Colossians 1

We study through books of the Bible here at the village chapel, and I'm really excited to be starting a brand new book study today.

We're looking at the letter of the Apostle Paul to the church at Colossae, the ancient city.

The book is called Colossians in your New Testament, and we're going to call our study of this book Christ is All in All.

As most of you would probably agree, we live in times of increasing skepticism, uncertainty, anxiety, fear, anger.

More people than ever are asking the very big questions of life.

Where did everything come from?

Are we part of some kind of designed creation?

Or are we just the result of the random chance co-location of atoms and chemicals in a meaningless existence?

What holds the universe or our galaxy or our solar system, Earth itself, or anything?

This chair I'm sitting in the screen you're watching, what holds all of that together?

What holds us together, even as entities, as beings?

Um, in just the finely tuned way all of that is held together?

Does human existence have any meaning or purpose?

Is this life all there is?

Do we have an eternal destiny at all?

What has gone wrong with the world?

Can we find a way to live together, to love one another, to commune with each other instead of trying to smash, abuse, and consume one another?

Where should we turn for answers to these big questions?

The 20th century American writer Walker Percy has been described as a philosophical novelist exploring the dislocation of man in the modern age.

And uh in a his uh disturbing novel about a dejected lawyer turned murderer, published in 1977, I think it was, he says this to live in the past and future is easy.

To live in the present is like threading a needle.

So I ask you, is it possible to thread the needle?

To live in the present world without being crippled by past guilt and shame or anger.

Is it possible that we can live in the present world without being immobilized by our fears of what the future may hold and what the outcomes might be?

We all know, I think, and recognize that we need outside help.

We can't do this on our own.

We all need someone who can come and rescue us or save us.

And here at the village chapel, we understand that.

We also understand that mere religion often just ends up uh boiling down to behavior modification.

The gospel, on the other hand, is about mind and heart transformation.

We find this compelling at the village chapel, and so we seek to persuade you that it is more than just practical, more than just inspiring, but that it is true, and that therefore it is good news of God's amazing grace on offer to you.

And so here we come to study the book of Colossians.

I think it will, just like the book of Revelation, which we studied just prior to this, it will set our sights much higher than this particular slice of space-time history that we're living in, with all of its trouble, with all of its um uh sort of the events that cause us to be suspicious and cautious and skeptical and all of that.

This will raise our heights to a much higher level because we're we're reading a letter that is literally written 2,000 years ago to a group of people living in a world of great difficulty, great confusion.

And um, so so let's take a look, first of all, at the background, the letter itself.

I may put up on the screen for you a uh slide that will sort of give us the general categories as we ask the question: what do we know about this ancient letter or epistle?

Well, we know that, and you'll see this in just a moment, it's written by, it's from Paul and Timothy.

That's going to be really clear from the beginning, and we'll get to reading it in just a moment.

Where was Colossae?

Here's the map, uh, because it's written to the saints and faithful brothers at Colossae.

These are Christians living in the Lycus Valley region of inland Asia Minor.

We call that Turkey today.

That's the nation of Turkey.

Colossae, as you can see from the map, sat about 100 miles east of Ephesus, just a short 10 miles to Laodicea.

That's one of the cities we studied in the book of Revelation, one of the seven cities, and 13 miles to Hieropolis.

And these three cities, uh, Colossae, Laodicea, and Hieropolis, were neighbor cities, and so they shared much in the way of commerce and culture.

It does not seem from reading Colossians that the Apostle Paul planted the church, nor did he visit the church ever.

It seems upon the writing of this letter that he is writing to them just based on the fact that his friend Epaphras had communicated to him what was going on there and how God was moving there in Colossae, that area of the world where riddled with earthquakes and all kinds of difficulty in the first century, Roman Empire, you know, all the all the stuff going on when Nero was their emperor.

You know, just think about all of that and their world situation.

And here the Apostle Paul writes this amazing, it's dense letter for, you know, for just four chapters, uh, as we've broken it out in our English Bibles.

It's dense like, I'm talking of, it's dense like a really great dense chocolate cake, if you like that kind of thing.

And uh many Bible commentators believe this letter sprang up out of that relationship that Paul had with Epaphras.

