Colossians 3:18-4:1. In yesterday’s reading Paul gave the Colossians a lot to think about. There were several thing that they needed to make sure they didn’t do and several that they need to do. There were both attitudes and actions involved. Some of the advise was kind of general and a little bit of it was more specific. Paul also reminded them that they were supposed to be an “image” of God to the world. Who God is and what he has to offer all of us is important. God want all men to have a renewed relationship with him. Our relationship with his was broken by our disobedience and rebellions (sin) and only Jesus can restore it. Our lives are the picture of that truth in the world. Today’s reading teaches us more about how to have a good “image” in our world.

In verses 18-19 Paul gets very personal when he tells husbands and wives how they ought to act toward one another. In verse 18 he tells wives to “be subject” to their husbands. A lot of people here in the United States and all over the world hate that kind of talk. “Where does Paul get off telling wives to be their husbands slaves?”, but that is not what Paul said. The word “subject” means to “subordinate”, the idea is like in an army where a private is subordinate to a corporal who is subordinate to a sergeant who is subject to a lieutenant and so on. In the some languages verb have “voice”, it tells us the relationship between the subject of the sentence and the action or verb. Is the subject doing the action or is the action being done on the subject. In the case of what Paul wrote here the voice tells us that the Wife is doing the action. It’s something like, “Wives, chose to put yourself under the authority of your husband.” The next part of the verse tells us the reason, the word translated “fitting” means to “arrive”. And we are told that it is “fitting” “in the Lord”.

Paul uses the title of authority for Jesus and explains that by “subordinating” herself to her husband that the wife is right where Jesus wants her. Paul’s use of the title “lord” for Jesus isn’t because he is trying to say “because Jesus said so”. Remember Paul has just been telling them how to act because of the example they were setting for the world, they were teaching the world about Jesus. In this case I think Paul wants the Colossian wives to think about who Jesus is to them, their “lord” (think boss or master). But what kind of master of the universe is he, one who demands allegiance? No, he offers restoration and an new life with God, and leaves it up to us to accept or reject the offer. It’s the same situation here the woman can willing subordinate herself to her husband, if she does the world gets to learn a little lesson about God. There is a difference though, in the God-mankind picture God is the boss but he is also God. In the wife-husband picture the husband is a boss or leader but the two are equal as persons and members of the kingdom of God (Galatians 3:28).

In verse 19 we don’t see the command for husbands to rule their wives but to love them. That word for love contains the idea of sacrificial living. Making sacrifices for someone can make someone angry or “bitter” so Paul encourages the husband not get bitter about loving his wife in this way.

Next Paul moves on to children. Children are to obey their parent. The word here is different from the word to submit used for the wife. Here the word basically means to listen and do. There is nothing voluntary here. Again we are given a reason it pleases the Lord. Again we see the master idea for Jesus. If there is a lesson to be learned here it is that as God’s children (See Romans 8:16-17) we need to obey him. Fathers on the other hand need to not “exasperate” their children. That word only occurs one other time in the New Testament in 2 Corinthians 9:2 where it is translated “stir up”. The commitment of the church in Corinth to give a bunch of money to Paul for relief in Jerusalem was getting the church in another area all excited about giving too. Some Bible experts like to use the word “nag”.

In a good way the actions of the Corinthian believers were “nagging’ at those in the other area. Here though the father is warned about “nagging” the kid so much that they are completely discouraged. You know it is interesting that God has told us that we all have failed him. We also know that he sees all we do and knows all we think.   He even has records of all our actions. And we know that Jesus suffered and died because of our personal individual sins (disobedience and rebellion toward God). We also know that even after we put our future in Jesus’ hands that we still fail, regularly. But what does God call us? Children. Saints. Chosen. He tells us that he loves us an forgives us. He actually lives in us. We are sealed (that means he claims us as his). The truth is there about sin and judgment but a lot of comfort too, of the believers, even with respect to judgment believers are comforted that they aren’t a part of that anymore. Some Christian leaders like to put down other Christians who tell people, “God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life”, but here we see that the Father (God) doesn’t want us all stirred up (in a bad way) he wants us to live for him happily.

