Sermon artwork

Colossians 1:1-8

Preached by Bart Erlebach on 19th January 2025

Scripture

1:1 Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother,

2 To the saints and faithful brothers in Christ at Colossae:

Grace to you and peace from God our Father.

3 We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, 4 since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints, 5 because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. Of this you have heard before in the word of the truth, the gospel, 6 which has come to you, as indeed in the whole world it is bearing fruit and increasing—as it also does among you, since the day you heard it and understood the grace of God in truth, 7 just as you learned it from Epaphras our beloved fellow servant. He is a faithful minister of Christ on your behalf 8 and has made known to us your love in the Spirit.

(ESV)

Generated Transcript
In the church Bible, the pages 1 1 8 2. Colossians chapter 1 verses 1 to 8. Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of god and Timothy, our brother, to god's holy people in colossi, the faithful brothers and sisters in Christ. Grace and peace to you from god our father. We always thank god the father of our lord Jesus Christ when we pray for you because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all god's people, the faith and love that spring from the hope stored up for you in heaven and about which you have already heard heard in the true message of the gospel that has come to you.

In the same way, The gospel is bearing fruit and growing throughout the whole world just as it has been doing among you since the day you heard it and truly understood god's grace. You learned it from epaphras, our dear fellow servant, who is a faithful minister of Christ on our behalf, and who also told us of your love in the spirit. Thank you, Anne, for reading that for us. As Ben has said, we're starting a series in the book of colossians this morning, a great book to be getting into together. Let me just pray for us as we start.

Father, we thank you for your word. We thank you for the message of truth, the gospel of truth, and we pray please now as we start this series in colossians that you'd help us open our eyes to the truth in your words, help us to understand it, help us to get into this book, to get to grips with it, to, understand what you're teaching us. And their father, please, would that shape our hearts and change our lives? Ah, man. What does genuine Christianity look like?

Before we get into the passage that, Anne read, we're just gonna think a little bit about, a kind of introduction to the book as a whole, the book of colossians. What does genuine Christianity look like? We can be suspicious, come we have things that we see online pictures, images that we see online because we know that they can easily be manipulated, easily be changed. So you've got there is a few photos here that you might have seen online. That 1, Barrick Obama, maybe you've seen before, which is just AI generated.

It's not a genuine picture, or this 1, of Oprah Winfrey as a security guard, not real, or this 1, of Will Smith working in, in a shop. They're not real. AI generated, but we're used to that now that you look at things and you think, well, it's just not real. It's not a genuine image. What about Christianity?

We can wonder whether what genuine Christianity is because there's so many different flavors of it. So many different forms it can take. You've got the the super traditional very ritualistic, very, very lots of ceremony. I gather in the United States, there's an increasing number of young men who are going towards, the Orthodox Church with all its, rituals and ceremonies. And then on the other end, you've got the the more charismatic churches, which can feel just completely different, much more informal, much more lively, much more upbeat, and maybe you hear of strange goings on in charismatic churches.

And you think, well, that is just poles apart from the tradition of which which is genuine. And if you're under Christian this morning, it's great that you're here. If you're exploring the Christian faith, you might be wondering which which is more genuine. And I've only mentioned 2 kinds. There there are all kinds of other sorts of Christianity going on there, all sorts of other forms of Christianity, which is the real thing.

And if you're a Christian, you might be wondering, is what I've got the real thing? Or is there a deeper spirituality out there that I'm missing out on? Which if maybe I did the more traditional I could have or or or if I went to somewhere where it was clearly more spiritual. Maybe I could be having something deeper. Well, the book of colossians is a great place for us to go.

It's a letter written by the apostle Paul to a church in a place called Colosi. And I've got some maps, there for you. I don't know if you can see it. Colosi is sort of there in the middle. So it's, in a what is modern day Turkey?

But it's there in the in the middle. And if the next slide, helpfully, zooms in a little bit closer. So you can see a little bit bigger. There you go. So that's where Colosi is.

