Colossae

Hello, and welcome to the Westside. Church's special Monday morning coffee podcast on this podcast, our preacher Mark Roberts will help you get your week started right with a look back at yesterday's sermon so that we can think through it other and better work the applications into our daily life. Mark will then look forward into this week's Bible reading so that we can know what to expect and watch for. And he may have some extra bonus thoughts from time to time. So grab a cup of coffee as we start to move together on Monday morning coffee with

Mark.

Good morning. Good morning. Welcome to the Monday Morning Coffee podcast for Monday October the 10th. I hope you're ready to think about yesterday's sermon and about how to integrate that into your life effectively as well as work that forward into daily vibrating because yesterday sermon and daily vibrating are kind of all going together as we are really, really into the book of Colossians. We had a guest speaker yesterday. I wanna say something about some of that. I'm home from a gospel meeting last week, Great church in Louisville, Kentucky, but I'm home where I wanna be and I got to preach yesterday at West Side. Well, I kind of got to preach yesterday. Let's talk about that. Let's talk about daily Bob reading. Let's get started. Yesterday in the 10 40 hour, I continued the preaching theme for this year, which is the New Testament Church Road tour. And of course, since we started in Colossians, now in our daily Bible reading the New Testament Church Road tour went to Colossi yesterday and that was a little bit different, wasn't it? Yes, it was. That's called first person preaching. And I think that's the first time that I've done an entire sermon in that particular style. And I was more than just a little bit nervous about that. That's kind of out of the box that's a little bit different and sometimes a little bit different isn't received very, very well. But I do wanna do some things differently from time to time and I wanna shake it up. I think variety is the spice of life. I don't wanna just constantly be doing the same thing over and over again. Everybody, as soon as I climb into the pulpit, rolls their eyes and know, here it comes. Standard sermon number 2 0 1. Well, that wasn't a standard sermon by any stretch of the imagination because yesterday I preached as if I was tiki, and I did that primarily because I just want us to feel the world of the New Testament more. What was it like to live in Colossi? What was it like to be friends with Paul? What was Paul thinking when he wrote this? I'm trying to push all of that across and it just seemed like that was a more effective way of doing that. I hope you liked it and but more than hoping that you liked it, I hope it worked in that it makes you appreciate the Colossian letter even better and see it in a better light. I would be interested in your feedback about all of that. Let me know what you think of first person preaching. I really, really was nervous about that and uh, felt kinda like going out on a limb, but boy, once you start that sermon and you say, I am Tish, there's no going back now, here we go. And, and I hope it helped you think in a better way about the Book of Colossians. I will give you an extra thought. You can't say everything in Tiki, Couldn't say everything yesterday, but I, I collected up this quote about the book of Colossians, that it is a very mental or cerebral book. This writer said, the brief book of Colossians is all about who we are in Christ. In the first two chapters, Paul teaches the Colossians who they are in Christ, and the last two chapters, he instructs them on how to walk in Christ. But throughout the book, Paul emphasizes the mind, the better the Colossians know what they believe, the harder it will be for someone to persuade them. Otherwise. I like that a lot. I like that a lot. I think instead of trying to dumb it down or try to back off, we ought to just come up and say we're gonna need to think. This is a thinking person's approach to the issues facing the Colossian brethren. And we face some of those issues today. This is a thinking book where you need to put on your thinking hat and engage your mind. There is nothing wrong with that. The Bible is not TikTok or Instagram and we just kind of mindlessly scroll it while we watch Netflix. That's not what's happening here. Ditch your mind in gear and let's think through Colossians. We're reading in Colossians chapter one to start this week. Got your Bible. Let's do some daily Bible reading. It is Monday, October the 10th and we are reading Colossians one versus 24 to 29. This is not a long reading by any stretch of the imagination, it's just a paragraph or so. Gonna give you some notes to remind you of where we are as far as answering the questions on the back of your reading schedule, what we're looking for there. What we're trying to get to, and this is a good place for me to say something about the similarity between Ephesians and Colossians. Tisha just couldn't say much about that yesterday, even though he actually is carrying the Ephesian epistle as well, he's also carrying fe LeMans epistle. But of the 155 verses in Ephesians, about half of those share a strong similarity to Colossians and most scholars believe that that comes because Colossians was written