptism, in which you were also raised up with Him through faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead.

When you were dead in your transgressions and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He made you alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our transgressions,

having canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, which was hostile to us; and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross.

성경전서 개역개정판 2장

또 그 안에서 너희가 손으로 하지 아니한 할례를 받았으니 곧 육의 몸을 벗는 것이요 그리스도의 할례니라

12 너희가 1)세례로 그리스도와 함께 장사되고 또 죽은 자들 가운데서 그를 일으키신 하나님의 역사를 믿음으로 말미암아 그 안에서 함께 일으키심을 받았느니라

13 또 범죄와 육체의 무할례로 죽었던 너희를 하나님이 그와 함께 살리시고 우리의 모든 죄를 사하시고

14 우리를 거스르고 불리하게 하는 법조문으로 쓴 증서를 지우시고 제하여 버리사 십자가에 못 박으시고

Complete in Christ

Colossians 2:11-14

1. INTRODUCTION

a. The same 2021 study from Experian shows that the average American has a consumer debt balance of $96,371, up 3.9% from 2020. Mortgages, home equity lines of credit and student loan balances are the biggest contributors to American debt today.

How many Americans are in debt?

b. The percentage of Americans in debt depends on what type of debt is being reported. According to the Urban Institute, more than 64 million Americans carry credit card debt. The Experian study also found that 340 million Americans are currently carrying some form of debt.

What percentage of America is debt-free?

c. According to that same Experian study, less than 25% of American households are debt-free. This figure may be small for a variety of reasons, particularly because of the high number of home mortgages and auto loans many Americans have.

d. According to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, the total amount of household debt in the United States reached a record-high $15.85 trillion by the spring of 2021. Some of this increase was spurred on by a loose job market in 2020, when unemployment hit 14.8% in April 2020. The less income you bring in, the more likely you are to rely on credit, go into debt or have trouble paying off debts you may already have. But the typical American household now carries an average debt of $145,000. The median debt was only $50,971 in 2000.

With all this discussion about debt, what does it have to do with being complete in Christ? Colossians 1:13-2:23 depicts the Colossian heresy in which Paul defends against through the first 2 chapters of the book.

e. So in this section with the in Him, we recognize that they taught something different about what it meant to be in Him. Our section here focuses on what does it mean to be in Him?

f. This is a question that has lingered through the history of the church and is still a common question. What does it mean that we are in Christ? Well Paul tells us simply that it means that we were buried with Him, and if we were buried with Him, then it means we are raised with Him.

2. BODY

a. You were buried with Him (2:11-12)

i. Verse 10 starts the in Him phrases that help us understand how the Apostle Paul was contrasting the Apostolic teachings versus the false teaching that came about from the Colossian Heresy. So what about this Colossian heresy is Paul defending? We notice that it must have some flavor of Judaism from this section here. Paul writes, that in Him, we were circumcised, but not just circumcised, circumcision made without hands. Paul was highlighting the fact that this circumcision was done by God and not man.

ii. The significance that Paul seems to be addressing a Jewish community is because of how circumcision was viewed by the Jews. If we read Romans 4:9-11, Paul uses the language that in verse 10, says that Abraham was credited as righteous when he was circumcised.

iii. This takes us to Genesis 17:10 where God says that His covenant shall be between Him and Abraham’s descendants and that his descendants shall be circumcised (cf Gen 17:11). Through this circumcision, it shall be the sign of the covenant. This is the seal of the covenant that Paul writes in Romans 4:11.

iv. Paul uses this language of circumcision to teach that Abraham through his circumcision would be the father of faith (Genesis 17:12) to Jews and also the father of faith to those who were Gentiles, or men who were not circumcised.

v. So here in Colossians 2:11, Paul is addressing the Jewish community that thought they were superior because they were circumcised. On this topic of circumcision, Paul uses this idea to distinguish between Christianity and unredeemed Judaism. What Paul is doing here is explaining that the line of being righteous with God was not circumcision of the flesh like in the OT, but rather, a circumcision of the heart. Paul contrasts OT circumcision and Christian circumcision by the point of entry. Christian circumcision’, the point of entry into the community of Christ’s people (as physical circumcision was the point of entry into the community of Israel), provides all the initiation one needs to belong to the people of God.

vi. You see, this is why Paul writes that Christians were circumcised made without hands. Unlike a circumcision that was done by man, Paul is talking about a circumcision which God has done.

vii. This is why Paul writes that this circumcision that God has done is a circumcision in the removal of the body of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ. What is Paul writing here? Paul is writing here that Christian circumcision is not merely a circumcision of the foreskin, but rather, a circumcision of the flesh. What is this circumcision of the flesh? Similar to the language of Romans 6:5-6, circumcision of the flesh is the death of our flesh.

