SPEAKER_01: This morning we are continuing our study in Colossians by looking at chapter 3, verses 12 through verse 17.
SPEAKER_01: So let me begin our time by reading from the Word of God.
SPEAKER_01: Would you follow with me as I read from the book of Colossians and chapter 3, beginning in verse 12?
SPEAKER_01: Put on then as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another, and if anyone has a complaint against another, forgiving each other.
SPEAKER_01: As the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.
SPEAKER_01: And above all these, put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.
SPEAKER_01: Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body and be thankful.
SPEAKER_01: Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs with thankfulness in your hearts to God.
SPEAKER_01: And whatever you do in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.
SPEAKER_01: This is the word of the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Two hundred years ago, a Scottish minister named Thomas Chalmers, who was at the heart of a kind of Scottish revival, preached a very influential sermon titled The Expulsive Power of a New Affection.
SPEAKER_01: He stated his main proposition, his main claim in that sermon with these words You have all heard that nature abhors a vacuum.
SPEAKER_01: Such at least is the nature of the human heart.
SPEAKER_01: The only way to dispossess it of an old affection is by the expulsive power of a new one.
SPEAKER_01: That very adequately captures what Paul is teaching us in Colossians and chapter 3.
SPEAKER_01: Through the first two chapters, Paul was explaining to us who Christ is.
SPEAKER_01: He is the radiance of the glory of God.
SPEAKER_01: All that is in God is in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: And he's been explaining to us what it means to be a Christian is to be united to Jesus Christ, so that you are forever in a union with Jesus Christ, who is the all of the fullness of God.
SPEAKER_01: So that to be a Christian is to take on a new identity.
SPEAKER_01: It's to be fully incorporated into the life of Christ, so that as God looks at you, he sees you in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: All of the love that's been radiating from the Father to the Son is now fully radiating to you because he sees you as united to his Son Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Your sins are forgiven.
SPEAKER_01: You have an eternal inheritance.
SPEAKER_01: All that belongs to Christ, the eternal Son, now belongs to you because you're in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: What Paul then does in chapter three is teach us how to live out our new identity.
SPEAKER_01: So he told us in the beginning of chapter three that we studied last week that to live out this identity in Christ means you have to set your mind on Christ and put to death what is earthly in you.
SPEAKER_01: Anything that is not going into the new world, the new kingdom of Christ, you're to put to death in this life.
SPEAKER_01: Put off all of that that is characteristic of your old life, all of your old self, anything that is sinful or displeasing to the Lord to whom you're united, you're to put off.
SPEAKER_01: But just to put off old habits or old attitudes or old actions, in itself is insufficient.
SPEAKER_01: You have to also put on new attitudes and new actions.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe in a very simple way, if you have a daily donut habit and you want to put off your daily donut habit, it's not enough just to stop eating the donut and then walk by Krispy Kreams every day and just jouncing for Krispy Kreams.
SPEAKER_01: You need to replace your old habit with a new, greater enjoyment.
SPEAKER_01: In an even greater way in your spiritual life, it's not enough just to try to put off old sinful habits, but you have to drive off old sinful habits with new holy habits.
SPEAKER_01: You have to drive off old affections, old desires, old loves with greater, more powerful new affections and new loves.
SPEAKER_01: That's what Paul teaches us in this text.
SPEAKER_01: Having taught us in the first 11 verses of chapter 3 how to put off what is old, in the following six verses, what Paul does is teach us how to put on what is new.
SPEAKER_01: And we could really summarize what putting on the new is in this.
SPEAKER_01: We're putting on Christ.
SPEAKER_01: We're living out our identity in Christ by being attracted to, by loving, and being characterized by what characterizes Christ.
SPEAKER_01: You put off the old man by putting on the new man, namely you put on Christ.
SPEAKER_01: And so what this passage does is it guides us how to put off our old person by replacing them with new per with new affections, new attitudes.
SPEAKER_01: I think a little outline that we could use would be this passage guides us into four ways that we put on Christ.
SPEAKER_01: The first way that we put on Christ, I'm going to summarize with these words, we'll put on a new self.
SPEAKER_01: A new self.
SPEAKER_01: And I say that because what Paul describes for us in verses 12 through 14 is a really comprehensive kind of transformation.
SPEAKER_01: So look down at verse 12.
SPEAKER_01: Paul starts this section by saying, put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience.
SPEAKER_01: So this verse really encompasses both your identity and your actions.
SPEAKER_01: Your identity being who you are.
SPEAKER_01: And because of who you already are, you're supposed to act in a corresponding way.
SPEAKER_01: And your identity is in these first three little descriptions.
SPEAKER_01: You are God's chosen ones, holy and beloved.
SPEAKER_01: This is who you are in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: You're God's chosen ones.
SPEAKER_01: God has chosen you, He set his affection on you, He set His love on you, He's given His inheritance to you, He's given you His covenants and His oaths and revealed Himself to you.
SPEAKER_01: You're chosen by God, elected, and brought to Him so that you're now holy, which is a category distinction.
SPEAKER_01: Not just describing your actions, but it's describing who you already are, your identity.
SPEAKER_01: It's a position.
SPEAKER_01: To be holy is to be set apart, to belong to God and be used exclusively for the service of God.
SPEAKER_01: This is who you are in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: So Paul can also call you beloved because you're in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: And this is the way that Paul describes Christ.
SPEAKER_01: He's the beloved of the Father.
SPEAKER_01: If you just flip back a page in your Bibles to Colossians chapter 1 and verse 13, look at the way Paul describes Christ in chapter 1, verse 13.
SPEAKER_01: In verse 13, Paul says, He that's the Father has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son.
SPEAKER_01: This is Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: He is the eternally begotten Son of the Father.
SPEAKER_01: He is forever the beloved of the Father, all of the divine perfections radiating in love and enjoyment towards the Son forever.
