Scripture Reading
Colossians chapter 1. Our focus this evening will be on verses 21 and 22. But I do want to read the chapter. It's helpful to see the verses in their context.
So beginning in Colossians chapter 1 at verse 1. Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, and Timothy, our brother, to the saints and faithful brethren in Christ who are in Colossae, grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. We give thanks to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always for you, since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of your love for all the saints. Because of the hope which is laid up for you in heaven, of which you heard before in the word of the truth of the gospel, which has come to you, as it has also in all the world, and is bringing forth fruit, as it is also among you since the day you heard and knew the grace of God in truth, as you also learned from Epaphras, our dear fellow-servant, who is a faithful minister of Christ on your behalf, who also declared to us your love in the Spirit.
For this reason, we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding, that you may walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing Him, being fruitful in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God. strengthened with all might according to his glorious power, for all patience and long-suffering with joy, giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified us to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the light. He has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of his love, in whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins. He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers.
All things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things consist. And he is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things he may have the preeminence. For it pleased the Father that in Him all the fullness should dwell, and by Him to reconcile all things to Himself, by Him, whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross. and you, who once were alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now he has reconciled in the body of his flesh through death to present you holy and blameless and above reproach in his sight.
If indeed you continue in the faith, grounded and steadfast, and are not moved away from the hope of the gospel which you heard, which was preached to every creature under heaven, of which I, Paul, became a minister, I now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up in my flesh what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ, for the sake of his body, which is the church, of which I became a minister according to the stewardship from God which was given to me for you, to fulfill the word of God, the mystery which has been hidden from ages and from generations, but now has been revealed to his saints. To them God willed to make known what are the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles. Which is Christ in you, the hope of glory? Him we preach, warning every man and teaching every man in all wisdom. that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus.
To this end, I also labor, striving according to His working, which works in me mightily. Amen. Well, let us pray.
Opening Prayer
Our Father, we thank You for this book of Colossians. We thank You for the wonderful doctrine set forth in this first chapter. We pray that You would just give us thoughts of our Lord Jesus Christ and the reconciliation that we have now because of your grace and because of the death of the Son of God. We ask, Lord, that you would just draw out our worship, our praise, our adoration, and our love to Christ.
That you would draw us near, Father, that we would know your closeness in our fellowship here together tonight. Certainly, as we gather for communion, it is with you first and foremost. It is to spend time in the presence of our gracious God and Father. Bless our study in the scriptures now, and we ask through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen. Well,
Introduction
this first chapter of Colossians is structured in a marvelous way. Paul begins with prayer for the Colossians in chapter 1, verses 9 to 12a. At that particular point, he transitions to theological instruction, beginning around the second part of verse 12. He then continues on to verse 20, teaching the people of God in Colossae concerning the great redemptive truths.
Specifically, God created through the Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord Jesus Christ upholds all things, in Him all things consist, as the Apostle says in verse 17, and it's Christ who has saved sinners. And then the Apostle here highlights what was done in a cosmic sense in verse 20 to a very particular or very specific sense in verses 21 and 22. He moves from the cosmic reconciliation of all things, that means the big picture, verse 20, to the very specific outworking of that reconciliation with reference to the saints in Colossae. It is at this particular point that he then transitions with reference to his own ministry on behalf of the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.
So it's a wonderfully structured passage I hope that tonight, as we consider verses 21 and 22, it will be an encouragement to our souls as we consider our Lord's work on our behalf. Specifically, we're going to take up verses 21 and 22 under three considerations. First, their previous state. Notice he says, "...and you who once were alienated and enemies in your mind." Why does Paul remind his audience what they were at one time?
It is to display in their lives the grace of God. It is to serve as a foil or as a backdrop to how magnificent God is. When we consider what we once were and what we now by the grace of God we are, We really ought to praise. We ought to stand in awe and in wonder that we rebel sinners, God-hating wretches, those who are running from Him, now have been brought nigh through the blood of Christ.
What should that promote but gratitude for our Lord and love and adoration for Him? So the Apostle deals with their previous state, secondly their present, status in verses 21B and 22. Their present status in what they have in the Lord Jesus Christ, and then their future blessedness at the end of verse 22. And then you see that ought to promote godly living.
That's what verse 23 says. There's movement here. The guilt that we have is met by the grace of God that results then in gratitude toward God and faithful living and a godly pursuit of those things which are pleasing in His sight. We only have time tonight for verses 21. and 22, specifically tailored to our meditation concerning the Lord in His death on behalf of sinners.
