Colossians 2:8-23 (Wednesday Evening Bible Study

Colossians 2:8-23

• Just a reminder, we looked at an overview of this entire section last week, and tonight we’ll be going into more detail. The false teachers in Colossae wanted to impose certain things on the Christians there. They wanted to teach people an additional philosophy; they wanted people to accept a system of astrology; they wanted to impose circumcision on Christians; they wanted to lay down rules and regulations for self-denial; they wanted to introduce the worship of angels
• Colossians 2:8-10
• 8 Be careful that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deceit based on human tradition, based on the elements of the world, rather than Christ. 9 For the entire fullness of God’s nature dwells bodily in Christ, 10 and you have been filled by him, who is the head over every ruler and authority.
  • Paul begins by drawing vivid picture of the false teachers. He speaks of anyone who will take you captive. The word used here could be used of a slave dealer carrying away the people of a conquered nation into slavery
  • It was an amazing and tragic thing that people who had been liberated could contemplate submitting themselves to a new and disastrous slavery (although the Israelites did the same thing coming out of Egypt)
  • These false teachers offer a philosophy which they declare is necessary in addition to the teaching of Christ and the words of the gospel
    • It is a philosophy which has been handed down by human tradition. The Gnostics were in the habit of claiming that their special teaching had been given by word of mouth by Jesus—sometimes to Mary, sometimes to Matthew, and sometimes to Peter. They said there were things which Jesus never told the crowd and communicated only to the chosen few
      • The charge Paul makes against these teachers is that their teaching is a human creation; it has no basis in Scripture. It is a product of the human mind, and not a message of the word of God. To speak like this is not to drift into fundamentalism or submit to a tyranny of the written word, but it is to hold that no teaching can be Christian teaching which is at odds with the basic truths of Scripture and with the word of God
    • It is a philosophy which has to do with the elements of this world. This is a much discussed phrase, of which the meaning is still in doubt The word for element has two meanings
      • It means literally things which are set out in a row
        • For instance, it’s the word for a line of soldiers. But  one of its most common meanings is the letters of the alphabet not doubt because they form a series which can be set out in a row
        • Because elements can mean the letters of the alphabet, it can also ver commonly mean elementary instruction in any subject. We still speak of learning the ABC’s of a subject when we mean taking the first steps in it. It is possible  that this is the meaning here
        • Paul may be saying: “These false teachers claim that they are giving you knowledge which is uninstructed and undeveloped because at most it is knowledge of the human mind. The real knowledge, the real fullness of God, is in Jesus Christ. If you listen to these false teachers, far from receiving deep spiritual knowledge, you are simply slipping back into the most basic instruction which you should have left behind long ago
      • Elements has a second meaning. It means the elemental spirits of the world, and especially the spirits of the stars and planets
        • There are still people who take astrology seriously. But it is almost impossible for us to realize how dominated the ancient world was by the idea of the influence of the elemental spirits and the stars
        • Astrology was then the queen of the sciences. Even men as great as Julius Caesar, and Augustus, as cynical as Tiberius and as level-headed as Vespasian would take no step without consulting the stars. Alexander the Great believed implicitly in the influence of the stars
        • Men and women believed that their whole lives were fixed by them. If someone was born under a fortunate star, all was well; if someone was born under an unlucky star, that person could not look for happiness; if any undertaking was to have a chance of success, the stars must be observed. People were the slaves of the stars
        • There was one possibility of escape. If the right passwords and the right formulas were known, then it might be possible to escape from this fatalistic influence of the stars; and a great part of the secret teaching of Gnosticism and of similar faiths and philosophies was knowledge which claimed to provide the followers with a means of escape from the power of the stars
        • In all probability, that was what the false teachers of Colossae were offering. They were saying; “Jesus is all very well, he can do much for you; but he cannot enable you to escape from your subjection to the stars. We alone have the secret knowledge which can enable you to do that.” Paul answers; “You need nothing but Christ to overcome any power in the universe; for in Him is nothing less than the fullness of God, and He is the head of every power and authority, for He created them.”
