Sermon artwork

Colossians 4:2-6

Preached by Bart Erlebach on 16th March 2025

Scripture

2 Continue steadfastly in prayer, being watchful in it with thanksgiving. 3 At the same time, pray also for us, that God may open to us a door for the word, to declare the mystery of Christ, on account of which I am in prison—4 that I may make it clear, which is how I ought to speak.

5 Walk in wisdom toward outsiders, making the best use of the time. 6 Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person.

(ESV)

Generated Transcript
Page 1 1 8 4. Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful, and pray for us too that god may open a door for our message so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ for which I am in chains. Pray that I may proclaim it clearly as I should. Be wise in the way you act towards outsiders. Make the most of every opportunity.

Let your conversation be always full of grace seasoned with salt so that you may know how to answer everyone. Thank you, Sue, for reading that for us. Please keep the passage open in front of you. Page 1 1 8 4, if you've closed your bibles. And let's pray it again.

Father, we thank you again that we have your word. It is an incredible thing to have the words of the living god. Help us therefore to list to understand and to know how to put into practice what we read, amen. In the letter of colossians, we we've been, working our way through, we come to a point where Paul turns his attention to how Christians should relate to those who aren't Christians, those outside the church. And this is particularly important for us at the moment as we work on how we're going to reach out.

How we're going to reach out to the local community around here where we've planted, and how you're going to reach out, how you're going to continue to reach out if you're a Christian, to your friends and family and neighbors. How should we go about doing it? Because we want them to come to know Jesus. But what should we do? Should we go out?

Full on, issue you all with megaphones so that when you get home today, you stand outside your neighbor's houses, proclaiming the goss will do them. Would that be wrong? Maybe it'd be a good thing. Maybe some here are loving the idea of it. I suspect most are not enjoying that idea.

No. There could be unwind ways of doing it. But we do need to convey the message, don't we? Of the gospel? We want to do it.

We need to. A a a famous evangelist well known evangelist, speaks of a time when a friend of his decided to break off their friendship with him. And it wasn't because the evangelists had been too full on with that friend, quite the opposite. The friend, he hadn't told his friend about Jesus at all, and that friend had, gone somewhere and heard the message of Christianity, heard the message of the gospel, and had concluded that If that's what the evangelist believed, he clearly didn't care about him. Because if he believed it and cared about him, he would have told him that message.

So he broke off that friendship. He's the message really is crucial for people to know. But how do we go about doing it? Maybe you're here today. You're not a Christian.

Maybe you're exploring Christianity It's great you're here. I wonder if you've seen why the message of Christianity is quite so important. Now I'm not gonna major on that this morning, but if you just cast your eyes back in the book of colossians to chapter 1 verse 21 and 22. There's a summary there of what Christians believe. Says once you were alienate from god and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior, but now he has reconciled you by Christ's physical body through death to present you wholly in his sight without blemish and free from accusation Those verses are saying mankind is alienated from god.

We are enemies of god. That is the state we're all in. It's a dangerous state to be in, but Jesus came and died so that we could be reconciled to god so that we could be forgiven. That we could be free for of accusation. That is the great news.

It's why everyone needs to hear it because if we don't, take hold of this, if we're not reconciled to god. 1 day, we will face Scott as his enemies. He makes an eternity of difference. It is that important. But how should Chris go about relating to non Christians.

How should we go about this task? There are 2 commands in our passage. If you turn back to colossians chapter 4 versus 2 to 6. There are actually 2 commands in, the pass in the English, it looks like more, but in the original narrative. And that's gonna form the structure for our sermon for for going through the passage.

And so the first command is this. Devote yourself to prayer, devote yourself to prayer, and we'll focus on that in verses 2 to 4. The starting point for how we are to relate to outsiders to the people in the area, people who you know, is devote yourself to prayer. Now, Paul is commanding them to pray about more than that. But it is at least that, and he comes on to explain more on that.

But by saying the first thing we need to do is commit ourselves to prayer, shows that the first thing we need is to depend on god. We need to look to him to lead us and guide us and to open hearts, which will mean we as a church, we're not franchise, like, you know, if you go to, obviously, if you go to a Starbucks anywhere in the country or a Costa or anything like that, it looks exactly the same. It feels exactly the same, and you can order exactly the same things. But church is to be like that. It's not that planting here, we just, decide to do what other successful churches do, assuming that that's what will guarantee people coming in and becoming Christians.

We're not franchises because first thing we need to do is look the lord and say, Lord, what do you want us to do? Would you lead us and guide us? It is a genuine dependence on the lord. Couple of weeks ago, I was on the Commission senior pastor's conference, it was a really encouraging time. The main theme of the conference was prayer.