Their Previous State
Note first, their previous state. Paul highlights three particulars here.
Alienated from God
The first thing he says is they were alienated from God. They were alienated from God and you who once were alienated. That's a bad thing. That means we were separated from God.
The concept of reconciliation presupposes that reality. There's been a breach. Why do you reconcile with somebody that you had a problem with? Because you had a problem with them and it's caused a chasm, it's caused a breach or separation in the relationship that demands reconciliation in order to be brought nigh together.
The Apostle says, in you who once were alienated, the idea here is to be estranged from God. Paul uses the same word in Ephesians 2.12 and in 4.18. 4.18 in Ephesians is probably a more parallel passage that you can turn to. Notice in Ephesians 4 verse 17, This I say therefore and testify in the Lord that you should no longer walk as the rest of the Gentiles walk in the futility of their mind, having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart. So you see the idea here is that prior to their reconciliation by Christ, they were alienated.
God kept them away. God kept them at an arm's distance. It's not that we alienated God, certainly the Bible teaches that, but in this particular instance, because of the passive verb, what we are to appreciate is because of our sin, because of our rebellion, because of our godlessness, the Lord kept us away. We were alienated because we offended Him.
We were alienated because we repulsed Him. We were alienated because we violated His law. And that is the reality that sin brings. It is a breach between God and the sinner.
The nature, the role of these reminders I've already indicated is for them to appreciate what they once were. And you ought to do this. And I think this supper affords a blessed opportunity for such reflection. What were we prior to the time when we got to eat the bread and the wine that signify for us the very blood and body of our Lord Jesus Christ?
He brought us not. He effected this reconciliation. He's the one that orchestrated this on our behalf. You see this motif throughout the prophets.
You see this motif throughout the New Testament documents. The Apostle Paul specifically wants to remind the people of God what they once were. Romans chapter 5, you can turn there. Romans chapter 5, the apostle does this so that we can appreciate the great depths that we have been brought out of by the grace and the mercy of our God in and through the Lord Jesus Christ.
Notice in Romans chapter 5, The Apostle highlights for us that we were helpless, we were sinners, and we were enemies of God. Verse 6, For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die, yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
Much more than, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him. For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. And not only that, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation. This is a helpful exercise in our Christian life.
It's important for us to remember the rock from whence we were hewn. It's important for us to remember, not some wicked, horrible way of thinking, man, before I became a Christian, I used to do this, and I used to do this, and I used to do that, with some sort of a sick, demented fascination with going back. as if that was really legit for the Christian person, but this idea of appreciating where we've come from. This is Paul's point in Colossians 1, 21-22. He's moving from cosmic reconciliation in verse 20 to show these Colossian believers, you were alienated.
You were gone. You were dead. You had issues. You had problems.
Turn over to Ephesians 2, another very popular or very famous portion where the Apostle does this. In Ephesians chapter 2, he highlights the reality that the sinners in Ephesus were lifeless, helpless, and hopeless, and they've been brought nigh. And you He made alive to one, who were dead in trespasses and sins, in which you once walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience, among whom also we all once conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, just as the others. You see, why does He do that?
Why does He give us this snapshot of their previous condition? Why tell us the depths of depravity that they found themselves in? So that verse 4 will be that much more glorious. So that verse 4 will be that much more sweet. that a contemplation of the magnificent grace of God, set in the context of this depth of depravity, shines that much brighter.
Verse 4, he says, But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ, by grace you have been saved. That's why Newton wrote, Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound, that saved what? saved a wretch like me. You see, the supper brings us face to face with this reality. We don't eat this bread and drink this cup because we're good.
We don't eat this bread and drink this cup because we're being rewarded. We eat this bread and we drink this cup to be consciously reminded of our Savior's dying love on our behalf. It brings us into contact with these eternal truths that we need to be reminded of over and over again. O'Brien says it this way, the gravity of their previous condition serves to magnify the wonder of God's mercy.
The past is recalled not because the emphasis falls upon it, but to draw attention to God's mighty action here in the reconciling death of his son on the reader's behalf. And may I suggest that a contemplation of these truths, what we were, what we have become, does issue forth, or should issue forth, in a robust pursuit of the things that the Apostle says here, in verse 23, "...if indeed you continue in the faith, grounded and steadfast, and are not moved away from the hope of the gospel which you heard, which was preached to every creature under heaven, of which I, Paul, became a minister." Notice in verse 6 of chapter 2, "...as you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him." You see, that's the motif, guilt, grace, gratitude. That's what Hercules Collins writes about, or that's the framework for the Heidelberg Catechism, or the Orthodox Catechism. Isn't that the trajectory in the Christian life?