And Paul is writing to a church there. Now, what's the situation in colossi that that Paul is writing to? It is a little bit tricky to piece it together. There is a sort of classic question as to whether in that church in colossi, whether there are actually false teachers present, people who are teaching what is false, or whether they're not there, but Paul is just getting them ready in case there are these false teachers. In some ways, it doesn't really matter which way it is.

The issue is that Paul is getting them ready because he is concerned for them that they might be deceived. So if you have a look in in your bibles to colossians, let me just take you to 1 other place. Colossians chapter 2 verse 4. This helps us to understand why Paul is writing this letter to this church. So chapter 2 verse 4 says, I tell you this so that no 1 may deceive you by fine sounding arguments.

So he's concerned that that these colossians could be, deceived, could be taken away from the truth by fine sounding arguments. Or verse 8 of chapter 2. See to it that no 1 takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and elemental spiritual forces of this world rather than on Christ. So he's saying it's possible that you could be duped, that you could be taken captive, that you could be taken away from the genuine real Christian faith. And notice here 2 things that he says that could take you away that that might take you captive.

1 of them is human tradition, and the other 1 is well, it's philosophy, which depends on human tradition or philosophy that depends on the elementals, forces of this world. Now it's slightly hard to unpick what that last bit is. But you certainly get from later on in the letter that some seem to have been involved in worshiping angels. Maybe there's a sort of spirituality that they're trying to encourage. So these false teachers, if they're there, or this deception, is to do with not saying Jesus is rubbish or jeez forget about Jesus, but rather it's a Jesus plus.

Thing. So it's yeah. Jesus is okay. Jesus is good. Yeah.

You need Jesus, but you need more than Jesus. To have fullness, and that seems to be aware that crops up several times in the book of colossians, to have a kind of full Christian faith. You need Jesus, but you need Jesus plus. Jesus plus tradition or Jesus plus spiritual experience. And Paul is saying, be warned.

Don't fall for this. It's not true. Don't be taken captive by it. And we see there's a summary verse or summary 2 verses that you could have for the whole letter, which is chapter 2 versus 6 and 7. He says so then, just as you received Christ Jesus as lord, continue to live your lives in him.

Rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught and overflowing with thankfulness. That could be a summary couple of verses for the book of colossians. That Paul is saying, just as you receive Christ Jesus as lord, continue to live in him. Jesus is at the center of it all. And if you've got Jesus, you've got the genuine Christian faith.

He is everything. If you have him, we'll see you have fullness. You don't need to find that fullness in other things. In tradition or in other spiritual experiences, you have everything in Christ Jesus. And that in some ways is is the core of the letter that it is all about Jesus.

Now this is good for you. If you're not yet a Christian, if you're exploring Christian things because Paul is gonna talk about the core, the heart of the Christian faith, he's gonna talk about Jesus. We're gonna learn lots about Jesus. And it's good for us if we're Christians because you might be tempted to think is what I've got the real thing. Maybe I should add something to it.

And we need to see, actually, the way to deeper spirituality The way to a deeper relationship with God is to know Jesus better, not to move on from him, not to add anything to him, but to stick with him. You have fullness, in Christ. That's why we're calling this sermon series in colossians fullness in Christ. So that's why we're coming to this letter. A letter all about the centrality of Jesus, and if it's with our Hope Church Essentials.

At the beginning of Hope Church, we said there are 4 essentials. The first 1 was, we wanna know Jesus better. Well, this is a letter all about Jesus. And so let's come to our passage for today. The opening passage of, the book of colossians.

And what we find is right from the start, Paul is reassuring the colossian Christians that they are genuine Christians. Genuine believers. They in our passage, you've got a little introduction verses 1 and 2, and then verse 3 to 8 is a a prayer is Paul giving thanks to god for the colossians. So he begins verse 1, Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of god and Timothy, our brother. Notice just there, Paul, as he often does, normally does in his letters, gives his credentials for, for being able to write to them in an authoritative way.

He says, he is an apostle. That is a sent 1. 1 sent by Christ Jesus. The this isn't true of Timothy. It's not true of epaphras who we'll hear about in a minute.

