The Choices We Make Series

Colossians Your Choice

I have a confession to make. I have way too many shirts. I don’t know what it is, but I have a closet full of shirts. Now before you judge me about being fiscally irresponsible, I’m also a Frenchie’s shopper. For years, when I was at my heaviest, I found it difficult to find shirts that fit me, now the world, is my oyster. Or at least Frenchie’s is my oyster.

The difficulty though, is having to choose what shirt to wear each day. I have some favourites, and the temptation is to just wear my favourites, but then I feel guilty about all that closet space that is being wasted with shirts I don’t wear. And whether the other shirts will feel neglected.

It gets worse when I travel, because I always want to take more shirts than I need. I know I will only be gone for three days, but what if I spill something on my shirt?

Does anyone feel my pain? It might not be shirts for you, maybe it’s dresses, or shoes, jackets or purses. I’m not here to judge.

We are continuing our series on Colossians: Christ Above All, and today we find ourselves in the third chapter of the Paul’s letter to the Christians who made up the church in Colosse.

Back to my shirts. In 2004, American psychologist Barry Schwartz wrote a book called, The Paradox of Choice – Why More Is Less. In the book, Schwartz argues that eliminating consumer choices can greatly reduce anxiety for shoppers.

It is a lot easier to order in a restaurant that has fewer choices on their menu, then having a four-page menu and dozens of choices to choose from.

One of the examples that Schwartz mentions is salad dressing. When I was growing up, we had French, thousand island, Catalina, and Italian. And they all came from Kraft.

In the book, we learn that in the United States, there are over 200 different varieties of salad dressings. Which seems kind of cool, and maybe a little excessive.

There are now all kinds of different ways to top your salad. But you must decide, and according to research, the average shopper will spend at least 10 minutes in the salad dressing aisle picking a dressing. Even when they know what dressing they are looking for.

I probably spend more time than I need to each morning, just picking out a shirt to wear.

When I first went into the ministry, I remember reading about the pastor of a large church who always wore the same thing. A navy suit, a white shirt and a red tie.

When asked about it, he responded by saying, “God’s time is too valuable to waste picking out clothes in the morning.”

In the third chapter of Colossians Paul tells us that we have choices that have to be made. And the most important choice is what we will wear. He wasn’t challenging the Colossian about the number of togas and robes they might have, or about the modesty of their dress. He was talking about our spiritual clothing, what we wear as Christians.

Last week, Rob looked at how Paul had challenged the Colossians to avoid Legalism in their Christian lives.

His scripture was Colossians 2:20–22 You have died with Christ, and he has set you free from the spiritual powers of this world. So why do you keep on following the rules of the world, such as, “Don’t handle! Don’t taste! Don’t touch!”? Such rules are mere human teachings about things that deteriorate as we use them.

But Paul wasn’t telling the Colossians that they were free to do whatever they liked. Sometimes we want to replace legalism with licence to to do anything. Instead he was telling them to choose a better way.

So, we are told in Colossians 3:9 Don’t lie to each other, for you have stripped off your old sinful nature and all its wicked deeds. So, he begins by telling us there are things we need to take off. In the New International Version, it reads this way: Colossians 3:9 NIV Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices.

So, Paul starts by telling us, There are Things We Need to Take Off. And he gets very specific.

It seems that in 2025, people get a little cranky if the church should have the audacity to actually call out specific sins. We are called judgmental. We are told that we aren’t very accepting, and we are asked, where has our Christian love gone?

It seems that the church is expected to accept everyone’s behaviour without question.

And to a certain degree I understand where those outside the church are coming from. The church has been very judgy toward society and the unchurched through history. Demanding that those who don’t have a relationship with Christ behave as if they did.