We are guilty, helpless, vile, undone sinners. God lavishes His grace upon us in and through His dear Son. And what is the result of that? We gather on the Sabbath to praise.
We look to the Lord God each and every day, we respond in gratitude to Him, and we pursue those things which are pleasing in His sight. There is a movement, there is a trajectory, there is a course that the Christian is to pursue. He says they were alienated from God,
Enemies in Their Minds
secondly, they were enemies in their minds. He says, "...and you who once were alienated and enemies in your mind." As I've said, the Bible tells us that God treats us as enemies. Romans 5.10. Here, because of the connection, I think He is envisioning this reality.
We are enemies in our minds. Romans 8.7. The carnal mind is enmity against God. The emphasis here is not that God looked at you as an enemy, but you looked at Him as an enemy.
You raised your fist at Him. You Colossian saints, prior to coming to the Lord Jesus Christ, prior to God effecting reconciliation in your lives, you were alienated from Him. That means He kept you at a distance, and while you were at that distance, you raised your fist. You scoffed, you mocked, you disobeyed, you rejected his commandments, you disobeyed his law.
Everything you could do, you typified an enemy. Or you typified a person at alienation, because you looked at that person as an enemy. And it's interesting because he says, who once were alienated and enemies in your mind. He does the same thing in Ephesians 4.
I already read it in verse 17. This I say therefore and testify in the Lord that you should no longer walk as the rest of the Gentiles walk in the futility of their mind. having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them. The Apostle here highlights the reality that man in his mind, man in his heart, man in the seat of his affections, the seat of everything, holds God in contempt. That's what the Colossians were.
That's what we were, and now we've been brought nigh to feast on the bread and on the wine. It really does show us the grace and the mercy and the kindness of God. The seat of the enmity is in the mind. But notice,
Wicked Works
thirdly, they engaged in wicked works. Verse 21, you who once were alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works. You see, it doesn't just stay in the mind. It flushes itself out.
It doesn't just stay up here, I hate you God, but it flushes itself out in the way that we live. When you see man given over to wicked works, you can conclude this much. He has enmity in his heart. He looks at God as an enemy.
This is precisely the focus. Edy says, the apostle charges them not merely with spiritual and latent hostility to God, but with the manifestation of that hostility in open acts of unnatural rebellion. It is not a neutral alienation, but one characterized by positive enmity. You see the construction, or you see the flow, rather.
We're alienated, we're enemies in our mind, and we flesh it out by wicked works. You cannot divorce the two. Again, the Apostle in Ephesians 2, he says the same thing. You, he made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins, in which you once walked according to the course of this world. according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience, among whom also we all once conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, just as the others." You see, what we deserved, apart from Christ, was wrath.
What we deserve, apart from Christ, is judgment. What we deserve, apart from Christ, is alienation. What we deserve, apart from Christ, is having been given over. What we deserve, apart from Christ, is what we saw in the parable of the tares this morning.
Gather them up with the other tares, bundle them up, and burn them in the furnace of fire. That is what is fit. That is what is fitting for the people who rebel against and reject God. If we stopped here, it would be absolutely consistent with everything we know about the moral government of a glorious God.
It is righteous for Him to judge sinners. It is righteous for Him to punish sinners. And it's in that context that
Their Present Status
Paul now moves to their present status. This is what you once were. You were alienated, you were enemies, and you engaged in wicked works. You were justly liable to the wrath and punishment and fury of God, but that's not what He did.
He reconciled you. He brought you near. He's rescued you. He's delivered you.
He has brought you into a state of blessedness. He has conveyed upon you every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus the Lord. I believe the subject of reconciliation, still in verse 21, is God the Father. The agency is through His Son and the blood of His cross, but I think the subject here is the Father.
Go back for just a moment to verses 19 and 20. For it pleased the Father that in Him all the fullness should dwell, and by Him, by Jesus, to reconcile all things to Himself, by Him, whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross. Now some will say it sounds as if Paul believes in universalism. I mean, if Paul says that he reconciles the entirety of the cosmos, then we must conclude that the entirety of the cosmos is reconciled unto God.
