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Colossians Part 15 – Friends

Oct 10

Posted by Bo in Colossians

Colossians 4:7-18

Here is the Word .doc for the following lesson. Colossians Study 15

Friends

Colossians Study

Friends

What would you think if I sang out of tune, Would you stand up and walk out on me.

Lend me your ears and I’ll sing you a song, And I’ll try not to sing out of key.

Oh I get by with a little help from my friends…

We are at the end of this wonderful letter to the Colossians.  Filled with some of the most wide ranging doctrinal truth found anywhere in scripture.  It’s easy to forget that what we have been reading and studying is a letter.  To be sure, we understand that most deeply we consider these words the revelation of God, penned by Paul under inspiration of the Holy Spirit.  But the vehicle that this disclosure was made by is in the form of a letter.  And so it bears the personalization that any correspondence of that sort would bear.  So in closing, Paul send greetings on behalf of those who have labored diligently with him.

Tychicus

“Tychicus will tell you all about my activities. He is a beloved brother and faithful minister and fellow servant in the Lord. I have sent him to you for this very purpose, that you may know how we are and that he may encourage your hearts, ” (Colossians 4:7–8, ESV)

Tychicus is mentioned 5 times in the NT.  The first is in Acts 20:4 at the end of Paul’s third missionary journey.  A collection was being taken up from the Asia Minor churches to be presented to the believers in Jerusalem who were suffering deeply at the time.  There was full fledged persecution going on from all sides at this point and Paul had a target on him.  So as we read of the proximity of Tychicus to Paul we can appreciate his commitment to Paul and his love for the Gospel of Christ.

When our letter finds him, it has been 4 years since they first met in Ephesus and 2 years since Paul’s Jerusalem arrest.  He has faced numerous assassination attempts, multiple trials and jailings; still Tychicus is by his side.  So it is not surprising when it comes to the important duty of delivering this letter, along with those to the Ephesians and Philemon, that Paul selects Tychicus as the letter bearer.  And if you remember our early lessons you’ll understand that he has no easy task before him.  The trip from Rome to Colossae was a difficult one. Tychicus would first have to cross much of Italy on foot, then sail across the Adriatic Sea. After traversing Greece on foot, he would sail across the Aegean Sea to the coast of Asia Minor. After all that, he still faced a journey of nearly one hundred miles on foot to reach Colossae.  Well over a 1,000 miles in all.

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Colossians Part 14 – Speech

Sep 26

Posted by Bo in Colossians

Colossians 4:2-6

Here is the Word .doc for the following lesson. Colossians Study 14

Speech

“Continue steadfastly in prayer, being watchful in it with thanksgiving. At the same time, pray also for us, that God may open to us a door for the word, to declare the mystery of Christ, on account of which I am in prison— that I may make it clear, which is how I ought to speak. Walk in wisdom toward outsiders, making the best use of the time. Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person. ” (Colossians 4:2–6, ESV)

Ever since we started chapter three, Paul has convincingly made the case that a true knowledge of the Holy God will inevitably lead to a life that increasingly reflects that very Holiness.  Sadly, most of modern evangelicalism has decided that the quickest and surest way to Godliness is through busyness.  Oftentimes, activity serves as the substitute for an authentic understanding of God.  Let’s no longer fall into this trap.  This and the other NT epistles serve as a perfect reminder for the priority of thought before action.  You’ll find that each of them frontloaded with information about the person and work of God and His Christ, followed by the inevitable responses to that knowledge.  So it is with that understanding that we follow Paul’s lead as to the direction of our speech towards God and man.

Speech Towards God

It was back in our third lesson in this series where we last looked at Paul’s words on prayer.  Those were back in 1:9-14.  Those verses centered on how Paul and friends had been praying for the Colossian believers.  The thing that struck us the most about the content of that prayer was the absence of the rather mundane temporal things that most often occupy our prayer requests.  Nothing about refinancing the mortgage, which new car to buy or whether to vacation in Cabo or the Bahamas.

