Colossians 2:8-15 "Let No One Take You Captive" - Jimmy Alexander

Well, good morning.

Turn with me, if you will, to Colossians chapter 2.

Colossians 2 · chapter mention

And today we will be looking at verses 8 through 15.

And this sermon is titled, Let No One Take You Captive.

So if you remember from last week at the beginning of chapter 2, the Apostle Paul explains to the Colossians why he is struggling for them.

He is promoting encouragement, unity, and assurance, because he knows that there are people who are trying to persuade them with plausible arguments.

So historically, we know that this city was very diverse.

It had a massive trading hub.

There were people from all around the world that passed through the city.

And it was what was promoted was this form of universalism.

Let's embrace all religious ideas.

And what this led to was an effort of adding Christianity to their religious smorgasbord so that it could blend in with other religions.

And so the group most famously known for doing this was a group called the Gnostics.

And they loved to talk about Jesus, they loved the idea and morals of Christianity, but they perverted it by changing the nature of Christ and redefining foundational truths.

So it's only fitting now that Paul would now expose the lies of these false teachers, that he would reveal their true agenda.

As Sun Tzu once said, if you know neither your enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.

So we shouldn't be naive or simple-minded regarding the enemy's tactics.

We should be aware of his schemes and strategies against the Christian faith.

So our outline today is simple.

What is the goal of false teachers?

What methods do they use to deceive us?

And why should we stand firm in Christ?

So starting with the first point, what is the goal of false teachers?

Well, Paul tells us in verse 8, he says, see to it that no one takes you captive.

So Paul starts with a command, and this implies that there are people in demonic influences that are trying to take us captive.

So C.S.

Lewis's book, The Screwtape Letters, is a great reminder about this unseen reality.

We forget that Satan has a kingdom with a hierarchy, and there are demons assigned to deceive God's people.

Do you realize that there is a detailed plan to attack you, to ruin your faith, or at the very least, limit your Christian witness?

And so the goal mentioned in this verse is what?

Captivity.

So let us be reminded that in Christ we are free.

We're free from the penalty and the power of sin.

We're set free from the fear of death.

We're set free from living a useless, hopeless life.

We're set free from the demands and the curse of the law.

As Galatians 5.1 tells us, it is for freedom that Christ has set us free.

And so the goal then of false teaching is to bring us back under oppressive things.

Like the Israelites, his goal is to turn us back to Egypt, to oppression.

There is one legalism to bring us back under the burden of the law.

There is licentiousness to bring us back under sin's addiction.

There's just doctrinal confusion to bring us back into a state of doubt or empty worship.

And so this is Satan's strategy.

But the question remains: what methods does he use?

What vehicles or strategies does Satan use to get us to believe lies?

Well, we're told at the end of verse 8, he says, by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world, and not according to Christ.

So the first thing Paul mentions is philosophy, meaning in the most basic form, how humans understand things.

Now, this is not talking about proper theology or uh philosophy, I'm sorry.

Proper philosophy that pursues the truth, it's wonderful.

We've got Francis Schaefer, C.

S.

Lewis, William Lane Craig are great examples of this.

So the Bible's stance on deep thinking and logic and philosophy is actually very positive.

So the philosophy that Paul has in mind here is unregenerate minds promoting anti-Christian principles that leads to anti-Christian conclusions.

So philosophy in general is not the problem here.

It is philosophy that is rooted in empty deceit, arguments that are deceptive, logic that is used by people who are utterly lost, blind to the truth, who create seemingly rational ideas that affirm their godless lifestyle.

And so, secondly, Paul refers to human tradition.

These are rules or handed-down regulations that are often presented as truth because of their popular acceptance or historical roots.

So the phrase in Greek implies handed-down regulations of humanity.

And so Paul wants the Colossians and all believers to focus on the truth and on Christ, not on human preference or majority vote.

And so some examples of these things, or I should say, they're in accordance with the elemental spirits of the world, not according to Christ.

So, in other words, these ideas, imaginations, tradition traditions did not originate from God.

It all comes from people who were born in a fallen world, born with a sin nature, who decide what is wise according to their own depraved intellect.

So captivity happens when we start believing ideas and practicing behaviors that originates from the wisdom of man instead of God's revelation.

So all these common ideas we hear today, that God can be whoever you want him to be.

