Sermon Cloud

You are part of God’s new creation, a new humanity. Through Jesus, He is re-making you, restoring his image in you. You must envision becoming all that Christ saved you to be. The old you is gone; and a new you is emerging. The old you died and a new you has been resurrected. He wants to roll out a newer version of you, each better than the last. You must identify and destroy the old patterns that do not fit with this new life that God is forming (personally and among you as a people). You have to put them to death; put them away. It's like you switched universities (OSU to Michigan; NC to Duke) and you have to do away with all the paraphernalia of your old school, its colors and its mascot and its cheers and its song. You belong to a new school. Those old patterns that were self-focused and community destroying practices have no place in the new community of self-less love that God is creating. And it is a community that is radically different from that of the Empire. The empire is divided by ethnicity and economics, but in the Kingdom of God’s beloved Son, there are no dividing lines. Christ is the only thing that matters, not your race; not your socio-economic status, and not your level of cultural sophistication (3:11). This is a diverse but unified humanity. The empire, the American dream that shaped your life before, squeezed you into a mold of lust and greed and lies and anger and jealousy and obscenities. But that old you died, you made a clean break and now you are being made new. 3:10, you are being renewed into the image of your creator, into the image of Jesus – the ultimate expression of humanity. You are a new humanity, a new creation that God is bringing about in Jesus. There are practices, patterns, virtues and habits that do belong to this new life that need to be put on, that must be cultivated if you are to be a contrastive community in the city of Colossae. Our attention turns from destroying old patterns that do not fit with our new life to cultivating new patterns and practices that are a part of this new life.
 
Make a conscious choice to live out this new life. We do more than envision a new life; we enact a new life. Put on – to clothe oneself. One must put these virtues on like a wardrobe. This new life requires a new look. We have to strip off the old wardrobe of pride and self-focus; the self-gratifying consumption of commodities and sexual experiences, greed, materialism, anger, malice, slander and obscene and abusive speech. Those clothes are the style and colors of our old school. These things look nothing like the striking vision God has for our lives and the world that He is ultimately bringing. The community that God is forming stands in stark contrast to the empire, radically different to that kind of life the American Dream is forming. You have to strip those things off and put on virtues like a garment. You have to make the conscious choice to put on compassion (seeing and entering into the brokenness of others to feel it and help to heal it rather than inflicting it or ignoring it); kindness (making people, not goods, the bottom line and seeking their well-being), humility and meekness (free from the enslaving arrogance that seeks to dominate and control, and with tremendous strength and confidence chooses rather to give and serve); and patience (hopeful waiting that does not demand instant gratification). All of these virtues are completed and bound tightly to us with love. It is the belt that holds these garments in place and accents them perfectly. Not just ideas; we exercise these virtues in face to face relationships. They get tested in those relationships. So, we have to bear with one another’s faults and flaws without trying to recreate people into our image – it is Christ’s image we are going for here, not our own. And, we have to forgive one another for the specific acts that truly hurt us – not holding a grudge or wishing for revenge, but forgiving the other. And notice how - like Christ has forgiven us – freely, fully, and finally. We clothe ourselves in these virtues because that is what God has revealed himself to be in Christ. It is not efficient or convenient or easy, but it is what our God is like and he is remaking us in his image (3:10). Who do you need to bear with; forgive; who do you need to be compassionate, meek, humble towards? The passage is trying to inspire and architect a new community in Colossae that looks radically different from the dominant culture. Application: Think about the environments in which you live and work and play; think of people – put a face on this: what specific actions will make these virtues real and tangible in your life?

