A Supreme Jesus In A One-Topping World

A SUPREME JESUS IN A ONE-TOPPING WORLD

COLOSSIANS 1:15-23

INTRODUCTION... CS Lewis, MERE CHRISTIANITY, Barbour and Company inc., pp.44,45

Then comes the real shock. Among these Jews there suddenly turns up a man who goes about talking as if He was God. He claims to forgive sins. He says He has always existed. He says He is coming to judge the world at the end of time.

I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: "I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept His claim to be God," This is the one things we must not say.

A man who was merely a man and. said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic... or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool; you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.

READ COLOSSIANS 1:15-23

In this passage we see that Jesus was so much more than those who followed Him could ever have imagined. Jesus was not just some good teacher or a good moral man. Jesus is supreme. Jesus is supreme for two reasons. Paul tells us these reasons: 1) Because of Who He is and 2) Because of what He has done.

You might be wondering about the title of my sermon: “A Supreme Jesus in a One-Topping World.” When I think of the word ’supreme’, which is the key word in this passage in verse 18, I think of two things. Gasoline and pizza. My wife, when we order pizza, loves to get the Supreme Pizzas with all of the toppings on it. Most of the time I like a one topping pizza; except if the pizza joint is offering a meat supreme; one with all the meats on it. Of course when it comes to taste, I am sure that nothing compares to the Supreme Pizza; it has all of the toppings and flavors that you could possibly want. There is no comparison. It is the same with Christ. Nothing compares with Him,; everything else is just one-topping.

I. CHRIST IS EXALTED AS SUPREME (VERSES 15-19) (WHO HE IS)

One of the first ways that Jesus is shown as supreme is that He is exalted as the image of the invisible God. Verse 15 says, “Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.” Paul begins his teaching about Jesus Christ by communicating to us that the fullness of God dwelt in Him. Many times we may wonder what God looked like. We wonder what God would do if He came to earth as a human being. We do not have to wonder about these things because Jesus is the answer. Jesus was ’God with Us.’ The disciples listened to Jesus and asked Him to show them the Father. What was Jesus’ response? He told them that if they had seen Him they had seen the Father as well. Jesus was God in the flesh revealed to us.

Hebrews 1:1-5 agrees with Paul and his teaching about Jesus when it says, “In the past God

spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom he made the universe. The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven. So he became as much superior to the angels as the name he has inherited is superior to theirs. For to which of the angels did God ever say, ’You are my Son; today I have become your Father.’”

Another way that Jesus is shown supreme is that He is shown to be the Creator, being equal with God the Father. The Hebrews verse that we just read eluded to that fact as well. Verse 16 says, “For by Him were all things created.” Paul exalts Christ by proclaiming that he created everything. John 1:1-3 states the same supreme fact about Jesus, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.”