Truth is subjective, or the ordinance of baptism is what saves someone, because that's how our church has always practiced it.

Or science disproves that God exists, or the Bible was written by man.

It's just a fairy tale.

Or all just ideas, practices that man has created because man is lost.

They're trying to make sense of the world, trying to justify self-rule.

Church, this is a reminder for us that the battle often lies with the mind.

The devil's strategies are never blatantly obvious.

Satan doesn't go to a husband in a faithful marriage and say, hey, cheat on your wife.

No.

He whispers small lies.

He says, Your wife seems to be neglecting you.

And then later he says, hey, that bank teller seems to be showing you more attention, more respect than your wife.

And then sometime later he whispers, I wonder what life would look like with that woman instead of your wife.

Certainly better than what you have now.

You see, sin's massive destruction starts with small lies.

And when a lie is believed, it grows.

And when it grows, it deceives.

And when we are deceived, we start believing all kinds of garbage.

So what we think about God, what we think about worship, what we think about Jesus affects everything.

It affects the way we behave and worship.

It affects our emotions.

For those who are in Christ, the devil cannot touch you.

1 John 5 tells us that.

But he can whisper lies in our ears.

He can introduce thoughts into our minds and get us to believe lies that would draw us away from Jesus Christ.

This is why we must be men and women of the Word.

This is why the Romans 12 principle of renewing our minds in God's truth is so vital.

When we are in the Word, we know God's truth.

We understand it.

And then we can discern ideas and imaginations that are contrary to it.

It's kind of like a garden.

We must make it a common practice to go to God's word and weed out any contrary beliefs that reside in us.

Do not be so prideful as to think that you no longer need God's daily bread.

So we must be a Berean in all things.

Search the scriptures to see if it's true.

Take every thought captive.

Take it to the Word of God and say, does this align with Jesus Christ?

Do not just accept anything that comes your way because it seems rational or logical or it has historical roots.

Friends, let no one take you captive.

Beware of such things.

So now that Paul has exposed the goal, one of the goals of false teachers, he now gives the church five reasons why we don't need to go back to captivity.

And reason number one is this Christ has everything and is everything we need.

Look at verse nine.

For in him, Christ, the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily.

So why do we not entertain human philosophy?

Why not listen to some other religious ideas out there?

Why not explore human tradition?

Because, says Paul, Jesus is God.

And therefore, we don't need to look to anything or anyone else to give us life, purpose, and salvation.

So you want to learn about God?

Look at Christ.

You want to know more about God's nature?

Look at Christ's ministry.

You want to know how we are saved?

Look to Christ on Calvary.

You want to learn the truth about sin, how the world works, and how we are to conduct ourselves in life?

Look at Christ's teachings.

You want all joy, peace, and satisfaction?

Go to Jesus Christ.

Do you need help?

Cry out to Christ, our mediator.

And so this is probably the boldest, most airtight declaration in the New Testament that declares that Jesus is God.

I just don't know how you could get around this.

And this ties in to reason number two, that we have been filled with him.

Look at verse 10.

You have been filled in him, who is the head of all rule and authority.

So why should we not go back to captivity?

Because Jesus, who is God, the one who has all rule and authority, has filled us.

The idea here is completeness.

Nothing else can fill us the way that He does.

Everything that your heart longs for, that God-sized hole in your life, that profound craving in your soul that needs fulfilled, can never be quenched outside of Christ.

Everything else is empty wells.

Give me all the riches of mankind.

Give me all the authority of this world.

Give me the power to have every sinful appetite that I desire at my disposal, and I will still be left utterly empty.

Because we were made to worship him.

We were made to walk with him.

Only our creator can fill that void.

So in Christ you lack nothing.

2 Peter 1 tells us that in him you have everything you need to live a godly life.

Ephesians 1 tells us that in Christ you have every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms.

Psalm 23 says, The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.

There's nothing more that I need.

So if you are discontent in Christ, it's not because Christ failed.

I hear people talk that way.

They treat God like a vending machine.

They say, I tried Jesus, and I'm still miserable.

And I always ask, you know, well, did you have unconfessed sin?

Are you still holding on to sin?

Are you repenting?

Did you approach him with a humble heart?

Did you come to him on his terms?

Or were you just trying to twist his arm?

If we're not finding satisfaction in Christ, I promise you, the problem is not Christ.

The problem is us.

