Colossians 1:15-20

Well, good morning, church.

Thank you, Jaren.

Appreciate that.

Well, as uh as Kim mentioned earlier, my name is Zayn.

I'm I'm one of the pastors here of Redeemer Church and just so grateful for the opportunity to uh open the word before you this morning to preach from his word to look at such a rich, rich passage of theological depth, of doctrinal truth, uh, that we could spend hours uh talking about this passage, verses 15 through 20, and we would barely be scratching the surface.

Uh so just keep that in mind for those who are deep into theology, who love theology.

I may only scratch the surface for you this morning, but that's okay, because there is immeasurable depths of riches in the grace of God and in his word.

So this morning, we're gonna look at the passage, we're gonna look at the context of it, and we're gonna see what that means for us today, as it did for the church in Colossae.

So, just kind of a recap, we've spent a couple of weeks so far in Colossians, and just a reminder, Paul is writing this letter, likely from prison, to a church that he did not start, nor has he visited before.

But he's getting a report from a fellow servant that he calls him, Epaphras.

And Epaphras has given Paul a report.

He's told Paul about this church, and Epaphras is a local, he likely started the church, but he is letting Paul know this is this is how this church is going.

There's really good things, but there's also some false teaching that's creeping in.

So Paul writes this letter that's containing some do's and don'ts, which we'll get to further on in Colossians.

But before we get to the do's and don'ts, in verse in chapters one and two, Paul is going deep into theology and specifically Christology, the study of Christ, who Christ is, and what that means for this local church.

And with this passage, 15 through 20, is kind of the focal point of the entire letter that he writes.

As we move along over the next couple months and look at each verse and each passage with more intention, we'll see Paul constantly referencing back and highlighting things that he's writing in these verses here.

In these four verses, we get to see who Jesus is.

Who he is to the fullest extent.

Some scholars have said this is the deepest passage of Christology in all of Scripture.

If you want to know who Jesus is, look at this passage.

And gain other wisdom throughout other books of the Bible, other writings, but this here summarizes all of who Jesus is.

Paul is putting, he's planting a flag in the ground for this church and saying, this is who Jesus is.

Don't listen to what others are saying of who he was.

This is who Jesus is.

Because Paul knows that seeing and savoring Jesus, the perfect God man, seeing and savoring him is the best thing you can understand for all of life.

No matter what false teaching comes your way, and no matter what trials, no matter anything and everything under the sun, who you see Jesus as affects every part of your life.

Paul knows that seeing and savoring Jesus is the most important thing.

You don't need to have a doctorate degree in some other religion to be able to have an apologetic approach to that religion.

You need to know who Jesus is, what he did, who he was, who he is even today, and that will help you combat this false teaching.

That is what Paul is writing in these words.

So as we come to this passage, we read it.

And some scholars have considered it a hymn, some have considered it a poem.

I, because I'm musically inclined, I like to think it's a hymn that the church would have sung because it is written in such a way that there is a rhythm to it.

There's a particular cadence, there's repetition in certain phrasing, so that the church would have been able to hear it and it would stick.

So, like some of the songs that we sing, you leave, like to God be the glory last week.

I was singing every day of the week.

There's a certain giftedness with music.

When words are written in such a way that helps you remember it as you're walking along.

That is what Paul is doing with these verses.

He's writing it, perfectly crafting it for this little church to help them memorize the truths of who Jesus is, to help them sing it throughout their day-to-day lives, to help them recite it in their homes, to remind them as they're facing difficulties in a difficult Roman world.

He was writing to help these saints run their race to completion until they see their Lord face to face.

That's what these verses are doing for that church at that time.

That's what these verses are doing for us today in our current context.

There's nothing new under the sun.

There are false teachings that are creeping into the church every single day.

There's false teachings in the world.

We need the truth of who Jesus is to combat whatever false teaching we may encounter, whatever trials may come.

This is the truth that we need this morning.

So before we dive in, let me pray and ask for God's help.

Father God, you are so good.

We love you, we praise you for who you are.

We thank you so much for your word.

God, that almost 2,000 years ago, this letter was written to uh a small church in a small town.

And God, we we come before you this morning to read these words to see how you are still speaking through them to your people.

God, would we see and savor the beauty of Jesus Christ this morning?

Would we leave after looking intently at these verses, after taking the Lord's Supper, would we would we see Jesus in a greater light?

