Christ, The Only Answer

Recap:

Last week we covered the second half of chapter one in which the Word of God describes the nature of the Son of God as the full representation and manifestation of God.

Jesus is not only the means by which God created all things that exist, but that He himself is fully God.

He is before all things because He created all things and all things are sustained by him and through Him. Also all things were created for Him.

Not only is Jesus the sovereign Lord of the universe but He is also head of the church which is His body. We examined that he is head of the church because of these unalterable realities:

He is the firstborn of the dead meaning, He is the first to resurrect with a glorified body. Being the first in this context means that others will follow...

He is All God in that all the necessary components of godness are complete in him.

He is the reconciler. He restored our broken relationship with God (himself) by His death on the cross. Although we separated ourselves from God by our sinful deeds, he restored us to Him and to each other.

Paul stated that he was joyous to suffer for the sake of the body. He saw this as an awesome privilege as it meant to participate with Christ in His suffering .

Paul was made an apostle of Christ in order to reveal, teach, preach the mysteries of Christ that were hidden for over a millennial… the truth that the Messiah would dwell within believers which included Gentiles.

As we examine chapter two specific and important ideas that the Word of God stresses.

Jesus Christ is the answer to philosophy

seen in the first 15 verses

the answers of the mind

Jesus Christ is the answer to ritual

answers for the heart.

Christianity in danger of one of two extremes: purely philosophical (steam), or purely ritualistic (ice). Both sides are really dangerous and do not reflect the gospel. Jesus is the water of life (Joh 4:14). drinking of Him you will never thirst again. Technically neither steam nor ice can quench thirst, but water which has the same qualities is the form that sustains life

Colossians 1:28–2:5 (LSB)

28 Him we proclaim, admonishing every man and teaching every man with all wisdom, so that we may present every man complete in Christ.

29For this purpose I also labor, striving according to His working, which He works in me in power.

CHAPTER 2

1 For I want you to understand how great a struggle I have on your behalf and for those who are at Laodicea, and for all those who have not seen my face in the flesh,

2 so that their hearts may be encouraged, having been held together in love, even unto all the wealth of the full assurance of understanding, unto the full knowledge of God’s mystery, that is, Christ Himself,

3 in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.

4 I say this so that no one will delude you with persuasive argument.

5 For even though I am absent in body, nevertheless I am with you in spirit, rejoicing to see your good order and the stability of your faith in Christ.

Paul’s struggles were not only on behalf of those he personally knew, what an example.

That which the apostle commended the Colossians of “the love they had for all of the saints.” was also true of him. Jesus alluded to this when He commented in Luke 6:32 that if you only love does who love you, what goodness do you have?

Paul was eager to bring these people to maturity. And all of us are responsible to for doing the same with one another.

He was concern with them having a Christocentric understanding of all things. That is, viewing all things through a christological lens. And doing so with all knowledge and wisdom.

So many of us attempt to use wisdom without knowledge, or acquire knowledge and stop there.

One theologian reminds us:

Knowledge is the apprehension of truth; wisdom is its application to life. Knowledge is prudent judgment and wisdom is prudent action. Both are found in Christ

Norman L. Geisler

And according to the Scriptures such wisdom is foolishness to the world.

Viewing all things through Christ has a bonding effect. It will unite us in our assurance of righteous thinking and acting.

Why is the apostle saying all of this:

Colossians 2:4 (LSB)

4 I say this so that no one will delude you with persuasive argument.

pithanologia = fine sounding arguments. Arguments that are plausible and yet false. They sound as if it could fit yet it is not truthful (millions of years).

Paul is not with them yet his love and concern for them was strong and he was promoting their order and stability in the faith (military terms meaning preparedness for battle).

Colossians 2:6–7 (LSB)

6 Therefore as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him,

7 having been firmly rooted and being built up in Him, and having been established in your faith—just as you were instructed—and abounding with thanksgiving.

Walking in him refers to daily conduct

1 John 1:6 (LSB)

6 If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not do the truth;

So the realities of the knowledge and wisdom in Christ must be lived out. This is what is meant by working out your salvation in fear and in trembling. It is not that your salvation is determined by what you do which which would be a salvation of works. But those who are saved live accordingly.

