Kaleo San Diego Church

INTRODUCTION

Saturday, July 23, 2005;

At least 88 people were killed and 200 injured when car bombs ripped through shopping and hotel areas in the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh on Saturday in the worst attack in Egypt since 1981.

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Thursday, July 21, 2005>;

Police are hunting up to four bombers who struck at London's bus and underground train network in an apparently failed bid to repeat the carnage of the July 7 blasts which killed more than 50 people.

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July 18, 2005;

IRAQ is slipping into all-out civil war, a Shia leader declared yesterday, as a devastating onslaught of suicide bombers slaughtered more than 150 people, most of them Shias, around the capital at the weekend.

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July 7, 2005;

A series of bomb attacks on London's transport network has killed more than 50 people and injured about 700 others.

Three explosions on the Underground left 50 dead and two died in a blast on a double-decker bus.

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Each of these four headlines over the last two weeks has something in common; at some point, the perpetrators of these crimes believed something to be true and then lived out their ideas, religion, worldview or whatever else you want to call it with consistency.  They acted out of what they thought.  They committed sinful and wicked acts of murder and all the while they assumed they were righteous.  The religious leaders or religious mentors of these individuals at some point persuaded each of these individuals that they were going to be more righteous if they strapped on a bomb and blew themselves and others up.  These people were acting out of an assumption that they could earn God’s favor by doing a particular act which would impress God and earn them paradise. 

Though these ideas about God and life which we have seen over the last two weeks resulted in physical casualties, in the time of this letter from the Apostle Paul in the city of Colossae, men and women were in a similar kind of danger, the danger of ideas and the consequences of them. 

Spiritual terrorists were attempting to subvert the Gospel of Christ all the while offering a more righteous position with God which would surely impress Him.  The results are even more deadly because what is at stake is eternity.   

Paul does not load a gun and shoot a fiery blast at the heresy.  Instead, he gives a positive affirmation of truth.  As Paul now reaches the heart of this letter he dwells upon the deity of Christ and the dignity and completeness of every believer of Christ that the reader is left without fully understanding exactly what he was combating.  The point is obvious: If you know the truth, any system of error is going to collapse in the face of the truth.  So it’s vital that Paul presents the truth as he does. 

Colossians 2:8-10

Verse 8- See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men, according to the elementary principles of the world, rather than according to Christ.

1 Peter 5:8 Be of sober spirit, be on the alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.

The ultimate cause of all lies and deception is attributed to Satan who is the father of lies and a murderer.  This deceiver seeks to influence individuals so that they are “held captive by him to do his will” (2 Tim. 2:26).

The secondary cause for all lies and deception is then man, who then shows himself to be a child of the devil (John 8:44). 

What marks both Satan and those who he has influence over is the absence of truth.  This characterizes what Satan is, how he acts, and what his desires have been from the garden, to lie about who God is and what God has said and done. 

Prior to the fall, Adam and Eve had no reason to question God’s truthfulness.  There was never a doubt about whether God was in fact a God of truth.  Lies were not part of the original created order.  It wasn’t until the serpent, the deceiver, which slithered into the Garden and began to cast doubt on God’s word and then blatantly lied about what God had said that doubt of God crept in. 

Man since that first day of terror, finds himself in a place of great difficulty finding true truth.  The consequences are deadly.

Paul is not speaking of philosophy in the classical Greek form, he is speaking more of a system of thought rather than about Plato and Aristotle.  These mystical philosophers were attempting to capture and carry Christians off as hostages to this system. 

This heresy contained elements of philosophy, legalism, mysticism, and asceticism.  It is likely, as I have said before, that the false teachers were the Essenes. 

Paul is concerned that those who have been transferred from Satan’s kingdom to Christ’s do not become enslaved again. 

He tells them to “see to it” or in other words “watch out,” “be on your guard.” 

Paul then tells them to make sure that no one takes them captive.  When he says se to it that no one “takes you captive” he uses the word sulagōgeō which is an interesting Greek word because it is only used here in the entire New Testament.  It means to be carried off as loot or plunder.  The reason that Paul uses this word is because it is a word play with sunagōgÄ“ which means synagogue.  He is taking a poetic stab at the false Jews. 

