Nourished (Colossians 2:11-19)

August 8, 2020

Colossians 2:9--10 (ESV) --- 9 For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, 10 and you have been filled in him, who is the head of all rule and authority.

What words of assurance! Paul tells us that Jesus is all the fullness of God. I heard an illustration from a sermon this week that I consider appropriate. As we look at the seemingly infinite amount of water in the ocean, we cannot imagine all of that water being contained in a single jar. This text tells us that the infinite glory of God was found in Jesus. Somehow Jesus contained the whole fullness of God in a human body. Then, he said something even more amazing. He says, "You have been filled in him." How is that possible? When we come to Jesus, we are supposed to find the fullness of God in our bodies. But when we look at ourselves, we might think, "How can God fill us when we are so full of sin?" I still struggle with all kinds of sins and fall short every day. This letter addresses the struggle with sin for these new Colossian Christians in the next verses. This morning, we will learn more about how God has filled us through Christ. Paul will show us four illustrations that explain in further detail how God has done that for us in Christ.

1. Circumcised? (11)

Colossians 2:11 (ESV) --- 11 In him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ,

After telling us that we have been filled with Christ, he tells us that we were circumcised in Christ. If you are a Christian, you remember receiving Christ. Did any of you schedule an appointment with the doctor and ask him to circumcise you? Circumcision is a sign for all of Abraham's male descendants whom God was in a covenant relationship with in Genesis 17. Circumcision was the sign of the covenant between God and Abraham. Their covenant was very simple. Abraham is circumcised along with his whole house, and God would provide Abraham's descendants with the promises.

Genesis 17:9--14 (ESV) --- 9 And God said to Abraham, “As for you, you shall keep my covenant, you and your offspring after you throughout their generations. 10 This is my covenant, which you shall keep, between me and you and your offspring after you: Every male among you shall be circumcised. 11 You shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskins, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you. 12 He who is eight days old among you shall be circumcised. Every male throughout your generations, whether born in your house or bought with your money from any foreigner who is not of your offspring, 13 both he who is born in your house and he who is bought with your money, shall surely be circumcised. So shall my covenant be in your flesh an everlasting covenant. 14 Any uncircumcised male who is not circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin shall be cut off from his people; he has broken my covenant.”

So why does Paul bring up circumcision here? Does he require the Colossians to keep this Old Testament law, to be circumcised? Look closer and see that he says, "You were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands." This is a different kind of circumcision than Abraham's. He says, "By putting off the body of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ." So instead of cutting off foreskin of every male, Christ cut off the body of flesh. This is not speaking about physical surgery, but spiritual surgery. Does this make sense? We can't be filled with Christ until our fleshly body is removed because God requires a spiritual circumcision for their to be a covenant relationship.

What does that mean? All that was fleshly, earthly, and sinful inside us must be removed through a spiritual surgery. If we don't let God remove that, we are not in covenant with our God. This is similar to what God told Israel to do on their own in Deuteronomy 10. They were commanded to circumcise their own hearts.

Deuteronomy 10:14--16 (ESV) --- 14 Behold, to the Lord your God belong heaven and the heaven of heavens, the earth with all that is in it. 15 Yet the Lord set his heart in love on your fathers and chose their offspring after them, you above all peoples, as you are this day. 16 Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no longer stubborn.

Israel was circumcised physically, but they needed more than that. They needed circumcised hearts. But, as time goes on, we see that they could not do it. In Jeremiah 4:4, God tells them to cut off the foreskin of their heart. They have put up a wall of protection around their heart and would not let it be changed. In Ezekiel 36, we see that God promises to do it for us.

Ezekiel 36:26--27 (ESV) --- 26 And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. 27 And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.

Abraham's circumcision was also a shadow of what God was going to do under the new covenant. God was going to remove the evil hearts inside of us, and replace them with good hearts that are willing to change and be careful to obey God’s rules. Doesn't that sound awesome? Think of all that is evil inside of you being cut away.

This is called circumcision in Christ. Circumcisions were a sign of the covenant relationship between God and Abraham's descendants. It was kind of like the rings we give each other in marriage. The Jews in the first century would force non-Jewish Christians to be physically circumcised, but Paul lets these non-Jewish Christians know that they have received a spiritual circumcision in Christ. There is no need to be physically circumcised. The command on Abraham’s descendants was just a shadow of this true circumcision. The Colossians are in a covenant relationship with God through their spiritual circumcision.

