Being Built Up In Christ: A Sermon on Colossians 2:1-7

Colossians 2 speaks of being built up in Christ,

1 For I want you to know what a great conflict I have for you and those in Laodicea, and for as many as have not seen my face in the flesh, 2 that their hearts may be encouraged, being knit together in love, and attaining to all riches of the full assurance of understanding, to the knowledge of the mystery of God, both of the Father and of Christ, 3 in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.
4 Now this I say lest anyone should deceive you with persuasive words. 5 For though I am absent in the flesh, yet I am with you in spirit, rejoicing to see your good order and the steadfastness of your faith in Christ.
6 As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, 7 rooted and built up in Him and established in the faith, as you have been taught, abounding in it with thanksgiving.  (NKJV).

We see that manifestation of Paul’s mind.  It is indeed lovely, caring, brotherly love, and concern for the true Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ.  Paul himself had never seen the Colossian church, but his heart was with them.  Henry wrote, “Paul's care of the church was such as amounted to a conflict. He was in a sort of agony, and had a constant fear respecting what would become of them. Herein he was a follower of his Master, who was in an agony for us, and was heard in that he feared. (2.) We may keep up a communion by faith, hope, and holy love, even with those churches and fellow-Christians of whom we have no personal knowledge, and with whom we have no conversation. We can think, and pray, and be concerned for one another, at the greatest distance; and those we never saw in the flesh we may hope to meet in heaven.”  The people at this church were blessed of God, and surely the people of Christ’s invisible church.  We see a deep love by Paul for them, and for the truth of God’s revelation.  We too are God’s true people if we have truly trusted Christ the Lord and Redeemer.  Are we not His people plucked from the pit of hell, and set on solid ground?  Paul saw Christ in the flesh, and he was surely an apostle of God in proclaiming the gospel of God.  Paul proclaimed it in the midst of great persecution, conflict and tribulation.  Paul was a committed man in preaching the true Gospel of God.  The divine Word says in 1 Peter 1:8, “whom having not seen you love. Though now you do not see Him, yet believing, you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory…”  (NKJV). 

When Paul proclaimed God’s message of the true gospel of the imputed righteousness of Christ, he proclaimed it against much opposition.  When we proclaim the gospel of the imputed righteousness of Christ alone we will encounter conflict.  We may even find conflict within the church.  But it was the thought that God is completely in control of events in time and space.  Even when people reject the gospel in the midst of great conflict we know in truth that God has a people He will save unto Himself in truth and righteousness.  Paul labored for the people, and he was greatly thankful and encouraged that the Paul labored for the Lord when he was absent.  Paul wants to encourage his brothers and sisters in Christ.  When we encourage each other in Christ it builds us up in the Lord and produces growth in Christ for God’s glory.  Paul did not personally found this church at Colosse.  We must think of others to build them up in the Lord, and bless them as they serve the Lord.  God’s people are knit together in love by the Trinity of love.  John was a beloved fellow of the Lord who was deeply loved.  John had a special relationship with Christ unlike the other disciples or apostles.  This relationship is awesome and wonderful.  So, too, we can look at Jonathan and David.  Both of their hearts were knit together in true love.  They had a brotherly relationship unlike what is commonly known.  It was a unique relationship grounded in Christian love, in Christlikeness, in love that is unequaled.  We ought to be knit together in love toward one another.  It is an enjoyable thing to see and experience being knit together in love among brothers and sisters in Christ.  Are we knit together in love?  Are you like Jonathan and David who had a love that transcends the common experience of love among believers?  We are to love as Christ loved His people in truth, in sincerity, in patience, in righteousness, in doing whatever we can to show our love in godly ways.  Daniel was also a man who was greatly beloved of the Lord in Christ. 

Let us also explore the encouragement of Paul.  Paul encourages the brothers and sisters in Christ at this church at Colosse.  Do we offer an encouraging word to friends in Christ at other churches we do not know?  Do we offer encouraging words to people at church?  When people are encouraged they are built up in the Lord Jesus.  Elders and deacons out of all of us need the most encouragement in the Lord.  Their positions of ministry are very discouraging, but we can offer a word of encouragement it is much better for them, and we do something pleasing in God’s sight.  May we do this!  We see in the Bible that encouragement is a biblical and proper thing to do:

