A Life Worth Living

We’re going to start a study in the book of Colossians.  Let me describe the religious scene.  See if this sounds a little familiar, what people are facing. 

A lot of people today when they think about how get closer to God, they really struggle with to do that.  See if you’ve ever met anyone like this. 

Have you ever met anyone who says, “I want to get closer to God but I believe there are lots of different ways to get closer.  One way is good for this person and another way is good for that person.  One of the problems I have with Christianity is there is only one way.  And I struggle with that.”

Have you ever met anybody who say, “I think the way to get closer to God is by getting closer to His messengers.  They are spiritual. I think that angels are the way to get closer to God.”  Although angels are in the Bible, these people forget about Jesus.  They forget about everything else and make angels the real key to getting closer to God. 

Have you ever met anybody who said, “I think the way to get closer to God is by a list of rules?  If I get the right list of rules and keep them and do pretty well, better than most people, I feel like I would be getting closer to God.” 

Have you ever met anyone who said, “Religion is what you give up.  If I give up enough things, don’t do enough things then God will really love me.  It’s obvious if I don’t do enough things.” 

All those things are ways of getting closer to God they may sound very contemporary.  They may sound like ways that people try to get closer to God in our culture but I just described the ways that people were trying to get close to God in a city called Colossae about two thousand years ago.  It was written in AD 60 so maybe it was more like 1956 years ago. 

This city and its problems almost exactly parallel our culture today.  There’s a lesson here – there’s nothing new under the sun.  If anybody says, “I’ve come up with a new way to get closer to God,” if you hear anybody say that on a social media, on the radio – it’s been tried before.  Almost all of them were tried in the first hundred years of the church.  Satan threw everything he could, every false teaching he could at the church at the very beginning.  I think one of the reasons God allowed Satan to throw all those false teachings at the church at the beginning was because He wanted us to have the answers.  People like Paul would write to these churches and say, “Here’s the answers.”

Today we call someone who takes all those different ideas we talked about and tries to compile them all into one thing and throws a little humanism in too with other things we call that Spiritual…. it used to be New Age.  Back then they had a different name for it.  They called it Gnosticism. 

In fact in Colossae it was Gnosticism – which means “knowledge” in the Greek language mixed with a bunch of other things.  People who write about this call it the Colossian false teaching or the Colossian Heresy.

If we start a study in this book we’re going to find answers.  Answers for yourself about getting closer to God.  You’re going to find answers for people who talk to you about getting closer to God.  We’re going to walk through this book, verse by verse and see what God has to say about us.  See how He can begin to transform our lives.  Both Gnosticism in the days of the Colossians and the idea of being Spiritual today both of those things grow out of the same questions in people lives. 

Questions like “How can we believe in a good God in an evil world?”  “If God is all powerful why don’t He take away all sin?”  He will some day but why doesn’t He do it right now.  “Is Jesus only one way among many ways?” 

These are the kind of questions people have running through their minds that they had running through their minds.  As you start to look at what God had to say to these people it doesn’t take long to realize “He has something to say to me.”

Tonight, let me start out with a couple of introductions. 

In the outline of the book of Colossians it’s a pretty easy book to see where God’s going with this thing.  Warren Wiersbe has outlined it this way: It’s about Doctrine and Danger and Duty.

1 - Doctrine - Christ’s Pre-eminence Declared

The Doctrine of who Jesus really is – chapter one.

2 - Danger - Christ’s Pre-eminence Defended

            The Danger of someone who tries to fit in a false teaching about Jesus

3 - Duty - Christ’s Pre-eminence Demonstrated.            

Our Christian Duty.  To some of you “duty” is an ugly word but He means this word in a positive way.  The beauty of doing what God calls us to do. 

The last two chapters are very practical chapters.  The best way to show how big, how great Jesus is through a life.  When you and I start to live the life that God wants us to live that shines forth to the world who Jesus really is.  

Colossians 1:1 NLT

1 This letter is from Paul, chosen by the will of God to be an apostle of Christ Jesus, and from our brother Timothy.

The Apostle Paul was the writer.

Paul wrote 1/3 of the NT. The word Apostle has the same root as missionary. God sent Paul to places no one had heard the Gospel. He was one of the few chosen by God to be the original carriers of the Gospel.

