SPEAKER_01 0:08

Hello and welcome to a study on Colossians chapter one, verses nine through fourteen, where we will focus in this session on verses nine and ten. May the word of God change us to be more like Jesus and have a desire to draw closer to him. Now, let's listen.

SPEAKER_00 0:37

I'm reading from Colossians chapter 1, verses 9 through 14. And so from the day we heard, we have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God, being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy, giving thanks to the Father who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light. He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

SPEAKER_01 1:32

Thank you, Dee. That's a beautiful portion of scripture. We are not going to be able to get through all five or six verses there. We're going to focus mostly on verses nine through ten, but that passage is glorious toward the end of it, and I thought it was worth reading. If you have your own Bibles, please keep them open to that passage. We're going to spend a lot of time on verse 9 and verse 10. I'm going to make reference to that a couple of times as I deliver this message, and you're going to want to make sure you look down and refresh your memory as to what it says. Let's quickly pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for your word. I pray, Lord God, that you would clean our hearts, that we would come to you even now and ask for forgiveness for any sins we may have committed, that our minds and our hearts would be open to hearing your word, and that your word would change us. Thank you, Lord, and I also pray that there's nothing that I would uh say in this message that would contradict the whole of your holy word. In Jesus' name. Amen. Paul wrote this letter while he was in prison. And up on the screen you can see a rendition of Paul praying in prison. And I know you can't read those words, but the sentence up there says, Why would the apostle Paul pray for a people he never met, for a church he did not plant, located in a city he never visited? He did so because he had to counter a serious problem that came from false teachers who were propagating what is called Gnosticism. Gnostics considered themselves to be of people of superior knowledge who could help, quote, lesser Christians attain a deeper spirituality. The very word Gnosticism comes from the Greek word gnosis, which means to know. The Gnostics, people in the know, the spiritual elite with all the answers, they thought, held as their basic doctrine that matter, anything physical or created, was evil and that only the Spirit was good. This reasoning led to the belief that Jesus Christ, if he really was the Son of God, could not have taken on human body because matter is evil. This delusion spawned in Gnostic fantasies about Jesus being only something like some ghost-like phantom. And to the Gnostics, Christ was not creator, the incarnation was not real, and Christ alone was not enough. It became a rather false, complex belief system and proudly intellectual. The Gnostics, those that were in the know, looked down upon simple Colossian believers, coercing them and demeaning them, which eventually did lead some astray. This is the alarming message that Epaphrus brought to Paul as he waited in prison. Epaphras, a disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ, is thought by many to have planted this church in Colossae. Paul's brilliant response was the letter to the Colossians, which presented Christ as the creator and all-sufficient redeemer in the most glorious terms, I believe, found anywhere in Scripture. Paul's masterful answer continues to serve the church well, not only over centuries past, but up to today, as the church has repeatedly faced similar heresies and continues today to be assaulted by false teachers and cultists who see Christ as only part of the answer. In the latter part of this chapter, which we did not read, Paul will write about the magnificent preeminence of Christ in all things, which once again I find to be one of the most rich, most exalted descriptions of our Lord Jesus Christ anywhere found in Scripture. But before he opens the heavens to describe the Lord so extraordinarily, he realizes that there is a need for the church that will allow them to be able to ascertain the truth from heresy. He will describe the Lord for them so that they will know that he alone is all that's needed for salvation. But before Paul describes the Lord for them so that they will know that he alone is enough, he finds it necessary to tell the Colossian Church how to gain this knowledge to fight off the false wisdom of the world and how to use that knowledge for the Lord's glory. Now, if we think that we are exempt from false teaching, ask yourself how tens of thousands of people follow so-called pastors that preach the name it and claim it gospel, or the wealth and prosperity gospel, or even the intimidation gospel. I might say that there are hundreds of thousands of people who are buying uh who are buying into those devilish lies week after week after week. And we are susceptible to the same types of teachings if we are not careful. I