To Walk Worthy – Colossians 1:9–14 (Aug. 23, 2026)

Amen.

Well, if you've got a student in kindergarten through third grade, they can go ahead and head out to their class now.

The rest of us, if you would, go ahead and open up your Bible to the book of Colossians.

We're going to be continuing our series that we began last Sunday through this book.

And really, what we're going to be looking at this fall in this letter that Paul wrote to the church at Colossae is the supremacy and the sufficiency of Jesus.

Really, our message almost every week is going to be Christ above all.

This morning we're going to look at verses 9 through 14 of chapter 1.

If you don't have a Bible with you, there should be one under a chair around you.

Feel free to grab that and use that, even take that home with you if you need a Bible.

You can also open up your bulletin and find the passage in there, even some pages to take notes on if that would be helpful.

Again, we're going to be looking at Colossians 1, verses 9 through 14.

Colossians 1:9–14

Now, before we do so, my guess is that most of us in here, I kind of even hope this is true, are relatively familiar with C.S.

Lewis's The Chronicles of Narnia.

It's probably easily one of the most uh well-known read children's series of all times.

If you aren't familiar with those books, the the center characters, central characters of those books are four siblings, the pevensey children.

Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy.

And not to give you spoilers, but in this book, what happens is that these four children are magically transported to this other world, this other land called Narnia.

And Narnia is this breathtaking, incredible land.

But when they arrive, it is sadly cold, dark, and bleak.

In fact, one of the phrases that has passed down from this story is that Narnia was always winter and never Christmas.

There was a hopelessness in Narnia because Narnia was under the authority, under the reign of an evil, powerful queen.

And it was longing for the mighty lion Aslan to return.

And when these children, these pevency children, when they show up to Narnia, what they quickly realize is that they're not there by accident.

That actually they were prophesied to be there.

In fact, even more so, they were destined to be mighty rulers.

They were destined to be the kings and queens of Narnia.

Maybe you could just imagine it a little bit.

They show up right in the midst of this great war in this foreign land.

And they realize that not only are they in the war, they're leading it.

That the fate of Narnia, in some sense, is in their hands.

Now you can imagine how they probably felt.

We don't know anything about Narnia.

We don't even know how to carry or use a weapon.

The armor doesn't even fit us.

We can't do this.

We're not who you think we are.

Full of doubts.

Full maybe even of despair.

We need to go back home.

Well, it's not a perfect illustration.

Few are.

We certainly don't have as many talking animals in our world.

But I wonder if sometimes you feel like the pevancies when it comes to the Christian life.

I wonder if you're honest with yourself.

Sometimes you feel like the Christian life is insurmountable, it's overwhelming.

I wonder if you've ever felt like a fraud as a Christian.

Or ever felt like a failure as a Christian.

Maybe you look around, even this room right now, and you see so many people who you're like, well, yeah, they can live out the Christian life.

I don't know about me.

And when you read passages, verse 10 in our passage this morning that says this, that you may walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him.

To think about living fully pleasing to God.

Does that sound like a pipe dream to you?

See, I think sometimes we read passages like this and we think, I don't even think that's possible.

And I think many of us, the way that we've coped with that, is that we've just sort of decided to sort of be at peace with our sin.

That what we try to do is we tame our sin, we try to hide it, we try to push it out of the way, we try to make it more difficult for others to see.

In some sense, we've begun to think that most of what the Christian life is, maybe is just failing, flailing, being guilty.

I wonder if you're here this morning and sometimes you just wonder, is the Christian life just an exercise and underachieving?

Now I think that sort of thinking not only makes us miserable Christians, but it also drives us away from Christ.

See, I think if we think that we're mainly just massive disappointments in the Christian life, then what's going to begin to happen?

I think we're going to begin to look for life and joy and hope and satisfaction in other things.

Not in Jesus, not in Christ.

See, last Sunday we heard a remarkable truth from Paul.

That the gospel, the good news of Jesus is real and it's really at work in us.

Well, as Paul builds this foundation in this letter, he's going to give us another essential foundational truth.

