Colossians 1.1-5
It comes as no surprise, I'm sure, that we will be dealing with the same question that we've been looking at for the last several weeks: Why Advent? Why did Jesus come? In our text - as a part of his familiar triad of faith, hope and love - Paul points us to heaven. The notion of heaven is a familiar answer to the question we are dealing with. Even those who have no interest in the Gospel think of Jesus' coming as in some way connected to heaven. And they are right. Jesus came so that we might enjoy heaven. That has been the hope of the saints since the very beginning. And, familiar passages like this one come to mind. 'In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you to myself; that where I am, there you may be also.' The heaven that Jesus promises is everything that this life is not. There we will find rest and lasting happiness and deep satisfaction. And we will enjoy that, and more, without any pain or sorrow or worry or tears. We will be with friends - some old friends and many new ones. All who will be there will be, in the very best sense of the word, our friends. And we will have forever to get to know them and to enjoy them. There will never be a quarrel or even a misunderstanding. And there will be no walls. The things that we enjoy here we will enjoy there - but more so. And best of all, Jesus will be there. Wasn't that the point of the promise that I read? '... that where I am, there you may be also.' This one whom we love without seeing, we will finally see and love even more. We will enjoy walks with Him in the cool of the day, and He will teach us about the boundless love of the Father and the powerful presence of the Spirit. It's good to think about heaven, to think about all that we don't like about here and then to remind ourselves that those things will not be there. And then to think about all that we do enjoy here and then to remind ourselves that these things will be even better there. Jesus has come so that we might enjoy heaven - forever. In a world so focused on the here and now, we need to be a people who look to heaven. The hope of heaven is to be a distinguishing mark of every Christian.
Now, I know that that might sound like I'm overdoing things, but there's something in our text that makes me think that, if anything, I'm understating the point. Listen again to a part of our text: '... we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints, because of the hope laid up for you in heaven.' Did you hear it? Did you hear that 'because'. It's the little words that we need to watch for. They make all the difference. These Colossian Christians loved the saints and had faith in Jesus because of their hope of heaven. Cause and effect. The Spirit is telling us that this hope of heaven, this expectation of enjoying all that heaven has to offer, is a cause of love and faith in the life of a Christian. Now, to my mind, the value of this hope just went way up. Jesus has come. He has brought the promise of a beautiful eternity with Him and with all the rest of the saints in a perfect paradise. And it is that expectation that motivates us to trust Jesus and to love each other.
Obviously, this is something that we need to unpack. But before we do, I need to tell you that the point that the Spirit is making here will make little sense unless I make something else clear first. You need to see that faith and love are hard. In fact, a living faith in Jesus and a lively love of the saints in this fallen world is incredibly hard.
Let's start with loving the saints. Loving the saints is easy if Christians are all nice people without any sharp edges, their needs are not especially large and are easily and quickly met, and their crises always happen at convenient times. But that, of course, is not the case. We saints are still sinners, and some of the things that we do often irritate the people around us. Our needs are rarely met quickly and easily - not the important ones. Rather, they take lots of time and energy, and meeting them will wear you down. And no crisis in a person's life comes at a convenient time for the others around him. The phone may not ring at 3 AM, but we still hear about needs at some of the most awkward of times. And then, of course, there is the problem of the saints hiding their needs,trying to be self‑sufficient and refusing to let others love them. Walls. Notwithstanding all of this, we are called to love - to really love - these difficult people whose taxing needs impinge on our lives and schedules at the worst possible times - that is, if they let us know about them. Loving the saints is hard. However, even though it was just as difficult for the Colossian Christians, they obeyed the command to love one another, and they did that so well that Paul gives thanks to God for what they did. Loving the saints is hard, but it's do‑able - because of the hope of heaven.
Then there's faith in Christ Jesus that these Christians displayed. If 'faith in Jesus' means that once, some years ago, I walked down the aisle, prayed the sinner's prayer or (you fill in the blank) - if it means that at some point I became a Christian and I haven't changed my mind since, then that's easy. But that isn't what Paul has in mind. Faith in Jesus isn't a 'once long ago' kind of thing. It's not even a 'when I hit one of those crisis moments I still believe the Gospel' kind of thing. Faith in Jesus is a daily battle to follow Jesus. And it is a battle. Does anyone here really think that once someone becomes a Christian that Satan says, 'Oh well. I guess we lost that one. Let's go look for someone else'? Does anyone here really think that living in a world that is committed to rebellion against Jesus is something that we just skate through? And am I the only person in this room who has nagging sins that dog my steps, day in and day out?
Paul wrote, 'For we wrestle not against flesh and blood ...' Jesus described the failure of the third soil this way. 'They are those who hear the word, but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it proves unfruitful.' And that leads to a reminder of the real danger. 'Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God.' Faith in Jesus is a daily battle with real dangers. It's hard.