SPEAKER_01: And now that you have been grafted into Christ, now that you're united to Christ, all of the divine love that is flowing full force eternally from the Father towards the Son is now flowing towards you.
SPEAKER_01: You are caught up in the trans in a transcendent, loving relationship between the Father and Son.
SPEAKER_01: The Father looks at you and genuinely calls you his beloved because he sees you in his son, in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: This is your identity, chosen, holy, and beloved, and out of that new identity, you are to put on new actions.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, even just to say it one step further before we move on to the actions, Paul has already said in chapter 3, verse 10, just a couple verses prior, if you glance your eyes up in your pip in your Bible to verse 10, he says, you have put off the old self.
SPEAKER_01: Your old self has died, and then you have put on the new self in verse 10.
SPEAKER_01: So you are already new in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: You're incorporated into Christ.
SPEAKER_01: This is the reality of who you are.
SPEAKER_01: Your old self is dead.
SPEAKER_01: You have put on Christ.
SPEAKER_01: So, Paul says, live it out.
SPEAKER_01: You genuinely and eternally are a member of the divine life, partaker in divine life, a member of the divine family.
SPEAKER_01: So live out that new identity with actions that correspond to who you already are in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: What would actions that correspond to your identity look like?
SPEAKER_01: Paul describes them in verse 12.
SPEAKER_01: With a little list compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience.
SPEAKER_01: Now each of those attitudes or attributes deserves a sermon in itself, but we could simplify this by saying what Paul is describing for us is living in a way that corresponds to who you are in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: In other words, act like Christ.
SPEAKER_01: How does Christ act towards you?
SPEAKER_01: Christ act towards you in compassion and kindness and humility and meekness and patience.
SPEAKER_01: So the ways that Christ acts are the ways that you are now to act because your life is united to him.
SPEAKER_01: Now, we should say a little bit about each of these, so let's just walk through this list rather briefly.
SPEAKER_01: If you look at the first item in the list, Paul says, put on compassionate hearts.
SPEAKER_01: And that little expression is rendered a little bit differently depending on your English translation of the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: A very wooden translation of the Greek would read something like guts of compassion.
SPEAKER_01: The idea here is it's just very simple, it's a little metaphor.
SPEAKER_01: In modern vernacular English, we use the heart as a metaphor for kind of the seat of the emotions and feelings.
SPEAKER_01: In ancient Greek, they use the guts, the bowels, as a metaphor for the seat of affection and feeling.
SPEAKER_01: Both of them are appropriate.
SPEAKER_01: When you feel very deeply about someone, when you feel deep compassion and love towards someone, where do you feel it?
SPEAKER_01: Maybe you feel it in your heart, your heart races a bit, but you also feel it deep down in your guts, don't you?
SPEAKER_01: So this is the metaphor that the Greek language uses to describe this.
SPEAKER_01: And what this is describing is a genuine visceral affection for other people.
SPEAKER_01: That's how we are supposed to relate to one another.
SPEAKER_01: Think of it this way: how does Christ relate to you?
SPEAKER_01: Does he just perform perfunctory good deeds because that's his duty to the Father?
SPEAKER_01: Or does he look at you and extend genuine compassion and love for you?
SPEAKER_01: Well, of course, the latter is the case.
SPEAKER_01: Christ doesn't just perform perfunctory deeds on your behalf, but he has genuine, true, divine affection for you.
SPEAKER_01: And as you receive and become more aware of the genuine divine affection God extends to you through Christ, that's going to overflow in the way you look at those who are also beloved by God.
SPEAKER_01: If he or she is beloved by the Father, how can I not also love them too?
SPEAKER_01: As Christ has genuine affection for you, you extend it to others.
SPEAKER_01: That's compassionate hearts.
SPEAKER_01: And then Paul goes on with this next word, kindness.
SPEAKER_01: Kindness.
SPEAKER_01: Which is a word that often gets reduced to just mere niceness.
SPEAKER_01: And like compassionate hearts, is not just perfunctory goodness.
SPEAKER_01: So kindness, the kind of kindness that Paul is describing, is not just kind of social niceness and etiquette.
SPEAKER_01: But rather, kindness is an attribute of God.
SPEAKER_01: The way that God treats you is kindness.
SPEAKER_01: It's according to his goodness and mercy.
SPEAKER_01: So for example, one verse in the scriptures that tells us about God's kindness is Romans 11 22, where Paul says, Note the kindness and the severity of God.
SPEAKER_01: Severity towards those who have fallen, but God's kindness to you, provided you continue in his kindness.
SPEAKER_01: So if you want to understand what is the kindness that I am to extend to others, think about what are the ways that God in Christ relates to you.
SPEAKER_01: How does he treat you?
SPEAKER_01: Is it not with goodness and mercy and patience and love?
SPEAKER_01: That is the kind of kindness we are then to bend out and extend towards others.
SPEAKER_01: And Paul continues, the kind of compassionate hearts and kindness that we treat others with will also usher forth in humility.
SPEAKER_01: Humility, which is a really interesting word because this word that he uses is a word that in most ancient literature in the time of Paul would have been used on a vice list rather than a virtue list.
SPEAKER_01: In the Greco-Roman world, most people looked down on the idea of humility.
SPEAKER_01: That was cowardice.
SPEAKER_01: It was something that was groveling and unbecoming.
SPEAKER_01: But Paul says it is a virtue in Christian life because it is characteristic of the way that Christ has acted towards you.
SPEAKER_01: So he Paul uses the same word in Philippians and chapter two to describe the work of Christ.
SPEAKER_01: He says, Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself and humbled himself to the point of death, even death on a cross.
SPEAKER_01: So as Christ humbled himself to the point of death, so you are to humble yourself towards others.