In false teachers, by the way, they they prey on our misery.

They say Jesus isn't delivering.

Are you still miserable after accepting Jesus?

Here, come try this.

Try this new practice.

Come over here where there are greater visions, greater peace, more spirituality.

Come and listen to what I have to say.

And so Paul reminds us you don't need to turn an ear to false teaching.

You don't need to seek some other claim of salvation out there.

If you have Christ, you are complete.

Period.

The third reason we don't need to go back to Egypt is because we have been circumcised by Christ.

Look at verse 11.

In him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of flesh, by the circumcision of Christ.

So the Judaizers during this time were constantly teaching that Christ plus circumcision equals salvation.

So Jesus' atonement was 99% sufficient, but we need to do our 1%, put some skin in the game, and get circumcised.

So the irony of circumcision is that its purpose in the Old Testament wasn't just a symbol of nationality to set apart the Jews from other nations, but it was a reminder for them that one, the flesh doesn't save.

It counts for nothing.

And secondly, that it is God who gives new life, not a reproductive organ.

So they totally missed the whole point of circumcision.

So what Christ did, we could never do.

Sure, we could go to a doctor and get circumcised.

We could go to a church and get baptized.

You could go to a tattoo parlor and get John 3.16 tattooed on your neck.

But none of these things get us into heaven.

So these actions might give us the impression that we love God on the outside, but they do not have the power to change our hearts and our desires on the inside.

Only Christ can do that work.

Christ pursued us while we were running from Him.

His love and grace, it hunted us down, it broke us down until we reached a point of saying, God, I surrender.

I can't do this.

I can't save myself.

And not by our works, but by his grace, he took our calloused, sinful heart and he replaced it with a heart of flesh.

He cut out of us the old man and gave us a new nature.

This wasn't done by human hands, it was done by the hand of God.

So every other religion in the world says, do this and live.

Behave and be saved.

But Christ says there is nothing you can do to earn my approval, but I can circumcise your heart.

I can change you, and I can save you.

Put your trust in me.

And now the fourth reason we don't need to go back to bondage is because God has made you alive in Christ.

Look at verse 12.

He says, having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith, in the powerful working of God, who raised him from the dead.

And so this is a beautiful description of our salvation.

If I were to ask you the question, how did God save you?

Most people respond in this way.

They say, Well, you know, I was at church, I heard the gospel, I went up to the altar, I was in a low point in life, and God saved me.

Or, you know, I was driving down the road, wrestling with scripture, listening to a Billy Graham sermon, and I gave my life to Christ.

And I'm not trying to take away at all from these stories.

These are special moments, events in our life that are memorable to us.

But that is our human perspective.

But what does God say about what actually happened in that moment?

What happened when I was saved?

Here is how the Bible describes it.

I was lost, I was dead in my sins, destined to hell, in God from the throne of heaven in his sovereign time, said, It is time to save Jimmy Alexander.

And he reached down into my life, and he took my sin-loving, useless, pathetic life, and he placed it into Christ's burial.

God buried the old Jimmy with Christ.

He put to death my old nature, my old identity.

And in that moment, God resurrected me and gave me a new life that wouldn't be controlled anymore by the dominating power of sin.

He gave me a new life that would be led by his Holy Spirit.

And in the same way that God raised Jesus Christ from the dead, accepting his sacrifice, so has God raised me and accepts me because I am now identified with Christ.

So we're not saved because we cleaned ourselves up and came to God.

We're saved because God, even while we were his enemy, said Come forth, and by his spirit we came to life.

God has made you alive.

The old sinful Jimmy that loved drugs and enjoyed lying and abused women was buried in baptism.

He was put to death.

And when God gave me the Holy Spirit, I was raised to life in Christ, and I am a new man.

Tell me what doctor out there, what philosophy out there, what religion out there, what other knowledge out there, what other power out there can do that kind of supernatural work.

You know, many people say today, God isn't real because if he was, we would see miracles.

God would do something supernatural and he doesn't.

In which I would respond, are you blind?

The greatest miracle that God could ever do in this natural world is take a raging sin lover, a God hater, and transform them into a humble, righteous God lover.

And this brings us to the fifth reason.

We don't need to go back to captivity.

We have total forgiveness of our sins in freedom from all condemnation.

Look at the end of verse 13 to verse 15.