“And so, from the day we heard, we have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God. 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 in light. He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. ” (Colossians 1:9–14, ESV)

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Watch Your Step Calvin

Sep 20

Posted by Bo in Humor

Calvin and Hobbes

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Colossians Part 13 – Home

Sep 15

Posted by Bo in Colossians

Colossians 3:18-4:1

Here is the Word .doc for the following lesson. Colossians Study 13

Home

A drum that Paul has consistently beat throughout this letter has been the importance of the Church.  You don’t need to look very far in order to understand just how important a role the Church is to play in our lives.  In the passage before us Paul provides brief, direct instructions on Christian living in the home.  He discusses the three relationships in ancient homes: Husbands and wives (3:18–19), parents and children (3:20–21), and masters and servants (3:22–4:1).  This is where we live our lives.  All the play-acting is over now.  If you’ve somehow feel that you’ve escaped the previous verses unaffected this are sure to change that.  The three relationships Paul takes up are the most fundamental to our lives.  This is where we are known for who we really are and is consequently where we are to shine the Glory of Christ most brightly.  For you see, this portion of scripture is not preeminently about having a fulfilled marriage and a good relationship with your kids.  Wives submitting to their husbands and husbands loving their wives is most deeply about manifesting the Mystery of the Church.  So first we are going to look at the mystery.  What it means, who it refers to and the place we play in it.  Then we will keep those glasses on as we look at marriage.  And we have to keep those glasses on because we have been so inundated with duty driven messages about this text that I fear our conditioning will tell us to white knuckle our way through these commands.  This entire chapter has been filled with “do this” and “don’t do that”.  Putting to death lusts and passions; putting away anger and malice are not primarily acts of our self-will.  Most supremely, they are outgrowths of the transformation that the Holy Spirit has wrought in our lives.  But we are fallen and depraved creatures who so often want the security that a checklist provides. Evidence that we are truly pleasing God.  Without which we feel helpless.  John Piper put it this way.

Manageable, duty-defined, decision-oriented, willpower Christianity now seemed easy, and real Christianity had become impossible.  The emotions—or affections, as former generations called them—which I was now free to enjoy, proved to be beyond my reach. The Christian life became impossible. That is, it became supernatural.  Now there was only one hope, the sovereign grace of God. God would have to transform my heart to do what a heart cannot make itself do, namely, want what it ought to want. Only God can make the depraved heart desire God.

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Colossians Part 12 – Peace

Sep 12

Posted by Bo in Colossians

Colossians 3:12-17

Here is the Word .doc for the following lesson. Colossians Study 12

Peace

Isn’t it easy to identify sin in the lives of those around us?  And by easy, I mean fun.  And by fun, I mean the challenge of examining the means and motives behind what:

  • kinds of cars that people drive,
  • the neighborhoods they live in,
  • how their kids behave,
  • the clothes they wear.

It’s a sad kind of board game where I jockey for spiritual superiority among my peers.  It serves the purpose of quieting my own conscience, albeit for shorter periods of time these days, it seems.  But none the less it’s a game I’ve been playing so well and for so long, why quit now?  Well Paul has certainly made it far less fun.  In the run-up to our verses tonight Paul has made some pretty brash statements.  Statements that, if taken at face value, which we should, call a number of activities what they are.  Sin.  Nor does he provide some fanciful means of abstaining from them.  Lust, anger, backbiting, filthy language, racism are referred to as the old clothes of our former life.  He tells us to simply take them off like you would any dirty shirt.  Except this shirt isn’t one that I’m supposed to run through the wash and put back on.  This is my normal course of life when dealing with sin.  Wear it until it becomes unmanageably and noticeably dirty, then wash it off.  The more I’ve thought about it, the more I’ve realized that this is how I’ve regimented myself to handle sin in my life.  Manage it.  Keep it “under control”.  That’s why I referred to Paul’s commands as brash or harsh.  He doesn’t seem to allow for me to play that game in any way.  In the book of Romans he wrote, “The night is almost gone, and the day is near. Therefore let us lay aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light. Let us behave properly as in the day, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual promiscuity and sensuality, not in strife and jealousy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh in regard to its lusts. ”, (Romans 13:12–14, NAS).  I’ll tell you what, “making no provision for the flesh” in my own life sure seems to cut in on discovering sin in other people’s lives.  Maybe that was what Paul had in mind as he wrote tonight’s verses.  Let’s back up and read last session’s verses at the front as well.

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