The rest of the Bible does not flesh that out. The Bible does not teach universalism. It does not teach all men, without exception, are going to enter into heaven. I take it this way, the creation itself, because of man's sin, is under the curse of God Most High.
Genesis chapter 3, when Adam sins, what does God do? He curses the ground. In Romans chapter 8, the Apostle says the creation itself groans, it yearns, it longs for redemption. That doesn't mean trees are crying out to God or the mountains.
It means the cosmos as a system is yearning for the redemptive power of God Most High to order things aright. Because sin has brought chaos and what God is doing in Jesus is bringing cosmos once again. I think this is the emphasis in the passage. It is akin to what Watts taught us to sing.
During the month, we remember the incarnation. No more let sins and sorrows grow, nor thorns infest the ground. He comes to make his blessings flow far as the curse is found, far as the curse is found. The idea in verse 20 is not a universalism.
The idea in verse 20 is that under Christ, God is making all things new. When we get to 21 and 22, He's saying, and you play a part in that, or you are an exhibit of that, because God took you, who were alienated, who were enemies, and who engaged in wicked works, and He's reconciled you. He has brought you together. You know, I often say that one of the chief boons of gospel blessing, at least in my mind, is forgiveness.
Reconciliation is right up there, isn't it? Again, the presupposition is alienation. It's estrangement. You know, sometimes we speak of a man and a woman, they get into a bit of an argument, and the man has to sleep in the doghouse.
Right? I hope that doesn't happen here. If any of you ladies make your husband sleep in the doghouse, shame on you. Repent.
Forsake your sins. That is not Ephesians 5 and Colossians 3 Christianity. And if any of you husbands drive your wives to the point where they want you to sleep in the doghouse, shame on you. Repent, because that's not Ephesians 5 and Colossians 3, husbanding.
But what does that presuppose? Alienation. What has to happen? The man wakes up in the morning, he brushes his teeth next to his dog, and he wanders into the house and he says, honey, honey, please let me come back.
Honey, please let me have my spot in the bed. Honey, please don't make me sleep with the dog again. He initiates it, he seeks after it, he wants that reparation. It's just the opposite of what we find in this text.
We're alienated, we're enemies, and we engage in wicked works. We do not seek reconciliation with our Creator. We did not initiate this process. We did not run back to Him.
We didn't hear a gospel sermon and raise our hand. We didn't listen and sign a card. If reconciliation is affected, it's because of divine sovereignty and His initiation. And that's what the tax stipulates.
Here's what you were. This is your previous state. Here's what is true of you now. Yet now He has reconciled you.
That's glorious Christianity. That's the stuff of encouragement at the supper. That is what ought to promote in us a Colossians 2, 6 attitude. As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him.
Because He saved you, because He's reconciled you, because He's redeemed you, because He's forgiven you, because He's declared you not guilty, walk in Him! In fact, run in Him. Pursue Him. Love Him.
Honor Him. Glorify Him. You've moved from guilt by the grace of God to gratitude. Flesh it out in your lives.
Be holy as God is holy. He's called you for this very purpose.
The Means of Reconciliation
Notice the means by which He brings reconciliation, the means of accomplishment. Verse 22, in the body... I'm sorry, the end of verse 21, "...in your mind by wicked works, yet now He has reconciled in the body of His flesh through death." How did reconciliation occur? Because we wanted it, because we initiated it, because we reformed our lives, because we said, you know, Lord, I'm not going to sin anymore, because I don't want to be in the doghouse anymore.
I want to draw nigh unto You. No, that's not it at all. In the fullness of the times, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the law. You read from Genesis to Revelation, and you'll see this conspicuously.
Salvation is of the Lord. It is not of man, it is not wrought by man, it is not initiated by man. Truly, it is monergistic. God seeks and saves His people.
When Adam and Eve sin, they go and they hide behind the trees. Look at the folly of sin. You think you're going to hide from your Creator? You think you're going to hide from the God that made the trees?
You think He can't see you? When God says, where are you? Is that really depicting God's lack of information? The question is for them.
It's like when you see your kid with chocolate dripping down his face, and you say, did you get into the cookies? Well, you know he got into the cookies. You are pressing his conscience with the reality of his sin. So God does.
He initiates. He makes covenant. He clothes Adam and Eve with the garments of skin. He calls Abram out of Ur of the Chaldeans.
