Victory In Jesus Series

VICTORY IN JESUS COLOSSIANS 2:11-15

J. Alistar Brown wrote about an experience he had of walking through a park.

He said, “I passed a massive oak tree. A vine had grown up along its trunk. The vine started small….nothing to bother about. But over the years the vine had gotten taller and taller. By the time I passed, the entire lower half of the tree was covered by the vine’s creepers. The mass of tiny feelers was so thick that the tree looked like it had innumerable birds’ nests in it.

Now the tree was in danger. This huge, solid oak was quite literally being taken over. The life was being squeezed from it.

But the gardeners in that park had seen the danger. They had taken a saw and severed the trunk of the vine----one neat cut across the middle. The tangled mass of the vine’s branches still clung to the oak, but the vine was now dead. That would gradually become plain as weeks passed and the creepers began to die and fall away from the tree.

How easy it is for sin, which begins so small and seemingly insignificant, to grow until it has a strangling grip on our lives.

But sin’s power is severed by Christ, and gradually, as we yield daily to Christ, sin’s grip dries up and falls away.”

Well, everybody likes to win, right?..... Nobody enjoys being a loser.

In the game of life, God has equipped us as Christians to be winners.

He certainly doesn’t want sin to grow in our lives until it has a strangling grip on us.

God doesn’t want any of us to live such a defeated life.

In Colossians 2:11-15, I believe we can see some of the things God has done to help us get to the winner’s circle…..for He loves us and wants us to be victorious.

First, God Has Given Us Purity Through Jesus.

Col. 2:11

“In him you were also circumcised, in the putting off of the sinful nature, not with a circumcision done by the hands of men but with the circumcision done by Christ,”

Jesus gives us purity in that we have been circumcised with a spiritual circumcision.

The circumcision done by Jesus is not a physical circumcision…..it is a circumcision of the heart.

Romans 2:28-29

“A man is not a Jew if he is only one outwardly, nor is circumcision merely outward and physical. [29] No, a man is a Jew if he is one inwardly; and circumcision is circumcision of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the written code. Such a man’s praise is not from men, but from God”.

When we have the circumcision done by Jesus, we no longer trust in our flesh.

Philip. 3:3

“For it is we who are the circumcision, we who worship by the Spirit of God, who glory in Christ Jesus, and who put no confidence in the flesh”.

That same spiritual circumcision also removes our sins so that we have been made near by the blood of Christ.

Ephes. 2:11-13

“Therefore, remember that formerly you who are Gentiles by birth and called ‘uncircumcised’ by those who call themselves ‘the circumcision’ (that done in the body by the hands of men)-- [12] remember that at that time you were separate from Christ, excluded from citizenship in Israel and foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world. [13] But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ."

Simply stated, we have put on the new man.

Col. 3:9-10

“Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices [10] and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator.”

You and I have had the body of sin destroyed.

Romans 6:6

“For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin.”

Consider the often repeated phrase “New and improved.”

There is something appealing about that statement.

We all like to get new things.

We are attracted to things that are advertised as “New and Improved”.

We like to have the latest computer or the latest cell phone or electronic game system.

The words, “new and improved” sell a lot of things.

We like new clothes…..We like new cars.

The list can go on and on and on……We like new things.

All of this points to the biggest need people have.

It is the need for a new life.

The reason why so many people are unhappy with what they have is because they are unhappy with who they are.