Jesus - In A Compartment Or In Control? Series

Jesus: in a compartment or in control?

Col 1:15-20

Full Script version

Key verse: ‘He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together’ (v.17)

Big idea: To ask: ‘Is Jesus merely a compartment of our lives, or is He in control’?

Service Sheet:

Title of talk

What’s so special about Jesus?

1. Lord of creation

2. Lord of salvation

3. Lord of my life?

So… what about me?

Introduction LOOK UP!

I love shopping! Day off - Trafford centre – 7 hours!

Asked myself 2 questions:

Challenged – how easy & enjoyable it was. 7 hours with God?

Really up for it – get excited at what I might find – put my all into it. All-consuming

Is it the same with God?

Do I get equally passionate about God?

Excited?

Challenge to us this morning is:

Is Jesus just in a compartment of our lives – unpack

Or is He in control of our lives?

Last week, what does it mean to be a Xn?

Saw that JC transformed Paul’s purpose in life

Thought about who we are in X and what Xnty is all about

This week, turning to look at who is this Jesus we follow?

Why bother?

Why follow someone who lived 2000 years ago?

Why not follow Buddha, turn to horoscopes and crystals, or how about a DIY god?

What’s so special about Jesus?

Maybe we buy into the pluralism of our age which says that Jesus is just one way among many, that we can construct our own spirituality from different sources

Maybe we can privatise our faith and say that it works for us,

But when it comes to other people, if other religions work them, that’s fine

Maybe we can just have Jesus in a comfy compartment of our lives

Maybe we’ll come to church and tangle with Him on a Sunday

But when it comes to our lives Mon-Fri – our work lives, our school lives, our social lives if we don’t work, those are separate areas or compartments

Let’s look again at the reading we heard, and as we do, I want us to keep in mind that question:

Is Jesus just in a compartment of our lives…

Or is He in control of our lives?

In looking at that question, we’ll be referring to the Bible – believing that the Bible is God’s eternal word to us and therefore through it God will speak to us today.

1. Jesus is Lord of creation

Lord – in charge of, in control of.

v.15 tells us He is the image of the invisible God

Msg: ‘We look at Jesus and see the God who cannot be seen’

God is invisible/no-one has ever seen God -Jn 1:18

JC reflects and reveals God as the Son of God

Jn 1:18, 14:9

People are made in the image of God – Gen 1:26-27

We are to ‘rule over creation’, stewards of what God has given us. Ultimately, JC is Lord of creation

He is the firstborn over all creation

JC has priority and sovereignty over creation

Means supreme/sovereign, not necessarily born first

Ps 89:27 refers to Solomon as David’s firstborn, but wasn’t David’s first son

v.16 – By Him all things were created

Jn 1:1-3

JC was God from the beginning – 2nd person of Trinity involved in creation

Msg: ‘Everything finds its purpose in Him’ - expand

v.17 – Key verse

Will look more at who Jesus is over the coming weeks – his character, what he said about himself, what he did and so on. Today if nothing else, take away ‘He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together’

Jn 8:58

Take away Jesus and there is nothing

v.18 – First to rise from the dead – others rose only to die. Head of the body, the Church

Word that is translated as supremacy occurs nowhere else in NT – it’s important!

Jesus is Lord over, and Lord of creation

2. Jesus is Lord of salvation

Salvation:

Rom 3:23 tells us ‘The wages of sin is death’.

When we die in our sins, we die eternally separated from God. We are in terrible shape and until we realize that, we won’t understand the significance of Jesus as Lord of salvation. Good news is that Jesus came to die in our place, instead of us. And when we admit the state we’re in and turn to Him, Jesus offers us a life of eternity with God – because He is Lord of salvation

v.19 – Fullness of God dwelt in Him

Not just ‘a bit God’!

JC shows us what God is like

If we want to know God, look at Jesus

Jn 14:8ff – already seen, Jesus reveals the Father

He reveals God because He IS God.