But it is true of Paul that he is an apostle sent by Jesus, and therefore has that authority to teach them and instruct them. And then notice what he says about the colossians. It's interesting, isn't it? Verse 2. To god's holy people in colossi, the faithful brothers and sisters in Christ.

In in 3 ways, he's saying to them, you are genuine believers. Isn't he? He's saying you're god's holy people. Your god's holy people, chosen by him, set apart by god. You are faithful brothers and sisters.

You're genuinely Christians. These colossians who may be questioning it. Now, you're you're genuine, you're faithful. And notice he says you're in Christ. Now that is a theme that's gonna come back in the letter of the colossians.

There's a lot in colossians about the fact that Christians are united to Christ. Christ in them and them in Christ. If you read through the whole letter and I encourage you to do so, you'll see that comes up that they are in Christ. And Christ in them. I call it a Christian is not someone who merely just agrees to with certain truths.

No. Something fundamental has happened to the Christian that Christ is in them, and they are in Christ. They're united with Christ. We'll come back to that. And then, Paul, thanks god for them.

And he picks out particular things for which he's thankful. Why does he pick out these things? In verses 3 to 8, he picks out particular things and says, I thank god for these things about you. Why does he pick out these things? Well, it's because they are the fruit of the gospel, that the gospel was proclaimed in colossi, and here is the fruit.

And Paul says, I thank god for those things. They show that you're genuine Christians, these fruit of the gospel. So what are they? What are these fruits? Of the gospel, where we see in verse 3.

We always thank god the father of our lord Jesus Christ when we pray for you because we've heard of your faith in Christ Jesus. So the first fruit of the gospel that Paul picks out is that they have faith in Jesus. Now it's important that Paul doesn't just say, I thank god that you just have faith. It's not just faith in the abstract. That can be something that people talk about today, that they just sort of value faith as if it is just a commendable thing in and of itself.

Paul doesn't do that. He says, no, it's faith in Jesus, faith in Christ Jesus. That's what I thank god for that is in you. There are plenty around us who would play down the sign play down the significance of the content of faith, but it is vital I spoke to someone a couple of months ago, a few months ago, someone who's not a Christian who was saying, and I it's a fairly common view, isn't it? Maybe there are some here who would who would have this view who would say it doesn't really matter which religion you follow, because in the end, you boil them all down.

They're all basically the same thing. Because he was saying, if you take away the distinctives, they're all about peace. That we all want peace in the world. Now you could question that whether all religions genuinely do. But he was saying basically that's what we all want.

We all want peace. We all want love. We all want happy lives. Basically, that's what all religions are about. So it doesn't really matter which 1 you, you opt for.

And Paul say no, that's not right. It does matter that it is faith in Christ Jesus. And Paul gives a lot of content to, in this letter about Jesus. 2 key things that you could pick on would be who Jesus is, and what Jesus came to do. Who he is?

Have a look again. Verse. Just, look at chapter 1 verse 19. There's so much in chapter 1 about who Jesus is, but let me just give you a little bit of a taste of where we're heading. Chapter 1 verse 19.

For god was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him. Talking about Jesus. God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in Jesus. All god's fullness, the fullness of god in a person, the person of Jesus Christ. That's who Jesus is.

All the fullness of god in him. So Jesus is unique. There is no 1 else like him. No 1 else has the fullness of god in them like this. And therefore, if you look at Jesus, if you read about Jesus in in the new testament, read accounts of what he did, what he said, you are reading accounts of what god is doing there because all the fullness of god is in him.

Jesus perfectly reveals to us who god is. Because all god's fullness is in him. Who Jesus is and why Jesus came. First 20 of chapter 1, and through him to reconcile to himself all things whether things on earth or things in heaven by making peace through his blood shed on the cross. Jesus came to this earth to reconcile us to god.

We're not in a good relationship with god, but Jesus came that we might be reconciled to god. And how did he do it by shedding his blood? Through his death, we can come into that relationship with god. Who Jesus is? What he came to do?