The next part of our reading is very controversial for a lot of people. Paul deals with the slaves and masters. For us today all we can think is, “Why didn’t Paul just tell all the masters that they were wrong and to set their slaves free.” Instead Paul tells the slaves to obey their masters. They are not just to make a show of it when the masters are watching but they are to sincerely work hard showing fear for the Lord (meaning God). What?

There is more but let’s deal with this part first. First of all the word used here for obey is the same one used for the children, there is no voluntary choice suggested here. But notice that tells them to obey their “masters who are here on earth”. I think that makes you think right away about other masters you might have. We then see that their service is to be sincere. The word translated sincere has the idea of undividedness and generosity, we might say “serve them with your whole heart, not half-heartedly.” He also tells them not to just put on an external show. And them there’s the part about being afraid of God. The word for fear is the same word as our word “phobia”. This word describes the kind of thing you want to run from. In the talk to the kids it seemed like God wanted us to be encouraged but here the person might want to run from the Lord (God). I think the thing we need to see is God wants us to be “real” and not fake. Our relationship with the real “Lord” needs to be from the heart and not just a show. If we just pretend to love God he isn’t fooled and we aren’t fooled but when the world sees how we really are they might be completely misled.

In Matthew, Mark, and Luke all three writers record the words of Jesus when he warned those listening that it would be better for them to have a huge grinding stone tied around their necks and be thrown into the middle of the ocean than to mislead a person about Jesus. I don’t think there would be a much bigger fear than standing on the edge of a ship with a huge stone tied to me waiting to be pushed in. How many hundreds of feet down would you be before you finally passed out in the cold and dark. God is serious about people learning the truth about him and especially about his love and forgiveness, that is why he so serious that his people be genuine and not fake. So he wanted the slaves to work hard for their earthly masters like they would for him.

We need to keep in mind that slavery then wasn’t exactly the same as slavery in our recent past. In our recent past slaves were all of one ethnic group. It was a white-black issue. In the time of Paul anyone could be a slave, slavery was based on wars and who won them. The winners would take the losers and make some of them slaves. Sometimes a person would become a slave because they were poor and had no real option. Some slaves in Paul’s day had the ability to earn money and even buy their freedom. Some slaves were given great responsibility and even respected in a way. But they were still the property of their masters and could be treated harshly. And usually they were pretty hopeless with respect to their lack of freedom, for most of them there was no way out. It would not have worked for Paul to tell them to rebel, if change was going to come it would have to come another way.

In verses 23-24 Paul continues to encourage them to be stable and faithful. When they were working for their masters on earth they should use the work as service to Jesus their real lord or master. In verse 24 he then gives them the greatest encouragement, he assures them that from their real master they are going to get an inheritance since their lord is the Christ, the chosen one who will one day rule the world. Interestingly if they were able to free themselves from their earthly master they would still be broke and homeless with no hope of an inheritance, but as believers they had an eternal home secured with all they would ever need.

In verse 25 the consequences probably are with respect to this world. Paul is probably contrasting the reality of rebellion by the slaves, death or imprisonment, with the hope of eternity with God. Some see this as a warning more to the master though. God is the one who will make sure everyone gets what is coming to them, if the masters are evil then they will pay. Paul is going to talk to the masters in the next verse and they are evidently part of the church in Colosse too. It is true that all believers will have their actions on earth tested or evaluated, not to see if we get to be in Heaven but for some other type of “reward” (1 Corinthians 3:11-15. The reward may be different levels of responsibility in the kingdom of God, see Matthew 24:42-47; 25:14-23), and certainly we suffer the consequences of sins sometimes in life, but this verse seems to be addressed to the slaves and warning them if they are considering rebellion. Remember too that a member of this very church, a slave Onesimus, had run away, all the way to Rome and the letter to his master was being delivered to the church along with this letter. In that letter Paul strongly encouraged the master, Philemon, to treat Onesimus with respect as a fellow “brother” in Christ, if not setting him free at least treating him with highest respect like a member of his own family. But for now Paul needed to keep Onesimus and others out of trouble and on track for Jesus.

In Colossians 4:1 Paul briefly speaks to the masters he tells the masters to be just and fair. The words mean to do what is right and treat them with equality (based on Philemon 16 probably treat them like they would want to be treated. See also Matthew 7:12). The masters needed to remember that they had a master in heaven who is always “just and fair”, with God there is no partiality (Romans 2:11 and Ephesians 6:9 which was also written at the same time as Colossians and delivered by Tychicus and Onesimus on their way back to Colosse). The basics of what Paul wanted to say to the masters is here in verse 1 but there was more in the letter to Philemon which would eventually be read to them as well. Certainly if Philemon either set Onesimus free entirely or kept him on but treated him with much greater respect, as one of the family, there would have been a lot of questions by the other masters in the church. Especially since Paul basically told Philemon that there should be no real consequences for Onesimus having run away. That alone would have made the other masters crazy and Philemon would almost certainly have to show them the instructions from Paul.

Encouraging rebellion would have brought the Roman authorities down on Paul and any one who listened to him. Ordering all the believers to release their slaves would have brought disaster for everyone. The best solution was to get the masters and slaves to work together and to keep the really important thing in view. This earthly kingdom is going to be in a mess until Jesus takes it over in the mean time we need to be wise about how we live and do our best to point people to God and how to have a new relationship with him. In the mean time as we all live for him our world here and now will get better and better. Love for Jesus is what finally put an end to slavery in most of the western world and it is what will set the whole world free (or at least as many as what to be free) for all eternity.

Thank you Jesus for setting me free from my sin and it’s consequences. Help me live each day as your servant showing though all the parts of my life truth about your forever family and your forever kingdom. Let me live for eternity and not today.

Colossians 3:5-17. In our last post we saw Paul trying to get the Colossian believers to focus on what is really important in our relationship with God. First is what Jesus has done for us, he has paid the price, fine, or penalty for our bad actions (sins, disobedience and rebellion toward God) and second Jesus has guaranteed that he will not only fix us spiritually but also physically. Jesus’ resurrection (the word in the original language means “to stand among”, to be back with the physically living) is proof that we can live again too, even after death (see Job 19:26, 1 Corinthians 15:51:52). Eternity with God is a gift from God, a gift we don’t earn but merely receive.   Those facts are the ones that should drive our lives; motivate us.

In today’s reading we see how, honoring God in some of our attitudes and actions.  In verses 5-11 we see several attitudes and actions that don’t really fit if we live God. In verse 5 we are told to “consider” the “members of our bodies dead” to certain things. Remember that the idea of death in the Bible is that of separation; also notice that this is something we need to “consider”. Our bodies are not “dead” to doing evil this is something we must choose and follow through on.

The first list is: Immorality, impurity, passion, evil desires, and greed. The first word is used in the Bible for sexual activity with someone you are not married to, by the way, part of our English word pornography comes from this word. The second word is literally “without cleanness”. In the Bible the idea of “clean” often means that something is acceptable to God. This isn’t talking about washing hands but of our attitudes and actions, are they things that God would approve of? The third word “passion” has the idea of suffering in it. We might think of obsession or maybe even the feelings behind stalking. The passion can be for a thing or a person. The problem here is something becoming more important to us than God is. The fourth word “lust” usually deals with wanting something that is forbidden and in this case it is linked with the word evil. Some Bible experts think that “passion” is continual lust. The final word is a compound word that means “wanting to have more”. Paul tells us that a desire for more is the same as “idolatry”. That word means “to serve and image” (like an image of God or god). But the image doesn’t have to be an actual god (like one of the Hindu gods). It can be anything that we choose to serve with our lives. In fact here Paul is linking idolatry with thing that we want more and more of (this can include relationships too).

In verse 6 we see that these sorts of things bring punishment from God. The reason is because these attitudes and actions show that we care more about feelings and stuff than we do about God. The problem is if we don’t really want God then he won’t force us to be part of his eternal family. We need to be careful about what we are living for (Luke 12:15-21, see also Mark 8:36). In verses 7-8 we see that the believers in Colosse had once been outsiders with God, they had done these very things, but now they had a new relationship with God through Jesus. They were now “living” in Jesus where before they were “living” (connected with) in these old self-interested attitudes.