first. There's just going to be a natural similarity of ideas because the common author Paul writes both of these epistles and maybe the thing to remember, and I'm gonna be talking more about the church and Ephesus and the Ephesian correspondence, I'm gonna say more about that as we get there, but we do well to remember that Ephesians is not as specific, not as specific to this particular church. It seems like it is a circular letter meant to be circulated and read by many of the churches in the area. So since that is the case, it should not be surprising at all that Paul would want some of that stuff that he wrote, the Colossian Church to go into a letter that he's writing to all of those churches in that particular area. Remember, Colossi is not that far from FSIS about a hundred miles down the road. The main thing here is the idea of the supremacy of Jesus Christ. The message here, this is what I've written in my Bible, what I'm gonna use for Q2 as I work through the daily Bible reading this week is the supreme Christ is all you need. That is the message that Paul is pushing. What is the central theme in Paul is preaching and teaching, being emphasized. The supreme Christ is all you need. Everything in this book centers on the supremacy of Christ. And then the application of that is we don't have to add anything to our Christianity to make it work. We need to connect all the verses that we as we're reading along to the idea of the supremacy of Christ and that everything we need is in Christ, the supreme Christ is all you need. So let's think about our reading versus 24 to 29, and it starts off with a puzzling expression. Paul says today that he's going to verse 24, Philip, what is lacking in Christ afflictions for the sake of his body. That's hard to understand because obviously Christ is the one time sacrifice for all of our sins. So there isn't anything that is lacking and there are a number of options that really don't work. But I wonder if Paul isn't using some apocalyptic language, that language in Ezekiel or Daniel or the Book of Revelation, which talks about how the people of God suffer because they are the people of God. And so God's people are suffering all of these tribulations until the fulfillment of all the time, and that completes the suffering of Christ because Christ is suffering through his people. That is not necessarily the best answer possible, but I'm reminded that Paul was told on the road to Damascus, Why are you persecuting me? Jesus says, When you persecute the church soul of Tarsis, you are, you are making me suffer. So maybe there's something to be said for that, but that is not the easiest of expressions to understand. And then Paul goes from there to talk about the mystery. Verse 26, He loves the idea of mystery, uses that a lot. Roman 16, Ephesians one, Ephesians three loves that idea and usually that references the idea of gentiles coming into the kingdom of God. That is something that we could not understand without there being revelation. That's what a mystery is when Paul uses that particular term. So then he says, Notice verse 27, To them, God chose to make known how great among the Gentiles are the riches of his glory, which is Christ in you that actually could be Christ among you. The you there is plural, or it could be the indwelling of Jesus Christ, the presence of Christ among us or even in us. And that is what we proclaim. Verse 28, Warning and teaching. Notice how warning and teaching are essential to to be able to present everyone complete verse 28 or mature in Christ. Sometimes I know this as a preacher, we get up and we're having discussion in Bible class or I get up and I preach a lesson about this ism or this false doctrine and that's eh, that you know, maybe the reaction to that is not just a great excitement. What we really wanted to hear today is something about how to have better marriage or how to raise kids to know the Lord or how to defeat this cultural sin. Excuse me. Instead, let me have a little slug of coffee here. Oh, there we go. Instead, we're hearing about the genesis of some kind of error and here's the guy who taught this way back when and here's what he said, and here's what the Bible says about that and kinda working through that kind of stuff that that doesn't always cause everybody to get real excited. However, that kind of warning and teaching verse 28 is essential if you want to be complete in Christ and the Colossians need that, guess what? We need that today as well see, tomorrow we'll be in Colossians chapter two. It is Tuesday again. Today we read Colossians chapter two versus one to 10. This breaks into two pieces here, a warning against being deceived, chapter two versus one to five, and then the idea of receiving Christ as Lord being alive in Christ. Chapter two versus six to 15. We'll just read two one to 10 today, but that gives you a sense of where we are in the development of thought. So maybe notice chapter two, verse two where Paul says, being knit together in love. And here you hear it there a little note that there could be a division brewing there. And I do like how Paul is encouraging the understanding and knowledge, which reminds us of what we read last week in chapter one and verse nine. Paul has been praying for that. I love how prayer and Colossians just permeates the whole epi. And then