Now, maybe some of you are curious about this. Have all of us been circumcised? When did Christ perform this operation on us? The next verses continue this discussion.

2. Resurrected (12-13)

Colossians 2:12--13 (ESV) --- 12 having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised him from the dead. 13 And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses,

Paul seems to change topics. He goes from talking about a spiritual circumcision to burial and resurrection. Not only are we circumcised, but we are also buried and raised with Christ. Notice that he explains when this resurrection happens, "Having been buried with him in baptism."

What is baptism, and why would anyone be baptized? Baptism is a burial and a resurrection which ties us to Christ's burial and resurrection. We die with Christ as we go under the water, and we are raised with Christ “through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised him from the dead.” Notice that baptism is not about us doing a work. It is about God working in us to bring us from spiritual death to life. We have faith that God is working in our baptism. We are not the ones doing the work, as many believe today.

Doesn't this go against all of the philosophies of men about baptism? How many of us have heard that baptism is a work that we do after being saved? I was told at age twelve that baptism was unnecessary. I was told that I didn't need to be baptized. But Paul talks about baptism as a work of God, not a work of man. Some people see this and conclude that this is referring to spiritual baptism. This text is loaded with metaphors, but the metaphors are describing what God is doing when we are physically baptized. Don't you see that the physical act of being baptized is connected to two spiritual events? The physical act of baptism is not meaningless. It is a spiritual event. Someone might have told you the gospel, and it made you feel all warm and tingly inside when you believed it. People say that feeling is the baptism of the Holy Spirit, but that's not Biblical. It does not say that a warm and tingling sensation is the baptism of the Holy Spirit or the confirmation that God has saved you. The confirmation of God saving you happens when we rise out of the waters of baptism.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that baptism alone saves you. That is how someone could make an argument that we are teaching works salvation. Baptism is joined with faith in this text. Baptism is where we have faith that God works to remove our sins. We have to be put under to get a heart transplant!

At that moment, we go from being an uncircumcised person to being part of the circumcision. They are card carrying members of God’s covenant family. Also at that moment, we go from being spiritually dead to God making us spiritually alive because we are made alive together with Christ. Paul wants the Colossians to know that God has filled them with what they need by circumcising their hearts through a spiritual circumcision (without hands), and God raised them from the dead (making them alive together with Christ through faith in his powerful working).

3. Debt Free (14-15)

Colossians 2:13--14 (ESV) --- 13 And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, 14 by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross.

Again we see the word "having." God circumcised us without hands, he resurrected us from our deadness through faith in the powerful working of God in our baptism, and he has nailed our trespasses to the cross. Now we have another picture. He takes a record of our indebtedness and sets it aside, nailing it to the cross.

Imagine a listing of all your sins since the moment you became accountable for them. Every sin makes us indebted to God, and we need to atone for that sin to be free. If we are self-aware, we know that the list of sins is greater than we can ever pay off. We lived two years debt-free while we were in West Palm. It felt great not to have debt, but now we have a mortgage and a car payment. That's a weight and a responsibility that we cannot get out of unless we sell our property. We are bound to pay this debt off. Imagine the government fined you for breaking the law, and the fine was so huge that no amount of selling things or work you could do in your life would pay off the debt. How much debt does one sin accrue? Paul says in Romans that the wages of sin are death. This is the same thing God said in the garden of Eden, "On the day you eat of it, you will surely die." But what does God do with the record of sins that deserve death? Instead of killing them, he atones for them. He forgives them by nailing those sins to the cross.

Isn't that a graphic image? The cross is an instrument of death, but God put our IOU's on that cross and forgave them. The sacrifice of Jesus has paid for all of our sins, but Paul is making a statement by saying it this way. If anyone wants to collect on the debt they owe, God has circumcised them, resurrected them, and given them new life in Christ, they can find all of our sins nailed to Christ's cross. What a statement! This leads us into our fourth illustration that is really over all the others.

4. Jesus Is In Control

The fourth image Paul uses throughout his section is that we are the body, and Jesus is our head. First, go back to verse 10.

Colossians 2:10 (ESV) --- 10 and you have been filled in him, who is the head of all rule and authority.

The second half of verse 10 reassures us by saying that Jesus is the head of all rule and authority. No ruler can stand against him. Now, look at verse 15.

Colossians 2:15 (ESV) --- 15 He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in him.

