Part 2: In Christ We are RECONCILED / Colossians 1:15-23

Discover the life-changing truth of who Jesus is and what it means to belong to Him. Through Paul’s letter to the Colossians, we’ll see how our identity, purpose, relationships, and mission are transformed as we learn to live fully in Him.

This week we see IN CHRIST we are RECONCILED

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Growing up generally, I enjoyed mealtime. I loved food. Uh, hot dogs, hamburg, whatever my mom was cooking, I generally loved it. But there was always one time, one thing, if it was on the table, I knew it was gonna be a long night. Tomatoes were my archenemy food growing up. I could not stand tomatoes, and I knew if they were on the table, my mom was gonna put a couple on my plate. And I knew we were gonna have a battle of wills over the next couple of hours to see if I was gonna eat those tomatoes. And I would dig my heels in, hold back, stand my ground, and I would say, no, absolutely not. And my mom would try to bargain with me and try to get me to eat these tomatoes, and I would absolutely not. I hated the look of them. I was like, they're slimy, they're not very sweet, they just don't look good to me. I will not eat these things. And she kept trying over and over again, I think even until I was in high school, so much I didn't even like ketchup. I didn't want anything that had a tomato in it. The only thing with tomatoes on it would be pizza, but I couldn't even have the chunks of tomatoes. I was, it was just, I don't know what it was, but I did not like these things. Looking back, I was, you know, thought I was winning these kind of battles, thought I was in control, and that I was actually just a hard-headed little boy that didn't have the perspective that my mom had, and she knew what was good for me that I should be eating some vegetables on occasion, and then I couldn't see it. You know, we often think we know what's best for us in our own lives. We hear something we don't like and we kind of recoil inside and say, you know, I don't like being told what to do. I like to be my own boss, my own man, and my own woman. And I get it, I feel that way sometimes too. But if we're really honest, that kind of independence can be a horrible way to live. What if we never changed our perspective? What if we stay locked into our own limited understanding and knowledge for our entire life? It would actually mean that we'd be in constant tension, constant conflict, and a whole lot of unnecessary struggle in our lives. And the truth is, real change usually doesn't happen naturally. It often requires us to be willing to see things differently, to trust that someone else, and in this case God that we're gonna look at tonight, has a better perspective and understanding than I do. And today we're gonna see this play out in the scripture that that are in our series called In Christ. Last week we looked at in Christ, this study through Colossians, that we were rescued, delivered from the domain of darkness, and transferred into a new kingdom, the kingdom of the Son of God. And that's a powerful foundation. But Paul, the author of this letter to Colossians, does not stop there. He keeps on going in this first chapter and gives us a next reality that in Christ we are not just rescued, we are reconciled. Reconciled. Now that's a word maybe you use in a bank account, you know, like I need to reconcile my numbers, make sure everything adds up. But what does reconciliation mean? Let me give you the definition we're going to work through tonight, and it's simply this that God, through Jesus' death and resurrection, is restoring people and creation to himself by giving hope and new life in him, in Christ, in God. That God, through Jesus' death and resurrection, is restoring you and I and all of creation back to what was originally designed, to hope and new life in him. In this way, reconciliation is a beautiful word, it's a beautiful process. I remember watching my mom and dad grow up when I was growing up, there was once a month they would get their bank statement in the mail. We don't I don't know if anybody even does this anymore. It's all done online, it's all done automatically, but they would get a bank statement and it would have all the checks that they had written that month, and they had to go and sit down at their office and reconcile that that this check had cleared and plus and minus. And it was like I knew at that point you don't go near that room. Like it was a it was a big process in my mom's life that once a month, going through receipts and trying to reconcile. It was not a beautiful thing. I would hear screaming, I'd hear, where's this? I don't know what's going on. But reconciliation here with God is a beautiful thing. It was done to bring us back into relationship with him. Think about it, because of our sin, we were alienated for God, enemies in our minds, as Paul just as Paul states. But God didn't leave us there. In his great love, he took the initiative through the death and resurrection of Jesus and made a way for us to come home. To come home. He didn't wait for us to fix ourselves because we couldn't. He didn't demand that we clean up our act first because we honestly can't. Instead, he sent his son to do what we could never do, to pay our debt and bear