SPEAKER_01: So here we are.
SPEAKER_01: It is a new year and a new decade.
SPEAKER_01: And perhaps you, along with many, many other people, see this as a time of year for a new you.
SPEAKER_01: New year, new decade, new self.
SPEAKER_01: I'm always impressed with people who make those lists, come up with those resolutions.
SPEAKER_01: I'm more than suspicious of myself and my ability to keep those from bitter experience.
SPEAKER_01: I used to do it, do it no more.
SPEAKER_01: That is why I'm greatly relieved when we come to this book and particularly this part of the Bible, because this little letter to Colossians, to the Christians in Colossi, is not so much a letter about new starts as it is speaking to Christians, encouraging them to stay the course, to stick with what they have started.
SPEAKER_01: Now, don't get me wrong, okay, as the Christian, as city church, we love to see new people, and we love to see new people making new starts.
SPEAKER_01: That is one of our greatest joys.
SPEAKER_01: But equal to that, equal to that is also not simply seeing people start the Christian life, but actually people staying with the Christian life.
SPEAKER_01: You see, Paul's writing to these new Christians, and already he can see that there's much that imperils their Christian life.
SPEAKER_01: So he's encouraging them to stick with what they've started.
SPEAKER_01: Chapter 2, verse 6 and 7.
SPEAKER_01: Let me just read it to you.
SPEAKER_01: But they're kind of the essential, the essence of the entire book.
SPEAKER_01: He says, Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus, talking about the start, as you receive Christ Jesus the Lord, do what?
SPEAKER_01: Depart from Him?
SPEAKER_01: Walk away from Him?
SPEAKER_01: Turn to something new?
SPEAKER_01: No.
SPEAKER_01: As you received Him, so walk in Him.
SPEAKER_01: Rooted and built up in Him and established in the faith, just as you were taught.
SPEAKER_01: It's not so much about starting something new, to huge relief.
SPEAKER_01: It's about staying with what you've started, sticking with Jesus, staying the course.
SPEAKER_01: And in order to do that, Paul gives us essentially two words, two massive words of encouragement this morning.
SPEAKER_01: Perhaps you're like me, because not only do I find starting new things troublesome, but I also find sticking with what I've started equally difficult.
SPEAKER_01: The Christian life, for anyone who has lived it even just a short time, you'll know.
SPEAKER_01: Look, if you're going to be real with yourself and with God, it's not about basing your Christian life on a past episode.
SPEAKER_01: Right?
SPEAKER_01: You made a decision a long time ago.
SPEAKER_01: If your Christian life is going to be real, if it's going to be living and growing, it's not about a past episode, about making a decision long ago.
SPEAKER_01: It's about a present experience.
SPEAKER_01: You know that.
SPEAKER_01: And what Paul's doing in this letter is simply encouraging us to enjoy, to exemplify, and to endure in the Christian life.
SPEAKER_01: The Christian life that you've been given, the Christian life that you've already started.
SPEAKER_01: And so he gives two massive, two massive words of encouragement to the Colossian Christians, to them for us today.
SPEAKER_01: And the first, the first word of encouragement that he wants to bring before them and therefore before us goes like this.
SPEAKER_01: He looks at these Colossian Christians and he says, the gospel alone, the word about God's Son, the gospel alone, has already and will go on, continuing to change you.
SPEAKER_01: Therefore, don't depart from it.
SPEAKER_01: Stick with it.
SPEAKER_01: The gospel alone, I know that's probably perhaps a bit of a convoluted sentence to take in all at once.
SPEAKER_01: I will break it down, but he says, look, the gospel alone already has and will go on, continuing to change you.
SPEAKER_01: Therefore, why do you need anything else?
SPEAKER_01: Why do you look for new resolutions?
SPEAKER_01: Stick with what you've started with.
SPEAKER_01: Hold on to what has already been given to you.
SPEAKER_01: Because you know, he says to the Colossians, it has changed you.
SPEAKER_01: And boy had it changed them.
SPEAKER_01: Paul actually never made it to Colossae.