SPEAKER_01: And he says, the way that you humble yourself towards others is Philippians chapter 2, verse 3, by counting others as more significant than yourself.
SPEAKER_01: This is the way that Christ has treated you.
SPEAKER_01: He has humbled himself to the point of death, and so you look at those who are beloved in Christ, and you place their needs above yours, their significance above yours, and seek their interests above yours.
SPEAKER_01: That's clothing yourself with humility, the kind of humility that Christ has extended towards you.
SPEAKER_01: When Paul continues with another word here, meekness, or some of our translations render this word as gentleness.
SPEAKER_01: Either is an adequate translation of the Greek word.
SPEAKER_01: This word in Greek would sometimes be used for the domestication of a wild animal.
SPEAKER_01: So if you take a wild horse that's used to following its own impulses and drinking for whatever streams it desires, and you bring it into captivity and you bring it under submission, you tame that wild animal, you bring it under the will of another.
SPEAKER_01: Put a bit and a bridle in its mouth, and you bring it under the will of another.
SPEAKER_01: This is the kind of attitude that Paul is describing here.
SPEAKER_01: In fact, this is the attitude that Jesus uses to describe the real, genuine member of the kingdom of God and the Beatitudes.
SPEAKER_01: Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the kingdom of God.
SPEAKER_01: So, what is meekness?
SPEAKER_01: Meekness is this attitude of submission to the will of God.
SPEAKER_01: Previously you followed your own desires and you drank from whatever streams you wished.
SPEAKER_01: But now that you the gospel has been revealed to you, now that you've been united to Christ, now that you know Jesus, your will has been brought into submission to the will of another.
SPEAKER_01: You are living your life under the will of Christ.
SPEAKER_01: And so you act towards others the way that Christ would have you act towards others.
SPEAKER_01: So just pause and think about this for a moment here, before we continue on in the rest of this list.
SPEAKER_01: Think about your relationships with the people who are nearest to you.
SPEAKER_01: If you are married, think about your relationship with your spouse or your children or your roommates or your friend or your parents.
SPEAKER_01: How much of your relationship with those near you is characterized by the will of the Lord?
SPEAKER_01: Submission and surrender to what does Christ want me to do?
SPEAKER_01: How much of your relationship with others, on the other hand, is characterized by just kind of my own impulses, and I'm just kind of riding my relationship out and just letting life happen, and the way I act towards others is just kind of natural and spontaneous, and whatever comes out of my heart.
SPEAKER_01: Well, what comes out of your heart is not always the will of the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: And if you actually actively take hold of your life, which is the way the scripture says that we are to live our life, and you examine your life in the light of the Word of God, you'll find that there's a lot of ways in which your relationships with others are not characterized by meekness, submission to the will of the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: There are many ways in which our lives aren't characterized by extending compassionate hearts and kindness and humility.
SPEAKER_01: Or this last word, patience, putting up with others.
SPEAKER_01: But isn't that the way that Christ has treated us?
SPEAKER_01: Has he not been infinitely patient with you?
SPEAKER_01: Have you ever looked at Christ and he given you so much as a sideways glance?
SPEAKER_01: Has he ever put up a front of begrudging tolerance towards his relationship with you?
SPEAKER_01: Has he not always treated you with tender mercies, kindness, and compassion?
SPEAKER_01: Have you, when you have gone to Christ in your time of need, not always found him ready to receive you and to help you?
SPEAKER_01: That's the way that Paul says our relationships with others should be characterized.
SPEAKER_01: As we increasingly behold the glory of who Christ is and the way he relates to us, then our hearts bend out horizontally and extend that kindness and meekness and gentleness and patience to others.
SPEAKER_01: Now Paul goes on in the kind of attitudes that we're to put on in the next verse.
SPEAKER_01: Look at verse 13.
SPEAKER_01: Bearing with one another.
SPEAKER_01: And if anyone has a complaint against another, forgiving each other.
SPEAKER_01: So bearing with one another obviously overlaps with patience, but the kind of bearing with one another that we're supposed to do is not just a kind of begrudging putting up with someone.
SPEAKER_01: Man, I don't like that guy, but I won't kill him.
SPEAKER_01: Rather, Paul says you're to extend something even more.
SPEAKER_01: If anyone has a complaint against another, and the word he uses for complaint could be rendered with a number of different words, it's the idea of you've got a legitimate gripe with this person.
SPEAKER_01: You could recriminate him.
SPEAKER_01: You have a genuine charge that you can place against him.
SPEAKER_01: They've actually done something wrong.
SPEAKER_01: And the way that you relate to them is not mere begrudging bearing with them, but Paul says extending forgiveness to each other.
SPEAKER_01: Now, just a word on forgiveness.
SPEAKER_01: Again, this is one of those attributes that deserves an entire sermon.
SPEAKER_01: What is forgiveness?
SPEAKER_01: Very simply, we could just say forgiveness is letting go of the wrong and extending compassion and goodness towards the wrongdoer.
SPEAKER_01: Now, forgiveness, of course, would be in a different category from reconciliation.
SPEAKER_01: To be reconciled with someone who's genuinely wronged you would require repentance on their part.
SPEAKER_01: And reconciliation, restoration of relationship, also is different from trust, which has to be built in a genuine organic relationship over time.
SPEAKER_01: But none of that precludes the command that you forgive.
SPEAKER_01: That's not contingent upon the wrongdoer's response.
SPEAKER_01: That's contingent upon you.
SPEAKER_01: And the Lord says, we are to forgive one another, and look how we are to forgive at the end of verse 13.
SPEAKER_01: As the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.
SPEAKER_01: So if you ask the question, how am I supposed to give forgive this person?
SPEAKER_01: Then you look at Christ and you ask, How did he forgive me?
SPEAKER_01: Was it not free and full and extravagant?
SPEAKER_01: Was any of Christ's forgiveness towards you begrudging?