our judgment, and bring us into relationship with the Father. And at the heart of this is the gospel. That's what the gospel is, and God is in the business of reconciliation. But there's a key to reconciliation for you and I to experience it. And it's a simple word, but it's a hard word, and it's the word submission. Submission. Submission changes the way you and I view authority. That's what submission is. We look at who's in charge. And in this case, it's is it me or is it Jesus? Who's in charge? That's the question we're gonna struggle with in Colossians tonight. We often think submission is hard. We hear the word and we kind of recoil. I don't want to submit to anyone. I like to be the one in charge, and honestly, that's a horrible way to live. We miss out on wisdom, we miss out on expanded understanding and perspective. Imagine if you grew up really never submitting yourself to your parents. You would never learn and grow, or a boss that you maybe loved and learned from, or somebody who's done your type of work before that you can learn from and grow from, or whatever you you love to research and be around. We submit ourselves to those things to grow. And this is what Paul is challenging us to do here in this reconciliation. The truth is we'd submit to things all the time, and it impacts our life for the positive. It can impact our life for the negative as well if we submit to the wrong things, but we choose what we submit to. And you and I, tonight, as Paul is gonna challenge us in this section of Colossians, is to intentionally submit our lives to Jesus. Why Jesus? Well, let's look at Colossians 1, 15 through 20, and we're gonna start to see why. Starts with this He, talking about Jesus, is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation, for by him all things were created in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authority, all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church, he is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of the cross. If you look at these verses, note it all, notice all the he is or in him statements. Paul just can't stop exalting Jesus here. He repeats it over and over again like he is overwhelmed with the greatness of Jesus. He is, he is, he is in him, in him, through him. It's like Paul is saying, stop, look at him, look at who he really is. And he's doing this because in the city that this letter was written to of Colossi, people were being pulled in all kinds of different directions. They were mixing Jesus with things like old Jewish rules, Greek philosophy, local spiritual powers, Roman imperial ideas. They were trying to cover all their basic, hedge all their bets just in case. And Paul cuts through every bit of it and says, No, only Jesus. He refuses to let Jesus be reduced to an option among many, and instead he lifts Jesus to the supreme position. And this is not just nice religious language. It's not like he just is writing some poetic thing here. Paul is making a bold declaration to the world that worship many things, just like our world does today. You know, Jesus was not a created being, he tells us here. He's been here from the beginning and he will be here always. He is not a lesser God, he is not an add-on to our spiritual life in everything. He has preeminence first place. And this is what Paul is saying that we are called to submit to. And Jesus is no small thing that we submit to. He is not manageable, he's not safe and comfortable, he is magnificent, he is worthy of all full submission because there is no one higher, no one greater, and no one more loving than Jesus. So let's look back at this, the definition that we had of reconciliation, right? That God threw Jesus' death, through Jesus, which makes me then ask this natural question after looking at all this at Paul, who is actually Jesus? Who is Jesus? And I want us to look at this idea for just a minute. You're like, we're we're sitting in church. Most of us know who Jesus is. We've we've heard him, we grew up, but I want us to really focus in on two aspects of who Jesus is in our life, because I think these two aspects help us understand how we're to live in response to submission to Jesus. Not just that he was God's son, nailed to a cross, rose from the dead. Those are all facts about Jesus that we should know, but there are some indispensable ideas about Jesus that we must hold on to. And the first is this he is the image of God. This is what Paul says. Verse 15, he is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. In their world, the word image is the word icon, where we get the word icon from. An icon is not just a computer thing you click on, it was used in that time to represent the embodiment of the power of a God. So it was a tangible representation, and that's what Paul is using here, this Greek word to say Jesus was iconic of God, that he was God in all form. And it carried a heavy meaning. It's not just a picture or a symbol, a cross or something we wear around our neck. He represented the full essence, authority, and presence of the original of God. And what Paul says here is Jesus is that image of the invisible God. He's making this bold claim against many false teachings. And what I want you to see here is there's a key idea related to this. Is Jesus is not just now a representation or a