SPEAKER_01: We hear that he learned of what was going on in Colossae with these Christians through a friend of his called Epaphras.
SPEAKER_01: Do you see that at the end of verse, in the middle of verse 7?
SPEAKER_01: Epaphras had gone to Colossae, taken the gospel to Colossi, and then he was reporting back to Paul about the impact the gospel had had in this city.
SPEAKER_01: And he said to Paul, look, these people who have heard the gospel, understood it, and accepted it have been completely changed.
SPEAKER_01: In one of the most fundamental, in fact, probably the most fundamental ways that any of us ever can.
SPEAKER_01: Looking for a new start this year, perhaps you are.
SPEAKER_01: You need to come to grips with the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: It has the power to change you in ways that you never dreamt possible.
SPEAKER_01: He says three things about these Christians in Colossi.
SPEAKER_01: He says, firstly, look, they had heard verse four of their faith in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Number one.
SPEAKER_01: Then their love for all the saints flowing out of their faith in Christ, they had a new relationship with God and were beginning new relationships with one another.
SPEAKER_01: And those, that faith and that love sprang from, he says, because verse five, um, we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus, the love that you have for all the saints, because of your hope.
SPEAKER_01: The hope that is laid up for you in heaven.
SPEAKER_01: See the certainty of that?
SPEAKER_01: Hope is not things in the Bible, people are not unsure.
SPEAKER_01: Hope does not mean unsure, it simply means unseen.
SPEAKER_01: Right?
SPEAKER_01: People think hope today, oh, that's very uncertain.
SPEAKER_01: But when you look at the Bible in the way the Bible uses that word, it's not talking about things that are uncertain or unsure, it's simply talking about things that are unseen.
SPEAKER_01: And he says, because of that, your whole present experience has been completely and utterly rewired.
SPEAKER_01: You now have, as he says, faith in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: That is, you no longer are trusting yourselves, as most people living in this world do.
SPEAKER_01: You're not trusting yourself anymore, you're trusting another.
SPEAKER_01: That's simply what he means when it talks about faith in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: It doesn't matter how strong your faith is, all that matters is the strength of the one your faith is in.
SPEAKER_01: And so he said, look, you you've been you've been transposed from the way the world thinks, trusting itself, to the way that God sees you.
SPEAKER_01: Or the way that you need to see yourself.
SPEAKER_01: And your faith now is not in yourself, but in Christ, which led amazingly to a love.
SPEAKER_01: Something like the world had never seen before.
SPEAKER_01: A love for all our saints.
SPEAKER_01: It's one of the themes that Paul will pick up on.
SPEAKER_01: This little word all in Colossians is very important.
SPEAKER_01: He talks about the Christians being filled full in Christ, about them having all that they we'll see later on today, having all that they need because of God's strength supplied for them.
SPEAKER_01: But this little word, all, is so important.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, You've got a love for all the saints.
SPEAKER_01: The world had never seen anything like this before.
SPEAKER_01: You take it for granted here this morning that you can walk into a room and sit next to one another, male and female.
SPEAKER_01: Don't you know that for many of the major world religions, even still today, this isn't possible.
SPEAKER_01: Rich and poor.
SPEAKER_01: Paul will talk about slaves and masters later on.
SPEAKER_01: And he levels the playing field.
SPEAKER_01: He says the gospel levels the playing field.
SPEAKER_01: It created new relationships which went deeper than being male or female, it went deeper than your socioeconomic standing.
SPEAKER_01: It went deeper than your race, your nation, the color of your skin.
SPEAKER_01: This was exceptional.
SPEAKER_01: Their identity was now in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: So they were free from having to defend themselves and protect themselves, and therefore could love anybody.
SPEAKER_01: All because, as he says, verse 5, all because of the hope that's laid up for them.
SPEAKER_01: So what is it that he's talking about here?
SPEAKER_01: He is talking about a fundamental rewiring of the essence of your identity.
SPEAKER_01: Who makes you you?
