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Synopsis of the Books of the Bible
John Nelson Darby
1800-1882
COLOSSIANS
INTRODUCTION AND CHAPTER 1
The Epistle to the Colossians looks at the Christian as risen with Christ,
but not, as in that to the Ephesians, as sitting in heavenly places in
Christ. A hope is laid up for him in heaven; he is to set his affections on
things above, not on things on the earth. He has died with Christ and he is
risen with Him, but not sitting in heavenly places in Him yet. We have in
it a proof of that which other epistles demonstrate, namely, the blessed
way in which our God in His grace turns everything to the good of those
that love Him.
In the Epistle to the Ephesians the Holy Ghost had developed the counsels
of God with regard to the church-its privileges. The Christians of Ephesus
had nothing to be reproached with:
therefore the Holy Ghost could use the occasion furnished by that faithful
flock to unfold all the privileges which God had ordained for the church at
large, by virtue of its union with Jesus Christ its Head, as well as the
individual privileges of the children of God.
It was not so with the Colossians. They had in some measure slipped away
from this blessed portion, and lost the sense of their union with the Head
of the body; at least, if it was not actually so, they were assailed by the
danger, and liable to the influence of those who sought to draw them away
from it, and subject them to the influence of philosophy and Judaism, so
that the apostle had to occupy himself with the danger, and not merely with
their privileges. This union with our Head (thank God!) cannot itself be
lost; but as a truth in the church, or of realisation by individuals, it
may. We know this but too well in the church of the day we live in. This
however gives occasion to the Spirit of God to develop all the riches and
all the perfection which are found in the Head and in His work, in order to
recover the members of the body from their spiritual feebleness, or
maintain them in the full practical enjoyment of their union with Christ,
and in the power of the position gained for them by that union. For us this
is abiding instruction with regard to the riches that are in the Head.
If the Epistle to the Ephesians delineates the privileges of the body, that
to the Colossians reveals the fullness that is in the head, and our
completeness in Him. Thus in that to the Ephesians the church is the
fullness of Him who filleth all in all; in that to the Colossians, all the
fullness of the Godhead dwells in Christ bodily, and we are complete in
Him. There is another difference however, which it is important to remark.
In the Epistle to the Colossians we do not- save in the expression, "love
in the Spirit "- find any mention of the Holy Ghost. He is fully brought
forward in the Ephesians. But on the other hand, we have Christ as our life
far more fully developed, of equal importance in its place. In Ephesians we
have more largely the contrast of heathenism with christian privilege and
state. The formation of the soul in living likeness to Christ is largely
developed in Colossians. It is more, in the well-known expressions, Christ
in us than we in Christ, though these cannot be separated. A further
important difference is that in Ephesians the unity of Jew and Gentile in
one body holds a large place. In Colossians the Gentiles only are in view,
though in connection with the doctrine of the body. These differences well
noted, we may say that the two epistles have a great resemblance in their
general character.
They commence in nearly the same way.
Both are written from Rome, while the apostle was a prisoner in that city,
and sent by the same messenger and on the same occasion, as well probably
as that to Philemon: so the names and salutations give us reason to
believe. The address to the Ephesians places them perhaps more immediately
in connection with God Himself, instead of presenting them as in brotherly
communion on earth. They are not called brethren in Ephesians 1:1, only
saints and faithful in Christ Jesus. They are viewed as walking on earth in
Colossians, though risen. Hence there is a long prayer for their walk,
though on high and holy ground as delivered. In Ephesians it begins with
the full purpose and fruit of God's counsels. In that epistle the apostle's
heart expands at once in the sense of the blessings enjoyed by the
Ephesians. They were blessed with all spiritual blessings in the heavenly
places in Christ. For the Colossians there was a hope laid up in heaven.
And there is a preface of many verses referring to the gospel they had
heard, and introducing his prayer for their walk and state down here. This
brings us where Ephesians 1:7 brings us, but with a much more enlarged
development of the personal glory of Christ, and more in an historical way
of God's actual dealings. It is also a more personal church address than
the Ephesians.
But let us consider more closely that which is said to the Colossians. The
blessed calling of which the apostle speaks (Eph. 1:3-10), and the
privileges of the inheritance (11-14), are wanting in Colossians; risen but
on earth, they are not sitting in heavenly places, all things being thus
their inheritance. It is not they in Christ there, but Christ in them the
hope of glory, and the prayer referred to above fills up the chapter till
we come to the common ground of Christ's glory in Colossians 1:15; and even
here the divine glory of Christ is brought out in Colossians, the simple
fact of the purpose of God as to Christ in Ephesians. And not only we have
not God's inheritance ours; but in Colossians the Spirit as earnest of it
is not spoken of. This indeed we have seen is characteristic of Colossians.
The Spirit is not spoken of, but life. We have the Person and divine glory
of Christ, and our completeness in Him, more insisted on in Colossians; but
not the saints' place with God in the same way. Further, as the saint is
looked at as on earth, not in Christ on high, his responsibility is brought
in. (Chap.1:23.) Colossians 1:3 answers to Ephesians 1:16: only one feels
that there is more fullness in the joy of Ephesians 1:16. Faith in Christ
and love to all saints are found in each exordium, as the occasion of the
writer's joy.
The subject of his prayer is quite different. In the Ephesians, where he
develops the counsels of God with regard to the church, he prays that the
saints may understand them, as well as the power by means of which they
participated in them. Here he prays that their walk may be guided by divine
intelligence. But this belongs to another cause, to the point of view from
which, in his discourse, he looks at the saints. We have seen that in the
Epistle to the Ephesians, he views them as sitting in the heavenlies. Their
inheritance consequently is that of all things which are to be gathered
together under Christ as Head. Here he prays for them in view of a hope
laid up for them in heaven; his prayer therefore refers to their walk that
it may be in harmony with the object which they had set before them. As on
earth and in danger of not adhering to the Head, the believers in Colosse
were in danger of departing from that object. He prayed therefore in view
of that heavenly hope. They had heard of this perfect and glorious hope.
The gospel had proclaimed it everywhere.
It was this gospel preached in view of a hope laid up in heaven which had
produced fruit among men, fruit that was characterised by its heavenly
source. Their religion, that which governed their heart in these
relationships with God, was heavenly. The Colossians were in danger of
falling back into the current of ordinances, and of the religious customs
of man living in the world, whose religion was in connection with the world
in which he dwelt, and not enlightened, not filled with heavenly light.
There is nothing but conscious union with Christ which can keep us securely
there. Ordinances to reach Him can have no place where we are united to
Him; the philosophy of human thoughts none, where we possess livingly
divine ones in Christ.
Nevertheless how precious it is-even if we are not in the full height of
our calling-to have an object set before our hearts which delivers us from
this world, and from the influences which hide God from us! Such is the
apostle's object in this scripture. He directs the eyes of the Colossians
to heaven, in order that they may see Christ there, and regain that sense
of their union with the Head which they had in some measure lost, or were
in danger of losing. The ground work was however there-faith in Christ and
love to all saints. They only needed realising their union with the Head;
which moreover could alone maintain them in the heavenly element above
ordinances, above human and earthly religion.
The apostle, in order to raise them up, sets out as usual from the point
where he found good in the saints to whom he wrote. This heavenly hope had
reached them and had produced fruit. It is this which distinguishes
Christianity from all other religions, and in particular from the Jewish
system, which-although individuals who were in it by grace sighed for
heaven-hid God behind the veil, and enveloped the conscience in a series of
ordinances at a distance from Him.
Now, based upon this hope which placed the inner life of the Christians in
connection with heaven, the apostle prays that the Colossians may be filled
with the knowledge of the will of God in all wisdom and spiritual
understanding. It is the fruit of a risen man's connection with God on the
earth. This is very different from commandments and ordinances. It is the
fruit of intimate communion with God, of knowledge of His character and of
His nature by virtue of this communion; and, although it refers to
practical life, as belonging to the inner life, it leaves ordinances
completely behind. The apostle had to begin at this practical end, at
christian life. Perhaps the Colossians did not at first understand the
bearing of these instructions, but they contained a principle which,
already planted in their heart and capable of being re-awakened, led them
to the point which the apostle aimed at, and was at the same time a very
precious privilege, the value of which they were in position to apprehend.
Such is charity. The apostle develops their privileges in this respect with
force and clearness, as one to whom such a walk was well known, and
moreover with the power of the Spirit of God. They are not in heaven but on
earth, and this is the path that suited those risen with Christ and looking
to heaven from the earth. It is divine life on earth, not the Holy Ghost
putting the soul of the believer at the centre of divine counsels, as in
Ephesians 3 through Christ dwelling in the heart by faith.
The first principle of this practical heavenly life was the knowledge of
the will of God-to be filled with it, not to run after it as a thing
without us, nor in indecision, in uncertainty, as to what it was, but to be
filled with it by a principle of intelligence which comes from Him, and
which forms the understanding and the wisdom of the Christian himself. The
character of God was livingly translated in the appreciation of everything
that the Christian did. And remark here that the knowledge of God's will is
based on the spiritual state of the soul-wisdom and spiritual
understanding. And this is of all practical importance. No particular
direction by man as to conduct meets this at all-rather saves us from the
need of spiritual understanding. No doubt a more spiritual mind may help me
in the discernment of Gods will ;
but God has connected the discovery of the path of His will, His way, with
the inward state of the soul, and causes us to pass through
circumstances-human life here below-to test and to discover to ourselves
what that state is, and to exercise us therein. The Christian has by his
spiritual state to know God's ways. The word is the means. (Compare John
17:17, 19.) God has a way of His own which the vulture's eye hath not seen,
known only to the spiritual man, connected with,flowing from, and to, the
knowledge of God. (Compare Exod.33:13.) Thus the Christian walks worthy of
the Lord; he knows what becomes Him,
and walks accordingly, that he may please Him in all things, bearing fruit
in every good work, and growing by the knowledge of God.