  • The Gnostic teachers offered an addition philosophy; Paul insisted on the triumphant adequacy of Christ to overcome any power in any part of the universe. You cannot at one and the same time believe in the power of Christ and in the influence of the stars
• Colossians 2:11-12
• 11 You were also circumcised in him with a circumcision not done with hands, by putting off the body of flesh, in the circumcision of Christ, 12 when you were buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead.
  • The false teachers were demanding that Gentile Christians be circumcised, for circumcision was the mark of God’s chosen people. All through the history of Israel, there had been two views of circumcisions. There was the view of those who said that in itself it was enough to put someone right with God. It did not matter whether an Israelite was good or bad; all that mattered was being an Israelite and being circumcised
  • But the great spiritual leaders of Israel and the prophet took a very different view. They insisted that circumcision was only the outward mark of someone who was inwardly dedicated to God. They used the very word in a more imaginative sense. They talked of uncircumcised lips, of a heart which was circumcised or uncircumcised, or of the uncircumcised ear. To them, being circumcised did not mean having a certain operation carried out on the body but meant having a change brought about in life. Circumcision was the mark of a person dedicated to God; but the dedication lay not in the cutting of the fish but in the cutting out from life of everything which was against the will of God
  • That was the answer of the prophets centuries before, and that was still Paul’s answer to the false teachers. He said to them; “you demand circumcision, but you must remember that circumcision does not mean simply the removal of the foreskin of a man’s body; it means the putting off of that whole part of his human nature which sets him at odds with God.” He continued; “Any priest can circumcise a man’s foreskin; only Christ can bring about that spiritual circumcision which means cutting away from a person’s life everything which prevents an individual from being God’s obedient child.”
  • Paul goes further. For him, this was not theory but fact. “That very act has already happened to you in baptism.”
  • Baptism is three things
    • It is adult baptism (meaning old enough to make the decision)
    • It is instructed baptism (You understand what you are doing)
    • It is total immersion
  • Therefore, the symbolism of baptism is clear. As the waters closed over the head of the one being baptized, it was as if the individual died; rising up again from the water, it was as if the individual rose to new life. Part of the person was dead and gone forever; a new individual had risen to new life
  • That symbolism could become a reality only under one condition. When people believed intensely in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. It could only happen when they believed in the effective working of God which had raised Jesus from the dead and could do the same for them. Baptism is a dying and rising again, because we believed that Christ has died and risen again and that we are sharing the experience of our Lord
  • Paul basically says; “You speak about circumcision. The only true circumcision is when a person dies and rises with christ in baptism, in such a way that it is not part of the body which is cut away but the whole sinful self which is destroyed, and that person is filled with newness of life and the very holiness of God.”
• Colossians 2:13-15
• 13 And when you were dead in trespasses and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, he made you alive with him and forgave us all our trespasses. 14 He erased the certificate of debt, with its obligations, that was against us and opposed to us, and has taken it away by nailing it to the cross. 15 He disarmed the rulers and authorities and disgraced them publicly; he triumphed over them in him.