Pursue Peace over Personal Wins. We are called into one body to image together to this world what our God is like. He is the God of peace. This letter has shown us how he has reconciled us to himself through Jesus Christ who personally lost so we could gain, and in doing so has also reconciled us together in one body (regardless of ethnicity or economics or personal record). We are called to live out that peace – relationships marked by mutual concern for the needs and interest of one another, not just our own. So, when conflict arises in your relationships, we must pursue peace instead of a personal win. Let the peace of Christ rule (be the determining factor, the judge or umpire) in your heart and relationships. The peace of the empire (Pax Romana) was achieved through military power and domination. There is a counterfeit peace that tries to win, dominate, or control people and silence opposition by using anger, manipulation, and abusive speech. But, we are called to a different way: we let the peace that Christ gives be a controlling factor in our relationships resulting in the flourishing of unity. We are to live free from the incessant need to get our way and to win and let Jesus reign over our relationships establishing his peace. The key to this is the end of v. 15 – Be thankful. Be grateful. Be content. Key to personal and corporate peace. Personal: Where there is celebration there is rarely anxiety. When you are celebrating the great love God has for you – chosen, holy, beloved – and his good gifts in creation and salvation, anxiety cannot take root in your heart. Paul is writing Colossians from Prison – Is Rome ruling? No; peace is ruling. Paul is celebrating God’s good gifts. Corporate: Conflict and Criticism rarely grow in the soil of Contentment.. Mary Jo Leddy, “We are held captive by dissatisfaction.” When we do not learn to rejoice and celebrate God’s good gifts in creation and salvation we invariably turn into a discontented people who are never satisfied and only crave more. We can become demanding, critical people, who are never satisfied with others, and who take everything and everyone for granted. When we do not live with thanksgiving in our hearts, we will inevitably live with fault-finding in our hearts, and that corrupts our relationships. When we are content in the good gifts and grace of God, rarely are we demanding and destructive to peace.  When you are tempted to grumble against someone, look for something to celebrate in their lives, look for something to give thanks for. This is how you pursue peace.

Savor and Share the Word of Christ. Let the word of Christ (about Christ, spoken by Christ) richly dwell (make its home in you – rearrange things until its comfortable difference between visiting and living). We have seen that praxis is rooted in a story. The culture is selling us a story and hoping to seize our imaginations and define for us what is important and what we should pursue.  Average household – 6hours and 47 minutes/day with the TV on. Hours/annually by America – 250 billion. 5-12,000 images every day that come across our eyes (internet, advertising, TV). All these things are trying to capture our minds and tell us what we should own, wear, drive, eat; how we should think, live, act, spend, look…The culture can quickly elevate its preference to principles and define what is normal. It sets the expectations for how you should live and move and have your being. But not us: let the word of Christ richly dwell. Let it be the story that shapes us. Let the Gospel of Jesus and his teachings be so settled in you, it becomes the lens for how we see life. Get his story, his teachings so ingrained in you that his word becomes your first vocabulary; so ingrained in you that it you naturally react to life’s stimuli like Christ would have. Get it in you so deeply that you find yourself in unrehearsed moments speaking it to one another and erupting in praise to God in your heart over the depth of its meaning. The community is intended to experience the constant flow of giving and receiving the word among one another. Question: How many of you can sing every word to your favorite song? Quote somewhat lengthy lines from your favorite movie? Name starting lineups of your favorite sports team, or give stats? What about quoting the word of Christ? What about quoting lengthy portions of  Scripture that shape your vision of reality and open up options for living that were previously blocked by the finality of the culture’s voice that used to enslave us?  Are you reading it, studying it, meditating on it? Psalm 1. Schedule this in or everything else will schedule it out. Be verbal in your reading and in your prayer. Paste up passages on your mirror. Whatever it takes to get the word into your heart. Application: Memorize Colossians 3.

Paul sums up this entire passage by saying whatever you do, word or deed, in the community, outside the community, do it in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. Live the kind of life and be the kind of community that is endorsed by Jesus, that He would be glad to have his name on. Live the kind of life and embrace the kind of practices and patterns that are accompanied by thanksgiving to God. In other words, can you end your day at work and have him sign off on you; can you end a date with a prayer of thanksgiving…Could we be the kind of community that Jesus is glad to have his name on and that would result in the giving of thanks to God for our presence?

Imagine two cities, one where everybody lived out the vices of 3:5, 8; the other where all the citizens lived out the virtues of 3:12 – 14. In which city would you rather live? Then become that city; become that kind of community by putting these practices on, clothing yourself in these virtues. Be an emerging humanity that shapes an emerging city.