he really begins to step into this idea that there's some problems developing plausible arguments may delude you chapter two and verse four, Even though we've got happy Paul here two five, he hears that things are going well from a Paus, but and and he is happy. But there is something working here and I wanna talk a lot about what's going on there or may actually not talk very much at all because we don't know specifically what label to put on the false doctrine that's being taught. We'll get more into that as we journey along in chapter two. But here we see each chapter two verse seven, the emphasis on Thanksgiving and then verse eight, Don't leave Christ for the false teachers. It's you need Christ and something else. But for Paul, it's just Christ and Christ alone. Anything else is human tradition and not according to Christ because verse nine in him dwells the whole fullness of deity. That just means everything that God is is in Christ. He's not short anything. I try sometimes to illustrate that by saying, if you hung out a sign that said help wanted God, we're trying to hire God here, and Jesus walks through the door as you check his qualifications, you're going to find that in him. The whole fullness of deity dwells bodily. There won't be anything. He's, Oh, you know, I can hire you as deity, but you're missing this one. No note, he is completely qualified. He is divine. That's a very CRA way of illustrating that. But I think it is helpful when you think about everything that God is and that is Jesus. And you have been filled into our reading today, verse 10, You have been filled in him. What exactly does he mean by that? I will share with you this quotation from one scholar. The parallels in Ephesians chapter one and verse 23, Chapter three in verse 19 suggests the meaning that God intends to flood the lives of men and women and ultimately all of creation with his love and power richness and that he's already begun to put this plan into effect through Christ and by his spirit. I like that. I think that's helpful here for Paul to be opening the eyes of the colossian brethren to what God is doing through them in Christ. Don't need anything else. You have Christ. More of that tomorrow. On Wednesday when we'll begin again in Colossians two, starting in verse 11, See you tomorrow. Welcome to Hump Day. It is Wednesday. We are finishing Colossians chapter two today. And this is the place where Paul takes on the false teaching and false philosophies that are beginning to spread a little bit among the co and brethren. Now, I said yesterday that I wanted to talk at length about this and then I kind of backed up on that and I'm still backing up on that because the reality is there isn't any one specific religion or idolatry practice or idol or cult that fits exactly everything that we're going to read, particularly beginning in chapter two and verse 16 where Paul begins to delineate some of the things that are being pushed on the colossian brethren, there isn't anything that fits that just perfectly. And if you go to the scholars and you're reading commentaries and other books about the book of Colossians, you'll hear lots and lots about the Colossian heresy as various teachers and professors and writers and authors and scholars debate what exactly is the colossian heresy. And when they're all done with all of that, you still won't know because nobody knows Lots of discussion here about narcism, and I'm not sure there is anything that makes people go to sleep faster than Bible class teachers talking about narcism. NATO is a second century development. It is not something that is part of first century Christianity. It was a big mover in Shaker later, but it is not present in Colossi, at least not in its full bo blown form because that doesn't come till much later answer to the question, What's the colossian? Heresy should just be a big we don't know. And then we probably need to move on and say less about what we don't know about. I am mindful here that this certainly has a Jewish flavor. Now we know that for sure because of what's said in verse 16 festivals and new moons and Sabbath. And then there's discussion here about things that you can eat and things that you can't eat that looks very verse 21. Don't handle, don't taste, don't touch. That looks very, very Jewish. What keeps us from saying that, this is just another run of Judaism, which we've seen everywhere. Paul goes in the book of Acts, Jewish teachers show up and try to bind the Jewish law on Gentiles, is that some of this sounds kind of mystical and esoteric, kind of a mysterious experience. And that of course looks more like some kind of cult, some kind of sorcery, some kind of magic following. But recently in our bible class in on Wednesday nights in Acts chapter 13, we met a guy named S who is Jewish and he is a sorcerer. Remember that in Acts chapter 13. So more and more I'm inclined instead of running off into agnosticism or to try to find some idle cult that could somehow check all the boxes here, more and more I'm looking at this and thinking, this just may be a corrupted form of Judaism, but whatever's going on, these false teachers are saying you can. You can have more than just that regular plain vanilla Christianity. You could be at a higher level, you could be an elite person like I am. And there is