One of the primary duties of the church leaders is to guard the flock against wolves and perverse men (Acts 20:28-32) who assault the flock in an effort to kidnap them.  This is why we take so much time to teach and stretch each of you to understand God’s word. 

This is no option.  My desire is not to offer you nice little bumper sticker platitudes, but real, concrete, true biblical truth, even in a time when the idea and nature of truth is perhaps denied.  We swim against the current of ideas and we cut through the thicket of opinions about God and man to reach a better understanding of who God is, what He has done, and what He promises to do.

Paul says that this “philosophy” is the way that men influenced by Satan will take you captive.  Smooth sounding arguments that offers a higher spiritual experience or a higher intellectual grasp of God and life. 

Paul is making a claim in verse 8 that there is truth and there is error.  In his words; “empty deception” or vain lies, this is what he is speaking against.  These lies come in two forms he says- “according to the tradition of men” and “according to elementary principles of the world.” 

Most philosophers through history, rather they be the spiritual mystical types like in Colossae, or the traditional western thinkers through history, build upon the work of previous philosophers.  They add their two cents in and continue to make additions and modifications of the original thought. 

For the Christian, this is unthinkable.  We are not allowed to add to what God has already clearly declared of Himself in His word.  He is the same yesterday, today, and forever.  Therefore, to follow this pattern of constant change with how God reconciles all things to himself, how man has peace with God, is to change what God has not.  It is to base our standards upon the ideas of men rather than “according to Christ.”  Christ is the rule and standard, it is He that determines what is true and false, it is His prerogative as Creator, sustainer, and Savior to demand our faithfulness to His standard and to dismiss the standard of men.  Even if this means that our ideas are not en vogue.  Even if it means that we are not accepted in popular academia.  Even if it means that our answer to the problems raised by man is not accepted, we stay faithful to assure that our thoughts and ideas are “according to Christ.” 

Traditions are not in and of themselves evil and neither is philosophy, but when God’s word is obscured and encrusted with customs, rituals, and teachings, so that we are no longer able to distinguish it from the traditions of men. 

Paul says that these traditions of men, or the “elementary principles” which literally means the letters of the alphabet, like saying the “abc’s of the world.  Paul is saying that this error is immature and not for mature Christians.  To follow them would be to regress from the mature teaching of Scripture to the infantile teachings of an immature false religion, not based on advanced thinking and wisdom but on silly and childish thoughts.  To abandon Christ’s truth for empty philosophy is like returning to kindergarten after earning your doctorate.

Don’t run after the latest trends that promise a more exciting experience or a more profound knowledge of God.  Don’t spend your life trying to find things to fill you. 

Why?

Verse 9- For in Him all the fullness of Deity dwells in bodily form,

To know God you don’t need to be captured by philosophy, you can be complete in Christ.  You can throw away human ideas, all the traditional religions of the world, and all the man made forms and theories because “in Him all the fullness of Deity dwells…”

God’s fullness is “in Him” there is no need to add to Christ.  To know Christ is to know the Father who sent Him. 

John 14:8-9  Philip *said to Him, "Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us."  9 Jesus *said to him, "Have I been so long with you, and yet you have not come to know Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; how can you say, 'Show us the Father'?

Paul is challenging the heretics assumption that there is a ladder that you must climb, a door that must be unlocked through spiritual accomplishments, or additional secret knowledge to attain the fullness of Christ.  Our access to the exalted Christ who sits upon the throne on the right hand of the Father in heaven is immediate and direct, and through him we have the ear of God Almighty (Heb. 4:14-16). 

This is why Paul uses a different word for “deity.”  He uses the Greek word “theotÄ“s” which is distinguished from another word “theiotÄ“s.”  The difference makes this perhaps one of the most powerful verses to clearly declare Jesus as God.  The Greeks would use the second word for a description of something “divine.”  Christ is not “divine” like we would speak of our favorite meal in a fine restaurant, or of a “godly” person.  Christ is much more than a superb person of godly virtue.  Paul asserts that Christ Jesus is God in bodily form.

The Deity, the God of gods, “dwells” which means to settle down and be at home in Christ.  It is present tense which indicates that the actual essence of God abides at home in Jesus.  He is fully God forever.  To know Jesus is to know God Himself. 