It was not then only the character of life: this life was productive; it
bore fruit, and, as life grew up, by increasing knowledge of God. But this
connection with God brings in another very precious consideration. Besides
the character and the living energy which are in relationship with this
knowledge, the strength of the Lord
is developed in it also. They draw strength from Him. He gives it that they
might walk thus. "Strengthened," he says, "with all might, according to the
power of his glory." Such is the measure of the Christian's strength for a
life in harmony with the character of God. Thus the character of this life
is revealed in the heavenly glory on high-Jesus Christ. On earth its
manifestation-as it had been in Jesus Christ-is realised in all patience
and long-suffering with joy, in the midst of the sorrow and afflictions of
the life of God in this world. This form of the life too is striking: all
divine strength according to His glory given in order to be patient, to
endure. What a character it gives to the Christian's life in this world !
And there is a generous bearing with others which it enables us to
maintain. Nor is anything a more manifest fruit of power than this. Will
too is here subdued. Thus, in spite of all we have to endure, we have with
God constant joy. It is a blessed picture of the form in which divine life
manifests itself.
And here the apostle connects this life of endurance with that which is its
source, its aim, and its present possession by faith. Walking thus we are
full of joy, and we give thanks to the Father who has made
us meet to share the portion of the saints in light. Here are the saints
established in their proper relationship with God (their Father) in
heaven-in the light, that which God is, and in which He dwells. Thus we
have the state of the soul, the character of the walk, and the strength in
which we accomplish it. As to meetness for God in light, we possess it.
Moreover we are translated into the kingdom of God's dear Son.
The means employed, and the practical character of the work which sets us
in the light, are then presented, introducing us (as far as Colossians
does) into the counsels of God, but in a practical way-in their results
future or present, not in counsel or as the mystery of His will.
The Father has delivered us from the power of darkness, and transported us
into the kingdom of the Son of His love. It is not a Jewish rule for man;
it is an operation of the power of God, who treats us as altogether by
nature the slaves of Satan and of darkness; and places us by an act of that
power in an entirely new position and relationship with Himself We see
indeed here, if we examine the principles in their origin, the same thing
as in Ephesians 1:4,5; 2:1-6, as to our position before. But it is evident
that the fullness and definiteness of a new creation are wanting.
"The inheritance of the saints in light," "the kingdom of the Son of his
love," remind us of Ephesians 1:4, 5; but it is not the thing itself, as it
is in God's mind, but our having been made meet for it when here; nor
consequently the development of a position with which one is familiar as
standing in it. The power and the love of the Father have made us meet for
it, and although the character of God is necessarily there as light and
love, according to His relationship to His Son, yet what we have here is
not our own relationship with God Himself, outside the question of whence
He took us, but the work in general which places us there in contrast with
our previous position. He has delivered us from the power of darkness, and
translated us into the kingdom of His dear Son; we have part in the
inheritance of the saints in light: but where is the saint " without blame
before him in love?" where our relationship to Him, according to the
counsels of Him who saw only the good which He purposed in His own heart?
where the "children unto himself by Jesus Christ," through His
predestination before the world was?
In Ephesians deliverance is brought in as a consequence of the position in
which the heirs, the objects of the eternal counsels of God, are seen.
Here deliverance is the chief subject. How dangerous and disastrous it is
to depart from the Head, and to lose the full consciousness, in the light,
of our union with Him! How perfect and precious is that grace which takes
notice of our condition, and brings us out of it to God, to make us
enjoy-according to the power and grace of God-the inestimable position
which He has given us in Christ!
The means which the Spirit here employs to accomplish this work of grace is
the development of the glory of the Lord, of the Son of His love.
Here alone, I believe, is the kingdom called the kingdom of the Son; and, I
think, it is only as introducing His Person as the centre of everything and
giving us the measure of the greatness of the blessing. It is the kingdom
of One who has this place, the Son of His love, into which we are
introduced. It is indeed His kingdom; and in order that we may apprehend
the character of this kingdom as it is now for us, and our nearness to God
as having part in it, it is called the kingdom of the Son of His love. It
is this which is the present foundation and characteristic of the
relationship with God of those who are truly in and of it. As the kingdom
of the Son of man, it is His manifestation hereafter in glory and in
government. Here it is characterised by the relationship of the Son Himself
to the Father, in His Person, with the addition of that which gives us a
full title to share it-redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of
sins.
The apostle, having thus introduced the Son in His relationship to the
Father, as the central and mighty object which was to attract the heart of
the Colossians and set them free from the yoke of ordinances sketches now
the different parts of the glory of that Person. If therefore the
assembly's own glory is wanting, that of Jesus is so much the rather set in
stronger relief before us. Thus God brings good out of evil, and in every
way feeds His beloved people.
The Lord Jesus is the image of the invisible God. It is in the Son of His
love that we see what God is. (Compare John 1:18; and also 1 John 1:2.)
This is the first character of His personal glory, the essential centre of
all the rest. Now, in consequence of this proper character of His Person,
He takes by right the position of representing God in the creation. Adam
was created in some sort in the image of God, and placed as centre in a
creation that was subjected to him. But, after all, he was only a figure of
the Christ, of Him who was to come. The Son, in His very Person, in His
nature (and for us as in the bosom of the Father), is He who makes God
known, because He presents Him in His own Person and in a full revelation
of His being and of His character be fore men and in the whole universe;
for all the fullness of the Godhead dwells bodily in Him. Nevertheless He
is a man. He is thus seen of angels. We have seen Him with our eyes or by
faith. Thus He is the image of the invisible God. The perfect character and
living representation of the invisible God have been seen in Him. Wondrous
truth for us with regard to the Person of our Saviour!
But then what place can He have in creation when He has come into it
according to the eternal counsels of God? He could have but one, namely,
that of supremacy without contestation and without controversy. He is the
firstborn of all creation; this is a relative name, not one of date with
regard to time. It is said of Solomon, " I will make him my firstborn,
higher than the kings of the earth." Thus the Creator, when He takes a
place in creation, is necessarily its Head. He has not yet made good His
rights, because in grace He would accomplish redemption. We are speaking of
His rights-rights which faith recognises.
He is then the image of the invisible God, and, when He takes His place in
it, the firstborn of all creation. The reason of this is worthy of our
attention-simple, yet marvelous: He created it. It was in the Person of the
Son that God acted, when by His power He created all things, whether in
heaven or in the earth, visible and invisible. All that is great and
exalted is but the work of His hand; all has been created by Him (the Son)
and for Him. Thus, when He takes possession of it, He takes it as His
inheritance by right. Wonderful truth, that He who has redeemed us, who
made Himself man, one of us as to nature, in order to do so, is the
Creator. But such is the truth.
In connection with this admirable truth, it was a part of God's counsels
that man should have dominion over all the works of His hands. Thus Christ,
as man, has it by right, and will take possession of it in fact. This part
of the truth of which we are speaking is treated in Hebrews 2; we shall
consider it in its place. I introduce it here merely that we may under
stand the circumstances under which the Son takes possession. The Spirit
speaks of the One who is Man but the One who is at the same time Creator of
all things, the Son of God. They were created by Him, they were necessarily
then created also for Him.
Thus we have hitherto the glory of the Person of Christ and His glory in
creation connected with His Person. In Him is seen the image of the
invisible God. He has created all things: all is for Him; and He is the
firstborn of all that is created.
Another category of glory, another supremacy, is now presented. He takes a
special place in relation to the assembly in the power of resurrection. It
is the introduction of divine power, not in creation but in the empire of
death; in order that others may participate in His glory by redemption, and
by the power of life in Him. The first glory was, so to speak natural-the
latter special and acquired (although in virtue of the glory of His Person)
by undergoing death, and all the power of the enemy in it. Accordingly it
is connected, as we have just said, with redemption, and with the
introduction of others into the participation of the same privileges. He is
the Head of the body which is the assembly, the Beginning, the Firstborn
from among the dead, that in all things He might have the preeminence. He
is the Firstborn of creation, He is the Firstborn
according to the power of resurrection, in this new order of things in
which man is predestined to an entirely new position, gained by redemption,
and in which he participates in the glory of God (as far as that which is
created can do so), and that by participating in divine life in Jesus
Christ, the Son of God and everlasting life; and, as regards the assembly,
as members of His body. He is the First born of creation, the Firstborn
from among the dead; the Creator and the conqueror of death and the enemy's
power. These are the two spheres of the display of the glory of God. The
special position of the assembly, the body of Christ, forms a part of the
latter. He must have this resurrection-glory, this universal preeminence
and superiority also, as being man, for all the fullness (namely, of the
Godhead, see chap. 2: 9) was pleased to dwell in Him. What place could He
have except that of first in all things! But, before speaking of that which
follows, some important remarks are yet to be made on that which we have
been considering.