There are lots of shortcuts to try to make being a Christian easier - and there are lots of people who pursue the shortcuts. But there are no shortcuts to being a real Christian. Now, don't misunderstand. 'Hard' does not imply 'gloomy'. Actually, those who fight the hardest rejoice the most. Those who take the shortcuts - they are the joyless ones. But faithful disciples of Jesus are people of joy. That may sound counter-intuitive, but lots of things about following Jesus in this fallen world seem counter-intuitive.
Yes, being a Christian is hard, but Jesus has not left us to our own resources to fight the daily battle. And thanks be to God for that. If we were left to ourselves, none of us would make it. Jesus has provided the resources - lots of resources - that we need for the battle. And Paul points to one of them in our text: the hope of heaven. Jesus has come to give to us a sure hope of heaven so that we might fight the good fight each day.
Now, we're ready for the next step. Now, we're ready to see how our hope of heaven helps us to deal with the daily battle. Here, let me point to two examples. The first comes from the book of Hebrews. This book is all about encouraging ongoing faith, persevering faith in Jesus, in the face of great difficulties. The author points to lots of things about Jesus to encourage the saints to whom he wrote. One of the things that he does is point to the example of Jesus when it came to the cross. 'Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.' Jesus is our example of persevering faith. At the cross, the question confronting Him was simple. 'Will I trust the Father's love and wisdom and thus submit to His will?' Here, think of what happened in the Garden of Gethsemane where Jesus wrestled with the will of the Father. Do I need to say that this was hard? But where did He come out on that? 'Not My will but Thine be done.' Too often we fall into the assumption that whatever Jesus did, it was automatic. He had to do it, and so He just did it. He had no choices to make, and there were no battles to fight. It was easy for Him since it was all laid out and He was God. That's not the Jesus of the Bible. He had real choices and real battles. He was one of us. That's what the Incarnation is all about. The Son of God became one of us. Jesus had to fight to obey the will of the Father. That was true at the beginning of His ministry after He fasted for forty days, and it was true at the end, when He was confronted with the cross. And it was true every day in between. So, why did He choose to go to the cross? The passage from Hebrews gives us one reason. '... for the joy that was set before Him [He] endured the cross, despising the shame...' And what is this joy? Heaven. And Hebrews points to one specific aspect of heaven, lordship. Jesus is now '... seated at the right hand of the throne of God.' The hope of heaven was a basis for Jesus' trusting the Father and fighting the battle of faith. It's no wonder then that Hebrews says, '... let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus...' Jesus is our example of how to fight the same fight that He fought - and won. The point is clear. Faithful Christian living is hard. But if we set our sights on the joy set before us, heaven, we will be able to continue the fight of faith.
Now, my second example. This is about being able to love the saints. Here, consider the example of the apostle. Paul went throughout the Roman empire preaching the Gospel and planting churches. One motive for this was his love for the people. 'For I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen according to the flesh.' Who here could say such a thing? Paul loved and so he preached. And in each city he visited - or so it seems - he got beat up. Time after time after time. What made it possible for Paul to get up each day and walk to the next town to preach to those people - many of whom hated him and made sure that he knew that in no uncertain terms? After talking about some of his struggles and suffering, he writes this: 'So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.' Paul looked to the eternal, to heaven, as his encouragement to love the saints by preaching to them and suffering for them. But notice something. These troubles that he faced and endured were 'producing ... an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison...' Great suffering here produces greater joy there. Having paid the price to love the saints as he did Paul now enjoys a reward that has more than made up for all of the suffering. His hope of heaven encouraged him to do the hard work of loving the saints. The difficulties were worth it. In this, he is an example to us. When you suffer in loving the saints, you will be rewarded. 'Behold, the Lord GOD comes with might, and his arm rules for him; behold, his reward is with him, and his recompense before him.'
The point of today's sermon is simple. Jesus has come. Advent. And one of the things that He has brought with Him is the hope of heaven. He has brought this because being a faithful Christian is hard. There is the daily battle of loving the saints and placing your faith in Jesus. But one resource that we can draw upon in our battles here is to hold on to that hope. A life of faithfulness is hard but at the end is heaven.
No sermon works until you make it your own. So, I'd like you to do two things. First, I'd like you to consider the notion that being a faithful Christian is hard, specifically when it comes to loving the saints and continually trusting Jesus. I'd like you to think about that. And I'd also like you to think about heaven. How do you understand it? Is it functioning for you - as it did for the Colossian Christians - as an encouragement to work at being faithful? Jesus has come so that you could have the hope of heaven. Are you enjoying His gift?
