Series in Colossians - Be Raised Alive in Christ

 

Be Raised Alive in Christ

Colossians 3:5-11

On a May spring morning in the car headed to church, I told my wife and in essence told God, I wouldn't be coming back to church again. I was through, she and the kids could go, but I wanted to do my own thing. I didn’t know what God had in mind for me that morning. He brought an elderly couple to the church to speak the Word and share their testimony of God’s goodness and faithfulness, and the power of God in the gospel of Jesus Christ. To make it concise, I sat at the end of the row near the back in order to make a hasty exit. But God had other plans. I ended up listening to the hope in Christ, and His power in salvation and over the devil. I went forward without my wife seeing me. She looked next to her and I wasn’t there, then she saw me upfront, shaking like a man with the DT’s with my hands in the air. The lady came and laid her hands on my head and God took over everything else. He gave me a peace that literally flowed through my body, from head to toe. I stopped shaking and was amazed at His peace that really filled me, then He did something that I didn’t ask for, He took two-thirds of my language away, I became a new creation. I had invited Christ into my heart and life. My wife was shocked at the transformation and the regeneration of the Holy Spirit in me. She said, I wasn’t the man she had married. And from that day forward God continually cleansed me (sanctified) of past sins, and renewed my mind and heart for Him, His will and His purpose.

This is what Paul meant when He told the Colossian church, to die to the old self and be raised with Christ, be a new creation in Him. So let’s read the first portion of the text. “Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. Because of these, the wrath of God is coming. You used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived. But now you must also rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices and have put on the new self…”

Paul understood the incredible manifestation and transformation that God does when a person submits to God’s Son, Jesus Christ, and yields to the Holy Spirit who is working in the new creation, transforming and regenerating a new life dedicated to God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. (Acts 9:1-19)

Paul also knew that one of the battle lines in the spiritual world is formed in the heart and mind of the believer. When the gospel is preached then the power of salvation is evidenced by grace through faith. “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes: first to the Jew, then to the Gentile. For in the gospel the righteousness of God is revealed—a righteousness that is by faith from first to last, just as it is written: “The righteous will live by faith.” (Rom. 1:16-17) And as Paul taught and preached, baptism in water has everything to do with righteousness (John’s baptism: Acts 19:1-6; Matt. 3:15), the death to the old life and the raising to a new life in Christ Jesus (Col. 3:1-4). All of this involved the transformation and regeneration of the heart and mind of the believer, which are now set on Christ Jesus in Heaven. 

Second, Paul now lists sins that were flagrantly manifested in the world and sadly in the church as well. “Put to death, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry.” For many had come out of idolatry and the paganism of their times. Then there were the jewish converts that idolized the rules and the laws. The first sins had to do with the intimacy of the flesh nature, and the conflict with the new Christ-nature. Deviant sexuality was promoted as normal in many of the cities of Asia minor, even tied into the religious cult activity of the shrines and temples. Paul taught this is not the morals or ethics of faith in Christ. They must be matched with the moral ethics of scripture. Jesus had said, “No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon [money, possessions, fame, status, or whatever is valued more than the Lord].” (Matt. 6:24 AMP)

Though the context was earthly vs. the godly, it applied to sexuality and morality as well. The mastery of the evil desires of sexual immorality needs to be slain with all of its passions. For many of the pagan converts, sexual immorality was habitual. Also impurity and lusts fit hand in glove with the deviancy of sexuality. For they corrupted the spirit and soul as well as the physical body to uncontrolled desires. 

The only way to be free from these, was the power of the Gospel through the Holy Spirit, who regenerates (brings new growth) after the death of the old.

Next, Paul addresses the issue of greed and evil desires. These sins are as old as the days of Noah, and infected many people, evil desires are the bane of mankind as well as greed. Both of these sins bring the wrath of God upon the person. For as Paul wrote to the Galatians, “Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows. Whoever sows to please their flesh, from the flesh will reap destruction.” (Gal. 6:7-8a NLT)  God will bring total destruction upon uninhibited and unrestrained sins. Paul understood that God’s wrath is final! 

Now, Paul’s list of sins of the earthly nature actually leads to the next listed sins of attitude and speech. For the early churches needed purging of these sins, and it came only through the blood of Jesus Christ and the regenerative power of the Holy Spirit. “But now you must also rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices and have put on the new self…” Paul exhorts the church to rid themselves of the sins of their attitudes that affect their lives and speech. Paul may have remembered King David’s words in the psalms, “Refrain from anger and turn from wrath; do not fret—it leads only to evil. For those who are evil will be destroyed.” (Ps. 37:8-9a NIV)

With anger comes rage and malice, slandering of all that don’t agree, and in the end filthy language is manifested where it should not be. Paul had spoken to the Ephesian church about these very sins that led to abusive and sinful speech. “Don’t use foul or abusive language. Let everything you say be good and helpful, so that your words will be an encouragement to those who hear them.” (Eph. 4:29 NLT) 

And Paul had already addressed this same issue with the Corinthian church “Or do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor men who have sex with men nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.” (1 Cor. 6:9-11)

The only solution to sin is repentance, cleansing, and the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit, the new life in Christ. Paul told all those who heard the gospel in Christ, believed in God’s promises and kingdom, and in their new lives in Christ there is no acceptance of sin, it had to be slain, die, and be buried as testified in the scripture. “For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more.” “Blessed is the one whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered. Blessed is the one whose sin the Lord does not count against them and in whose spirit is no deceit.” “ You will tread our sins underfoot and hurl all our iniquities into the depths of the sea.” (Heb. 8:12; Ps. 32:1-2,5; Mic. 7:19)