The Son is here presented to us as Creator, not to the exclusion of the
Father's power, nor of the operation of the Spirit. They are one, but it is
the Son who is here set before us. In John 1 it is the Word who creates all
things. Here, and in Hebrews 1, it is under the name of Son, that He, who
is also the Word, is revealed to us. He is the Word of God, the expression
of His thought and of His power. It is by Him that God works and reveals
Himself. He is also the Son of God; and, in particular, the Son of the
Father. He reveals God, and he who has seen Him has seen the Father.
Inasmuch as born in this world by the operation of God through the Holy
Ghost, He is the Son of God. (Psalm 2:7; Luke 1:35.) But this is in time,
when creation is already the scene of the manifestation of the ways and
counsels of God. But the Son is also the name of the proper relationship of
His glorious Person to the Father before the world was. It is in this
character that He created all things. The Son is to be glorified even as
the Father. If He humble Himself, as He did for us, all things are put into
His hands, in order that His glory may be manifested in the same nature in
the assumption of which He humbled Himself. And already the power of life
and of God in Him is manifested by resurrection, so that He is declared to
be the Son of God with power by the resurrection. This is the proof of it.
In the Epistle to the Colossians that which is set before us is the proper
glory of His Person as the Son before the world was. He is the Creator as
Son. It is important to observe this. But the persons are not separated in
their manifestation. If the Son wrought miracles on earth, He cast out
devils by the Spirit; and the Father who dwells in Him (Christ) did the
works. Also it must be remembered, that that which is said is said, when He
was manifested in the flesh, of His complete Person, man upon earth. Not
that we do not in our minds separate between the divinity and the humanity;
but even in separating them we think of the one Person with regard to whom
we do so. We say, Christ is God, Christ is man; but it is Christ who is the
two. I do not say this theologically, but to draw the reader's attention to
the remarkable expression, "All the fullness was pleased to dwell in him."
All the fullness of the Godhead was found in Christ. The Gnostics, who in
later years so much harassed the assembly, used this word " fullness" in a
mystical and peculiar sense for the sum and source (and yet after all, in
the sense of a locality; for it had a "oros", limits which separated it
from everything else) of divinity which developed itself in four pairs of
beings- syzygies-Christ being only one of a pair.
It is not necessary to go further into their reveries, except to observe
that, with different shades of thought, they attribute creation to a god
either inferior or evil, who also was the author of the Old Testament.
Matter, they said, did not proceed from the supreme God. They did not eat
meat; they did not marry; at the same time they gave themselves up to all
sorts of horrors and dissoluteness; and, strange to say, associated
themselves with Judaism, worshiped angels, and etc.
The apostle was often in conflict with these tools of Satan. Peter also
mentions them. Here Paul sets forth, by the word of God, the whole fullness
of the divinity of Christ. Far from being something inferior, an emanation,
or having a place however exalted in those endless genealogies, all the
fullness itself dwelt in Him. Glorious truth with regard to the Person of
the Lord our Saviour! We may leave all the foolish imaginations of man in
the shade, in order to enjoy the perfect light of this glorious fullness of
God in our Head and Lord. All the fullness was in Him. We know indeed the
Father, but revealed by Him. We possess indeed the Spirit, but the fullness
of the Spirit was in Him, and because, having accomplished our redemption
and our purification, He then received that Spirit for us. And God Himself
in all His fullness was revealed, without any reservation, in the Person of
Christ; and this Christ is ours, our Saviour, our Lord. He has been
manifested to us and for us. What a glorious truth for us!
It is for His own glory, no doubt, that He should be known as He is, as
love; but it is not the less true that this revelation was in connection
with us. It is not only the Son revealing the Father, sweet and precious as
that fact is; it is the fullness of the Godhead as such that is revealed
and shewn forth in Christ. It was the good pleasure of the fullness to
dwell there.
But Christ was not only the Head of creation in virtue of the divine glory
of His Person, and the Head of the assembly as risen from among the dead
and victorious over the power of the enemy; creation, and all those who
were to form the assembly, were alike far from God, and the latter were so
even in their will; to be in relationship with God they must be reconciled
to Him. This is the second part of the glory of Christ. Not only was it the
good pleasure of the fullness of the Godhead to dwell in Him, but by Him to
reconcile all things to itself, having made peace by the blood of the
cross. This reconciliation of things in heaven as well as on the earth is
not yet accomplished. Peace is indeed made by the blood, but the power has
not yet come in to bring back the whole into actual relationship with God
according to the value of that blood.
Thus, in Israel, the blood was put upon the mercy seat, and
expiation-peace, was made; but besides this everything was sprinkled, and
the sins of the people were confessed. This, with regard to Israel and to
creation, has not yet been done. As to that which is outward, it remains
still at a distance from God, although peace is made. We know that it is
the good pleasure of God to reconcile all things in heaven, and on the
earth, by virtue of this blood. All things shall be restored to order under
a new rule. The guilty, remaining in their sins, will be outside this scene
of blessing; but heaven and earth will be completely freed from the power
of evil (and even from its presence during the millennium, as regards
manifestation -still later, absolutely from its presence itself), according
to the virtue of that blood which has separated between good and evil,
according to the character of God Himself, and so glorified God that peace
is made. God can act freely for blessing; but here the work is twofold,like
the glory of the Person of Christ, and refers to the same objects as His
glory. It is in the counsels of God to reconcile unto Himself all things in
Heaven and on the earth through Christ. But Christians He has already
reconciled. Once not only defiled, like the creature, but enemies in their
minds, He has already reconciled them in the body of His flesh by means of
death. The perfect work which Christ accomplished in His body, blotting out
our sins and perfectly glorifying God His Father, has brought us into
relationship with God in His holiness according to the efficacy of that
work; that is to say, it is efficacious to present us, perfectly
reconciled, holy, without blemish and without blame, before His face; and
with the consciousness of it, and of the love that has wrought it, and the
favour into which we are brought, so that in the sense of this the heart is
brought back to God: we are reconciled to God. This supposes that we
continue steadfast in the faith unto the end.
The position of the Colossians gave room for this warning, being viewed as
walking on earth.
We have seen that they had a little departed, or were in danger of
departing, from the realisation of their union with Christ.
It will be noticed also, that the apostle speaks of his gospel as spread
abroad in all the world. Grace had overstepped the narrow limits of Judaism
and the expectation of the Messiah, in order to make known the testimony of
the perfect love of God in the whole creation under heaven, of which Paul
was the instrument as the apostle of the Gentiles.
Hitherto, then, the Spirit of God has set before us the two preeminences of
Christ, that over creation and that over the assembly, and the two
reconciliations which answer to them, namely, first, that of the things
over which Christ is set as Head, that is, of all things in heaven and
earth; and second, that of Christians themselves: the latter already
accomplished, the former yet to come. The ministry of the apostle had now
the same double character. He has not undoubtedly to preach in heaven; but
his ministry is exercised in every place under heaven where there is a soul
to hearken. He is a minister of that gospel; and then he is a minister of
the assembly, a distinct service or ministry, making known its true
position and its privileges, connected indeed with the other, in that the
gospel went out also to the Gentiles to bring them in. (Vers. 23, 25) By
this last instruction he completed the word of God: an important principle
with regard to the exclusive authority of the written word, which shews
that its totality already exists, demonstrated by the subjects which it
comprises; subjects which are entirely completed, to the exclusion of
others which people may seek to introduce. The circle of truths which God
had to treat, in order to reveal to us the glory of Christ and to give us
complete instruction according to His wisdom, is entire, when the doctrine
of the assembly is revealed. There were no others to be added.
It is not a question here as to the dates of the books, but of the
circle of subjects. The law, the kingdom, the Person of Christ, redemption
and the ways of God, had already been brought out; the doctrine of the
assembly was then to be revealed, in order to make the communications of
God complete as to their subjects.
But this doctrine in particular exposed the apostle to persecution and
sufferings, which the Jews especially, and the enemy sought in every way to
inflict upon him. But he rejoiced in this as a privilege, because Christ
had suffered on account of His love for the assembly-for His own. The
apostle speaks here, not of the efficacy of this death, but of the love
which led Him to suffer. Looked at in this point of view, the apostle could
participate in His sufferings, and we also in our little measure; but the
apostle in a peculiar manner, as the special witness-bearer to this truth.
If Christ had been content to accept the position of Messiah according to
man, He would have been well received. If Paul had preached circumcision,
the offence of the cross would have ceased: man could have taken part in
the religion of God, if His religion had recognised man in the flesh. But
if God is revealed, if His grace extends to the gentiles, if by this grace,
and without having respect to the Jew more than to the Gentile, He forms an
assembly, which is the body of Christ, sharing the heavenly glory of His
Son-this is what the flesh cannot endure. To be thus shut out as nothing
worth before God, even in its religion, take what pains it might-this is
unbearable. This is the source of the enmity of the Judaising spirit, which
is founded on the flesh, on man, and which is constantly reappearing in the
apostle's history, whether as exciting the hatred of the heathen, or as
corrupting the doctrine of Christ and the simplicity of the gospel.
Religion in the flesh boasts its own peculiar privileges. (See Phil 3)
CHAPTER 2
Thus we have a double ministry, as well as a double preeminence of Christ,
and a double reconciliation; and each having a similar relationship the one
to the other: Christ, the Head of all things in heaven and earth, the Head
of the assembly; all things in heaven and earth are to be reconciled,
Christians are reconciled; Paul exercises his ministry in the whole
creation under heaven, he is the minister of the assembly. Naturally his
ministry was limited to the earth. In every respect the extent and bearing
of the glory of Christ, and of the ministry, went beyond the limits of
Judaism, and were in contrast with the whole system.
