Level Up July 21

Level Up – The Epistles Summer 2024 Colossians ◼ Introduction – NIV Study Bible o Author ▪ Paul (Colossians 1:1) o Date and Place of Writing ▪ A.D. 60 ▪ Paul’s first imprisonment in Rome (Acts 28:16-31) o Recipients ▪ The church at Colosse ▪ Colosse had been a leading city in Asia Minor at one point, but by the first century it had been surpassed by Laodicea and Hierapolis (4:13).

▪ A believer named Epaphras had been converted and had brought the gospel to Colosse (1:7-8; Acts 19:10). The young church had been subjected to an heretical attack. o Purpose – Why did Paul write this letter?

▪ Paul’s purpose is to refute the Colossian Heresy: • Ceremonialism: Strict rules about food and drink, religious festivals (2:16-17), and circumcision (2:11; 3:11).

• Asceticism: “Do not handle! Do not taste! Do not touch!” (2:21) • Angel worship: 2:18 • Deprecation of Christ: (1:15-20; 2:2-3; 2:9) • Secret knowledge (2:2-3; 2:18) • Reliance on human wisdom (2:4,8) o What does the beginning of the letter tell us? 1 Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of Goda, and Timothy our brother, 2 To God’s holy people in Colossae, the faithfulb brothers and sisters in Christ: Grace and peace to you from God our Father. 3 We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, 4 because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all God’s people— 5 the faith and love that spring from the hope stored up for you in heaven and about which you have already heard in the true message of the gospelc 6 that has come to you. In the same way, the gospel is bearing fruit and growing throughout the whole world—just as it has been doing among you since the day you heard it and truly understood God’s graced. 7 You learned it from Epaphrase, our dear fellow servant, who is a faithful minister of Christ on our behalf, 8 and who also told us of your love in the Spirit.

▪ aPaul speaks against the heretics with his apostolic authority.

▪ bThe word for faithful literally means “believing.” Again the emphasis is on the truth of the gospel as opposed to the heresies being taught.

▪ c”True message” refers again to the truth of the gospel. Paul will refute at least six false teachings in this short letter.

▪ dThe heretical teachings focused on behaviors to avoid. Paul will remind them that the good news of the gospel is grace.

▪ ePaul reminds them that the first person who told them about Jesus had his stamp of approval.

◼ The Bible Project – highlights o The letter is addressed to a group of people that Paul had never met who made up a church community that he did not start.

▪ This church in Colossae was started by a co-worker of Paul's named Epaphras who was actually from that city.

▪ Epaphras had recently visited Paul in prison and he updated him on how well the Colossians were doing overall.

▪ But he also mentioned some of the cultural pressures tempting them to turn away from Jesus.

▪ Paul wrote this letter to encourage the Colossians to address the issues that Epaphras had raised and then to challenge them to a greater devotion to Jesus. o The letter's design and flow of thought are pretty easy to follow.

▪ The opening movement focuses on Jesus as the exalted Messiah.

▪ Paul then goes on to show how his suffering in prison is for the exalted Jesus.

▪ Then he addresses the pressures tempting the Colossians to turn away from Jesus.

▪ After this he explores the new way of life that Jesus's resurrection opened up for them. o The letter opens with two prayers.

▪ 1:3-8 – Paul first thanks God that he learned from Epaphras that the Colossians have been totally faithful to Jesus, showing love for God and their neighbors all because of the hope they have in the new creation that Jesus has in store.

▪ 1:9-14 – He moves on to pray that they would grow in their wisdom and understanding about Jesus.

▪ Key text – 1:13-14 - 13 For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, 14 in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. o Then Paul has placed a poem here to help the Colossians and us do exactly that.

▪ 1:15-20 – It is the centerpiece of chapter 1, a poem all about the crucified and exalted Messiah.

▪ It has two parallel stanzas. The first stanza explores how Jesus is the true image of God. • In him the full character and purpose of God is embodied in a human.

• He is the firstborn, an Old Testament phrase about Jesus' royal status over all creation.

• He shares in the very identity of the one true creator God. • By him, all reality, all powers and authorities, spiritual and human, have been created.

• It is in Jesus the Messiah that we discover the very author and king of creation.

▪ In the second stanza we discover he is also the one bringing about a new creation.

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He is the head of a new body, which refers to Jesus' people who were the new humanity of which his own resurrection existence is a prototype.

• In him, God's glorious temple presence dwells.

• It is through Jesus's death and resurrection that God has reconciled himself to humanity, to all spiritual powers, to all of creation.

▪ Key text: 1:15-20 (see below). o Paul then shows how the truth of this poem transforms his own experience of suffering in prison.

▪ 1:21-28 ▪ He is being punished for announcing to the Greek and the Roman world that Jesus is the resurrected Lord and king of all.

▪ So his suffering, he thinks, is not a sign of defeat.It is actually his way of participating in Jesus's own suffering, done as an act of love. So his hardships are actually a cause for joy.

▪ He is imprisoned for the surprising news that Israel's resurrected Messiah is creating a new multi-ethnic family.

▪ And more: just as the divine glory dwelt in Jesus, so Jesus dwells in and among his international family.

▪ Or, as Paul says, the Messiah is in you all, the hope of glory.

▪ Key text: 1:27-29 - 27 To them God has chosen to make known among the Gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. 28 He is the one we proclaim, admonishing and teaching everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone fully mature in Christ. 29 To this end I strenuously contend with all the energy Christ so powerfully works in me. o Paul then addresses the cultural pressures that are tempting the Colossians to turn away from Jesus.

