Colossians 1.19-The Father Was Pleased to Have All His Fullness Dwell Permanently in His Son Jesus Christ
Wenstrom Bible Ministries
Pastor-Teacher Bill Wenstrom
Sunday May 24, 2015
Colossians: Colossians 1:19-The Father Was Pleased to Have All His Fullness Dwell Permanently in His Son Jesus Christ
Lesson # 25
Colossians 1:18 He is also head of the body, the church; and He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that He Himself will come to have first place in everything. 19 For it was the Father’s good pleasure for all the fullness to dwell in Him. (NASB95)
Colossians 1:19 presents the reason for the previous statement in verse 18 in which Paul asserts that the divine purpose was accomplished so that Jesus Christ alone became the Preeminent One among each and every person in the church with no exceptions.
“It was the Father’s good pleasure for” is the verb eudokeō (εὐδοκέω), which means “to decide with pleasure, to be pleased, to be very pleased, to take great delight in something or someone” since it pertains to considering something as good and therefore a worthy choice.
The third person singular form is a reference to God the Father.
In the New Testament when this verb is used of deity, it is always used with reference to the Father and never the Son or the Spirit (cf. Matt. 3:17; 12:18; 17:5; Mark 1:11; Luke 3:22; 12:32; 1 Cor. 1:21; 10:5; Gal. 1:15; Heb. 10:6, 8, 38; 2 Pet. 1:17).
Therefore, this verb indicates that the Father “was very pleased” or “took great delight” that all His fullness would dwell in His Son Jesus Christ.
The aorist tense of the verb is a constative aorist describing in summary fashion the Father’s decision in eternity past to have all His fullness to dwell in His Son Jesus Christ.
“All the fullness” is composed of the following: (1) adjective pas (πᾶς), “all” (5) noun plērōma (πλήρωμα), “for the fullness.”
In Colossians 1:19, the noun plērōma indicates that Jesus Christ is the perfect embodiment of God’s power and love.
It speaks of Jesus Christ being the full or perfect embodiment of the Father’s redemptive power and love or the perfect or full expression of the Father’s redemptive power and love.
Or we can say that He was the perfect embodiment of the Father’s plan to save sinners.
The articular construction of this word plērōma functions as a possessive personal pronoun meaning “His” and is referring to the Father.
Therefore, this “fullness” is a reference to God the Father’s fullness.
This word is modified by the adjective pas, which means “all” and speaks of totality indicating that Jesus Christ was the total and complete embodiment of the Father’s plan to save sinners.
“To dwell in Him” is composed of the following: (1) preposition en (ἐν), “in” (2) intensive personal pronoun autos (αὐτός), “Him” (3) verb katoikeō (κατοικέω), “to dwell.”
The verb katoikeō is a compound word composed of the preposition kata which means “down” and is prefixed to the verb oikeo.
The preposition is intensifying the meaning of the verb oikeo and means “to settle down, to dwell in.”
This compound verb’s meaning and usage are similar to oikeo especially in contexts designating places of residence, but this compound verb is more forceful and more of an intensive term.
In Colossians 1:19, the verb katoikeō is used in a figurative or spiritual sense and means “to dwell permanently” since it is a more intensive term than oikeo which Paul could have used but of course did not.
The apostle wanted to convey the idea of a permanent indwelling because he is speaking in the context of the Father’s fullness in relation to His Son, Jesus Christ.
So here the word is used in relation to all the Father’s fullness “dwelling permanently” in Jesus Christ.
All the Father’s fullness, i.e. His plan to save sinners “dwelled permanently” in the person of Jesus Christ, His Son.
The intensive personal pronoun autos means “Him” referring of course to the Lord Jesus Christ and is the object of the preposition en which is a marker of location indicating that the Father was very pleased in eternity past to have all His fullness, i.e. His saving grace and love permanently reside in the person of Jesus Christ.
