"you Want Me To Do What?" - 2004-08-01

“You Want Me To Do What?” August 1, 2004 By John M. Partridge Scripture Reading: Colossians 3:1-11 Our reading today comes from Paul’s letter to the Christians at Colosse. Colosse was a small and relatively unimportant city that was about 100 miles east of Ephesus and was evangelized about the same time as Paul’s mission to Ephesus. We sometimes hear of another missionary in this region known as Epaphras. Epaphras a native of Colosse and was likely brought to Christ during Paul’s first visit there. This letter was written when Epaphras visited Paul while Paul was a prisoner in Rome (most likely during Paul’s first Roman imprisonment), and told him of what was happening at the churches back home. Although it is never named, it is apparent that some type of heresy was being preached. Now we hear the word heresy bandied about from time to time but I’m sure some of us are kind of fuzzy on exactly what it means. Simply put, heresy is teaching that departs from scripture or teaching that was anti-Christian. The specific heresy is never really named in the letter to the Colossians, but from the teaching that was contained in the letter scholars are pretty sure that some brand of legalism was being taught. This could also be thought of as some type of “works gospel”, and what I mean by that is someone was teaching the words of Jesus and his saving grace and atonement for sin but was also preaching that in order to attain Jesus grace you had to do some list of stuff and then you could be saved. That is heresy. That is not what Jesus preached, nor any of his followers. In this letter to the Colossians, Paul warns them to be on their guard against false teachers and rejects contrary teaching that is presented as traditional. Paul argues that the traditions and teachings of men are a human invention and cannot be set over the teachings of Christ. Paul goes on to tear down several other wrong teachings that had been circulating and encourages the church to put the past, and their past sinful behavior, behind them and to pursue Christ and the way of righteousness. Our passage today is right at the end of all that. In today’s passage, Paul begins in kind of the same place as when you stand in front of a big map. You know what I mean, one of those big maps at the mall or at a state park or hiking trail. There is a big map and some where on the map is a red arrow with large print that says “You Are Here”. That is where we begin our passage today. Paul starts chapter three with a fairly basic statement, if you are a Christian, “if you have been raised with Christ”, then this is where you should be. Paul says that we must “seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.” Our focus must be directed toward pursuing heavenly things and more than that, Godly things. We must seek the things that please God and we must not pursue the things that are on earth. Paul then explains you have died. Please don’t misunderstand this to mean, “When you have died,” because there is an important difference. Paul says, “for you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.” “For you have died,” that means, because you have died, present tense. You see this refers to what the readers would have already understood about what we would call substitutionary atonement. Whoa! Well, OK. Most of us wouldn’t call it substitutionary atonement; most of us would call it Jesus payment of our debt. What Paul means when 1