The apostle then insists on the second part of his ministry, of which he
had been just speaking; dwelling however particularly on that which met the
need of the Colossians, and developing it, in order to secure them in the
enjoyment of the whole circle of these precious truths. He completed the
word of God by announcing this mystery, which had been hidden from all ages
and generations, but was now manifested to the saints. No display of the
ways of God since the creation had (in the truths on which it was founded,
in the revelation of God-of His power, or of His thoughts, which formed its
basis and gave it its character) contained the mystery contained in the
doctrine of the assembly. It had not been communicated to any of those who
formed part of the system which preceded it, or who were the medium of
light to others, as instrumental in the revelation of the light of God.
Angels, men, Israel, the prophets-all were alike in ignorance of it. The
assembly (this body united to the Son of God become man and glorified) and
the calling of the Gentiles into that unity was hidden from them all.
Now that Christ the Head of the assembly, the Head of the body, was
glorified, the mystery of this body was made known. The apostle here dwells
on one particular side of this subject, which, after the Person of Christ,
forms the centre of all God's ways. This side is Christ in us, especially
as Gentiles, the hope of glory. And in this again we see how the saints are
viewed as on earth, though in the power of resurrection. The aspect here
given of the mystery is, Christ in us down here, not union with Him
actually in glory, though inseparable from that. In fact this mystery was
in every way a new thought, a new truth. That which was known was a Messiah
who should be manifested among the Jews, the accomplishment of glory in
their midst; the Gentiles at most having part in it, as subordinate to the
people of God. But according to the doctrine of the assembly, Christ
invisibly dwelt in the midst of the Gentiles,
and
even in them; and as to the glory He was only the hope of it. A Christ
dwelling in the hearts of men, and of men formerly rejected and outside the
promises, and filling their hearts with joy and glory in the consciousness
of union with Himself-this was the wondrous mystery prepared of God for the
blessing of the Gentiles. It was this Christ, a Christ such as this, whom
Paul preached, warning every man, and teaching every man according to the
full development of the wisdom of God, which wrought mightily in the
apostle by the Spirit, in order that he might present every man in a
spiritual state answering to this revelation of Christ, as being also its
fruit. Not that every man would receive it; but there was no longer any
limit. All distinction between them was blotted out, alike by sin and by
grace, and there was but one thing to do; that is, to seek that every man,
by the power of the word and the Spirit, should reflect Christ and grow up
unto the stature of His fullness as revealed in the doctrine committed to
the apostle. He laboured for this according to the working of Christ in
him; for Christ was not only the object, but the power that wrought to form
souls after His own image.
Now this power wrought in the apostle's weakness; in a human heart, that
felt the necessities of men and the difficulties that occurred by the
way-that felt them as a man, although according to God, and was the fruit
of His love. He desired that the Colossians should understand the conflict
he had for them, and for all those who had never seen him, in order that
they might be encouraged and be thoroughly united in love; so that they
might understand, in all the riches of a full assurance, the mystery of
God.
The apostle felt that it was this which they needed and which would be a
blessing to them. He knew that union with Christ, realised in the heart,
was a safeguard from the wiles of the enemy, to which the Colossians were
exposed. He knew the unutterable value of this union, and even of its
realisation by faith. He laboured, he wrestled in prayer-for it is indeed a
conflict-in order that the full sense of this union with the glorious Head
might be wrought in their hearts, so that the Christ on high should be in
them by faith. All the treasures of wisdom and knowledge were found in the
mystery, of which this was to their souls the centre and the power. They
had not to seek elsewhere. Science, falsely so called, might pretend to
furnish them with heights to which the simplicity of the doctrines of
Christ did not reach but in fact the wisdom of God and the depths of His
counsels left these cloudy efforts of the human mind at an infinite
distance. Moreover they were truth -reality-instead of being but the
creatures of imagination inspired by the enemy.
For this reason the apostle had brought forward these marvelous revelations
of God respecting the double glory of Christ, and with regard to His
Person. He declared them in order that no one should beguile the Colossians
with enticing words. He avails himself of the order that existed among
them, and of their faith to guard them against the danger they were in from
these thoughts which might glide unperceived into their minds, while all
was yet going on well, and the consciousness of their faith was not
touched. This often happens. People have faith in Christ, they walk well,
they do not perceive that certain ideas overthrow that faith; they admit
them, while still maintaining the profession of faith together with these
ideas; but the force of the truth and the sense of union with Christ and
the simplicity that is in Him are lost. The enemy has so far attained his
end. That which is received is not the development of Christ, but something
outside Him.
Therefore the apostle says, "As ye have received Christ Jesus the Lord,
walk in him; rooted and built up in him, and confirmed in the faith, even as
ye have been taught." When we have received Christ, all the rest is but a
development of that which He is, and of the glory which the counsels of God
have connected with His Person. Knowledge, or pretended knowledge, outside
this, does but turn us away from Him, withdraw our hearts from the
influence of His glory, throw us into that which is false, and lead our
souls into connection with the creation apart from God, and without
possessing the key to His purposes. Thus, since man is incapable of
fathoming that which exists, and of explaining it to himself, his efforts
to do so cause him to invent a mass of ideas that have no foundation, and
to endeavor to fill up the void that is found in his knowledge through his
ignorance of God by speculations, in which (because he is at a distance
from God) Satan plays the chief part without man's suspecting it.
Man, as a child of Adam, is not at the centre of the immense system of
God's ways. Out of Christ and without Christ, he does not know the centre;
he speculates, without foundation and without end, only to lose himself
more and more. His knowledge of good and evil and the energy of his moral
faculties, do but lead him astray the more, because he employs them on
higher questions than those which simply relate to physical things; and
they produce in him the need of reconciling apparently inconsistent
principles, which cannot be reconciled without Christ. Moreover the
tendency of man is always to make himself, as he is, the centre of
everything; and this renders everything false.
Christians then ought to walk with simplicity in the ways of the Lord, even
as they have received Him; and their progress ought to be in the knowledge
of Christ, the true center and fullness of all things.
When man occupies himself philosophically with all things, the
insufficiency of his own resources always throws him into the hands of an
intellectual leader, and into tradition; and, when religion is the subject,
into traditions which develop the religion of the flesh, and are suited to
its powers and tendencies.
In those days Judaism had the highest pretensions to this kind of religion,
allied itself with human speculations and adopted then, and even pursued
them assiduously; offering at the same time proofs of divine origin, and a
testimony to the unity of the Godhead, which the absence of the grossness
of Pagan mythology and the meeting of human consciousness of the divine
rendered credible. This relative purity tended to remove-for enlightened
minds-that which was disgusting in the Pagan system. The Jewish system had,
by the death of Jesus, lost all pretension to be the true worship of God;
and was therefore suited (by the advantages it offered in the comparative
purity of its dogmas) to be an instrument of Satan in opposing the truth.
At all times it was adapted to the flesh, was founded on the elements of
this world, because by its means, when owned of God, God was proving man in
the position man stood in. But now God was no longer in it; and the Jews,
moved by envy, urged the Gentiles to persecution; and Judaism allied itself
to Pagan speculations, in order to corrupt and sap the foundations of
Christianity, and destroy its testimony.
In principle it is always thus. The flesh may appear for a time to despise
tradition, but that which is purely intellectual cannot stand in the midst
of humanity without something religious. It has not the truth nor the world
which belongs to faith, and for an immense majority superstition and
tradition are needed; that is to say, a religion which the flesh can lay
hold of, and which suits the flesh. God by His power may preserve a portion
of the truth, or allow the whole to be corrupted; but in either case true
christian position and the doctrine of the assembly are lost.
We may indeed find philosophy apart from the religion of the flesh, and the
latter apart from the former; but inthis case philosophy is impotent and
atheistic, the religion of the flesh narrow, legal, superstitious, and, if
it can be so, persecuting.
In our chapter we find philosophy and the emptiness of human wisdom united
with the traditions of men, characteristic as "the elements of this world,"
in opposition to Christ: for we have a heavenly Christ who is a perfect
contrast to the flesh in man living on earth, a Christ in whom is all
wisdom and fullness, and the reality of all that which the law pretended to
give, or which it presented in figure: and who is at the same time an
answer to all our wants. This the apostle develops here, shewing death and
resurrection with Him as the means of participating in it.
And first all the fullness of the Godhead dwells in Him bodily. Instead of
the misty speculations of men and fantastic aeons, we have the fullness of
God bodily, in a real human body, and thus efficaciously for us, in the
Person of Jesus Christ. In the second place we are complete in Him; we need
nothing out of Christ.
On the one side, we have, in Him, God perfectly presented in all His
fullness; on the other side, we possess in Him perfection and completeness
before God. We are wanting in nothing as to our position before God. What a
truth! What a position! God, in His perfect fullness, in Christ as man, we
in Him before God, in the perfection of what He is- in Him who is head of
all principality and power, before which man in his ignorance would incline
to bend the knee! We are in Him, in whom the fullness of the Godhead dwells
as to His Person; in Him, who is above all principality as to His position
and His rights as Christ, man exalted on high.
The apostle then enters into some details of application to demonstrate
that the faithful have all in Christ, viewed according to the position
which He has taken without having anything to seek elsewhere here below.
