03 Why You Can’t Seek God and Avoid Christ (Colossians 1:13-23)

Welcome to Wednesday in the Word. What the Bible means and how we know. I'm Krisan Marotta. This is the third talk in our series on the book of Colossians. Today we'll be looking at Colossians chapter 1, verses 13 through 23. If you'd like to follow along in the lecture notes, you can find us at wednesdayintheword.com slash Colossians 3. That's wednesdayintheword.com slash Colossians 3. Thanks for joining us. You may have seen the news stories of this last fall about the Wheaton College professor. Wheaton College or one of their professors. Oh, if not, last fall, Larissa Hawkins, she's a tenured professor at Wheaton College, she began wearing the traditional Islamic headscarf, and she posted on her Facebook page why. And this is what she said, quote, I stand in religious solidarity with Muslims because they, like me, a Christian, are people of the book. And as Pope Francis stated last week, we worship the same God. Well, in response to that Facebook post, Wheaton placed her on administrative leave, not for wearing the head covering, but for, quote, significant questions regarding the theological implications of her explanation of why she was wearing it. And they began having talks to talk about those implications. That didn't work. And then they took steps to fire her, and they actually announced last week that they have reached a place of quote reconciliation and she is voluntarily leaving the college. And I will put a link to all those news articles in the lecture notes for today. So if you want to read more about that, you can find those at wednesdayintheword.com slash Colossians, what is this, three or four? I should know this. This is lecture three. This is three, so it would be slash Colossians three. So it's that you might imagine her actions and the college response sparked quite a lot of debate in the blogging community. There was a lot of uh theological kind of clarity and precision, and others arguing for more like more compassion and inclusion. And I don't want to wade into all those issues of the debate, but I bring it up because I think our passage today sheds light on that question. So is it how can you can we say that Christians and Muslims are both people of the book and we worship the same God? Well, I'm gonna argue today that Paul says Jesus Christ is absolutely central to the gospel, essential to it, and any gospel that diminishes or changes or de-emphasizes his role in any way is not the gospel. So I understand her desire to show compassion for all people, but it strikes me, and of course this is my good for nothing, worthless opinion, but to say that we are both people of the book is either really naive or just plain uninformed. Because the Bible and the Quran are very different. They make very different claims about the kind of book they are, and they teach very different things. Specifically, they make very, very different claims about who Jesus is. Very different. And that's why I mentioned the story today, because Paul's going to make some really bold claims about who Jesus is and what it means to follow him. And just to remember, idolatry is not just worshiping a false God, it is also worshiping a false idea of the true God. And I think that's a danger we sometimes fall into. I mean, consider the golden calf episode. The Israelites weren't worshiping a different God. They were putting a false identity on the God that brought them out of Egypt, and God reacted very strongly to that and said you and condemned that to set them straight. So consider the claims Paul makes about Christ today, and then you can make up your own mind about the theological implications of Dr. Hoskins' actions and Facebook posts. So just to remind you where we are, we're still in the opening of the letter. Paul's writing to the church at Colossi. It's a church he didn't found and he didn't visit in person. He's writing this letter because Epaphras came to him with news about the church and sought his help. And he has told Paul the Colossians are on the verge of turning away from the gospel and sought Paul's advice and help in that situation. So a heresy was spreading through their church. They're on the verge of mixing in other ideas to the gospel and Paul's writing to set them straight. And the tone he sets in this letter is holding fast to the gospel is non-negotiable. This is a life or death issue. This is a big deal, and you want to hold fast. So he's prayed that they would fully comprehend the gospel and be grateful for it. And that that is not just icing on the cake of their faith. That's fundamental. He's praying that the reality of the gospel would come home to them in such a real way that they would be, it would change their lives. So it would be more than a religious commitment for Sundays, but they would grab hold of this life-changing hope and truth such that it impacts every day of their life. So that's where we are. He ended his prayer last week in Colossians 1, 11 through 12. May you be 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 of light. And he's going to continue right from that thought in the section we're going to look at today, which is verses 13 through 23. So he's continuing that thought, and he's going to spell out the God the Father who qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints of light. How did he do that? How did he change you from one who was in darkness to one who is in light and one who had no hope to one who has hope and an inheritance? He did it through Christ and Christ alone. And he's going to paint this very strong picture of who Jesus is. And I could I think I could sum this whole section up by saying he's going to say, everything we can know about God we know from Jesus, and everything in creation is under Jesus' authority. So everything we can and need to know about God we learn from Jesus, and everything in all the earth in creation is under his authority. So he goes from this, we were lost, we had no hope, and yet God gave us a share in this inheritance through what Christ did on the cross, and without Christ we have nothing. We have no standing. He is everything to us. Without him, we have no hope. So he's going to paint this picture that it's not that Jesus gives me a piece of understanding, and these other prophets, they have a piece of understanding, and these other worldviews, they have a piece, and we put them all together to fill out the puzzle. He's going to claim we learn everything we need to know in Christ Jesus. Everything we can know about God, his person, his character, his authority has been revealed to us through Christ, and all of creation is under his rule and authority. Okay. So let's look at 13 through 15. He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. He's the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. So this follows right from 12, where he talks about being grateful to the Father who's qualified you to share in the inheritance. How did he do that? He delivered you from the domain of darkness, adopted you into the kingdom of his son. In him the Son we have redemption and we have forgiveness. And then he starts basically who is this Son? He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. And that's the turn he takes. He's going to go off of that into who Christ is. This is one of the most explicit teachings we have in the New Testament about the nature of Christ. I like to call this the attack of the killer prepositions. Because I don't know if you noticed about it. There are a lot of in him, by him, through him, before him, and it's they can be really challenging to figure out what all those prepositions mean and tricky to pen down. So we're going to try to sort some of that out, but it's just the attack of the killer prepositions. So let's look at 15. He's the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. So the first thing he tells us about Jesus is he's the image of the invisible God. And that language is used fairly consistency in the New Testament. The idea is that you have the reality and you can have an image of it. There's this the thing that is the real thing, and then there's a likeness or an image of that likeness. And we are to learn something about the real thing from the likeness. So one reveals the other to me. And the idea is that Jesus tells me about God. When I look at the visible man, Jesus, I can see and learn something about the invisible God. So as a finite creature, I can't really understand the nature of God. I can't really grasp some all I need to know about him. How am I going to learn who he is? I look at the visible man Jesus. He shows me God in a way I can understand and teaches me about him in a way I can grasp. And we get this same idea from the words of Jesus. This is John 14, 8 through 10. Philip said to him, Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us. And Jesus said to him, Have I been with you so long and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, Show us the Father? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you, I do not speak on my own authority, but the Father who dwells in me does his works. So Philip comes to him and says, Show us the Father, and Jesus basically says, Why are you even asking me that? If you have seen me, you have seen the Father. Everything you need to know about the Father, I am representing to you and making clear to you. So he is the image of the invisible God. He reveals God to me in a way I can understand. So this man, Jesus, is the place where I learn about God, and he's going to go on to claim, the only place where I learn about God. Then he says he's the firstborn of all creation. That idea comes from being the firstborn son of a family. The firstborn had privileges that the others did not have. You're probably familiar with the stories about the firstborn receiving the double portion of the blessing. But the firstborn also had the authority to speak for the father when the father was absent. So the firstborn had not just this place in chronology, but they were first in the sense of authority and role and significance. So when the father was gone, it was the firstborn who represented him. And I think that's the idea Paul's picking up on here, that Jesus is the firstborn of all creation, meaning he has the highest place in all creation. He has the highest the authority, the priority. No one else has a higher priority than him. He stands above it. So it's not that he's a created thing, but he is above all of creation. There's no one higher than him. And notice as we go through the next verses how he emphasizes the all in all creation. And the phrases that follow in the verses coming up, he