Having forgiven us all our trespasses, by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands, this he set aside, nailing it to the cross.

He disarmed the rulers and the authorities and put them to open shame by triumphing over them in him.

So in Christ we have total forgiveness of our sins.

The text says, all are trespasses.

Not some, not the minor ones, but all.

Psychology can help you process trauma.

Doctors can help us feel better physically.

Education can help us intellectually.

But there is only one thing that can remove the torment of our guilt and shame.

There is only one thing that can cleanse the haunting memories of the sick things we have done behind closed doors.

There is only one thing that can soothe the guilty conscience, that voice in the back of our minds that cries out, guilty, and that is the blood of Jesus Christ.

Every awkward thought, every sinful comment, every time you've mistreated someone, every prideful imagination, every sin, no matter the degree, big or small, Jesus' blood is sufficient enough to cover it.

And this is available to all who would come.

Not by works, not by effort, but by bowing at the foot of the cross, recognizing your desperate need for his grace, and simply saying, Nothing in my hand I bring, but simply to the cross I cling.

And how was this achieved?

How was this made possible?

Well, Paul explains in verses 14 through 15.

He first says that Christ canceled the debt.

So we racked up a sin debt so high that it was impossible to pay for.

It exceeded the heavens.

And unlike our culture, you can't just file for bankruptcy.

Someone must pay the debt.

And there is nothing we could do or say to make it right.

You could live a million years performing trillions of good deeds, but you would still fall infinitely short of paying back your sin debt for just one day.

And because God is good, justice must be carried out.

He must demand a legal, just punishment.

And the sentence is eternal hell.

And although we couldn't get to God, he came to us.

Christ willingly took our sin along with the certificates of judgment, and he carried his cross to the top of Calvary.

And for our sake, for the sake of our redemption, and for the glory of God, he nailed our sin in his physical body to that tree.

And God the Father poured out the fullness of his wrath on Christ until every last penny was paid for, until Jesus cried out, it is finished.

And he was the only one who was able to do this because he was fully God and fully man.

And an eternal punishment can only be paid for by a perfect, eternal sacrifice.

He achieved it.

And the results were what?

Look at the verses.

He disarmed the rulers and the authorities and put them to open shame by triumphing over them.

What does this mean?

It means that the demands of the law were satisfied.

The law that hangs over us, constantly saying, You're a sinner, you deserve death, you deserve to die, you deserve punishment and condemnation, was nailed to the body of Christ on that tree.

Satan's accusations against us, his ministry of accusation, was totally destroyed.

He can no longer accuse God's people before God's throne.

Day and night, we see this in the Old Testament.

Satan was always accusing God's people of being unworthy.

He showed up at the body of Moses, trying to take it literally.

He accused Job before God, saying, Job only serves you because you bless him.

And so Satan, he appeals to God's holiness, saying, How can you call Abraham your friend?

He is an impatient sinner who jeopardized his wife on multiple occasions.

How can you call David a man after your own heart?

A man who stole another man's wife and then murdered him?

Where is your justice, God?

Shall the judge of all the earth not do what is right?

Condemn them in your righteousness, destroy them in your wrath?

And here we have the answer to the age-long question.

How can a good God forgive Old Testament saints?

How could a perfect judge allow sinners to go into heaven, into his presence?

How can God forgive evil men and yet maintain his justice?

Here's how.

Be reminded of these five things.

You have access to God, you have been filled with Christ, you have been circumcised by Christ, you have been made alive in Christ, and you have been totally forgiven in Christ.

Church, what more could you possibly need?

Tell me, why exactly do you feel the need to go back to Egypt?

What philosophy out there, what human tradition out there can do any of these things?

You know, I'm no historian, but the city and the culture of colossi, as I study it, seems very similar to where ours is heading.

Everyone has a platform to share their truth.

Truth is subjective, words don't have meaning anymore, and anything you want to believe can be justified on Google.

And so there are so many voices out there, so many ideas, thoughts, philosophies screaming in our ears, and we can't avoid it.

We're going to be exposed.

And the solution is not being a separatist or a monk and living far away from everything and everyone.

Not at all.

The solution is what?

It is to remain holy in an unholy world.

It is to remain stable in our faith in an unstable world.

And most importantly, it is to remember all of what Christ has provided for us, making sure that no one takes you captive.

Church, let's pray.