In this introductory sermon for a new series studying the book of Colossians, Pastor Joe Babij explains the background of the book and the apostle Paul’s original purpose in writing. Pastor Babij breaks down Paul’s original purpose into a three-fold intention:
1. Establish a rapport with the Colossian believers and express to them a pastoral concern for their spiritual health and wellbeing
2. Counteract the clever false teaching that had arisen in the church and that was now confusing believers
3. Warn the believers about a wrongheaded approach to Christian living that is the result of false teaching
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okay good morning let’s take our Bibles this morning and turn to Colossians that is the book that we’ll be looking at the letter Colossians I want to direct your attention to chapter 1 verse 15.
through verse 18. I just want to read that before I start Colossians 1 verse 15.
yeah says he is the image of the invisible God the firstborn of all creation for by him all things were created both in the heavens and on Earth visible and invisible whether Thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities all things have been created through him and for him he is before all things and in him all things hold together he is also the head of the body of the church and he is the beginning the firstborn from the dead so that he himself will come to have first place in everything let’s pray father this morning as we look at your word and as we get into this new epistle I pray Lord that you would bring out the truths in it to us for this very purpose that we would have a higher view of God in Christ than we ever had before help us to know Lord that the great attacks of all cults of all false teaching is to diminish Christ and I pray Lord that would not be something we would tolerate in our own lives and I prayed this in Christ’s name amen two of the most powerful words in advertising I have read about is new and free I tend to believe it because every day I get emails advertising something some new product and if you purchased a product in the next 10 minutes you get something free now then you think to yourself well that sounds like a pretty good deal I think I’ll check it out and sometimes you end up purchasing the new product maybe more than you often maybe more than you really do want to so when we come to the gospel message that echoed across the first century world both these elements were emphasized Ephesians chapter 2 says for by Grace you have been saved through faith and that not of yourselves it is a gift of God that means it’s free and then also in Ephesians it says so that in himself he might make the two into one new man thus a stem establishing peace so suddenly all the old categories people used to define themselves in all the old ways they attempted to understand the world and the relationships to the Divine were shattered all of a sudden and why is that because something new had come the gospel had come into the world and changed everything in fact if you look at chapter 3 verse number 11 it reads there a renewal in which there is no distinction between Greek and Jew circumcised and uncircumcised Barbarian Cynthia cynthian slave and free but Christ is all and in all now this was a new way to think this was a new way to look at things it was a man named Ralph Martin he observed a as far as this verse is concerned he said that in society of Christians a new type of humanity is being formed that Christ’s life flows out of his people and is reproduced in their midst and one proof of the new life was seen in the canceling of restrictions and the inhibitions which made the ancient world socially stratified and class conscious Paul has shown how the church he has shown how in the church barriers of race social distinctions and sex are being broken down as Christians act upon their baptismal profession of imitation in initiation into the body so some of these things are pretty much very much alive in our day keeping race and the division of races keeping class distinctions this all divides people but if you think about the church what happens in the church people get saved from all tribes and Nations and colors of skins and backgrounds and they come in and they’re unified and all those distinctions should drop down why because we are all one in Christ Christ is our answer he’s the one who brings Unity but many in the in the ancient world struggled against the idea of this new thinking they were attracted to the church but they adjusted Christ to their old categories they tried to Define Christianity in terms of human philosophy rather than letting Christ Define them in this new Humanity see we have the same problem for example two characteristic marks of the church are first it is a living organism in which everyone is to be interacting and involved with one another and yet often we treat the church as a business or as a democracy or we treat the church and social taboos according to Social taboos and norms and yet often we when we do this we we really are denying that the church is a living organism that should be functioning together with people’s spiritual gifts and everybody interacting and using those gifts to build up this body where all these distinctions have dropped away a second characteristic of the church is it should be at least Dynamic holiness which is marked really which is to Mark the character of Believers and the believing community and yet we persist in trying to Define our righteousness by the things we do and the things we don’t if I keep this list I’ll be a good Christian if I do these things and check these boxes I should grow and I should be a good uh member of the community so yeah we are tempted even they were tempted and we are tempted to put new wine in old wine skins and you know what happens when that takes place it ruptures so the church at colossi was being emptied of its power by a teacher who claimed Advanced knowledge and it’s the Greek word gonosis and they were attempting to fit Christianity into the old and empty philosophical system it was an early form of