Deuteronomy 1:38, “But your assistant, Joshua son of Nun, will enter it. Encourage him, because he will lead Israel to inherit it.”  (NIV).  Deuteronomy 3:28, “But command Joshua, and encourage him and strengthen him; for he shall go over before this people, and he shall cause them to inherit the land which you will see.’  Acts 11:23, “When he came and had seen the grace of God, he was glad, and encouraged them all that with purpose of heart they should continue with the Lord.”  Acts 15: 30 So when they were sent off, they came to Antioch; and when they had gathered the multitude together, they delivered the letter. 31 When they had read it, they rejoiced over its encouragement. 32 Now Judas and Silas, themselves being prophets also, exhorted and strengthened the brethren with many words.  1 Thessalonians 3:2, “and sent Timothy, our brother and minister of God, and our fellow laborer in the gospel of Christ, to establish you and encourage you concerning your faith…”  1 Thessalonians 3:6, “But now that Timothy has come to us from you, and brought us good news of your faith and love, and that you always have good remembrance of us, greatly desiring to see us, as we also to see you…”  (NKJV).

Within the Godhead of the Trinity there is a love unspeakable, unimaginable, unbelievable.  Each member surely loves His own, but have you thought of the love the members have for each other?  Yes, indeed, the Members of the Godhead are knit together love for each other in truth and righteousness.  The Father’s love for the Son and the Father and Son’s love for the Spirit are perfect, undefiled, pure, holy.  We see a love that surpasses understanding, and they are devoted in truth.  But we see the love of the Father toward God’s people who are in Christ.  The Father loves God’s people through God the Son the Incarnate Lamb.  God the Father loves His people as He loves God the Son, because it in and through Christ that the Righteous Father loves His own.  Within this love of God’s people from the Father, we find no division, no abandonment, no forsakenness in terms of God’s people.  We remain firmly in God’s love through Christ the Redeemer, and nothing in all creation can take us out of the Father’s grip. 

31 What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? 32 He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things? 33 Who shall bring a charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. 34 Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, and furthermore is also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us. 35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? 36 As it is written:

      “ For Your sake we are killed all day long;
       We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.”

37 Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. 38 For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, 39 nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.  (NKJV).

We remain firmly settled in the Triune love of God.  There is nothing in all creation that can separate us from His love.  Romanists believe that mortal sin breaks the grace of justification, and you could die in mortal sin, and end up in hell.  But even sin cannot take us out of God’s Almighty hand because we are firmly planted in Christ Jesus.  Once we are His (and the Lord knows those who are His) we cannot be taken out of His loving hand.  Sin does hurt us in our relationship with God.  It can make our prayers go unanswered, and cause us to be chastened by God.  Yet, sin cannot break the true grace of justification.  It does not mean we should abuse grace, and sin more and more, but it does mean we ought to humble ourselves under God’s Almighty hand, and He will exalt His people in truth and righteousness.  We must faithfully repent of the sins we have committed; we must labor for the Lord in whatever we do; we must fear God, and produce fruits of righteousness unto the praise of His glorious grace.  We cannot remain in sin, and forsake repentance; we must be faithful to God in Christ.  We must remain in self-control, and we must be people of love to the world, to our enemies, to the church.  Let us remember the love of Christ.  Did He not die for His people?  Did He not freely go to the Cross at Calvary?  He did spare His own life but endured the Cross that was set before Him by His Father.  The Cross was an ordained act of love by God.  It was God who put His Son to death through His appointed means.  We cannot miss the love of the Cross, and how He loved us while we were still sinners.  The full payment for sin was seen at the Cross, and Christ provided for His people the all-sufficient merit that we need.  We see today that people think good works save people, but how can this be if every faculty of man is tainted with serious and rebellious sin?  No, my friends, it was Christ and Christ alone that provides that all-sufficient merit that God’s people need to stand before the Father of heaven and earth.  The Father of love ordained the Cross to be as it was, not to condemn His people, but to free them from the sin that emerged in the Garden of Eden.  We cannot stand before God without the loving robes of Christ’s righteousness.  It is impossible to stand before the God-man without His righteous robes of purity in love, in holiness, in purity, in righteousness.  The act of giving God’s people Christ’s garments is an act of true love for His elect only.  The Cross never failed once to save God’s people, nor does the intercession of Christ fail.  The Cross and the intercession of Christ for His beloved few is and was and remains to be, an eternal act of indescribable love, compassion, pity.