That the Christian life is possible.

That we can actually live in a way that pleases the Lord.

See, the pevensey kids, they would come to realize who they truly were.

Who Aslan, the true king, had called them to be and would empower them to be.

And slowly, imperfectly, with so many missteps, some small, some significant, they would become who they truly were.

Kings and queens of Narnia.

Friends, I don't know that that's all too dissimilar from the Christian life.

I think even some of this story is a little bit of what Paul is gonna help us see this morning.

Who we are in Christ, who we have been called to be in Christ, how Christ strengthens us to actually live out the Christian life.

Here's our main idea this morning.

We can live a life pleasing to the Lord, but only by his provision.

George, I pray this is so encouraging for us this morning.

As you battle sin, as you battle suffering, we can live a life truly pleasing to the Lord, but only by his provision.

Let's look at verses 9 through 14 together now.

Here's what Paul says.

For this reason, that the gospel is real and it's really at work in you, Colossians.

For this reason, Paul says, since the day we've heard of how the gospel is at work in you, we haven't stopped praying for you.

We are asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will and all wisdom and spiritual understanding.

Why?

So that you may walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him.

What does that look like, Paul?

Bearing fruit in every good work and growing in the knowledge of God, being strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, so that you may have great endurance and patience, joyfully giving thanks to the Father, who has enabled you to share in the saints' inheritance and the light.

What is that?

He has rescued us from the domain of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of the Son, He loves.

In Him we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

We're gonna look at three truths this morning.

The first is the facts of the Christian life.

We're actually gonna start at the end of the passage and work backwards.

And here's why, because I think we so often miss what Paul and really, in some sense, the New Testament and all of Scripture does.

We so often think that it begins with calling us to do certain things and then tells us if we do those things, we'll have life and acceptance will be in Christ.

See, I think so many of us think that what it looks like to be a Christian is to obey and you'll live.

Right?

To do this and you'll be saved.

One pastor explains such thinking as this: to say, I obey God, therefore I'm accepted by God.

When actually the exact opposite is the case.

Actually, what Paul is gonna show us and what scripture shows us is that we are actually accepted by God, therefore we obey.

Now, I know school just started, so I feel a little bit safe to do a brief English lesson.

Just for a moment, we're gonna talk about two really key types of statements in the Bible: indicatives and imperatives.

We're bringing you back to school.

An indicative, if you don't remember English kind of class in high school, an indicative is a declaration.

It's a statement of what has happened or what in Scripture God has done.

An imperative is a command, it's what we must do.

See, indicatives give us facts, imperatives tell us how to act.

Now, here's why this is so important.

Because every time we see an imperative or a command in Scripture, what we are called to do, it is always grounded in an indicative in what God has done.

And that's true in our passage.

The very grounding, the very soil of this passage is verses 13 and 14.

Look at it.

What does it say?

He has rescued us from the domain of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of the Son He loves.

In him we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

These are indicatives, they're facts.

There's no call here on what we must do.

No, we're just told what God has done.

Church, I know many of us know this, but I think we need to still hear it again and again.

Deep down, I'm so convinced that we don't really believe it.

That actually we don't obey in order to be saved.

We obey because we have been saved.

We don't live in order for God to accept us.

We live because God has accepted us.

That's massive in the Christian life.

Christianity isn't a tryout, it's not a test, it's a gift.

Friends, it's a wondrous gift.

Church, look at what God has done, verse 13.

He has rescued us.

He, not us.

He has rescued us.

Now, that is the very connotation of rescue.

If you are being rescued, the only thing you brought to that rescue is the need to be rescued.

If you're being rescued, you bring the problem, someone else is the solution.

Well, that's actually the case here.

Now, what is humanity's problem?

What is our problem?

Here's what Paul says.

Apart from Christ, look at it, verse 13, we live under the domain of darkness.

Now, that word domain means power or authority.

So if you if you think about this, this power of darkness, we're under that.

What does it mean?

It means the power or authority that arises from darkness or evil.