Circumcision (the divine token of the covenant with the Jews, and of the
putting off the flesh, which was required in order to form part of God's
people) had its reality in Him. By the power of the life which is in Him,
and which is theirs-being made partakers of the efficacy of His
death-Christians account themselves to be dead, and have put off this body
of sin by faith. This is the true circumcision of Christ made without
hands. Circumcision made by hands was but the sign of this putting off the
body of the flesh-the privilege of the Christian in Christ. Having a new
life in Christ, he has efficaciously put off the old man.
We are buried with Christ by baptism (this is its meaning), in which also
we are risen with Him by faith in this operation of the power of God
whereby He was raised from among the dead. Baptism was the sign and
expression of this ;
faith in the operation of God which raised Him, the means by which is
effected in us this marvelous resurrection with Christ into a new state and
scene-this happy death, or rather this precious participation in the death
of Him who has accomplished all for us. And when I say "faith," it is the
power of God's Spirit working in us. But it is the power of God Himself, as
it wrought in Christ, which works in us to give us the new standing in
life. Viewed in connection with our resurrection with Christ it implies-by
the very fact of our receiving it-that we are forgiven perfectly and for
ever. We were under the burden of our sins, and dead in them. This burden
Christ took upon Himself, and died for us, accomplishing what put away our
sins in going down into death. Raised up with Him, inasmuch as partaking of
that life which He possesses as risen from the dead, we have-like Him and
with Him-left all that burden of sin and condemnation behind us with the
death from which we have been delivered. Therefore He says, "Having
forgiven you all trespasses."
Christ, when He arose, left death and the weight of condemnation under
which we were lying, behind Him-we also being raised up with Him. Naturally
God, in thus raising us up from the state in which we were, has not raised
us up to condemn us, or with condemnation attached to this new life, which
is Christ Himself. For He had already borne the condemnation, and satisfied
the justice of God, and died for the putting away of sin, before He
communicated this life to us. God brought us out of death and condemnation
with Christ who had borne it for us. But this is connected with another
aspect of this work of grace, spoken of here, and also in Ephesians, and
even in John 5 and 2 Corinthians 5. He who is alive in sins is dead in them
towards God. If I look at him as alive in them, death must come in and has
come in on the cross. (See Rom. 6) This side is not brought forward in
Ephesians; only death in Romans; in Colossians death and resurrection in
Christ, of which we have spoken. In Ephesians this is not spoken of at all.
We are viewed as dead in sins, dead towards God, and all good is a new
creation according to God's counsels. We are quickened together with Christ
when dead in sins. This also is taken up in Colossians: only it is not
spoken of as a new creation. But in both a new life is given when we are
dead; only Ephesians begins with this in Christ raised and exalted, and by
the same power in us. In Colossians it is introduced as completing what is
taught of the administration of this doctrine of death in baptism and our
resurrection by faith of God's operation in Christ. In Ephesians grace
finds us dead and quickened with Christ. In Colossians it finds us alive in
sins and brings in death and resurrection, and completes this by quickening
with Christ.
All the ordinances likewise, which belonged to the rudiments of this world
and which applied to man in the flesh, and weighed as an insupportable yoke
upon the Jews (and to which they endeavoured to bring others into
subjection), which put the conscience always under the burden of a service
unaccomplished by man, and a righteousness, unsatisfied in God-these
ordinances were blotted out. In them the Jew had put his signature, so to
speak, to his guiltiness; but the obligation was destroyed and nailed to
the cross of Christ. We receive liberty as well as life and pardon.
This is not all. There was, the strength of principalities and powers
against us-the might of spiritual wickedness. Christ has vanquished and
despoiled them on the cross, having triumphed over them in it. All that was
against us He has put aside, in order to introduce us, entirely delivered
from it all, into our new position. It will be seen here, that what the
apostle says of the work of Christ does not go beyond that which He did for
our deliverance, in order to set us in the heavenly places. He speaks (ver.
10) of the rights of Christ, but not as sitting in the heavenly places, nor
as, leading the enemy captive; neither does he speak of us as sitting in
Him in the heavenlies. He has done all that is necessary to bring us into
them; but the Colossians are viewed as on earth though risen, and in danger
at least of losing the sense of the position which was theirs in virtue of
their union with Christ, and were in danger of slipping back into the
elements of the world and of flesh, of the man alive in the flesh, not
dead, not risen with Christ; and the apostle seeks to bring them back to
it, by shewing how Christ had accomplished all that was requisite-had taken
out of the way all that prevented their attaining it. But he cannot speak
of the position itself: they were not consciously in it. In the things of
God we cannot comprehend a position without being in it. God may reveal it.
God may shew us the way to it. The apostle does so here with regard to the
Person of Christ, which alone could bring them back to it; and at the same
time he develops the efficacy of His work in this respect, in order to set
them free from the shackles that kept them back, and to shew them that all
obstacles had been removed. But in detail he has to apply it to the dangers
that beset them rather than to display its glorious results in heaven.
Jewish ordinances were but shadows, Christ is the substance. By bringing in
angels as objects of homage, and thus putting them between themselves and
Christ, they would separate themselves from the Head of the body, who was
above all principalities. The simplicity of christian faith held fast the
Head, from which the whole body directly drew its nourishment and thus
increased with the increase of God. It looked like humility, thus to bring
themselves into relation with angels, as superior and exalted beings who
might serve as mediators. But there were two faults of immense importance
in this apparent humility. First, it really was thorough pride-this
pretension to penetrate into the secrets of heaven of which they were
ignorant. What did they know of any position held by angels, which would
make them the objects of such homage? It was pretending to mount up into
heaven for and by themselves, and to measure their relations with God's
creatures without Christ, and at their own will to connect themselves with
them. Secondly, it was to deny their union with Christ. One with Him, there
could be nothing between Him and them; if there were anything, then they
were dead and twice dead. Besides by this union they were one with Him who
was above the angels. United to Him, they received, as we have seen, a
communication, through all the members of the body, of the treasures of
grace and life which were in the Head. The mutual links between the members
of the body itself were thereby strengthened, and thus the body had its
increase.
Two applications of the doctrine that they are dead with Christ and risen
with Him follow. (Chap. 2:20.) He applies the principle of death to all the
ordinances, and to the asceticism which treated the body as a thing vile in
itself which ought to be rejected; and (chap.3:1) he uses the resurrection
to raise their hearts into a higher sphere and to bring them back to Christ
by looking up; they being dead as regards the old man.
To make these instructions more plain by shewing their connection, we may
remark that the apostle points out the double danger, namely, philosophy,
and human tradition, in contrast with Christ. (Chap. 2:3; see vers. 9-15.)
While identifying us with Christ, he speaks of the bearing of the work of
Christ Himself rather thanof this identification. In verses 16-19 he
applies it first (ver. 16) to subjection to ordinances, that is, to the
Jewish side of their danger; and then (ver. 18) to the Gnostic philosophy,
science falsely so called, which linked itself with Judaism (or to which
Judaism linked itself), reproducing itself under a new form. From verse 20
the apostle applies our death and resurrection with Christ to the same
points, or to the deliverance of the Colossians by raising their thoughts
on high.
But the Colossians are not the only ones who may have been in this danger.
In the main these principles have been the ruin of the church at all times.
They are those of the mystery of iniquity,
which has so much ripened since then, and produced effects so various, and
under such different modifications, on account of other principles which
have also acted, and under the sovereign providence of God. We shall see
the deep, simple, and decisive principle which is involved in it in the
verses that follow.
The verses already quoted, as far as the twentieth, had judged this whole
Judeo-philosophic system from the point of view of Christ's work, of His
resurrection, and of union with Him in His heavenly position.
That which follows judges it after our position. The preceding verses had
demonstrated that the system was false because Christ and His work were
such as is declared in them. The passage we are going to consider shews
that this system is absurd, cannot be applied to us, has no possible
application, because of our position. On the one hand it is a false system,
null and void in all its parts, if Christ is true and is in heaven; and, on
the other hand, it is an absurd system in its application to us, if we are
Christians. And for this reason: it is a system which supposes life in this
world, and relationships to be acquired with God, having their foundation
in that life, while it pretends to mortify flesh; and yet it addresses
itself to persons who, for faith, are dead. The apostle says, that we are
dead to the rudiments of this world, to all the principles on which its
life acts. Why then as though we were still living (alive) in it, as though
we were still alive in this world, do we subject ourselves to ordinances
which have to do with this life, and which suppose its
existence?-ordinances which apply to things which perish in the use of
them, and which have no connection with that which is heavenly and eternal.
They have indeed a semblance of humility and self-denial as regards the
body, but they have no link with heaven, which is the sphere of the new
life -of all its motives, and all its development; and they do not
recognize the honour of the creature, as a creature come out of the hand of
God, which, as such, has always its place and its honour. They put a man in
and under the flesh, while pretending to deliver us from it, and they
separate the believer from Christ by putting angels between the soul and
the heavenly place and blessing; whereas we are united to Christ, who is
above all these powers, and we in Him.
These ordinances had to do with merely corruptible things-were not
connected with the new life, but with man living in his life of flesh on
the earth, to which life the christian is morally dead; and as far as
regarded this life, they did not recognize the body as a creature of God,
as it ought to be recognised.
Thus this system of ordinances had lost Christ, who was their substance. It
was connected with the pride that pretended to penetrate heaven, in order
to put itself in relation with beings whom we do not know in such a manner
as to have any relations with them -pride which in so doing separated from
the Head of the body, Christ, and thus disowned all connection with the
source of life, and with the only true position of the soul before God.