When was it written?

Uh most commentators would agree that it was probably the early 60s, perhaps the late 50s.

And by the way, remind you, that's not the 1960s with the Beatles and Hermann's Hermits and the monkeys.

This is, no, the original 60s andor the late 50s.

Where was it written?

This letter, as we'll see in chapter 4, verse 18, the Apostle Paul is writing from prison.

So it's one of those prison epistles.

Um, Ephesians, Philippians, and uh Colossians, and also Philemon, all of these are the uh four uh prison epistles written by the Apostle Paul while he's incarcerated for his faith.

And Philemon, especially, lived in Colossae.

Um, and so when Paul writes Philemon, he's talking about, he's writing to Philemon about Onesimus, a common uh person that they had they knew in common, and he's trying to reconcile that relationship.

And Onesimus, Philemon all lived, both lived in Colossae.

So all of this is so amazingly connected and tied together, isn't it?

Why was the letter of Colossians written?

Well, there was a raging tornado of competing and contradicting ideas in the world at that time, just like we have in our own day and time.

And they didn't even have the internet to sort of make all that flow fast.

Um, and their culture was not dominated by sort of an expressive individualism and sort of, you know, the cacophony of competing autobiographies.

Uh, that's not the case in their world, but there were a lot of ideas that were floated around, especially when it comes to religion.

And remember, Colasi is out in the Roman Empire.

It's not over in Israel, which was a monotheistic world, if you will, or a religious context, if you will.

The Jews believed in one God.

Well, out in the Gentile world, they believed in many gods.

They had a pantheon of gods, all kinds of different little g gods, most of whom were uh identified by the part of nature, for instance, that they might have been responsible for, the god of the harvest, the god of the rain, the god of the moon, the god of sometimes uh events, world events like the god of war or something.

So we have a lot of sort of a poly or many gods is the is sort of the religious context out in the Roman world.

And add to that, you had emperor worship, which was going on, where the political figures, uh, the Roman emperors in succession, were increasingly demanding that all persons within the Roman Empire would view them, see them as gods, as deity.

And so it would be Caesar is Lord, and they'd hold a sword to your throat, say that Caesar is Lord, or die, basically.

And so the Christians, as you can imagine, are facing increasing persecution, literal persecution, not just marginalization, but literal persecution, not just ridicule, but their very lives were at stake.

And so Paul writes to encourage them in all of this.

How were they to know what was true when it came to reality and to their life with God?

These are questions they must have been asking.

So, in response to that, that um cacophony of ideas and that, you know, that swirling hurricane of uh thought about God and our life with God or the gods, um, you mix into that.

Uh, there was a little bit of angelology.

We'll see that as we go.

People starting to worship angels.

Um, you mix into that even some of the Gnostic Judaism that existed, um, which is kind of complex.

You can look it up online, get a little bit better idea of it.

But it was sort of a dualism.

The uh material world was seen as evil.

And um, and so that led to either, well, let's just totally indulge ourselves.

Antinomism, it's antinomianism, it's called, sort of a uh a reckless lawlessness.

Uh, just indulge yourself because it's evil, it doesn't matter anyway.

Uh but the problem is you start to use other people and you start to act in self-destructive ways.

Um, and then the other way that that would lead is sadly it would lead to others who would just uh go in a more ascetic direction, withdrawing in a legalistic way from the world, um, and from not only from uh the the the pleasures, the real good, you know, honest, uh legitimate pleasures of this world, as well as from the opportunity for their witness uh to be seen by others and for them to hear about God.

So here's what happens.

The Apostle Paul speaks into that kind of a world.

And we have some similarities in our own world.

And uh there's a great benefit, I think, to studying an old letter like this and seeing what we can learn from them about our own day and time and how to be people, the people of God in our own day and time.

Um, one of the great commentators on the book of Colossians is Joseph Barber Lightfoot, J.B.

Lightfoot.

He was a 19th-century English theologian preacher, and uh ended up being the Bishop of Durham at one point.

Here's a quote from him: Christ is both the beginning and the end of the material universe.

That's the case that chapter one's going to make here.