fills out what that means by all creation and watch the all things, all things that he repeats as he goes through this. And the idea being there's no place in creation where I can look that Jesus does not have authority over. So 16. For by him all things were created in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities, all things were created through him and for him. Here's our some of our killer prepositions. So by him all things were created. Now we've got this through him and for him. I'm not going to go into every every time we hit one of these, I'm not going to go into all the options, but just to give you a flavor of the debate of what the kinds of things you wrestle with in here. So when we look at by him all things were created, what could that mean? If you go to a Greek dictionary and you look up the preposition there that's by, it's got pages and pages of options. So just a few of them could be created by him, as in he did the creating. So for by him all things were created. He's the one who actually did the created. It could be causal because of him, all things were created. That's another way to translate this word. So all things were created because of him. There's lots more, but I'll just to make it short. The option I choose would be all things were created to be in him. There is nothing that is created that is outside the sphere of his influence, because all things were created with him in mind, with a view toward putting them under his authority. And I choose that because what he goes on to emphasize is the no part of creation is apart from him. He talks about heaven and earth, visible and invisible, thrones, dominions, rulers, authorities, all of it. So he seems to go on to say everything we see, everything that's visible, everything that's invisible, all are part of creation, and all of that God put under Jesus' authority. So wherever you go, every throne, every power you can find, everything you can see, everything you can't see, it all falls under the authority given to Jesus. Then all things were created through him and for him, yea, more prepositions. I think the idea is it's all his under his reign. So all things were created, this is how I understand it, through him as God and for him as Christ, I think is the idea. So as a member of the Trinity, all things were created through him, and as Messiah, he is going to rule over all things. And the emphasis is that God rules over everything in Christ. Christ is the focus. So you can't drop Christ out of the gospel because this is the way God has chosen to reveal himself, and this is the person he has given everything to. So you can't have a gospel without Christ because God has chosen to give Christ this unique authority over everything. And yes, he means everything. So he's the firstborn of creation because it was all made for him, it was given to him as ruler and authority. Look at 17. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. Okay, before all things. There's another great preposition. What does he mean by that? I think he means before in the sense of above. This preposition can refer to time as in chronologically before, but it seems more likely to me that it's the other meaning of priority. Especially with the word he uses, it tends to mean above all things, first in importance. And in him, all things hold together. This is not the force. This is not like Star Wars, everything, the force that binds all the atoms together. The idea, I think, is that all things will be brought together under his rule. All things are going to be put in subjection under his feet and his authority, and in him, under his rule, everything will find right its rightful place. Paul makes the same claims in Ephesians. This is Ephesians 9, uh, Ephesians 1, verses 9 and 10. He's talking about how God is going to sum up everything in Christ, and everything will find its place under the role of the rule of Christ. And he says, making known to us the mystery of his will according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ, as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth. It's the same idea. Everything, when God puts everything right, when God finally does away with all sin and death and futility, and he puts creation back the way he intended it, it is all going to come together under the Lordship of Christ. So back in Colossians 1.18. And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. So Paul uses this metaphor of the church a lot, and he uses it in Ephesians, he uses it in 1 Corinthians, and he uses it here, and the idea is that we are different individuals, but we come together to form a unity, and in that unity, Christ is the head, he's the leader, he has the most important place. In the same way that a body has a head that tells it what to do and directs and and um orchestrates everything else going on in the body, Christ is like that to us. Again, the idea is he has the most important place. He's the beginning, the firstborn from the dead. I think he's referring to the resurrection as a sign that Christ Christ's sacrifice was accepted. So he's the forerunner in that sense. He went first. He solved this problem of our sin and defeated death so that we can enter the life, and he was the first one to experience that resurrection, and we find life because he gave it to us through his death. So it