reflection of God, he is the full revelation of God. So he's not just showing parts of God, like I'll reflect a little bit of God's goodness here and God's mercy here, or I'll do a piece of this, or represent just a little bit. He is the full revelation of God. Everything about Jesus was God, and everything about God was Jesus. There's an argument, many people say, oh, I don't like the God of the Old Testament, but I like Jesus. They're the same. They're the same. There is not a distinction between the two. The two, the character, the way that Jesus lives his life is the representation of the full revelation of God. And God had been, he had been faithful throughout history to reveal himself in different ways. He gave the law to Moses. He had set different righteousness standards through the law. He spoke through prophets. He even met one-on-one with like Moses on a mountaintop. But Jesus himself was the full flesh and blood embodiment of God, which should make us do something. And this is the application I want you to see here. Understanding him as the image of God means that the fullness of God's character is fully revealed in the person and the words of Jesus, not my interpretation of him. And this is where it gets a little tricky and personal because too often we approach Jesus with our own ideas already in place. We want a Jesus who isn't nice all the time, doesn't really confront sin. We want a Savior who supports maybe our political views but doesn't challenge my own greed or pride. We want a Jesus who fits neatly into our lifestyle instead of one who calls us to lay down our lives and sacrifice for others. We don't get to interpret who Jesus is. We get to understand who he is as he reveals himself to us. So the question, are you worshiping the real Jesus or a version that you've shaped your life to make you more comfortable? Are you worshiping a Jesus in your own image or one that you is in the image and full revelation of God? Open your Bible this week. Pray to the Spirit of God to reveal to you the true nature and character of Jesus and where you need to submit to him. Read the words of Jesus, the teachings of Jesus, and allow them to take root into your life. These are things that we should be doing regularly as followers of Jesus. It's not just following Jesus, it's not just showing up to church and wearing the label of a Christian. It is submitting ourselves to his character, his nature, his words, and living them out. If he is the full revelation of God, then how he viewed sin, how he approached justice and injustice, how he dealt in times of need and what he did in times of pain or in anger are how God would react and how we should submit ourselves to as well. So he is the image of God. There's another beautiful part about Jesus, and it's in verse 20, it says he is the savior of the world. Through him to reconcile to himself all things, making peace by the blood of the cross. Now, this verse is one of the most important statements about the scope of the work of Jesus in the New Testament. He is the one who brings peace. The Roman Empire at that time, they they would bring peace, but they would say there was a saying bring peace with a sword, right? They would bring peace through conquest and through power. Jesus brought peace through sacrifice, through giving his life as a sacrifice for our sin. He bridged the gap between a holy God and a rebellious humanity. And I want you to see another key idea here about Jesus that when we say he's savior, is that Jesus is not a life coach or some boss to be pleased. He is actually the purchaser and provider of my salvation. And in our world, it's too easy sometimes to put Jesus into this model of, oh, you know, remember the bracelets, WWJD, what would Jesus do? Those are great, but those kind of sometimes turned into like a little, let me just know a little saying, What would I do here? What would I do there? Give me a little advice here, Jesus, instead of fully submitting to Jesus. He's not this life coach or not a boss that we have to keep pleased so that we can stay in the in the hunt and in the game. He is actually the one who purchased our salvation. He didn't come to assist us in saving ourselves on the cross. He offered the one perfect final sacrifice that fully paid the debt of our sin, satisfying God's righteousness wrath against us. Which brings us to the thought I want us to understand tonight that understanding him as Savior means that this was the only one sacrifice needed for salvation, which was Jesus. There's no work left to be done. God does not need your help. God doesn't need your help to save you. You don't get to add to the process. And this may feel like, but I you know, I feel like I need to do something. But this truth is actually one of the most liberating truths of the entire Christian faith, and it's what sets the Christian faith apart. You and I do not get to add to the work of our salvation. It is done completely by Jesus. Deep down, many of us still live with this quiet pressure that we have to do something to help Jesus save us. But Paul is declaring something far better. When Jesus died on the cross, the work was finished, the debt was paid in full. And so I want to challenge you this week as you're living out that life, you're not doing it as a performance. You're not