Colossians 1:20-23
Here is the Word .doc for the following lesson. Colossians Study 5
It was in a church in Munich that I saw him—a balding, heavyset man in a gray overcoat, a brown felt hat clutched between his hands. People were filing out of the basement room where I had just spoken, moving along the rows of wooden chairs to the door at the rear. It was 1947 and I had come from Holland to defeated Germany with the message that God forgives.
“It was the truth they needed most to hear in that bitter, bombed-out land, and I gave them my favorite mental picture. Maybe because the sea is never far from a Hollander’s mind, I liked to think that that’s where forgiven sins were thrown. ‘When we confess our sins,’ I said, ‘God casts them into the deepest ocean, gone forever. …’
“The solemn faces stared back at me, not quite daring to believe. There were never questions after a talk in Germany in 1947. People stood up in silence, in silence collected their wraps, in silence left the room.
“And that’s when I saw him, working his way forward against the others. One moment I saw the overcoat and the brown hat; the next, a blue uniform and a visored cap with its skull and crossbones. It came back with a rush: the huge room with its harsh overhead lights; the pathetic pile of dresses and shoes in the center of the floor; the shame of walking naked past this man. I could see my sister’s frail form ahead of me, ribs sharp beneath the parchment skin. Betsie, how thin you were!
[Betsie and I had been arrested for concealing Jews in our home during the Nazi occupation of Holland; this man had been a guard at Ravensbruck concentration camp where we were sent.]
“Now he was in front of me, hand thrust out: ‘A fine message, Fräulein! How good it is to know that, as you say, all our sins are at the bottom of the sea!’
“And I, who had spoken so glibly of forgiveness, fumbled in my pocketbook rather than take that hand. He would not remember me, of course—how could he remember one prisoner among those thousands of women?
“But I remembered him and the leather crop swinging from his belt. I was face-to-face with one of my captors and my blood seemed to freeze.
“ ‘You mentioned Ravensbruck in your talk,’ he was saying, ‘I was a guard there.’ No, he did not remember me.
“ ‘But since that time,’ he went on, ‘I have become a Christian. I know that God has forgiven me for the cruel things I did there, but I would like to hear it from your lips as well. Fräulein,’ again the hand came out—’will you forgive me?’
“And I stood there—I whose sins had again and again to be forgiven—and could not forgive. Betsie had died in that place—could he erase her slow terrible death simply for the asking?
“It could not have been many seconds that he stood there—hand held out—but to me it seemed hours as I wrestled with the most difficult thing I had ever had to do.
“For I had to do it—I knew that. The message that God forgives has a prior condition: that we forgive those who have injured us. ‘If you do not forgive men their trespasses,’ Jesus says, ‘neither will your Father in heaven forgive your trespasses.’
“I knew it not only as a commandment of God, but as a daily experience. Since the end of the war I had had a home in Holland for victims of Nazi brutality. Those who were able to forgive their former enemies were able also to return to the outside world and rebuild their lives, no matter what the physical scars. Those who nursed their bitterness remained invalids. It was as simple and as horrible as that.
“And still I stood there with the coldness clutching my heart. But forgiveness is not an emotion—I knew that too. Forgiveness is an act of the will, and the will can function regardless of the temperature of the heart. ‘… Help!’ I prayed silently. ‘I can lift my hand. I can do that much. You supply the feeling.’
“And so woodenly, mechanically, I thrust my hand into the one stretched out to me. And as I did, an incredible thing took place. The current started in my shoulder, raced down my arm, sprang into our joined hands. And then this healing warmth seemed to flood my whole being, bringing tears to my eyes.
“ ‘I forgive you, brother!’ I cried. ‘With all my heart!’
“For a long moment we grasped each other’s hands, the former guard and the former prisoner. I had never known God’s love so intensely, as I did then”
Stories about forgiveness and reconciliation are powerful and strike a chord with us. And think about this for a moment. What are the stories that resound most deeply with us? It is the reunion of a guard and prisoner. It is the story of a Steve Saint who baptizes the Auca Indian who murdered his father. They are the stories that center upon the vilest of offenses committed against the weakest of us. The greater the crime, the greater the reconciliation.