know of a church that's not too far away from here that teaches hyper-gracism. And the church pews are full of people listening and believing to that false teaching. If you don't know what hyper-gracism is, it is that once saved, you never need to ask for forgiveness for your sins any longer because you're saved. It doesn't condone sinning, but it says after you sin, no need to go to the Lord and ask for forgiveness. I don't know what they do with John, 1 John 1, 8 and 9, but that's being taught. There's also a church that's not too far from here that believes that good works will get you to heaven. And of course, there's churches that teach about a place called purgatory, that the wine and the bread taken during communion actually turns into the blood and body of Christ. And honestly, the list goes on and on and on. And if you or I confronted any of them on their teachings, on their false teachings, if we were unable to defend our biblical faith, ultimately we would be told that we just need to study more, to get more knowledge, that we are ignorant in these quote higher things. Sounds like Gnosticism to me right here in the 21st century. So how do we overcome that type of attack on us? Paul is going to tell us. Paul will give us the answer on how to defend the true faith and how not to fall into believing the teachings of false teachers that can be found everywhere. He starts with a prayer for knowledge, verse 9. And so from the day we heard, heard what? Heard that they believed in the Lord Jesus Christ and became a church. From the day we heard, we have not ceased to pray for you. In what way, Paul? Asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will and in all spiritual wisdom and understanding. From the apostle's perspective, a deep, growing knowledge of Christ and His will is of the greatest importance to the successful spiritual life of the Colossians and of you and me. But we have to stop here for a minute before we go on because we need to ask ourselves a question. Is that a concern for us as well? Do we truly even want a deeper knowledge of our Lord? Do we want to better know his will for our lives? Do we want to grow spiritually? Or are we just tickled pink with where we are today, having no further desire to change, to be more like Him? That's how we are, and we can fall into that, or we can be in that position on a regular basis. It's called apathy. A great and disastrous lethargy. And apathy can easily lead to following false teaching because spiritually we can become sluggers. Let me read for you Proverbs 13:4. It won't be on the screen. And think of this from a spiritual standpoint. The soul of a sluggard craves and gets nothing while the soul of the diligent is richly supplied. Are we sluggards spiritually? Because if we are, we get nothing. Here's another passage that affirms what Paul is saying here in Colossians. This is Ephesians 1:17. I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the spirit of wisdom and revelation so that you may know him better. Notice in these passages, it hasn't got there's no finger or light pointing or shining on us. It's all going back. Why do we do all these things? For his glory, as we will see. Here in Paul's Colossian prayer, when he said, We have not stopped praying for you and asking God to fill you with the knowledge of his will, he was using language of incredible intensity. For he knew that spiritual knowledge is foundational to a sound, fruitful, growing Christian life. Make no mistake, God puts no premium on ignorance. That is why we must be in his word every day, and then we must desire to be obedient to it. In Psalm 1, verses 1 and 2, we read, Blessed is the man whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night. Blessed is the man. And then in Joshua chapter 1, verse 8, very familiar passage. This book of law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it. Not the sum of what's written into it, all that is written into it. For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success. You know, typically, I think when we pray for ourselves or for others, we pray for physical health, well-being, pray for maybe social relationships, and maybe we even pray for forgiveness, which should not be a maybe. It should be mandatory when we go before the Lord. But shouldn't part of our prayers for ourselves and those that we are interceding for be to ask God to give us or them complete knowledge of his will and grant to them or grant to us spiritual wisdom and understanding? Have you ever prayed a prayer like this for yourself or others? It's an all-important prayer. It's an all-important prayer for your pastor, for new believers, for existing believers, for your family members, and for yourself as well. And I admit this, and until I began reading this passage, and we've probably all read this passage numerous times, and writing this message, delving into the word, I find myself in the I haven't done this too often before category. And that's not right. Not right for me, it's not right for any of us. Because of the Colossians adoption into God's family, Paul petitioned the Lord to reveal his will