Colossians 1:1-8. Today we begin the book of Colossians. This is a letter to the church in a city called Colosse in Asia Minor (modern day Turkey). For more about the letter the city and the author check out the “Intro to Colossians”. It is important to read the introductions because the books of the Bible were written at different times and places and for different reasons. Without the backgrounds it can be difficult and sometimes impossible to understand what you are reading.

Verses 1and 2 are a typical greeting for a letter in those days (about 62 AD). Verse 1 tells us it is from Paul and Timothy. Paul is the actual writer but he wants the readers to know that Timothy is there and at least agrees with what he is writing. Paul calls himself an “apostle”. The New Testament is written mostly in Greek and the Greek word here means “sent one”. In the New Testament the word is usually used in a technical way, sort of like a job title or “office”. Paul certainly was given the job of going and telling people, especially Gentiles or non-Jews, about Jesus. You can read more about Paul in “Paul: Sent One to the Gentiles”. The second “author” is Timothy. Timothy was a companion of Paul on some of his journeys around the Mediterranean world. He was from a town about 150 miles east of Colosse, Lystra. Timothy had become sort of a “right hand man” to Paul and was given many responsibilities. Here in verse 1 he is called “our brother”. Paul is comparing believer in Jesus to a family.

In verse 2 he tells us who the letter is to, “saints and faithful brothers in Christ who are at Colosse”. Saints is a word that mean holy or dedicated to a particular purpose. If you play soccer you might have a pair of cleats that you only use to play soccer in, they are holy, dedicated to playing soccer. These guys are special because they are part of God’s family. They are also faithful brothers they stick together for God. We also see that these people are “in Christ” and “in Colosse”. It’s interesting that “in colosse” is at the beginning of the verse in the original language. These people were in that physical location but they were a dedicated and faithful family “in Jesus”. Colosse may have been the city they lived in but Jesus is where they really lived. By the way the word Christ means “chosen one” in the Greek language it is equal to “Messiah” in the Old Testament. In this letter it is used technically to refer to Jesus the Chosen One; the Christ.

The second part of verse 2 is a typical blessing from Paul to the Colossians. Paul’s prayer to God is for the Colossians to have “grace and peace”. Grace is referring to a gift. In this case the gift is from God. In the New Testament the gift of God is a place in his forever family, forgiveness and payment for the wrongs we have done. This gift is “in Christ” and it is from “God our Father”. Again the family connection, the idea of a father is one of protection and provision.

Verse 3 begins the next part of Paul’s greeting, a prayer of thanks. In verse 3 Paul tells the Colossians that he is thankful to God for them. Again he uses the picture of a family, again calling God a father, this time of Jesus Christ. In verse 4 Paul tells us that he thankful because he has heard of the faith of the Colossian believers in Jesus and the love they have for “all the saints”. Evidently the way put the words together in the Greek language stresses the actions associated with their faith more than the object (Jesus) of it. Their belief in Jesus had caused them to go out and live differently especially in the lives of others.

Verse 5 tells us why that had this life changing belief, it was their hope. They knew they had a place in Heaven, Jesus had opened up eternity with God to them and that knowledge, that hope. Set them free to love God and others. They had heard about this “before” when they heard the “word of truth”; the “gospel” (the word translated “gospel” means good news). What they heard truly was good news, it gave them hope for all eternity and made their lives radically different.

In verse 6 we see that this truth wasn’t just some sort of “head knowledge” it was active in their lives and in the lives of people everywhere who had heard it. The language that Paul uses here is the language of reproduction. Bearing fruit is the kind of language that would be used to talk about having children. The idea of “increasing” has the idea of becoming mature. So the “gospel” was having children and they were growing up quite well. The Colossians were some of these “children”. At the end of verse 6 Paul returns to “good news” that they had heard and confirms what it was they had heard and understood. It was about the “grace” or free gift of God. Remember it was “in Jesus” and it was the fact that Jesus had dealt with the penalty for disobedience, death. The “gospel” is also true, something they could see because of their changed live and the changed lives of others.

In verse 7-8 we see that the believers in Colosse originally learned about Jesus from a guy named Epaphras who was a faithful servant of Jesus. I think the mention of him being faithful is important. We see that it is not just words that communicate the good news about Jesus it is the change he makes in peoples lives too. In Matthew 5:16 Jesus told his followers to let their changed lives “shine before men” so that those men would in turn honor God with their lives.

Here in the very beginning of the book we see several things that hint at what might be going on in Colosse. First of all we need to understand that they were in a pretty good place with God. First of all they were part of God’s forever family, they were “in Jesus” and were “brothers”. This was their hope and it was building their faith. It was also affecting their actions, their faith or trust in the reality of what Jesus had done for them was growing and they were living and caring for others.   Their love (agape- a word for love in the Greek that has the idea of sacrifice) was for “all the saints”; they were caring for others without thinking about the cost.

A couple of groups of words seemed to show up quite a lot in the greeting. First was the idea of truth or facts. The gospel was something that they had heard and seen and experienced. The truth that they had taken hold of changed things; it had given hope and changed their lives. They had a new relationship with each other and with God. God was their “father” and they were his children. Later we will see they were being tempted with other ideas, ideas that claimed to give them a better relationship with God. Here in the beginning Paul wanted to make sure that they already had a great and real relationship with God.

God thank you for making it all so real and so simple. Thank you for giving me a sure place in your forever kingdom. Help me be faithful like the Colossians. Let me live each day in ways that draw others to you.