This system falsified equally our position on earth by treating us as
though still alive after the old man, whereas we are dead; and dishonoured
the creature as such, instead of recognizing it as coming from the hand of
God.
That which was a danger to Christians in the apostle's days characterises
Christianity at the present time.
The Christian's position was thus set forth, but in its application thus
far rather to the danger of Christians than to their heavenly privileges.
Thus grace has provided us with all we need, using every privilege, using
the faith of some, giving warnings and instruction above all price, and
turning the faults of others to account.
CHAPTER 3
Now begins the direct exhortations founded on the truth that has been
developed, and adapted to the state in which the Colossians were; that is,
viewed as risen with Christ, but not sitting in heavenly places.
Risen with Christ, they were to set their affections on things above, where
Christ sits at the right hand of God, and not on things on the earth. The
two could not go together. To look, to have one's motives, above and below
at the same time is impossible. Be tempted by things, have to resist them,
we may; but this is not to have them as our object. The reason for this is
however found in our position: we are dead, and our life is hid with Christ
in God. It does not say, "we must die." Man cannot do this by will: we
cannot deny will by will. Nor would the will of the flesh ever do it. If it
acts, it does not abdicate. We are dead: this is the precious comforting
truth with regard to the Christian by virtue of Christ having died for him.
He has received the life of Christ, and all that Christ did for him in that
life belongs to him. Thus he is dead, because Christ died for him. The life
with which the power of temptation, guilt, the attacks of sin, are
connected, exists no longer to faith. By death all that was connected with
it has come to an end. Now that which was connected with the life of the
old man was sin, condemnation, weakness, fear, powerlessness against the
assaults of the enemy-all that is past. We have a life, but it is in
Christ; it is hidden with Him in God. We are not yet manifested in its
glory, as we shall be manifested before the eyes of all in heaven and
earth. Our life is hidden, but safe in its eternal source. It has the
portion of Christ, in whom we possess it. He is hid in God, so also is our
life: when Christ shall appear, we shall also appear with Him.
It will be remarked, that the apostle does not speak here of our union with
Christ, but of our life, of the fact that we are dead, and that our life is
hid with Him in God. He does not speak of the assembly with regard to our
position; he speaks, no doubt, of Christ as being its Head, as to His
personal glory, but not of it as to us. He speaks of us individually. Each
one has his own life in Christ truly, but as his own; it is not union with
other Christians. We have this life in Christ, but it is not here our union
as one body with Him. It is the individual character of the Christian, to
whom Christ, the Head, is everything.
That which is also highly important to observe in connection with this
truth is that in this epistle there is nothing said of the Holy Ghost. The
apostle speaks practically of their love in the Spirit, but in the
instruction of the epistle he does not name Him. Even when he says, "here
is neither Jew, nor Greek," &c., it is in the new man, not because we are
one in Christ. The individual was to cleave to the Head. He was no longer
living in this world; he was dead, and his life hid with Christ in God. But
this was for himself; he was to know it, and hold it fast for himself, as
necessary truth, that he might be preserved from the wiles of the enemy. In
a word, it is life in Christ. Elsewhere we see many of the things which the
apostle here mentions spoken of as the fruit of the Spirit, by which
communion and union are maintained; but here it is simply in the nature of
the life that these fruits have their source. It is quite natural
consequently, that the compass and the assemblage of all spiritual
relationships in one, in Christ, which we find in the divine instruction
when the Holy Ghost is introduced, are wanting here.
In the Epistle to the Ephesians this operation of the Holy Ghost is found
everywhere, and characterises the whole of that which is developed in
communion with the Head, Christ, with whom we are united in one body by the
Spirit. Thus we are individually sealed by the Spirit of promise, the
earnest of our inheritance; we all have access to the Father by one Spirit;
we are also builded together for a habitation of God through the Spirit;
the union of the Gentiles in one body is now revealed by the Spirit; saints
are strengthened by the Spirit in the inner man; there is one body and one
Spirit; we are not to grieve the Spirit; we are to be filled with Him; the
word itself is the sword of the Spirit. The union of the body with Christ,
our resurrection with Him, that we are sitting in the heavenlies in Him-all
that flows from this union, is fully developed; but at the same time the
Holy Ghost, who unites us to Him, and unites us all together as one body,
and who here below characterises the presence of God in the church, who
acts in us, secures our future, and becomes our strength in the present-the
Holy Ghost, I repeat, is found every where, to complete the truth and to
give it its present force for us here below.
Many of the exhortations in the Epistle to the Ephesians are nearly the
same as those to the Colossians. But in the Epistle to the Ephesians they
are connected with the Spirit; in that to the Colossians with the action of
the word and of grace in the heart. This gives an immense range and a
connectedness to the doctrine of the Epistle to the Ephesians, in that
which regards our position here below, because it brings in God Himself,
and as dwelling in us by the Spirit, and filling us, whether as in the
individual or in the oneness of the body; and gives the full scope of the
counsels of God.
Yet the possession of life is in its way as important as the presence and
indwelling of the Holy Ghost. It makes the blessing ourselves, not merely
an operation in us, and, as we have seen, the character of divine life is
far more fully developed; whereas in Ephesians it is more contrast with the
previous state.
In the Epistle to the Romans we have (chap. 8) this action and presence of
the Holy Ghost presented in a very remarkable way as to the individual. He
characterises us vitally in the principle of our resurrection, is the
witness in us that we are children filling us with joy and with the hope of
glory as heirs, the support of our weakness and the source of our petitions
and our groans. In the Epistle to the Romans it is in connection with our
personal relationship to God; in that to the Ephesians, as the presence of
God in us in connection with our union to Christ as one body.
There is another thing to be noticed here which throws light on the purpose
of the Holy Ghost in these epistles. The starting-point in that to the
Ephesians is the counsels of God. Man is looked at as he is, without one
pulse of life as regards God; he is dead in trespasses and sins, by nature
the child of wrath. God is rich in mercy; He raises him up with Christ who
in grace went down into death, and places him according to His counsels in
the same position as that Christ is in. We are His workmanship, created
anew in Christ Jesus. God is pleased to bring us into His presence
according to His own counsels and His nature. It is not said that we are
dead with Christ. Man is not viewed as living in the flesh, so that in one
way or in another he had to die. This was not necessary. The Ephesians were
to apprehend, on the one hand, the full contrast between God and man
according to His counsels; and, on the other, man's sinful state according
to nature. In their epistle all is the work of God Himself according to the
original purpose of His own heart, of His nature, and of His will,
man is already dead, and even Christ is not brought in as to His place till
viewed as dead, and thereon risen and exalted on high.
The Colossians were in danger of subjecting themselves to ordinances, and
thereby were in a position to consider man as living in the world; and the
apostle makes them feel that they are dead with Christ. He was obliged in
grace to follow them where they were, for their danger was to take man into
consideration as living on the earth; in order, nevertheless, to shew that
the Christian had already died with Christ, and his life on earth was as
risen with Him.
In the letter to the Ephesians man is not said to die with Christ. He is
dead in his sins when God begins to act towards him. No man is alive to
God. The Christian is quickened together with Christ, Christ Himself first
viewed as dead.
This character of the Colossians however, the dwelling on life or the new
man, has its value for us all, and a great value, because the life, the new
nature, and grace working in it, are much less brought forward in the
Epistle to the Ephesians, where the subject is the energy of God, who
creates men in Christ and unites them to Him, fills the believer and the
assembly here with the nature and the character of the new man, and thereby
of Christ, yea, of God Himself.
I may add here to that which I have said of the Holy Ghost, that, when the
apostle speaks in Colossians of the power of hope in us, he does not
mention the earnest of the Spirit. It is still in us, the hope of glory.
Throughout it is Christ, and Christ as life.
One might suppose that there was only the Holy Ghost acting in the fullness
of His power, and filling the individual and the assembly. But in this
Epistle to the Colossians we find that there is a new nature, an intrinsic
change, not of the flesh indeed, but of the man. For we are viewed, not
merely as quickened by the Son, but as dead and risen with Christ, the Man
who had died, so as to have passed out of-put off- the old standing of a
child of Adam, and into a risen one with Christ-put on the new man. This is
at once a standing and a state before God, a source of tastes, of
sentiments, of desires, of arguments, and of moral capacities, which are in
connection with the very nature of God, who has caused it to spring up in
theheart. We are renewed in knowledge after the image of Him that created
us. But this source is a life, which needs that the Holy Ghost should
reveal to it the objects that are suited to it, and that awaken these
tastes and feelings, which satisfy them and cause them to grow. It needs
that the Spirit of God should act in it to give it strength; but it is a
real life, a nature which has its tastes attached to its very existence;
which, being enlightened by the Holy Ghost, is conscious of its own
existence; and in which we are the children of God, being born of Him.
Neither is it unimportant that we should learn, with regard to the life of
the flesh, and when thinking of it, although it be on the negative side,
that we are dead; that God recognises nothing belonging to the old man;
that He takes pleasure in a new nature, which is indeed ours by grace, but
which is of God Himself, and which is the moral reflection of His own.