Let us consider the love of God for His beloved people.  Psalm 25:6, “Remember, O LORD, Your tender mercies and Your lovingkindnesses, for they are from of old.”  Psalm 40:11, “Do not withhold Your tender mercies from me, O LORD; Let Your lovingkindness and Your truth continually preserve me.”  Psalm 51:1, “Have mercy upon me, O God, According to Your lovingkindness; According to the multitude of Your tender mercies, Blot out my transgressions.”  Psalm 69:16, “Hear me, O LORD, for Your lovingkindness is good; Turn to me according to the multitude of Your tender mercies.”  Psalm 119:77, “Let Your tender mercies come to me, that I may live; For Your law is my delight.”  John 15:12-13, “This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.  Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends.”  Romans 5:5, “Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us.”  Romans 5:8, “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”  1 Corinthians 16:22, “If anyone does not love the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be accursed. O Lord, come!” (NKJV).

Let us consider the love who ought to have toward one another in Christ our Lord.  Romans 12:9-10, “Let love be without hypocrisy. Abhor what is evil. Cling to what is good.  Be kindly affectionate to one another with brotherly love, in honor giving preference to one another…”   Romans 13:8-10, “Owe no one anything except to love one another, for he who loves another has fulfilled the law.  For the commandments, “You shall not commit adultery,” “You shall not murder,” “You shall not steal,” “You shall not bear false witness,” “You shall not covet,” and if there is any other commandment, are all summed up in this saying, namely, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”  Love does no harm to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.”  Romans 14:15, “Yet if your brother is grieved because of your food, you are no longer walking in love. Do not destroy with your food the one for whom Christ died.”  1 Corinthians 13:3, “And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, but have not love, it profits me nothing.”  1 Corinthians 13:4, “Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up...”  1 Corinthians 13:8, “Love never fails. But whether there are prophecies, they will fail; whether there are tongues, they will cease; whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away.  1 Corinthians 13:13, “And now abide faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love.”  1 Corinthians 14:1, “Pursue love, and desire spiritual gifts, but especially that you may prophesy.”  1 Corinthians 16:14, “Let all that you do be done with love.”  (NKJV).

We see that the knowledge and wisdom of the love of Christ is surely beyond anything we can imagine in our human minds.  Let us not forget that we are depraved, and we have sin that affects our minds.  Let us not seek knowledge and wisdom elsewhere, for it in Christ all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are.  The wisdom of the wise is foolishness in the sight of God, but the wisdom of God is far better, and far greater then the futile wisdom of the world.  We understand that Solomon was a man of wisdom, and some believe he was the wisest man who ever lived.  But when we come to Christ we clearly see that He was the One who gave Solomon his wisdom, and surely we can see that Christ is not merely high human wisdom, but rather, He is Incarnate Wisdom.  We see that the wisdom of Christ is not tainted with human sin as our minds are tainted with serious sin before God.  But Christ had the purest mind that ever was, and His wisdom is the greatest of all, for in Him all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are found.  Do we dare look to another save Christ Jesus?  Do we dare think we are wiser then He?  What foolishness!  See how sin exalts itself over the plain testimony of divine Scripture?  See how sin creeps and lurks to find glory for itself?  We need to be people who seek knowledge and wisdom of the things of God.  We find the true mind of God in divine Scripture.  We find the breathed out words of God in holy Writ.  But the Quran and the Hindu texts do not have the same divine words of God.  They fail at every level to change the hearts and minds of men.  The holy Bible is the only holy book on earth.  In it we find Christ speaking to us—do we listen to His divine wisdom and knowledge? 

We see that Paul preached the message of the Gospel, and we see that the only way men can truly believe the gospel is by the Spirit of God and the Word of God.  This is the wisdom and knowledge of God.  But man tries to find ways of clever arguments to believe, and programs but they fail to realize that it is only by the Spirit of truth and the Word of truth that the sons and daughters of men will heed the message of the Gospel of grace and peace.  Without the divine Wisdom of God in Christ Jesus there would be no hope of redemption, but now the hope of glory, the hope of heaven, the hope of true bliss.  I remember the time when I saw that all of my past was a life of misery.   I only understand this because of the spiritual awakening I received by God the Spirit.  I also listened to the Word of God until it came out of my mouth, ears and eyes.  All mankind is under sin, and guilty before.  All mankind is a slave of sin, and in spiritual bondage.  Shall we go back to Egypt?  Shall we live lives of foolish sin?  Why would any want to go back to a life of utter misery, terror before God in His wrath, and constant rebellion in sin?  We could offer God money to take us in.  We could not offer God some merit of our own.  We could not offer God works of grace that forms the ground of our justification.  We could not offer God our civil righteousness or alleged goodness.  None of these, my friends, matches up with the sinless purity of Christ robes of righteousness.  None of these, my friends, could stand before God’s ways of utter perfection.  We simply fail at every level to provide some kind of worthiness to God.  The only worthiness that is acceptable before God is in and through Christ Jesus.  It is not in anything or anyone else, save Christ Jesus the Redeemer and Kind and Lion of Judah. 

