Colossians 1:19-23

In Jesus is the fullness of the Godhead. In Him, through God’s salvation gift, we live.

John 3:17 17 For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.

Romans 5:10 For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life.

Grace, blessed, grace the eternal gift that cannot be purchased by our works but only through the birth, death and resurrection of our Savior, Jesus Christ. It is up to us individually to accept this gift!

Recently I was listening to a popular Christian radio broadcast, and a caller phoned in and said that their biggest struggle to faith was believing they were worthy of God’s salvation. The radio DJ agreed with this plight and encouraged the caller they were worthy of it. I turned down the radio and told my daughter’s that’s not how the Gospel works, and there are many well-meaning Christians who struggle for failing to recognize this truth - None of us are worthy of God’s love and salvation, that’s what makes it “amazing grace.” 

God loves us simply because we are His. God is love, and so He loves us first. Only Jesus lived the perfect life that is worthy of God’s salvation. We receive this life through faith in Christ because of God’s grace. Jesus died in our place, receiving the punishment due for our sins, and Jesus rose from the dead, defeating the death our sins deserved. We now receive spiritual life through faith alone in Christ Jesus alone. 

We celebrated Easter yesterday, but Easter is paramount to our Christian faith because it is the catalyst that brings people created in God’s image back to abundant life, every single day of the year. All glory be to God for raising unworthy sinners back to life, an abundant life, through faith in Jesus Christ our Lord.  Just a Navy Wife@first5

“Well, nobody else can live the life you live,” Mr. Rogers reminds us. “And even though no human being is perfect, we always have the chance to bring what's unique about us to live in a redeeming way.” SabbathMoments 

Colossians 1:19-23

19 For it pleased the Father that in Him all the fullness should dwell, 20 and by Him to reconcile all things to Himself, by Him, whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross. 21 And you, who once were alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now He has reconciled 22 in the body of His flesh through death, to present you holy, and blameless, and above reproach in His sight—23 if indeed you continue in the faith, grounded and steadfast, and are not moved away from the hope of the gospel which you heard, which was preached to every creature under heaven, of which I, Paul, became a minister. The New King James Version

All the fullness to dwell in Him refers to God being fully present in Christ.

Consequently, Christ is sufficient for the Colossians’ salvation. This phrase echoes the glory of God filling of the tabernacle 

In the ancient world, people believed that deities lived on high places such as mountains. For example, when the Israelites entered the wilderness, God met them on a mountain in Exodus. But God did not stay on the mountain; He instructed the Israelites to build a tabernacle—a dwelling place for Him to live among His people. God came down and filled the tabernacle with His glory as a sign of His presence among them. 

The prophet Isaiah interpreted this cloud of glory as the Holy Spirit. This gracious act was God’s extension of friendship to the Israelites. The Gospel of John describes Christ as the tabernacle or the dwelling of God—an allusion that demonstrates the continuity between God’s presence among the Israelites and His presence in the person of Christ. 

The Greek word used here, apokatallassō, refers to the act of restoring a relationship to harmony. The purpose of Christ’s death on the cross was to bring all things created by Christ and for Christ  into harmonious relationship.

Christ was not an angel or a nonphysical being; He had a body, and He endured suffering and death in His body. By emphasizing Christ’s physical body, Paul may be combatting early gnostic-like influences that could have been at work in Colossae. Gnostics emphasized spiritual, nonmaterial reality over the material world, prompting some people to deny that Christ had a physical body. Gnostics wrongly considered material reality to be evil and sought to escape it through abstaining from worldly comforts and pleasures. While fully developed Gnosticism postdates the new testament, the beliefs Paul seems to be addressing here resemble later gnostic thought. 

Holy describes belonging to or being set apart for God. The Colossians cannot claim responsibility for their status before God; no human tradition or rule made them holy. Rather, Christ’s work of reconciliation brought them into relationship with God, making them holy. 

Since believers belong to God, they bear His image, which enables them to live out God’s command to holiness. Paul seems to be acknowledging that the Colossians are at a crossroads. He charges them to continue trusting in Christ and living out the gospel message. However, they must refuse to observe the rules and traditions of false teachings, which threaten to lead them in a different direction. They must remember that faith in Christ is not simply a way of entering God’s kingdom—it is the way of life within the kingdom. Faith Refers to living in union with Christ and sharing in Christ’s resurrection. Faithlife Study Bible

The opponents of Paul, and later the Greek Gnostics, seem to have used this word fullness as a technical term for the sphere between heaven and earth where a hierarchy of angels lived. The Gnostics viewed Christ as one of many spirits existing in this hierarchy between God and all people. 

However, Paul used the term fullness to refer to the complete embodiment of God. Christ is the only Intercessor for human beings and fully embodies all of God’s nature. No other intermediary, whether person or group, is able to stand in our place before the Father. Only Jesus can do this. 

He has reconciled: this phrase shows the significance of Christ’s work on the Cross. It does not mean that all people will be saved, since many passages clearly say that unbelievers will suffer eternal separation from God. The work of Christ will overthrow the damage effected by the Fall and change all of creation from a position of enmity to a relationship of peace and friendship.

The false teachers at Colosse were telling the believers that redemption could only be accomplished through a spiritual being. They rejected Christ’s incarnation. According to them, Jesus could not have had a physical body. Thus Paul uses two terms, body and flesh, to clearly state that Christ became man and experienced a physical death. 

We who were once enemies of God and alienated by our own wicked works will one day be presented as above reproach on account of Christ’s death for us.

 

The perseverance of the Colossians was proof of the reconciling work of Christ on their behalf The apostles are said to have turned the world upside down, even though their ministry up to that point had been limited to a small portion of the eastern Mediterranean region. The NKJV Study Bible

John 1:16 And of His fullness we have all received, and grace for grace.

2 Corinthians 5:18 Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation,

Ephesians 2:14 For He Himself is our peace, who has made both one, and has broken down the middle wall of separation,

Ephesians 2:16 and that He might reconcile them both to God in one body through the cross, thereby putting to death the enmity.