SPEAKER_01: They no longer belong to themselves, they belong to another.
SPEAKER_01: They no longer were protecting themselves, they were pouring themselves out in service to one another.
SPEAKER_01: They were no longer simply aiming for this world, but they were looking for the world to come.
SPEAKER_01: Their loyalty, their love, and their longings have been completely changed.
SPEAKER_01: And all, Paul says, because of the gospel, which has gone out into all the world and is changing people who hear it, understand it, and accept it.
SPEAKER_01: And it's creating in them themselves a whole new way for them to think about themselves.
SPEAKER_01: It's creating through them whole new communities.
SPEAKER_01: Something like the world had never seen before.
SPEAKER_01: And it's giving them a confidence and a certainty that no matter what happens in this life, they know their future's secure.
SPEAKER_01: Do you know?
SPEAKER_01: If that's what the gospel gives people, do you think they would have missed an opportunity ever to meet up as church in Colossae, where they came together and reminded one another that this is what had already happened?
SPEAKER_01: And Paul takes it one step further.
SPEAKER_01: He says it's not simply telling you what has happened, but the gospel itself is the ongoing power to continue to change you.
SPEAKER_01: You don't need anything new.
SPEAKER_01: Look what he says.
SPEAKER_01: Look, this gospel, it's universal, has come to you, verse 6, as indeed it has in the whole world.
SPEAKER_01: It's universal and it's a living dynamic power.
SPEAKER_01: Paul was saying people's lives transformed.
SPEAKER_01: Because he says it's bearing fruit and increasing, filling people up so that they don't need to use one another.
SPEAKER_01: Filling people up so that they can actually serve one another.
SPEAKER_01: As it also does among you, since the day you heard it and understood the word of grace of God in truth.
SPEAKER_01: The gospel alone has already and will go on, continuing to change you.
SPEAKER_01: Stick with it, people is what he's saying.
SPEAKER_01: He wants these Colossian Christians to see that what they have in the gospel is worth more than anything else this world can afford.
SPEAKER_01: He wants them to see that what they have in this gospel will make them equal for any challenge that they might face in this world.
SPEAKER_01: He wants them to see that in this gospel there's there's nothing more precious that God could have given them.
SPEAKER_01: Because in the gospel, the word about his son, we know that God gives us himself.
SPEAKER_01: He's not waiting for us to earn his approval, he's not measuring us up to see if we deserve it.
SPEAKER_01: But it's the word of God's grace in truth.
SPEAKER_01: He's giving people who could not earn it, but did not deserve it, will never merit it.
SPEAKER_01: He's giving us himself.
SPEAKER_01: And do you know something?
SPEAKER_01: If you've got that right, if you can understand that that you now have peace with your Maker, He loves you, that as you'll see as you go on through the letter, his son did it all for you.
SPEAKER_01: If you know that, if that has penetrated your life, it changes the way you see yourself and one another and the world around you.
SPEAKER_01: So let me ask you, has it?
SPEAKER_01: If it has, stick with it.
SPEAKER_01: That's what Paul wants us to see.
SPEAKER_01: Stick with it.
SPEAKER_01: He says, in many ways, look, don't underestimate it.
SPEAKER_01: It can change people.
SPEAKER_01: Perhaps sometimes you think the gospel is weak, ineffective, it doesn't actually do what it says on the tin.
SPEAKER_01: But Paul says, no.
SPEAKER_01: Stick with it.
SPEAKER_01: The gospel alone has the power to change people.
SPEAKER_01: Don't underestimate it.
SPEAKER_01: Don't unappreciate it.
SPEAKER_01: Right?
SPEAKER_01: I think, especially at this time of year, people are looking for long lists that they can make for themselves, set their targets, see if they can perform, um, feel good about themselves.
SPEAKER_01: Normally, if I'm making the list, it's only going to be disappointing to myself.
SPEAKER_01: But people are looking for that, aren't they?
SPEAKER_01: People are looking to be able to say to themselves and to others religiously and even to God, look, I've done it.
SPEAKER_01: I've done enough.