▪ 2:1-23 ▪ They were confronted by a combination of mystical polytheism along with a pressure to observe the laws of the Torah.

▪ So, all these new Christians had grown up worshipping the various Greek and Roman gods who govern different arenas of human life. Many simply included Jesus as one more deity that they could worship.

▪ There was also a great pressure from the Jewish Christian community for these non-Jews to complete their commitment to the Messiah by following all of the laws found in the Torah.

▪ Specifically, he mentions eating a kosher diet, observing sacred days and circumcision.

▪ It is very similar to the problem he addressed in the letter to the Galatians.

▪ For Paul, to give in to either of these temptations is compromised. It is a failure to grasp who Jesus really is and what he did on their behalf.

▪ The Colossians used to live in fear of spiritual powers and elemental spirits, as Paul calls them, but Jesus triumphed over these through his death and resurrection. He freed the Colossians from any obligation to them.

In the same way, Jesus fulfilled on our behalf all of the laws of the Torah, which never had the power to transform the selfish human heart anyway.

▪ So, what Jesus did in his life and death and resurrection lacks nothing. It doesn't need to be supplemented by following the laws. He is the reality to which all of the laws of the Torah were pointing anyway.

▪ Instead of the laws, followers of Jesus have the power of his resurrection to change them, which is what he goes on to explore.

▪ Key text: 2:6-7 - 6 So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live your lives in him, 7 rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness. o Following Jesus means joining his new humanity because their lives have now been joined to the risen Jesus' life.

▪ 3:1-11 – This is why Paul challenges the Colossians to set their minds on things above, where the Messiah is seated, or rules, at God's right hand.

▪ Now Paul does not mean here, think about how you will one day leave Earth and go to heaven.

▪ Rather, the heavens are the transcendent place from which Jesus rules now over all of creation. From there, he will one day return here to transform all things, or, as Paul says, when the Messiah who is your life is revealed, you too will be revealed with him in glory.

▪ Key text: 3:1-4 - Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. 3 For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. 4 When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory. o Paul challenges them to live in the present as the kinds of new humans they will one day become.

▪ 3:12-17 ▪ He uses the image of their old humanity characterized by distorted sexuality and destructive speech.

▪ For Christians, that humanity died with Jesus and has been replaced by his own new humanity, which is characterized by mercy and generosity, by forgiveness and love.

▪ This humanity transcends the ethnic and social boundary lines of our world to create, in Paul's words, a people where there is no one Greek or Jewish, circumcised or uncircumcised, slave or free, but the Messiah is all and is in all people.

▪ Key text: 3:17 - 17 And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. o Paul then gets really practical in addressing “whatever you do.”

▪ 3:18-4:1 ▪ He shows the Colossians what this new humanity might look like in a first century Roman household, which was a highly authoritarian institution where the male patriarch held the power of life and death over his wife, children and slaves.

▪ Not so in a Christian household. Here the risen Jesus is the true Lord.

▪ So in the Lord, the wife allows her husband to become responsible for her.

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And the husband is subject to Jesus by loving his wife and placing her well-being above his own.

▪ In a home where Jesus is Lord, children are not objects but are called to maturity and to respect.

▪ Parents are to raise their children with patience and understanding.

▪ Christians who are slaves are to honor their human masters precisely because they are not the real master. Jesus is.

▪ And Christians who have slaves are to understand that this slave is not their property, but rather a fellow member of Jesus's body to be honored and embraced in love.

▪ He is reshaping the most basic Roman institution around Jesus, who rules by his self-giving love.

▪ So while he does not abolish the household structure outright, the exalted Messiah demands that it be transformed almost beyond the point of recognition for any Roman living in Colossae. o You can see this most clearly in the letter's conclusion.

▪ 4:2-18 ▪ After a request for prayer, Paul applies these instructions about Christian slaves and masters.

▪ We discover that Tychicus is the one carrying and reading this letter to the Colossians.

▪ 4:9 – He is accompanied by a certain Onesimus who was a former slave to a Colossian Christian named Philemon.

▪ We discover from another letter addressed to Philemon that Onesimus had escaped from his master. It was a crime worthy of imprisonment.

▪ But Paul asks the whole church to greet Onesimus as a faithful and beloved brother in the Lord.

▪ In the letter to Philemon, Paul says that he should receive Onesimus no longer as a slave, but as a brother. Whoa.

▪ Key text: Colossians 4:2-6 - 2 Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. 3 And pray for us, too, that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ, for which I am in chains. 4 Pray that I may proclaim it clearly, as I should. 5 Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity. 6 Let your conversation be always full of grace,seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone. o In the letter to the Colossians, Paul is inviting us to see that no part of human existence remains untouched by the loving and liberating rule of the risen Jesus.

▪ Our suffering, our temptation to compromise, our moral character, the power dynamics in our homes, all of it must be re-examined and transformed.

▪ We are invited to live in the present as if the new creation really arrived when Jesus rose from the dead.

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Practice

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15 The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.16 For in him

all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him. 17 He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. 18 And he is the head of the body, the church;he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy. 19 For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, 20 and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.

Practice – How does Paul exalt Christ in Colossians 1:15-20?

1:15 – 1:16 – 1:17 – 1:18 – 1:19 – 1:20 –