It's very important there is content to this faith, faith in Jesus. And Paul says, this is 1 of the fruits of the gospel. Genuine Christians have faith in Jesus. And it's important for us to know that faith in Jesus is not just agreeing with those truths, but it's putting our lives into them. It's it's trusting in them.

You'll have heard if you've been to in Christian circles for any length of time, you'll have heard this illustration before you're bound to have done. But it's the 1 about blondin. Yeah? The, tight rope walker. Let's have the picture of him.

There he is. He was the first person to cross the Niagara Falls on a tight rope. And the story goes that what he would do is he would he crossed the Niagara Falls on a tight rope. There was a crowd watching him, and there are maids. That he did this.

And the story goes that he would, then say to the crowd, you, you, you know, you've seen I can cross the Niagara. Do you think I could do it, wheeling a wheelbarrow in front of me? And they go, yeah. Of course, you can. You're the great blond in.

You've just done it. You of course, you could do it. Do you think I could do it with someone in the wheelbarrow? Which everyone goes, yeah. You could do it with someone in the wheelbarrow.

So he says, okay. So can someone come forward and get in the wheel back? And classically, people will say, you know, that that that's an illustration of faith. Faith is not just saying, yes, I think you can do something Jesus. It's not just saying I think you can that you I think you are the god or that I think you can reconcile people to to god.

It's saying I put my life into those truths, into you Jesus, and I put my life in you and say, I trust you to reconcile me to god my life in your hands. It's not just knowing these things. It's resting your life on them. And Paul says, I thank god that you've got faith in Jesus. It is the first fruit of the gospel.

Faith in Jesus. The first thing. Second fruit is love for god's all god's people. So we see it there at verse 4 because you've heard I've we've heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all god's people. The second mark of genuine Christianity of a genuine, Christian is a love for other Christians.

The Bible knows nothing of a a Christian faith, which is purely solo. The the Christian is brought not just of Jesus, but also to god's people. And there is a love that is brought about through the gospel. There's a love for other believers. Now we asked, I asked, last week, we won't do it again.

How many introverts and extroverts we had in our church family. And it turned out, my suspicions were correct, that maybe we had a few more introverts than extroverts, not exclusively, so, but we've just got that's just the way we are. As a church family. Now sometimes when people hear, you know, you need a love for other Christians, I think introverts can hear sometimes you've gotta be an extrovert, and that's just not the way it is. Introverts are people who get more energy from being on their own.

They to recharge, you wanna be on your own or with 1 or 2 other people. Extroverts get their energy from being with other people. They love it. And that's great. The issue is you can love others whether you're an introvert or an extrovert.

The the introvert is not saying I never want to be with people. It's just saying, actually, I find that more draining. Now introverts, we can be encouraged that, that the Bible does emphasize and does encourage us to have personal faith in Jesus. It says, actually, that's good. And that Jesus Wenden had times on his own with the lord.

And we are encouraged to do so too to have time on our own with god in prayer. And introverts go, yeah, that sounds great. And maybe extroverts maybe find that challenging to have those times on your own. With the law. But introverts need to be challenged as well to go.

Actually, it is good to be with others and to make a priority of spending time with others. And we've we're not gonna love 1 another well if we don't spend time with 1 another. And therefore, it's really good when we have things like a church lunch to say, actually, I'm gonna make that a priority. If you see that there's a church lunch to go, I'm gonna make sure I'm there on that day, and I wanna be with people to get to know them and love them. Introverts would just go away from that feeling a bit more drained.

But that's alright. We can sacrifice a bit of energy and, you know, a bit of that because we want to love 1 another and spend time together. And I want to encourage you when we have the meals in other people's homes as well. Don't just think, oh, that's for others. That's not for me.

Now sign up for that because we've got to get to know 1 another, and maybe you'll find that big. I mean, different people find different sized groups harder, don't they? Some people find big groups intimidating. Some people find smaller groups intimidating. Some people are better 1 on 1.

Okay. But let's cross that pain line maybe and go, actually, we've gotta be with 1 another. Spend time together. Being 1 another's homes open up our homes to 1 another. So that we can love 1 another.

