What’s really important…
By James Galbraith
First Baptist Church, Port Alberni
October 21, 2007
Text
Col 2:16 Therefore do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a religious festival, a New Moon celebration or a Sabbath day. 17 These are a shadow of the things that were to come; the reality, however, is found in Christ. 18 Do not let anyone who delights in false humility and the worship of angels disqualify you for the prize. Such a person goes into great detail about what he has seen, and his unspiritual mind puffs him up with idle notions. 19 He has lost connection with the Head, from whom the whole body, supported and held together by its ligaments and sinews, grows as God causes it to grow.
Col 2:20 Since you died with Christ to the basic principles of this world, why, as though you still belonged to it, do you submit to its rules: 21 “Do not handle! Do not taste! Do not touch!”? 22 These are all destined to perish with use, because they are based on human commands and teachings. 23 Such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom, with their self-imposed worship, their false humility and their harsh treatment of the body, but they lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence.
Review
Paul has been trying to teach the Colossians that Jesus, and Jesus alone, is all they need for a life changing faith
not Jesus + wealth,
or Jesus + tradition,
or Jesus + good deeds
JUST JESUS!
He is doing this because there were a few people in their group that taught the opposite.
They were trying to take all the extra activities,
the religious habits and regulations that they followed before they gave their lives to Jesus, and make new believers do them too!
It’s bad enough that they were stuck in their old ways themselves, but they were also trying to get the new Christians to follow their example.
In this passage,
the Apostle Paul lists what exactly the others were teaching,
and then points the people back to Jesus as the Saviour of their souls.
Exegesis
1. Here’s a list of the different things that people were tacking onto the gospel, based on what we see in this paragraph:
vs. 16- food and drink regulations (probably from Jewish tradition)
- observation of certain religious festivals, including:
- New Moon celebrations, Sabbath Day
vs. 18 – false humility
- worship of angels
vs. 21 – rules regarding contact with physical objects
vs. 23 – regulations which led to harsh treatment of body
Now some of these things were just plain wrong,
such as worshiping angels or mistreating one’s one body.
Worshipping angels takes what is created and make it something to be worshipped, and mistreating one’s own body simply shows disrespect for what God has made!
Other things in this list were things that are good on their own, but they can become bad when we give them more of a place than they deserve.
Observing a Sabbath day is a good, healthy thing, as is participating in different festivals, or holidays that find their roots in our faith.
Christmas, Easter, Thanksgiving are all examples of modern-day “religious festivals”, and they can be a time of great blessing,
but when the festivals becomes more important than the reason for it,
or the Sabbath day becomes so bound in regulations that it becomes more work to try an enforce a day of rest,
we’ve gone astray and made the practice more important than the Saviour it’s meant to honour.
Christianity is not about Christmas or Sabbaths or Easter or anything else but Jesus – all of our celebrations and observances and everything else that is rooted in our faith, must take it’s place behind Jesus.
So not that he has listed what “extra’s” this group were struggling with,
2. Here is what Paul has to say about all this “extra”,
and the people who promote it in all it’s various forms,
Do not let anyone judge you by your compliance to them
Our allegiance is with Jesus, not a pile of rules and regulations that others may have plastered around him.
He is our judge, and not a self appointed crew of regulation writers.
- the regulations are a shadow of “things to come” – ie. Jesus
The best any of these practices can be is merely a shadow,
a faint, colourless outline, of the real thing.
So don’t keep your eyes on the shadows – keep it on the saviour!
People who focus on these things, rather than Jesus himself, have
“unspiritual minds puffed up with idle notions”
Those who are experts in the extra’s are really perfecters of platitudes,
they are self deceived individuals ,
for despite all their God-talk and perfect manners,
they simply do not have their minds wrapped around Jesus
They have neglected their vital connection with Jesus,
who is “the head who hold everything together”
They have unplugged themselves from the network that Christ must be the Central Processing Unit for.
Jesus describes himself as “the vine”,
while we are the branches coming off that vine,
ready to serve him as our source of everything we need.
Wrapping our faith in all these extras and worshipping them, instead of him, is like cutting ourselves off that vine and trying to go it on our own.
And ultimately, these extras have
“an appearance of wisdom, but no value for sensual indulgence”
The society these folks lived in was not unlike our own,
with a very strong focus on pleasure and indulgence.
Those who focused on all these extra’s thought that they were separating themselves from the rest of the world,
those people who lived like their was no tomorrow,
when in fact they were just as bad as everyone else.
Life wasted in the extras, without the focus on the person of Christ,
is not much better than life with out Christ at all.
3. What Paul want the people he’s talking to understand is this,
Jesus is what you really need
Jesus is “the Head, from whom the whole body, supported and held together by its ligaments and sinews, grows as God causes it to grow.”
We don’t cause ourselves to grow - He does.
He sustains us, he nourishes us, he keeps us alive.
You can disconnect quite a few of our parts and still keep living,
but modern science has still not found a way to separate us from our heads and keep us alive.
Our faith is much the same – separate it from it’s head and it may run around like a chicken that’s lost its head too – making a big mess but really dead on it’s feet.
Jesus is “the reality” that any practice or observation or festival or holiday must be accountable to,
Nothing we do as part of our faith should pull us away from Christ, all we do must be rooted in him.
He wants us to know that
“you died with Christ to the basic principles of this world”,
meaning that when we take our first step of faith,
when we give our lives over to him,
our accountability lies in Jesus,
and not all the rules and regulations that other may surround him with.
We don’t have to maintain a perfect attendance record at church,
we need to follow his commandment to love as he loves us!
We don’t have to read the right books, watch the right tapes,
hear the right broadcasts or pay the right preachers,
eat the right foods or drink the right drinks,
We need to set our hearts on the right Saviour – Jesus Christ – and let him work in us!
because the extras don’t save us – He does – and a life lived for him is what we really need to pursue.
To wrap this up this morning,
If you’ve already started your life of faith, placing your trust in Jesus,
make sure that you keep our eyes on the Saviour,
and not on all the trappings of our faith.
Tapes, books, celebrations, meetings are all good things,
but when they push Jesus in to the back seat of our daily lives,
we have wandered in to a spirituality of the extraneous
rather than a life lived for Christ.
If you have not placed your trust in Christ yet,
allow me to invite you to consider just that,
Maybe you’ve run across too many people who made our faith look like a game of doing just the right thing at just the right time with just the right words and just the right emotions.
It’s not that at all.
It’s all about Jesus – he’s what’s really important.
He lived and died and rose again,
simply so that you could know God and enjoy him forever.
We do pray and meet together and many other things that enrich our faith, but we do it for one reason – to bring us closer to Jesus.
He’s our reason for being, and he’s all we need.
He’s all you need too. Will you consider him today?