God, would you do it even now, this morning?

In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.

So as we look in Colossians, in in chapter two, Paul gets into some of these heresies that the the church in Colossae is is dealing with.

So Colossae, Colossae, I don't know which one it is.

So we're fine with it.

I think Colossae, I'm gonna call it Colossae.

Colossae, either way.

But we see two apparent heresies that are going on.

So in chapter two, he brings them.

We're not gonna go into depth.

That's gonna be, there's gonna be separate sermons for that, because they they each have their own uh own viewpoint, but they're both basically doing the same thing.

So in chapter two, verse eight, and sixteen and seventeen, he's talking about human tradition, these do's and don'ts, keep these sort of traditions and things.

And then in verse 18, we see this kind of esoteric knowledge, this looking beyond the this into the spiritual realm and trying to gain this knowledge outside of scripture, outside of who God is, and even polytheism.

So why don't you just add Jesus to whatever other God you've been serving?

So there's this tradition, which is more so focusing on the Jewish aspect of what was going on at that time, and then this polytheistic, esoteric knowledge, this seeking philosophy to add into what they believe of the gospel.

Both of these are doing the same thing.

Both of these heresies are making less of Jesus.

Because to add anything to Jesus is inadvertently saying he's not enough.

So that's that's what Paul is saying here.

He's like, hey, you've got these heresies, but I'm gonna write to you about who Jesus is, because that's what matters.

We see in 15 through 20, he is all, he is over all, he is in all, he's through all, he holds it all together.

He is holding every single thing together.

He is not lacking in anything.

So to add anything to him, add anything to this faith, you're claiming that Jesus is not enough.

So that's what's going on in this church at that time.

There's outside pressures that are sneaking into the church that are claiming that you need to add to this Jesus, you need to add to the gospel.

2,000 years later, we're still dealing with the same thing.

We inadvertently make less of Jesus when we're trying to add to the gospel.

When we're trying to add to what the Bible, in its completeness, has taught us.

We've been given everything we need.

So to look outside of Scripture for anything is to say Jesus is less than.

But also outside of the church, we see we people see what we see people seeking spiritual wisdom outside of the Bible.

I claim to hear this specific thing from God, so now I'm gonna proclaim it to you because I have a special relationship with God that you don't have, so you need to listen to me.

That's how cults work.

We see people using religion as a melting pot today, picking and choosing what they want to believe.

Doing the roulette with the Bible, I'm gonna believe what this says, but I'm gonna ignore everything else.

You affirm Jesus, but you also want to affirm Gandhi and Muhammad in their teachings.

This melting pot of religion.

That's what's oftentimes happening outside the world, it's not happening here, of course.

But what about in our own individual approaches to the word?

In our legalistic approach.

We think, if I don't spend an hour every single day in scripture and in prayer, then I can't approach God.

I can't approach him in my shame.

You're adding requirements on to who Jesus is and who he is to you.

Or we look beyond the Bible to answer how we are to be a husband, how we are to be a father, how we are to be a spouse, how we are to be an employee, how we are to run a business, how we are to relate to the entire world.

We let outside influences affect how we approach scripture and how we are to live and how we've been called to live as believers.

Now, I'm not saying we we completely throw away any sort of uh worldly advice.

That's not what I'm saying.

What I'm saying is whenever you add on to who we're called to be as a husband, we're to lay our lives down as Christ has loved the church.

But in actuality, we spend more time at work than we do with our family.

We take promotions and promotions and promotions at the expense of being available for our family.

That's a subtle way that this can creep in, and you're inadvertently saying Jesus is not enough.

Or in the way that we're raising our kids.

How can we let the world infiltrate and deal with how we are called to live?

Inadvertently, we are saying Jesus is not enough.

We need to add in this in that way to who he is.

So we come to these verses and we say, God, we need some help.

Because we are prone to wander, prone to leave the God I love, right?

As the as the uh hymn says.

We need Christ's help.

We need to make much of him.

So Paul in these verses is claiming some very, very strong things for this early church.

He is claiming Jesus is fully God.

He's not just some deity that has risen above normal spirituality, he is fully God.

He made everything, he's holding it all together, cannot add anything to him, and he's also saying in one day, he will fully reconcile everything to himself.

One day, Christ will fully reign, and there will be no sin, no tears, no hardships anymore.