  • Paul uses a series of pictures to show what God in Christ has done for us. The intention is to show that Christ has done all that can be done and all that need be done, and that there is no need to bring in any other intermediaries for our full salvation
    • We were dead in our sins
      • They had no more power than the dead either to overcome sin or to atone for it. Jesus by His work has liberated all people both from the power and from the consequences of sin. He has given them a life so new that it can only be said that He has raised them from the dead
      • Further, it was the old belief that only the Jews were dear to God; but this saving power of Christ has come even to the uncircumcised Gentiles. The work of Christ is a work of power, because it put life into those who were as good as dead; it is a work of grace, because it reached out to those who had no reason to expect the benefits of God
    • He erased the certificate of debt
      • He wiped out the charges which set out all of our self-admitted debts based on the law. There are two Greek words that we have to understand to get the full picture
        • The word for certificate literally means an autograph; but its technical meaning that everyone would have understood, was a note signed by a debtor acknowledging his indebtedness
          • It was almost exactly what we call an IOU. People’s sins had piled up a vast list of debts to God, and it could be said that they acknowledged that debt
          • More than once, the OT shows the children of Israel hearing and accepting the laws of God and calling down curses on themselves should they fail to keep them
          • In the NT we find the picture of the Gentiles as having no the written law of God which the Jews had, but the unwritten law in their hearts and the voice of conscience speaking within
          • People were in debt to God because of their sin—and they knew it. There was a self-confessed written accusation against them, a certificate of debt which they had signed and admitted as accurate
        • The word for erased is a Greek verb
          • To understand that word is to understand the amazing mercy of God
          • The substance on which ancient documents were written was either papyrus, a kind of paper made of the pith of bullrush, or vellum, a substance made of the skins of animals. Both were expensive and certainly could not be wasted
          • Ancient ink had no acid in it; it lay on the surface of the paper and idd no soak into it like modern ink does. Sometimes to save paper, a scribe used papyrus or vellum that had already been written on. When he did that, he took a sponge and wiped the writing out. Because it was only on the surface of the paper, the ink could be wiped out as if it had never been
          • God, in His amazing mercy, banished the record of our sins so completely that it was as if it had never been; not a trace remained
        • Paul goes on. God took that written accusation and nailed it to the cross of Christ
          • It used to be said when a law or regulation was cancelled, it was fastened to a board and a nail was driven right through it. But it is doubtful if that was the case or if that is the picture here
          • Rather, on the cross of Christ, the charge that was against us was itself crucified. It was executed and put completely out of the way, so that it might never be seen again 
          • Paul seems to have searched human activity to find a series of pictures which would show how utterly God in His mercy destroyed the condemnation that was against us
          • Here indeed is grace. And that new era of grace is further underlined in another rather obscure phrase that this certificate of debt had obligations that were against us and opposed to us
            • Before Christ came, people were under the law, and they broke it because no one can keep it perfectly. But now, law is banished and grace has come. We are no longer criminals who have broken the law and are at the mercy of God’s judgment; we are sons and daughters who were lost and can now come home to be wrapped around with the grace of God
    • One other great picture is seen here. Jesus has disarmed the rulers and authorities, and disgraced them publicly, triumphing over them
      • The ancient world believed in all kinds of angels and in all kinds of elemental spirits. Many of these spirits were out to bring ruin. They were completely hostile. Jesus conquered them forever
      • He disarmed them. The word for disarm was the word for taking the weapons and armor from a defeated enemy. Once and for all, Jesus broke their power. He put them to public shame and led them captive in His triumphant procession
      • The picture is that of the triumph of a Roman general. When a Roman general had won a really notable victory, he was allowed to march his victorious army through the streets of Rome, and behind him followed the kings, leaders, and people he had defeated. They were openly branded as his spoils
      • Paul thinks of Jesus as a conqueror enjoying a kind f cosmic triumph, and in His triumphal procession are the powers of evil, beaten forever, for everyone to see
  • Paul sets out the total adequacy of the work of Christ. Sin is forgiven and evil is conquered; what more is necessary? There is nothing that Gnostic knowledge and Gnostic intermediaries can do for men and women—Christ has done it all already
• Colossians 2:16-23
• 16 Therefore, don’t let anyone judge you in regard to food and drink or in the matter of a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath day. 17 These are a shadow of what was to come; the substance is Christ. 18 Let no one condemn you by delighting in ascetic practices and the worship of angels, claiming access to a visionary realm. Such people are inflated by empty notions of their unspiritual mind. 19 They don’t hold on to the head, from whom the whole body, nourished and held together by its ligaments and tendons, grows with growth from God. 20 If you died with Christ to the elements of this world, why do you live as if you still belonged to the world? Why do you submit to regulations: 21 “Don’t handle, don’t taste, don’t touch”? 22 All these regulations refer to what is destined to perish by being used up; they are human commands and doctrines. 23 Although these have a reputation for wisdom by promoting self-made religion, false humility, and severe treatment of the body, they are not of any value in curbing self-indulgence.