Um, nor is his office in the spiritual world less complete in the church as in the universe.

Christ is sole absolute supreme, the primary source from which all life proceeds, and the ultimate arbiter in whom all feuds are reconciled.

And when I read that quote, I thought to myself, oh my goodness, man.

Lord Jesus, come.

And as we put you first in our lives and in our hearts, Lord, begin to do the work that only you can do in reconciling our relationships with one another, in reconciling our relationship, uh, or our witness, rather, uh in empowering our witness out to the watching world as well, so that God might be glorified and our and we might do uh good and love our neighbors well.

Well, I don't want to get too much further into detail on the introduction without reading chapter one.

I'll throw up my outline in advance.

I do that occasionally for you guys.

Uh, Colossians 1, we'll have a greeting in verses 1 to 2, prayer of gratitude, verses 3 to 8, uh, prayer for growth in the gospel, verses 9 to 14.

Um, he'll focus on the uniqueness, supremacy, and sufficiency of Christ in verses 15 to 23.

And then he's going to talk about his own apostolic leadership, his servant leadership, if you will, in verses 24 to 29.

And uh just open your Bibles then, Colossians chapter 1.

Colossians 1 · chapter mention

Um, that happens to be on page 1169 in my Bible, but your English Bible's probably got it on a different page, depending on what translation you have.

But the letter nonetheless goes just like this.

Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ, by the will of God, and Timothy, our brother, to the saints and faithful brethren in Christ.

Now, you want to circle those two words in Christ.

He will use the phrase in Christ or in him, and the the the reference will be to Christ, in him, in Christ, he's going to do that 11 times in what we call these four short chapters.

So the way to view your life in the middle of all the craziness and chaos is to view your life in Christ.

Hmm.

So, as intellectually confused and morally bankrupt as the world is, and how how that all presses in on you and presses in on me when we're trying to consider what is reality?

What does it mean to be a human person?

Who am I?

What's my identity?

All of that is to be found in Christ, in him.

11 times.

You you can run the numbers if you want as we go along.

But he says to the saints and faithful brethren in Christ who are at Colossi, that's this ancient city, grace to you and peace from God our Father.

And remember, grace always precedes peace.

And it always comes from, flows from God.

And he is generous with his grace.

And I pray for each and every one of you, no matter what's going on in your life right now, whether you're sitting at home and everything's going fine, or whether you're in a hospital room right now and you're waiting for the next set of test results, or whether you've just experienced some great loss, I pray the grace of God and the peace of God would surround and sustain you right now.

Well, verses three through eight are a prayer of gratitude.

And notice the emphasis on faith, love, and hope.

Really important triad there in the Christian faith.

We give thanks to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always for you.

The Apostle Paul writing to the saints at Colossae, he says, We're praying for you all the time, and we're giving thanks to God for you, since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus, and the love which you have for all the saints, because the hope laid up for you in heaven, of which you previously heard in the word of truth, the gospel which has come to you, just as in all the world also it is constantly bearing fruit and increasing, even as it has been doing in you also since the day you heard of it and understood the grace of God in truth, just as you learned it from Epaphras, our beloved fellow bondservant, who is a faithful servant of Christ on our behalf.

And he also informed us of your love in the Spirit.

And so there you have that beautiful prayer of gratitude from the Apostle Paul as he writes to them.

He opens up with his greeting and he writes immediately, uh, letting them know that he's heard of their faith in Christ.

Not just faith in faith, not just faith in humanity, not just faith in the ascendant, the ascendancy of man or whatever.

No, faith in Christ.

Christ, that outside help that we need, who has come inside and become one of us and brought us God's salvation as a free gift, if we'll turn to him and receive it by faith.

So it's their faith in Christ, their love of the brethren, all the saints.

He even says that.

And I get convicted myself, maybe you do too, especially in the world in which we live right now.

See, where so many people think, oh, it's a, you know, the entire thing, the entire world hinges on this one event or the outcome of this one event.

And yet, no, um, as that separates people who put idols up, as that separates them, what they don't see is that they can't love each other.

Why?

Because Christ isn't preeminent.