Jesus is the end all be all.

He is all in all.

So the main point for this morning is Jesus is Lord of all, therefore, he is all we need.

Jesus is Lord of all, therefore, he is all we need.

And within that, I'm gonna we're gonna make two kind of observations with how this text is broken up.

15 through 17, we're gonna look at Jesus is Lord of creation, and then 18 through 20, Jesus is Lord of the new creation or Lord of the church.

So let's look at verses 15 through 17.

It says, He is the image of the invisible God.

What a statement.

What a statement.

So in in these words, he's he's linking back to the account of Genesis.

In the beginning was the word.

That's John 1, sorry.

Genesis 1, in the beginning was God.

He's linking back.

God was there in the beginning.

Everything was created by God.

We know that.

We read that.

But we see Jesus is there.

We see Jesus is the image of the invisible God.

He doesn't write that.

If he if if Paul doesn't write that statement to start out this section, then you could affirm what the scholar in in the early 300s A.D.

Arian, Arianism, who said that Jesus was the first created being.

And that was who Jesus was.

He was the first created one.

But Paul refutes that immediately the best thing.

He is the image of the invisible God.

He is God.

You don't look at Jesus and see a copy of God.

No, you look at Jesus and He is the exact image of God.

He is the second person of the Trinity.

He was not created.

He is not a created being.

He existed with God before all time.

We see that affirmed in John 1.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

He goes on to say, No one has ever seen God, he's got a spirit, he's invisible, but the one and only Son, who is Himself God, is at the Father's side.

He has revealed Him.

Hebrews 1 affirms this as well.

He is the radiance of God's glory in the exact imprint of his nature, sustaining all things by his powerful word.

And in John 14, when the disciples are saying, You know what, Jesus, can you just show us the Father?

Like, wouldn't that be cool?

And it's not like this ridiculous question.

Like Moses asked that same thing.

Like, God, just show me show me your glory.

Like they really wanted to see God in his fullness.

And Jesus responds, If you've seen me, you've seen the Father.

You don't have to look anywhere beyond me.

You see me, you see the fullness of God.

Paul, in this, is making a distinction between Adam, the first man, and Jesus.

Adam was created in the image of God.

He was created in the image of God.

He was to reflect some communicable attributes for the theological nerds in the place.

Communical attributes.

Those are things that God has given to us, and we share in a likeness in him.

We can have joy.

We desire justice.

We desire right from wrong.

He has given us those attributes.

But Jesus is the image of God.

Adam was made in the image.

Jesus is the image, meaning he is perfectly holding all of the communicable attributes and the incommunicable attributes.

Namely, he's all-knowing, he's all sufficient, he is all-powerful, he is ever-present.

All of those things that we as humans do not share in, Christ, Jesus, in bodily form, shared all of those things to the fullest extent, because he is God.

So let me put it this way: some of you have met my dad, others of you haven't.

He's been here a couple of times, but my dad and I have some resemblance.

Now, if he was standing beside me, you may see it, you may not.

He's 6'2, I'm clearly not.

If you've stood beside me, I'm like 5'7 on a good day.

The little bit of hair that I have is red, the little bit of hair that he has is is brown.

He's super tan.

I am not.

He can spend time in the sun, I can't.

He has blue eyes, I have blue eyes.

He has a red beard, I have a red beard.

If you spend enough time around us, you'll hear my dad in me.

But I'm not my dad.

We are completely different people.

I share attributes of my dad.

I am like Adam was, I am to my dad like Adam was with God.

I have my dad's DNA in me, but I am not my dad.

Adam was not God.

Jesus, though, is the exact imprint of God's nature.

He is fully God.

When you look at Jesus, you see God.

There is no distinction between the two.

So in Adam, where he was created in the image of God and failed and sinned, and the curse came into the world, Jesus steps into humanity, steps down from glory, but does not negate his divinity.

He is not less than God.

He is fully God.

That is a really important truth to cling to this morning.

He is fully God, as the Nicene Creed put it in refuting heresies in the 300, uh 400 AD, God from God, light from light, true God from true God.

He is not lacking in anything.

So in that, God, and in Jesus, the second person of the Trinity, he is totally equal.

He is not lacking in anything.

And we see Jesus ever present in the creation story.