Colossians 1:18 Furthermore, He Himself, as an eternal spiritual truth exists in the state of being the head over His body, namely His church who, as an eternal spiritual truth exists in the state of being the founder that is the firstborn from the dead ones. The divine purpose was accomplished so that He alone became the Preeminent One among each and every person with no exceptions 19 because He was very pleased to have all His fullness dwell permanently in Him. (My translation)
The apostle Paul in verse 19 presents the reason for his previous statement in verse 18 in which he asserts that the divine purpose was accomplished so that Jesus Christ alone became the Preeminent One among each and every person in the church with no exceptions.
Here in verse 19 he asserts that the Father was very pleased for all His fullness to dwell permanently in His Son, Jesus Christ.
Therefore, verse 19 indicates that Jesus Christ is the Preeminent Person in the church without any exceptions because the Father was very pleased to have all His fullness dwell permanently in Him.
The interpretation of the noun pleroma, “fullness” is difficult.
Most interpreters identify this noun as referring to the fact that Jesus Christ has all the attributes of the Father’s divine essence.
In other words they believe it is referring to “the fullness of deity” resides in Jesus Christ.
However, this is by no means the correct interpretation since Paul is teaching that the Father was very pleased to have all His fullness dwell permanently in His Son which would mean that the Father made a choice to choose His Son to have all His fullness residing in Him permanently.
In other words, the Father chose Jesus to possess all His attributes permanently.
However, this clearly does not agree with the rest of Scripture which is emphatic that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and has all the attributes of deity.
The Father did not give His attributes to His Son at His incarnation but rather His Son inherently possessed these same attributes Himself or in other words, He was God before His incarnation.
We must remember that in context Paul is presenting the reason why Jesus Christ is the Preeminent Person in the church which he mentions in Colossians 1:18.
In this passage, he asserts that Jesus Christ is the head of His body, the church and is the founder that is the firstborn from the dead which of course speaks of Jesus Christ’s resurrection.
So Jesus Christ is the Preeminent One in the church because of His resurrection since this sets Him apart as the beginning or the originator of the new creation.
This would appear to indicate that the plērōma is arising out of Jesus Christ’s resurrection which vindicated Him and demonstrated the Father had accepted His death on the cross as sufficient to propitiate Him, and redeem all of sinful humanity and reconcile all of sinful humanity to Himself.
His resurrection thus marked Him out as the Father’s choice as Savior.
Paul’s statement in Colossians 1:20 also helps us to understand the meaning of plērōma because it asserts that the Father reconciled all His creatures to Himself through Jesus Christ, His Son by means of His substitutionary death on the cross.
So it would be better to interpet plērōma in light of Paul’s statements in verses 19 and 20 and the Son’s resurrection and work of reconciliation.
Therefore, since Jesus Christ was raised by the power of God and His death on the cross was the perfect expression of God’s power and love for sinners, the noun plērōma indicates that Jesus Christ is the perfect embodiment of God’s power and love.
In other words, His resurrection was the perfect expression of God’s power and His work on the cross the perfect expression of His love for sinners.
His resurrection demonstrated God’s power in full measure and His work on the cross demonstrated God’s love for sinners in full measure.
This means that all the Father’s fullness dwells permanently His Son in the sense that His resurrection was the perfect embodiment of His power and His work on the cross the perfect embodiment of God’s love for sinners.
Therefore, the noun plērōma speaks of Jesus Christ being the full or perfect embodiment of the Father’s redemptive power and love or the perfect or full expression of the Father’s redemptive power and love or we can say that He was the perfect embodiment of the Father’s plan to save sinners.
John 1:16 uses the noun pleroma in relation to Jesus Christ and God’s grace policy towards sinners.
By employing the noun pleroma in relation to Jesus Christ, the apostle Paul is taking from the language of the false teachers in Colossae which was a favorite word of theirs.
Paul was dealing with the Essene branch of Judaism with a tinge of an incipient form of Gnosticism that was found in Essene Judaism.
The apostle also uses πλήρωμα, “fullness” which occurs in Colossians 1:19 and 2:9 and in both instances Paul uses the word in relation to Jesus Christ.
In the former, the word expresses the fact that Jesus Christ is the perfect or full embodiment of the Father’s power to save sinners and love for sinners and in the latter, the word is the perfect embodiment of deity.
In both instances, he uses this word to refute these false teachers in Colossae.