When Christ is preeminent, when our faith is in Christ, when our faith isn't in money, the way the economy goes, when our faith isn't in uh our our health, when our faith isn't in our the politics or whatever, when it's in Christ Jesus first, you see, then we can actually love one another.

Why?

Because we're free.

We're free from the frustration and anger and fear and all that stuff that is created by setting something above Christ.

He heard of he had heard of their faith in Christ and the love which we have for all the saints because of the hope laid up for you in heaven.

And so with each one of these things, faith, there's an object.

It's Christ.

Yeah.

Love, there's an object.

It's all the saints, not just some of the saints, not just the saints that think the way I think, not just the saints that sing in the same style of music I sing in, not just the saints that actually take secondary doctrines and think of them differently.

No, the saints are all of those who are in Christ Jesus.

They trust Christ first and foremost.

And therefore, if I do that same thing, Christ is first in my life, Christ is first in your life, in their life, and we love one another because we have this common supreme high priority in our lives, and it's Jesus.

He's the one we hold most dear.

He's preeminent.

And that then flows into or turns into a hope, verse five, laid up for us in heaven, of which you previously heard in the word of truth the gospel, which has come to you.

And he goes on to say, This is this came to you, Colossae, church.

It came to you by way of Epaphras, this good friend who's a faithful servant.

Now, verse nine, what he starts here is the prayer for growth in the gospel.

Let's take a look at that.

For this reason also, since the day we heard of it, we have not ceased to pray for you and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.

Look at those three words right there.

I love those.

They go together, they're sort of in the same category.

That is, he wants them to be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.

So, in other words, this faith of ours in Christ, this love of ours with the brethren, and again, uh the whole body of Christ, and this hope that we have about the way the future is going to roll out according to God's purposes and plans, and the way that our lives actually have an eternal destiny in Christ.

We have this hope of heaven, this hope of eternity with him.

And so, with all of that in mind, the apostle Paul says he's gonna pray for them, that they're gonna continually be filled with the knowledge of his will, with the spiritual wisdom that they're gonna need and the understanding that they're gonna need, so that you may walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, to please him in all respects.

And so, as we read that verse 10, uh, we we see that the idea or the goal is that we might begin to walk in a manner that glorifies God.

And so we pray for discerning wisdom all along the way.

We pray for faith to trust all along the way.

Uh, God is in charge of all the outcomes.

We trust him for those outcomes.

Yeah.

We pray for him to unite us in the spirit of Christ, of Jesus Christ, and so that his body might be one, just as Jesus.

Prayed that we might be one.

And then we we pray for the glory of God, that we would be walking in a manner worthy of the Lord, to please him, not to please me, not to please the culture, not to please my friends that I run with, not even to please, you know, close family members.

My first priority is that God would be delighted with how I walk in my life.

Bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God.

So there's an ongoing growth, as we're saying here in our third point.

It's a growth in the gospel, all right?

Increasing in the knowledge of God, strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might for the attaining of all steadfastness and patience, joyously giving thanks to the Father who has qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints in light.

You, yeah, there's just so much there.

Like I said, dense chocolate cake, my fave.

Okay.

But here, this is like this is like even better than that, because this is for our souls.

This is this is a delight for us to see that we could be strengthened by the Lord with all power, uh, according to his glorious might.

Well, how much glorious might does God have?

He's got it all.

It's unlimited.

And so we want to be strengthened by him.

And so that's that is such a freedom to think about.

Because I don't know about you, but I run out of love for other people.

I run out of warm, fuzzy feelings for our culture sometimes.

I run out of even my love for God sometimes.

I don't feel it.

And yet here comes God taking up the initiative and being not only the source of my life to begin with in creation, but more than that, he's the source even of the faith that he gives me to believe in him.

He strengthens me with his power according to, or uh according to his glorious might for the attaining of all steadfastness and patience.

Man, that's great.

Does that describe my faith?

Steadfast and patient.

I want that to be the case.

I want that to be the case in the season that we're in right now.

That we, the people of God, we the church of Jesus Christ, might seen, might be seen by the watching world to be people who aren't confident in themselves, but confident in Christ.

And that's what makes us steadfast.

Yeah.

And even, I love this, steadfast and patient.