In verse 16, for everything was created by him in heaven and on earth, the visible and invisible, with the thrones or dominions, or rulers, or authorities, all things have been created through him and for him.

He is before all things, and by him all things hold together.

I skipped over the last part of 15, the firstborn over all creation.

I want to highlight the firstborn word.

In our context today, we have a different thing that comes to mind than what the local context of Colossians would have thought.

We think firstborn, like wellborn, is my firstborn son.

That is not what this is meaning.

Firstborn in biblical terms, if you do biblical theology and look at the scope of scripture, Israel was considered God's firstborn son.

Does that mean Israel was the first nation ever created?

No.

There were plenty before them.

David in Psalm 89, God says that he is my firstborn king.

He will reign victoriously.

There were many kings before David.

This term is he is ruler.

So in that, Jesus is, he has that place with creation.

He's ruling and reigning as the firstborn.

He's ruling and reigning over all of creation.

All things were made through him, for him, by him, and to him.

And I love the all-encompassing nature of what Paul is saying in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible.

There's nothing outside of the realm of God that Jesus did not create.

Every single thing was made by him, through him, and for him.

Because he rules and reigns, every single thing he made reports to him.

He controls all of it.

Not only that, Paul goes further and says, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities.

Now that language is speaking of the spiritual realm.

So there's there's this idea that there's ranks of angels, of angelic being.

Paul is saying those aren't outside the scope of Jesus' creation, his rule and reign either.

No, no, no.

Visible and invisible, Jesus rules and reigns over all of it.

He created all of it and Is sustaining all of it.

He's holding it all together.

So he is not this absent deity who created everything.

And then it like uh if you have those toys, you spin it and you you let go and it like jumps a little bit.

It's like, no, no, no.

Jesus is actively moving all of creation.

Like we just saying, for his glory and our good.

Every single thing that he touches, everything, every single thing that he has made, he rules and reigns over it.

There is absolutely nothing outside of his reign.

So let's think about that.

Jesus stepped down from glory and took the lowliest form you could be in human form.

A baby in a mother's womb.

We see elsewhere in scripture that he is the agent of that.

Psalm 139.

No, he's knitting together.

You were knit together in your mother's womb.

So Jesus, in some mysterious way, steps into his own creation while also sustaining everything.

That that should blow your mind.

As I've been studying this, I'm like, God, how in the world did you think of this?

This is insane.

But it is so good.

It it the sun in the sky this morning, we get to feel the heat of it.

It's going to be nice when we walk out those doors.

It's going to be 70 degrees.

We're going to feel the warmth.

The sun is there exactly where it is supposed to be because Jesus put it there.

And it will stay there until he says, fall.

As we see in Revelation.

One day he's going to say to all the stars, fall.

And everything is going to be restored.

If that's the case, then that only means that he's ruling and reigning every single second of every single day.

Because if he wasn't, he wouldn't be able to do that whenever he wanted to.

He is holding and sustaining everything.

The connective tissue that's holding your body together even now, right now, as you're sitting in your pew, Jesus is holding that together.

We can dive deeper into science and we can see all of the molecules and atoms and all those things.

But in the end, Jesus says when they hold together, and Jesus says when they don't.

He placed every single star in the sky and he stepped into this earth that he created.

He was there when it was formed, and he stepped into it.

He walked on the dirt that he created.

He, the same sun that you walk out and you'll feel the beams on your head, some of us a little more than others.

He felt that same sun that he created.

He walked, he felt, he was a full human being.

That is an absolutely astounding truth.

He was not a shadow or a copy of a human being, as some have claimed throughout church history.

That he was some, he wasn't fully human, he was kind of an image of a human.

But no, no, no.

If that's the case, then his death was insufficient.

How can a non-real human die?

But I want to recognize the difficulty that comes with this truth.

For a lot of us, we read this and we're like, God, wow, you are incredible.

Especially when we're on the mountaintop of success, when everything's going well.

It's like, yes, God, look at you, look at you go.

But others, when we're in the depth of despair, of heartache, when things aren't going our way, when it seems like every single way we turn is a dead end.

It seems like God has turned his back on us.

Those are the times when it's really difficult to affirm this doctrine, which is God's sovereignty and his providence.

If you want to have a terminology for it, this is God's sovereignty and his providence.

He's ruling and reigning over everything, and he's providentially ruling and reigning.