Why? Because He is reversing the effects of Babel. In chapter 11 of Genesis, they want to build this tower. They want to make a name for themselves.
God confuses their lip. He confounds their tongue. And then He calls Abram. And what does He say?
I'm going to make a great nation out of you. I'm going to make your name great. And that then unfolds into the great redemptive purposes and plan of God Most High to send His Son on this ministry of reconciliation. It's not we that sought to come out of the doghouse, it's God who fetched us.
He says, in the body of His flesh through death. What is highlighted here is the incarnation.
The Incarnation and Substitutionary Death
The specific mention of Christ's physical body underscores the truth of the Incarnation. It differentiates it from His mystical body mentioned in 1.18, which is the Church, and it sets forth the substitutionary atoning death of our Lord Christ on our behalf. How was reconciliation affected? It was through Christ's death.
Isn't this one of the grand purposes of the incarnation? I love the Nicene Creed and the way it specifies this. I believe, speaks of God the Father, the Almighty. And then it speaks of Jesus Christ.
I believe in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all worlds, God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made. And then note this next clause, who, for us men and for our salvation, came down from heaven, and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the Virgin Mary, and was made man, and was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate. He suffered and was buried, and the third day he rose again according to the Scriptures. and ascended into heaven, and sits on the right hand of the Father, and He shall come again with glory to judge the quick and the dead, whose kingdom shall have no end." You see what these divines specified. You see what they say.
Who for us men, and for our salvation. not for our example, not just to promote some warm, glowing feelings in the month of December, not so we could rally around the tree and give each other gifts, but He came down for us men and for our salvation. Paul ascribes reconciliation not to the will of man, not to the overtures of the sinner, but to the grace and the power of God manifested through the death of His Son. It is through His flesh, or the body of His flesh, through death. Edi says, man does not win his way back to the divine favor by either costly offering or profound penitence.
Again, you see the man coming out of the doghouse. He goes to the back door. He says, Baby, lover, I'm so sorry. I brought you these big thing of flowers.
I got you a gift card for the cake. I'll rub your feet. I'll do whatever. Just bring me back into your favor.
That's not Bible. God sought us. God hung His Son upon the cross and was pleased to bruise Him, putting Him to grief according to Isaiah 53. It was the Lord's chastisement that fell upon His own dear Son.
It's all of Him. He is the agent of reconciliation. Edi says this perceptively. Man does not win his way back to the divine favor by either costly offering or profound penitence.
God reunites him to himself. He is not only provided for such an alliance, but actually forms and cements it. And it's through this body, or through the body of his flesh, of his death. 2 Corinthians 5.18. Another passage that speaks of this great act of reconciliation. 2 Corinthians 5.18.
Now, all things are, well, let's look at verse 17. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. All things have passed away. Behold, all things have become new.
Now, all things are of God who has reconciled us to himself through Jesus Christ and has given us the ministry of reconciliation. That is, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation. Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us. We implore on Christ's behalf, be reconciled to God, for he made him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in him.
That is their present status. Now
Their Future Blessedness
notice their future blessedness in verse 22b. Note the thrust of the text. And you who once were alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now he has reconciled in the body of his flesh through death, not because you were holy, not because you were blameless and not because you were above reproach. In other words, reconciliation doesn't find its causation in the ability, the holiness, or the blamelessness of the sinner.
God initiates, God affects it in order to produce a particular result. Paul does the same thing in Ephesians 1. Just as he chose us in him, before the foundation of the world, to be holy and blameless. He doesn't choose us in Him before the foundation of the world because we were holy and blameless, but rather He chooses us in order to be holy and blameless.
It is a consequence and not a cause. Holiness, righteousness, fruit bearing, godliness are consequences of God's reconciling work in our lives. They're not conditions. In other words, we don't stand up here and say, look, you really need to labor so that you can be holy, blameless, and above reproach, so that God will set his affection on you.
You need to be that poor, pathetic guy at the back door with a big thing of flowers. all kinds of repentance and all kinds of good works, presenting to his wife, so that perhaps, if she's feeling specially noble, she'll let you back in and not make you sleep in the doghouse. That's not the emphasis of the text. God reconciles in order to produce this and make this happen in your life. to present you holy and blameless and above reproach in His sight." These are the particulars, these are the realities, these are the things that reconciled sinners, by the grace of God, through the power of the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, now pursue, now seek after, now seek to exhibit and seek to display before not only God, but before a watching world as well. So that is verses 21 and 22.