performing for God. Instead, you're confessing to God where you need Him, where you need His power, His forgiveness in your life, and begin to rest in the fact that you are already fully loved, forgiven, and accepted. We don't work for our salvation, we work from it. We don't work for it, we work from it. So now let's move to the next part of Colossians as we see who Jesus is, this image of God, the full representation, revelation of God, and this full savior of mankind. What does that mean now for us? We see in verses 21 to 23. And you now, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he is now reconciled in his body of flesh by this death in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him, if indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard. Remember all the in him, through him, in him, in him, in him. Now notice the in you, you statements. Paul turns the spotlight from the greatness of Jesus straight on to us in these verses. After lifting Jesus high and declaring him the image and the Savior of the world, Paul now brings the focus right back to us. And this is a classic move that Paul often does of contrasting things. He wants us to feel the weight of who Jesus is and immediately apply it into our lives. It's like he's saying this look, look at how magnificent Jesus is, and now look at who you were and who you are now because of Jesus. And this is both humbling and hopeful in our lives. And it makes me, when we go back to the definition of reconciliation, if God through Jesus' death and resurrection is restoring people and creation, if that's what reconciliation is, restoring people and creation, then it makes me ask a natural question, then who am I in this process? We see who Jesus is, but who am I? And wants to see again a couple of key things here. We saw about Jesus now. These are two things that are common about all of us. And the first thing is this is I was born naturally hostile to God. Verse 21 tells us that, and you who once alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil things. Paul described this universal human condition that we are all in. Alienated means we are cut off from God. Hostile means that we were thinking of our desires, not just what we wanted, but actually opposed to God. This is not just bad behavior. It is a deep heart-level rebellion that all of us were born into. We weren't born into a good relationship with Christ. We born with God, we were born with a hostile nature. And that's the key idea. My hostility with God is not overcome by just living a healthier, better life. It is by living a humble life, a humble life submitted to God. We often try to fix our own broken relationship to God through self-improvement, doing nicer, being a nicer person, reading the Bible more, living a more moral or disciplined life. Those are all great things, but they don't create the salvation that we need. The real solution is not becoming a healthier version of yourself, but becoming a humbler person before God. Which makes us then ask ourselves, what is humility? Understanding humility is this. Humility is not having a poor view of myself, it's having a proper view of myself. So humility is not just thinking, oh, woe is me, I'm a horrible, bad person. It's understanding that compared to the supremacy and the iconic nature of the revelation of Jesus, that he is the savior of the world, who am I to that? To humble myself and say, I am neither one of those. I was actually hostile to God. I was not a representation of God, and I cannot save myself. And so I place myself humbly under the person of Jesus. That's the proper view of ourselves. And this is where I would say challenges this week to pray to our. To God and say, God, show me where I'm trying to be in charge. Show me where I'm trying to still prove myself to you. And confess that and submit humbly to God. So, first of all, I was hostile toward God. The second thing we see in verse 23 is that there's a universal need for the hope of the gospel. I need the hope of the gospel. Verse 23, it says, as we continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you have heard. And Paul ends this powerful passage with a call to perseverance. The gospel is not just this one and done moment in our life. Wherein maybe in a church service I pray a prayer and say, God, forgive me of my sins. I want to go to heaven when I die. Amen. And now I'm done. That's not the full work of the gospel. The full work of the gospel starts to play out from that moment of submission to a lifetime of humility and submission and seeing God do work of the sanctification in our lives, of moving us toward righteousness. Yes, sins are forgiven. We are stepped into the family of God, but now we begin to grow into that moment. And while we all need salvation in a momentary sense of stepping from outside the faith to inside the faith, we also need a lifetime of following Jesus to experience the full hope of our salvation. And a lot of times we think that that will show up in a change of our circumstances, but the key idea I want you to see here is true hope from God is not found when our circumstances change, but is when our character changes. Not a change of circumstances, but a change of character. I would love to sit here and say, the more you follow God, the easier the circumstances