for them while praying that they would have the spiritual eyes necessary to discern it. If you're taking notes, you can put down Ephesians 1, 17 and 19 to affirm that. Please take note of this. Paul had not stopped praying for them since the day he had become aware of their faith. He's in prison. Paul's example teaches us that we are all in constant need of intercessory prayer. That's not occasional or based on some impending circumstances. His immediate and ongoing prayers for the Colossians confirm for you and me that God's will for our lives is indeed a present reality that we can grasp and understand rather than some type of distant fairy tale that we can't figure out. And his request demonstrates that our own ability to know and follow God's will for our lives begins with and remains dependent on our prayers. Think about verse 9 for another minute. The implication underlying Paul's request is that it is actually possible for believers to know, to know and understand God's will for their lives. If it were not a reality, Paul would not have prayed for this for the Colossian Christians. Now, how many of us really want to know the Lord's will on a day-to-day basis? The answer to that is to ask yourself as I ask myself, when was the last time I asked the Lord to reveal his will for me in my life, even for the one day that's ahead of me in the morning? Of course, this begs an all-important question, one that I'm afraid we may not even ask ourselves. Do we want to know the will of God in our lives? And if so, would we follow it? And would we follow it if it revealed something that we didn't particularly like? We all need to answer that question in our lives. Because the answer to that question will lead you to confession if you have not had a desire to have an increase in knowledge and wisdom from the Lord to his glory, or to remind us all that we need those types of prayers for ourselves and others way more often. You know, God's plan is rarely a straight shot to some visible goal. His plan requires of us a journey. And that journey may be filled with detours, sudden stops, and maybe even confusing turns. But if our hearts are set to obey him in all that we know to do, and that's a key part of my statement, if our hearts are set to obey him in all that we know to do, then we will be in the center of his will every step of the way. And how will we obey him in all that we know to do? We must ask him for the knowledge and the wisdom to do so. Therefore, if we have a desire to know God's will for us, question do we? We must adopt more of a biblical approach. Believe it or not, much of his will for us is outlined with clear instructions. Instead of letting us aimlessly wander around, he gives us the specific steps that will lead us right to the place in life where we can enjoy the satisfying pleasures of knowing him and fully experiencing his will in our lives. Again, the real question is do we really want that? Or do we just stumble our way through life? Are we fairly happy not knowing what he truly wants for us? Another question we have to ask ourselves. The steps to finding the will of God in our lives are clearly prescribed in Scripture. In fact, at least five times in the New Testament, God's will for you and me are explicitly stated. In 1 Timothy 2, 3 and 4. I'm not going to read the verse, but it's up on the screen. The Bible teaches us that it is God's will for us to be saved and to come to the knowledge of his truth. His desire for our salvation affirms his love for all people and his desire for their repentance and redemption. Again, if you're taking notes, put down 2 Peter 3, 9. While those here hopefully have reached that point of salvation due to his grace, why is this important? Because spiritual conversion is absolutely necessary to discern his will for our lives. Scripture also affirms that it is God's will for us to be sanctified. 1 Thessalonians 4:3 clearly asserts this is God's will, your sanctification. To be sanctified literally means to be set apart or to be made holy. Here's the passage. Here's the passage in 1 Thessalonians chapter 4. Finally, then, brothers, we ask and urge you in the Lord Jesus that as you received from us how you ought to walk and to please God just as you are doing. You might say to yourself, if I stop there, okay, I'm doing that. I'm doing that. But as I continue in that same verse, Paul says this, that you do so more and more. For you know that, for you know what instructions we gave you through the Lord Jesus, for this is the will of God, your sanctification, that you abstain from sexual immorality, that each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor. For God has not called us for impurity, but in holiness. Therefore, whoever disregards this disregards not man, but God, who gives us his Holy Spirit. God saves us so that we will become holy and blameless before him. Ephesians 1 4, if you're taking notes. Therefore, his will for our lives includes our spiritual growth as we are transformed by his grace. 