Introverts will do it in different ways. Introverts express their love in different ways extra. I'm I'm making too big a deal of that, aren't I? We just gotta love 1 another. It would just look different the way that we do it.

And that's alright. But Christians, the genuine Christian loves other believers. They don't just go, I'm just gonna come to church and just go home and ignore everyone else. Now they wanna love other believers. That's the second fruit of the gospel.

A love for 1 another. And thirdly, hope. So it's faith, love, and hope, verse 5. The faith and love that spring from the hope stored up for you in heaven, about which you've already heard in the true message of the gospel. We thought about hope quite a lot last term, but we have it again here.

It is a hope stored up for you in heaven. And again, that may hint at what the false teachers were were trying to do that 1 of the things maybe they were trying to do was to say, those things that the gospel promises in the future, you could have them now. Because there is a lot in the Christian faith where you go yeah, we've got a lot now, but actually there's a lot that's yet to come. And maybe those false teachers were saying, you know, what you could have them now? So for instance, Jesus does say, you can have life in all its fullness.

And we do experience some of that now. But there is also a groaning. Roman's 8 talks about it. A kind of groaning about about this world that we don't have all that we will have in the future. There's still suffering now, and we're still tempted now.

We still sin now. But maybe some of these false teachers were saying, you know, as you might have heard other people say today, the, you know, if you had genuine faith, if your faith was real, if you had a really strong faith, you wouldn't suffer now, or you wouldn't sin now. But yet, the Christian hope is 1 of the Christian faith is 1 of hope of forward looking. We don't have all those things now. We're looking forward to them in the future, but we don't have it all now.

Much of the Christian, of what Christians, what Christianity holds out his future. But it is an incredible thing actually in this world to have hope for the future. That through Jesus and his death and resurrection, we do look forward to, a time in the future, which Jesus will bring, where there will be no death or mourning or crying or pain. That we look forward to that future. It is a glorious future.

It's expressed in, the song written by a town ending getty that there is a hope, which says there is a hope that stands the test of time that lifts my eyes beyond the beckoning grave to see the matchless beauty of a day divine when I behold his face. When suffering cease and sorrows die and every longing satisfied, then joy unspeakable will flood my soul for I'm truly home. Real Christianity has that hope it is future looking. We can have moments of doubt, of course. And in those moments, we need to go back to Jesus and the truths we know about him, and we need 1 another to help us to say no, hold on to the hope.

Keep holding on to it. It is a glorious future we look forward to. Hold on to it. It is certain. But we don't have it yet.

So Paul says, he thanks god for the fruit of the gospel in the lives of these colossians. This fruit, which he's saying, look, this is genuine Christianity. It's it's produced this in you. This faith in Jesus. This love for god's people and this hope for the future.

You're saying you're genuine Christians. You've got these things. And then he says, that the ministry that they received was genuine. So, he he talks a little bit, in in the next verses, up to verse 8, about the genuineness of the ministry they received, and we'll go through this much, much more quickly. Because again, they might have questioned it because the person they'd heard the Christian teaching from was not Paul.

It wasn't 1 of the apostles. It was a guy called Epaphras. And therefore, they might have questioned it and thought, did epaphras really get it right? When he came to us in Colosi with this gospel message, was he just coming with his own ideas, or was it the real thing that we got? This last Christmas, we were on the lookout for a new Christmas tree.

We we we we had, you know, 1 that you put together yourself, and our 1 wasn't looking so good. And my wife looked on our website to see if we could get a secondhand 1, cheaper 1. And there was 1 that someone was selling, and, it it was a good price, but and he said it, you know, never been used before. Is still, you know, unused Christmas tree. We thought, well, this is this is looking good.

Until we sort of started to tweak, maybe this wasn't quite right. Maybe this was a bit it might have been fine. But it was the moment when he said he insisted that we do the deal in a car park. I thought this doesn't sound quite right. Let's pull out of this.