He wrote this letter from prison.  We’re going to read later about the chains he was in.  As you’re reading this letter, remember he’s not setting on some bright hillside writing.  He’s not setting at his house with the computer going getting ready to go get a cup of coffee when he doesn’t know what to write next.  He’s in a prison cell.  God used that opportunity to remind him of the Colossian need and he writes to them.

“Paul and our brother Timothy.” 

Timothy is named 24 times in he New Testament.  In six of Paul’s letters find his name right there at the beginning – Paul and Timothy – they just go right alongside of each other.  Timothy was Paul’s son in the faith.  He won him to Christ.  He taught him how to be a pastor.  He sent him to be a pastor eventually at Ephesus.  But much of the time he was there to support Paul.

Some of you are “Timothys.”   Your name may not be listed first in a letter.  But I think it’s not bad to have your name listed second in six of the New Testament letters. Chris Hodges and John Maxwell…  

Timothy had a great ministry.  It may not be as noticeable to us.  One of the problems with modern day America is we think it has to be noticeable to be important.  But there are very, very great ministries that God has and He’s using some of you in where no one maybe is noticing.  Pastor Kathy’s ministries in the jail is not seen by many on the outside. Maybe you’re listed second or third of fifth on the list always.  But not with God.  Do you think Timothy is second on God’s list?  Absolutely not.  It’s a reminder of how God can use somebody like this in an incredibly great way. 

They wrote this letter to a place called Colossae. 

Colossae is located about a hundred miles inland from Ephesus.  That’s going to be important because it tells us how the good news first got to this place called Colossae.  It’s located near a couple of other real well known towns like Hierapolis and Laodicea.  That’s one of the seven churches that was written to in the book of Revelation.  These were pretty small towns – Hierapolis and Laodicea.  Colossae in between the two (they were about ten miles apart) was a tiny little town.  A small little place.  But they had some needs and God wanted to meet those needs so He wrote a letter to them.

Take a look at Col 1:2

Colossians 1:2 NLT

2 We are writing to God’s holy people in the city of Colosse, who are faithful brothers and sisters in Christ. May God our Father give you grace and peace.

He is writing to the believers in Christ and in Colosse.

The Believers were both in Christ and in the world.

We are in Christ and we’re in the world.  In fact, there’s not a believer who hasn’t faced this dynamic of both being in Christ and being in the world.  The believers were both in Christ and in Colossae.  They’re set beside one another to show the contrast.  It’s a vivid contrast, this insignificant little town Colossae –  “in Colossae” – is set right beside the most significant relationship anyone could ever have – the fact that we’re in Christ.  It’s the vivid contrast of the people who are holy separated unto God and a town that was very unholy, where some very pagan and idolatrous things going on in this town called Colossae.

We are not trying to be in Christ on Sundays and then in the world on Monday. That’s not what Paul is talking about.

When we become a Christian, God places us “In Christ” but he has also placed in the world. He wants us to make a difference in the world and to influence it towards Jesus. We are always in Christ as we operate in the world. And when we live like that, more and more people in the world will be drawn to Christ.

Through out the letter to Colossians he will teach us how to live out having Jesus at the center of our lives.

Before we talk about the few quick things about how Christ can be at the center, let me remind you of why Paul wrote this letter. 

Why did Paul write the letter? to counter the Colossian Heresy.

This heresy is a false teaching that was going on.  Here’s a quick list of some of the thing we’re going to be looking at in the next few weeks.  The Colossian heresy involved several things.  It involved false thinking, false works, false worship and false sacrifice. 

The Colossian Heresy involved Gnosticism or False Thinking

You can look in chapter 2:8 at why they struggled in their faith.  Colossians 2:8 “ Don’t let anyone capture you with empty philosophies and high-sounding nonsense that come from human thinking and from the spiritual powers of this world, rather than from Christ.”

Instead of starting with the false and talking about how bad it was.  Paul starts with the truth and talks about how good it is.  Two very different things.  He could have started with chapter 2 and said this is why this is wrong, that was wrong… but he doesn’t.  He starts with who Jesus Christ is.  Then after laying out all about who Christ is, then he’s ready to go on and attack why this false teaching is wrong. 

If you ever get involved in a place where you feel like you’re being drawn astray then the first thing to go back to is the truth.  Sometimes you get so involved in studying a lie that you forget the truth.  Paul says, let’s talk about the truth first.  You determine a counterfeit dollar by know the real dollar.