3 John 3–4 (LSB)

3 For I rejoiced greatly when brothers came and bore witness to your truth, that is, how you are walking in truth.

4 I have no greater joy than this, to hear that my children are walking in the truth.

They have knowledge of the truth and that truth is expressed in the way that they are living.

Philippians 3:16–19

“16 However, let us keep walking in step with the same standard to which we have attained.

17 Brothers, join in following my example, and look for those who walk according to the pattern you have in us.

18 For many walk—of whom I often told you, and now tell you even crying—as enemies of the cross of Christ,

19 whose end is destruction, whose god is their stomach and glory is in their shame, who set their thoughts on earthly things.” (LSB)

So many use grace and mercy as some kind of currency in order to continue in sin or excuse sin or ignore sin altogether.

And all of this walking in the truth of the gospel must be done in continual thanksgiving to God for all that he has done. People will come up with ideas, philosophies, thought processes where you can feed into sin. They will come up with loopholes that allow you to live according to the dictates of your own flesh rather than following the ways of the kingdom of Christ which Christ explained in the sermon on the mount.

He is our Lord, our Savior, our God and gets to dictate how his subjects ought to live.

Colossians 2:8 (LSB)

8 See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men, according to the elementary principles of the world, and not according to Christ.

The more times change, the more they stay the same. There will always be those who wish to plunder Christians with the so called “deeper or better” understanding. Many have twisted the Scriptures to try and make them line-up with what’s called wokeness, or critical race theory which redefines what is sin, what is hatred, who is capable of it, the further disenfranchising and/or over-elevation of certain people groups and the creation of new people groups which are not actually people groups but just groups that want to remain in sin and their sin be recognized as normative for us all. Everything from trans ideology to it is my body so I have the right to murder whats growing in me ideology, all of which is relatively new.

“Stand fast to the old truths; they will outlast all these philosophies. Stand fast to the old way of living; it will outlast all the inventions of men. Stand fast by Christ, for you want no other object of worship but Himself”

Charles Spurgeon.

(friend who insists that sex only in marriage is archaic; Dear Martin book).

Colossians 2:9–10 (LSB)

9 For in Him all the fullness of Deity dwells bodily,

10 and in Him you have been filled, who is the head over all rule and authority;

There is no fulness pleroma in human reasoning. Fulness is found in Christ in whom the fulness of God dwells.

Apart from Christ there is only emptiness.

The heresies addressed here denied Christs deity, or denied His humanity. Paul here affirms that Christ is both, truly God, and truly man. Jesus stands as God before man, and He is the only man that can stand before God.

As believers, we have been filled with Christ. This does not mean that we have become God, what it means is that we share in his divine nature. The righteousness of Christ as been imputed to us by grace through faith (2 Pet 1:3-4).

Colossians 2:11–12(LSB)

11 in whom you were also circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, in the removal of the body of the flesh, in the circumcision of Christ,

12 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.

Paul turns here from the theological errors of false teachers to their practical errors, from Gnosticism to legalism. The Gentile Christians in Colosse had no need to conform to Jewish rules and regulations such as circumcision for in Christ they had been circumcised.

Spiritual circumcision, which is the one that counts, was done by Christ and not by man.

Romans 2:29 (LSB)

29 But he is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is that which is of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the letter; and his praise is not from men, but from God.

So, what people were in Adam, sinful, fallen, and corrupt was destroyed, put off by Christ

Now the believer is a new creation, therefore they have a new authority in their lives, not the Law of Moses, which was meant to keep them until the real permanent salvation would come, but the life of Christ is now the the Head and the authority.

2 Corinthians 5:17 (LSB)

17 Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.

The putting away of all of the ritualistic requisites of the law as being fulfilled in Jesus Christ. It is new from a Jewish perspective but they were warn that things would change.

Habakkuk 1:5 (LSB)

5 “See among the nations! And look! Be also astonished! Be astounded! Because I am doing something in your days— You would not believe if it was recounted to you.

This new thing where salvation, justification, sanctification, way of living, would come from the life of the Messiah and not from the law.

And these realities are true of every believer at the moment of their salvation when he/she is buried with Christ in baptism by the Spirit and raised with Him to new life.