I think if you're a Christian, if you're familiar with the Bible, it's not hard to think about Paul is talking about here about Satan.

And what Paul is telling us is so clear in Scripture.

The Bible doesn't mince words here.

There are really only two ways to live.

We either live enslaved to sin and Satan, or we live in service to Christ.

We either live under the domain that takes life, or we live in the kingdom that gives it.

Now let me tell you why this is so helpful, I think, in part.

Maybe you're here this morning, and maybe you're not a Christian.

And maybe you're here in part because you have tried really, really hard to be a better person.

To make yourself good.

And even with all of that trying, all the best you could do was to make yourself look good, not actually be good.

And friends, here's why Paul is telling us is because we're actually enslaved to sin outside of Christ.

That actually your pride, your selfishness, your lust, your greed, your laziness, it actually grips you.

It holds you, it imprisons you.

See, our sin is not like a rock climbing wall.

I think that's how we so often think about it.

We can't just find the right footholds, the right practices, the right principles, the right steps, and get stronger and climb our way out of our sin.

No, the Bible pictures our sin as a prison.

And I know you're like, well, there's been a lot of really awesome movies about prison escapes.

But it's a different kind of prison.

It's self-imprisonment.

The Bible talks about who we are outside of Christ as actually choosing prison and thinking we're free.

Thinking, wanting to actually be imprisoned.

That's what sin does.

But here's what Paul says He has rescued, God has rescued us from this prison.

Now, that in itself is amazing.

But notice he says more.

And transferred us.

Where did he transfer us?

Look at the text.

To the kingdom of the Son he loves.

Now think about it.

God didn't just rescue us and transfer us to another prison.

He didn't, he didn't transfer us just to a new prison, but to a new kingdom.

And not just any kingdom, but his own kingdom.

With his beloved son as king.

Think about this.

God has brought us into his own land.

Even if you will, into his own home.

Now, Christian, this is so important.

Here's what this means: you don't live under darkness' authority anymore.

If you're a Christian, you are no longer enslaved to sin.

Sin is still present.

We still battle, we fight sin, but it doesn't rule us anymore.

We now live in the light.

We live in the kingdom of God with Christ as King.

I think one of our biggest problems is we don't actually believe that.

We're people living in the kingdom of God thinking that we live in the darkness.

So that's why Paul is telling us this is a fact of the Christian life.

Don't miss, I think, something that's very interesting here.

This is past tense.

He has rescued us.

He has transferred us.

He's done it.

That's true right now of us.

We are citizens right now of God's kingdom.

And that is a fact, not because of anything we've done, but because God has done it.

And yet there's more.

Look at verse 14.

We have, Paul says.

Friends, notice again the language.

That's present tense.

We have right now what?

Redemption.

Now maybe that's a theological word to you.

Maybe a word that you've said a lot but don't really understand what it means.

To be redeemed means to be bought with a price.

Literally, it means to be bought out of slavery by a price.

To be paid, to have your freedom paid for.

Well, that's exactly what Christ has done on the cross.

He actually has bought our freedom from sin and Satan.

And what does that mean?

Look at the end of verse 14, the very last phrase of this passage.

It means the forgiveness of sins.

Church, that's right now.

Paul says, right now, we have the forgiveness of sins.

Now, again, I think sometimes that's a phrase.

Honestly, a lot of these facts are things that we've heard so often that we don't actually consider what that means.

To be forgiven in Scripture of our sin means that it's as if our sin never happened.

It's gone.

It's as good as canceled.

Friends, that's what Paul tells us.

This is the fact, another fact of the Christian life.

That our past sin, our present sin, our future sin is as good as gone in Christ.

It is canceled in Christ.

Friends, how can that possibly be?

Well, look at the two most crucial words.

I think maybe in this whole passage, but certainly in verses 13 and 14.

Look at the beginning of verse 14.

In him.

In Christ.

Do you know that if you read through Paul's letters, you're gonna see this phrase all the time.

It almost feels like Paul's um.

Like when Paul doesn't know what to write or say, it almost feels like he's just writing in Christ.