In fact, this letter to the Colossians – you might consider a follow up letter to some new believers.  Chances are the church at Colossae was about five years old at the time church history tells us.  Everyone in the church was a fairly new believer.  Paul writes back this follow up letter to encourage them in their faith, to show them how Christ can make a real difference in their lives.

Paul talks in Colossians 1 how some incredible things can happen in our lives.  He talks about some of the things we all have to understand in order to live a life that is both worthy and pleasing.  Both of those things. In the middle of the section we will get to where he says We pray the way you live will always honor and please the Lord. Col 1:10

Colossians 1:10 NIV

10 so that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God,

That was what Paul wanted to them and for us. He wants you and me to be able to look back and say, “My life might not have lived up to my expectations, but in an incredible way, it lived up to God’s expectations for me.”

You may think God’s expectations are so high you could never reach them.  God knows you better than you know yourself.  He knows how to enable us to live a life that is worthy of Him. 

Wouldn’t it be wonderful to look back on life and see, “That life that I lived?  It was worth living.”  Not just that it was fun – although it’s good to have fun.  Not just it was exciting – although it’s good for excitement to happen.  But “I lived a life that was worth living.”

Then he says it’s also a life that is pleasing.  I love that picture!  That you and I can live lives where God looks down from heaven and smiles.  It brings Him joy to watch His children live out faith.  That’s what He wants for us, that kind of a life.

The thing to remember about this is that God doesn’t look down on me and get disappointed with me all the time and say, “They’re messing up again!  They’re not being pleasing to Me now!”  That’s not the direction of this letter.  That’s not the direction of the New Testament.  What God really wants to say to us is, “Here’s how.  You’re already saved.  I already love you.  I can’t love you any more than I already do.  But now that I’ve shown My love to you, now that you’re in My family, I want to show you how to live the best life.  I want to show you how to live a life that makes Me smile.”  So we live a life that’s pleasing to the Lord and that’s worthy of the Lord 

Not to get Him to love us but because He loves us.  And that love spills over into our lives. 

Paul’s going to show us some things about how that works.  Some practical things about how we can live this kind of life that is pleasing to the Lord.

Colossians 1:3–5 NLT

3 We always pray for you, and we give thanks to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. 4 For we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and your love for all of God’s people, 5 which come from your confident hope of what God has reserved for you in heaven. You have had this expectation ever since you first heard the truth of the Good News.

1. The process of faith, hope and love.

We know from 1 CO 13 that faith hope and love will outlast everything else and that love is supreme. Here in Col 1, Paul talks to us about the process. How they fit together and which comes first.

The process begins with hope.  Faith and love spring up from the hope that is in you.  And hope draws us to faith and faith leads us to love in a whole new way.

Faith and love both spring from hope in our lives. 

I talk to a lot of people about how they come to faith in Christ.  They say something like this, “I had all these problems, these needs in my life.  It’s because of those that I came to Christ.”  Almost like they’re embarrassed that it was their need that brought them to Jesus Christ.  Like it should have been just pure altruism that brought you to Jesus Christ.  There is not a person in this room who if we sat down and talked honestly would not tell you that the thing that brought them to Jesus Christ was their need.  That’s what brings us to Jesus.  We’ve got a need and when you have a need you’re looking for something to meet that need.

example - you are on a trip and you need to go the rest room. It might be getting a little urgent and so you start looking at road signs to see when the next rest room is coming up. When you see a sign that says… in 3 miles, it gives you hope. You saw the sign and the hope brings about faith… it’s going to be there.

The same thing is true with us as believers.  When you came to Christ, you came because you saw in Him a hope that you didn’t have.  We haven’t seen all the hope in heaven.  We’ve seen some of it in this life yet.  But we come to Christ because we have a hope in Him.  But this process doesn’t stop after you become a believer.  It’s still true in our lives today as believers.  Faith and love spring from hope.

Hope draws us to faith.

Faith leads us to love.

Maybe you have tried to have faith without hope. You just live in the present everyday world and you try to trust God all you can but you don’t think about eternity.  You don’t think about eternal things.  You don’t think about the reward of God’s love.  You’re trying to have faith but it’s without hope.  It’s powerless and you wonder why.