2 Corinthians 3 18. Again, you may say, Yeah, I know this. True, perhaps. But what are you or I doing to attain a greater holiness, increasing our sanctification? If that's not the desire of our hearts, then perhaps it is our will that we wish to follow and not his. And of course, if that's true, then we won't know the will of God for us. And perhaps, perhaps, we don't even care. But if we do desire to become more and more like our Savior, that is to become more sanctified in our life. It is only possible through another aspect of his will for our lives. The Bible makes clear that it is God's will for us to be spirit-filled. Paul counseled the Ephesians to understand what the Lord's will is when he said, Be filled by the Holy Spirit. That's up too soon, Sue. While believers receive the Holy Spirit at salvation, yielding to his control and allowing him to permeate every area of our lives is an ongoing and deliberate process, one that incidentally will never take place unless we desire it. Our moment-by-moment surrender to his abiding presence in our lives is an essential component of God's will for every believer. Next, as we faithfully live for Christ through the power of the Spirit, we also begin to recognize that it is God's will for us to stand. 1 Peter 2.15 teaches us: for this is the will of God, that by doing good you should put to silence the ignorance of foolish people. Living in opposition to a world that is hostile to Christ and His ways requires believers to stand firm in our faith and devotion to Him. 1 Corinthians 15, 58. This involves taking a stand against the enemy, standing up for the truth, and standing up for those that cannot stand up for themselves. Finally, his word teaches us that it is God's will for us to suffer. This certainly isn't what we visualize when we dream of God's best for us. But 1 Peter 4.19 tells us that believers, quote, who suffer according to God's will, end quote, should continue to trust the Lord and live by obedient faith. This type of suffering is the natural result of God's people going against the grain, living counter-culturally, and experiencing resistance and opposition for their faith and love in the Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus himself prepared his followers with a warning about this hostility. You can read about that in John 15, 18 through 21. Likewise, Paul instructed Timothy: all who want to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. As followers of Christ, we are not guaranteed to be spared from suffering. In fact, we are assured of the opposite. When we are living according to the will of God, it is then that we have to endure the hardships, whatever may come across for His name's sake. Because these five aspects of God's will are clearly stated in the scriptures, none of us have to blindly wonder what is God's will for my life. He has told us one to receive the gift of salvation, two, to be sanctified, that is, to be made holy, three, to be spirit-filled, four, to live in opposition to the world, and five, to suffer. Granted, these elements of God's will may not always help us to answer specific questions about any particular decision for which we still need to pray, but these are even better. They are clear. We know with certainty what God wants for our lives. They are consistent. They won't change tomorrow, even if our circumstances do. And they are customized. Even though they are universally true, they are personal instructions and are applicable for each one of us. These spiritual realities of God's will are also practical. When we devote ourselves to pursuing these things that God has clearly revealed, we will realize his will for our lives in more specific ways. When we obey his clearly expressed desires and specific instructions, they ultimately translate into a knowledge and understanding of his intentions for our lives. By devoting ourselves entirely to those aspects of his will that he has plainly revealed, we will be able to discern the more personalized and specific plans that he has for us. As a result, we can move forward with confidence, being convinced that it is possible to know and understand God's will for our lives. Here's an example of what I'm talking about. If we're concerned about God's plan for our lives, and we all need to ask ourselves, do we even care about that? We can often become impatient in wondering what God's plan really is for our lives. But I don't think it's as complicated as we might make it out to be. God's plan for us is revealed a little at a time, but only as we follow Him, and His plan may look different in different seasons of life. A young woman may ask God to direct her to his plan and believes college is part of that plan. But halfway through college, she falls ill and must spend the next two years convalescing. Is she now out of God's plan? Not if her heart is set to obey him. In that convalescent home, she meets a young man who becomes her husband. They both love the Lord and desire to serve him and believe that his plan for them is the mission field. They begin preparation, but halfway through the training, she becomes pregnant with a high-risk pregnancy. Did they miss God's plan? Has the Lord abandoned them? Not at all. Because of their experience caring for a