That's how often this phrase in Christ is, because it represents what I believe is the premier fact of the Christian life.

That we are in Christ, united to Christ.

What's true of Jesus is true of us.

Friends, this is so important.

This is grounding everything that he just said.

Here's what this means: when Jesus died on the cross in our place for our sin, it is as if we died to sin with Jesus.

And then when he raised from the grave, we are in him, meaning that we also raised from the grave with him to new life.

Friends, that's what it means to be united to Christ.

It's a pretty well-known illustration that many have used.

I wonder if you could imagine that you're at the wonderful, the best airport in the country, the Indy Airport.

And I wonder you're at the Indianapolis airport, and there's this plane that is going to a desired destination, where you want to go.

And what does your relationship to that plane need to be?

Well, you don't need to be inspired by that plane.

Your goal is not to be beside the plane, to try to fly like the plane.

You don't need to be behind the plane.

Your goal isn't to precisely chart its path and try to furiously follow it wherever it goes.

You're not even trying to be under the plane, submitting to the plane's authority.

No, what relationship do you need to have to the plane?

You need to be in the plane.

Friends, that's the relationship that we have to Christ.

We are actually in Christ.

See, if you're On the plane.

If you're in the plane, that means wherever the plane goes, you go.

What's true of the plane is true of you.

Friends, that's what it means to be in Christ.

All that is Christ, his eternity, his inheritance is ours in him.

See, church, what is required though to get on that plane?

You actually have to step into it.

The only thing that's really required, in one sense, to step into that plane is some amount of trust in the plane.

Well, what does it mean?

How is it that we are placed in Christ?

Well, the Bible tells us by faith.

We commit ourselves, we step into Christ in a sense.

We rely on Christ, receive Christ alone as our Savior and Lord.

See, church, here's what we simply cannot forget: that this is who we are in Christ.

That we are rescued and redeemed.

And that these are bedrock, indisputable facts of the Christian life.

Now, here's why this is so important.

When Paul calls for us to live lives worthy of the Lord, he's not calling us to be better.

He's not calling us to be someone else.

No, he's calling us to be who we are in Christ.

To actually live the life we've been given in Christ.

Friends, that isn't a burden.

That's a blessing.

See, we can actually live a life pleasing to the Lord, but only by his provision.

So we've seen the facts of the Christian life.

Let's look at the acts of the Christian life.

See, it may be, and I imagine, that many of you are very familiar with those acts that we just looked at.

And I wonder, even if you're honest with yourself, as we were walking through those facts, if there wasn't a little bit of you that said, yeah, I know that.

That maybe even the last few minutes, you're like, I checked out a little bit in that.

Why is it that those glorious facts of the Christian life have become sometimes ho-hum to us?

Well, I think here's the reason why.

It's because we've disconnected them from our present.

See, take the forgiveness of sins for a second.

I imagine, and some of you may be there right now, that at one point in time, if you're a Christian, the forgiveness of sins was the sweetest truth in the world to you.

It was a marvelous thing.

But now you've left that in the past.

You've thought, well, that was a restart.

That was a wiping of the slate clean.

But that's not how Paul sees it.

That's not why we need to understand the fact of the Christian life.

Paul sees the forgiveness of sin, not just the canceling of the sin, but actually the freedom from the power of sin.

See, when Paul says the forgiveness of sins, he's telling us we've also been redeemed, set free from sin.

I love how the British preacher Dick Lucas says it.

He says, it is inconceivable that God should forgive the past and then send us back incapable of living a new life.

But isn't that how most of us think?

Yes, I've been forgiven, but now I have no hope of living any other way but in sin.

That's what we think.

God did not save us from sin to throw us back into sin, to make it incapable, make us incapable of living free from sin, of actually living in victory over sin.

No, the facts of the Christian life actually give rise to the acts of the Christian life.

Here's what's so amazing.

What God asks of us, he actually provides for us.

So look again at verse 10.

To walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him.

That's our call.

But what Paul is telling us is that that is not an impossible life.

No, he's directing us to the life that's actually available to us in Christ.