This is the picture that is represented in water baptism…

Colossians 2:13 (LSB)

13 And you being dead in your transgressions and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He made you alive with Him, having graciously forgiven us all our transgressions.

The dead can do nothing. they cannot even ask for help. You have to be alive in order to cry-out for help. What hope do dead people have? death is the end of all things. The dead cannot praise him. Isaiah writes the words of Hezekiah:

Isaiah 38:18–19 (LSB)

18 “For Sheol cannot thank You; Death cannot praise You; Those who go down to the pit cannot keep watch for Your truth.

19 “It is the living, the living who give thanks to You, as I do today…

1 Corinthians 12:3 (LSB)

3 Therefore I make known to you that no one speaking by the Spirit of God says, “Jesus is accursed,” and no one can say, “Jesus is Lord,” except by the Holy Spirit.

Dead people cannot truly seek God, they are dead. But if by some miracle they are made alive. And thats precisely the miracle, the Colossians were made alive in Him having been forgiven.

Colossians 2:14–17 (LSB)

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

15 Having disarmed the rulers and authorities, He made a public display of them, having triumphed over them in Him.

16 Therefore, no one is to judge you in food and drink, or in respect to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath day—

17 things which are only a shadow of what is to come; but the substance belongs to Christ.

canceled out the certificate of debt. This refers to the handwritten certificate of debt by which a debtor acknowledged his indebtednes. Look at what the following passage.

Romans 3:19 (LSB)

19 Now we know that whatever the Law says, it speaks to those who are in the Law, so that every mouth may be shut and all the world may become accountable to God;

The law then shows all of humanity, every single human being, that you stand rightfully condemned. For the written code is the law that shows sin and death.

Romans 8:2–3 (LSB)

2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death.

3 For what the Law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God did: sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and as an offering for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh,

Galatians 3:25 (LSB)

25 But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor.

Hebrews 7:12 (LSB)

12 For when the priesthood is changed, of necessity there takes place a change of law also.

So Paul is addressing the Jewish portion of the heresies that are creeping into the Colossian church. Those heresies have crept in the church today I have fought them myself, there are people that use to be members here who subscribed to the very heresies Paul it contending with here.

All of the content of the law was to be fulfill in Jesus Christ, they were a shadow of what was to come which was Jesus Christ.

Romans 10:3–4 (LSB)

3 For not knowing about the righteousness of God and seeking to establish their own, they did not subject themselves to the righteousness of God.

4 For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.

This is the reason why the apostle insists that no one is to judge you based of food, drink, festivals, new moons, or a Sabbath day.

Foods refers to dietary restrictions most likely those listed in Lv 11.

Festival refers to annual religious celebration in the Jewish calendar: Passover, Pentecost, Tabernacles, etc (Lv 23).

New Moons refer to the monthly sacrifice offered on the first day of each month (Num 10:10, 28:11-14; Ps 81:3).

Sabbath days refers to the weekly Sabbath.

Colossians 2:18–19 (LSB)

18 Let no one keep defrauding you of your prize by delighting in self-abasement and the worship of the angels, going into detail about visions he has seen, being puffed up for nothing by his fleshly mind,

19 and not holding fast to the head, from whom the entire body, being supplied and held together by the joints and ligaments, grows with a growth that is from God.

Like virtually all cults and false religions, the Colossian false teachers based their teaching on visions and revelations they had supposedly received. Their claims were false, since Jesus Christ is God’s final and complete revelation to mankind (Heb 1:1, 2).

You cannot grow apart from Christ. And Christ is the end of it all so the apostle asks a question:

Colossians 2:20–23 (LSB)

20 If you have died with Christ to the elementary principles of the world, why, as if you were living in the world, do you submit yourself to decrees:

21 “Do not handle, nor taste, nor touch”?

22 Which deal with everything destined to perish with use, which are in accordance with the commands and teachings of men;

23 which are matters having, to be sure, a word of wisdom in self-made religion and self-abasement and severe treatment of the body, but are of no value against fleshly indulgence.

Why do you deny yourself the things that Christ says you can have, and allow yourself to participate in the things that Christ as has said do not do, like immorality, slander, malice, profanity, anger, greed… these are the things that matter…