he's talking about the firstborn from the dead in that sense. There is a resurrection coming for all of us, and he was the first one to show it to us. He was the first one to experience it. Now you say, What happened to Lazarus? Well, Lazarus was not resurrected such that he never died again. He was resuscitated and then he died again. That's not the same thing as being resurrected into a body that will never die, which is what Jesus was resurrected to. And he gave us uh he was the first never to die again, and that's the promise that's held up for us. So notice that what he's saying through all that is in every single way you can think of. Jesus was first, Jesus has priority, Jesus has the significance, everything about him is like the top of the line. That's where you go if you want to learn who God is, that's where you go if you want to see God. He is the one who will be Lord and King of everything. And why is he emphasizing that? Well, probably because that's the thing the Colossians are turning away from. Okay, so why is he first in every way? Look at 19 and 20, because the fullness of God dwelt him. So for in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on heaven or on earth, making peace by the blood of his cross. So he's the visible manifestation of everything I can know about God. There's nowhere else to go. No other prophet has a piece of truth that Jesus is missing. No other religion has a corner of truth that Jesus missed. He has it all. I think that's what he means by the fullness of God. Everything I need to know about God I find in Jesus. Everything I need to learn about salvation, about truth, I find in him. Everything I need to know about redemption. It is all there in Jesus. God was pleased for the fullness to dwell in Jesus, and then through Jesus to reconcile all things to God. So remember the story of creation up to this point has been basically a tragedy. It's the story of this great divorce between God and his creation. On the one side, we have the holy, transcendent God. He's not part of creation, he's beyond it, he's holy and complete, and on the other side, we humans are finite, guilty creatures. We're trapped in our rebellion, mired in our sin and our evil, and we are so far gone we don't even want to know who God is because we're lost in our rebellion. So you have God's side that is holy and pure, and it's right and appropriate for him to reject us, to condemn us, to place us under his wrath, and there's this divide or this wall between us, rightly so on his side, and foolishly on our side. And the picture of Paul's painting is what bridges that gap? How do you get across that divide or that wall? That's what Jesus does for us. He is the fullness of God, the completeness, the everything in us to us. Now it's easy to read all this and start thinking, you know, this is like big theological language and concepts, and and maybe this is just like a treatise on abstract truth of the Trinity. And it's easy to kind of get lost in that language, and I don't think that's what Paul's trying to say here. I think the real question he's answering is how are you going to find God? How will you know who God is? How will you know his will? How will you know what's truth and what's falsehood? How will you learn about God and what he wants from you and his character? And from our side of the equation, how are you going to solve this problem of sin and guilt? How can you get over that such that you can approach God again? And his point is, there's one and only one place to go. Everything I need to know, I learn in Jesus. Everything I need to solve the problem of this gap between me and God, I find in Jesus and the cross. Everything I need to know about what makes life fulfilling, what makes life real, what gives life hope, where do I find meaning? It is all there in the cross. So on our side, we look at Jesus and we see the God that we desperately need to know. And on Jesus, on God's side, Jesus is the means by which God is reconciling us to Himself. So all of creation will be brought back to God through the blood of Jesus on the cross. And all of God is being represented to creation through Jesus. So his point is that central to the story is the fact that God became man and died on the cross in our place. And if you take that out of the gospel, you have taken out Christianity. Any version of the gospel that removes the cross from the center of the story is no longer Christianity. Because the cross is the place where God made peace between us. Peace as opposed to wrath and condemnation. The cross is the place where we learn about God, where we see Him. Now that may sound Pretty theological and maybe like a point not worth making, but there are several movements today in the American church that are doing exactly that. They're trying to minimize the place of the cross. You can Google it and you'll find bloggers writing about how the cross today is just too offensive. And we really just, you know, we don't want to lead with that. We should kind of put that in the closet and go out and love people to death, which typically translates into liberal social clause causes. And once we've loved them and got them all kinds, well then we can mention that cross thing, you know, if it's not too offensive. So sin, not so big a deal. We'll minimize that. Cross, too violent, too bloody. We