always some people who will be attracted to that. Somebody shows up and says, I know more than everybody else. I've got some, Oh, I've got some inside information. There's always going to be some people who get pulled into their orbit. The idea I can be better than the regular folks has an attraction because it appeals to our pride. So as you read today, look down through here the various things that are being pushed by these maybe Jewish mystics that are among the brethren in colossi, but especially please notice out of verse 23, that making up all kinds of extra rules and regulations, that's not how you become a better disciple and and that's a breakthrough that ought to be a breakthrough for a lot of us. I'm not sure how I miss this growing up. Maybe we won't reading in Colossians enough, but growing up it seemed like the people who were respected and admired and looked up to the most were the people who were abstaining from everything, who were making up all kinds of rules outside of what the New Testament teaches. Oh, the Bible says not to go there. Well, you know what I won't even talk about there. I won't even start. I on and on and on. All kinds of manmade rules and regulations designed with good intentions. You know, if, if, if that way over there is a sin, then I'll tell you what, I just won't even take one step in that direction because then I might take two steps which could lead to five steps, which could lead to 50 steps, which could lead to a hundred steps, which could finally get me into sin. So I'm such a great Christian because I never took step one. Mm. That's a problem, isn't it? That's a problem, isn't it? Manmade rules and regulations are not what produces genuine godliness. That idea, I'm such a better Christian than you because you know what, I don't even begin to talk about, think about or go in that direction that's going on in Colossi sometimes that goes on among brethren today. We need to be better than that. We need to be complete in Christ. We need to respect one another's liberty in Christ and we need to be certain that we see that this business of self-made religion aestheticism and severity to the body. Colossians 2 23 is of no value in stopping the indulgence of the flash. Hope that helps you today. I'll see you tomorrow as we journey into Colossians three. Welcome to Colossians, the third chapter. Welcome to Thursday. Today we're reading Colossians three, one to 10. This is a section of Colossians that really helps us to make lasting change. And I think it's important here that we, we, we make certain, we keep up with the idea that Christianity is not about behavior modification, it is about knowing God. And the more we know God, the more we renew our minds, the more we can change our behavior. And it is important not to get the cart before the horse. And that's why Paul says we need to set our minds on things above Colossians three, inverse two. I'm really helped here by some material that BJ Sipes did on Colossians, the third chapter that got me thinking in that particular vein. And I would say this, lots and lots of people wanna divide Colossians just like Ephesians into an ethical section and a doctrinal section. So Paul does all this doctrinal stuff, Chapter one and two, and now here's the ethics, here's how to live that out, Chapter three and four. And I think Paul would just nash his teeth if someone said that to him. For Paul doctrine is always practical and is always to be lived out. And I don't think you could draw that kind of very clear broad line right down the middle of the book. This is stuff you know, and this is stuff you do. Go back and look at Colossians one and two. There's plenty of things to do in Colossians one and two and there is plenty of things here that we need to think or know in Colossians three and four. So part of that goes with the idea that we seek the things that are above Colossians three verse one, and then we set our minds. Colossians two, Seeking here is desiring and wanting. Setting here would be ponder regard, honor. And then if as we do that we think of our life being hidden with Christ in God. Verse three, that's a difficult expression, probably references there maybe how the Christian life is hidden to those in the world. They don't see it, they don't understand what we're doing. What follows Then beginning verse five is what's called a vice list. And there are a number of these in the New Testament. Think about the works of the flesh for example. And they usually go with a virtue list. Don't do this, do this instead. And that may have been done to instruct new converts. Here's the material that you need to begin walking with Christ. Stay out of this. Get involved in that. And I think our reading today is fairly straightforward. I would give you a note in verse eight, obscene talk. That is a difficult expression to translate though the term. Some translations have filthy language here is only found in this place in the New Testament. Other translations render it abusive language and that may be more accurate than obscene language. It certainly does not mean profanity in the commonly accepted sense. In fact, in the very next verse Paul says, Do not lie to one another. And that may be in illustration of what he means in verse eight where he says something there about your talk about what you say. Look