When he talks about walking worthy, fully pleasing, he's not saying, here's what you need to achieve.

He's telling, here's what's available to you in Christ.

Now, what does that sort of life look like?

Well, Paul's gonna give us a nice little helpful summary here, and he's gonna use four participles.

Back to English for a second.

A participle, mostly best understood, is an ing word.

Look at these four ing words in the text.

What does it look like to live the Christian life?

Bearing fruit, growing in knowledge, being strengthened, giving thanks.

Friends, let's look at these four in kind.

First, bearing fruit.

What does it look like to walk worthy, to be fully pleasing to the Lord?

Well, verse 10 says, bearing fruit in every good work.

See, I think there's a danger that some of us could so hear a message like this, the facts of the Christian life, and we would think it doesn't matter what we do.

That the Christian life actually doesn't entail good works.

No, Paul is very clear.

The Christian life absolutely entails good works.

That God actually in Christ has prepared good works for us to do.

But good works are fruit.

That's so helpful.

They're not the root of our salvation, they're the fruit of our salvation.

That idea of fruit is so key that actually these good works arise out of the life that we have in Christ.

Friends, that's so important.

To walk worthy of the Lord is to do good works.

And maybe right now you're like, well, why am I not bearing more fruit?

Maybe you're thinking of your own Christian life and you long for more fruit, for more good works to be evident in your life.

Well, I don't want to overdo the image, but I think this is helpful.

If you wanted a tree to be more fruitful, here's what you wouldn't do.

You wouldn't look at the fruit.

You wouldn't focus on the fruit.

You wouldn't inspect the fruit.

No, what would you do?

You'd focus on the tree.

Because if the tree was to be more fruitful, then what is most important?

That tree be healthy, that that tree be uh have nourished by good sunlight and good water and good nutrients in the soil so that it would grow up and bear fruit.

Well, friends, I think that's a little bit what the Bible says about us.

If we want to bear good fruit, good works, we don't focus on good works.

We're not just constantly trying to do better and to do more.

No, what we should be focused on is good nourishment.

Now, what is that nourishment in the Christian life?

Well, it's a lot of things, but chiefly it's God's word.

See, here's how this works: the Holy Spirit uses his holy word to bring about holy fruit in us.

It's a pretty simple idea.

This is what it looks like for us.

Now, what does that mean practically?

Well, it means we need to feed on God's word.

You know, it's very often I chuckle.

You probably shouldn't chuckle when people are praying, but sometimes I'll chuckle when we pray before a meal.

And I think every one of us has said it if you've been a Christian or you've heard someone pray, or you pray for food and you say, Well, we pray that this food would be to the nourishment of our bodies.

And then we eat pork nachos.

Or like cheesy fries, or a hot dog in chips.

And there is a part of me that thinks, yeah, the only chance is that God would make this nourishing to us.

Like, that's our only hope as we eat this.

Maybe that is the idea of the prayer.

But I think there is something in all of our minds that like that doesn't quite match.

And yet, isn't that what we so often do in our Christian lives?

We fill our minds and hearts with junk.

Just so much worldly stuff.

And then we ask God to bless it, to bear fruit.

Church, if we long for good fruit, we should nourish ourselves with God's good word.

So bearing fruit, that's what the Christian life looks like.

Second, growing in knowledge.

These first two things look so similar that they're almost inseparable.

The Christian life, Paul says, look at verse 10 again, is growing in the knowledge of God.

Now, here's how I think we primarily confuse this mark.

When we think about knowledge, we think about information.

So to grow in the knowledge of God, what we immediately think is to grow in knowing about God.

But that's not how the Bible talks about knowing most often.

What Paul means here, what the scripture means when it says knowing, is not primarily knowing more information.

It's not about information, it's about relationships.

It's not about knowing more about God, it's about knowing God.

Like actually knowing him in relationship.

Now, those two aren't entirely separate.

You can't know or have a relationship with someone that you know nothing about.

But the flip side is true.

Many of us know a lot about certain people, famous people, but we actually don't know them at all.