It’s easy to focus on God tonight, but tomorrow you are back in the world with all sorts of distractions. Nothing bad, jus the cares and duties of the day. It’s easy to have our attention drawn away.

Paul says don’t forget the process. Don’t forget your hope. Those distractions offer no hope for you. Also, if your faith is fading, look at your hope. Remember how the process of God works in our lives.

We’re so earthly minded sometimes that it’s easy to forget our hope for day after day after day and then our faith is weakened.

Paul goes on as he talks about this faith and hope and love. Look at Col 1:4

Colossians 1:4 NLT

4 For we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and your love for all of God’s people,

Some translations say saints. It’s not the NO Saints nor is it some special people recognized by the RC Church. Paul is talking about Believers. We are all saints set apart for God’s work.

A couple questions about this hope since it’s so important. 

When does this hope happen? Right Now

Colossians 1:5 NLT

5 which come from your confident hope of what God has reserved for you in heaven. You have had this expectation ever since you first heard the truth of the Good News.

The hope that’s reserved for you in heaven is talking about hope right now stored up for you in heaven.  It’s the picture of the fact that God has things waiting for you if you just come and have faith and believe.  And the minute we believe the riches start to be poured out upon our lives.  I like that picture.  That’s why that hope can start to change our lives right now.  That’s when it happens.

If hope is so important,

Where does it come from? Good News

Hope comes from the gospel.  Hope comes from the good news.

That leads to the next thing that Paul wants to talk about as he talks about how you and I can live with Christ as the center of our lives.  He starts to talk about the power of the good news that’s happened in our lives.  There’s only one good news and it’s the good news of Jesus Christ.  He tells them all about what had happened to them because of Christ.

Colossians 1:6–8 NLT

6 This same Good News that came to you is going out all over the world. It is bearing fruit everywhere by changing lives, just as it changed your lives from the day you first heard and understood the truth about God’s wonderful grace. 7 You learned about the Good News from Epaphras, our beloved co-worker. He is Christ’s faithful servant, and he is helping us on your behalf. 8 He has told us about the love for others that the Holy Spirit has given you.

2. The Power of the Gospel

Look a this list of what Paul said about the Gospel.

The Gospel is truth.

When you look at all the other religions of the world and their attempts to reach God and their ideas about God you could take every other attempt to reach God besides the revealed truth about God and title it “Guesses about God” because that’s what other religions are.  But the gospel, the good news, is the truth about God.  That’s why it’s such good news.  It’s the one truth about God.

The Gospel is universal.

It’s worldwide.  Don't ever buy into the idea that the good news about Christ is just for the western culture, just for the American culture. 

That’s going around today: “let’s be accepting of everybody and say everybody can have their own religion depending on whatever culture they happen to grow up in.” 

Remember the good news did not come to the western culture to begin with.  It came to the Near Eastern culture.  It didn’t come to white people.  It came to Asian people.  The gospel, the good news of Christ, is for the entire world.  That’s why it’s such good news.  There’s not a person, a culture, that doesn’t need the good news of Christ.  That’s the power of the gospel.

The Gospel is growing.

Paul says you’ve heard about it and now it’s bearing fruit and it’s growing.  There is something that’s effective about the gospel of Christ.  Everyone you tell the good news isn’t going to accept it, are they?  There’s going to be people who reject it. 

But it’s like planting seeds.  There’s a certain number of them that will grow inevitably.  You can look around the world today and see the same thing.  It’s bearing fruit and it’s growing.  You can look around this room and see the same thing. 

The Gospel is delivered by people.

This true, universal, growing, effective good news of God the way He delivers it is by people.  In fact he names the person who delivered it to them.  You heard it he says from a guy named Epaphras.

Who was this guy?  There’s a few clues about him in the Bible.  Colossae was about 100 miles from Ephesus.  Paul had never been to Colossae when he wrote this letter.  As far as we know he never went there.  But he’d been to Ephesus.  And he spent three years there telling the good news about Christ and teaching people in a school there about who Jesus was. 

Epaphras most likely was one of those people in that school that he taught.  After Paul left people went out from that school and went back to their hometowns to tell the good news about Christ.  Epaphras was one of those people. 

He went back to his town and he told Colossae about who Christ was.  And he started a church and people started to grow in that church. 