And 1 of the passages that was preached on was 2 Chronicles chapter 20. It's a wonderful, story. I'd encourage you to go go home and and read it. It's a wonderful 1 to read. At that point in the life of Judah, a vast army has come to attack them.

And the people of Judah gather together to seek the lord and seek his, health. And the king of Judah, jehoshaphat, is before the people at the temple, and he prays to the lord. And his prayer ends like this, we have no power to face this vast army. We do not know what to do, but our eyes are on you. What a great prayer to pray.

At frightening, we have no power. We don't know what to do, but lord our eyes are on you. Paul says devote yourselves to prayer, which means being like that coming before god with that absolute dependency of saying, lord, we don't have the power to bring anyone to faith. We don't know what to do. But our eyes are on you.

And Paul tells us what this prayer should look like. He says devote yourselves to prayer verse 2, which means it gotta be persistent. We've gotta keep going at it. Very often our praying is sporadic, isn't it? It is for me.

I I I would think it would be for you too. On our own, we pray when we feel l t that we haven't been or when we're enthused to pray, but it can wane, can't it? It it we can lack enthusiasm. And therefore, it just sort of goes, by the way, or or we gather to pray, and maybe we're enthusiastic to gather to pray, but it can easily drop off and Paul says be devoted to it. Keep going up praying.

It's encouraging, isn't it that when Jesus taught his disciples, 1 of the parables that he taught, it says at the beginning, that he taught it so that his that his followers would pray and not give up. It's encouraging, actually, that Jesus knew and Paul knew in this letter that we would be tempted to give up. You and I will be tempted to not persevere. Paul says devote yourself to And he says to do so, being watchful and thankful. What does that mean?

I think the 2 things go together being watchful and thankful. It's keeping your eyes out seeing what the lord is doing as you pray, and then giving thanks to him for what he's doing. I think it it's very easy. I find it very easy when pray just to start with my list of, well, the next thing is this. The next thing is this.

Rather than taking a moment and going, what's the lord been doing? Maybe it's different from what I prayed. Maybe it is an answer to prayer, but let be thankful. Watchful and thankful. And Paul then speaks about the content of the prayer.

First 3, he says, and pray for us too that god may open a door for our message so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ for which I am in chains, pray that I may proclaim it clearly as I should. Now, as pointed out to me, rightly, at the beginning, the fact that he says, and pray for us to that dot dot dot, means that now that he comes on to say, you know, this is what you're to pray and pray about open doors for the gospel, that that's not the only thing you're to pray for. He's presuming that you will pray for maybe what's come before. He says devote yourselves to prayer after having talked about marriage and about home life and about, work life and about a whole load of things. And maybe last week, as we as we talked about that, you just felt completely overwhelmed by that.

What do you do? He says devote yourself to prayer. But it does certainly include praying about outreach because that's what he goes on to. He says, pray for and what does he say to pray for? Pre for open doors.

Open doors for Paul. And Timothy. Now we'll see in a minute. What he commands the colossians to do is different from what he and Timothy are doing because, well, because they're gift are different. Paul and Timothy are preachers.

They're proclaimers. So he says pray for open doors for us. But we'll see in a minute what he commands for the colossians. And he says, for those who are proclaimers, those who are preachers and teach is pray for open doors. And the image that we have there, whereas the image that comes to my mind, I don't know whether it was in Paul's mind, but the image that comes to my mind is you imagine a messenger going to a city with a message, important announcement to make to that city.

Alright. Nowadays you do it in different ways, you know, social media or whatever. But imagine it was olden days where you don't have that. And this messenger comes to the city, but the city is surrounded by thick walls, and the gates are shut. And no matter how much that herald proclaims and shouts that message, no 1 hears it because the gates are shut.

What does he need? He needs someone to open the doors? Can come in and speak the message so that people can hear it. But if the doors are shut, it's not gonna be hurt. Well, we often say that today's culture is closed or hard to the gospel.

I think that's true to now you find it with people you speak to about the gospel. It seems like there's quite a hardness there. There's quite a reluctance to engage with things to do with the gospel. How's that gonna change? In some ways, you say, we've got an open door here.

We're here in this building. Well, that's great. And and it's true, and we should praise god what for it. But what about into the Sunrise Day and Signal Park Towers and Tallworth as a whole and seeing people engage with the gospel? What do we need there?

We need the lord to open doors for the proclamation of the gospel. What in this school. We want to pray for open doors to come in and be able to speak of Jesus. We need to keep praying that the lord would open those doors. Otherwise, we'll just be shouting on the outside.

And Paul says to them to pray he'd be clear. First of all, pray that I may proclaim it clearly. For claim what? The mystery of Christ. That's what he's talking about.