See, here's why I think this is so helpful and practical.

What are we doing when we open our Bibles in the morning?

What are we doing when we gather with the church right now on Sunday to hear his word preached, sung, prayed?

What are we doing when we meet with other brothers and sisters in Christ to study the Bible?

We're not primarily seeking information.

We're seeking God.

Friends, you're not reading the Bible to learn more facts.

It's not a textbook.

You're reading the Bible to know God, to have fellowship with God.

God speaks to us in his word, and we speak back to him in prayer.

We have a real relationship with God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

So, Christians, I think it's really important for us to ask this question.

Do we know God better today than we did one year, five years, ten years ago?

Friends, that's the question.

Not that we know more about God, but do we know Him more?

See, the Christian life isn't a test we study for.

No, it's a relationship we're brought into.

Do you see how it's not a burden?

It's a blessing.

If you had to take a test, it makes you nervous.

It makes you stressed, anxious.

But if you're invited into a relationship, into a friendship, oh, that's a blessing.

So we see the first two marks, the third mark is being strengthened.

Look at verse 11.

Paul says, being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might, so that you may have great endurance and patience.

Church, what a helpful reminder again.

The Christian life isn't lived in our own strength, but in God's strength.

You know, in one sense, when we say, I can't do this, we're right.

Like that's actually not a completely wrong inclination.

The problem is that shouldn't lead us to despair.

It should lead us to dependence.

See, we, why should it lead us to dependence?

Because we know the one who Paul says has all power, whose might or strength is glorious, preeminent, magnificent.

See, the reality that God strengthens us when we understand it rightly shouldn't lead to passivity or laziness.

No, it actually should lead to action.

We really understood how God strengthened us, our I can't would begin to become I can by God's strength.

That's the Christian life.

Now, don't miss why God strengthens us, though.

Look at what he says.

So that with the result you may have great endurance and patience.

Here's what it's something that I think we so often forget.

When do you need strength?

Just think physically for a moment.

That may be most simple.

You don't need strength to lift something that's light or to do an easy task.

No, you need strength to do something hard.

Friends, Paul tells us that God strengthens us.

Why?

For endurance and patience.

Now, endurance is needed to deal with hard things.

Patience is needed to deal with hard people.

Both are in the Christian life and in life in general.

Paul, that's what he's praying, that we'd have strength to be in, to endure and to be patient.

See, the Christian life is actually a life strengthened by God, not to make things easier for us.

I think that's what we so often think, that God's strength should be used to make things easier for us, to take obstacles out of our path, to give us success.

But Paul says that God strengthens us to actually endure hardship and to be patient with hard people.

I think this is so countercultural.

I mean, our world, our culture trains us to think that easy is always better.

Now, I know a lot of you students, I'd love to have your attention just briefly, a lot of you students just went back to school.

And I think if I asked you right now, summer is easier than school.

Like school is harder than summer.

And I hope school hasn't been all hard.

But I know it has been hard.

Because when you go back to school, in one sense, you have difficult classes, there arise some difficult situations.

And I think if you're honest, you'd be pretty quick to say there are a lot of difficult people.

Well, let me encourage you, students, and in some ways, adults, this is for all of us.

What difference would it make?

If instead of praying that God would remove that hardship, what if we prayed that God would give us the strength to endure it?

That God would actually give us the patience to walk through and walk with people that were difficult.

Do you know see how different of a mindset that would be?

If you go into your school, your day at work, uh, these sorts of things, and we're just hoping and expecting that God would make everything easy for us, we will be miserable people.

But if we're praying that God would give us the strength to endure whatever comes our way, well, friends, I would argue that that's actually a better way to live.

That's what the Christian life looks like.

The last mark that we have is giving thanks.

And you know, the older I get, the more convinced I am that giving thanks isn't just a mark of the Christian life, it's the hallmark.

I mean, it really in some ways, if you wanted to see, well, how deep has the gospel got in me, I think the question is, how much does thanksgiving come out of you?

How deep has the gospel got in is in direct proportion to how thankful you are.

I want us to see what uh Paul says here, though.

