Growing in Christ Through Repentance
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Intro
Intro
Last week we began looking at Colossians 3:5-11 and focused on verses 5-6.
We talked about putting to death those things that are earthly inside of each of us.
We talked about the fact that since our minds are to be set upon the things above, because of our relationship with Jesus, that we are to take steps of obedience.
Steps that put to death the desire the earthly things within you.
These steps are a process. It is not a once and done sort of deal.
New life marks a starting point for every believer.
New life is not a result of successful daily battle with temptation.
New life though does bring the desire to have that battle.
I would like you to think with me if you can to your the time when you placed your faith in Christ.
Maybe you have a specific day or time or place. Maybe you don’t remember the exact day or place because of your age.
Either way, it is important because for the believer it marks the beginning of new life.
It marks a rebirth. It marks a time when you made a commitment to follow Jesus.
It marks the beginning of God’s work of sanctification in your life.
It also ought to mark a time of repentance.
To repent is to change direction, to feel regret, to change your mind.
It is much more than remorse though.
Simply feeling bad alone is not true repentance.
As I was moving snow this week I have been listening to some sermons, one of my favorites to listen to is Alistair Begg - he put it this was
repentance is not simply something that begins our Christian experience, but genuine biblical repentance is to be the hallmark of all that Christian living really means.
Genuine biblical repentance does not only happen at conversion.
Genuine biblical repentance is not saying God I’m sorry and then turning around and doing the same thing again.
Sure it may be part of the process for a time but there has to be more.
This is in large part is what we have been looking at here in Colossians.
We have seen this modeled in our text here.
We are made aware of this through the different metaphors that Paul uses.
We have clear pictures of dying to our old way of life, and rising into the new.
In chapter 3 here we see the picture of putting off the old, and putting on the new.
We will never, on this side of heaven be completely free from inclination to sin.
What we do find though is that through our life in Jesus, if it is genuine, a desire to be obedient to Him introduces us to more difficult battles than we have experienced up to this point in our lives.
We find each and every day a need to engage in biblical repentance.
We must keep this in mind as we continue in chapter 3.
True biblical repentance is an ongoing process when Christ is all in our lives.
We are called to repent because Christ is all.
Read Col. 3:5-11
In these you once walked. V. 7
In these you once walked. V. 7
The Christian life, the Christian walk, our relationship with Jesus is a process.
It is a process where were are brought from unrepentant sinner, to a person who sees their true need for Jesus.
To be brought from death to life.
From sinful acts to righteous ones.
This is where we begin in verse 7.
Through this verse Paul was reminding the Colossian believers that they were once people who were condemned to suffer the wrath that was mentioned in verse 6 because of their sinful lifestyles.
A very literal translation of this verse reads in which also you all walked formerly, when you were living in these.
These referred to in verse 7 can refer to both the list in verse 5 and verse 8.
The idea here is that before Christ, these vices ruled your life.
Vices such as these lists make the image of God indiscernible in a person.
Verse 5, Paul called on the hearers of this to make a decisive break with the sinful tendencies that they have carried with them into their Christian lives.
For some of us this is easy to see, we came to Christ at a later stage in life so can see and remember those things that we once walked.
For some of us though, that have grown up in Christian homes and placed our faith in Jesus at an early age, this is more difficult to see.
We may think perhaps that we don’t have that much sin that we bring with us into our Christian life.
When in reality the Christian who places his faith in Christ at an early age is no different the Christian who comes later in their life.
Sin is equally as bad, some though is more outwardly visible than others.
That is, I believe why Paul gives the lists that he does.
They show both outward actions and inward thoughts.
Sexual immorality and impurity are often though of as outward, as are slander and obscene talk in verse 8.
But passion, evil desire, covetousness, anger, wrath, and malice are often inward thoughts or feelings.
The main point of this though is the verb to walk and to live.
In these you too once walked, when you were living in them.
Paul is showing a snapshot in time of their lives.
He is reminding them of the way they used to be.
Not in a sense of drudging up old long dead forgiven sins, but as to say, you are not this way anymore, are you?
