Scripture Reading: Col. 2:16-19; 1:25-28
We have pointed out a number of times that Paul’s ministry was a ministry of completing the word of God. In 1:25 he says, “I became a minister according to the stewardship of God, which was given to me for you, to complete the word of God.” If the Epistles of Paul were removed from the Bible, there would be a great gap. The word of God simply would not be complete. The divine revelation was completed through the ministry of Paul.
Of all the books written by Paul, the ultimate book, the consummate book, is Colossians. This book is filled with matters which are high and profound. We may compare it to a gold mine filled with riches to be dug out.
In the book of Colossians, Christ is revealed not only as the all-inclusive One, but also as the extensive One. He is universally extensive. This is indicated by the fact that in 2:16 and 17 He is presented as the body, the substance, of all the shadows. Christ is the reality of all the positive things in the universe. This makes Him extensive as well as all-inclusive.
According to the revelation in the book of Colossians, the extensive, all-inclusive Christ is everything to us. Although Christ is universally extensive, He should be our daily experience. We should experience Him in our daily living and in our daily walk. The extensive, all-inclusive Christ must become real, practical, and experiential to us day by day. On the one hand, in Colossians Paul presents the revelation of the extensive Christ. But on the other hand, he speaks of our experience of such a Christ in a detailed way.
Concerning the revelation of Christ, Paul uses terms such as “image of the invisible God,” “Firstborn of all creation,” “Firstborn from among the dead,” “the mystery of God.” But concerning our daily experience of Christ, Paul speaks of such common, ordinary matters as eating and drinking (2:16). Even in such matters we need to experience Christ. For example, you may experience Christ as you are enjoying a cup of tea or even a glass of water. If we ask ourselves whether or not we enjoy Christ in the small matters of our daily living, we shall realize that we are short of experience. If you do not enjoy Christ in your eating and drinking, and if you do not enjoy Christ as the real clothing while you are dressing yourself, you have been defrauded of your prize of the enjoyment of Christ. This is an extremely serious matter.
Colossians 2:16 says, “Let no one therefore judge you in eating and in drinking or in respect of a feast or of a new moon or of Sabbaths.” In writing these words Paul wisely refers to matters related to our daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly enjoyment. Eating and drinking are daily matters, keeping the Sabbath is a weekly matter, observing the new moon is a monthly matter, and enjoying certain feasts is a yearly matter. In referring to these matters, Paul indicates that whatever we enjoy daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly should be the enjoyment of Christ. Otherwise, we are being defrauded of Christ and carried away from Him. For example, when you eat your lunch, you need to realize that your physical food is a shadow of Christ as the real food. Christ is the body, the substance, of this shadow. We should know this not only doctrinally, but also experientially. When you are invited to go to a restaurant for a meal, you should not go there only to enjoy the shadow, but go to enjoy Christ.
According to 2:16-17, material things are a shadow of Christ. The “things to come” in verse 17 are the things concerning Christ as our enjoyment. Thus, Christ is the body, the substance, the reality, of all the shadows. As such, He must be the reality of our daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly enjoyment.
It is significant that after speaking of Christ as the body of the shadows, Paul goes on to say, “Let no one purposely defraud you of your prize” (v. 18). According to the context, the prize is the enjoyment of Christ as the body of the shadows. The enjoyment of Christ is truly a prize.
Some of the saints in Colosse were Jews, and others were Greeks. Both paid a price in turning to Christ. Having paid a price, they could receive the enjoyment of Christ as their prize. Both the Jewish and Gentile believers had suffered much because of their faith in Christ. Therefore, they could have the subjective enjoyment of Christ as their prize. The same is true of us today. Many saints have suffered persecution because they have turned to Christ and to the way of the Lord’s recovery. But now they may enjoy Christ as their reward, as their prize. This prize is not only the objective Christ, but in particular it is the subjective enjoyment of Christ. Colossians 2:16 and 17 indicate this. These verses reveal that Christ is not only objective, but that He is also the One for us to enjoy daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly. The Christ we experience daily in matters of eating and drinking is a very subjective Christ. The same is true of the Christ we experience as our weekly completion and rest (the Sabbath), as a new beginning in darkness (the new moon), and as our yearly enjoyment (the feasts). Therefore, according to verse 18, to be defrauded of our prize is to be deprived of the subjective enjoyment of Christ. Daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly we should enjoy Christ. We should not allow anyone to defraud us of this prize.