gnosticism gnosticism didn’t fully develop until the second century but Satan doesn’t care about that he’ll Implement anything he wants in the thinking he wants wherever he wants it if he’s going to divide people so when we are studying when we were studying through II Peter and Jude it became apparent very soon that false teachers had become a problem in the church now we come to Colossians and the problem here being addressed as you guessed it false teaching teaching that underminded the true gospel the difference between second Peter Jude and Colossians is that the false teaching influencing the Believers is not coming from a plurality of teachers at least initially but from a singular false teacher the colossian heresy rested on the authority of a singular false teacher meaning that one person could cause a lot of damage in the church if they have the wrong truth in the wrong Doctrine it’s like John Kitchen in his commentary he said like a spiritual guide claiming Superior insight into the spiritual realm and is insisting on certain rights and taboos and practices as means of protection from evil spirits and for deliverance from afflictions and calamities and Paul used used the single singular form to identify this person if you look at chapter 2 verse number eight notice what it says here it says C2 is that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deceit that no one is in the singular and then down to Colossians chapter 2 look at verse number 18 it says let no one keep defrauding you of your prize by delighting in self-abasement and the worship of angels and then taking his stand on Visions he has seen inflated without caused by his fleshly mind so there was some singular teacher that was having a great influence upon the Colossians and this church and so this false teacher though totally misunderstood the gospel of grace the person of Christ and holy spirit sanctification but they were concerned about issues explored by people of all ages questions like this and we all we’ve all had these questions what is God like and what is his relationship to the world or a question like how does a human being gain access to God’s true presence or how does the human being gain fullness of life this false teacher attempted to answer these questions not from any scriptural Foundation but from the particular philosophical way Colossians thought just like in America we all have a American philosophy of Life of thought were influenced by the culture or influence just like they were influenced and so what they try to do is they try to take the gospel and shove it in through the old philosophical system and that’s what you have coming out of Colossians see the heresy of Colossians was grounded in gnosis that is Advanced knowledge not gained from scripture but came from worldly wisdom or unknowable wisdom that came from somewhere else and that was also wrapped up in mystery if you notice in chapter 2 verse number eight the Apostle Paul defines it as see to it and no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deceit according to the tradition of men according to the elementary principles of the world rather than according to Christ so this means that they use their own terms to Define things and therefore redefining Christ and redefining the gospel in their own terms this is classic religion this is classic cults this is this is what they all do matter of fact this is a great model for them to follow and they have followed it in different ways so then the two greatest failures of the teaching of in colossian in colossi were that it disparaged Christ and therefore distorted distorted Christian Living and that’s why I read that passage and started off with that if the teaching that is being taught the Thrones Christ it not only robs him of his rightful place of preeminence but it also distorts all the foundational doctrines of the Christian faith and the Christian life becomes a set of man-made rules and regulations with no spiritual power and no ability to deal with the nature of sin and to put sins to death there’s no power for that and that’s what all religions do there’s no power to live a holy life or a Godly life see the falsehood this teacher espoused is exposed by Paul however Paul did not make a frontal assault on this false teaching like he did in second Peter in Jude his approach this time to this falsehood in colossi was a positive setting forth the truth of Christ from the scriptures in the power of the Holy Spirit so what was the reason for the writing of Colossians what was the reason for it it looks like a paparis look at verse number seven to chapter one just as you learned it from a Papyrus our beloved fellow Bond servant who’s a faithful servant of Christ on your behalf and then chapter 4 verse 12 he says a paparis who is one of your number a bond servant of Jesus Christ sends you his greetings always laboring earnestly for you in his prayers that you may stand perfect and fully assured in all the will of God so apapris was a lead elder or possibly the lead pastor of this church at colossi and he reported to Paul about the bothering circumstances at the church like the false ideas the T and the teachings that were being dispersed among the Believers that colossi and a paparis most likely sensed an apostle needed to confront this teacher and his teachings of which a Papyrus most likely felt unprepared to do himself he had a call in an apostle to do it so the Apostle of course responds to his request and he writes this epistle to the Colossians to him and in this epistle he has a three-fold intention three things are going on in the mind of Paul to write this letter and the first intention was this to establish a rapport with the colossian Believers and express to them his pastoral concern for their spiritual health and way well-being now why did he need to do that because Paul never visited colossi neither did he have part in founding it a paparis was his main connection to the church and so Paul also was concerned to strengthen the church and to confirm their adherence to the gospel which they already received and that’s what happens many