  • This passage has certain basic Gnostic ideas intertwined all through it. Paul is warning the Colossians not to adopt certain Gnostic practices, on the grounds that to do so would not be progress, but rather going backwards in the faith. Behind it lie four Gnostic practices
    • There e is Gnostic self-denial
      • There is the teaching which involves a whole host of regulations about what can and cannot be eaten and drunk. In other words, there is a return to all the food laws of the Jews, with their lists of things that are regarded as clean and unclean. The Gnostics considered all matter to be essentially evil. If matter is evil, then the body is evil If the body is evil, then two opposite conclusions may be drawn
        • If the body is essential evil, idc does not matter what we do with it. Being evil, it can be used or abused in anyway, and it makes no difference
        • If the body is evil, it muse be suppressed; it must be beaten and starved, and its every impulse chained down. 
      • Gnosticism could result either in complete immorality or in rigid self-denial. It is the rigid self-denial which Paul is dealing with here
      • In effect, he says; “Have nothing to do with people who identify religion with laws about what you may or may not eat or drink.”
      • Jesus had said that it made no difference what people ate or drank. Peter had to learn to stop talking about clean and unclean foods. Paul rephrases what Christ had said Himself. He says they are destined to perish by being used up. Jesus meant the same thing when He said that food and drink are eaten, digested, and then eliminated from the body
      • Food and drink are so unimportant that they are destined for decay as soon as they are eaten. The Gnostics wanted to make religious into a series of regulations about eating and drinking; and there are still those who are more concerned with rules about food than about the charity of the gospel
    • There is the Gnostic and Jewish observation of days
      • They observed yearly feasts, monthly new moons, and weekly sabbaths. They drew up lists of days which specially belonged to God, on which certain things must be done and certain things must not be done. They identified religion with ritual
      • Paul’s criticism of this stress on days is quite clear and logical. He says; “You have been rescued from all this tyranny of legal rules. Why do you want to enslave yourself all over again? Why do you want to go back to Jewish legalism and abandon Christian freedom?”
      • The spirit which makes Christianity into something bound by regulations is not yet dead by any means
    • There are the Gnostic special visions
      • The Gnostics prided themselves on special visions of secret things, which were not open to the eyes of ordinary men and women
      • There is always danger when people begin to think that they have attained a height of holiness which enables them to see what other people—considered to be inferior—cannot see; and the danger is that people will so often se not what God sends them but what they want to see
    • There is the worship of angels
      • The Jews had a highly developed doctrine of angels, and the Gnostics believed in all kinds of intermediaries. They worshiped these, while Chrisitans know that worship must be kept for God and for Jesus. Paul makes four criticisms of all this
        • He says that this kind of thing is only a shadow of truth; the real truth is in Christ
          • That is to say, a religion which is founded on eating and drinking certain kinds of food and drink and abstaining from others, a religious which is founded on such things as Sabbath observance, is only a shadow of real religion; real religion is fellowship with Christ
        • He says that there is such a thing as a false humility
          • When they talked of the worship of angels, both the Gnostics and the Jews would have justified it by saying that God is so great, high, and holy that we can never have direct access to Him and must be content to pray to the angels. But the great truth that Christianity preaches is that the way to God is open to the most humble and most down to earth among us
        • He says that this can lead to sinful pride
          • Those who are meticulous in their observance of the special days, who keep all the food laws, and who practice abstinence are in very grave danger of thinking themselves especially good and of looking down on other people. And it is a basic truth of Christianity that those who think that they are good are never really good, least of all those who think themselves better than other people
        • He says that this is a return to un-Christian slavery instead of Christian freedom, and that it does not free people from fleshly lusts but only keeps them on the leash
          • Christian freedom comes not from restraining desires by rules and regulations but from the death of evil desires and the springing to life of good desires by virtue of Christ being in Christians and Christians in Christ