He's actively involved in every single detail of every single thing that is going on.

In order for him to rule and reign over everything, that means he's also ruling and reigning over the difficult times of our lives.

When we experience loss, when we experience heartache, when we experience all the ups and downs of life.

If we didn't trust the full, sufficient work of Christ, we could come to the conclusion that he is not hearing our prayers.

But if we truly believe that he does rule and reign over everything, there's not an a single centimeter of this earth that he does not claim.

We could come to the conclusion that he does not hear our prayers.

But in this doctrine of God's sovereignty and his providence, we have full assurance that even in the depths of despair, he is hearing our prayers.

He is hearing our cries.

Church, these verses are not some coffee mug verses that we just look at and glance at and say, Man, isn't God good?

This is sweet.

No, to affirm this is to affirm that even in sorrow, God is good.

Even in joy, God is good.

Even the loss, the heartache, the pain, God is good.

Because we know in some way, shape, or form, whether in this life or the next, God is getting the glory out of it all.

Because he is ruling and reigning, and he is causing all of it to work for his glory.

One thing that because of the sovereignty and the providence of God that I cling to often is that he can handle your tears.

He can handle your sorrow.

He can handle your cries.

He can handle your complaints.

He knows the words that you're going to say before you even say them.

He knows the depths of your heart because he created it.

His ear is attentive to the cries of his daughters and sons.

What a glorious truth that is.

We don't have an absent God.

We don't serve an absent God.

We serve a God who knows intimately every single detail of who we are.

If you're married, he knows you better than your spouse does.

If you're a son or a daughter, you're not yet out of the house.

You may think that your parents know you better than anybody else in the world.

No, God knows you better than them.

What a glorious truth that is.

He knows the depths of your heart.

He knows your sin as well.

So we can come to him.

He sees a faithful, loving father.

We've seen that in Christ Jesus stepping down into glory down from glory into humanity.

We see that he is before all things and by him all things hold together.

He knows it all.

He created it all.

He's not surprised by anything.

He is not surprised by anything that happened Friday night and Saturday morning in the Middle East.

He's not taken aback by any of that.

He knew it was going to happen.

In some way, shape, or form, he's going to get the glory out of it.

That is a hard truth.

But if we're in Christ, there is only love in his eyes when we approach him.

Because as we'll see, Jesus' blood covers those and has given us peace with God the Father.

There's not an ounce of wrath pointed at you if you are in Christ.

There's only the blood of Jesus covering you, declaring you a righteous son or a daughter, a co-heir with Christ.

Jesus is Lord of all.

And here in 18 through 20, we see that Jesus is fully man, but he did not negate his deity either.

So he's fully God and fully man.

If you want a terminology for it, if you want to dive into the doctrinal well that it is, hypostatic union is the terminology for that.

One of my favorite quotes of this is in a Shylin Christian hip-hop song.

Jesus, both God and man, 200%.

That's what that means.

Hypostatic union.

He is fully God and fully man, and he joins into one person.

He's not negating any sort of humanity.

He's not negating any sort of deity.

He is two natures in one person.

David Mathis puts it this way: Jesus has two complete natures, one fully human and one fully divine.

What the doctrine of the hypostatic union teaches is that these two natures are united in one person, in the God man.

Jesus is not two persons, as some have claimed throughout church history.

He is one person.

The hypostatic union is the joining, mysterious though it be, of the divine and the human in one person of Jesus.

Kevin DeYoung puts it this way: he became what he was not without ceasing to be what he was.

He became what he was not without ceasing to be what he was.

So in some mysterious way, that if you really try to dive deep down into it, it will hurt your brain.

Trust me.

Jesus, both God and man 200%.

Our minds can only fathom 100% of something being physically in front of us.

Jesus was 200%, 100% God, 100% man in one person.

Why did he have to do this?

Why did he have to come this way in order to be a perfect sacrifice?

In the ways that Adam could never live up, because he's only created in the image of God.

He was not God.

There was an insufficient sacrifice.

Everything leading up to Jesus' death on the cross was a shadow and copy of who Jesus was.

We needed a perfect human to be our substitutionary atonement.

And in so doing, he becomes the head of the church.

So if you think back in Genesis 1, Adam was created to rule and reign over all of creation, to be the head over creation, but he failed.

So we needed a new creation.

