Colossians

In this random list of names, more important than any individual name on the list, we catch a glimpse of the good life.  Paul concludes his letter to the Colossian people by recounting the work and ways in which God has worked with him and his closest companions. This simple list of names reveals that we are called to be a collaborative community; collaborating with God and one another.

Paul believed that prayer was central to living our new kingdom lives in the world; as citizens of this new Kingdom, it is essential that we understand what prayer is, why we pray, and how we pray.

Passages like Colossians 3:18-4:1 are known as “household codes” they provide instructions to Christian people on domestic matters. They define what a home life should look like, but many of these instructions seem outdated. At best these instructions seem antiquated; at worst outright misogynistic, domineering, and biased toward the wealthy. However, placed within Paul’s context these instructions suggest a way of being at home that disrupts, upends, and challenges the social hierarchies of his days.

Everyone regardless of age, stage, ethnicity, culture, socioeconomic background, etc. has experienced some sort of disappointment, disillusionment, or hurt from people in the church. In order to be the community Paul imagines, the Church of Christ, we must practice forgiveness.

Often times what lies between who we are and who we want to be in Christ is the impulse to hide from life in the community; from life together. In Colossians 3, Paul describes a vision for life together in which we take on the likeness of Christ through our participation in a community of strangers, committed to one another, and under the guidance of the Prince of Peace.

We regularly experience moments in our lives where our expectations for our own maturity and growth do not match reality. In Colossians 3:5-10, Paul challenges our disappointment with a vision for growth that is about learning to grow into the clothes we’ve already been given.

To “seek those things that are above” sounds like an impractical set of instructions. In reality, to live out the realities of Christ’s Kingdom involves the inconvenience of proximity and involvement in the messiness of people’s lives.

Paul writes to address Colossian believers’ temptation to conform to Hellenistic Jewish practices; a temptation Paul believes to be detrimental to their faith. This is to say, that for the Colossian Church, and for ourselves, the greatest temptation is not toward apostasy or abandoning the faith; it is not toward outright immoral or unethical behavior; our greatest temptation is to believe the subtle lie that Christ is insufficient.

Many of us experience a soul-level weariness that feels like war, and the voice we choose to believe will either lead us into captivity or into victory.

After building this foundation of who Christ is and reminding the Colasse church yet again that Jesus is the Messiah in Chapter 1; Paul gets to the purpose of his whole letter– spiritual maturity.

The story of Redemption is written across human history and culminates in the resurrection of Jesus that first Easter; this is the story Paul tells in a short piece of poetry written to the Colossian church.