child with special needs, they are now able to minister to other families with similar needs. Their mission field looks much different from the one that they had envisioned, but it is God's plan for them. And most importantly, they are able to look back and see his hand in every turn along the way, because the desire of their hearts was that they would have knowledge, an increase in knowledge and wisdom in the Lord's will for them. But what must be our end goal in seeking the Lord's will? We find it in verse 10a, so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him. We must long to please Christ our Savior. The desired outcome of Paul's petition is that we will be worthy of the Lord, and we will be fully pleasing to him. In other words, this brings us to the final outcome of Paul's prayer in this portion and the result of all those who follow it. All to the honor of Christ and the glory of God becomes the intended outcome of our obedience. Not whether or not we are satisfied, happy, warm, whatever. The increase that we need to ask the Lord for in knowledge and wisdom and understanding is not for a comfortable life, as much as that's not a bad thing to want. It is that we need to have the intended outcome of this request that I pray we would all pray for on a daily basis, to bring honor to Christ and glory to God the Father. That's it. Where does that stand in our daily lives? I think it's possible that many believers may have a hidden agenda in discerning God's will in their lives, their own personal benefit, what makes them happy, what fits their plans, what helps to achieve their dreams, answers their prayers, satisfies their desires. But satisfying Him must become our deepest passion and our highest goal. We must be willing to lay down our dreams and desires in order to pursue his will for our lives. God does not always ask us to relinquish the creature comforts that he bestows upon us, but he knows our hearts and whether or not we are willing to put his will over our own. It's easy to say that we will. When it comes down to it, when the rubber meets the road, are we willing to lay anything and everything on the altar for him? It's a serious question. Are we willing to give up the life that we presently know right now? If he calls us according to his will and word to give those things up. And you know, some people actually quote Psalm 37.4 to justify their expression uh expectations. 37.4 says, Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart. And many use that to say, this is a verse that I use for all the creature comforts that he's given me to give me the desires of my heart. But this misunderstanding portrays God as some cosmic genie who is somehow forced to grant us our wishes as long as we ask in Jesus' name. What this verse actually means is that God will implant in our hearts his desires when we learn to delight ourselves in what pleases him. Our desire to please Christ cannot simply be an emotion or a feeling. It must translate into action. We must not only long to please Christ, we must live to please Christ. Let me repeat that. Paul's emphasis on knowledge, wisdom, and understanding in verse 9 cannot be divorced from the action that we find in verse 10. His prayer for the Colossians was intended to influence their behavior as noted by his use of the familiar metaphor to walk. This means that pursuing God's will for our lives must be defined as thoroughly living in submission and surrender rather than living in comfort and convenience. He may give us comfort and convenience. And praise God when he does that, and he's probably done that and still doing that for everyone in this sanctuary and hearing me on the radio. But we must pursue his will and submit and surrender to his will. And if that means we lose some of our comforts or conveniences, we need to pray that we will be ready to do so. It means our lives must be entirely and exclusively devoted to honoring Him. Our true desires will be revealed through our actual behavior as we embrace the ultimate purpose of following God's will, pleasing Jesus Christ. Do we see how important this is? Without taking these steps, we will and we'll never take these steps if he is not first. You see that? If he's not first, we won't take these steps. If our love for him is not first, if it doesn't come above our own comfort, then we will be forever wanderers, never knowing the will of God in our lives. We need help. We need to have our minds and our hearts changed continuously. We simply cannot do this by trying harder ourselves. It doesn't work. The flesh simply won't allow it. It's gonna stand in my way, it's gonna stand in your way. But through the power of prayer, along with a new desire to place his will way ahead of ours, not only does this become possible, but I believe you and I will see the fruition of those truths come to life in us. And when it does, out of our hearts will flow rivers of living water, and it will be all to his glory, and it will also be to our good, remembering Romans 8 at the end of that chapter. Yes, it will be for our good as he receives the glory due to his name in what we do in exchange for