can't teach that. I even s saw an article where um there was a group where they were arguing to take the cross out of Sunday school because they thought it was just too, you know, just too violent to teach kids. Well, what would Paul say to that? I think if Paul was here today, he would rebuke that idea and say, you can't have Christianity without the cross. You can't have a gospel without the cross. The fact that God became man and died on the cross in our place, that's the gospel. That's the central idea. You any story that removes him is missing the point, as he says in 19, for in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on heaven or on earth, making peace by the blood of his cross. This is the place where it all happens. The fullness of God, everything we need to know about him, is in Jesus. And the place where we find the solution to our biggest problem is at the cross. Now there's an interpretive question, reconcile to him all things, whether on heaven or earth. What does he mean reconcile heaven and earth? I think that's a poetic way of saying man and God. That earth is the place where man dwells, heaven is the place where God dwells, and that he is poetically saying he is reconciling man and God. He's not I don't think he's talking about the angels or anything there, but that this is man and God. So his point being, Jesus died to reconcile both mankind and God to each other. It's not like he solved one side of the equation and left the other side hanging. He solved the entire problem, everything necessary to bring God and man back together, he accomplished. Now he's going to go on to say why we need this, why is this such a big deal? Why we need reconciliation. Look at 1 21 through 23. And you who are alienated and hostile in mind doing evil deeds, he is now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him. If indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard, which has been proclaimed in all creation under heaven, and of which I, Paul, became a minister. So he's saying, All of us, at one time, we were strangers, we were we were rebels, we were aliens, we were hostile to the things of God, we were pursuing evil, and what has changed? God has reconciled us through Jesus in his body of flesh by his death. So the thing that made the big difference to us is the cross. And it he did it in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him. So we were rebels, we didn't want anything to do with God. We should be his children, but instead we were strangers and his enemies. And how does God respond? He sends his son to die in our place, to do for us what we can never do for ourselves, to bring us mercy, to pay the penalty for our sins, so that God could forgive us and make us his children again. So there's one and only one way the sinner can be made holy and blameless, and that is through the cross. So God sent Jesus for that purpose, so that I would no longer be a stranger and enemy. And then notice he has this if indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you have heard. That's the theme in this letter. That's the warning he's gonna key off of. We're kind of finishing his opening, and he's gonna pick up on that if indeed you continue in the faith, and then he's gonna go into a series of kind of exhortations of the kinds of ways you may be shifting away. So that's an important if. All this is yours if you continue to believe the gospel. All these promises, this life-changing hope we've talked about, that is all yours, but you have to stay true to the gospel, stable, steadfast, not shifting into some other ideas. Okay, so let me try to wrap this up in the minutes we have left. So it's because it seems you read through this passage and it's easy to people like to look at this passage and go into great debates on the nature of Christ and what is it, the Trinity, and you can get a lot of abstract theology out of it. But I don't think that's what Paul intended. I mean, it is a valid application of of what he says to try to figure all that out. But in this context, remember, he's writing to people who are on the verge of straying. He's writing to people who are beginning to say, well, here's the gospel I heard, but these other ideas, boy, they look kind of appealing, and they make a lot of sense too. And maybe they're both true, or maybe I can mix them in a little bit, or maybe I can add this and take that away. And he's praying, remember, he prayed that God would give them a knowledge of God and the gratitude that results from that knowledge, and that they would understand the choice before them. So he wants them to understand the greatness of the thing God has done and what it means to them personally. And in the process, he's making clear Christ is absolutely central to that. You cannot walk away from him. If you walk away from him, you're walking away from everything. If you diminish who he is or what he does, you've left the gospel. If you take him out of the gospel, it is no longer the gospel. And he's not alone in that thought. This is Hebrews 1 through 4, chapter 1, verses 1 through 4. He makes the author of Hebrews makes the same point. Long ago, at many times, in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom he also created the world. He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature. He upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purifications for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high, having become as much superior to the angels as his as the name he has inherited is more excellent than theirs. So that and all that kind of rather beautiful language is the exact same point. He said, God spoke to us through the prophets. Now he has revealed everything he wants us to know through his son. He has he has spoken in a way that he did not speak before. He's the image of God, the fullness of God dwells in him. It's the same idea. After making purifications for our sins, he was ushered into the inheritance that we are now hoping for. So it's the same idea that Jesus is the perfect expression of everything God wants us to know. So what do I have to be grateful for? Well, I ought to be grateful for what God has done for me in Christ. He reached into heaven to actively do good for me. Or he reached into creation to actively do good for me. And how? Through Jesus. How do I come to know and understand God? Through Jesus. He's the image of the invisible God. So I think he's basically saying, look, Jesus is the biggest deal there ever was. In him I see and understand God. In him I find reconciliation. And how much that means to you, I think, depends on how much you see your need for reconciliation. And I think that's where our culture is wandering. We water down the picture of our need for reconciliation. We like to picture God as this big, benevolent being who looks down on us and wishes us well. And the gospel becomes, oh, God loves you. He's in your corner, he's on your side, you're not alone. Love wins. And we just want to believe that there's someone up there, out there who's on my side after all, you know, kind of looking out for me. Well, there's no need for a cross with a God like that. A God that smiles at your little mistakes and kind of nudges you in in the right direction and kind of puts those guardrails on to keep you, you know, when you fart go a little too far, is there when you need him, leaves you alone when you don't want to hear from him. That's not the picture of God. The biblical picture of God is he is holy, he is righteous, and we are not. And that is a problem that must be solved. We are under his wrath because we are not holy and righteous. It's not that sin is just unfortunate and these little mistakes we make, it is tragic, it is wrong, it is deserving of we have violated justice. A crime has been committed, and justice must be paid. And how are we going to pay that price? Who's gonna satisfy justice? Well, the cross is the one place where all that happens. That's why he's the biggest deal there ever was. So why is the world such a terrible place? Why do we have terrorists and wars and murders and bombs and earthquakes and disasters? Well, the Bible has an answer to that. The Bible says we are a people under God's wrath. We've been kicked out of the garden because of our sin. We lost the life and blessing God has to offer his children when we rebelled and turned our backs on him. So why do tragedies happen? Because we're sinful people in a sinful world and creation is fallen and broken. We don't have the life that God offers because of our sin. How do we get back to that place of life? How do we find his blessings once again? It all comes together at the cross. So sin is not something just God just smiles at and patiently waits for us to get over. It is a big deal. It is wrong. It deserves sin and death. And the more we understand that, the more we see why the cross was necessary, why it's at the center of the story, and how important it is for me. So when you begin to see that picture, then you see how we stand on one side of this great divide and God is on the other, and the thing that bridges the gap is the cross. If I see that, then the person who bridges that gap ought to become supremely important to me. Because when I get a sense of how lost I am, how much I need the cross, the next crushing problem is now what? Because left to myself, I'm guilty. Left to myself, I am unworthy, I am utterly lost, without hope, and justifiably condemned. You know those times like where you catch your kids out and something they've done wrong and all of a sudden they know it, and they're just like their whole body, you know, they just kind of droop and it's like, oh, you know. And you know that they know they did wrong. That's the place we ought to be at. But thanks be to God, he doesn't leave us there. We are not left to ourselves. He sent his son, Jesus, to die in our place to pay that penalty so that we can be reconciled. So the first step is to recognize the magnitude of the problem, but the second step is that supreme gratitude that Christ solved the problem. And I think that's what Paul's trying to get at in this section. That yes, there's some great theological truths about what it means for the Trinity and the person of Jesus, and there's a sense we can learn a lot from his explanation, but I think his purpose is to say, do you understand the choice you're making? When you start walking away from the gospel, do you understand what you're doing? Why do you have hope? Why do you expect someone to hear your prayers? How can you sleep at night? How can you face the future in a world with trouble and hardship? The answer to all of that is the cross. If you leave