As the ruler, he disarms all of those who are ready to put us to death. He put them to an open shame on the cross and triumphed over them by becoming the perfect sacrifice for our sins. They cannot bring a charge against us because now we are all under Christ’s rule.

Colossians 2:16--19 (ESV) --- 16 Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink, or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath. 17 These are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ. 18 Let no one disqualify you, insisting on asceticism and worship of angels, going on in detail about visions, puffed up without reason by his sensuous mind, 19 and not holding fast to the Head, from whom the whole body, nourished and knit together through its joints and ligaments, grows with a growth that is from God.

Here we see that Jesus is the one who stands up for us. He is the head and we are his body. He takes care of us and nourishes us. He is the one who provides what we need for forgiveness and spiritual life. He is the head we must hold fast to. As long as we hold on to our covenant relationship with God through Jesus and strive to live the resurrected life, no one can judge us or disqualify us. As a part of this body, our head provides us with everything we need. We don't rely on ourselves or the philosophies of men to make us full. Jesus does that for us.

Application

Why is all of this here? What does this information do for us?

For The Lost

First, if you are hearing all of this and you are not in a relationship with God. This study should encourage you to seek the spiritual hope that God offers you. Paul has described a way for you to be free from all of the guilt your sin has placed on you. You can be forgiven of every sin through the sacrifice of Jesus. All of the sins we have committed will be nailed to the cross.

Isaiah 1:18 (ESV) --- 18 “Come now, let us reason together, says the Lord: though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool.

There is more to know than this lesson provides, and I would like to help you understand things more fully. But you can find those things out today and receive the gift God offers to you.

For Those Baptized For The Wrong Reason

What if you believed that your baptism was just an outward showing of an inward faith or a way for you to become a part of the local church where you grew up? You have been living for Christ all this time assuming that you were circumcised and forgiven of your sins. The first time I was baptized at age 7, I had no clue why I was doing it. I did not understand repentance or making a covenant with God. I did not have faith that he would forgive me of my sins when I was baptized because I did not fully understand God’s plan to do this work in baptism. At age 17, I didn’t understand everything about baptism, but I knew I needed to be rebaptized for the right reason to be forgiven of my sins. Maybe God forgave you of your sins when you were baptized. I don’t know. But if you understand what this is saying and you don’t believe your baptism was done for the right reason, I would be happy to rebaptize you. We have examples of this in the book of Acts. Men were baptized by John the Baptist, and they were rebaptized in the baptism of Christ.

Maybe your situation is a little different from what I described above. If you want to study this more and ask me questions, let me know.

For The Christian

What about everyone else? If we back out and look at this section as a whole, it gives us a lot of information, but not much instruction. As baptized believers, we have been forgiven of our sins and filled in Christ. But what are we supposed to do with this information?

Remember at first when I asked the question, “How could God make us full when we are so sinful?” Do we see how he does it in Christ? He gives us a sign of the covenant relationship between us. We are the spiritually circumcised in Christ. So, Paul says later in the letter, we need to “put to death what is earthly within us” and “put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience.” God removed the foreskin of our heart so that we would be different from the world. “Above all these, put on love.” We might be sinful and falling short of God’s glory, but Jesus provides all of the nourishment we need to grow.

So we don't listen to men who pass judgment on us or disqualify us. When we enter into a covenant relationship with God through Christ, we are forgiven so long as we “continue in faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard” (1:23). We listen to God's word, submit to him in baptism, have faith that God forgives us in Christ, and find the nourishment we need to become like Christ. If Jesus says that we are full, we are full. If Jesus says we are forgiven, no one and nothing can condemn us. He is the judge, and no one can overrule him. Isn’t that an fantastic picture that nourishes our soul.

We don’t listen to judgments passed against us, nor do we pass judgment and disqualifying those who our God has set free. That should be our goal at this congregation. We want to assume the best in everyone who walks in these doors. We do not want to be puffed up and judgmental toward people from different backgrounds. We just want everyone to experience the salvation this text describes and do what verse 19 says, hold fast to the head and find nourishment to become what God wants us to be. We want everyone to find the covenant relationship with God that we have experienced.

Conclusion

If you have not submitted your heart to God, we want to encourage you to do that today. You can have your heart circumcised, be made alive together with Christ, and have your sins nailed to the cross. Then, as we struggle with sin, our head will protect us, his body, from the enemy. He promises to nourish and care for us as we grow to be like him. Will you come to Jesus to find forgiveness and life?