his love and his salvation that he has granted to us. There may be those in the sanctuary or within the sound of my voice that are still living for themselves, that are still living by the world's ways, that still don't think that they need a savior, as a lie from the devil himself. Paul told us that all fall short of the glory of God. And if you're listening to me right now, who's all? You're part of the all. All have fallen short of the glory of God. And the wages of sin is death. Yes, we all go through physical death, should the Lord continue to tarry. But it also, Paul is also talking about a spiritual death. There is indeed life after death. The grave doesn't end our eternal lives. And according to this truth of the scriptures of our Lord, there are two abodes once we leave this planet. One is heaven, one is hell. Heaven, a place where there is no more tears, no more weeping, no more crying, no more pain, no more suffering. It is a place where our Lord and Savior Jesus said he was going to prepare for us when he returned. It is a place with streets of gold where our Savior lives and reigns and will come to judge the quick and the dead. It is a place reserved only for those that have turned to Jesus, have repented of their sins and asked him to be their Lord and Savior. It's easy to mouth the words, but the Bible tells us that there is no one that seeks after God, no, not one. You need the power of the Holy Spirit to turn you away from your sin, to repent of that sin and come to the Lord Jesus. The great news is if you are within the hearing of my voice right now, and you understand that you're a sinner, and that heaven is reserved only for those that can stand before God as though they were sinless. It's called justification, which we receive upon belief on the Lord. Then there is another place in eternity, it's called hell. Hell, according to the scripture, was a place created for the devil and his angels. But yet, when you reject, when you reject the salvation of an eternal, all-powerful, all-knowing, omniscient God, your punishment is equal to that rejection. And it is an eternity in a place that the Bible describes, among other ways, total darkness, bottomless pit, weeping and gnashing of the teeth, eternal fire. Where you, and I believe this with all my heart, and when the Bible talks about gnashing of the teeth, here's why, and this is not from the scripture directly, this is just my opinion. I believe that one of the things that has people that have gone to hell gnashed their teeth is that they realize for eternity, in the pain and the suffering they're in, that it didn't have to be that way. That they were given an opportunity to give their lives to Jesus Christ, the very Son of God. And he, at that moment in time, would have taken all of their sins off of them. The sin of a sinner like you and me and all those that already believe, has been imputed upon the Lord Jesus Christ on the cross. And his perfection and his holiness and his purity was imputed to those that believe. It's a miracle. And I don't understand exactly how all that works, but that's what the scripture says. So that when we, those that are in Christ Jesus, stand before the Father on judgment day, he looks at us as though we have never sinned. Praise him for that. That your sin and my sin for all believers is as far as the east is from the west, and he will remember it no more. That's what Jesus did for the believer. And he did it for the unbeliever as well. But the unbeliever must come to Jesus and ask him to be their savior, save me from my sins, and then, Lord, will you be the Lord of my life? I want to give up being the captain of my own soul. I want you to be my Lord. I want to follow you as my king, as my sovereign. Help me to do that. None of us can do that without his help. How do we get his help? He imparts the Holy Spirit up into every believer so that spiritual things that we were blind from before, now we can see. And he gives us his everlasting word for us to dig into and to learn more about him and to learn more about our need for him. And to ask him to impart upon us his wisdom and his knowledge and his grace and his mercy. We all need it, and we all need to change, and we need to change today. Put his will above your will, put his desires above your desires. Walk according to the Spirit, Spirit-filled, as Paul tells us. We're not going to do that if we leave this place and go home and say life just continues to go on the way it has for the last 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80 years. We won't change. We won't change. We will be tickled pink with the way that we have been. I don't care whether or not you're in kindergarten, tenth grade, if you're in college, or if you're a PhD from a spiritual standpoint, we all can grow. We all can grow in the knowledge and the wisdom of the Lord Jesus Christ. And we need to. To his glory, to praise Jesus and to please him. Thank you so much for listening. I hope that this message will change us all. And uh please join me next time for part two on Colossians chapter one, verses nine through fourteen. May the Lord bless you and yours.