Look at the last word of verse 11.

Joyfully.

Joyfully what, Paul?

Joyfully giving thanks to the Father.

Church, I hope we're beginning to grasp it.

The church, the Christian life isn't a burden, it's a blessing.

To give thanks is actually to be full of joy.

Paul Tripp said this the DNA of joy is gratitude.

What is it?

The very heart of joy, of happiness, it's thankfulness.

I think you know that.

You could take circumstances out of the equation.

But I imagine, have you ever known a person who is genuinely happy who always complains?

Never.

That person could have everything this world has to offer, and they could have nothing this world has to offer.

And if they're full of complaints, I guarantee you they are not full of joy.

One of my favorite, maybe top five quotes of all time for me from the Prince of Preachers himself, Charles Spurgeon.

Here's what he says: God's people are always happy when they are grateful.

We should be ten times more full of bless if we were proportionately more full of thankfulness.

We bury God's mercies and then sigh for his comforts.

That last line every time, and I've read this a lot, so convicting.

Like I could tattoo that thing on my forearm.

Like that's what I feel like I need.

Because the truth is the reason we're not constantly overcome with gratitude is because we've forgotten, we've ignored, we haven't considered all that God has given us in Christ.

You know, I'm actually convinced that there's really not a one moment that we'll ever have in life where we couldn't be thankful to God.

That's how much He has done for us.

This is the Christian life.

What does it look like to walk worthy and to live a life fully pleasing?

Well, it looks like a life of bearing fruit and good works, of growing and knowing God, of being strengthened to persevere, of giving thanks.

And here's what Paul is saying: that life is ours in Christ.

That we don't earn that life, we actually receive it.

We're invited into it.

That we can live a life pleasing to the Lord, but only by his provision.

And that leads us to the last point, the ask of the Christian life.

Because think about it, and this should make sense to us.

If we can live a life pleasing to the Lord, but only by God's provision, isn't it right that we should pray?

And that's actually what this entire passage is.

I don't know if you noticed it, but verses 9 through 12, the middle of nine through the end of 12 is one sentence, and it's just a prayer of Paul.

Paul wants the Colossians to walk worthy, to live pleasing to the Lord.

And so what does he do?

He asks God for help.

He prays for what they most need.

And what is that?

Paul makes one request here.

He makes a request, he tells us why, the goal of that request, he tells us what that looks like lived in life, and then he tells us what God has done.

What's that one request?

Look at verse 9, middle of the way.

We are asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding.

Now, here, it's an amazing request.

Here's the problem.

It just feels very pregnant to us.

Like there's just a lot in that little phrase, a lot of words.

What does it mean?

Let's break it down just briefly.

We understand that word fill, right?

Paul is praying that we be full, abounding in something.

What?

The knowledge of his will.

Whose will?

Paul's will?

No, God's will.

Paul wants us to know deeply God's will.

And I know there are some of you right now that are like, Amen.

That's what I've been praying for every day.

God, what is your will for me?

Show me your plans for me.

See, when we think of God's will, that's how we think about it.

We think about decisions.

Who does God want me to marry?

What college does God want me to attend?

Where does God want me to live?

What career does God want me to pursue?

And I don't think that's necessarily completely wrong, but that's not what Paul means here.

And it's not how scripture mostly speaks of God's will.

No, it's talking about God's revealed will.

You know, I used to do a lot of ministry, especially in kind of my early days as a pastor, with students and young adults.

And my favorite thing to do with them is to tell them, I know exactly what God's will is for you.

Like actually, I I know God's will for you to attain.

And they'd be like, what?

Tell me.

And I go, okay, open up to 1 Thessalonians chapter 4, verse 3.

1 Thessalonians 4:3

For this is God's will, your sanctification.

Friends, what you're praying for?

Like, I want to know your will, God.

Here it is.

Here is God's will for you, Christian.

Your sanctification, your holiness, your Christ-likeness, you becoming more and more like Jesus.

God's will is far less concerned with what you will do, and it is far more concerned with who you are, who you become in Christ.