SPEAKER_01: No.
SPEAKER_01: All of it was overflowing and kind and willing and exuberant.
SPEAKER_01: This is the way that Christ has extended his forgiveness to us.
SPEAKER_01: And so Paul says that's the way we are to forgive one another.
SPEAKER_01: We could even say it this way: what did it cost Jesus to extend his forgiveness towards you?
SPEAKER_01: Was it not everything?
SPEAKER_01: It was the blood of his own cross, it was his very life that cost Jesus his forgiveness towards you.
SPEAKER_01: So our forgiveness towards one another is never measured based on relational cost.
SPEAKER_01: As soon as you catch yourself examining and calculating what are the relational costs to extending forgiveness to this person, you're wrong.
SPEAKER_01: You're already wrong.
SPEAKER_01: There's no calculation entailed in the forgiveness that Christ offered to us, neither should there be in what we extend towards one another.
SPEAKER_01: We extend the same kind of lavish forgiveness that Christ has already lavished on us.
SPEAKER_01: This is what it looks like to live out your identity in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Then Paul just keeps going.
SPEAKER_01: Look at verse 14.
SPEAKER_01: And above all these, put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.
SPEAKER_01: Now, what does Paul mean by love?
SPEAKER_01: And I think very clearly here, he doesn't just mean action, but affection.
SPEAKER_01: And the reason that I point that out explicitly is that it's natural for our modern-day American Christians to emphasize the reality that biblical love is action.
SPEAKER_01: It's an actual act where you act on behalf of someone else in their best interest.
SPEAKER_01: You do what is best for someone else.
SPEAKER_01: You put their interest above your own and you act.
SPEAKER_01: That's love.
SPEAKER_01: And that's an important emphasis for us to make because so much of the world's understanding of love in our society is kind of frothy, warm fuzzies, and there's no substance behind it.
SPEAKER_01: But Christian love is always self-sacrificial acts on behalf of those who are the object of your love.
SPEAKER_01: But even that description of love would be insufficient to capture the biblical idea of love, wouldn't it?
SPEAKER_01: How does Jesus love you?
SPEAKER_01: Is it self-sacrified self-sacrificial acts on your behalf?
SPEAKER_01: And then after it's all over, he says, Glad that's over.
SPEAKER_01: Sheesh, man, I can't stand that guy, but I did what I had to.
SPEAKER_01: I loved him.
SPEAKER_01: That's not the way Jesus loves you.
SPEAKER_01: He extends genuine affection towards you.
SPEAKER_01: Real biblical love is action and affection, always both.
SPEAKER_01: And what Paul is commanding us here is we are not just to do this list of actions.
SPEAKER_01: In fact, if he were thinking of love just merely in terms of actions, this would be the most redundant verse in the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: He just gave us a whole list of all of the self-sacrificial actions to extend to one another, and then at the end of that, he says, crown it all with love, with more self-sacrificial action.
SPEAKER_01: What Paul is saying rather in verse 14 is here are all the actions that you extend towards your brothers and sisters in Christ, and crown it all with genuine godly affection for those whom you are acting towards in love.
SPEAKER_01: Genuine affection.
SPEAKER_01: In other words, he begins and ends in the same place.
SPEAKER_01: Compassionate hearts, extending real visceral affection and love, crowning all of your actions.
SPEAKER_01: What ties it all together is that you actually have affection for the person you're acting towards.
SPEAKER_01: Now, of course, that doesn't mean wait until you feel something for a person before you act.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes the act of sacrificing your own interests and placing the interest of someone else above your own, it's in the course of that act, as you get caught up in doing what the Lord wants you to do, even though you don't feel like it, that the Lord works on your heart in such a way that he conforms your affections towards his own and trains you to actually love the person with affection that you're already loving in action.
SPEAKER_01: But all genuine, godly Christian love always has both: affection and action.
SPEAKER_01: This is what it means to put on the new self.
SPEAKER_01: To put on Christ, to ask, what are the ways that Christ has, is, and will treat me?
SPEAKER_01: That's how I treat others.
SPEAKER_01: Now Paul goes on and says, not only do we put the put on the new self, but we also have a new arbiter.
SPEAKER_01: Look at verse 15.
SPEAKER_01: In verse 15, Paul says, Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you are called in one body, and be thankful.
SPEAKER_01: Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts.
SPEAKER_01: And this word that's translated rule is a word that would be used for a referee or a judge in an ancient athletic event, or an arbiter between two competing parties.
SPEAKER_01: So the idea here is that the peace of Christ has the final say and is dictating your life whenever you have two competing desires or interests.
SPEAKER_01: In your heart.
SPEAKER_01: So, what is the peace of Christ that Paul refers to?
SPEAKER_01: It might be natural for us to think that the peace of Christ is referring to is some kind of subjective inner peace.
SPEAKER_01: But the way that Paul describes the peace of Christ in his writings and in fact the New Testament writings broadly is something objective.
SPEAKER_01: It's a real status that you enter into.
SPEAKER_01: Wherein the Holy God, who's not at peace with you, but stands over you in judgment for your sin, satisfies his judgment through the death of Christ on your behalf, and brings you into a new status, brings you into his peace.
SPEAKER_01: He's at peace with you through the blood of Christ's cross.
SPEAKER_01: That's the objective reality in which you stand because of your union with Christ.
SPEAKER_01: That's the peace of Christ.
SPEAKER_01: You see this in a number of places in the New Testament.
SPEAKER_01: For example, Acts chapter 10, verse 36, Peter uses these words to describe the peace of Christ.
SPEAKER_01: As for the word that he sent to Israel preaching good news of peace through Jesus Christ, the gospel offers you to come into a status, a reality of peace with God.
SPEAKER_01: And Paul says that when you become a Christian, this is your reality.
SPEAKER_01: Romans 5, 1.