The Colossian believers, however, were being defrauded of their prize of the enjoyment of Christ. The Jewish believers were distracted from Christ by the Judaizers, whereas the Gentile believers were carried off by certain philosophical concepts. Both were defrauded of the daily experience and enjoyment of Christ. Furthermore, they had lost the weekly, monthly, and yearly enjoyment of Him. This indicates that the Jewish and Gentile believers alike had been led astray, deprived of the very prize for which they had paid such a price. As we have indicated again and again, this prize is the subjective experience of Christ daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly.
We need to check whether we experience and enjoy Christ in a practical way daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly. It is very possible that we, like the Colossians, have also been defrauded of our prize. Satan, the Devil, may defraud us of Christ, and we may not even realize it. Once I had my briefcase, which contained my passport, stolen from beside my chair while I was talking to someone in an airline company office. However, at the time of the theft I did not realize what was happening. I was defrauded of my briefcase, but I was totally unconscious of the fact. In like manner, we may not be conscious of the fact that the enemy has deprived us of the enjoyment of Christ. We may have lost the daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly enjoyment of Christ and not even realize it.
In His recovery the Lord is bringing us back from religion and everything other than Christ to Himself. God’s economy is to dispense Himself into us for our enjoyment. God wants Christ to be not only our Savior and not even just our life, but also to be our daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly enjoyment. But as we consider the situation among the vast majority of Christians today, we see that this enjoyment has been lost. Instead of enjoying Christ, believers are occupied with religion, so-called worship services, and theological teaching. There is very little enjoyment of Christ in a practical and living way. No doubt it is necessary for the Lord to have a recovery. We need to be brought back to Christ Himself. In particular, we need to be recovered to the continual enjoyment of Christ in a daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly way.
My burden is not to give more messages on doctrine. My concern is that the saints experience Christ in a practical way. If such is not our situation, then we have subtly been defrauded of Christ as our prize by the enemy. We need to enjoy Christ in all the small details of our daily living.
By the Lord’s mercy, we may live a very upright life. But although we may be kept from sin, we may still be very much short of Christ. In many respects, our daily living may be excellent. But still we must ask a crucial question: How much do we experience Christ and enjoy Him? It is not our goal only to have a proper daily life. Our goal must be Christ. We are here to gain Christ and to experience Him. I appreciate the fact that the standard of our daily walk is quite high. If everyone in this country had such a standard, the situation of the whole nation would be much improved. But we cannot be satisfied simply to have an upright daily life. This is not God’s goal. For the sake of God’s purpose, we need to experience Christ and enjoy Him. How much enjoyment of Christ do you have in your daily life? If you do not have much enjoyment of Christ, then in your experience the word of God has not been completed in full. You stand in need of the ministry of Paul, in particular of the book of Colossians.
According to 1:26, the word of God completed through the ministry of Paul was “the mystery which has been hidden from the ages and from the generations, but now has been manifested to His saints.” This mystery is Christ in us, the hope of glory (v. 27). Although we may have considerable knowledge of the Bible, we do not have the completion of the divine revelation unless we adequately experience Christ daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly. Our need is for the subjective Christ to become our enjoyment to complete the divine revelation within us. If we are short in the experience and enjoyment of Christ, we are also short concerning God’s revelation. His revelation needs the experiential Christ as its completion.
In verse 28 Paul said that he announced Christ, “warning every man and teaching every man in all wisdom” in order to “present every man full grown in Christ.” The way to be full grown in Christ is to experience Christ and enjoy Him daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly. Those who experience Christ and enjoy Him in this way will become full grown. They will be full, complete, and perfect; they will not lack anything.
In our daily living it is easy for us to be more concerned about our behavior than about the enjoyment of Christ. As those who love the Lord and seek Him, we have a natural desire to uplift our behavior. We earnestly desire to have an upright daily life. Whenever we fail the Lord in our daily walk, we are full of regret and we confess to the Lord and ask Him to forgive us and cleanse us. Although we may be very exercised in matters like this, we may not care adequately for the enjoyment of Christ. Oh, we need to enjoy Christ in our daily living!
We have seen that we need to enjoy Christ in the daily matters of eating and drinking. The fact that we eat and drink a number of times during the day indicates that we should not be content to enjoy Christ just once a day. Eating and drinking are shadows. If we eat and drink more than once a day, then we should also enjoy Christ more than once a day. We should experience Christ not only daily, but many times throughout every day.
In 1 Thessalonians 5:17 Paul says, “Pray without ceasing.” To pray in a genuine way is to enjoy Christ. I regret to say that much of our prayer is not genuine, for we often do not enjoy Christ as we pray. Whenever we pray properly in the spirit, we enjoy Christ. To pray unceasingly actually means to enjoy Christ without ceasing. We need to enjoy Christ continually. However, not many of us have been helped to live a spiritual life in the way of constantly enjoying Christ. For this we need to pray that the Lord would grant us the grace to enjoy Him daily and throughout every day.