That he talk about Jesus clearly. It's interesting. He doesn't pray for, a clever presentation. He says, no, pray that I'd be clear. We know from the book of Romans, Paul talks about the Goss bull has been in the power of god for the salvation of everyone who believes.

It's the gospel that has the power. And therefore, you just need to proclaim it clearly and let it do the work. I'm pretty awful at DIY. And my dad tried to teach me, and often he would say, you know, let the tool do the work. You know, did someone say that to you?

Let the tool do the work. You know, if you're bashing and nail them with a hammer, you're not trying to force it and let the hammer do the way. If you soaring. Don't force it. Let the sword do the wet.

Let the tool do the work. So with the gospel. The gospel is the power of god. Let it do the work. We just need to proclaim it clearly.

So pray for us for the holiday club that's coming up for the Easter services, pray for open doors, pray for clear proclamation of the gospel, and pray for other open doors. In this area for the gospel to be proclaimed. So Paul says, first thing, as we think about relating to outside disease, be devoted to prayer. Now we're going to do something slightly unusual. This morning, don't panic.

It's alright. Don't be fear fearful. I'm just gonna get you to talk to the person next to you just as a slight variation on what we're doing. Now if this frightens you and you think, I don't want to talk to someone next to me. If you're new here and you're thinking, I just don't want to be quiet and you're whatever, that is fine.

If someone turns to say, it's alright, I just wanna be on my own. That is absolutely fine. No 1 will think less of you. If someone says it to you, don't think less of them. Alright?

So if you wanna be on your own, that's fine. But could you talk to the person next to you? Here are a couple of questions. What particularly struck you from verses 2 to 4, and what will you do as a result of them? Okay?

Go for it. Talk to someone next to you. Okay. Okay. Let's, let's come back together.

I hope you've got something there where you're going. Yeah. Okay. This is what I'm gonna do. This is what I need to change.

I want to encourage you that, Hopechurch, we were we were launched. We were born out of prayer. As we look back, that has been true of us as a church. In lots of ways, we could talk about that more, but we were born out of prayer. So let's not think, oh, we've done that.

Actually, we need to ratchet up the praying. Don't we? Wanna increase the praying of Hopechurch. So we need to be devoted to prayer. Second command live wisely.

First 5. Be wise in the way you act towards outsiders. May the most of every opportunity. Like I say, what Paul expects from the colossians is a bit different from what he and Timothy are to do. They're preachers, they're proclaimers, so they, he says pray for us for open doors.

And you might be relieved to know that you you aren't instructed to go and preach and proclaim in the same way. If you're not gifted in that, that must that'd be a great relief to you, I would think, if you're not gifted in that kind of thing. No, we aren't all called to be preach And if we assume that we are and we think we've all got to do it, then we will, well, we, yeah, it won't be appropriate. We won't do it right. It won't work well.

But we are all called to live in a way that commends the gospel and to be ready to respond. So we may not all be preachers, but we are all to live in a way that commends the gospel and ready to respond when people ask us questions. And he instructs them, therefore, to act wisely towards, non Christians towards outsiders. And there are many ways that we could be unwise. We could be bulling a China thinking every conversation, we've got to speak the gospel every single time, speaking in, in a way, which is just blunt and bold and courageous.

And we think, well, there we go. I've done my job and we we leave chaos in our wake. That would be unwise. But it would be unwise as well to be chameleons and just blend into the background, and you work in a place for 20, 30 years, and then people are surprised to hear that you're Christian. That would be unwise as well, wouldn't it?

Now why is living must firstly be that well, that we live out what we've seen in coloss that there's those who have Christ in them and are in Christ that we then live out the life that we are called to, things that we read in chapter 3, that we put off what belongs to the earthly nature, things like ****** immorality, anger, or filthy language. Even just taking those off and not doing them might make us stand out at school or in the workplace or or or in our with our neighbors. And then he said put on things like compassion and humility and kindness. And again, just doing those things might make us stand out, as well as what we've read about marriage and family life and work life that we thought about last week. Those things are gonna make us stand out, and you've gotta be prepared to stand out.

That you don't drink in the way that your colleagues drink, but which I don't mean you have some weird technique of drinking, or if it's What are you doing? What are they doing is making a right mess? Oh, they're a Christian. No, no, not that kind. But, obviously, they, you know, you don't treat alcohol the way they do.

You know, the same as them in parties. You don't speak the way they do. You're not dishonest, maybe in the way that some others are. Do you stand out so that when we get a chance to speak, our live commend the gospel. We won't do it perfectly.