In verse 8 Paul tells them to take off theses old ways of living and gives them another list. Where the first list was more about attitude this second list is about actions, actions toward others. Again there are five things in the list. First Paul tells them to put aside “anger”. The word has the idea of “reaching for something” and of “desire”. What we see here is actions based on desire and emotion. The second word, wrath, is related to the word for lust in the first list. This word means anger, heat, passion or even describes a boiling pot. While it is similar to “anger” in this list it is more violent. Perhaps our word “mad” is better for “angry” and maybe we might use “furious” instead of “wrath”. Both have a lot of feelings involved but “wrath” seems to be more violent. Next comes “malice”. This word has the ideas of “evil”, “wicked”, and “harm” in it. This is evil directed at another person to their harm. Fourth is “”slander”. The King James Translations says “blaspheme”. That is a “transliteration” or borrowing of the word directly from the Greek language. In Greek the word is “blasphemos”. It is a compound word that means to “harm the fame”. The idea here is hurting someone’s reputation. Finally Paul told them to “put aside” abusive speech. The word actually means “dirty, shameful or dishonoring words”. They were to take these away from their mouths. There are a couple of possibilities for what this means exactly but we need to remember the first list. One issue in that list was the idea of “impurity” things that were not acceptable to God. In this case we might want to think if our words are word that would make God happy, are they words that would come out of Jesus’ mouth? If not then we should take them out of our mouths too.

In verses 9-10 Paul brings up a new action, lying. He tells them not to lie to each other since they have “laid aside” their old way of living and put on (the opposite of “laying aside”) a new “self” that is being made knew according to a true knowledge of “the image of the Creator”. Paul is saying, “Look you guys are being fixed up so people can get an idea of what God really truly looks like. Don’t you think it might be a good idea to actually be truthful yourselves?” That idea of representing God is actually behind all of the instructions Paul is giving them, it’s like he is saying, “You are children of God, act like it.”

In verse 11 Paul extends the idea of being in God’s image when he informs them that in God’s family there are no ethnic, religious, culture, or class differences. Jews and gentiles are different “people” groups, we might think tribes or nationalities.   Circumcised and uncircumcised deals with religious rituals. Barbarians and Scythians seem to be similar in how others looked at them but there were smaller differences. We might think of the differences between people from the south of the United States and people from the north. Or maybe Canadians and people from the USA. These are more “cultural” differences. Slave and freedman deal with “station” or “class”. In India some people wear a little dot on their forehead. The dots are different colors and represent how important you are in that culture. Paul is telling us that everyone is the same, we are equal to God whether rich or poor, worker or boss. Jesus is all and in all. It is important to notice that first part, it’s all about or by Jesus. Jesus is God and he is in us so we are all equal in his family. Tomorrow we will see that being “equal” doesn’t mean that we all are the same in respect to what Jesus has us do.

In verses 5-11 Paul basically said “don’t” now in verses 12-17 he is gong to say “do”. Like “don’t eat that, eat this” (of course he already told them it wasn’t about eating, really he is saying, “don’t act like that act like this”). In this section Paul starts out with another list of five, but he can’t seem to stop there.

Firs Paul comes back to a place he has visited a lot in this letter; he reminds them of their relationship to God, they are identified (chosen or picked out), purified or cleaned up (holy), and “huggified” (ok, ok, “Loved” by God, is that better?). Because God has forgiven us and brought us back into his family we should be forgiving too. The first word is “compassion” that mean to show “pity or mercy”. Second we should be “kind” to others (this word has the idea of moral usefulness, you might think “be a good influence or a Godly influence”). The third word is “humility”, the idea is the attitude of a servant. The forth word is “gentleness”, that one’s pretty understandable. Finally they were to be patient. This word is related to the word wrath in verse 8 and basically means “take a long time to boil over”.

Verse 13 seems to explain or give an example of this last attitude that they were supposed to put in their inner beings (hearts).   Some Bible experts think it gives two more attitudes though. In verse 13 Paul tells the Colossian believers to “bear with one another” and to “forgive” each other. The first idea is of “hanging in there even if it hurts” and the second has the idea of giving a gift freely. The second word “forgive” is related to the word “grace”, like in the free gift of Heaven that Jesus made available to everyone when he died on the cross. I guess you don’t get a better example of a gift than Heaven or more suffering to deliver it than the completely innocent God-man, Jesus, dying on a cross and having God the Father turn his back on him (even if only for a short time). That really is patient, bearing and forgiving. At the end of verse 13 Paul makes it clear that we are to live like this because of Jesus’ example.