So Christ came in bodily form, not negating his divinity, because we needed a fully God and a fully human person to come.

And out of Jesus' death, he births a new creation, the church.

And only the all-sufficient, glorious King Jesus can be the head of that church, of that new creation, right?

He is the head of the body, the church.

We say this often.

Jesus is the senior pastor of this church.

Cam and I are under-shepherds.

We are not chief shepherds of this church.

We answer to King Jesus.

Every single believer in this church, we answer to King Jesus.

Cam and I are doing our best to shepherd as Christ is teaching us in his word to teach you and train you and warn you in all things to present you mature before God in the final day.

But Jesus is the head of the church.

He is the chief shepherd of Redeemer Church.

In any other church that is a gospel-centered church that roots themselves in the Word of God, Jesus is their chief shepherd.

He is their head.

So Jesus had to come in bodily form to start this new creation that was birthed out of him.

And that is why he is called the firstborn from the dead.

Firstborn.

Again, it's not he's the first one that has died, because plenty of people have died.

And Jesus also, he rose some people from the dead, Lazarus, right?

There were other people in scripture that were raised from the dead.

Jesus wasn't the first one, but he is to have preeminence.

He has rule and reign over death itself and over the resurrection.

Through Adam's deep sleep, Eve was created, right?

Out of the side of Adam, Eve was created.

In the dark depth of sleep of death of Jesus, the church was birthed out of his side.

Out of his death, the church is created.

Therefore, he has preeminence.

He has rule and reign over the church.

A church that exists outside of the rule and reign of Jesus is a false church.

We've talked about that before.

There's true churches and there's false churches.

You can have lots of different uh categories within a true church.

You can deviate in some of how true of it is it and how lacking in truth is it.

But at some point, a false church is just a false church.

Jesus is not ruling and reigning over that church.

The candlelight has been put out.

They are not following King Jesus.

Jesus is preeminent over the resurrection.

He is the chosen representative of the resurrection.

That's why Paul can say, and he died in 2 Corinthians 5.15, and he died for all, so that those who live should no longer live for themselves, but for the one who died for them and was raised.

His death was our death.

If you're in Christ, you died when he died.

If you're in Christ, when he rose, you rose.

His resurrection is your resurrection.

The same power that raised Christ from the dead is the same power that raised you from the dead.

There's no other power outside of that.

He has preeminence over resurrection.

Paul goes further, so that he might come to have first place in everything.

Not only in all of creation, all that was already created, but also over this new creation, the resurrected saints, the church, the beloved of God.

And this was not something that Jesus was just doing on his own.

He wasn't going rogue.

This was the plan from the beginning of time.

God, it says, was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him.

In chapter 2, verses 9 through 10, it goes a little further into what this actually means.

It says, for the entire fullness of God's nature dwells bodily in Christ.

For the entire fullness of God's nature dwells bodily in Christ.

Again, that's linking back to verse 15.

He is the image of the invisible God.

So God is pleased to have the fullness of all who he is in Jesus' bodily form.

Therefore, he has first place in everything.

Creation and the new creation.

And going on in chapter 2, verse 10, what this means for this new church.

He is the firstborn from the dead.

So all the fullness of God dwells bodily in Jesus.

If you are in Christ this morning, Paul is saying, and you have been filled with him.

Therefore, saints, you are lacking in nothing.

You have every single thing you need.

You have all the fullness of God.

You have all the fullness of God right now.

That is a crazy truth.

You are lacking in nothing.

But the alternative to that is if you are not in Christ this morning, you are lacking everything.

You will not find rest for your soul outside of Christ.

You will not find hope.

You will not find joy.

Everything that you search for outside of Christ will fade and die.

We need Christ because all the fullness of God dwells bodily in him.

And when we are found in him, Christ dwells in us.

He gives us his Holy Spirit.

As Paul prayed, that we would know with all wisdom and understanding, understanding God's will, as he prayed in Colossians 1.

Church, this is an astonishing truth.

Jesus claims he is the way, the truth, and the life.

No one can come to the Father except through me.

Jesus is not some addition to whatever way of life you want to live.

He demands all of who you are, because he rules and reigns over all of it.

We cannot pick and choose what we want to believe in Scripture.

We don't have the right to do that.

We're not God.

We can't choose what we want to do.

Jesus is Lord of all, therefore, he's all that we need.