viii. What does this mean? Well when we think about debt, one thing we understand is the only way to clear it fully is when we die. When we die, whatever debt we have is cleared assuming that we have no property left over. This is the same picture that Paul is drawing. When we die with Christ in the flesh, our debt is completely paid for because we are dead. There’s nothing left to pay our debt with. As long as we are alive, there is always the option to pay off our debt. But once we are dead, that debt is settled.

ix. So when Paul says that we have been circumcised in the flesh, that our flesh has been cut off, it has been settled. This is how Christ settled our debt of sin. Because we have died, we no longer owe anything on behalf of our debt. We are free from that debt.

x. This is why Paul says in verse 12, having been buried with Him in baptism. Notice that we were buried because we have died with Him. When Christ died, He paid for the debt of sin and it was settled with Him. He had paid for the debt of our sin and now because we are in Him, our debt is paid for. This is why believers don’t go to Hell. Believers go to Heaven because the debt of their sin has been paid. But the unbeliever goes to Hell because that debt of their sin has yet to be paid. Even in their death, that debt causes them to default into Hell.

xi. This is why Paul writes we were buried with Him in baptism and immediately following that Paul writes that we were raised with Him.

b. You were raised with Him (2:13-14)

i. This is the highest point of the Christian faith. So many people think that the death of Christ was the highest point. It is a high point because we are free from the debt of sin. But the resurrection of Christ, the fact that we come to life is the fact that our debt has truly been paid. This is the promise of the Gospel. It’s not simply that our debt has been paid to an anonymous vendor. It is that God has demanded payment for our sins and Christ has paid that debt with His own life. Once upon payment received, meaning when Christ died, that payment was fully paid and settled. So when we are raised with Christ, we don’t experience that debt because it has fully been paid for.

ii. If it’s a hard principle to understand, simply think that debt disappears when you die. So when you died with Christ, our debt was paid because we died. There’s nobody else that can be responsible for our debt. But when we came back to life, that debt doesn’t transfer. Why? Because we are no longer the same person, but a totally new person in Christ. This is what makes Christianity so amazing. If Christianity was an upgrade, upon death, our debt would still transfer to us. Why? Because we are not born again. We are simply upgraded. But that’s why Jesus says you must be born again. Upon resurrection, that debt no longer is transferred to us because we are new.

iii. This is what Paul explains in verse 13. Paul talks about our past old life. When you were dead in your transgressions and the uncircumcision of the flesh, this is when Christ made you alive together with Him. What does this mean? When you were dead in your sins, you were neck high with debt, Christ took you under Him and paid for your debt with His life. Through His death, we died. Our identity died with Him. Every record of debt died with Him. This is the circumcision of the flesh.

iv. The story doesn’t end there. When we died with Christ, we were made alive with Him. Our resurrection in Christ gives us new life and we are new. 2 Corinthians 5:17 tells us that the old has gone and the new has come. We are new creations in Christ and therefore, our record is clean. This is how we have been forgiven of all our transgressions and canceled all the certificate of debt that were against us.

v. What’s beautiful about Paul’s language here is that he writes in verse 14, that Jesus canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us. It could be translated that Jesus canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of the Law. This helps us understand Romans 7:6 where it tells us that we were released from the Law having died to that which we were bound. We were bound to the Law because for every sin, there’s a cost that must be paid.

vi. Think about a ticket. When you get a ticket, each ticket has a fine. If you receive a speeding ticket, by the Law, you have a pay a fine. Similar to that, every sin we commit has a fine. So when we looked at the Law, it is a record of all the sins we committed, we realized our bankruptcy. We realized we don’t have enough money to pay all this back. This is how we became bound to the Law because we could not pay it back. We had to be enslaved so that we could pay off the debt with our lives. This is what it means to be slaves to sin. We are slaves to sin because we must pay back the cost of sin. At that point, Christ died for the ungodly and paid back our debt with His life.

vii. How did Jesus cancel this debt? He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. What’s beautiful about this statement? Yes it talks about Calvary’s cross. But what’s more beautiful is that Jesus came in the flesh, and died in the flesh. The nailing of our sins on the cross is a real physical death.

viii. So much of our culture today is convinced that Jesus never existed or God doesn’t exist. But the Bible consistently tells us that Jesus was not a myth. Jesus physically came to earth and died on the cross. Biblical history, through the history of the Jewish people and through the Old Testament, confirms that they were pointing towards a Messiah. The New Testament confirms that this Messiah, Jesus Christ, is the fulfillment of Messiah that was projected in the Old Testament. This nailing of the cross is not metaphor, but rather reality.

3. CONCLUSION