If you are placing your minds on the things above, you will have moved on from these things.
You will be putting to death that which is earthly in you.
The NIV Application Commentary: Colossians and Philemon Bridging Contexts
Paul also indicates that God’s wrath is redemptive in intention. When we compare sin to cancer, we realize that we hate the cancer and not the person with the cancer. God hates sin, not the sinner. Paul’s reminder to the Colossians that they “used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived” (3:7) reveals that such behavior does not automatically bring wrathful damnation (see Eph. 2:3). God wishes to redeem us from our sinful destructive ways and allows us to go our own way in the hopes that our eventual wretchedness will cause us to wake up.
That is the purpose of repentance, to change direction, because Christ is all and He resides in you.
Paul continues his call with another imperative in verse 8
8 But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth.
The Pillar New Testament Commentary: Colossians and Philemon 2. Putting off the Practices of the “Old Self” (3:5–11)
In vv. 6–7 Paul underscores how vital it is for Christians to deal with sin in their lives by reminding us (1) that sinful behavior is a hallmark of our past life that we have left behind; and (2) that God’s wrath falls on people who engage in such behavior. These verses therefore support the two calls to put away sin that frame them: “put to death …” (v. 5); “you must rid yourselves …” (v. 8).
The verb here put away means to literally rid yourself, put away, lay down, take off these things.
This verb here gives the picture of taking off clothes and in the context specifically dirty clothes.
The dirty clothes referenced in this verse is an anger that does not subside, wrath, rage or fury, malice, or an ill will that perverts moral principles from their desired good purpose to evil, slander or blasphemy, abusive words that damage a person, and lewd or obscene speech.
What we are to do is to put off these things. Remove them from our person.
Don’t allow them on our body.
And specifically in verse 8 here Paul is stating that Christians should avoid unnecessarily critical and abusive speech.
Anger, wrath, and malice can all lead to slanderous and obscene talk.
The purpose here is not to single out some specific sins but to show the attitude of anger and ill will towards others that leads to hasty, hurtful, nasty speech.
This is important because of Jesus teaching in Matt. 15.
11 it is not what goes into the mouth that defiles a person, but what comes out of the mouth; this defiles a person.”
18 But what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this defiles a person.
The concern is not as much the speech as it is the heart of the person.
If these things are proceed from the mouth, one must question what it is that is the heart.
True repentance is evidence of a changed heart.
Although some may try to fake this evidence.
Do not lie to one another.
Do not lie to one another.
9 Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices
I believe Paul is saying here, put off these things, and do not do so in a false manner.
Don’t do it to fit in. Don’t do it to be a part of the Christian crowd.
Put off these things because of Christ living in you, because your mind is focused on the things above.
Again we are talking about genuine repentance. A genuine change of direction.
Grow in Christian Character.
Grow in Christian Character.
9 Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices 10 and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator.
There are a few verbs in here that help to describe Christian character and its growth.
The first two have primarily to do with the act of salvation but all three constitute continued growth.
As I mentioned earlier, this putting off and putting on has the picture of changing changing clothes.
How often do you change your clothes, guys especially I am not talking about your jeans.
The New American Commentary: Philippians, Colossians, Philemon Completely Control Your Sinful Appearances (3:9–11)
In the metaphorical language of changing clothes, Paul explained that the old self had been put off, the new self had been put on, and the new self was in process of growth toward a new goal.
I am not saying you are saved every time you change your clothes.
The point I want to make is that of the process of growth toward a new goal.
The initial change is an important one.
It is the one sets in motion the act of verse 10, being renewed in knowledge after the image of your creator.
The NIV Application Commentary: Colossians and Philemon Bridging Contexts
Human beings are trickier to fix than machines. When an engine does not work, it can be repaired, even if it means putting in a whole new set of parts. We cannot deal with human envy, lust, and greed that way. More than once, people have had to plummet to the depths of degradation before they awoke to their condition and turned back to a loving, forgiving Father.
The understanding of the old self is important a proper understanding of where we as believers are going.