Application - Oh how I wished all would hear and believe the gospel of Jesus Christ. “Above all, you must understand that in the last days scoffers will come, scoffing and following their own evil desires. They will say, “Where is this ‘coming’ he promised? Ever since our ancestors died, everything goes on as it has since the beginning of creation.” (2 Pet. 3:3-4 NIV)

But God is patient, “The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.” (2 Pet.3:9)

Nothing is impossible for our God, our Lord Jesus Christ. He can take the most vile of people and change them instantly, or take His patient time and deal with the deviant sins that have entangled the life of believer. I choose that morning to follow Christ instead of my own sinful lifestyle, and in choosing Christ, he worked and is working His salvation in me. “Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.” (Phil. 2:12-13 ESV)

God can do more than we can ever believe. “Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us.” (Eph. 3:20) And I am the evidence of the mighty working power of God’s goodness, mercy, and grace. For there is no place in the church or in the life of a believer for the sin’s of the earthly nature or the sins of our attitudes that affect every area of our being and relationship. They must die so that we can live in Him and He in us. This is the evidence of the new life in Christ, the old nature is dead and the vibrant new life is flourishing in the regenerative power of the Holy Spirit to transform us in heart and mind. “Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” (Rom. 12:2a NIV)

Last, Paul now explicates the new life in Christ. “Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator. Here there is no Gentile or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all.”

Paul’s analogy takes on the act of dressing oneself. For Paul’s analysis of the new self is to die (take off, rid and destroy the old) and put on the new. The old self is still tainted and tied to lying, and the Father of lies, Satan. Paul knew that you can’t live both lives old and new together. The old must die and be destroyed. And after the death of the old comes the beginning of the new transformed life. To Paul, it was like putting on a new full set of clothing, pure and untainted, new and spotless. This is being a new creation, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. (2 COr. 5:17 NIV)

Paul now brings the conversion of a new life into the image of our Lord Jesus Christ. Through the act of reconciliation by God the Father in the knowledge and in the life of a new believer, we are being conformed into the image of the Son. As Paul had experienced and now exclaimed, our new self was in Christ, for the Colossian church was being transformed and reconciled to the Father through the Son. It didn’t matter their ethnicity, gender, or station in life. For everyone who was born of the Spirit (regenerated), walking as a new creation, literally Christ lived in them and they in Him. Christ is there all in all.

Application - Paul has taught us that Jesus Christ is sufficient, meaning He doesn’t need anything for He is God the Son. And in Him, His work of atoning for our sins on the cross was sufficient, there isn’t anything else needed He paid it all.

It is the same in our new life, Jesus is sufficient to give us what we need. “But my God shall supply all your needs according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus." (Phil. 4:19 NIV), to guard our hearts and minds “And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” (Phil. 4:7) And help us to grow and mature in His will and purpose for our new lives. “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son.” (Rom. 8:28-29 ESV) And last, we continue in His work until He comes to take us to where He is. “God is the one who began this good work in you, and I am certain that he won't stop before it is complete on the day that Christ Jesus returns.” (Phil. 1:6 CEV)

I’m again including the ABC’s of salvation for all those who have not yet received Jesus Christ for salvation. For Jesus, God the Son, came to this world to save all who would believe and trust in him. He desires to reveal himself to you, He is the Light that overcomes the darkness of this lawless world. He hears your prayers, and all authority in heaven and earth have been given to him. He will answer you if you will truly believe. If you haven’t asked him to be your Lord and Savior, today could be that day.

 First, A - Admit that you are a sinner. This is where that godly sorrow leads to genuine repentance for sinning against a righteous God and there is a change of heart, we change our mind and God changes our hearts and regenerates us from the inside out. Romans 3:10 - As it is written: "There is none righteous, no, not one." Romans 3:23 - For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. (We are all born sinners which is why we must be born spiritually in order to enter the Kingdom of Heaven). Romans 6:23 - For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. The bad news is that the wages of sin is death, in other words our sin means that we have been given a death sentence, we have the death penalty hanging over our heads, that's the bad news. But here's the good news: The good news is that the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. Ephesians 2:8-9 - For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith —and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast. Second,

 B - Believe in your heart that Jesus Christ died for your sins, was buried, and that God raised Jesus from the dead. This is trusting with all of your heart that Jesus Christ is who he said he was. Romans 10:9-10 - That if you confess with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved. Third, 

C - Call upon the name of the Lord. Every single person who ever lived since Adam will bend their knee and confess with their mouth that Jesus Christ is Lord, the Lord of lords and the King of kings. Romans 14:11 - For it is written: "As I live, says the Lord, Every knee shall bow to Me, And every tongue shall confess to God." Don't wait until later — do this now. Romans 10:13 - For "whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved." "O God, I am a sinner. I'm sorry for my sin. I want to turn from my sin. I believe Jesus Christ is Your Son; I believe that He died on the cross for my sin and that He was buried and You raised Him to life. I have decided to place my faith in Jesus Christ as my Savior, trusting only in His shed blood as sufficient to save my soul and to take me to heaven. Thank You, Lord Jesus, for saving me. Amen."

Please share this with someone this week, the Lord knows that we and they need it.

If you would like other lessons, please go to http://pmdinhisservice.blogspot.co

Until next week, In His Service Mike Davis

I have revised my webpage on Spiritual warfare. Please give it a look. Thank you. http://uss-warfare3.webnode.com