SPEAKER_01: And it's it's not necessarily the bad people who are trying to do that, right?
SPEAKER_01: It's the good people, it's the moral upright.
SPEAKER_01: The religious people who are trying to do that.
SPEAKER_01: You see, if you begin to transpose any of your confidence, any of your joy out of the gospel into something else, well, it's going to lead to disaster.
SPEAKER_01: It's going to wreck your life and may wreck other people's lives too.
SPEAKER_01: See, these Colossian Christians, they were in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Right?
SPEAKER_01: That is the reality now that defined them.
SPEAKER_01: Their identity was wrapped up in him and his performance.
SPEAKER_00: And his performance is perfect.
SPEAKER_00: You're not in him.
SPEAKER_00: You can't get any better.
SPEAKER_01: When God looks at you, he sees you as the way he sees his son.
SPEAKER_00: It's staggering.
SPEAKER_01: But the more that sinks into your life, the more that you begin to appreciate that that's the way he sees you, then the more able you'll be able, the more able you'll be to serve others, to love one another.
SPEAKER_01: You won't be striving and struggling and seeking to put yourself first or to make a name for yourself or to put other people down.
SPEAKER_01: No, you don't need to.
SPEAKER_01: Because you now know the most important eyes in the universe are looking at you and they're smiling.
SPEAKER_01: And so, being so rooted, as we saw, being so established as we saw, since you received Christ, and now you're in him, don't move away from him.
SPEAKER_01: You're in him.
SPEAKER_01: Therefore, you can pour your your yourself out and your hope is secure.
SPEAKER_01: So don't don't underestimate the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: It can and continues to transform lives.
SPEAKER_01: Don't unappreciate the gospel in your own life.
SPEAKER_01: Because it is the power that continues to change all of us.
SPEAKER_01: Rather seek daily to orientate your life around this gospel.
SPEAKER_01: Dwell.
SPEAKER_01: Marinade yourself in the glorious truth of the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: That God has loved you with an unending love.
SPEAKER_01: The gospel, Paul wants them to see, the gospel, and the gospel alone has and will continue to go on changing them.
SPEAKER_01: So stick with it.
SPEAKER_01: Be assured.
SPEAKER_01: Stick with the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: Then he secondly goes on to say, I mean, this is a prayer this morning, right?
SPEAKER_01: He's teaching them what to pray for.
SPEAKER_01: And out of that, what you might simply want to say is, Well, my prayers this year, they need to be more thankful for the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: Start there.
SPEAKER_01: What do you thank God for?
SPEAKER_01: We go around our dinner table at night, right?
SPEAKER_01: There's four children, two adults.
SPEAKER_01: And the things that we ask one another as to what we should pray for, um, well, there are some very strange ideas.
SPEAKER_01: Let's just put it like that.
SPEAKER_01: But so it's so seldom when we actually, as a family, are thinking like this.
SPEAKER_01: What should we be thanking God for?
SPEAKER_01: Well, for the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: Right?
SPEAKER_01: That is how God has changed you and continues to go on renewing the world today through the teaching of his gospel.
SPEAKER_01: Let's not let's not underestimate it.
SPEAKER_01: Let's not unappreciate it.
SPEAKER_01: Rather, let's us orientate around it, our lives.
SPEAKER_01: There's lots that were seeking to pull the Colossians away.
SPEAKER_01: That they would be defined by what they could do, their success, their performance.
SPEAKER_01: There was lots.
SPEAKER_01: You'll see that as you go through the letter.
SPEAKER_01: Paul's simply raising this flag now, and he's he's positioning the issues that will become more obvious throughout the rest of the letter today.
SPEAKER_01: But the big thing, the headline news that he wants to open up for us, for them, for our health and well-being, is you've got the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: Don't think that you need anything else.
SPEAKER_01: The gospel alone has the power to change.
SPEAKER_01: Then, secondly, he says, look, if the gospel alone is power to change, then it is God alone, God alone, who has already and will go on, not simply changing you, but keeping you.