of your life are going to be. Everything's going to be great. Nobody's going to die. You're never going to lose a job. There's probably going to be enough money in your bank account. Nobody, none of your friends are ever going to do anything to hurt you. Everything's going to be great. It's not true. That's nowhere in scripture. It's not promised to us. A life of easy circumstance, but what is promised to us is the ability to have hope to walk through whatever circumstance comes our way. That we can stand firm and steadfast, as these verses say, through whatever circumstance comes, our character is strengthened. Our character is changed because of what we have done, because of the hope of the gospel. Which brings us to this idea of understanding hope. Ultimately, hope is not the absence of trouble, but it is the absence of turmoil. Trouble will come, but turmoil is when I feel out of control, when I don't know where to look to, I don't know what to hold on to. True hope knows that no matter how big the storm is, my anchor, as scripture defines hope, is steadfast in my salvation of Christ through Christ. No matter what storm comes, my anchor of hope is steadfast. And the truth is, maybe you're in a hard season right now and the waves are high, circumstances are overwhelming, recent diagnosis is scary, a relationship is strained, the future feels uncertain and heavy. And I want you to hear something tonight. You can have real peace in the middle of a storm. Not because the storm is gone, but because the captain of your soul is the one who is with you and he is completely trustworthy. Some of the most peaceful moments in my life that I've ever known have come through some of the biggest storms in my life. And I knew I could trust God at the deepest levels because I was facing the strongest trials. Brings us to our question of the day as we close. Where is it in your life that you're trying to be the savior of your own life or the life of others? Where are you trying to play? Where are you getting these roles reversed? Where are you playing the role that Jesus has been given? The role of the image of God and Savior of the world, and you, instead of being humble and in need of hope, have switched and said, I want to be Savior, I want to be the one that impresses God. Maybe it's in your marriage trying to fix a spouse. Maybe it's with your kids carrying the weight of their future and their salvation on your shoulders. Maybe it's in your career, your finances, your reputation, or even your own spiritual growth. Wherever it is, hear this with all your heart. There is a better Savior than you. And his name is Jesus. He doesn't need your help to save you. He doesn't need your help to save the people you love. He has already done the work. The sacrifice is complete. The blood has been shed. The reconciliation has been accomplished. And so this week I want to challenge you to step into this courageous, freeing feeling of knowing that Jesus is not, he is strong enough, wise enough, and good enough. He is strong enough, wise enough, and good enough for all of us. And we can trust him even when we don't understand him. Interestingly, I eventually started liking tomatoes. Years later, when we lived in New York, I was at a friend's house and they brought out this platter of just tomatoes covered with mozzarella, basil, and olive oil. And I'm like, tomatoes really? Just only tomatoes? And I didn't want to be rude. And so I took a bite. And to my surprise, I loved it. It was amazing. And I was like, what have I been missing? And I began to eat tomatoes almost with anything I could. There was a salad. I used to order every salad. No tomatoes. No, put them on there. I love them. Now I would start ordering the tomatoes with basil. I loved them. And a few years after that, my mom came to visit us in New York and we were out to eat, and I ordered some tomatoes with mozzarella and basil. And she looked at me and she was like, You are not the same person. You have changed. And I was like, you're right. I am not the same person. Something had changed. What I once fought against, I now enjoyed. And that's what happens when we finally are willing to try, when we let go of our old perceptions, stubborn ideas, and we discovered that what we once maybe resisted from God, trying to put ourselves in the wrong position, when we accept that we are humble people in need of salvation, we find true satisfaction. If you've never truly surrendered your life to Jesus, today is a perfect day. The key to reconciliation, as we said, is submission. And it starts right here, right now, with a simple act. You don't have to clean yourself up first. You don't have to have it all together. You come as you are with your mess, your failures, your hostility, and your need, and you simply tell Jesus, I'm done trying to be my own savior. I submit to you. Be my savior, forgive me, reconcile me. And he will not turn you away. He'll receive you, forgive you completely. He'll give you a new life, a real hope. That's what he does. That's what the cross was for. Because when we finally stop trying to be our own savior, we discover the beautiful freedom of being truly saved. That's the hope we have, that's the peace we can experience, and that's what it means to live reconciled with Christ. Let's pray together.