Apparently what happened is as the church began to grow Epaphras heard about Paul’s imprisonment over in Rome and both because of the problems in the church and his concern for Paul he goes to visit Paul.  He tells him about some problems in the church.  He tells him about some things that are going on.  Then instead of Epaphras going back he stayed to minister to Paul while he was in chains.  That’s who this guy was.  He’s one of those people who you just come across for a moment in the Bible.  But he’s a man who changed his city for Christ.  He changed an entire city for Jesus Christ.  He planted he first church there.  He told them the good news about who Jesus really was.

Too often, we want Paul to come to our town… Epaphras didn’t’ wait for that. He told everyone about Jesus. You don’t need Paul, me or anyone else, God has sent you to your family, friends, work place etc.

Colossians 1:8 “ He has told us about the love for others that the Holy Spirit has given you.” Love in the Spirit is love that’s empowered by the Holy Spirit.  The interesting thing about that is this is the only time the Holy Spirit is mentioned in the entire book of Colossians.  It’s not that the Holy Spirit’s not important it’s just that the book emphasizes more the person of Christ than the person of the Spirit. 

In verse 6 there’s a sort of definition for what the gospel is.  What is this good news of Christ?  There’s a synonym given. 

Colossians 1:6 NLT

6 This same Good News that came to you is going out all over the world. It is bearing fruit everywhere by changing lives, just as it changed your lives from the day you first heard and understood the truth about God’s wonderful grace.

It’s synonymous.  Good news – God’s grace.  The same thing.  The good news is God’s grace.  God’s grace is good news.  The good news that’s come into our lives is that God has graciously forgiven our sin because of Jesus Christ.  If anyone ever asks you for a quick definition of gospel – what does it mean?  Say “God’s grace”.  God’s gift to our lives.  That’s the good news.

Then he prays for them.

3. The purpose of God’s Will in our lives.

Have you ever thought… “Knowing God’s will for my life seems the most difficult thing to accomplish at times.  There is so much confusion.  Most people seem to interpret the Bible to fit their agenda and waiting to hear from God about what His will is on a certain matter seems fruitless.  Maybe it’s me.  Maybe I don’t have the right mindset.  Or maybe I don’t have enough faith.”

Most of us have at one time or another felt that way. It’s an honest statement about how we have all felt. As you read these verses, these prayers that you and I would know God’s will, that believers would know and understand God’s will it starts to open up how we discover God’s will.  A new sense of confidence in God’s will.  A growing sense of confidence in knowing God’s will.

Look at Col 1:9

Colossians 1:9 NLT

9 So we have not stopped praying for you since we first heard about you. We ask God to give you complete knowledge of his will and to give you spiritual wisdom and understanding.

Paul was praying for them all the time. He was praying that they would know God’s will. Anyone here ever wanted to know God’s will for your life?

Here is the way we usually seek that out. Here’s the situation; give me the answer… now if possible. I am in a hurry…

That’s part of knowing God’s will, but His will is bigger than that.

Sometimes we try to skip from what God wants us to be and try to go straight to “God, what do You want me to do?”  We try to skip character and we want the answer for the circumstances.

Paul teaches us in these verses the highest kind of knowledge is the knowledge of what God wants. 

Not just God’s answer for a particular situation but what does God want for my life?  He uses three words.  They’re very key. 

He uses the word “knowledge” and the word “wisdom” and the word “understanding”. 

Remember that word “Gnostic” I told you about earlier?  Those people who tried to have greater knowledge than anybody else.  That’s where the word comes from, the Greek word Gnostic. 

Paul uses the word “Gnostic” here but he puts a beginning on it.  It sort of means super knowledge.  If they say you can have knowledge, here’s where real knowledge, genuine knowledge comes from.  He’s talking about spiritual intelligence. 

There’s all kinds of intelligence.  Some people are intelligent about computers.  Others are intelligent about statistics.  He’s talking about spiritual intelligence, an intelligence we all can have.  That’s knowledge.

Then he talks about “wisdom” and the word that’s used here means the ability to have God’s insight into human life.  How does God look at things?  What’s God’s perspective?  What does God have as a principle for this situation.  That’s the word “wisdom” that’s used here.  We use the word “wisdom” in a different way.  But the particular word that’s used here focuses in on that.