This is why we are drawn to these stories. In us lives the innate understanding of the guilt we have perpetrated against the guiltless one. We have brutally and viciously engaged in rebellious acts against our God and King. We long for any hope that we too, “the worst of sinners”, may be reconciled. So enters the great reconciler.
“ and through him to reconcile all things to himself by making peace through the blood of his cross – through him, whether things on earth or things in heaven. And you were at one time strangers and enemies in your minds as expressed through your evil deeds, but now he has reconciled you by his physical body through death to present you holy, without blemish, and blameless before him – if indeed you remain in the faith, established and firm, without shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard. This gospel has also been preached in all creation under heaven, and I, Paul, have become its servant. ”
(Colossians 1:20–23, NET)
Since completing the introductory portion of his letter, Paul turned his attention on magnifying Christ. The unseen God revealed in the visible person of Jesus Christ. All things, seen and unseen, good and bad were made by Him, were made for Him and are presently being sustained by Him. And though He reigns perfectly and supremely in this world, it would seem that all is not quite right. His creation wars against Him. This hostility is no reflection upon His character; it’s a mirror of our own. And He could allow us to remain at enmity with Him eternally and remain perfectly Holy and Just. Yet He has sovereignly and graciously determined to reconcile us unto Himself. We will look at the:
- Summary of Reconciliation – vs.20
- Condition Prior to Reconciliation – vs.21
- Means of Reconciliation – vs.22a
- Purpose of Reconciliation – vs.22b
- Evidence of Reconciliation – vs.23
Summary of Reconciliation
“ and through him to reconcile all things to himself by making peace through the blood of his cross – through him, whether things on earth or things in heaven.”
What does reconciliation mean? The verb katallassō, from where we get our word “reconciled”, means “exchange” or “to change”. Paul adds the little preposition “apo” to the beginning of the verb in our verse to intensify its meaning and thus reveal that we are thoroughly, completely, and totally changed. But if we leave our understanding there, we have robbed Christ of great glory. For how can we truly express thankfulness if we do not acknowledge who brought about the action? Our reconciliation, both corporately as an elect people and individually is a supernatural change performed by Jesus Christ the Righteous. Our change in position before God is not owed to our good sense and superior reasoning capacity. It is the unspeakable gracious gift of God.
We have learned that reconciled means “to change”, but what has changed? Paul answers by stating that we now are at peace with God. The world we now live in is a horribly marred version of the perfection that God created. The warring that takes place between and among weather, man and animals are simply emblematic of the ultimate warring that is taking place by man against God. Just as things were good when He created all things, “God saw all that He had made, and behold, it was very good” (Gen. 1:31), they will one day be again. He will re-create a new Heaven and Earth, Revelation 21. Animals will lose their instinctual thirst for blood, Isaiah 11:6-9. Even fallen men and angels will be reconciled, in a sense. They will change from being the enemies of God to the judged of God.
Condition Prior to Reconciliation
“Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior.” I had a political science teacher in college who once quoted a story told about the author Henry David Thoreau that recounted a deathbed conversation he is said to have had with his aunt. She said, “Henry, have you made your peace with God?” He answered, “I didn’t know that we had ever quarreled.”
We are in such great need of change because no other of God’s creation has fallen quite so far as that of man. We are the unique bearers of the image of the Holy One. Yet our appearance is more a kin of Satan than that of God.
“As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath. ” (Ephesians 2:1–3, NIV)
“As it is written: “There is no one righteous, not even one; there is no one who understands, no one who seeks God. All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one.” “Their throats are open graves; their tongues practice deceit.” “The poison of vipers is on their lips.” “Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness.” “Their feet are swift to shed blood; ruin and misery mark their ways, and the way of peace they do not know.” “There is no fear of God before their eyes.”” (Romans 3:10–18, NIV)
Our condition is not serious. Ours is hopeless. We have declared the only one who can help us as our enemy. We are aliens. Paul used the same word here:
“remember that you were at that time separate from Christ, excluded from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. ” (Ephesians 2:12, NAS)
“being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their heart; ” (Ephesians 4:18, NAS)
We had been excluded from the favor of God. The only presence of God that we would know would be His bitter wrath at judgment. Our punishment would be entirely just, for we have made ourselves to be the enemies of our King. And in his righteousness all rebellion must be put down. We make our enmity known by virtue of our wicked behaviour. It has been well said that “we are not sinners because we sin; we sin because we are sinners.” Paul maintains that the former actions of the Colossian believers bore witness to the fact that they lived in abject rebellion to God’s rule.