We are dead then, and our life is hid with Christ in God. We have members
on earth-no recognised life; and we have to put to death all these
members
of the old man. The Christian has to deny them practically as belonging to
the old man, while his life is there where Christ is. They bring down the
wrath of God upon the children of disobedience. Christians walked in these
things when they had their life in them; but this is no longer the case:
and they deny not only gross sins, the fruit of positive lusts (chap. 3:5,
6), but all the workings of an unbroken will and an unsubdued heart, every
indication of the actings of the will of that nature which knows not God,
and is not ruled by His fear, all anger and malice and falsehood flowing
from selfishness or the fear of man. (Ver. 8.) Truth reigns in the heart
which has put off the old man, according to the simplicity of the new man,
which is renewed also in knowledge after the image of Him who created it.
(Vers. 9,10.) The new man walks in the light. It is not only that there is
a conscience which judges good and evil according to that which man ought
to be according to his nature as a responsible being; there is a new man
who judges the old man altogether, judging good and evil according to the
knowledge of God. Such is the putting off.
Before Christianity, which is the full revelation of God, there were
indeed, as need not be said, souls born anew; but their rule, when a rule
was definitely given, was man's responsibility (whatever piety and grace
might inspire), and the law, which was the perfect measure of that which
man, as a being responsible to God, ought to be. Saints then did not
distinguish between a new and an old man, although of necessity they had
the conscience of the old man and the tastes of the new in measure in many
respects. The sense, for instance, of the evil of falsehood had not at all
the same place as with the Christian. Now the new man is renewed in
knowledge after the image of Him who created him.
God Himself in His nature is the standard of good and evil, because the new
man has the knowledge of what that nature is: he is made a partaker of it,
and he has the light of God. It is an intelligent participation by grace in
the nature of God, which is the marvelous and precious privilege of the
Christian. God works in this nature; but by communicating it He has placed
man in this position. Christ is the perfect model of this image, the type
of the new man.
Other differences have disappeared: there remains but the old man, which we
only acknowledge as dead, and the new man. To the latter Christ is all; so
that there is none but He whom they see and whom they acknowledge, and He
is in all believers. They put on therefore as such, as elect, holy, beloved
(Christ being their life), the character of Christ, mercies, kindness,
humility, meekness, patience, forbearing one another, and forgiving one
another if offence has been given, even as Christ has done to us.
Finally they put on
love, the bond of perfectness, that which gives a divine character to all
the qualities that have been enumerated, and that were manifested in
Christ, and a divine check on taking amiable nature for divine grace, for
divine love is holy.
And note here, that the putting on of these qualities is in the
consciousness of the blessed place before God expressed in the words "elect
of God, holy and beloved." It is as such. Nor can we do it otherwise. It is
in the sense of this wondrous favour that grace develops itself in our
hearts. So in Ephesians, "as dear children."
Several of these qualities may be resembled by things in nature; but the
energy, the features, the bond of divine love, which acts in the sense of
communion with God, are totally wanting in the latter; and this gives a
character, a completeness, a righteousness of application, a perfection, a
propriety, and an energy to the manifestation of these qualities, which
love alone can give. For it is indeed God Himself who is there, acting in
His nature which He has imparted to us. For He who dwells in love dwells in
God, and God in him. With regard to the state of the soul, there is a crown
to this walk, wherewith they who follow it constantly are adorned. The
peace of Christ reigns in the heart, that sweet and ineffable peace which
nothing could disturb, though His spirit passed through everything to try
it, for He walked ever with God. God has also called us to this; He is the
God of peace. And here the apostle introduces the oneness of the body, not
as to its privileges in Christ, but as to the fact that Christians are
called to be together in the unity of which peace is the seal and the bond.
And then there will be thanksgiving; for the soul is conscious of the love
and the activity of God, and everything flows to it from that love.
But, besides peace and thanksgiving towards God, there is the development
of life in the knowledge of what is revealed, its food and joy. This too is
enjoyed in the activity of life and love towards others. The enjoyment of
God and of that which is in His presence leads to this activity of the
soul. When the latter is real, it is the joyful liberty of a nature that is
itself in health, the activity of love that is natural to it, and which
receives its energy from communion with God, according to His nature. The
word of Christ unfolds all that is revealed to the soul as that in which it
lives, and in which it expands itself, and is thus the rule, and active and
directing power, because it is the expression of that nature, and the
revelation of all its ways, and of its active energy in love in Him.
The apostle therefore exhorts that the word of Christ may dwell in them
richly. This is the development, according to the perfection of God, of the
new man, and the wisdom of God to form and direct him. Paul desires that
Christians may fully realise this. It is by communion with the Lord,
holding intercourse with Him, that it is done. The word being that in which
the wisdom is found; also according to this development the saints can
teach and admonish each other.
But in this case it is not only wisdom that we learn, and that is displayed
in us, but affections in connection with Him in whom we have found this
wisdom, so that these expressions of the life of Christ, as true wisdom in
the world, find their voice in our hearts in praise, in thanksgiving, in
singing His excellency. All the intimate affections in which spiritual life
develops itself express themselves, according to what we have learned: they
flow from the Spirit of Christ, and are the expression of the soul's
connection with Him and of the feelings this produces in the heart. Christ
in His Person, in the consciousness of His presence, as the object of our
thoughts, and in the moral fruits proceeding thence, sustains the
intercourse and the communications of the soul that is occupied with His
praises.
But this consciousness of relationship with Christ, in the life which is of
Him in us, applies to everything. Nothing is done without Him. If He is the
life, all which that life does has Him for its end and object, as far as
the heart is concerned. He is present as that which is the governing
motive, and gives its character to our actions, and which preoccupies our
heart in performing them. Everything relates to Him: we do not eat without
Him; (how can we when He is our very life?) we do not drink with out Him;
what we say, what we do, is said and done in the name of the Lord Jesus.
There is the sense of His presence; the consciousness that everything
relates to Him, that we can do nothing-unless carnally-with out Him,
because the life which we have of Him acts with Him and in Him, does not
separate from Him, and has Him for its aim in all things, even as water
rises to the height from which it descended. This is what characterises the
life of the Christian. And what a life! Through Him, dwelling in the
consciousness of divine love, we give thanks to our God and Father.
Observe here that the christian life is not only characterised by certain
subjective qualities which flow from Christ, but by its having Christ
Himself for the aim and object of the heart and mind in all that we do in
every respect. Christ personally reigns in, and is pleasant to, the heart
in everything.
To the inexperienced eye of man nature is often confounded with grace; but
the intelligent consciousness of Christ as the heart's object, of His
presence, of the seal of His approval when one thinks of Him cannot be
confounded with anything. There is nothing, that resembles it, nothing that
can appear to take its place. When He reveals Himself to our heart, and the
heart walks with Him, and communes with Him in all things, and seeks only
the light of His countenance, the seal of His favour on the soul in all
things, then He is known, well known. There is none but He who thus
communicates Himself to the soul when it walks in the way of His will, as
expressed in the word.
After these great and important principles of the new life the apostle
enters into the diverse relation ships of life, giving warnings against
that which would endanger them, by shewing what the christian character of
each one of them is. To the wife, obedience-affection was natural to her.
"Thy desire shall be to thy husband." To the husband, affection and
kindness-his heart may be indifferent and hard. Children are to be
obedient; fathers, gentle, in order that the children's affections may not
be estranged from them, and that they may not be induced to seek that
happiness in the world which they ought to find in the sanctuary of the
domestic circle, which God has formed as a safeguard for those who are
growing up in weakness; the precious home (if Christ is acknowledged) of
kind affections, in which the heart is trained in the ties which God
Himself has formed; and that in connection with the Lord, and which, by
cherishing the affections, preserves from the passions and from self-will;
and which, where its strength is rightly developed, has a power that, in
spite of sin and disorder, awakens the conscience and engages the heart,
keeping it away from evil and the direct power of Satan. For it is God's
appointment.
I know indeed that another power is required to deliver the heart from sin
and to keep it from sin. Nature, even as God created it, does not give
eternal life, nor does it restore innocence or purify the conscience. We
may, by the energy of the Spirit, consecrate ourselves to God outside these
relationships, renounce them even, if God should call us by more powerful
obligations, as Christ teaches us in the gospel. The rights of Christ over
man lost by sin are sovereign, absolute, and complete. He has redeemed him;
and the redeemed one is no longer his own, but belongs to Him who gave
Himself for him. Where relationships exist, sin indeed has perverted every
thing, and corrupted the will; passions come in; but the relationships
themselves are of God: woe to him who despises them as such! If grace has
wrought and the new life exists, it acknowledges that which God has formed.
It well knows that there is no good in man, it knows that sin has marred
everything, but that which sin has marred is not itself sin. And where
these relationships exist, the renunciation of self-will, death to sin, the
bringing in of Christ, the operation of life in Him, restore their power;
and if they cannot give back the character of innocence (lost for ever),
they can make them a scene for the operations of grace, in which meekness,
tenderness, mutual help, and self-denial, in the midst of the difficulties
and sorrows which sin has introduced, lend them a charm and a depth (even
as Christ did in every relationship) which innocence itself could not have
presented. It is grace acting in the life of Christ in us which develops
itself in them.
To be without natural affection is a sin of hopeless apostacy and
estrangement from God, of the complete selfishness of the last days.
I am not drawing a false picture, or speaking poetically, as though the
bright side were all; I only say that God has formed these relationships,
and that whosoever fears God will respect them. Grace is requisite. They
give occasion, through their intimacy itself, to all that is most painful,
if grace do not act in them. The apostle warns us here of this danger. If
the Lord is the bond in them, if our still closer union with Him forms the
strength of our natural relationships, then grace reigns here as elsewhere;
and, to those who stand in these relationships, they become a scene for the
lovely display of the life of Christ.