Then he talks about understanding.  “All spiritual wisdom and understanding.”  The word “understanding” means the application of that wisdom, that principle in real life situations.  One person has called this a clear vision of what needs to be done.  That’s what we want.  We want…   “God, give me a clear vision of what needs to be done and I’ll do it.” 

But we forget the first two steps.  Knowledge – Wisdom – Understanding.  They fit together. 

Knowledge – I need spiritual understanding.  That means I say, “God, I need Your insight on this.  I can’t figure this out on my own.”  If the only time you say that to God is when you’re really desperate, you’ve tried all the ways, all the tricks that you usually use then we miss out on a lot of God’s will.  But if I can start every day saying, “God, I need some spiritual understanding here.  I know I'm going to think this is the way to do things but I really need Your understanding.” 

It starts with a real desire and that desire is followed up by the second thing.  Wisdom – the desire for God’s insight and perspective into human life.  Then I get a clear vision of what needs to be done.    We try to skip the part that says I set down and take a look at God’s word, I get to know Him better, and let Him start to give me a clearer vision of who He is and who He wants me to be.    

There’s something psychological about this that fits in with how God works in our lives.  The truth is God can’t get you to do something that you don’t want to do without making you a robot.  You’re not going to want to do something that isn’t at the core of who you are.  If God’s going to really get you on track with His will, when He wants to move you hear or there, if He’s really going to get you or I to do that, He’s going to have to start by changing who we are so when it’s time to make that move He can get us to make that move. 

So God’s will is bigger than this decision about whether I should move or not.  This decision about whether I should marry or not.  This decision about which career direction I should take.  That is part of God’s will.  But expand it!  God’s will is all about who He wants you to be.  God’s will is all about how He wants to develop my life and your life.  When you start to expand it like that you start to discover who He wants you to be and how He wants you to develop in life the most amazing thing starts to happen.  All that stuff that you used to worry about starts to fall into place like you wouldn’t believe!

God often, with brand new believers will say, “Here’s the answer”.  Just like you with a brand new baby when it cries you say, “Here’s the answer!”  When we grow up as a believer God starts to demand more of you.  Instead of just doling out the answers, He starts to give us opportunities to grow.  That’s what’s happening in some of your lives and you’re wondering why?  It’s a sign of growth really.  “Great!” you say.  “I like the baby stage where I just kept getting the answers.”  The problem with that is you don’t grow in relationship to Him. 

You and I, we can love a baby but they can’t love us back in the same kind of way.  But when that child gets older they have a brand new capacity to love.

See what God’s doing?  See how God’s will is bigger than we think sometime. Col 1:9   

Colossians 1:9 NLT

9 So we have not stopped praying for you since we first heard about you. We ask God to give you complete knowledge of his will and to give you spiritual wisdom and understanding.

He wants you to understand his will.

God doesn’t want to leave us in the dark. You may feel that way… we all have at one time or another. When we do, we need to ask, “What’s God trying to teach me and how does He want to develop me?  What does He want me to be?  If I feel like I'm in the dark I need to go back and say, “Who am I supposed to be?” and get that settled and then move ahead to “What do you want me to do in the situation?” This will take a life time to learn. That’s why many times we keep hitting our heads against discovering God’s will. 

The most important thing to God is what it’s causing us to be.  It doesn’t mean that where you live isn’t it important to Him.  It doesn’t mean that who you marry isn’t important to Him.  Those are important decisions.  But what’s more important to Him is what He’s doing in your life and heart and who He’s bringing you to be.

As He works His will out in our lives some amazing things start to happen.  He says, in Col 1:10

Colossians 1:10 NIV

10 so that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God,

Here are some things that are part of our life that are worthy and pleasing to the Lord.

1. Bearing fruit in every good work.

Great things are happening through your life.  What this verse means is every good thing that you do, every good choice that you make, every faith choice that you and I make is going to bear fruit.  There’s a promise in this verse.  Every time I make a choice of faith it will bear fruit in some way.    That’s part of living a life that’s pleasing to the Lord. 

Bearing fruit, by the way, doesn’t come out of trying harder.  It comes from trusting more. 

A branch cannot bear fruit by cutting itself off from the vine and going out on its own and really trying hard to bear the most fruit.  A branch bears fruit by trusting more in the vine and then naturally the fruit comes.  Don’t try.  Trust! 