To be in Jesus is to be in God and in Him…

Verse 10- and in Him you have been made complete, and He is the head over all rule and authority;

Because of who Christ is, we have been made complete.  We have been peplÄ“rōmenoi (been made complete).  The perfect tense of the  word indicates that the results are eternal.

As a result of the Fall, man is in a sad state of incompleteness.  He is spiritually incomplete because he is totally out of fellowship with God.  He is morally incomplete beause he lives outside of God’s will.  He is mentally incomplete because he does not know the ultimate truth. 

At salvation, believers become partakers of the divine nature of God and are made complete.  Believers are spiritually complete because they have fellowship with God.  They are morally complete in that they recognize God’s authority and will and trust in Christ for His righteousness.  They are mentally complete because they know the truth about ultimate reality. 

 

There is a temptation in each of us to pursue something other than Christ to fill us.  It is our human condition, along with our cultural climate that whispers in our ear that more can be had, that we aren’t really complete, filled, and satisfied just yet.

Man in his dilemma and condition out of Christ might not be able to articulate his sense of incompletion, but the sense is still nonetheless present.  Man finds no rest until he rests in the fullness of Christ.  Man is not found until Christ finds Him, man is not alive until God breathes into Him the breath of Spiritual life, and man is not full until he is filled with the fullness of Christ. 

The appeal of sin holds out a promise to us much like the promises made by the Judaistic philosophers in Colossae.  Christ becomes one of many things that will one day fill us.  He becomes our “spiritual” necessity for our “spiritual” health.  He becomes our servant to serve our “spiritual” needs.  We then seek other things to fit other needs.  Our hearts produce idols for us to worship so that we become fragmented people that find physical, psychological, financial, and intellectual pieces of ourselves fulfilled through different means other than fullness in Christ.  We seek sexual satisfaction on our terms rather than the terms of the one who created sexuality.  We seek psychological stability from opinions of men rather than the God who gave us our emotions.  We seek financial increase for personal prosperity rather than seeing all things given by God for His glory.  And lastly, we seek intellectual excitement through human observations rather than hearing the One True Observer tell us what we truly need to know and understand. 

Christ cannot be compartmentalized to fit our personal agenda, he cannot be a means to another end.  Christ will not be used as currency for the purchase of an idol, namely the worship of ourselves. 

God’s Risen Son is custodian and ruler of the created world as well as the world of ideas.  His lordship is over every material and spiritual, external and internal impulse.  Every pursuit of fullness out of Christ will only lead to empty deception and vain imaginations that leave us wandering this world lost and blind.  It is only Christ that can make us complete.  It is only God’s Son that can fill us so that we are full. 

Our completion isn’t dependent upon a list of rules, a strict code of religious conduct or our elegant theological formulations.  Our completion isn’t dependent upon a “higher” spiritual experience.  It isn’t dependent upon ecstatic spiritual expressions.  Our completion comes from being found in Him.  To be located in God’s Son.  To be hidden in Christ.  To be wrapped and enveloped in the Creator and Sustainer of all there is, who holds all things together by His power, who is the Lord of lords and King of Kings, who causes all powers and principalities and rulers to bow their knee in submission to His supremacy.  In Him the One true Deity, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob dwells in fullness, and in Him we, though we are jars of clay attempting to contain the whole Pacific Ocean, are completed and filled to bursting with the God who is and always will be. 

In the Greco-Roman world around which Paul moved, there were many “rulers” and “authorities.”   There was one ultimate authority to whom all knees bowed- Caesar.  According to the Romans there was only one Lord of the word, but according to Paul, he now had a rival.  Read Philippians 2:5-11 and see what it says about Jesus.

Paul, writing to the Colossians knew that there was a cultural pressure to declare Caesar as the one true ruler and authority.  Paul declares as a slap in the face of anyone who would attempt to add Jesus to Caesar or Caesar to Jesus that there was only one who was head over the Cosmos, only one Savior of the World, only one true victor forever, Jesus of Nazareth.  Caesar must now bow to Jesus authority and preeminence.  The world must come to Christ on His terms.  The new King has arrived and has won victory for all His citizens, Jesus the King and rule and authority. 

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