All right.

So we're waiting for the God of who holds all human history, the sovereign God of the Bible who holds all of human history in his hands.

We're waiting for him to roll out his purposes.

And it goes step by step, and I'm not in charge of it.

I'm not in charge of the pace of it.

I'm not in charge of the direction of it.

You know why?

Because I'm not God.

If I knew what he knew, I'd be praying all the time, completely 100% accurately according to his will.

But I'm not God.

His thoughts are higher than my thoughts.

His ways are beyond my understanding.

And so I bow before him.

We bow before him as a church, don't we?

Trusting him and learning what it means to receive from him strength for each and every day, according to his glorious might for the attaining of steadfastness and patience.

And then he goes on, joyously giving thanks to the Father.

All right, you know, thanksgiving uh every November comes up.

Who are you giving thanks to?

Is it just a warm, fuzzy feeling of let's just be thankful here?

But we're not really directing our, we're not giving our thanks to anybody.

If you don't believe in God, I don't know who you're giving thanks to.

Hmm.

But here the Bible tells us we're giving our thanks to the Father who has qualified us, he's done it, he's the one who's done it, qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints in light.

Okay, I mean, that's just we could go on and on.

I just don't have time.

I'm looking, I just had to look away at the clock.

But the next section is really powerful as it comes up.

It's the incomparable Christ.

He starts to describe.

Um, he delivered us from the domain of darkness, so we're gonna be the uh the saints who are in the light.

Why?

Because he's delivered us from darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

Do you need redemption today?

I do.

I'd I'm gonna say we do.

And I'm gonna say, even if you're an atheist or an agnostic today, you've if you face reality, if you can look in the mirror and just really be honest for a second, you'd have to acknowledge that you need redemption too.

So where are you gonna turn for it?

Who's gonna be your redeemer?

Here's one that's on offer right here.

The person Jesus Christ.

And he has come to deliver us, to rescue us, to set us free, if you will, um, from the domain of darkness.

And he's transferring us I love this, to the kingdom of his beloved son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

Oh, I need that too.

Well, verses 15 through 23 really start to spell out the uniqueness, the supremacy, and the sufficiency of Christ.

Unique, nobody else likes him.

His supremacy means he's high and above everybody else in ways that uh that that give us hope.

Why?

Because he's supreme, he's sovereign.

He's the one we can run to when everything else falls apart and breaks down or is confusing.

We can go to him.

Why?

Because he's the ultimate, he's supreme.

And he's sufficient.

That is, his work, as it'll be described here, his work is sufficient for my salvation and for your salvation.

When we run to him, he can do it.

He's able to save.

Check this out, all right?

He means Jesus is the image, um, the prototype, the um uh he is the sort of firstborn, if you will.

He's the uh exact image of the invisible God.

And we we we get this from um here from Colossians 1, we get it in John's Gospel, chapter 1, we get it in Hebrews chapter 1.

Hebrews 1 · chapter mention

But Christ is the image of the invisible God, he's the firstborn, the the prototype of all creation.

I love this.

And there is honor uh in being called that firstborn.

That doesn't mean he was uh uh was not eternal in his existence.

What he's saying here, what Paul is saying, is that there is an honor uh in this messianic status of Jesus coming to earth, condescending to leave the heavenry, heavenly realm, to step into our world, a world of lost sinners, and become one of us so that he could save us.

And so this is an amazing honor that God would come himself and save us.

Verse 16, for by him all things were created.

There you go, where did everything come from?

Wow.

Where did everything come from?

John chapter 1, Genesis chapter 1.

John 1 · chapter mention Genesis 1 · chapter mention

And I can't wait to study Genesis starting in January of 2021.

Depending on when you're watching this, I thought I'd better put the year in there.

By him, meaning Jesus, all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth.

That's pretty much everything, folks.

By him, all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities, all things have been created by him and for him.

That is a bold claim.

That coming from a first century writing, not a not a fourth century, not way later, after some people, you know, some religious people all got together and thought, well, down through history, we want to prop up the sort of image of Jesus and, you know, because he died and you know, shucks another good man down and all that sort of thing.

No, this is the way it was from the beginning.