2. Growing in the knowledge of God.

For some of you that sounds pretty boring – growing in the knowledge of God.   Many times we think that growing in the knowledge of God is just intellectual but this is talking about relational growth.  Part of that is intellectually understanding more about who He is.  But it’s relating to God in a brand new way.  When you start to grow in the knowledge of God it is not boring.  In fact, the knowledge of God and boredom are direct opposites.  What could be more exciting than getting to know the God who made the universe?  What could be more exciting that getting to know the most important person in the universe? 

Someone said,

Knowing God is exciting, captivating, being filled with fresh ideas, concepts and possibilities of which you never could have dreamed.” 

When you and I grow in the knowledge of God, that’s what we’re growing in.  We’re getting to know Him better.  That is not boring.  Don’t let anybody ever tell you it is. 

That’s part of living this worthy and pleasing life.

3. Being strengthened with God’s power.

That word “strengthen” means it’s continually happening.  It didn’t happen once.  It’s happening every day in my life. 

What do you think the sign would be of someone who’s being strengthened by God’s power?  Patience & Endurance

What would that look like?  Someone who is allowing God’s power to strengthen their everyday life what would it look like? 

Miracles?  If you were really being strengthened by God’s power does that mean you’d actually be able to go out and walk on water and feed 5000?  Is that it? 

If you’re strengthened by God’s power does that mean you’d have a magnetism like no one else?  That there’s just something about you as you walk down the street you almost glow and people would fall at your feet and ask who Jesus really is?  Is that it?

Look at Colossians.  The sign of some one who’s truly being strengthened by God’s power, the incredible awesome power of God comes into my life and there’s two signs.  It means I become a person of patience and a person of endurance.  No bigger sign.  It’s not walking on water.  It’s not personal magnetism.  It’s patience and endurance. 

Those are two very interesting words in the Greek language.

“Patience” is a word that applies specifically to problems. 

Being patient with problems and circumstances in my life.  Have you ever had to be patient with a problem?  Have you ever had to wait on something to happen?  When God’s power comes into your life it gives you the power to wait, to trust through a problem.  The verse tells us that’s the most incredible display of God you can find. 

Then He uses the word “endurance”.  That’s a different word that applies in a different way.  That word applies to problems. 

Endurance applies to people. 

He uses a different word on purpose here.  Have you ever had to be patient with a person?  Who hasn’t?  When God gives you the power to be patient with a person…  Sometimes we have our own tricks, our own ways to try to do it.  I'm not talking about that.  I'm talking about when God gives you the power to be patient with a person.  That is a display of His power. 

We want the outward displays but the Bible says the inward displays are the most powerful of all. 

Charles Spurgeon said once,

“By perseverance and patience the snail reached the ark.” 

Sometimes it’s one little step at a time on your way to the will of God.  Being patient with people and being patient with problems allows God’s power to be released in our lives.  That’s an incredible truth.

4. Giving thanks.

When I'm living a life that’s worthy and pleasing to God, I am giving thanks to Him.  If you’re like me you have some days when your thanksgiving quotient is real low and you have some other days when you’re just filled with gratitude for what He’s done.  The more I allow my heart to be filled with gratitude, the more I'm living that life that’s worthy and pleasing.

There’s a list of things that he gives of why you and I should give thanks. 

He’s qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints for the Father’s kingdom and light.  The Lord’s Supper is one of the most powerful ways that we have to give thanks.  Paul says that one reason we can give thanks is because we’re qualified. 

Our name is on the dotted line.  That qualifies you to share in the inheritance of the saints in God’s kingdom.  You’re not trying to attain that inheritance.  You’re already qualified.  There’s going to be degrees of reward in heaven the Bible tells us.  We’re all going to be filled with joy and we’re all going to share in the inheritance if we’re His children. 

Does that change the way you think?  If you knew that your name was on a will somewhere and the inheritance to you was going to be one hundred million dollars, if you knew that and it was in the vault.  It was signed.  It was just waiting on the right time to be released.  If you knew that would that change the way you thought sometimes?  Sometimes for good.  Sometimes for bad in some people’s lives.  But hopefully for good it would change the way you thought about the opportunities in your life.  You can know it.  You can know that you name is on the dotted line that we’ll spend eternity with Him in heaven.  Let that change the way that you think.