that, where are you going? So we don't have hope. We don't we can't sleep at night because we've done something great. It's be the only reason we have all that is because Jesus died on the cross and reconciled us to God. So that ought to make a difference when I face trials. It may sound like ivory tower theology, but remember he's writing to a group of people he's profoundly concerned about. He's concerned that they're walking away from the words of life and turning to an empty philosophy and death. And he says, What's the important thing you need to get hold of? What's that thing you need to continue steadfast and strong in? The cross. Because in one way or another, we all like to find an alternative to God. You know, we look for meaning, we look for fulfillment, we look for truth all, you know, everywhere and and back again. You know, meditation, zen, organic food, healthy living, spiritual disciplines, fasting, maybe it's asceticism or or social justice causes or solving all the problems of the world. And I think Paul would say you can't seek God and avoid Christ. You can look in all those other places, but the only real answer is in Christ. So you can't seek God and avoid Christ. There is nowhere else to go. You can look high, you can look low, you but you're going to have to deal with him because everything God wants us to know about him is found in Jesus. There's no other part of creation I'm going to find truth, not you know, energetics or meditation or philosophy or knowledge or or beauty. There's not a single thing elsewhere that's going to teach me what I need to know apart from Jesus. Now those are important, I'm not, I mean, those are important things to learn, but if you're looking for truth, you're looking for uh the meaning of life, it is going to be found in the cross. And whether we know it or not, whether we're Christians or not, we are under the authority of Jesus. Sooner or later, we're gonna have to face him. There's not gonna be a vote, there's not gonna be an election, there's no majority rule. Eventually, all things are gonna be brought under his rule, and that is gonna be made manifest to the world, and we will have to face him. So the Colossians are trying to solve all those problems some other way. They're seeking to be Christians without Christ, or by reducing Christ's place in his supremacy. And Paul's saying, don't go there. This is important, this is life or death issues. Whether or not I accept Jesus and who he is, that has fundamental consequences for my eternal destiny. So turn while you will, run where you will, you're going to eventually run into Jesus. You can search creation high and low for the meaning of life, and you're going to only find it in Jesus. So there's a sense in which we've been saved today because we are justified, we are no longer under his wrath, we are forgiven. God is no longer angry with us, we are no longer strangers, we've been adopted into his family. So there's that sense in which my salvation is accomplished, that God has forgiven us, but there's also a sense in which our salvation is not yet, because we are not yet sanctified. We are still struggle with the presence of sin, the power of sin, and we still live in a fallen world. And that's what we're looking forward to. That hope when that part is finally put right. So nothing in this creation will ultimately fulfill us until we get saved from the power and presence of sin. So that's what the life-changing hope that this story is all about. And that's the warning he sounds in 23. If indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you've heard, that's the turn he's gonna pivot off of for the rest of the book. He says, This is what God for God has done for you if you hold fast to the truth of the gospel. And the rest of the letter is gonna be a warning to hold fast to that truth. Because nothing less than your eternal destiny is at stake. All this is yours, all this hope, all the reconciliation, all the peace, all of that is yours if you continue to follow Jesus and trust his blood. The life-changing hope we talked about last time, that's yours if you embrace the gospel. And I think his basic message today is you can't find God and avoid Christ because that's the place we will find him. Let me stop there and pray for us. Father, these seem hard truths in one way and simple truths in another way. It's a story we've heard over and over, and it's easy to let the words roll off of us without really understanding or grasping the power behind them and the depth of grace that you showed in in sending your son to die on the cross. And I just pray for all of us here that we would never turn away, that we would grasp that truth as if it's the hour we first believe in the joy and the hope and the excitement of knowing that you have solved the problem of our sin. And that though we struggle today with its presence and power, that you have promised one day to put all things right, to right every wrong, to wipe away every tear, and to put everything under the lordship of your son. We just pray that those would not be abstract theological truth, but that would be the uh life-changing hope Paul talks about, or that the eyes of enlightening the eyes of our heart as he prays in the features, that you would do that for us so that we could see clearly and hold fast to the truth of Justin.