He is the way, the truth, and the life.

No one can come to the Father except through Him.

Other religions, all other worldly religions, will affirm Jesus was a person.

Some will claim he was a deity, not the deity.

Other religions will say Jesus is a good teacher.

Christianity is the one that says Jesus is fully God and fully man.

There's no way to get to the Father except through him.

You cannot find truth, you cannot find grace, you cannot find mercy outside of the finished work of Jesus.

It's not possible.

You can run after anything this world has to offer, it will fail.

Jesus is our all in all.

Church, we have a great high priest in Jesus, who was fully human and lived a perfect life, never sinning.

He walked on the dirt that he created, he walked in the warmth of the sun that he was simultaneously holding in the sky.

And he willingly laid down his life on the cross as a living sacrifice in order to pay the debt that we owe because of the sin that we committed against a holy and righteous God.

I keep bringing that the the the the illustrations of of Adam and Jesus are just astonishing.

This is not original to me, but in my preparation I heard this that through a tree came sin.

Through a tree came life.

Through Adam in the garden, God said, Don't eat of this tree.

For in so doing you will die.

And Adam failed.

And because of Adam's sin, we have sinned as well.

All we like sheep have gone astray.

We've all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.

But Jesus, he climbed up on a tree.

Sometimes the cross is referred to as a tree.

He willingly went to the tree and died, knowing that in that we may have life.

What a glorious exchange.

We have a perfect hive priest.

Because he was a perfect sacrifice.

Let's flip to Hebrews 2.

I'm going to look at two different passages in Hebrews as we start to wrap things up.

Hebrews 2.

And we don't have time to dive into all of the riches of the depths of all that's going on in Hebrews.

But just if you are in Christ this morning, think about what this means.

The fact that Jesus stepped down from glory.

So Hebrews 2, 14 through 17.

Hebrews 2, 14 through 17 says, Now, since the children have flesh and blood in common, Jesus also shared in these, so that through his death he might destroy the one holding the power of death, that is the devil, and free those who were held in slavery all their lives by the fear of death.

For it is clear that he does not that that he does not reach out to help angels, but to help Abraham's offspring.

Therefore, he had to be like his brothers and sisters in every way, so that he could become a merciful and faithful high priest in matters pertaining to God to make atonement for the sins of the people.

He had to, he had to become like us in every single way, flesh and blood, in order that he may become the perfect high priest in our place.

Not to continuously make this sacrifice, he sacrificed once and for all.

He is seated at the right hand of God right now and interceding for you on your behalf to God the Father.

That is what he has done for you.

Not only was he perfect sacrifice, but he also rose from the dead.

So we don't just talk about Jesus' death, we also talk about his resurrection.

So not only did he have to become like us in every single way, laid down his life, paying the debt that we owe in the death that he took on on the tree, but Hebrews 7, let's flip there, Hebrews 7 25 through 27, we see that he ascended to the right hand of God.

Hebrews 7 25 and 27 because of the work that he has done on the cross.

So it says, Therefore, he is able to save completely or save to the uttermost.

I lost place.

Therefore, he is able to save completely those who came to God through him, since he always lives to intercede for them.

For this is the kind of high priest we need.

Holy, innocent, undefiled, separated from sinners, and exalted above the heavens.

He doesn't need to offer sacrifices every day as high priests do, first for their own sin, then for those of the people, he did this once for all time when he offered himself.

Once and for all, the sacrifice was made on your behalf.

Church, he did that for you.

Regardless of what may come your way, regardless of what difficulty may come, you can have full assurance that Jesus is ruling and reigning over all of it.

He's orchestrating it all ultimately for his glory, but also for your good.

Because he's interceding for you on your behalf before God the Father.

And that he will continue doing that until he returns and makes all things new.

As the kids' book says, He will make all he will make all wrong things right and all dark things light.

He will come and restore creation as it was meant to be.

That's what verse 20 is talking about.

So there's debate in what is going on in verse 20 of Colossians 1.

Some people have used that verse to affirm universalism.

That's not what's going on because you just read a couple more verses later on in Colossians.

Like, no, God's wrath is aimed at those, the sons of the disobedient.

God's wrath will come.

If you are not found in Christ, you will spend eternity separated from him.

There will be no redemption.

But Christ has made peace through the blood shed on the cross.

One day he will reconcile all things in heaven and on earth.