In Paul’s word about shadows we have a hint as to how we may enjoy Christ in a practical way. Since such things as eating and drinking are shadows of which Christ is the substance and reality, we need to be reminded whenever we eat and drink that the real food and the real drink are Christ. When you eat your food, you should simultaneously eat Christ. When you drink some beverage, you should also drink Christ. As you put on your clothing, you should be reminded that Christ is the real clothing, and you should experience Him as such. As you put on your material clothing, you should also put on Christ. It is easy to enjoy Christ in this way. Whatever we do day by day should remind us of Christ as the reality of that thing. Even our breathing should remind us of the necessity of breathing Christ spiritually.
If we follow the practice of taking Christ as the reality of all the material things in our daily life, our daily walk will be revolutionized and transformed. It will be full of Christ. When we eat and drink, we shall take Christ as our spiritual food and drink. Everything we do will remind us to contact Christ, to enjoy Christ, to experience Christ, and to have Christ as our everything. To practice this day by day is truly to enjoy Christ.
Further help concerning the practical enjoyment of Christ is found in 2:7. According to this verse, we have been rooted in Christ. This word implies the existence of soil. Christ is the rich soil in which we are rooted. In a foregoing message we pointed out that this rich soil contains many marvelous elements: the fullness of the Godhead, the headship of Christ, Christ’s circumcision, His burial, being raised up with Christ, the wiping out of the ordinances, and the stripping off of the rulers and authorities. Colossians 2:9-15 is a description of the elements of the soil implied by the words “having been rooted” in 2:7.
We are rooted in Christ, who is the rich, fertile soil. Having been rooted in Him, we should go on to absorb His riches. As a tree absorbs nourishing elements from the soil through its roots, we also should absorb the riches of Christ into us. The elements absorbed into a tree from the soil enable the tree to grow. Thus, a tree’s growth depends upon the nourishment it absorbs through its roots. Since we have been rooted into Christ, we should remain in Him in a practical way day by day. In our experience, we need to stay rooted in Christ. However, if we forget Christ in matters such as eating and drinking, we are not rooted in Him in our experience. When we eat our food, we may not remember Christ. After our meal, we may spend some time in prayer. But even at the beginning of our prayer, we may not actually and experientially be rooted in Christ, for we may pray many unnecessary things. But in His mercy and patience, the Lord waits until we begin to pray in a genuine way. Then in our experience we absorb Christ’s riches. However, when our time of prayer is finished, it may happen that we do not go on to assimilate what we have absorbed of Him. According to the Lord’s words in John 15, it could be that we do not abide in Him.
In the morning many saints spend time with the Lord. However, even though they spend a certain amount of time with Him, they may not absorb much of His riches. The reason is that they are in too much of a hurry. If we would absorb the riches of Christ into us as our nourishment, we should not be rushed. We cannot absorb anything if we are in a hurry.
We should not only absorb the Lord in the morning, but we should be like trees continually absorbing the riches of the soil. This means that we must learn to practice the continual enjoyment of Christ. We should let every physical thing be a reminder of Christ, for all these things are shadows of which Christ is the substance. The clothing we put on each day should remind us of Christ. We should put Him on in our spirit and by our spirit. Drinking a glass of water should remind us to drink Christ by the exercise of our spirit. To follow this practice is to be rooted in Christ and to absorb His riches.
If we would absorb the riches of Christ as the soil, we need to have tender, new roots. Do not let yourself get old, but be fresh and renewed day by day. Pray to the Lord, “Lord, I want my consecration to be fresh, and I want to open to You anew. I want my roots to be tender that I may absorb Your riches. Lord, don’t let my roots get old.” If our roots are tender and new to absorb the riches of Christ, we shall grow automatically with the riches we assimilate. This is to enjoy Christ and to experience Him subjectively daily and hourly. This will keep us from being defrauded of our prize. But if we do not remain rooted in Him to absorb His riches, in a subtle way the enemy will defraud us of the practical and continual enjoyment of Christ.
Although there are millions of Christians on earth today, almost all of them have been defrauded of their prize of the enjoyment of Christ. They believe in Christ, have received Him, and perhaps have even paid a price to follow Him, but, like the Colossians, they have been deprived of the enjoyment of Christ. All Christians, including us, need to heed Paul’s warning not to allow anyone to defraud us of our prize. We should not allow anyone to carry us away from the enjoyment of Christ. Christ is the body, the reality, of all the positive things in the universe. As we enjoy the positive physical things, we should be reminded to enjoy Christ. If we do this, our daily living will be full of the enjoyment of Christ. Then we shall be rooted in Him, absorb His riches, and grow in Him.