Friends, what do we need most?

Paul says we need to be filled with this compelling and clear vision of the Christian life in Christ.

That's why he prays additionally, in all wisdom and spiritual understanding.

Like we need to not just know what life in Christ is, not the vision of what it looks like to live in Christ.

We need to not just know it, we need to grasp it.

And we actually need to know how to wisely live it out, how to put it in practice.

That's what we most need to know.

Because I imagine something like this has happened to you at some point in time.

Maybe it'll happen to you today.

You've heard a sermon, read your Bible, and then later that day, you're like, oh, that that I read in the morning or heard this morning, that's actually right here in my life right now.

Or maybe you've shown up even this morning or on some Sunday morning, and you've been like, what I've been dealing with in life, that's it.

Like God just opened up right here my heart, my situation, my life, and showed me, oh, this is what he says.

This is his will, in a sense, not a decision.

But this is the vision of what life in Christ looks like.

And friends, here's what Paul tells us just a chapter later in Colossians 2, verse 3.

Colossians 2:3

If we want to know God's will and God's word, well, look at what he says.

In Christ are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.

What does it ultimately mean to be filled with God's will?

It means to be full of Christ.

George, I actually think this is so helpful.

To be full of Christ is to have Christ as our compass, our North Star, our GPS, our guide, our wisdom, our life.

I mean, think about living a day full of Christ.

Knowing in your depths and understanding who Jesus is and what Jesus has done, who you are in Christ, where Jesus is now, what Jesus will do, what Jesus will do in your life, what Jesus is calling to you?

Notice, think about just being full of Christ.

How wonderful would that be?

In all our relationships full of Christ, in every conversation full of Christ.

That doesn't mean that it was all, that conversation is all about Christ, but we are filled as we converse and talk with one another.

What about in all of our workings and all of our things that we do, we're full of Christ, in all our decisions, full of Christ, in sleep and in waking, full of Christ.

Friends, I think that's heaven.

I think that's a little bit.

What will heaven be like?

We will be so filled with Christ, and so knowing his will and his ways.

So think about what Paul's praying.

He's praying that we would taste heaven.

That we would be so full of Christ that we would live in Christ.

That's what we most need.

Church, I don't want to be callous, but I just think about here's what Paul prays.

That we would taste heaven.

What do we so often pray?

That our kid would win the big game.

Or that he would ace the test.

They would make some more friends.

Paul prays that they would taste heaven, that they would be full of Christ.

What do we pray?

For our neighbor's dog.

Maybe for some health issues that someone's having.

I'm not saying, hear me very clearly, any of those things are wrong things to pray for.

Oh, we should pray for those things.

But we should pray more to be full of Christ.

Because I promise you, if we were praying, what we most want for our kids is to be full of Christ.

Because then whatever comes their way, oh friends, they'll be able to handle it in Christ.

Friends, we want to pray for one another like this, that we would be full of Christ.

Church, we need to pray bigger, better prayers.

Prayers that have everything to do with a life pleasing to the Lord.

See, we want to pray in such a way that if God answers those prayers, we actually can and will live a life fully pleasing to the Lord.

See, I hope we see the wonder of Paul's teaching.

The Christian life isn't a burden, it's a blessing.

It's not a perpetual endeavor and falling short.

It's not underachieving.

No, think about it.

In Christ, we've been forgiven and freed from sin and Satan.

Church, we have been increasingly strengthened by God.

Increasingly, God is filling us with the knowledge of Christ so that we can truly live in Him.

You know, Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy, they didn't make themselves kings and queens.

They didn't find some great knowledge or wisdom within themselves.

They didn't rise up and conquer alone.

Now, if you read the stories, you'll see that it was all Aslian, who is the Christ figure in the story.

What you'll see is that the more they heard from him, the more they grasped his power and his presence with them, the more of them, the more full of him they were, the more nobly and truly they lived.

Church, I think that's true for us too.

May God make us more full of Christ so that we might actually live in him.

See, church, we can live a life pleasing to the Lord, but only by his provision.

Let's pray.