SPEAKER_01: Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: That's your reality.
SPEAKER_01: You are in peace with God.
SPEAKER_01: That's your status before God.
SPEAKER_01: In other words, you could say the peace of Christ is maybe shorthand for the totality of the gospel realities that describe and compromise your life.
SPEAKER_01: You are in the peace of God.
SPEAKER_01: You are in the status of having peace with the eternal, holy, infinitely loving God through the death and resurrection of Christ.
SPEAKER_01: So, when you have competing desires in your heart, the peace of Christ dictates who gets the say in your life.
SPEAKER_01: So if in a relationship you have on the one hand a desire to get revenge against someone, and on the other hand, the inclination that maybe I should forgive, the peace of Christ comes into your life and says, Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, Vengeance is mine, says the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Rather, overcome evil with good.
SPEAKER_01: Because God is your avenger, God is your judge, God is your father, God is on your side, he'll take care of you.
SPEAKER_01: You don't need to avenge yourself.
SPEAKER_01: Leave it to the wrath of God.
SPEAKER_01: Because you're in the status of having peace with God, you can entrust your soul to a faithful creator who will do what is right.
SPEAKER_01: And instead, you can extend all of the attitudes that we just saw in verses 12 through 14 to those around you.
SPEAKER_01: This is what the peace of Christ being the arbiter in your life would look like.
SPEAKER_01: Or you could say, if you are caught between worrying about a situation or resting in confidence in God, then you look to the peace of Christ and ask, what does the peace of Christ say I should do?
SPEAKER_01: Well, the peace of Christ would say, if God has already done the greater thing of securing peace for you through the death and resurrection of his son, will he not also do the lesser thing of guiding you through this storm?
SPEAKER_01: Or if you're caught between being frustrated because you don't have what you deserve in life, or between being content because you already have more than you deserve.
SPEAKER_01: Well, the peace of Christ would answer resoundingly that what you have in Christ is already more than you deserve.
SPEAKER_01: You can be content so long as your gaze, your eyes, your mind is fixed on the reality that you have peace with God through Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Let the peace of Christ be the arbiter in your warring desires in your heart.
SPEAKER_01: Paul goes further on this interior life reality and says, Inside of your own heart, you now have a new master as well.
SPEAKER_01: Look at verse 16.
SPEAKER_01: And in verse 16, Paul says, Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly.
SPEAKER_01: Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly.
SPEAKER_01: What is the word of Christ?
SPEAKER_01: More common in the Bible is to hear of the Word of God or the Word of the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: So what's the word of Christ?
SPEAKER_01: Is it something separate?
SPEAKER_01: Well, if you have read Colossians 1 to 2 and have picked up anything that Paul was putting down, you would know this.
SPEAKER_01: Christ is God.
SPEAKER_01: In him all the fullness of deity dwells.
SPEAKER_01: So the word of Christ and the Word of God are not separate realities, they're synonyms.
SPEAKER_01: The word of Christ is the Word of God, is the Word of the Lord, because Christ is the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: So another way of saying this, you might just say to yourself, let the Bible dwell in you richly.
SPEAKER_01: Let the Word of God, the Word of Christ, dwell in you richly.
SPEAKER_01: Now, what does it mean for the Word to dwell in you richly?
SPEAKER_01: The word for dwelling here is not just like a stay at an Airbnb, but it's rather taking up permanent residence.
SPEAKER_01: And it is a truism that he who dwells in the house is the master of the house and not just a passing guest, right?
SPEAKER_01: The one who takes up residence and lives there permanently is now the master of that domain.
SPEAKER_01: The word of Christ dwelling in you richly means that the word of Christ takes up its home in your heart and now it rules over the home of your heart.
SPEAKER_01: The word of Christ has the say, the word of Christ has sway, the word of Christ is directing and guiding everything that's going on in your internal spiritual life.
SPEAKER_01: Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly and abundantly, and when the word of Christ is living in you, it will be your master and your guide, and it'll change everything about you.
SPEAKER_01: Now, this thread of the word of Christ dwelling in you and controlling your internal life just runs all the way through the New Testament.
SPEAKER_01: And I want to show you a couple parallel passages to show you some of the ways that the Word of Christ is described elsewhere in Scripture.
SPEAKER_01: Flip back to Ephesians.
SPEAKER_01: And in Ephesians and chapter 5, I want to show you a parallel text, actually, two parallel texts in Ephesians, to look at some of the ways that the Word of Christ dwells in us.
SPEAKER_01: In Ephesians and chapter 5, in a very famous text in verse 18, Ephesians 5.18, Paul says, Do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit.
SPEAKER_01: What does it mean to be filled with the Spirit?
SPEAKER_01: Well, if you are filled with the Spirit, the Spirit is filling you and controlling and dictating your life.
SPEAKER_01: This is what your life would look like.
SPEAKER_01: Look at verse 19.
SPEAKER_01: Addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart, giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: That's synonymous with Colossians chapter 3, verses 16 and 17.
SPEAKER_01: So in these two passages, you have, on the one hand, in Ephesians, the Spirit of God filling you and creating this kind of life.
SPEAKER_01: And in Colossians and chapter 3, the Word of God dwelling in you richly and creating this kind of life.
SPEAKER_01: Do you see to say that the Spirit of God is filling you is synonymous with saying the Word of God is dwelling in you richly?
SPEAKER_01: Because when the Word of God is dwelling in you and controlling your mind and it's shaping your affections and guiding your life, then the Spirit of God is controlling and shaping your affections and guiding your life, because it is the Spirit of God that inspired the Word of God.
SPEAKER_01: If you want your entire life to be conformed to the image of Christ, then the Word of Christ has to dwell in you richly, and it is the Word of Christ that is the instrument by which God does his work in your life.
SPEAKER_01: Let's flip over to Ephesians chapter 3.