he says that you have died, is that because of your sins, because of the things that you have already done wrong, you have already been convicted, found guilty, and convicted… to death. Jesus however, has taken your sins, past, present, and future, upon himself and served your death sentence for you. Having done so, you have already died and your life now belongs to Jesus and your life is kept with him, Paul says it is hidden with Christ, so that neither Satan nor anyone else can harm you. You are also hidden in the sense of verse four, that physically, here on earth, you don’t look any different than before you were a Christian. But, when we get to glory, when we get to heaven, your new nature and your new body will be revealed for everyone to see. In the next section, starting with verse five, Paul instructs us on what we are to do now that he has reminded us about who we are and where we are on the big map. Once you know where you are, then you must normally decide which direction you need to go, and Paul obliges us. Paul teaches that we are to put away forever, or put to death, everything that is earthly. And Just in case you weren’t sure what sorts of things are earthly, Paul is kind enough to provide a list. Put away fornication, Okay that’s not too difficult to understand, fornication is sex before marriage, don’t do that. Put away impurity. What does that mean? If your drinking water is impure, what does that mean? It means that some tiny bit of something that doesn’t belong, some tiny bit of corruption, has gotten in. So to put away or to put to death impurity means that we need to stop doing anything, even a little bit, that is less than what God wants. That means, no foul language, no pornography, no movies that show things we shouldn’t see, no outfits that cause members of the opposite sex to - unavoidably - think the wrong things. I didn’t say this was an easy teaching did I? Paul tells us that we are to avoid all of the things that would corrupt us even a little bit. How would you feel if someone told you that they had put just a little bit of poison in your drinking water? Poison is poison and even a little bit is too much. Paul then by saying that we must put to death impurity, means that we cannot tolerate even “just a little bit” of these things that make us impure. Let’s continue. Put away passion. Now wait a minute, can’t passion have a good meaning? Yes it can. Look at the list so far; it all has to do with sex or something like it that is outside of the biblical or scriptural model. The same is true with passion. You passion for your work or your hobbies is a good thing. So is your passion for your husband or your wife. A passion for Christ is a thing that we would try to have, but a passion for things you shouldn’t have, or for your neighbors wife, or your neighbors Lexus, or even your neighbors lawn tractor, these are not good things and we need to put them all away. Put away evil desire. Golly, none of us would want to have something that is evil would we? Well, maybe. Have you ever caught yourself daydreaming about that gorgeous babe on Baywatch or the girls in the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue? How about that hunky actor on the daytime soap operas or the one that’s always shirtless in the movies? Do you

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ever want to have them for yourself? Evil desire. There’s a dangerous step between admiration and lust, and they are just a little bitty baby step apart. Put away greed. Now, those of you who are movie fan’s will recall a fairly famous scene in the movie “Wall Street” where the main character played by Michel Douglas tells his students that “Greed is good.” He goes on to explain that greed is the engine which drives commerce and is what built capitalism and what made America great. Nonsense. The desire to do better, to be better, the desire to improve yourself, to be the very best at something, these things are not greed. Greed is when you desire more for the sake of having more, greed wants to have more without putting in the work necessary to get more. Greed is a condition of the heart. When the heart wants something so badly that it no longer cares how it is gotten or who is hurt, that is greed. Have you ever bought a lottery ticket just because you really just wanted to give a couple of dollars to your local school system? Or did you do it because you wanted to get rich the easy way? Did you know that most of the money in the lottery system comes from the poorest people in the state? The very people who can afford to lose money the least? Did you care who was hurt? Have you played at the Indian casinos because you just wanted to make a better life for the underprivileged Native Americans that have been treated so badly by the American government in the past? Or did you do because you wanted to get rich with out working for it? Greed. In fact, this is so serious that Paul identifies greed as idolatry. He doesn’t say that it is like idolatry; he says that it is idolatry. When you want something that badly deep in your heart, you are worshiping an idol. You have put money or something else ahead of you worship of God himself. Be very, very careful. Put greed away, put it to death. Put these things away because in verse six Paul says that it is because of these things that God’s wrath, his holy anger, is coming against those who disobey. I don’t know about you, but one thing I don’t want coming after me is an angry God. Paul says that these are the ways you used to live, the ways that you once followed, when you used to live that life. But now you must get rid of all such things. Now comes another list, but this one is a little easier to understand. Get rid of anger. Does that mean you can’t ever be angry? No. It means that you must never allow anger to gain control of you. If some nut cut you off in traffic, can you be angry? I think, yes. But does that mean you can catch up to him and swear at him or get in front and cut him off, or pull out a pistol and take shots at him? Uh, no. Don’t let your anger control you. Also look at what you are angry about. Are you allowed to be angry about the store down the street going out of business? Probably not. But are you allowed to be angry that God is being systematically thrown out of every public place in America or that His name is regularly maligned and His word twisted by every Tom, Dick and Larry that wants to make a political point? Yes, you can be angry about that. Be angry enough to do something about it. Can you be angry when the very people charged with their safe custody abuse the children in their care? Yes, you can be angry about that. Jesus didn’t put a whooping on the entire temple guard and throw out all of the moneychangers because he had a bad day. God’s temple, his house, was being misused and the poor were being abused and taken advantage of, and Jesus was angry. Angry enough to do something about it. But if you know the story, Jesus was very