SPEAKER_01: It's God alone, it's the second thing he says, in many ways, he he opens it up in verses 9 to 14.
SPEAKER_01: He he does something very, very similar.
SPEAKER_01: Um, it's God alone who has already and will go on continuing to keep you.
SPEAKER_01: How are you gonna make it through the year?
SPEAKER_01: Right?
SPEAKER_01: How are you going to continue thinking as a Christian, living as a Christian through 2020?
SPEAKER_01: You're gonna face lots of temptations.
SPEAKER_01: There's gonna be disappointments.
SPEAKER_01: Some things will surprise you, others will perhaps even threaten to crush you.
SPEAKER_01: What do you need to know?
SPEAKER_01: Do you need to see in order to keep going?
SPEAKER_01: Well, it's God, the God who has already done everything for you, is going to continue keeping you.
SPEAKER_01: And so Paul takes it up.
SPEAKER_01: After thanksgiving for the gospel, he says, and so we pray.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 9 From the day we heard, uh, and so from the day we heard, we have not ceased to pray for you.
SPEAKER_01: Asking, well, asking actually that they would grow in the knowledge of God's will, right?
SPEAKER_01: That they would be filled with the knowledge of his will, what his plans are for the world, what he intends to do with all that he has made.
SPEAKER_01: Uh, that you will be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, so that you will see the world not simply as everybody else does, but not simply from a temporal, but from an eternal perspective.
SPEAKER_01: Not simply from a physical material point of view, but from a spiritual, everlasting point of view, that you will begin to understand the world as it really is.
SPEAKER_01: And as your belief begins to grow, as you're shaped in that, well then he says, so your behavior will be transformed.
SPEAKER_01: Because what you put in affects what actually is lived out.
SPEAKER_01: So we pray that you'll be filled with all spiritual knowledge of his will, so that verse 10, you'll be able to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Here's your aim as a Christian in 2020.
SPEAKER_01: It's really simple.
SPEAKER_01: What do you want to do?
SPEAKER_01: Well, it's summarized there for you in verse 10.
SPEAKER_01: In those words, which simply say, pleasing to him.
SPEAKER_01: What's your big desire for 2020?
SPEAKER_01: As Christians, the answer is so straightforward and simple that we would live lives growing in our knowledge of God's will, living in a manner that's worthy of him, pleasing him in all that we do.
SPEAKER_01: But do you know something?
SPEAKER_01: This is the real shock to me as I prepared for this week.
SPEAKER_01: If God so does answer this part of Paul's prayer, what should you expect?
SPEAKER_01: I would think, certainly, if I was writing this letter, I would think, okay, so I'm understanding more, I'm living better, therefore, that should usher me in to a more uh easy life, more comfortable circumstances.
SPEAKER_01: That's what I would expect, right?
SPEAKER_01: You take off the the uh to-to list, and surely that's gonna make things better.
SPEAKER_01: Paul says, however, on the other hand, that if you grow in your knowledge of God's will, if you begin to see the world with him at the center and orientate your life around that, it's not gonna make your life more enjoyable.
SPEAKER_01: In many ways, it's gonna make your life more unbearable.
SPEAKER_01: Because look what he says in verse 11.
SPEAKER_01: May you be strengthened.
SPEAKER_01: You perhaps might want to put therefore in there, may you be strengthened with all power, his power, according to his glorious might.
SPEAKER_01: So that what?
SPEAKER_01: For all endurance and patience with joy.
SPEAKER_01: He knew, Paul knew, better than most.
SPEAKER_01: Having given up living for himself, if you know anything about Paul, he was a religious zealot.
SPEAKER_01: He was a Hebrew of Hebrews, he had all the credentials that anyone could ever wish for if you wanted to be noted for your religiosity.
SPEAKER_01: He had it all.
SPEAKER_01: And that was the fast track, actually, to a life of significance and influence and credibility.
SPEAKER_01: He had it all.
SPEAKER_01: And then God stopped him in his tracks, showed him that he, if he continued on that track, he was going to end up completely and utterly crushed.