They saw Jesus as Lord.

And that's why saying Caesar is Lord wouldn't work for them.

Because Jesus is the one who created all things.

Jesus has created everything in heaven and earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities.

In other words, he's in charge of the outcome of this week, next week, next year, next administration, next king, no matter what country you live in.

He is ultimately sovereignly in charge of human history.

And that's why we turn to him and run to him.

That's why we worship him.

That's why we praise him.

That's why we pray for all people who are in need around the world and seek to join him in the work that he's doing to advance the gospel, to to serve the poor and the and to protect the vulnerable in our world.

He is before all things, verse 17, and in him all things hold together.

There you go.

There's this, you know, if you're looking for a grand unified theory of what holds it all together, is it is it, you know, energy?

Is it is it some kind of secret stuff out there in the black hole in the universe or what?

No, it's Christ that holds all things together.

He's holding the universe together, he's holding the world together, he's holding this, you know, little camera I'm looking into together.

He's holding me together, he's holding you together, even right now.

Christ is all and he's all in all.

You see, that's why we're calling it that kind of a study here.

He is before all things and in him all things hold together.

Verse 18.

He is also head of the body.

Now, so he's gone from creation.

Now he's going to talk about how Christ is not only the Lord and sovereign over creation, but he's the Lord and sovereign over his church as well.

He's the head of the body, the church, he's the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, the resurrection, so that he himself might come to have first place in everything.

Does he have first place in my heart or in your heart?

Does he have first place in my mind or in your mind?

Or do I replace him with the way I'm thinking about things or the way the culture is thinking about things, or the way all the myriad of voices that are speaking into your head, whether it's through music, art, news, um, chatter around the water, you know, cooler at work, or whatever it might be, um, what's filling our heads?

What's influencing us?

What is it that's speaking into our minds and shaping us?

Um, that he might have first place in everything.

It was the Father's good pleasure for all the fullness to dwell in Jesus, in him, okay?

And through him, through Jesus, to reconcile all things to himself, having made peace through the blood of his cross, through him, Christ, I say, whether things on earth or things in heaven.

And although you were formerly alienated and hostile in mind, engaged in evil deeds, yet he has now reconciled you in his fleshly body through death, this on the cross, in order to present you before him through to God, holy and blameless and beyond reproach.

If indeed you continue in the faith, firmly established and steadfast, not moved away from the hope of the gospel that you have heard, which was proclaimed in all creation under heaven, and which I, Paul, was made a minister.

And now he goes on to talk just for a couple of seconds here about his ministry to them.

Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake.

Remember, he's in prison.

And in my flesh I do my share on behalf of his body, the church, in filling up that which is lacking in Christ's afflictions.

Of this church I was made a minister according to the stewardship from God bestowed on me for your benefit, that I might fully carry out the preaching of the word of God.

That is the mystery which has been hidden from the past ages and generations, but has now been manifested to his saints, to whom God willed to make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.

Ah, I love that.

That's actually where we got that little subtitle for our study of the book of Revelation: The Hope of Glory is Christ in you.

I love this.

We proclaim him, Jesus, admonishing every man and teaching every man with all wisdom that we may present every man complete in Christ.

And he uses the generic man.

He's talking about everyone.

And so we proclaim him admonishing everyone, teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone complete in Christ.

And for this purpose also, I labor, striving according to his power, which mightily works within me.

And folks, it mightily works within you too.

Here's Paul, a true servant leader, if you will, uh, in the church.

He's consistently laying down his life for the gospel and for those that the Lord has sent him to serve as an apostle.

Apostle means a sent one.

So the apostle Paul is a sent one in a very generic sense, you are an apostle as well, just like you are, as he started off, a saint.

He's writing to the saints.

Who are the saints?

Well, all of the people who are in Christ are saints.

So look at somebody in your living room right there, or wherever it is you're watching this from.

You're, if you're looking into somebody who's trusted Christ as their savior, guess who you're looking at?

A saint.

Saints don't have to be on a dashboard of a car or hanging from the rear view mirror.

Saints are those who are in Christ, in him.

And so we are the people of God because of the finished work of Jesus.

We belong to him.

