Colossians Series, Part 3
// August 30th, 2007 // Sunday Recap
We moved into chapter 2 of Colossians this week. We picked up on two big themes that I’ll highlight for you here.
I encourage you to read along in Colossians as we make our way through these powerful and life-giving truths.
All wisdom is in Christ
Col. 2:3-7 makes an interesting statement. Paul is taking another shot at Gnosticism by saying that all knowledge and wisdom is hidden in Christ. He is referring specifically to the Gnostic habit of putting their “special knowledge” in books and keeping them hidden from ordinary people. All this knowledge and wisdom that they had accumulated by their pursuit of personal completness was futile because ALL wisdom is in Christ. Anyone that receives Christ can have access to all He has.
You don’t have to be a Gnostic living in Colosse to identify with what Paul is saying here. We are all surrounded by a culture that holds self-actualization and the pursuit of knowledge in high regard. We are taught in school from the beginning that the key to betterment of self is learning and self expression. Good and evil are irrelevant to the more important ideal of having “experiences” that stretch our humanity. However, if we seek the answers to our questions in places other than in Christ we will ultimately fail. Not only do we get our answers from Him, but we find out what questions really need asking.
If we will learn to walk with Jesus and allow our roots to go deep and wide, then we will bear fruit. As we walk with Him, our ability to resist sin and cling to Him will increase. Our knowledge of His Word and therefore our faith in Him will grow. Yet, it is so easy to step away from this path of grace and into a Gnostic mindset where it’s all about me and how I am going to work out a solution to my dilemma.
The Philosophies and Traditions of the World
Col. 2:8-10 deals with the Church’s need to guard itself against the intrusion of the “basic principles of the world” and the “traditions of men”. I see a lot of this happened today. Whether it’s a preacher telling us that Jesus wants us all to be rich or another church allowing a homosexual to be a pastor. Not only do we often fail to build fences where God has instructed, but we then build fences where He never intended. We construct false divisions between us and “them” based on our preferences for or against a musical style, type dress, sunday school curriculum, stance on alcohol consumption, etc.
But there are also more subtle forms of this. Like the way materialism, moral relativism and humanism can seep into our lifestyle. What about the exclusivity of Christ’s redemption for salvation? Does it trouble you that Jesus is the only way? The only truth? The only path to Life? Do you lean more on psychology to meet the needs of your soul, or the scriptural truths of sin, repentance, forgiveness and grace?
Perhaps the effects of gnosticism are more far reaching than we thought?
[tags]gnosticism, colossians, apostle, Paul, Bible, scripture, devotional, sermon, preaching, Jesus[/tags]