It comes as no surprise, I'm sure, that we will be dealing with the same question that we've been looking at for the last several weeks: Why Advent? Why did Jesus come? In our text - as a part of his familiar triad of faith, hope and love - Paul points us to heaven. The notion of heaven is a familiar answer to the question we are dealing with. Even those who have no interest in the Gospel think of Jesus' coming as in some way connected to heaven. And they are right. Jesus came so that we might enjoy heaven. That has been the hope of the saints since the very beginning. And, familiar passages like this one come to mind. 'In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you to myself; that where I am, there you may be also.' The heaven that Jesus promises is everything that this life is not. There we will find rest and lasting happiness and deep satisfaction. And we will enjoy that, and more, without any pain or sorrow or worry or tears. We will be with friends - some old friends and many new ones. All who will be there will be, in the very best sense of the word, our friends. And we will have forever to get to know them and to enjoy them. There will never be a quarrel or even a misunderstanding. And there will be no walls. The things that we enjoy here we will enjoy there - but more so. And best of all, Jesus will be there. Wasn't that the point of the promise that I read? '... that where I am, there you may be also.' This one whom we love without seeing, we will finally see and love even more. We will enjoy walks with Him in the cool of the day, and He will teach us about the boundless love of the Father and the powerful presence of the Spirit. It's good to think about heaven, to think about all that we don't like about here and then to remind ourselves that those things will not be there. And then to think about all that we do enjoy here and then to remind ourselves that these things will be even better there. Jesus has come so that we might enjoy heaven - forever. In a world so focused on the here and now, we need to be a people who look to heaven. The hope of heaven is to be a distinguishing mark of every Christian.
Now, I know that that might sound like I'm overdoing things, but there's something in our text that makes me think that, if anything, I'm understating the point. Listen again to a part of our text: '... we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints, because of the hope laid up for you in heaven.' Did you hear it? Did you hear that 'because'. It's the little words that we need to watch for. They make all the difference. These Colossian Christians loved the saints and had faith in Jesus because of their hope of heaven. Cause and effect. The Spirit is telling us that this hope of heaven, this expectation of enjoying all that heaven has to offer, is a cause of love and faith in the life of a Christian. Now, to my mind, the value of this hope just went way up. Jesus has come. He has brought the promise of a beautiful eternity with Him and with all the rest of the saints in a perfect paradise. And it is that expectation that motivates us to trust Jesus and to love each other.
Obviously, this is something that we need to unpack. But before we do, I need to tell you that the point that the Spirit is making here will make little sense unless I make something else clear first. You need to see that faith and love are hard. In fact, a living faith in Jesus and a lively love of the saints in this fallen world is incredibly hard.
Let's start with loving the saints. Loving the saints is easy if Christians are all nice people without any sharp edges, their needs are not especially large and are easily and quickly met, and their crises always happen at convenient times. But that, of course, is not the case. We saints are still sinners, and some of the things that we do often irritate the people around us. Our needs are rarely met quickly and easily - not the important ones. Rather, they take lots of time and energy, and meeting them will wear you down. And no crisis in a person's life comes at a convenient time for the others around him. The phone may not ring at 3 AM, but we still hear about needs at some of the most awkward of times. And then, of course, there is the problem of the saints hiding their needs,trying to be self‑sufficient and refusing to let others love them. Walls. Notwithstanding all of this, we are called to love - to really love - these difficult people whose taxing needs impinge on our lives and schedules at the worst possible times - that is, if they let us know about them. Loving the saints is hard. However, even though it was just as difficult for the Colossian Christians, they obeyed the command to love one another, and they did that so well that Paul gives thanks to God for what they did. Loving the saints is hard, but it's do‑able - because of the hope of heaven.
Then there's faith in Christ Jesus that these Christians displayed. If 'faith in Jesus' means that once, some years ago, I walked down the aisle, prayed the sinner's prayer or (you fill in the blank) - if it means that at some point I became a Christian and I haven't changed my mind since, then that's easy. But that isn't what Paul has in mind. Faith in Jesus isn't a 'once long ago' kind of thing. It's not even a 'when I hit one of those crisis moments I still believe the Gospel' kind of thing. Faith in Jesus is a daily battle to follow Jesus. And it is a battle. Does anyone here really think that once someone becomes a Christian that Satan says, 'Oh well. I guess we lost that one. Let's go look for someone else'? Does anyone here really think that living in a world that is committed to rebellion against Jesus is something that we just skate through? And am I the only person in this room who has nagging sins that dog my steps, day in and day out?
Paul wrote, 'For we wrestle not against flesh and blood ...' Jesus described the failure of the third soil this way. 'They are those who hear the word, but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it proves unfruitful.' And that leads to a reminder of the real danger. 'Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God.' Faith in Jesus is a daily battle with real dangers. It's hard.