SPEAKER_01: Let me show you one other parallel passage that would show us and flesh out for us something of the way the Word of God would work in our hearts.
SPEAKER_01: And in Ephesians chapter 3, verse 17.
SPEAKER_01: Now very famously, Ephesians is comprised of six chapters, in the first three of which Paul is teaching us about who God is and what he's done for us.
SPEAKER_01: And in chapters four to six he says, now what are the ways we should live in light of those truths?
SPEAKER_01: And at the end of chapter three, his teaching about who God is and what he's done for us.
SPEAKER_01: Paul prays in 3.17 that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.
SPEAKER_01: This is what you need is the love of God to overwhelm and saturate your heart.
SPEAKER_01: As a Christian, you are called not to love the world or the things in the world.
SPEAKER_01: But prior to knowing Christ, that was all you knew.
SPEAKER_01: All of your affections, your whole life, your joys, your hopes, everything you understood was comprised of the things of the world.
SPEAKER_01: To say, do not love the things in the world is an impossible task.
SPEAKER_01: What is strong enough to expel your love for the world?
SPEAKER_01: The love of Christ.
SPEAKER_01: You need the love of Christ to come in in a rush, in a tidal wave, a tsunami into your heart and to take up residence and to be the guiding and dominant controlling reality of your heart and your affections and your mind.
SPEAKER_01: How will that happen?
SPEAKER_01: Verse 17.
SPEAKER_01: Christ will dwell in your hearts.
SPEAKER_01: That word dwell is the same word that Paul uses to describe the word of Christ taking up residence in your heart.
SPEAKER_01: You will have the word of, excuse me, you'll have the love of Christ shed abroad in your hearts when you have the word of Christ in your hearts.
SPEAKER_01: Because it's only the word of Christ that reveals to you the love of Christ.
SPEAKER_01: To have Christ and his love dwell in your hearts is synonymous with the word of Christ dwelling in you richly.
SPEAKER_01: The way that you access all the love that is objectively there, Christ's love for you is objectively real.
SPEAKER_01: The way you access it and know it and experience it and live it out is when the word of Christ takes up residence in your life, when the word of Christ dwells in you richly.
SPEAKER_01: When you can flip back to Ephesians, excuse me, Colossians in chapter 3, and as you're turning to Colossians and chapter 3, if you have heard some of our studies of Colossians chapters 1 through 2, you have heard that I have repeated, or at least tried to repeat at length, this line.
SPEAKER_01: You need more of Christ.
SPEAKER_01: I think that is an adequate summary of what Paul is teaching in Colossians chapter 1 and 2.
SPEAKER_01: You only ever have one problem in life.
SPEAKER_01: You need more of Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Yes, you have very practical problems, there are prescriptions that you need, there are carpouls you have to arrange, but ultimately the fundamental realities that compose your life and determine your happiness are only and exclusively and sufficiently provided for you in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: You need joy and satisfaction and love and wisdom and purpose and meaning, and all of that is provided for you overwhelmingly and abundantly in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: You only genuinely have one need in your life.
SPEAKER_01: You need more of Christ, who is more than you've ever begun to imagine.
SPEAKER_01: Now, to say that line that all you need in life is more of Christ, we could actually say it another way.
SPEAKER_01: Because how do you access Christ?
SPEAKER_01: Paul's told us in Colossians 2, it's not through mystical dreams and visions, it's not through legalistic aesthetic practices.
SPEAKER_01: How do you access Christ?
SPEAKER_01: What he's telling us in Colossians 3.16 is you access Christ fully and sufficiently through the word of Christ.
SPEAKER_01: So we could also say this very similar line, equivalent line.
SPEAKER_01: You only ever have one problem in your life.
SPEAKER_01: You need more Bible.
SPEAKER_01: That's the entire sum of your life.
SPEAKER_01: What are you doing with your life?
SPEAKER_01: What are you doing here in this world?
SPEAKER_01: Your life is so fleeting.
SPEAKER_01: You have one problem.
SPEAKER_01: You need more of the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: You need to know more of the truths of Scripture, to believe them with faith, and obey them in faith, because it is the word of Christ that is adequate to equip a man for every work pleasing to God.
SPEAKER_01: 2 Timothy 3.17.
SPEAKER_01: You have one problem in life.
SPEAKER_01: You need more Bible, because it is the Bible that reveals to you the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: And as that glory fills your life and controls your affections, it will train you and guide you in the way the Lord wants you to go.
SPEAKER_01: Now, this is the teaching of Scripture.
SPEAKER_01: It's also the teaching of the church historic.
SPEAKER_01: Fourth century bishop of Constantinople, John Christostom, in his sermon on this text, said, This is the cause of all evils, not knowing the scriptures.
SPEAKER_01: Or Jerome, the translator of the Latin Vulgate, ignorance of the Bible means ignorance of Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Simplify your life.
SPEAKER_01: You only really have one problem: more of the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: Who is Christ in this situation?
SPEAKER_01: What has he done for me?
SPEAKER_01: What does he want me to do?
SPEAKER_01: What is the word of Christ for me in this instance?
SPEAKER_01: What is the promise of Christ in this time, right now?
SPEAKER_01: What are the ways that Christ can help me?
SPEAKER_01: What are the ways that Christ would have me walk?
SPEAKER_01: All you need in life is Christ, and Christ is fully revealed to you on the pages of Scripture.
SPEAKER_01: All of Christ for all of life revealed fully and sufficiently in Scripture.
SPEAKER_01: Now that reality, more of Christ being revealed to you and dwelling in your heart richly through the Word of Christ, will not just stay inside of you as an individual, but it'll flow out of you into the life of the body corporate.
SPEAKER_01: Look at the rest of what Paul says in verse 16.
SPEAKER_01: Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom.
SPEAKER_01: Now that teaching and admonishing one another is Paul's work.