And part of the gospel is saying, yeah, even a sinner like me can be saved, can be forgiven. So Paul says be wise, and says to make the most of every opportunity, so where you get an opportunity, looking for them, looking for opportunities to speak about Jesus or to invite people to things that you go, yeah, I'm on the lookout for them. I'll just sitting back doing nothing. I am looking for those chances, and maybe it's easier after a while to stop looking for those opportunities, but he says make the most of them. And, of course, we all know that sinking feeling where we miss opportunities.

And if that's you and you feel I made a mess of it, of course, we come back to god and we say we ask for forgiveness. We know we've got it through Jesus. We trust in god's sovereignty that You missing that opportunity, hasn't wrecked eternity for someone? No. The Lord's in control, and, we ask for that opportunity again, and keep a lookout for it.

And Paul turns to their speech He says verse 6. Let your conversation always be full of grace, seasoned with salt so that you may know how to answer everyone. What's that like? Gracious speech, which is seasoned with salt. I I again, I don't think it's that you've gotta speak the gospel in every conversation, but it maybe it's it's conversation which is shaped by the gospel.

So speech shaped by the truths of the gospel. So we'll be kind. Are we looking to be forgiving of others, especially if they're nasty to you for being a Christian? And I want to suggest, the more we soak ourselves in god's word, the more we let it shape our thinking and our hearts, the more we will speak graciously seasoned with salt. Because the gospel doesn't just give you, a rescue from judgment.

It changes the way you think, doesn't it? The way you look at the world. And you just need to let that come out in your speech. So for instance, Others may talk about being lucky or fortunate. What would you say?

But you're thankful to the lord for whatever it is. Others speak of their hopes and dreams for their children. What what what they may be or their grandchildren, whatever they may be, whether that's in education or career or in sporting achievements, you go, well, what are your hopes and dreams for your children? Are they gonna be that they follow Jesus? That they love Jesus?

Well, you could speak about that. Others speak of their fears about the future. You could speak about, yeah, it's scary. Maybe whatever it is, but I trust in the lord. Do you see kind of gracious speech seasoned with salt shaped by the truths that you're learning from god's word.

Many little ways, our speech can be gracious. And then it says so that you'll know how to answer everyone. Living wisely and speaking graciously will, in due course, leave maybe 2 questions. It doesn't say how frequently, but to people just asking or saying something. And then maybe you've got a, opportunity to reply to respond to say something more about Jesus.

Are you ready to respond and say, to speak about what Jesus has done for you? The forgiveness you have through Christ's death on the cross, and the hope of it journal life. Oh, we do it nervously. They're we're nervous, and we're feel like we make a right mess of it. I do.

But we do it anyway. Trust sting the lord. And notice we don't have the responsibility of converting anyone. It doesn't say that we do. We just don't do we.

It's not in our power. We speak. We live wisely, speak grace justly ready to respond and we leave the conversions up to the lord. So be wise, he says. Now I'm gonna encourage you again.

Just talk with the person next to you. Hear you go. What struck you from verses 5 and 6, and what would you do as a result? There you go. Go for it.

Okay. Let's come back together. I just want to encourage you, after the service. How about chatting about continuing those conversations and maybe talk with others. Maybe people you weren't sat next year, you could say, what did you think?

What what are the things that you're gonna put into practice. Just as we, as we finish, what struck me from these 2 points about the way we relate to outsiders, firstly devote yourself to prayer, then be wise, is that this is outreach is very relational, isn't it? I mean, it's that it's not cookie cutter. It's not, you know, we just do this, that or the other, or we just respond we just, you know, put on what we think. It's it's relational in 2 ways.

First to the lord, say lord, what do you want us to do? We devote ourselves to prayer. Lord, we, we look to you, to lead us, guide us, and for you to do the converting. We depend on you. And then it's relation with the people that we're trying to reach out to, that you're responding to them.

You're trying to be wise with them. That it again, it's not just well we do this because we do it, but actually, we wanna do what's best for the people that we know and the people we're around so try to reach out to them in a wise way. So it's relational in both ways. Okay. I'm gonna lead us in prayer.

That's prayer. Heavenly father, we pray, please, that you would help us to live out your word. That is we think about how to reach out to the people around here and the people we know further help us to devote ourselves to prayer? Or we do come before you saying we have no power to do this. And lord, we don't know what to do.

We don't know the best things to do. So please would you lead us and guide us and would you bring people to faith in Jesus because we can't do that. We need you to do it farther. And father, please help us to be wise in the way we act towards outsiders. Father, please help us to live out your word, to commend the gospel in our lives.

Father help us to speak wisely as well, that our conversation would gracious and seasoned with salt. And that you would give us the words father to respond when people ask us questions when there are opportunities that you'd give us the words to say because we're weak and we we get tongue tied and we we make stakes, but father, please, would you use us, even us, to speak of Jesus, point people to him, and would you father please bring people to faith? Amen.