There will be a new heaven and a new earth where there will be ultimate peace.

And sin, death, Satan, and his fallen angels will be cast out.

There will be ultimate peace when Christ reconciles all things to himself.

Until then, there's not going to be worldly peace.

There's going to be strife.

But we have confidence that Jesus will one day return.

And we will be with him in glory.

The sacrifice that he made on the cross will be ours in full.

We will be like him.

There will be peace.

And there will be eternal punishment outside for those who are not found in Christ.

That is the truth of the gospel.

It is a hard truth, but it is true nonetheless.

So, in closing, just some questions to think about.

Do you know this Jesus?

This one who is the image of the invisible God, who is the firstborn of all creation, who is a firstborn from the dead, who all things were created through him, for him, by him, and to him.

He's holding it all together by the word of his power.

All of these things are working for the good, for his glory, and ultimately for the good of the church.

And he will one day return and call us with him into glory, where we'll share in inheritance with him, with all the saints, with in joining in song and hymns and spiritual songs, singing praise to the glorious God who saves to the uttermost.

Do you know this, Jesus?

If you do, he is worthy of all of our praise.

He is worthy of every single thing, not a compartment of our lives.

He's worthy of it all.

He is worthy of our total surrender.

That is what being a Christian means.

It's not saying, God, I'll follow you and then doing whatever we want.

And when things get hard, saying, God, I'm sorry, please forgive me.

No, it is meaning, it means total surrender before a perfect, righteous, and holy God.

We don't deserve this love.

He came down in bodily form to show us how much he loves us.

Do you know this Jesus who stepped down from eternity?

Experience everything that you experience as a human.

Do you know him?

What area of your life are you withholding from his rule and reign, thinking that you deserve that glory instead of him?

Where are you ruling on the throne of your life?

What area of your life do you need to lay on the altar and say, God, it's yours anyway?

I need to get out of the way.

God, use it in the way that you will use it.

Is it a job?

Is it your need for money?

Is it your need for whatever else this world has to offer?

What is it in your life that you need to lay down?

That you have the false sense of control.

We don't have control over anything, guys.

It's all his.

One day we will die and we will not have anything that we have in this life.

Unless you have Christ, you have it all.

You have everything that you would need.

Ever need.

I think this is a Hudson Taylor quote.

It was hard to see who it was, because it's been used a lot.

If he is not Lord of all, he's not Lord at all.

So that that could that goes for Jesus at large.

If he's not Lord of all, he's not Lord at all.

But that also goes for your individual life.

If he is not ruling and reigning over every area of your life, then you're not allowing him to be Lord at all.

Because in so doing, you're still control, you're thinking you're controlling what he actually has control over.

So say you've got, I I heard this quote like, say you got, you're, you, you're like, God, I give you 95% of everything, but I'm gonna hold on to 5%.

You're dictating what 95% he has a hold of.

So technically, you're still controlling what you think you're controlling.

He demands all of us.

He demands all of you.

That's what he desires.

He desires you.

And we see that his heart is gentle and lowly.

He invites us to come to him, all who are weak and heavy laden, and we'll find rest.

As uh St.

Augustine wrote, our hearts are restless until they find our rest in you.

Sinner, are you trying to find rest outside of Christ?

Let me save you some time.

You're not gonna find it outside of him.

We need the all-sufficient, supreme, glorious Jesus in every single way, every single minute of every single day.

He is all that we need every minute of every day.

Last question for thought: what is drawing your eyes, your heart, your mind away from this supreme, glorious, sufficient Jesus?

Take some take some inventory.

If you're married, ask a spouse.

If you're a son or a daughter, ask your parents.

If you're single, ask somebody close to you.

Do you see any way in which I'm living that would make you think I'm in control and not God?

It's a hard question to ask, but it's worth it.

Trust me.

Do that today, as Cam often says, if you're a kid, ask your parents for ice cream.

Ask them.

Ask these questions.

Where in your life do you need to surrender your false sense of control?

What is drawing your eyes away from the all-sufficient, glorious Jesus?

Do you know him?

If you don't, man.

I would love to open the scriptures with you, read through the Gospel of John, and see how glorious this Savior is.

What a glorious King we have.

Who stepped down from glory, despising sin and shame.

Who die the death that you deserve.

What a glorious king we serve.

Let's pray.