SPEAKER_01: And instead gave him to Christ.
SPEAKER_01: What did that do for Paul?
SPEAKER_01: He was on the fast track to a life of significance and influence and credibility.
SPEAKER_01: What did it do for Paul coming to know Christ?
SPEAKER_01: Well, for Paul, it meant that that life was gone.
SPEAKER_01: And he moved, Paul moved, not from one success to another success, but he moved from one struggle to the next.
SPEAKER_01: And he knows that that is the path for every Christian who's growing in their belief, who's being shaped by that belief in their behavior.
SPEAKER_01: He knows that if you're going to stand as a Christian in a hostile world, which was growing in its opposition and determination against the gospel, then you were going to need all of God's strength, according to his mighty power, simply enable simply to enable you to endure.
SPEAKER_01: How often we get this so wrong.
SPEAKER_01: We're looking for God to do the spectacular in our lives.
SPEAKER_01: We're looking for God to hold us up as being someone special.
SPEAKER_01: Do you know what's spectacular?
SPEAKER_01: Do you know what's really special?
SPEAKER_01: It's not simply somebody who starts the Christian life and is sent into the stratosphere.
SPEAKER_01: But somebody who starts the Christian life and sticks with it all their days.
SPEAKER_01: God's power at work in people's lives?
SPEAKER_01: Speak to Christians who have been at it longer than you've been alive.
SPEAKER_01: Talk to saints who have been seasoned by years of suffering.
SPEAKER_01: Find those who are slightly ahead of you in the game and listen to their story.
SPEAKER_01: Because the spectacular.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Well, because he's already qualified you.
SPEAKER_00: You already belong to him.
SPEAKER_01: Don't to see if God loves you, don't look around the world.
SPEAKER_01: Okay?
SPEAKER_01: You look around the world, you're going to see tragedy, mishap, you're going to see disaster.
SPEAKER_01: You look around and you think, well, does God really love this world?
SPEAKER_01: Don't look around the world.
SPEAKER_01: Don't look in.
SPEAKER_01: Don't look around.
SPEAKER_01: Don't look in.
SPEAKER_01: Because if your heart's anything like my heart, it's full of doubts.
SPEAKER_01: It's full of questions.
SPEAKER_01: That's my present experience.
SPEAKER_01: Don't look around, don't look in.
SPEAKER_01: If you want to know if God loves you, look back.
SPEAKER_01: That's what we're going to remember in a few moments when we gather around the Lord's table.
SPEAKER_01: Because there we see an innocent one, the most perfect man who ever lived, suffering the worst of fates that ever could have been possible.
SPEAKER_01: Doing it all because he didn't want us facing it by ourselves.
SPEAKER_00: He has qualified you already.
SPEAKER_00: Do you think he's going to give up on you now?
SPEAKER_00: He has delivered you from the domain of darkness.
SPEAKER_01: Meaning, quite simply, that the devil and all his forces will not have the final say over your life.
SPEAKER_01: Doesn't mean you'll be free from suffering here.
SPEAKER_01: That's clear.
SPEAKER_01: It simply means that the devil will not have the final say over your destiny.
SPEAKER_01: He's qualified you, delivered you, he's redeemed you, he's brought you back, he's paid the cost.
SPEAKER_01: He's not going to give up on you.
SPEAKER_01: He has forgiven you your sins.
SPEAKER_01: So the God who'd rescued them had already proven and would go on to show that he was committed to keeping them.
SPEAKER_01: And so he says, if that is true, if the gospel has changed you, if it's God who keeps you, you don't need to be going looking anywhere else.
SPEAKER_01: Stick with what you've been given.
SPEAKER_01: Hold on to what you have to keep Christ king.
SPEAKER_01: That is to the praise and glory and fame of God our Father and Jesus Christ His Son.
SPEAKER_01: So as we begin 2020, let's see what we already have and not what we are setting out to achieve for ourselves.
SPEAKER_01: And let's together say, if this is true of us, well, thanks be to God.