There are lots of shortcuts to try to make being a Christian easier - and there are lots of people who pursue the shortcuts. But there are no shortcuts to being a real Christian. Now, don't misunderstand. 'Hard' does not imply 'gloomy'. Actually, those who fight the hardest rejoice the most. Those who take the shortcuts - they are the joyless ones. But faithful disciples of Jesus are people of joy. That may sound counter-intuitive, but lots of things about following Jesus in this fallen world seem counter-intuitive.
Yes, being a Christian is hard, but Jesus has not left us to our own resources to fight the daily battle. And thanks be to God for that. If we were left to ourselves, none of us would make it. Jesus has provided the resources - lots of resources - that we need for the battle. And Paul points to one of them in our text: the hope of heaven. Jesus has come to give to us a sure hope of heaven so that we might fight the good fight each day.
Now, we're ready for the next step. Now, we're ready to see how our hope of heaven helps us to deal with the daily battle. Here, let me point to two examples. The first comes from the book of Hebrews. This book is all about encouraging ongoing faith, persevering faith in Jesus, in the face of great difficulties. The author points to lots of things about Jesus to encourage the saints to whom he wrote. One of the things that he does is point to the example of Jesus when it came to the cross. 'Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.' Jesus is our example of persevering faith. At the cross, the question confronting Him was simple. 'Will I trust the Father's love and wisdom and thus submit to His will?' Here, think of what happened in the Garden of Gethsemane where Jesus wrestled with the will of the Father. Do I need to say that this was hard? But where did He come out on that? 'Not My will but Thine be done.' Too often we fall into the assumption that whatever Jesus did, it was automatic. He had to do it, and so He just did it. He had no choices to make, and there were no battles to fight. It was easy for Him since it was all laid out and He was God. That's not the Jesus of the Bible. He had real choices and real battles. He was one of us. That's what the Incarnation is all about. The Son of God became one of us. Jesus had to fight to obey the will of the Father. That was true at the beginning of His ministry after He fasted for forty days, and it was true at the end, when He was confronted with the cross. And it was true every day in between. So, why did He choose to go to the cross? The passage from Hebrews gives us one reason. '... for the joy that was set before Him [He] endured the cross, despising the shame...' And what is this joy? Heaven. And Hebrews points to one specific aspect of heaven, lordship. Jesus is now '... seated at the right hand of the throne of God.' The hope of heaven was a basis for Jesus' trusting the Father and fighting the battle of faith. It's no wonder then that Hebrews says, '... let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus...' Jesus is our example of how to fight the same fight that He fought - and won. The point is clear. Faithful Christian living is hard. But if we set our sights on the joy set before us, heaven, we will be able to continue the fight of faith.
Now, my second example. This is about being able to love the saints. Here, consider the example of the apostle. Paul went throughout the Roman empire preaching the Gospel and planting churches. One motive for this was his love for the people. 'For I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen according to the flesh.' Who here could say such a thing? Paul loved and so he preached. And in each city he visited - or so it seems - he got beat up. Time after time after time. What made it possible for Paul to get up each day and walk to the next town to preach to those people - many of whom hated him and made sure that he knew that in no uncertain terms? After talking about some of his struggles and suffering, he writes this: 'So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.' Paul looked to the eternal, to heaven, as his encouragement to love the saints by preaching to them and suffering for them. But notice something. These troubles that he faced and endured were 'producing ... an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison...' Great suffering here produces greater joy there. Having paid the price to love the saints as he did Paul now enjoys a reward that has more than made up for all of the suffering. His hope of heaven encouraged him to do the hard work of loving the saints. The difficulties were worth it. In this, he is an example to us. When you suffer in loving the saints, you will be rewarded. 'Behold, the Lord GOD comes with might, and his arm rules for him; behold, his reward is with him, and his recompense before him.'
The point of today's sermon is simple. Jesus has come. Advent. And one of the things that He has brought with Him is the hope of heaven. He has brought this because being a faithful Christian is hard. There is the daily battle of loving the saints and placing your faith in Jesus. But one resource that we can draw upon in our battles here is to hold on to that hope. A life of faithfulness is hard but at the end is heaven.
No sermon works until you make it your own. So, I'd like you to do two things. First, I'd like you to consider the notion that being a faithful Christian is hard, specifically when it comes to loving the saints and continually trusting Jesus. I'd like you to think about that. And I'd also like you to think about heaven. How do you understand it? Is it functioning for you - as it did for the Colossian Christians - as an encouragement to work at being faithful? Jesus has come so that you could have the hope of heaven. Are you enjoying His gift?
No comments:
Post a Comment