John 3:16 tells us that the motive behind Jesus sacrifice was God’s love for us. Love has a way of motivating actions that bring people together. Evidently the Colossian church was having some problem coming together as a group. Paul wanted them to “love” each other and gave them concrete ideas and actions that they could put on to bring the group together, as well as things to avoid.

In verse 15 they needed to let peace be in their lives, peace that comes from knowing Jesus and letting him take control of their day to day lives. Peace would come just like hope did when they trusted Jesus for their eternity (Colossians 1:5, 23, 27). This peace was a part of being part of God’s forever family a family that included all the believers in Jesus there in Colosse. For all of this they needed to be thankful.

Verse 16-17 extend this idea of thankfulness for the group of believers that they were a part of. In verse 16 we see that they each had a part in encouraging the others. Their relationship with God was because of who Jesus is and what he has done. They learned about this through the true words about Jesus that they had learned. The truth about Jesus needed to live in them and through them (dwell in them), but it also needed to be expressed or told by them. They were to teach each other through “psalms and hymns and spiritual songs”.

Some experts like to relate the first, psalm, with the book of Psalms in the Old Testament. Certainly that is a book of song in honor of and relating to God, it is part of the Bible and is useful for teaching and training (2 Timothy 3:16) but in 1 Corinthians 14:26 the word seems to be used for a new song by someone in that group. It is probably both, Psalms from that “book” and new Psalms from the hearts and lives of believers. The word “psalm” (the Greek word in Colossians) seems to be related to plucking a musical instrument. Many of the “Psalms” from that book were written by David, king of Israel, to express his experiences in living for God he played a stringed instrument and set his “Psalms” to music. His Psalms express the highs and lows of his life with God, his successes, his failures, and most of all God’s faithfulness and love.

The second word in verse 16 is “hymns”. This word contains the idea of celebration and the idea seems to praise or honor gods and heroes with this song. Of course we would only want to honor the one true God, Yahweh, our savior and hero.   The third word (actually two words) is “spiritual songs”. The word translated songs is “ode” from which we get the English word “ode” from. An ode is and extended song, a story about some one or something. In this case it is a “spiritual” ode. That could mean that it is from the “Spirit” meaning the Spirit of God but it probably is referring to our ‘spirit”. It is our story about our relationship with God, sort of like David’s (and others’) “Psalms”. At the end of the day what I think is important here is These are a musical celebration of who God is and what he is doing or has done in our lives and the lives of others. They come from the heart and are filled with thanks.

Today’s reading ends with an extension of this attitude of thanks. Paul tells his readers and us that all of our actions and words need to be in the “name of the Lord Jesus” and that they are expressions of our thanks to God.   “In the name” means we need to keep in mind who we are representing with our lives, we need to reflect the family that we are a part of (See “What’s in a Name?”). Notice that Paul uses the word ‘Lord” in connection to Jesus. We have a cool and wonderful relationship with God because of Jesus but we need to remember that he’s the boss.

In today’s reading there was a lot of “what” but in the background there has also been some of the “why”. The why is because we are supposed to be examples to the world. In verse 7 it seems like Paul is repeating himself when he talks about walking in our old evil ways when we lived in them. It’s almost like he wants us to focus on the fact that now we “live in Jesus”. Our new life need s to have new actions that show it. Also in verse 10 we are reminded that we are getting a makeover; a spiritual makeover that should show in our lives too. And this makeover reflects or shows God to the world. Jesus weaves in and out of this letter like a beautiful thread that Paul wants the world to see in the lives of the Colossians. Jesus is everywhere in this letter, saving and changing. We benefit from all he is and has done and we need to show that to the word. He is our hero that we celebrate, he our God that we honor, he is the savior in our odes, and he has been all that for generations past.

Thank you Jesus for getting me out of my old life. I know that I can slip back there and I need to put on the new life. I need to practice the new attitudes and let them change my actions. Thank you for not showing favoritism.   Thank you that Heaven’s door is open for anyone who will receive the gift you have offered (John 1:12). Help me share the song that is you with all that I meet. Make many more songs in their lives. Let the world be filled with Jesus music. Thank you God for all of it.