times uh somebody gets saved the church gets planted and soon after that happens Satan comes in instead of person staying in one place to be established in the faith he pulls them out and sends them somewhere else and they never get back into the church he always wants to rob that seed he wants to Rob something from us and so right here we we see that one of the things that a paparis was telling to Paul about the church look at verse number four chapter one since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and the love which you have for all the saints in verse number 8 of chapter one he and he also informed us of Your Love in the spirit and then chapter 2 verse 1 Paul says I want you to know how great a struggle I have on your behalf and for those who are at laodicea and for all those who have not yet personally seen my face now Paul never visited there nobody nobody knew about Paul except a few people so he was trying to establish himself with them and his concerned with them and just say to them listen I am interested in you guys and I’m interested that you stay firm in the gospel and don’t move from there and I’m interested that the true gospel will prosper among you and keep planting seeds and developing fruit that was his first intention his second intention was of course to account to counteract the clever false teaching that has had Arisen in the church and was now confusing believers so he the false teacher or they because eventually his teaching trickled into other people and they ended up being teachers also so he and they were claiming for themselves in unusual degree of knowledge and learning and insight that did not come from scripture so what are their attempts in this clever teaching to answer these fundamental questions like what is God like well the Colossians philosophical mindset was that they saw all things in terms of two contrasting principles one principle was that on one side there was good which was associated with the spiritual and immaterial world and then on the other side there was evil which was associated with the material universe and never shall those two meet so they thought God himself was perfectly good spiritual and totally disassociated from the material world in fact they thought God did not create the material Universe he would not pollute himself with such conduct and for them the idea that God would become a man was unthinkable because God becoming material becoming flesh was Unthinkable to them and of course the Biblical teaching found in chapter 1 and verse 27 a very familiar verse and I believe one of the key verses in Colossians Christ in you the hope of glory Christ in you the hope of glory did not fit the Gnostic uh Gnostic philosophical categories it just didn’t fit anywhere because God can’t have anything to do with the chill Universe directly it had to be indirectly so not gnostics uh people with Advanced knowledge when I say that saw the human being as trapped a spark of the Divine held captive in human form so salvation meant release from bondage to all that was material including one’s own body so Resurrection was a horrible thought to them to come back and live in a body in this world again was horrible to them because the material cannot have part with the spiritual so that leads to the next question they tried to answer how does a human being gain access to God well Colossians philosophical colossian philosophical mindset was that they saw God as remote remote and inaccessible that God may be approached through a long chain of intermediaries that stretched between him and matter so Jesus Christ may be one of these intermediaries but low in rank because Jesus had contact with the world so just think of it like this it was a long chain and on on one side of the chain was the material world and on the other side of the chain was God but you couldn’t go directly to him you had to go from one Link in the chain to the next Link in the chain to the next Link in the chain to the next week in the chain and finally you would get to God and who was part of those links in the chain angels so Angels would be the would be the beings who formed the chain between man and God these powerful Angel angels were worshiped because human Destiny lay in their hands look at chapter 2 and verse number 18.
it says let no one keep defrauding you of your prize by delighting in self-abasement and the worship of angels so the worship of angels was definitely in the mindset of these false teachers that because God was pure and uh remote from man and because man was evil and material was evil you had to go through these angels to get to God so that brings if that’s the case then how does a human being gain fullness of life in this religious system how do they do it well the Colossians should practice the way of life laid out by their teachers who have this special knowledge so their way of life was is stressed asceticism it’s stressed rigid regulations it’s stress abstinence is stressed self-punishment The Liberation from evil from the evil fleshly body was a good thing to them and angels that go in between were honored by rituals and self-discipline so this is the way this is the way to have fullness in this world if you do these things so the the old idea of spiritual spirituality drastically distorted the biblical doctrines of the Christian faith and the Christian way of life in other words conversion and sanctification those are both things we need to understand as Christians and so right now this is completely distorted because they’re going to put up we’re going to see in a moment several things that you have to do to have fullness of life so this was the essence of their teaching and they were confusing Believers at colossi with their novel ideas and their false gospel and yet these teachers sounded so amazing I never heard this before this sounds good they sounded knowledgeable they sounded contemporary they were so up to date now I can I can get a handle on this and yet this false teaching had certain features to it that Paul addresses in this epistle and look at the first one in verse 16 and 17 of chapter 2.