We know that the old self is crucified with Christ
6 We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin.
But believers still sin.
This goes back to Genesis. Back to Adam’s sin in the garden.
Our identification as humans, with Adam, is one of servitude to sin.
The hope comes with putting this off and coming to Christ and identifying with Him and his power over sin that we put on.
We are brought into a new realm of existence. a realm where the old self, Adam and all that he represents, no longer determines our thinking and our behavior.
By putting on the new self, we are no longer identified with Adam, his sin and his death.
This change of allegiance through, from Adam’s lordship to Jesus does not mean that we are not influenced by the old pattern of behavior.
While we have a new Lord, we still think and live as part of Adam’s realm.
This is why the commands that Paul gives here are so important.
This is why they are not a once and done thing.
Repentance is a change of direction. Perhaps just a small one because we are drifting off the road.
Perhaps though it needs to be a full on u turn and heading the other direction.
This is what we must do in order that we grow in our relationships with Jesus.
We repent in order that we might grow.
A new humanity.
A new humanity.
The new self that we are talking about is not only a new nature inside of you, or a new person, rather it is a whole new way of life.
11 Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free; but Christ is all, and in all.
Here in the new humanity being created by God in Christ there is not exclusivity.
Six of these pairs are arranged in contrasting patterns.
Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, slave and free.
Each of these are pretty clear in the contrast of one another.
The two kind of odd ones in the verse are barbarian and Scythian.
We would assume that Paul also intends some contrast between these as well because of where they fall in the context.
Barbarian has the meaning of being a foreigner, a non-Greek person. They were any people that the Greeks thought to be culturally inferior.
Scythian referred to people living in the region of the black sea. These people were considered unrefined, awkward and uncultivated in appearance, manner or behavior. Perhaps downright rude.
The point of this is by showing that the polarities of worldly existence are overcome in Christ.
There is no status distinction among those who believe in Jesus. No one has a special claim to God or is treated with less dignity than another.
Jesus, who is all, and in all, binds Christians together in equality and in turn calls all to repentance equally.
Everyone is called equally to turn for the wrath of God is coming equally. The only difference is Christ.
Conclusion
Conclusion
This is not a list of do’s and don’ts. We can see from scripture that that does not work.
The NIV Application Commentary: Colossians and Philemon The New Humanity (3:9b–11)
The renewal comes from being joined to Christ, who is the image of the immortal God (1:15–16), in whom we have been created. No system of “dos and don’ts” can create the image of God in humans.
There is a need to work out in our daily lives the reality of our transfer out from under the lordship of sin and into the lordship of Christ.
The NIV Application Commentary: Colossians and Philemon Bridging Contexts
A perversion of our relationship with God leads to a perversion of all human relationships, and we become less than human. If we do not see fit to have the true God influence our knowledge, we wind up with unfit minds. Such minds become so corrupted that they no longer can think straight and are totally untrustworthy as a guide in moral decisions. This situation leads to a religion based on falsehood, a body that is defiled, and a society where hate and war are at home. The inevitable price of having our way with God is spiritual poverty, spiritual blindness, spiritual deafness, and passions running riot.
The NIV Application Commentary: Colossians and Philemon Bridging Contexts
Our holiness will not come from our futile attempts to comply with an arbitrary list of observances and taboos. Our godliness is not measured by the things we do not do. It comes from being in Christ, dying with Christ, and being raised with Christ.
This all begins with placing our faith in Christ. Believing that He died and was raised from the dead, now seated at the rind hand of the father.
This is not simply a question of ethics, if we make it so, we are no better than the false teachers that Paul was writing to refute.
By making this a question of ethics we face the temptation to create strict rules and have long winded discussions for the purpose of reigning in morality.
Being joined to Jesus is the foundation for new life. This is the only thing that truly enables change.
When Christ becomes our life, we not only die to human teaching and understanding, we die to sin.
The motivation to sin shifts because we have a new motivator in our lives.
That motivator is Jesus.
We are called to repentance because Christ is all and in all.