SPEAKER_01: If you flip back a page in your Bibles to Colossians 1 and verse 28, this is the way Paul describes his apostolic ministry.
SPEAKER_01: Paul the Apostle, chapter 1, verse 28, says, Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone in all wisdom that we may present everyone mature in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: That's the work of the Apostle, and handed down to the elders and teachers of the church, it's to teach and warn everyone that we may present everyone mature in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: But it's not exclusively reserved to those in teaching functions in the church.
SPEAKER_01: It's the work of every Christian.
SPEAKER_01: Every Christian has a teaching ministry.
SPEAKER_01: If you are a Christian, your relationship to the Word of God is not merely to bring it into your heart, but for it to permeate your heart through to others.
SPEAKER_01: Now, what does teaching and admonishing mean?
SPEAKER_01: For reasons that go way beyond my pay grade, the ESV has translated the same Greek word in chapter 1, verse 28 as warning, and in chapter 3, verse 16 as admonishing.
SPEAKER_01: But they're the same word.
SPEAKER_01: They mean the same thing.
SPEAKER_01: To admonish is just a fancy English word that means to warn.
SPEAKER_01: I learned that because I looked it up in Webster's.
SPEAKER_01: Your ministry as an individual Christian is for the Word of Christ to dwell in you and to control you and to shape your affections, and as you are learning and beholding more of the glory of Christ, to then teach others, which is to positively instruct others what you're learning about Christ in scriptures, to share it with others, to positively tell people more of Jesus, and to warn others when you see your brothers and sisters walking in ways that are not according to Christ's will, when you see people walking out of step with their identity in Christ, or when you see people living apart from Christ entirely, to warn them of the reality of divine judgment and to warn them back to Christ.
SPEAKER_01: And that warning and teaching ministry overlaps with praise.
SPEAKER_01: Look at the rest of verse 16.
SPEAKER_01: Teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs with thankfulness in your hearts to God.
SPEAKER_01: I think if you were to ask Paul, Paul, where does teaching stop and singing begin?
SPEAKER_01: He would just say, Yes.
SPEAKER_01: Because your teaching is instructive, but your singing is also instructive.
SPEAKER_01: He says that teaching and singing really overlap.
SPEAKER_01: There are really two ways of doing the same thing, of forming our hearts to love Christ the way he has loved us.
SPEAKER_01: Let me just walk through these three little categories of songs that Paul has here: Psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs.
SPEAKER_01: Overly briefly, Psalms would be plucked songs.
SPEAKER_01: The word for, this translated Psalm is a word for plucking a stringed instrument, and so it was the word that got used for the book of Psalms, because the book of Psalms is associated with David, and David had a stringed instrument that he played with his songs.
SPEAKER_01: In the New Testament, this word Psalms is used seven times, and it's used for the canonical book of Psalms.
SPEAKER_01: So it seems that what Paul is referring to here when he says singing psalms is actually singing psalms from the scriptures.
SPEAKER_01: And we in fact did that this morning in our corporate worship.
SPEAKER_01: The second song we sang this morning was Psalm 150.
SPEAKER_01: Then he broadens out and says hymns.
SPEAKER_01: Hymns would be poetic ex uh poetic means of extolling gods or heroes in the ancient world.
SPEAKER_01: So it's when you want to extol and celebrate some virtue or heroic deed.
SPEAKER_01: And it your desire to praise this person or this deed goes beyond what you can express in mere prose.
SPEAKER_01: You have to extol them in poetry in a beautiful way to correspond to the beautiful thing this person is or has done.
SPEAKER_01: And Paul says that's what we do in Christian worship is we extol the glorious deeds of God.
SPEAKER_01: Finally, this last word, spiritual songs, the word songs is just the most generic word for a song in the ancient world.
SPEAKER_01: That it would be hymn, it would be hymns, it'd be funerals, it'd be weddings, it'd be drinking songs.
SPEAKER_01: But Paul says Christians in their in their worship are just being spiritual songs.
SPEAKER_01: What is a spiritual song?
SPEAKER_01: Paul's using the word spiritual to refer to the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_01: Holy Spirit-inspired songs.
SPEAKER_01: That is words that are corresponding to the truths revealed by the Holy Spirit in Scripture.
SPEAKER_01: Now let's just put this together.
SPEAKER_01: And let me ask this question.
SPEAKER_01: If a friend or a colleague were to ask you, when you go to your Christian worship services and you sing, why do you sing?
SPEAKER_01: Suppose this person's unfamiliar with that kind of Christian tradition of singing, what answer would you give them?
SPEAKER_01: And of course there are a number of adequate answers that you could give them.
SPEAKER_01: Here would be an inadequate answer.
SPEAKER_01: I go to express myself.
SPEAKER_01: That's what the songs are: expressing myself.
SPEAKER_01: Now, certainly part of what we're doing in singing is we're expressing our hearts to God.
SPEAKER_01: But do you see what Paul is saying in this text is that understanding of what we're doing in singing is at best inadequate.
SPEAKER_01: What the songs are doing is these songs are spirit-inspired psalms.
SPEAKER_01: They're hymns that extol the great glories of God in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: They're songs that correspond to the truths of the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_01: And they do the same thing the Word of Christ does.
SPEAKER_01: They come in and they shape your heart so that the Word of Christ can dwell in you richly.
SPEAKER_01: One of the things you're doing when you are singing in corporate worship is you are, before you express yourself, is the truths that you are singing are shaping and forming you.
SPEAKER_01: So that the truths of Scripture get into your heart, and the music that comes along with them is shaping your heart to respond in emotionally, visceral, appropriate ways to the truths of who God is in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: So that one of the functions of spiritual, excuse me, of musical worship is to shape you, to form you as a person.
SPEAKER_01: So that as the truths of God are getting into your heart and forming and shaping you, what then comes out of your heart is appropriate.