We don't want a dodgy Christmas tree. Maybe it would have been fine. But anyway, our our senses were going of kind of this doesn't seem quite right. And maybe that's true for the colossian Christians as well, that they were going, we got this from this guy, Epaphras. Who's he?

You know, with this message about g, is it genuine? Is it right? Did he get it right? Well, notice Paul says, verse 5. The faith and love that spring from the hope stored up for you in heaven, about which you've heard in the true message of the gospel that has come to you.

The message you received is the true message. Or, the message of truth. It's actually the word of truth is more literal. So it's not just that the message was true, but it's the message of truth. You see Christianity is at its core about truth.

About truth claims about Jesus. About who he is and why he came. And Paul's saying that message is the message of truth that you heard. It's the true message. And verse 6, it's bearing fruit everywhere.

In the same way, the gospel is bearing fruit and growing throughout the world just as it has been doing among you. Since the day you heard it and truly understood God's grace. Do you see what Paul is doing there? He's saying, you heard it, but it's not just you. Loads of other people have heard this gospel message as well.

In fact, it's going around the world. I don't think he means literally, it's it's actually literally gone round the world by that point, but he's saying it's going from nation to nation. And as the gospel is going out, as this message that you've heard is going out, this same message is going out, it is bearing the same fruit everywhere it goes. The same fruit of faith and love and hope. It's it's bearing the same fruit throughout the world.

And that's a great encouragement for us. That Christianity is the most global religion there is. If you look on a map, of all the religions of the world and where they are located, where followers of those faiths are located, it's incredible to see. Of course, for instance, Hinduism is mainly in India, and Islam is mainly in, well, sort of Middle East and North Africa, but it it's sort of that area. But if you look at where Christianity is, you see, it's it's global.

It's around the whole world. And as you think of that, just think it's the same message that we've received that they are receiving, and they are hearing. Whether they're in London or Singapore, South Africa, Brazil, wherever it is Afghanistan, where people are hearing the gospel. It's the same gospel, and it's producing the same fruit. And that should encourage us to go.

It's the genuine message. What we've got is the same as what they've got, and it's producing the same fruit. And it is the message of god's grace, as Paul says there. And then he mentions epaphras and says he's a genuine minister. Verse 7, you learned it from epaphras, our dear fellow servant, who is a faithful minister of Christ on our behalf and who also told us of your love in the spirit.

Do you see he's saying epaphras was genuine? You know, he's the real thing. He's a genuine minister. You got the right thing. I'd say Paul says, yes.

It the you received a genuine Christian ministry. You didn't just receive a knock off version in a car park somewhere. Your preference's theology wasn't just his own. Wasn't just, he made it up on the way to you. It's the real thing.

Okay. So how did this passage leave us? How did it leave the colossians? Well, it was a reassuring passage for them, wasn't it? As they began, the Paul saying to them, I thank god that you have genuine Christian faith because I can see the fruit, faith in Jesus, love for god's people, and I hope that's stored up in heaven.

And if you've got those things, be encouraged. You've got the real thing. It's genuine. And keep that trust in Jesus. Keep coming back to him.

Don't think you've got to add other things for fullness as a Christian. You don't need those other things. If you've got Jesus, you've got everything. But maybe you think, well, actually, I'm not sure I am a Christian. I don't know whether I have got those things.

Can I encourage you? Keep coming back? Keep coming back because the fruit comes from the gospel. And that is what we're gonna be thinking about as we go through colossians. What we're gonna see is the message the good news about Jesus Christ.

So keep coming back and keep looking at who Jesus is, and I encourage you to put your faith, your trust, your life. In him. Let me pray for us. Heavenly father, we, thank you that in Jesus, we can have fullness that we don't need to look elsewhere. Thank you that the message of the gospel is the genuine message, and putting trust in Jesus is real Christianity.

And so we pray please that you would help us and encourage us through what we have seen. Father, please reassure us if we are Christians of what we've got And father, for those who aren't yet, people who've put their faith in Jesus, we pray you would open their eyes to Jesus, who he is and why he came. And to put their faith fully in him and that the fruit of the gospel would be born in their lives too. Amen.