The Way of Jesus Takes Practice

Prayer

Colossians 3:1-17, A Picture of Becoming Like Jesus

So, again, we’re talking about what it means to be followers, or apprentices of Jesus - because we want to learn from him how to live life. Being an apprentice of Jesus means that we organize our lives around three basic goals: To be with Jesus. To become like Jesus. To do the things Jesus did.

Last week we started looking in greater depth at goal #2, becoming like Jesus, and the great challenge therein. The challenge is that we don’t come into following Jesus with blank slates, but, rather, having already been conformed to the pattern of this world. Already enslaved to sin, because we’ve been following the ways of the world.

As a quick recap, in order to stop being conformed to the pattern of this world, we have to recognize how the habits we engage in, stories we’ve come to believe, our cultural environment, our relationships - how all these things have and are even now forming us. This morning we’ll be looking at how, like Paul writes in Romans 12:2, we are to no longer be conformed to the pattern of this world, but instead, be transformed into the likeness of Jesus.

We talked as well, about our great hope. That the very reason Jesus came is, as CS Lewis writes - the Son of God became a man to enable men to become sons of God. Jesus came, offering us salvation, healing, new life, to that we could become like him - righteous, holy, loving. The big question, then, is how. I agree with John Mark Comer when he says that it’s not that we don’t want to become like Jesus, or even that we’re not trying to become like Jesus, it’s that we don’t know how.

To get us started I want us to look at Colossians 3:1-17. It’s a lengthy passage, but really powerful. Here Paul lays out what’s involved in becoming like Jesus. Colossians 3:1-17, Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. 3 For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. 4 When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory. 5 Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry.  6 Because of these, the wrath of God is coming. 7 You used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived. 8 But now you must also rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. 9 Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices 10 and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator. 11 Here there is no Gentile or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all. 12 Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility,  gentleness and patience. 13 Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. 14 And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. 15 Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful. 16 Let the message of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts. 17 And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

We see throughout this passage that Paul’s focus is on what it means for those who trust in Jesus to become like him. That, like Jesus, our priority would be the kingdom of heaven. That we would seek first the kingdom of God. That’s what Paul means when he exhorts us to set our minds on things above, set our hearts on things above, not on earthly things.

It’s even more blatant when Paul goes into the lengthy discourse on getting rid of the old in order to embrace the new we have in Jesus. We’re to put to death all the ways we’ve been conformed to the pattern of this world - sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed. He uses the imagery of taking off old clothes, rags of anger, rage, malice, slander, lying. Because we can’t put on the new self until we take off the old. We can’ t clothe ourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, patience, forgiveness - and most of all, love, until we take off the old.

Finally, the passage ends with a beautiful summary of becoming like Jesus, Colossians 1:17 - And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. Do everything in the name of Jesus. Do it all for his sake, in a way that represents him. Over and over, the emphasis here is we are to become like Jesus (our focus on kingdom, our righteousness, everything).

Now, before we move on, there’s an essential point I need to make here. This is so critical, because it’s so easy to get this wrong, to get it wrong in two different ways. It’s essential we understand the difference between effort and earning.

Earning is about what we do in order to deserve something. If you earn something, it’s owed to you. You do the work, you get the reward. That is not the gospel, not what spiritual formation is rooted in. Earning is all about our work, what we do - and it’s fundamentally opposed to grace. We can’t earn God’s love. We can’t earn the forgiveness of Jesus. Our salvation, our healing, new life we have in Jesus, is always, always God’s good gift to us. Grace.

Effort, on the other hand, is not opposed to grace. Effort is fundamentally different from earning, and it’s important to recognize this, because it would be equally wrong to think that grace means we can be passive, that we have no part to play in becoming like Jesus. Grace means we cannot earn it. But that doesn’t mean we are not to make an effort. Paul makes clear here in Colossians 3 that we have a role, we must put forth effort. That we must practice the way.

Just note how many commands Paul gives us here - set your hearts on things above, set your minds above. Put to death the things that belong to your earthly nature. But now you must also rid yourselves of all these things. Clothe yourselves with all these wonderful traits. Bear with each other, forgive each other. Over and over again, these are things we are to do. Doing requires effort.

Here’s the thing - we engage in practices, we make the effort to follow Jesus (by being with him, working to become like him, doing what he did). Not in the hope that we can transform ourselves, but to open ourselves up to God’s transforming work in us through his Holy Spirit. We do the little we can do to open ourselves to God power and presence in us, doing what we can’t do ourselves. And always, always, immersed in the grace of Jesus Christ. You’ll notice that Paul never uses the word “grace” here, but this passage is soaking in grace. Everything about it assumes God’s gracious gifts of love and life in us.

Right from the very beginning - since then, you have been raised with Christ - in other words, because God has raised you to new life through Jesus, that’s why you are to set your hearts and minds above. We didn’t raise ourselves with Jesus into his resurrection life, that was by the grace of God.

Again, in verse 12, Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved. Paul is reminding us here of God’s grace. He chose us to be a part of his people. We didn’t earn that. He made us holy. We didn’t earn that. We didn’t earn his love. Verse begins with therefore - in other words, because God chose you and made his holy and dearly loved people, make the effort to become like Jesus.

That’s the idea, we make the effort, undergirded by grace of Jesus. This is key. So, the question remains, what’s the effort? What do we do? What’s the little we can do in order that God can do his great works in us? How do we set our hearts and minds above? Put to death all that junk in us. Take it off so we can clothe ourselves with all the virtues of Jesus. How do we let the peace of Christ rule in our hearts?