So I've already mentioned there is movement from alienation to reconciliation. That's the emphasis in the passage. Here's what you were, here's what you are.
Application
Brethren, as we eat this bread and we drink this cup, we need to remember this. We need to understand that we don't just do this as some sort of a religious rite once a month because that's what Christians do. We do this to refresh our minds, to encourage our hearts, as our confession says, to confirm and strengthen our faith in the realities of gospel blessing. In other words, this is a visible, tangible representation of the blessed realities that are specified in verses 21 and 22.
Yet, now, He has reconciled. It hinges upon the body of His flesh through death. That's amplified in verse 20. Notice the way the Apostle speaks of it there.
And by Him, to reconcile all things to Himself, by Him whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross. Now those who have been with us for any time will probably expect me to read this quote from Gordon Clark. You're not going to be put off because I'm going to do this." I love this statement from Clark's commentary here. Now, when we pause to consider, this is staggering.
Notice what he says, having made peace through the blood of his cross. Again, we need to divorce our minds and our thoughts and our hearts of this sort of romantic idea. You know, we wear crosses, we have crosses, we look at crosses, and they speak of something beautiful and special. And it should.
The reality of the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ ought to promote in us a great deal of appreciation. Do you realize what a cross was for? It was for punishment. It was for execution.
It was for crucifixion. No one in the first century walked around with crosses adorning their bodies. You just wouldn't do that. You wouldn't put a picture of Auschwitz or Dachau in your living room.
You wouldn't invite people in and say, I want you to see this wonderful picture of this death camp. You just wouldn't do that. That's offensive. You certainly wouldn't have pictures of electric chairs hanging up in your house, unless you're really sick and demented.
I realize there's probably somebody out there that does defy the generality, but for the most of us, we don't have hangman's nooses. We don't have pictures of people in firing squads. We don't celebrate those sorts of things. Well, in the first century context, you didn't celebrate the cross.
I mean, again, we celebrate it as Christians because we understand the significance, but we ought to not miss the reality of the blood of the cross. I remember this great statement by Dr. Davis in his comments on the atonement at Gibeah. Something to the effect that people, readers of the Bible, oftentimes forget that atonement is a smelly, drippy, bloody mess.
It's not this polished romantic thing where the effeminate Jesus just sort of wanders up there and does his thing. It was the wrath and fury of the Father inflicted upon the Son, such that the Son cries out in dereliction, Why hast thou forsaken me? It was horrendous and horrific and the concept of the blood of the cross being the means by which peace is effected. You just wouldn't think that way.
Peace through the cross. So back to Clark. Now when we pause to consider, this is staggering. The preceding verses, 15 to 20, the preceding verses have described Christ in transcendent terms.
The Saturday morning guys know that means, and girls, that that means He's above. He's apart. Transcendent means way out there. God as Creator, God as Governor, that's transcendence.
The reality that Christ is the agent of creation, the reality of verse 17, that in Him all things consist, this world, the galaxies, everything that is, depends upon the Word of His power. Hebrews 1.3 says, "...he upholds all things by the word of his power." That's transcendence. That's what Clark is saying. The preceding verses have described Christ in transcendent terms.
He was the Creator in whom all the fullness dwells, the heir of the universe for whom it was created. Now, when the Creator of heaven and earth, the Creator Himself, voluntarily suffered on the cross for our sins, we can only stand in awe and worship. Right there. We can only stand in awe and worship that our God who made this world, our God in whom it consists, our God stooped and came into this lower world, took on the likeness of sinful flesh, lived 33 years among us, effected and perfected righteousness, and was ultimately delivered up by an angry mob May I say, even more severe, delivered up by His Holy Father.
And He died for our sins, and He rose again, so that we might have reconciliation. What's the response? Adoration and awe. Let us pray.
Closing Prayer
Father, we thank you for the glory of Christ revealed in Colossians. We thank you for the glory of Christ revealed from Genesis to Revelation. We thank you that you've made us partakers of these truths and you have saved us, God. We know we didn't seek you.
We know it was not our initiative. It was not our good works. It was not our sacrifice. It was not our pleading, our repentance, or anything of the sort.
But you reconciled us according to your grace and according to your plan. how we thank you, how we praise you, and God, how we ought to, as Clark suggests, respond with adoration and with awe. We thank you for this opportunity to remember our Lord's death on our behalf. I pray that you would continue with us now, and we pray through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.