Means of Reconciliation
“But now he has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body through death”, vs20 says “the blood of His Cross”
To understand the significance and efficacy of substitutionary atonement we must look to the OT. In fact, it is in the first verses of Genesis when the idea is introduced to us. After the fall of Adam, God intervenes upon their helpless condition and personally sacrifices one of His one creation to cover (atone) their nakedness (Gen 3:21). It is in vs.15 of that chapter that Christ’s death is foretold, “And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; He shall bruise you on the head, and you shall bruise him on the heel.”
The following chapter tells us about the inadequacy of a non-blood sacrifice, when Cain’s offering of vegetation is rejected by God. The sacrificial structure is systematized in the book of Leviticus as a means of pointing towards the true and final offering. The first thing that is abundantly clear though, is that blood must be shed, “And according to the Law…without shedding of blood there is no forgiveness. ” (Hebrews 9:22, NAS). Be sure it is understood that in the O.T. way of thinking, “blood shedding” is equated with a sure, certain and violent death. The second is that the innocent must perish for the guilty. This is portrayed in the restrictions that were placed on type and condition of animal that were permitted to play this role in the sacrificial system.
The constraints and ordinances established in the Levitical system were enormous, cumbersome, complex and restrictive. But when you consider how High and Holy God is, and how lowly, wicked, vile and depraved is man. The idea that God condescended Himself to man’s approach at all, is an incredibly unspeakable act of His mercy. This was all done to pave the way for this.
“When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the written code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; he took it away, nailing it to the cross. And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.” (Colossians 2:13–15, NIV)
Purpose of Reconciliation
And why was this done? As an example of personal sacrifice? No! God’s ultimate goal in reconciliation is to present His elect holy and pure before Him. ” to present you holy in his sight, without blemish and free from accusation”. Let me make a point that is essential as it has to do with Christ’s work on our behalf. Forgiveness does not mean Holiness. Just because I lack guilt, doesn’t mean I possess Holiness. And without Holiness, no man shall see God. We need to be Holy and righteous to stand before Him. The problem is, even without our sin, we have none. So again enters Christ. “and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. ” (Philippians 3:9, NIV). Does anyone know what we call this theological term? Imputation. This is the great trade off. “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. ” (2 Corinthians 5:21, NIV)
Evidence of Reconciliation
For those who have known Christ for any length of time at all, one of the hardest to understand truths we have come to know is that not everyone who professes to be a Christian actually is. At the end of our Lord’s sermon on the mount he warned that, “ ‘Many will say to Me on that day, “Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?” And then I will declare to them, “I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness” ’ ” (Matt. 7:22–23).
There are many evidences that demonstrate genuine salvation, but none more significant than that given here. “if you continue in your faith, established and firm, not moved from the hope held out in the gospel. This is the gospel that you heard and that has been proclaimed to every creature under heaven, and of which I, Paul, have become a servant. ”
Real faith never finally and completely fails. It might stumble and fall, but it always perseveres. The word “if” here is not ean (ἑαν), an unfulfilled, hypothetical condition used with the subjunctive mode, presenting the possibility of a future realization, but ei (εἰ) with the indicative, having here the idea of “assuming that you continue in the faith.” I like the NLT translation of this verse. “But you must continue to believe this truth and stand firmly in it. Don’t drift away from the assurance you received when you heard the Good News.” (Colossians 1:23, NLT)
Continuance in the gospel as it was preached by Paul would show that the person was saved and thus would be presented holy, without blemish, and unchargeable before God. That is, Paul was here addressing truly born-again Colossians, not unsaved professors of Christianity who would follow the Colossian heresy.
Wuest, K. S. (1997). Wuest’s word studies from the Greek New Testament : For the English reader (Col 1:23). Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.
Paul wouldn’t allow there to be any confusion over exactly what they were to continue in. They were to hold fast to the good news taught to them by the apostles. All other messages were to be ignored. This was a topic that Paul felt very strong about.
“But even if we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to what we have preached to you, he is to be accursed! ” (Galatians 1:8, NAS)
There are many responses that these verses could generate. Let me give you three.
- Exultation
- Exaltation
- Preparation