A Study In Colossians: Walk The Walk Series

Above All: A study in Colossians

Walk in Him

Colossians 2:2-7

Pastor Jefferson M, Williams

Chenoa Baptist Church

05-22-2022

Intro

In 1969, Martin Broadwell described the “four levels of teaching.” Some have called it “four stages of learning any new skill.” They are:

Unconscious Incompetence - the person doesn’t know what they don’t know

Conscious Incompetence - the person figures out how much they don’t know. This causes a lot of people to quit whatever skill they are trying to learn.

Conscious Competence - the person starts to become proficient at the skill but still had to concentrate to do the skill well.

Unconscious Competence - the person now performs the skill without thinking. It has become almost automatic.

Let’s take learning to play the guitar. A lot of people have a guitar in the their closet somewhere.

At some point in the past, they picked it up and tried to play it but the strings didn’t cooperate and it sounded terrible.

Maybe you watched someone play guitar that was very good and you started realizing what you were doing wrong. You learned that there was a lot you didn’t know.

At that point, you had a choice - give up or practice more than you have before.

If you chose the route of practice, you started learning chords and scales and strumming patterns. It started to be a little easier for you but, in order to impress your friends, you really had to concentrate.

Malcolm Gladwell has cited research that says that it takes 10,000 hours of practice to become an expert, or unconsciously competent. This is when you can close your eyes and play and not think about what your fingers are doing. Think Eddie Van Halen. [Slide]

When you were born again, do you remember how much joy you had? You were zealous and wanted everyone to know about Jesus. But you didn’t know what you didn’t know.

Then you started reading your Bible, studying it, memorizing it. And, all of sudden, you were overwhelmed with how far off you were in many areas.

So you started not only reading and studying but seeking to apply the Scriptures in your life. It wasn’t easy. You had to have accountability. You had to be intentional.

But then after many years, some of the things that were so hard are not that difficult anymore.

Take the example of handling conflict. My dad was scared of conflict. My mother was a pro at conflict and would rip your still beating heart out of your chest. I grew up terrified at the thoughts of dealing with conflict.

But as I started growing spiritually, I learned that fear isn’t the heart posture that God wanted me to have when it came to conflict.

With the help of a mentor, I started putting Scriptures like Matthew 18 into action and dealing with conflict in a Biblical way.

It was scary and wasn’t natural but after a few situations where I saw the incredible benefit of handling conflict the way God tells us to I was sold.

I’m not unconsciously competent by a long shot, but conflict no longer terrifies me.

In fact, we never become unconsciously competent in our spiritual lives until we get to heaven.

This is all a part of sanctification - the life-long process by which God makes us more and more like Jesus.

And this is what Paul will focus on in these two power packed verses today.

Review

In the autobiographical section that we have studied the last couple of weeks, we have seen:

Paul’s Attitude: He rejoiced in being able to suffer for the Church that he loved

Paul’s Calling: He was commissioned by God to preach, admonish and teach the Word to the Gentiles

Paul’s Purpose: To make known the mystery, that Gentiles can be part of of the kingdom

Paul’s Energy: He worked to the point of physical exhaustion but Christ energized his ministry

Paul’s Struggle: He may have been a 100 miles away, but he wrestled in prayer for these believers.

Paul Goal: He prayed for the churches to be encouraged in heart, united in love, and grow in their understanding of Jesus

Paul’s Warning: He wrote to make sure that they wouldn’t be deceived by fine sounding arguments.

Paul’s Delight: Paul is overjoyed and proud that the Colossians were standing firm against the false teachers.

Turn with me to Colossians 2:6-7.

Prayer.

The Heart of Colossians

“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.”

We are only going to study these two verses today but these verses have been called the heart of the letter of Colossians.

These two verses are sandwiched between two warnings: