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Scripture Reading: Col. 2:6-8, 2:11-12, 2:16-17, 19; 1:9-11, 1:27; 3:1, 3, 9-11
In the previous chapter we saw seven main points in Colossians. The next main point is that we receive Christ. Colossians 2:6 begins, “As therefore you have received the Christ, Jesus the Lord.” Received is a very meaningful and important word. Only two books, the Gospel of John and Colossians, speak of receiving Christ in this way. John 1:12 says, “As many as received Him.” When I was young, I did not properly understand the meaning of believing in the Lord Jesus. However, after many years I realized that to believe in the Lord Jesus simply means to receive the Lord Jesus, like a radio receives the radio waves in the air and people receive breath into their bodies. Colossians stresses that we have received Christ.
The ninth main point in Colossians is that we walk in Christ. Colossians 2:6 concludes by saying, “Walk in Him.” This verse tells us to walk not according to Him but in Him. In Him means that Christ is a sphere, a realm in which we walk, signified by the good land of Canaan. In Him also includes the meaning of walking by Him, just as traveling in a car means that we travel by the car.
In the early days of the church the Colossian believers were confused and carried away from the knowledge of Christ. According to church history, they were distracted by Gnosticism, a philosophy composed of Jewish, Egyptian, Persian, and Greek teachings. Those teachings appeared to be good, in the same way that the teachings of Confucius appear to be good. The word Gnosticism itself indicates the word of knowledge and wisdom. Verse 8 speaks of philosophy; in writing this, Paul had in mind Gnosticism, the teaching and thoughts of human wisdom. He also speaks of the elements of the world, the rudimentary teachings of the world. This also is related to the teaching of the Gnostics. This Gnostic philosophy was brought into the church and caused confusion regarding the proper knowledge of Christ. Hence, many believers were distracted from experiencing Christ. This was the reason that Paul wrote Colossians.
The principle of this portion of the Word is that throughout all the centuries there have always been good teachings invented and taught by man that distract Christians from the real knowledge and experience of Christ. In China, for example, many Christians were distracted by the ethical teachings of Confucius from the real and living experience of Christ. We must realize that when we were regenerated, we received Christ as our life and our everything, so Christ has become the sphere, the realm, and the means for us to live on the earth and walk in the presence of God. Therefore, we must reject and abandon not only the bad things but even the good things, the best teachings invented by man.
The best thing invented by man in human culture and civilization is not science. Many times science has produced awful things, such as machines to kill many people. The best human invention is philosophy. However, we must never be distracted by human philosophy; it is a subtle substitute for Christ. Satan uses philosophy in a subtle way to distract people from the real experience of Christ, but many times we do not realize that we have been distracted. We may consider that philosophy is good because it helps us to be better persons, to have a better living, which is a glory to God. This is wrong. We Christians have received Christ as our life and as our everything, and now we must learn not to know any good thing other than Christ. We should abandon all the other good things and learn to live and walk in Christ. I would caution the young brothers and sisters about studying books of philosophy. I do not like to see that a young person would major in philosophy at a university. To do this is to put yourself into the mouth of a tiger; at any time the enemy, Satan, can swallow you. Human philosophy is very deceiving for Christians.
The basic principle in Colossians is that God has given Christ to us. According to Colossians, the will of God is to make Christ everything to us, to give us Christ as our portion, our life, and our everything. By the mercy and grace of God we have received Christ as the all-inclusive One. Therefore, after we receive Him, we must walk in Him as our sphere and by Him as our means. We must learn to know Christ in this way.
We should not think that because we have heard this word and read Colossians, that we know everything. What we are speaking here may be considered as instructions telling us that we need to know Christ and walk in Him. Now we must learn these things through our daily experience. I am saddened by the fact that not many Christians have learned how to experience Christ in a detailed way in their daily life. I have heard certain teachings about this, but I have not met many Christians who practice the real experience of Christ in their daily life. Today what we need is not more good teachings but to learn to live by Him in a practical way. All the good teachings other than Christ should be put aside. We must spend more time to know Christ, not merely by our understanding but by the wisdom in our spirit.
The apostle Paul gives us the secret and the way to walk in Christ in 1:9-11. Verse 9 says, “We also, since the day we heard of it, do not cease praying and asking on your behalf that you may be filled with the full knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.” In order to experience Christ and walk in Christ, we must have all spiritual wisdom and understanding. We need the wisdom in our spirit to realize Christ. First of all, we must realize that in God’s purpose, His will is to make Christ everything to us. We must have a clear understanding of this. To be sure, in order to experience Christ, we have to know Him. The more we know and realize Him, the more we sense that we need Him, and the more we are willing to experience Him. Therefore, we need spiritual wisdom and understanding, that is, the revelation and vision concerning Christ. Hence, we need to read the Scriptures to gain the knowledge of Christ. However, we should not read merely in the way of mental understanding in letter. Rather, whenever we read the things concerning Christ in the record of the Scriptures, we must pray much.
We should not merely exercise our mentality to understand the Bible in its black and white letters. Of course, we need understanding. If we do not understand English, for example, we can never understand an English version of the Bible. We must know the words and understand them with our mind. However, this is not all. After we understand the words, we must immediately exercise our spirit. This requires much prayer. We may illustrate this by eating. When we eat, it is important to thoroughly chew our food. The more time we spend to chew the food, the more we get the nourishment and the easier it is to digest it. Chewing food illustrates the way to read the Word with the exercise of the spirit. After we see the words, read the words, and understand them, we need to “chew” them. This is done not by our understanding but by our prayer.
For this reason we need to exercise our spirit. When we read, we need to exercise our mind to understand the words, and we may even need to go to a dictionary. However, after we understand the words, we need to exercise our spirit and pray from the spirit, “Lord, I open my mouth. I wish to sense Your word from the depths of my spirit.” In this way the secrets of the Word will be opened to us. We will pass through the surface of the black and white letters and find the depths. Then we will see something different and living. At this time we will know Christ not merely according to the letter but according to spiritual understanding and realization. We will receive the vision and revelation of Christ from the Word. We all need to read the Word in this way.
We may illustrate the way to eat the Word with Colossians 2:16-17. In the previous chapter we saw that eating, drinking, the feasts, and the Sabbath are a shadow of the things to come, but the body is of Christ. In reading these verses, we must first know the meaning of the words in black and white. Following this, we need to pray in order to exercise our spirit to realize the spiritual matters, the spiritual content in this word. Then something will be opened to us, not only something of the Word but something of Christ Himself. We will realize that what we need is Christ as the reality. We all need to have the spiritual wisdom and understanding so that we may realize Christ. Then we will be able to experience Him.
Colossians 1:10 says, “To walk worthily of the Lord to please Him in all things, bearing fruit in every good work and growing by the full knowledge of God.” To walk worthily of the Lord and grow by the full knowledge of God is to live and walk according to spiritual wisdom and understanding. After we receive the revelation and vision concerning Christ, we have to walk according to it. Then we will walk worthily of the Lord and partake of the Lord more and more. In this way we grow by Christ being increased in us. The way for Christ to increase in us is by our receiving spiritual wisdom, understanding, and revelation concerning Christ and by walking according to the spiritual revelation of Christ that we have received. This is to gain the real, subjective, and experiential knowledge of God, by which we grow with the increase of Christ.
Verse 11 says, “Being empowered with all power, according to the might of His glory, unto all endurance and long-suffering with joy.” We need the inner empowering according to the might of His glory. This is not only to have revelation in our understanding; it is something more. It is that the Holy Spirit within us strengthens us, energizes us, and imparts the might of God’s glory into us.
First, we have revelation and vision in our spiritual understanding. Then, we make the decision to walk according to that vision. Third, we look to the Lord that He may strengthen us with His power. This is the proper way to walk in Christ.
The tenth main point in Colossians is found in 2:7, which says, “Having been rooted and being built up in Him.” Having been rooted and being built up are different verb tenses. Our being rooted is already accomplished, but our being built up is a process. We have been rooted in Christ. There is no need for us to be rooted again, because this has already been accomplished. What we need now is to be built up.
To be built up has two meanings. On the one hand, we ourselves need to be built up with Christ just as a little child needs to be built up into an adult. Although we have been rooted in Christ, the measure of Christ within us may be small; we may not have an adequate measure of Christ. If we are built up with Christ, we will have a proper measure of Christ within us. On the other hand, we need to be built up with others. Colossians emphasizes Christ as the Head of the Body. All the members themselves must be built up, and they must also be built together as the Body.
The second aspect of building depends on the first. If we ourselves have not been built up, how can we be built together with others? To be built together with others depends on our being built up. Our growing in Christ is a matter not only of receiving Christ and walking in Him but of being built up ourselves and being built up with others. These are very important matters with many details.
To be rooted in Christ means that we are plants who have been put in Christ as our soil. Therefore, we must enjoy Christ, experience Him, and be built up in Him. In order to build, we need materials. As plants, Christ is the soil to us, and as the building, He is the very material with which we are built. An American child is built up by eating the produce of America, such as beef, chicken, fish, and fruit. In the same way, our spiritual measure is built up by feeding on Christ. At present we may have a small spiritual measure. We need to grow to a greater measure of Christ, and the way to grow in measure is by feeding on Christ, taking Him in, and digesting Him. Then He will be added to us more and more. We will have Christ increased within us, and our measure will grow. Christ is the material for the building up of our spiritual measure. For us to be rooted, Christ is the soil, and for us to be built up, Christ is the material. Christ is the very substance, element, and material for us to grow and be built up.
We have received Christ. Now we need to walk in Him and by Him. In order to walk in Him, we need to know Him in revelation and vision, and after we receive the revelation, we have to walk according to what we see. Then we open to Him and allow the Holy Spirit to strengthen us into our spirit, imparting the might of His glory into us that we might be empowered to walk in Christ. Then we must realize that we have been rooted in Christ. Christ is the very source of our supply, and as the soil, He is our entire supply. From Christ as the soil we absorb all the supply that we need to grow. He is the very material, substance, and element with which we can have a greater measure in spirit. All this in total is the growth of Christ. I hope that you will spend time to bring these matters to the Lord, to pray about them, and to learn to practice them. We must realize all these matters and put them into practice. Then we will have the real experience of Christ. We will then be able to help others, not merely to teach them about Christ but to minister to them the living knowledge and experience of Christ.
The next main point in Colossians is our identification with Christ. We are identified with Christ in four things — in His death, in His burial, in His resurrection, and in His ascension (2:11-12; 3:1, 3). We died with Christ, we were buried with Him, we were raised with Him, and we ascended with Him. Therefore, we are no longer the old man but the new man (vv. 9-10). In our daily walk we must always reject the old man and everything of the old man as that which is dead and buried and has nothing to do with us anymore. We are now resurrected and ascended with Christ in the heavens, and we are the members of the new man. Within this new man there is nothing old. There cannot be Greek and Jew, circumcision and uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, slave, or free man (v. 11). All these are the old things. In the new man everything is Christ. Christ is all and in all.
We are now in the new man, so we must put on the new man in our experience. We realize that we have been united and identified with Christ; we are dead, buried, resurrected, and ascended in Him and with Him. Therefore, all the things of the old man have nothing to do with us; we put them off and reckon them as buried. Then we live in the new man and walk as the new man. In this way we enjoy Christ not only by ourselves but by and in the corporate Body, which is the church, the new man.
The twelfth main point in Colossians is found in 1:27. Christ in us is the hope of glory. He is not only our life but also our hope, which is the hope of glory. Hope of glory indicates that when Christ comes, He will bring us into glory, that is, He will glorify us. Today this glory is concealed by our physical body, but one day when He comes, our physical body will be changed in nature by being transfigured. The glory that is Christ Himself as life will shine out through our body to bring our entire body and our entire person into glory. We should not think that glory is something objective that will come upon us some day. Rather, this glory is subjectively within us today, and one day it will spread out through our body. The divine life will swallow up the death within us, and we will be in glory.
Through transfiguration our body will become transparent, like the shade of an electric lamp. One day the Lord will come to transfigure the “lampshade” and make it transparent. Then the glory within will shine out, and the “lampshade” will be in glory. This will transpire on the day of our glorification, but today the glory is already within us. Christ in us is the hope of glory.
Another main point in Colossians is the way to apply Christ. The main goal of this book is to tell us how to apply Christ and appropriate Him. This entire book is a book of application, telling us how to appropriate Christ in our daily life in order to meet our every need. Colossians 1:12 tells us that Christ is the portion of the saints, but we must know how to enjoy and apply Him. In the early days of the church some of the Christians in Colossae had a Jewish background. They regarded special foods and drinks and observed the Old Testament feasts, the new moons, and the Sabbath. The apostle Paul told them that these items are only a shadow and that they must give them up. Christ is the very body of the shadow (2:16-17). They needed to apply Christ as the real food, drink, days of feast, new moons, and Sabbath. By this passage alone we can realize that the intention of this book is to show us our need to appropriate Christ in a practical way, even in our eating and drinking.
The last main point is found in 2:19, which is an important verse. This verse says, “Holding the Head, out from whom all the Body, being richly supplied and knit together by means of the joints and sinews, grows with the growth of God.” Joints are for supplying the nourishment needed by the Body, and sinews are for knitting the members of the Body together. Among the believers some are joints that nourish and supply, and others are sinews that join, unite, and knit the members together. By this nourishment and knitting the Body receives the supply from the Head, and it grows with the growth of God. This means that God increases within us, because what we receive from Christ the Head is something of God, even the fullness of the Godhead. On the one hand, the growth of the Body is the increase of the element of Christ within us, and on the other hand, it is the increase of God Himself. In this way the Body grows.
We may compare this to the growth of a tree. A tree grows by the fertilizer. As we put fertilizer into the soil, the tree absorbs more riches from the soil. Because the tree has more elements and more nourishment, it grows by this element and nourishment. As members of the Body, what we receive from Christ the Head is the very fullness and essence of God. The more we receive Christ, the more we have the increase of God, and it is by this increase that the Body grows and is built up.
These fourteen main points cover the entire book of Colossians. By such a book we can know Christ in a full way, and we can know who Christ is. We can know the Head of the universal man, and we can know how to appropriate Him in our daily lives. We can know how to receive, enjoy, and experience Christ so that the essence of God will constantly increase, and we will have more and more of God. In this way the Body will grow and be built up. We need to “chew” and digest all the important points of this book. Then they will become our experience.