And he has made us saints.

He's turned sinners into saints.

And he's done all of this according to verse 29, according to his power, which mightily works within me.

Ah, yeah.

All right.

There's so much here.

Let me start with a quote from Trevan Wax, a good buddy of ours.

He works at um over at Lifeway.

He's an editor and an author and a just a great all-around guy.

The church has the opportunity to show the world that there is something more important than politics, something more lasting than the social media fervor of the day.

So, yeah, this is our opportunity.

This is our moment.

Um, do our duty as citizens of this world, yes, pray, vote.

Um, but we also have a sort of a higher priority citizenship, don't we?

In the kingdom of God.

Yeah.

In the city of God, as we learned in the book of Revelation.

And we have an opportunity now to show the world that there is something more important than the temporal, the finite, this slice of time and what's going on in this slice of time.

There is something to which uh we can set fix our eyes on.

That's Jesus, or someone to which we can fix our eyes, Jesus.

And there's a love that flows from Jesus.

Why?

Because he laid down his life for those who were his natural enemies, sinners like me and you.

And so we follow him in that.

We lay down our lives for others.

Um, yeah, wow.

And then it becomes visible that this faith that leads to love also leads to a hope that transcends the outcomes in this world.

And that's why we can remain steadfast and at peace, not flippantly, not trivializing anything that's going on, but just calmly confident that God, a sovereign God, is in charge and in control, and he's he's uh more important than anything else.

And so we keep him first in our own lives.

There are an obvious sequence here.

I think that modern churches do well to recognize, even as Paul speaks to this ancient church, and it's that Christ must be first.

He's the unique, he's supreme in all things, and his his power, his offer of salvation is sufficient to change a heart like mine, to change a heart like yours.

C.S.

Lewis says you can't get second things by putting them first.

You can get second things only by putting first things first, and that's true whether you're you know talking about money or sex, power, pleasure, whatever it might be, social media, status, it doesn't matter.

There's so many things that we could be putting first, and then Jesus would become second.

But when we put him first, see, we keep second things second because the first thing is first.

I love that about Lewis.

He always had a way of stating the obvious in such a way that we find surprising and astonishing.

Dick Lucas is one of my favorite uh Bible teachers.

He's a guy I listen to quite a bit, and he has a commentary on the book of Colossians.

He says, it is of real importance for present-day Christians to be reminded that a genuine spiritual experience is marked by hope, as much as by faith and love.

This is seldom the emphasis in modern Christian teaching.

As we see from the numerous sermons, studies, and books that are on faith and love, important subjects, but there are few books out there on Christian hope.

And that, again, folks, that's one of the reasons why we study through the book of Revelation.

It's one of the reasons we're studying through the book of Colossians right now, and one of the reasons we're going to study the book of Genesis coming up in the coming months.

We want to sort of push reset and reboot on the way we view everything so that Christ is first.

He's preeminent.

And so that from him being first in our lives, what we find, again, is that calm confidence in a sovereign God.

What is your hope on this day as you're studying Colossians with us?

Um, I seek to persuade you to put Jesus first.

As long as we think the next election, Eugene Peterson says, might eliminate crime, establish justice, or another scientific breakthrough might save the environment, or another pay raise might push us over the edge of anxiety into a life of tranquility, we're not likely to risk the arduous uncertainties of the life of faith that from his book, Along Obedience in the same direction, and Eugene had that calm confidence in Jesus.

Eugene had that kind of inexhaustible joy, that unflappable hope in a sovereign God.

Because he knew who was ultimately in charge, he knew who he belonged to.

He knew how to find what the real meaning of life is in Christ.

One of the reasons I keep going back to him over and over again.

Close out today with this thought from James K.A.

Smith, as we think about our study of Colossians and Christ being all in all for each and every one of us.

I really love this uh book, You Are What You Love, and recommend it to you.

Um Smith says, Jesus' command to follow him is a command to align our loves and our longings with his.

To want what God wants, to desire what God desires, to hunger and thirst after God and crave a world where he is all in all.

A vision encapsulated by the shorthand, this little phrase the kingdom of God.

Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

Jesus, you are our all in all.

Amen.