in other words it held first of all a false legalism it says therefore no one is to act as your judge in regard to food or drink or in respect to festival or new moon or a Sabbath day now that means that this probably has some kind of Jewish roots to it Jews were involved with this teaching if they if they want to believe the Christian faith then they’re going to have to reinterpret things so it was ritualistic it insisted that the colossian Christians should observe religious days and seasons that was part of what was going on and then secondly it was also mystical look at Chapter 2 Verse 18 and 19.
there was a false spirituality to it it says let no one keep defrauding you of your prize by delighting in self-abasement and the worship of angels taking his stand on Visions he has seen inflated without cause by his fleshly mind so in other words it was a mystical Cult of Angel worship indulged in Praises of Visions only understood by certain people after a long period of thought that only this person could understand this and interpret it and tell you what to do so there was a false mystical spirituality and there is always mysticism in Cults and religions try to Define things in certain religions or ask them what do they really believe on this sometimes it’s very hard to do very hard to do even when I was a grew up as a Catholic I would ask my father all these questions why why you know why do we go in and give flowers that the May procession of Mary no answers he couldn’t answer he would get so frustrated that I would answer these things but why because everything the unbloody sacrifice of the mass is all very mysterious and so as long as it’s mysterious people get to the point where I don’t need to know what it is I just feel like I’m part of something spiritual I feel good when I go to church and I come out of church but never really learned anything doesn’t do anything in your life you just go back to the old way of life you lived before and then you go to church the next day or whatever you do that’s what religions usually happens in religions or there’s all this regulation on what to do and how to look and how to dress and how to act and all those things are all observed by others and if you step out of line then you get called out for it sometimes also this there was a feature of a false asceticism look at chapter 2 verse 20-23 it says here if you have died with Christ to the Elementary’s principles of the world why as if you were living in the world do you submit yourself to degrees such as do not handle do not taste do not touch which all refer to things destined to perish with use in accordance with the Commandments and teachings of men and then it says these are matters which have to be sure the appearance of wisdom in self-made religion and self-abasement and severe severe treatment of the body but are of no value against fleshly Indulgence so here we see that this worldly philosophy that is reinterpreted interpreting Christianity becomes a religious system and of course it always makes for a good religious system to do these things but there’s no power it says there’s no value against fleshly Indulgence there’s no power at all and then in contrast to all that I know I’m giving you a lot of stuff but you have to understand the book when you get to other things in contrast to that not like the seeming broken record of the Apostle Paul who was always talking about the cross and about the death of Christ and about his resurrection yet this was and is the only real message so then we and the Colossians always have to be brought back to the essence of the true Gospel of Jesus Christ that’s we we always have to be brought back to that back to that and why do we have to be back to that because it’s always the true gospel that Satan the God of this world system will rentlessly uh attack he will come against it he will come against it he is coming against it now Martin Lloyd Jones says the Christian faith is not what I think it is not what you think it is what it’s not what anybody else thinks it is what is plainly taught in Scripture the gospel is really clear the Christian church is firmly established upon the foundation of the Apostles and the prophets Christ being the Chief Cornerstone so the Gospel of Jesus Christ is a very clear and simple method and so that means the third intention Paul had for writing was to warn the Believers in colossi about the wrong-headed approaches to the Christian Life and Ministry that were resulting from false teaching again in chapter 2 verse number eight see to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deception in verse 16 of chapter 2 therefore no one is to act as your judge and then in verse number 18 let no one be defrauding you and then in verse 23 these are matters which have to be sure the appearance of wisdom but just self-made religion the you know the full the harsh treatment of the body and of course with has no value for sanctification you cannot be Sanctified like this so the description of the true gospel message found in verse number 28 of verse number one it says we Proclaim we Proclaim admonishing every man and teaching every man with all wisdom so that we may present every man complete in Christ so once someone hears the message proclaimed then all of a sudden they get into the teaching and what the teaching does is mature them and sanctifies them till they become mature in Jesus Christ actually the word admonishing here in verse number 20 28 is the word oh right it means to admonish to warn to instruct and to instruct in what a giving instructions in regard to belief and behavior both it often refers to someone who offers counsel and instruction for avoidance or cessation of inappropriate thinking and conduct and while using the word of Truth to establish to establish their objective to get somebody to see that what they’re thinking and what they’re doing is not in line with the Christian faith and of course that means they may need to hear the gospel because they think they’re saved but they’re not saved so if you notice in verse 28 the message that we have in the gospel is to be proclaimed right that means it is a message that we declare we got something to say it’s an announcement from on high to people from God to people and it should be