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deliberate. He was not impulsive. He took the time to sit on a hillside and weave a whip and then went to the temple and raised a ruckus. Today we would say that it was premeditated. Planned in advance. Jesus didn’t lash out, he allowed his anger to put a stop to injustice. Don’t let your anger control you, but allow yourself to be angry over the things that make God angry. Get rid of wrath. That would be revenge or retaliation. Remember that in Romans 12:17 Paul tells us not to repay evil for evil and in verse 12:19 “Do not take revenge my friends, but leave room for God’s wrath, for it is written, “It is mine to avenge; I will repay,” says the Lord.” Get rid of malice. Malice here means ill will, or acting out of spite. Don’t do things just because you don’t like somebody or because you are in a bad mood. Get rid of slander. Don’t talk bad about other people. Does that sound like gossip to you? Quit. Get rid of abusive language from your mouth. Who me? Please note this doesn’t just say swearing. Although I am certain that swearing would qualify as abusive language, how about talking down to others. Or put down jokes between friends, or telling your children or your employees that they don’t measure up. Evaluation you say? Or was that abusive? Take very special care. Find a way to say what you need to say in a love and not in a way that hurts others. Do not lie to one another. Ouch. We don’t lie do we? Oh yes we do, in a thousand little ways we don’t even think about. Do we promise to come to meetings and then find something more important to do? Do you commit to helping out on a church project and then call at the last minute and beg off after its too late to find a replacement for you? Do you tell others that you tithe, and you don’t? Knock it off. You’re not fooling anyone anyways. If you say you will, do it. If you don’t do it, don’t say that you do. Don’t lie. Be people of integrity. Why? Because, Paul says, “you have stripped off the old self with its practices…” that is who you used to be, but you have taken that off, you have gotten rid of it. You “have clothed yourselves with the new self…” you have put on new clothes, you changed sides and have put on the uniform of your new team. Paul says that your new self “is being renewed in knowledge according to the image of its creator.” That means that your new self, your new Christian self, is being rebuilt, piece-by-piece, to look more and more like the one who made you. You are looking more and more like Jesus. “In that renewal” Paul says, our new rebuilt Jesus looking selves no longer have the differences we used to see. Paul calls together a list of opposites that will be no more when we look like Jesus. No more Jew or Greek, culturally and religiously you couldn’t get much more different than these two groups. No more circumcised and uncircumcised, these are the people that represent those under the old mosaic covenant, under the old Jewish laws and the people outside. No more barbarian or Scythian. Here Paul’s list is a little different. Barbarians were cultureless people from anyplace but particularly from some of the

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nomadic tribes and the Scythians were the people from the edge of the known world, the barbarians barbarian, both of these groups would be in sharp contrast to the Jews and the Greeks who while very different, both had a highly developed culture and system of laws. No more slave and free. This difference is obvious to us given our cultures history of slavery and a war to put slavery behind us, but what would this list look like today? No more black and white, no more rich and poor, Democrat and Republican, city people and country people, no more Baptist and Methodist, or Lutheran and Catholic or whatever. All these differences are gone because we have been remade. Now Christ is our all in all. Christ is all and in all. Is Christ your all in all? Have you put these things behind you, have you put them to death in your life? Have you gotten rid of all the evil things we talked about today? Are you being rebuilt in Christ’s image? Are you allowing Jesus to work on your heart to make it more like His? Is Christ your all in all? Is he all that matters to you? Do you recognize your brothers and sisters in Christ that look different but who are also being rebuilt to look like Jesus? It’s hard. In fact it’s too hard. It’s too hard a thing for you to do at all. Open your heart today and let Jesus do the work of rebuilding your heart.

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