CHAPTER 4
It will be observed how the apostle consequently introduces Christ into
them, and especially in regard to those who are subject in them, wives and
children; in order to sanctify, by so exalted a motive, the obediencesuited
to their position. He does this still more where the tie is not of nature
but one which has its origin in a sinful world-and from sin itself-that
between slaves and their masters. Grace does not set itself to change the
state of the world and of society, but to lead souls to heaven by renewing
them after the image of God. I doubt not that it has very much altered for
the better the social condition of man; because, through bringing the
conscience immediately before the only true God whom it has revealed in His
own perfections, and establishing by its authority that of the natural
relationships in the human family, grace has had its effect upon that
conscience even where the heart was not converted, and has furnished it
with a rule in that which regards morality. But Christianity, as to its own
doctrine, treats the world as alienated from God, and lying in evil-man as
the child of wrath, and lost.
Christ, the Son of God (who if He had been received could have put all
things right, and who will hereafter by His kingdom establish righteousness
and peace), was rejected by the world, and the friendship of the world is
enmity against God. The state of man is treated in the gospel in a deeper
way than in regard to his social condition. It is viewed with reference to
the soul's connection with God, and consequently with that which is
eternal. God imparts a new life unto us, in order that we may enjoy those
new relationships with Himself which redemption has gained for us. Now as
Christ, while living, was the expression of the love and the omnipotent
goodness of God in the midst of a fallen creation, so, being now rejected
by the world (which thus condemned itself), Christ, who dwells by His grace
in the heart of one who has received life, becomes to that heart a source
of happiness in communion with the love of God, which lifts it up and sets
it above circumstances, be they what they may. The slave, in possessing
Christ, is free in heart; he is the freed man of God Himself. The master
knows that he himself has a Master, and the relationship in which he finds
himself takes the form of the grace and love that reigns in the heart of
him who in it exercises his authority.
But, as I have said, to the poor slave Christ is especially presented as a
resource. He may serve his master, whether a good or bad one, with
faithfulness, meekness, and devotedness; because in so doing he serves the
Lord Himself, and is conscious that he does so. He will have his reward
there where nothing is forgotten that is done to glorify Christ, and where
masters and slaves are all before Him who has no respect of persons.
Two principles act in the heart of the Christian slave: his conscience in
all his conduct is before God; the fear of God governs him, and not his
master's eye. And he is conscious of his relationship to Christ, of the
presence of Christ, which sustains and lifts him above everything. It is a
secret which nothing can take from him, and which has power over everything
because it is within and on high-Christ in him, the hope of glory. Yes, how
admirably does the know ledge of Christ exalt everything that it pervades;
and with what consoling power does it descend into all that is desolate and
cast down, all that groans, all that is humbled in this world of sin!
Three times in these two verses, while holding their conscience in the
presence of God the apostle brings in the Lord, the Lord Christ, to fill
the hearts of these poor slaves, and make them feel who it was to whom they
rendered service. Such is Christianity.
The apostle ends his epistle with some important general exhortations.
He desires that the saints should continue through prayer in communion with
God, and in the sense of their dependence on Him, conscious of His nearness
to them, and of His readiness to hear them. For that which speaks to the
heart for our walk is not enough; the soul must know it's own relations
with God exercising itself in those relations; and it must receive directly
from Him that which assures it of His love. There must be perseverance in
this. We are in conflict with evil, which has a hold upon our own hearts if
we are without the strength of God. We must therefore commune with God. We
must watch therein with settled purpose of heart, not merely as an
occasional thing: any one can cry out when he is in need. But the heart
separated from the world and all that is of it occupies itself with God,
with all that regards the glory of His name, according to the measure in
which we are concerned in it. The conflict is carried on with a tender and
freed spirit, having only His glory as the object, both in the assembly and
in the individual walk. But thus one understands that God works and that He
does not forsake us, and thanksgiving is always mingled with the prayers we
address to Him.
Paul felt his dependence on this blessing, and he asked for a share also in
their prayers, that God might open his mouth, and that he might proclaim
the gospel as he ought to do.
Now we are in a hostile world, in which hostility is easily awakened where
it does not already exist openly, and in which offence is quickly taken at
things wherein perhaps we neither saw nor intended evil. We must take away
the occasion even from those that seek it, and walk in wisdom with respect
to them that are without.
How clearly the within and the without are here distinguished! Those
within, whom God acknowledges, His family, His assembly-they are His own.
Those without, they are the world, those who are not joined to the Lord.
The distinction is plainly marked, but love is active towards them that are
without, and, being itself in the enjoyment of communion with God, it is
careful to do nothing that might prevent others from enjoying it.
But there was something more: they were to redeem the time. The natural
man, taken up with his own affairs, and disinclined to serious things, gave
Christian love little opportunity to set grace and truth before him and
make him care for his own soul, thus serving the Lord and using time in His
name. The heart of man cannot always escape the influence of surrounding
circumstances, which bear witness to his heart and conscience that he is
under the dominion of sin, and already eating its bitter fruits here below-
circumstances which bring to his conscience the remembrance of a too-much
forgotten God, which speak with the mighty voice of sorrow to a broken
heart, glad at least to have a resource in God when his hand is pierced by
the broken reed on which he leaned. God Himself acts upon man by these
circumstances, and by every circumstance of life. One who is walking with
the Lord knows how to avail himself of them. Satan may indeed deceive a
man, but he cannot prevent God at all times from speaking to the heart. It
is a happy thing so to walk with God that He can use us as His voice, when
He would thus speak to poor sinners. Our speech ought always to be the
expression of the separation from evil, this power of the presence of God
which keeps us inwardly apart from it, so as to make that power felt by
others; and that, in all the questionings which arise in the heart of man,
wandering out of the way in confusion and darkness, and even leading others
astray thereby, we may know how to give an answer which comes from the
light and conveys light.
Tychicus was to carry the testimony of the interest which the apostle took
in the welfare of the Colossians, and of his confidence in their interest
in him, Paul bears witness to the love of others, and to their concern also
in the progress of the gospel and the prosperity of the faithful.
Marcus, who had formerly drawn back from the toils of the work, receives a
testimony here on the apostle's part and a still better one later (2 Tim
4:11), forhe had made himself useful to the apostles himself. Such is
grace, The secret of the interest Barnabas took in him comes out here: he
was nearly related to him, This dear servant of God was from Cyprus too. He
went there and took Mark with him, The flesh and Judaism find their way
everywhere. The poser of the Spirit of God is requisite to raise us above,
and set us beyond, their influence.
Demas receives no especial testimony. The apostle conveys his greetings,
but is silent as to himself. Only in the Epistle to Philemon is he named as
a fellow-laborer of the apostle. Afterwards he forsook Paul. He was a
brother: the apostles admits his claim but says nothing; had had nothing to
say. "And Demas," for Paul's style is terribly cold.
We may observe that the Epistle to the Ephesians was written at the same
time, and sent by this same Tychicus. The one "from Laodecia" is, I doubt
not, one that they were to receive from that assembly, written by Paul, and
by which the saints at Colosse were to profit; possibly the Epistle to the
Ephesians, which he may have had communicated to the Laodiceans. Be this as
it may, all that is said is that it was one of which the assembly at
Laodicea were in possession and by no means that it was directly addressed
to them; rather the contrary. It is very possible that a letter, or a
hundred letters, may have been written by Paul to others, which it was not
in the purposes of God to preserve for the universal assembly: but here
there is no proof that a letter had been written to the Laodecians.
Tychicus was the bearer of two; he may have been the bearer of three, one
of which differed only in some details of application which might serve to
confirm the Colossians without being in the main another Divine
communication for other days; but, I repeat, it does not appear to be so
from that which is said here. It might be said, a letter "from Laodicea,"
because it was there instead of a letter to Laodicea; but it is not the
usual mode of expression. We have seen that the letter to the Ephesians is
another communication of the Spirit of God. It has been preserved for us.
We do not know whether that from Laodicea was the same communicated by them
to the Christians of that city; or another, which they were to send to the
Colossians (an assembly in their vicinity), and which-adding nothing to the
divine relations-has not been preserved for us.
It appears that Christians were not very numerous at Laodicea. The apostle
salutes the brethren there. There were some who assembled in the house of
one Nymphas; they were not in a case to have a letter addressed to them in
particular: still the apostle does not forget them. But that which he says
here is an almost certain proof that the apostle had not addressed any
epistle to them. He would not have sent greetings through the Colossians to
the brethren in Laodicea, if at the same time he had written a special
epistle to the latter. The case is plain enough: there were brethren at
Laodicea, but not in great numbers and not in that distinct position which
gave rise to an epistle. But this little assembly in the house of Nymphas
was not to be forgotten; it should profit by the epistles addressed to
other assemblies more considerable than itself, and whose condition
required an epistle, or gave occasion to write one, which epistles were
transmitted to Laodicea, according to the apostle's order.
With regard to the Epistle to the Colossians, it is not a supposition. The
apostle commands them expressly to have it read in the assembly at
Laodicea. The latter had also received another epistle from some other
assembly, and the Colossians were to profit by it in the same manner. The
two assemblies, which were near each other, were mutually to enjoy the
spiritual favors that were granted them.
The apostle does not forget individuals even. Archippus receives a solemn
exhortation to take heed to the ministry which the Lord had committed to
him, and to fulfill his service.
The apostle had not seen these assemblies. (Chap 2:1)
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