Henry wrote, “The more intimate communion we have with our fellow-christians the more the soul prospers: Being knit together in love. Holy love knits the hearts of Christians one to another; and faith and love both contribute to our comfort. The stronger our faith is, and the warmer our love, the greater will our comfort be. Having occasion to mention Christ (v. 2), according to his usual way, he makes this remark to his honour (v. 3): In whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. He had said (ch. i. 19) that all fulness dwells in him: here he mentions particularly the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. There is a fulness of wisdom in him, as he has perfectly revealed the will of God to mankind. Observe, The treasures of wisdom are hidden not from us, but for us, in Christ. Those who would be wise and knowing must make application to Christ. We must spend upon the stock which is laid up for us in him, and draw from the treasures which are hidden in him. He is the wisdom of God, and is of God made unto us wisdom, &c., 1 Cor. i. 24, 30.”

Let us examine attaining to all riches of the full assurance of understanding.  The Christian faith is understood by those who have listened carefully to the Bible and theology.   But it is not only understood intellectually but also with the actions of our daily lives.  When we act on deeds of love, we experience a sense of great confidence.  We then can see it operate in our lives and in the lives of other Christians.  We then, by God’s grace, can build confidence.  People may come and deny the faith, and use arguments to argue me out of the kingdom, but it says no affect on His people because we have seen the power of God in Christ in our lives.  God has been at work; no argument can argue me out of that. 

We see that the divine wisdom of God is hidden from the wise and prudent.  We see that the gospel is not offered to them, but to the elect only in a sense.  We see that the babes are the ones whom He came to save, and seeks out and saves.  But the wise and prudent do not have the gospel revealed to them because this was well-pleasing in the sight of God the Father.  God chooses to save the nobodies, the people who are nothing, the destitute.  He saves these people because the only attraction God sees is their nothingness.  Christ saves His own, and He will never cast out those who come to Him.  1 Corinthians 1:21, “For since, in the wisdom of God, the world through wisdom did not know God, it pleased God through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe.”   1 Corinthians 2:4, “And my speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of human wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power…”  1 Corinthians 3:19, “For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written, “He catches the wise in their own craftiness…”  Colossians 1:9, “For this reason we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding…”  James 3:17, “But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality and without hypocrisy.”  Revelation 5:12, “saying with a loud voice: “Worthy is the Lamb who was slain To receive power and riches and wisdom, And strength and honor and glory and blessing!”  (NKJV).

Let us examine the phrase both of the Father and of Christ.  The Father is God the Father, the First Person of the Trinity.  He is whom Christ is submissive.  Christ is divinely subordinate to God the Father as God the Son, but being subordinate does not mean inferior.  We profess as Christians that the Father and the Son are equally divine, but they have different roles within the Godhead.  The Father and the Son agree in what must be done in terms of redemption.  The Father sends the Son into the world to save His people from their sins, and just punishment.  This is the wisdom of God in the gospel presentation in the perfect life and atoning death of Christ.  In the Father and the Son are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.

Now this I say lest anyone should deceive you with persuasive words.  Let us remember the contrast:  1 Corinthians 1:17, “For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel, not in cleverness of speech, so that the cross of Christ would not be made void.”  Paul did not engage in persuasive words but in the words of God.  Let us remember that the Word of God changes the heart of man by the Spirit of God.  We must preach the gospel of Christ by the Word of God.  It is not by clever speech but by the Word of God.  We learn that it is in the gospel not even in baptized that we are saved, but solely in the gospel of Christ. 

For though I am absent in the flesh, yet I am with you in spirit, rejoicing to see your good order and the steadfastness of your faith in Christ.  We ought to live as if our life is on display in the public eye, and we ought to live, more importantly, that God Himself is watching us.  Are you living a life in good order and steadfastness of your faith in Christ? 

As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him… If you have Christ, you ought to live like it.  If you have Christ, you ought to walk in Him.  People profess Christ but they lack true fruit.  If you have Christ you ought to walk in Him. 

…rooted and built up in Him and established in the faith, as you have been taught, abounding in it with thanksgiving.  Are you rooted and built up in Him and established in the faith?  Haven’t you been taught this, and do you abound in it with thanksgiving? 

Father, walk worthy of the gospel, and live in light of it, and build each other up in the Christ of Scripture.  Amen.