solemnly announced because it’s a message most glorious and most wonderful be a good person and you get to heaven that’s not good news but Christ crucified risen from the dead offering to you a free gift because he has done everything for you that’s good news that is a message that needs to be proclaimed it’s also a message that is proboscuous that means it is it is definitely we are proclaiming him Christ and believe me if you’re going to get a clear picture of Christ it’s going to be right here in Colossians it’s got the highest christology in all of the Bible and we’re going to see that as the weeks go on but it is a message that is very clear and stated positively the clarity of spirit scripture refers to its accessibility the knowledge of God contained in the Bible has been revealed in such a way that it can be sufficiently understood in and of itself by those who seek it and then on the negative side the Bible is not a collection of mysterious writings that requires the assistance of some other knowledge to render it understandable scripture is so clear that it judges and illuminates everything even the thoughts and intents of the heart also the message that we have is for everybody if you notice in verse number 28 notice what it says it says we Proclaim him at admonishing every man teaching every man with all wisdom so that we may present every man complete in Christ now this is different this is no class Warfare here this is not racism here this is everyone no matter where you came from this message is for you that means we we take the message of the of the gospel and we take it to everyone not just the educated not just the religious Elite not just some special group with super knowledge we bring it to everyone doesn’t matter who they are and it is a message that has purposeful substance in verse 28 it says the end of the verse so that we may present every man complete in Christ that the teaching in the word of God is always heading somewhere it’s always doing something it’s always intended to accomplish the will of God and In this passage the will of God is that you and I would be made complete in Christ and we cannot do that on our own we can’t Implement our will to put off sin we need spiritual power the spirit of God living up in us to put sin to death in our life and of course this word of God as we just search out scripture what is what does it do it admonishes us to live wisely like it says in Psalm 119 verse 130 the unfolding of your words give light it gives understanding to the simple it gives us the ability to have skill for living and in colossian it teaches about a specific person it says in our the content of the message that we preach in verse 28 to whom God in verse 27 it says to whom God will to make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the John Gentiles which is Christ in you the hope of glory that’s something we ought to have on our walls soon as we wake up that’s what we should see Christ in you the hope of Lord that’s it Christianity is Christ he is at the center of it all and your attitude and my attitude and relationship to this person is of significant important importance you don’t need an endless list of angels you have to go through between God and man no Christ can bring you to God because he’s God what does it say in second Corinthians 4 5 for we do not preach ourselves we preach Jesus Christ not ourselves as Bond servants for Jesus sake for God who said light shall shine out of darkness is the one who has shown in our hearts to give light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ see God has visited his redeemed people to do what to accomplish Redemption that God loved and gave himself for his people as it says in the verse in John 3 16 for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son it’s all about Jesus the person and the facts concerning him in Chapter 2 Verse 3 in him The Treasure of wisdom is in knowledge is there hidden are the treasures of knowledge in Christ in verse 9 of chapter 2 in him dwells the fullness of God so the Apostle Paul is saying these things about Jesus that goes far beyond what people say today about Jesus that he’s a good teacher that he’s a good example that he is a a good man to follow and usually they go no further you see this is why you and I need the book of Colossians because if we didn’t have it we would all conclude that Jesus was just an exceptional human being and that is about as far as we would go and we would go no further and yet when we read this epistle what do we see we see that Jesus Christ in verse number 15 through 18 which I started with which I will end with he is the image of the invisible God the firstborn of all creation for in him all things were created both in Heavens and on Earth visible and invisible whether Thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities all things have been created through him and for him he is before all things and in him all things hold together he is also the head of the body of the church and he is the beginning the firstborn from the dead and he himself will come to have first place in everything that is our Lord that is what should be on our mind so a true christology is the final answer to every heresy every false teaching that ever has been or will be you hear something false you hear some new thing happening test out what they say about Christ and pretty pretty soon you’ll find out that they’re wrong and the scripture is Right amen so those are just some of the foundational things that lay out what’s going to be happening in the book of Colossians this morning let’s pray Lord this morning I just pray Lord that as we get into this epistle that Lord we would see not only how false teaching could be very attractive to people very enticing to them but Lord It ultimately becomes slavery and bondage and they remained in in bondage they remained in being dead in their sin and they have no life to overcome the Troubles of their life and the Very sin nature that pulls them down and causes them to live for themselves so Lord enable us today to grasp these things as we move through this epistle so Lord we would be firmly established in the truth that Christ Jesus is the preeminent one and there is no other and I just asked this in Christ’s name amen