at that in different translations. Study that a little bit further. You can make your own decision about what exactly Paul is calling out there. We'll finish the chapter tomorrow with that virtue list versus 11 to 25 for Friday. See you tomorrow. And we made it. It is Friday end of the week. We're reading Colossians three, 11 to 25. We're almost done with Colossians. We'll be moving into FileMan and the book of Ephesians next week. Let's finish strong though in Colossians, the third chapter, Some things to put on chapter three verses 12 to 17. Paul has said what to take out, two list of five. And now he gives five things to put in the put in or put on in. Verse 12 is a reference to baptism. And there is discussion of course of humility when we read that and don't even blink, but humility in the Greek world was thought of as a weakness. It was not praised to put others ahead of self. And I'm seeing verse 16, some things there, verse 15 and 16 that seem to say that there may be the beginnings of some divisions in the Colossian church. They need to be har in harmony. Peace is so important for Christians. There has to be peace in the congregation in a church that is at peace can worship together. They can teach and instruct one another. And again, look at verse 17 giving things and I do like verse 16 teaching and admonishing one another In all wisdom. Let's do things that are effective. Let's teach an admonish in a way that works. Sometimes there's not much emphasis on that. As long as I'm teaching the truth, I can just beat people over the head of it and be mean and abusive. Oh, but I spoke the truth. No, we need to speak the truth in love. Whoops, that's actually from next week. That's in Ephesians. But we need to teach and admonish in all wisdom. One of the ways we can do that of course is in song and we do that in our assembly together beginning in verse 18. Then Paul turns his attention to the home, to the Christian home. This is a code for the household and those are common in Roman literature, but they're not anything like this at all. Couple of quick notes here. Verse 18, Wi submit to your husband's submission here is in a special tense in the Greek known as the middle voice. It means you submit yourself submission must never be seen as something that is inflicted upon someone. We choose. We choose to submit to Christ, we choose to submit to governing authorities. Roman 13, we choose to submit ourselves to our elders. Hebrews 1317, we choose to be in submission. It does not mean I can't underline this strongly enough that you are inferior. I have never thought of myself as being somehow inferior to the politicians who run this country, but I am in submission to them as governing authority. And then verse 19, Husbands love your wives and don't be harsh with them. This is totally different than all of the codes that would've circulated in the Roman world. There's, there's no sense of this in any way, particularly among Pagans which gave husbands complete rights over their wives, over the entire family. The man was the tyrant and could be the tyrant in a Roman home. And Paul is changing that dramatically. If you ever feel like, wow, the New Testament is wildly out of step with with modern American standards and ideals, it is in no way any less out of step than what it was when Paul wrote this to the church in Colossi. Nobody thought husbands had to love their wives and not be harshed with them. That was just a a, a given that the man is the head of the house and he can just order everybody around even in some circumstances could order the death of his children. That's the kind of power and authority, nothing there about love, care, any of that in the New Testament world. And then there's even discussion of slaves and their masters. We wonder, because this is such an extensive section here, if there are a lot of slaves in the church in Colossi, and I think there's good application here to our employers and our jobs, some people don't want to make that application because clearly working for a living is not the same as slavery. I get it. But it still seems the principle here applies. And I think one of the important issues to get out of clause is 3 23 is that everybody works for the Lord. Everybody. Not just the preacher, everybody's working for God. You are working for God, I'm working for God and we all need to work hardily because we are working from the Lord and we receive our wages from him. We are serving the Lord Jesus Christ, not just our employer. There you go. That's Colossians chapter three. Then a little bit more in Colossians and then we'll push forward some of these other letters that Tisha is carrying and we'll get into that more next week after we get done with Colossians, the fourth chapter. Well, there you go. Thank you for listening. If you love the Monday Morning Coffee podcast, we certainly would like for you to follow, subscribe, rate and give a review on iTunes or whatever app you listen on. Mostly we would like for you to tell a friend about the show cuz it will help them with their daily Bible reading just like it's helping you. So until Monday, may your coffee be delightful. May your Friday be wonderful and may the Lord be with you today all day. I'll see you on Monday with a cup of coffee.

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