Intentional Spiritual Formation - The How to Become Like Jesus

John Mark Comer lays it out well here in this video clip (comes from Session #3, Formation part 2 - 3 minutes long).

Comer here offers the things we are to do - engage in Spiritual Practices (new habits). Teachings of Jesus (to counter the stories we’ve come to believe). Community (root ourselves in relationships that encourage us toward knowing and loving Jesus). All of this immersed in the power and presence of the Holy Spirit. This formation happens over time and through experiences, in particular, suffering.

I want to touch at least a little bit on these aspects of what Comer calls Intentional Spiritual Formation, because these are the things we are to organize our lives around, to intentional engage in, in order to do what we can do to open ourselves up to the Holy Spirit’s transforming work in us, to become like Jesus. First one he mentions are the practices. By the practices he means the spiritual disciplines. Solitude. Silence. Prayer. Confession. Worship. Scripture. Service. The list goes on.

There’s no other way around it, since we tend to live busy, hurried, distracted lives, this requires changing habits. In order to engage in practices of Jesus, we have to let other things go. Can’t just pile on the practices on top of everything else we’re doing, it will never work. We have to eliminate some habits, simplify our lives, slow down, in order to engage in spiritual disciplines. This will require effort.

Let me offer you a word of encouragement here - you are already engaging in some or even many of these practices. On the whole, we have very faithful participation in Sunday morning worship. You practice generosity through your giving. You engage in Community to various degrees in how you interact with others here, on Sunday mornings, our meals together, small groups. So many of you serve in different capacities. And it may not be as habitual or regular as you’d like, but I’m guessing most of you pray and read Scripture in some form or fashion through the week. But we want our engagement in the practices to reflect that our lives are centered around being apprentices to Jesus.

As we move toward the end of this course, we’ll be looking at constructing a Rule of Life. Rule of Life is simply a plan that we lay out to engage in the practices, to develop new habits that to help us become like Jesus. It involves careful consideration, so we won’t go into detail here, but I hope that you’re embracing the idea that spiritual practices are a necessary part of following Jesus faithfully.

Second aspect Comer mentions is Teaching, specifically, the teachings of Jesus. Because we all have stories we believe, ways of understanding the world, ourselves, who God is, what’s important in life, what success looks like - that we’ve picked up from our families of origin, from the culture around us, media we engage with. We want to make sure that we’re living based on the stories of Jesus, what he knew to be true about the Father. We encounter Jesus’ teachings here on Sunday morning (assuming I’m doing what I should be doing), small group studies, and hopefully, daily reading of Scripture).

Third critical element is Community. We must be intentional about pursuing relationships with other followers of Jesus - in other words, the church. Here is where we learn to love (the mark of spiritual maturity). You can’t do that by yourself, which is why you cannot follow Jesus in isolation. We learn to love by being in authentic relationship with other people, people with whom we often disagree with, who get on our nerves at times, who at times even wound us.

Great question came up in one of our small groups- recognized that when John Mark Comer was talking about community, it meant a community that was willing to confess their sins to one another. The questions was - Is that really what it means? Yes. Absolutely yes. Notice in this passage that Paul doesn’t assume that all those vices (sexual immorality, greed, anger, filthy language, lying) are all things of the past for the church at Colossae. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have to put them to death, get rid of them. Why he commands them to bear with each other, forgive one another for the grievances they have against each other.

Paul was writing to churches that had a lot of messed up folks - but he always knew that in spite of all their flaws, they were still “God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved.” Jesus still claims us as his own, as messed up as we are. And that’s always been the case - Jesus loved us while we were yet sinners. He loves us even now, the mess that we are. If we are to love like Jesus, it means that we are to love each other as we truly are. Not only for the good parts of each other.

Now, that doesn’t mean we need to be sharing our deepest, darkest secrets with each other. But I do hope it means that we’re willing to open up more. To share more of our brokenness, our struggles, our doubts - and yes, even our sins. To tell more of our stories. Because I’m convinced that it’s that willingness to share more of who we are will grow us into a deeper, more loving community of Jesus followers. Because that’s how it works in all relationships - we grow in love as we share ourselves with one another. Just like Jesus shared himself with us.

Last word - Holy Spirit, to be the new environment we immerse our lives in. May be the hardest to get a hold of. This is what all our efforts are intended for - practices, teachings of Jesus, community, is to create an awareness of the Holy Spirit in us. The power and presence of God in us. Sanctifying us (making us holy, like Jesus). Empowering us to do what we could never do on our own.

Practices are intended to help us slow down, to be attentive to the work of the Spirit in us. Giving us understanding of Jesus’ teachings. Convicting us of sin. Empowering us to receive Jesus into our hearts, his love, his grace, his peace. Chose with this thought, one I’ve been trying to be mindful of - quote I heard recently. Even more than wanting more of the Holy Spirit in us, our we should want the Holy Spirit to have more of us. In other words, we truly start becoming more like Jesus when we surrender ourselves to the power and presence of the Holy Spirit in us.

Course Work

Extra time to catch up this week: If you haven’t watched all the Session videos, I encourage you to go back and do that. Read through page 155 of the book.

Especially the spiritual practices: Sabbath. Continue to engage in daily Scripture reading and prayer. Here’s where we can begin to take part in spiritual formation, our part in this. The practices, lots of helpful guidance in Companion guide. Make the effort. Don’t worry if you fail, doesn’t go well, we’re looking at the long haul, bit by bit.

Closing Prayer - offer ourselves to become like Jesus