SPEAKER_01: At the end of verse 16, thankfulness from your hearts to God.
SPEAKER_01: So the truths of Scripture, we're speaking to one another, we're meditating on, we're singing to one another, and the truths of Scripture are forming and shaping our hearts.
SPEAKER_01: They're reorienting the whole soil of our hearts so that what springs and grows for them is good fruit offered to God in praise.
SPEAKER_01: You have a new master.
SPEAKER_01: This is part of your new identity, is the word of Christ takes up root in you, dwells in you, and transforms you.
SPEAKER_01: But there's one last step along this path that Paul shows us in this text.
SPEAKER_01: That is, you have a new goal.
SPEAKER_01: Look at verse 17.
SPEAKER_01: Whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.
SPEAKER_01: I say this is a new goal.
SPEAKER_01: Because prior to Christ you had your own goals, you had your own direction, you were living your life, you had your own orientation.
SPEAKER_01: But now that you have been united to Christ, you have one goal, and we all in Christ have the same goal.
SPEAKER_01: That is, everything we do, we want to do for Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Now I just want to point out a couple things here.
SPEAKER_01: Look at the middle of verse 17.
SPEAKER_01: Paul gives a command.
SPEAKER_01: Do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: That's a very active command, isn't it?
SPEAKER_01: I think that's worth emphasizing because we have a tendency when we think about the way that the Word of Christ transforms us, to think of that too passively.
SPEAKER_01: That is, if you have a desire for sinful things and you're wrestling with this desire and you want to rid yourself of it, there's a tendency to think very passively.
SPEAKER_01: I will pray until God removes this desire.
SPEAKER_01: But that's not a fully orbed understanding of how to put on your new identity in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Yes, indeed, pray for God to transform your heart, but then you have to actually do things that are in accord with your identity in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: You have to actually act, and in your act of faithfully doing what God wants you, sometimes that is the place where God transforms your desires.
SPEAKER_01: Do everything that you do in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, giving thanks to God the Father through him.
SPEAKER_01: So what would it mean to do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus?
SPEAKER_01: Of course, it's not just a tagline, do what you want and say in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_01: Notice that this command is really the converse of the third commandment.
SPEAKER_01: The thought, the third commandment states this negatively.
SPEAKER_01: Colossians 3.17 states it positively.
SPEAKER_01: Third commandment, of course, is do not take the Lord's name in vain.
SPEAKER_01: What does it mean not to take the Lord's name in vain?
SPEAKER_01: Of course, it means don't use the Lord's name as a curse word, but more than that, it means don't take the Lord's name.
SPEAKER_01: Don't take the God of Israel, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, and claim him as your own, put his name over your head, identify yourself with him, and then live in such a way that you act as though that name had no power over your life.
SPEAKER_01: That would be to make the name of the Lord look empty and vain.
SPEAKER_01: Positively, what Paul says is that you identify yourself with Jesus Christ, and you do everything in his name.
SPEAKER_01: That is, you do everything in your life according to his attributes, ordered by his will and ruled by his word.
SPEAKER_01: That's what it means to do everything that you say, think, and do in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: And as that is happening, your heart is being transformed to give thanks back to God.
SPEAKER_01: You realize that the call of Jesus Christ, the New Testament call to become a Christian, goes beyond any call in this world.
SPEAKER_01: The call to not love the world or the things that are in the world, which previously that is all that you knew, all that comprised your hopes, dreams, and goals for yourself, for your family, everything that was important to you is in the world.
SPEAKER_01: And Jesus' call is not to love that.
SPEAKER_01: If you rightly understand the call of Jesus, it will sound like a call to self-annihilation.
SPEAKER_01: And we should ask ourselves: the Jesus whom we say we worship, has he called us to crucify our old life?
SPEAKER_01: That is the call of Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Deny yourself, take up your cross and follow me.
SPEAKER_01: Put to death what is earthly in you.
SPEAKER_01: And on your own, that will sound impossible.
SPEAKER_01: But if the Spirit, by the grace of God, has opened your eyes to see Christ, and you have seen that if you would love not the things in the world, if you would put to death what is earthly in you, if you would crucify your old self, what is offered to you is Christ.
SPEAKER_01: The glory of the infinite God, fully disclosed to you eternally.
SPEAKER_01: All of God's love, mercy, compassion, joy, an everlasting kingdom of peace and righteousness, all that is God's, freely, graciously, eternally given to you in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: If your eyes have been open to that, then you say, loss is gain.
SPEAKER_01: To lose my life would be to find it, and to die would be to live.
SPEAKER_01: Because when I died, I died with Christ, and forever I will live with him.
SPEAKER_01: Lord, we thank you that you have revealed yourself to us through the word, and that you have declared that you have everlastingly achieved salvation for all of your people.
SPEAKER_01: Lord, we worship you and thank you that you have transferred us from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of your beloved Son, have placed us in a union with your son, and you call us your beloved.
SPEAKER_01: So we ask that as you have first loved us, that you would shape our hearts to love you back.
SPEAKER_01: We ask that by our worship, by our relationships, by our service to you, that you would shape, conform us to live lives that are pleasing to you, for you're worthy of all this.
SPEAKER_01: We ask this in the name of Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: And now, for a parting word for Pastor Jesse Johnson.
SPEAKER_00: Thanks for joining us.
SPEAKER_00: If you're in the Washington, D.C.
SPEAKER_00: area, I would love to see you at Emmanuel Bible Church.
SPEAKER_00: For more information on our church or our current service times, go to IBC.church.
SPEAKER_00: For more information about the Master Seminary and their Washington, D.C.
SPEAKER_00: location, go to TMS.edu.
SPEAKER_00: I hope this resource has been a blessing to you and it helps you seek the Lord daily, serve others around you, and share the gospel with boldness.