Colossians 2:6-23
“A Big Sigh of Relief”
As Christians, it seems like we are always trying to add more stuff...
…rules, regulations, don’t do this, don’t say that…
“…you gotta have this, you gotta have that…”
But in our Scripture Lesson for this morning, Paul is telling us that Jesus Christ is all we need.
A wealthy art dealer once sent his agent to find and purchase a certain set of paintings that he desperately wanted.
After searching and searching the agent returned to report to his boss that he had finally found those paintings.
They were in the dealer’s own warehouse.
He already had what he desired.
He already possessed that which he pursued.
Have you ever found yourself searching for something…
…something you know you need so bad…
…only to find you already have it?
I remember, as a new born Christian in college, feeling so bad about my inability to “live up” to what I thought Christianity was about.
I felt as if I were a person living in the hands of an “angry god” whom I had to act and do things a certain way in order to please.
And so I sought, and sought and sought to do what I perceived was God’s will.
But I kept falling short.
And every time I fell short I became more and more discouraged.
And with that discouragement came depression, guilt, hopelessness and a general feeling of unhappiness…
…even a bit of self-loathing, if you will.
I felt like there were a whole long list of rules and regulations that I needed to follow in order to be on “God’s good side,” or to be “saved.”
But I couldn’t follow them.
I couldn’t measure up.
I was lost!
I was steeped in darkness and sin.
There seemed to be no way out!!!
Have you ever felt like this?
Perhaps you feel this way now.
Maybe, you imagine that God is looking down on you with either a great big disgusted sneer or a hopeless tear.
Or even worse, perhaps you feel as if God has given up on you—turned His back on you!
Do you feel as if you are not good enough?
Have you missed the mark?
Has your train derailed?
I remember feeling that way in college.
And during one of those unhappy spells I opened my Bible to this passage from Colossians and read:
“When you were dead in your sins…God made you alive with Christ.
He forgave…all [your] sins, having canceled the written code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; he took it away, nailing it to the cross.
And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.”
Can you sense the “sigh of relief” I felt when reading those Words for the first time?
I was already complete in Christ!!!
I didn’t need anything else, just more of what I had!!!
Anyone looking at the Cross of Jesus with a normal understanding of the first-century world would think: “the rulers and authorities stripped Him naked and celebrated a public triumph over Him.”
But, blink and rub your eyes!
On the Cross, God stripped the armor off the rulers and authorities!!!
The Devil and his demons---God held them up to public contempt!
God’s triumph was over the principalities and powers, the very powers that thought it was the other way around!!!
What a glorious paradox!!!
God’s supposed weakness overcomes all other strength!!!
God’s supposed folly overcomes everything that stands against us!
Dear Saints, all the forces that might try and take over your life…
…to steal your salvation or the joy of it…
…are included in the ones shamed by the triumph of God in the Cross of Jesus Christ!!!
And God did all this for YOU, for ME!!!
What better reason to be “overflowing in thankfulness”!!!!
The Law that stood over and against us has nothing more to say.
When Jesus was nailed to the Cross, this written code was nailed there with Him!!!
“There is therefore no condemnation,” as Paul writes in Romans Chapter 8, “for those who are in Christ Jesus…”
… we are “set free from the law of sin and death. For what the law was powerless to do…God did by sending his…Son…in order that the righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us…”
Breath in, breath out…
…Can I get a great big SIGH OF RELIEF?!!!
If anyone or anything tries to entice you to think any differently…
…and to make you think you have to please Jesus to make it into heaven or to be saved and live this life to the full—take no notice of them!!!
All those things are irrelevant!!!
All you need is Christ!
Hold fast to Him.
Trust in Him and you will have all you need!!!
More than once, the Old Testament shows the children of Israel hearing and accepting the laws of God and calling down curses upon themselves if they fail to keep them.
They failed!
And so will you and me if this is what we try and depend on.
Without Christ, people are in big trouble because of their sins.
There is a written accusation against them, a charge list, if you will.
But in the Cross of Christ…
…God in God’s amazing mercy and love has banished the record of our sins so completely that it’s as if they had never been committed, not a trace remains!!!
On the Cross of Christ, the charge that was against us was itself crucified!
It was executed and put completely out of the way
And here is grace!!!
For those who have accepted Christ as Savior and Lord, we no longer need to feel like criminals who have broken the law and are condemned…
…instead, we are sons and daughters of God who were lost, have been found and can now come home to be wrapped around with the loving embrace and grace of God!!!
In verse 16 of Colossians Chapter 2, Paul begins with “Therefore…”
“Therefore do not let anyone judge you by what you eat and drink…”
“Do not let anyone…disqualify you for the prize…”
“Since you died with Christ to the basic principles of this world, why, as though you still belonged to it, do you submit to its rules: ‘Do not handle! Do not taste! Do not touch!”…
… “Such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom with their self-imposed worship, their false humility and their hard treatment of the body, but they lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence.”
In other words, you have been set free from this stuff in Christ.
Don’t become a slave to them again!!!
Christ took them to the Cross—nailed them there—made a public spectacle of them…
Stop being so hard on yourself.
It won’t do any good; it will just make you miserable!
Allow Christ’s Spirit to change you, shape you, mold you into the person you were created to be!
Once our minds have grasped this, our hearts will come on board.
And once that happens—there is nothing that can take away our peace, nor our Christian joy!!!
“I’ll just be two minutes,” I said, leaving my friends on the street corner while I went to get the car.
It was raining, and we’d just come out of a restaurant.
But I wasn’t two minutes.
I took more like ten.
My friends were starting to worry that I’d had an accident.
I hadn’t; I had driven out of the parking lot and tried to turn into the street where they were waiting for me.
But I wasn’t allowed to turn that way.
It was a one-way street.
So, I was forced to go off in the opposite direction.
It was a long way around through narrow and winding streets before I could find my way back.
So often, what looks like the shortest route is impossible.
Sometimes the right way is what seems the hardest.
Paul is warning the Colossian Christians about the dangers of being drawn into a religious system that might seem like the obvious way…
…the shortest way that will bring them to where they need to be.
It made heavy demands, and offered clear, bright clean lines.
“don’t handle this, don’t taste that, don’t touch this”
This seemed like the kind of detailed regulations, and severe self-discipline they needed to stay in line.
It would make them feel as if they were really making a head-way in their moral and spiritual lives.
“Well,” Paul says, “it may feel like that, but it’s an illusion.”
“Go that way, and the street will soon become a dead end!”
A religion that focuses only on the details of things you’re allowed or not allowed to touch or eat is dealing with worldly and perishable things.
God is much bigger than that!
This self-imposed stuff may have the appearance of wisdom in the kind of religion it comes up with, but it won’t do anything in making you genuinely holy.
For that, you need to go what seems like a much harder and longer route…
…You need to die and be raised to new life!
You need to belong to God’s new world.
The truly human life you are seeking—the life of a genuine holiness that runs right through your personality and right on to others is only found in Christ!
It is in Jesus that we are transformed!!!
We do not need more; we need not have less.
We need to discover what we already have!!!
Or if we don’t yet have Jesus accept what He has already done for you!!!
Don’t be unhappy, uneasy, strained, oppressed, and fearful.
Don’t try and save yourself…
Jesus is Lord!
Jesus loves you!
Live in Him and for Him!!!
And be thankful!!!
Praise God!
Amen.
