Sunday School | Colossians

Introduction

Alrighty then. You ready? Thank you for your patience. I have been gone. It looks like I've been on vacation for the last month, but I promise I haven't been. I’ve been off speaking to college students and gone the first two weeks I was gone, but then Mary Winn got sick and so we bumped their thing. I was here last week, but we decided to let them finish. I appreciate your patience as we finally, finally get back to our study.

Testament, where you at? There's Bob. Bob tells me that with this study, we crossed the 50-yard line. So we've gone, this is number four according to Bob, this is number 14. There are 27 books in the New Testament. So we are just over half, or you will be just over half of all the New Testament books. And I really hope the purpose of this is not just to entertain you for forty-five minutes on a Sunday, but to equip you to go back and to read it. So if you haven't yet begun that habit, you could even start today. After we talk through Colossians, then you could read through Colossians this week. You could read through Colossians today, honestly. It's four chapters. It's really short. But I really hope these things are helping you to kind of get your way through the book and to understand all that God has revealed to us in his word, all the treasures therein.

The Context of the Passage

As we jump into it today, we're gonna be in Colossians, and I'm just curious. What do you guys know about Colossians? And if you don't have it, anybody not have the sheet already? Anybody need them? Need them? Over here, guys. We'd love to get them. So what do you know? Was there a hint here? Yeah. Good. What do you know about Colossians? Okay. That's good. So, like most of the many of the letters in the New Testament, it is written to a church. So Colossae is a city. This is a letter that Paul wrote to the church in Colossae to address, we'll see what they, what he, what they, what he wrote to address.

What else? What do you know about Colossians? Are there passages in there that are significant or the big theme of the book or any of those things? Fullness. Fullness. That's exactly right. I try to make a point of that in the front. We'll look at that in a second. Fullness in what sense? What does that mean? Where every Christ has killed everything and ending in all the fullness. Yes. Okay. This is a major theme. It's probably the most significant theme in the book of Colossians is that. And the way that I framed it here is that the all the fullness of God is in Christ, and all the fullness of Christ is for us. It is a, it's a major thing. We'll take that. We're gonna take a bunch of time, and we'll unpack that.

So, yes, highly important concept in Colossians is totality, completeness, fullness. What else? Do you know much? Chris? Paul wasn't the god of Colossians. Very good. Yes. That's a little bit obscure. So what Chris is saying is that Paul did not plant the church at Colossae. So oftentimes, when Paul writes to these churches, these are his people. These are his churches, and he's writing to follow-up. You can, you can kind of see this. If you read through the book of Acts, you can kind of trace the shape of Paul's missionary journeys. He goes to these cities and he, you know, plants a church, goes to another city, plants a church, then he writes letters back to them.

This one is different. Some other dude, Chris, who planted it? I can't remember. It's Vyrnaya. Close. Close. It's, I don't know how to say it. It's either Epaphras or Epaphras, E P A P, whatever, but some a bunch of other letters. Okay? Epaphras plants the church, and Paul writes—and we can, you can see that in the text. I, we can, I can show you that if you want to, that Paul is writing to follow-up on something that somebody else had done. So that's totally true. Okay? Yeah. Sam? Parallel to Ephesians. Parallel to Ephesians. Very much so. This, if you were here, like, a month ago, our last class, we looked at a, we looked at the letter to the church at Ephesus, and the whole kind of, like, middle of that document is all these parallels. I did not recreate it here. I thought that would be a little bit redundant. But if you wanted to see how Colossians and Ephesians tie up, you can go back and you can see just, I mean, thought for thought, word for word, there's an enormous amount of parallel between them.

And yet, despite all of the similarities, there are some important differences. And I don't know if I'm imagining this, but I almost feel like one of the primary differences is even present right now in this room. Most letters of the New Testament, when I read through them, it's not that hard to say, like, okay, this is the idea. This is the notion going on. This is the obvious thing. This is Philippians is about this, and Galatians is about this. I feel like that's harder to do in Colossians. Does that feel fair? Like, Colossians has, like, these very distinct moments, but it feels a little more grab baggy to me. It doesn't feel like there's, like, an a chief overriding argument. I think the fullness is the closest we get to that, and I'll show you that. But I feel like most letters in the New Testament exist in my mind with a very distinct form and shape. Like, if you wake me up at two in the morning, I can tell you what the letter is about. You ask me what Colossians is about, I'd be like, well, you know, it's got this and it's got that. And it's just not super, super sharp, I think. Right? Nevertheless, it's full of treasure.

One more. Anybody else want to say that I just did, I just insult your favorite book and you want to tell me what some important thing that's in it? No. See, I'm not lying. It's true. Okay. So let's take a look. If you look at Colossians, I just, I listed all these things. Paul is absolutely interested in the theme of fullness. Just listen to this. There's a few key terms that show up, and I'll just, I'll read you a sample of them. He says, because we've heard about your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all the saints. For all over the world, this gospel is bearing fruit and growing, just as it's been doing among you since the day you heard and understood God's grace in all its truth.

Maybe this third one here might be the most important expression of this. Just listen to this. That Jesus is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by him, all things were created. Things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rules or authorities, all things are created by him and for him. He's before all things. In him, all things hold together. He's the head of the body, the church. He's the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead so that in everything he might have the supremacy.

For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven by making peace through his blood shed on the cross.

You're gonna see similar, I'm gonna read every one of these to you. Go down to the bottom of that left column. My purpose is that they may be encouraged in heart and united in love so they may have the full riches of complete understanding. In order that they may know the mystery of God, namely Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. For in Christ, all the fullness of the deity lives in bodily form, and you've been given fullness in Christ, who is the head over every power and authority.

That verse right there, two nine and ten at the bottom of the left, that might be the thesis statement of Colossians. Right? Just here because it's got both halves. For in Christ, all the fullness of the deity dwells, and you have been given fullness in Christ.

So that's really ultimately what, if you go through and you, there's a bunch more that I won't bother to read to you now. But when you go through Colossians, if you read it today, read it this week, watch for those. Honestly, probably missed some. Right? So you're watching for that, trying to understand that.

Has anybody ever heard what is the, what's the context of that? What is in, what most letters, most of the letters in the New Testament, you can kind of reverse engineer them to be like, if this is the solution, I can work backward and imagine what was the problem. Do you guys know what was going on in Colossae or how we tend to categorize this in light of all that? Yeah. Well, I think there was some false teaching, asceticism, and different things that were creeping in. That's right. That's exactly right. So, false teaching, asceticism is often characterized under the heading of gnosticism. Is that, is this meaningful to you? Not if we said, do you guys know what gnostic can anybody give me a quick working definition of gnosticism? Would you be able to do that? Familiar? No? You don't have to. Can't even spell it. Starts with a g. Do you guys know gnosticism? So what does the word Gnostic mean? Special knowledge. Knowledge. Okay. So Gnosis is knowledge, special knowledge. What, what, what does that mean? Do you know what was going on there? There's like a secret, like, they almost had the secret society that knew better than everyone else, and they were set apart. They set themselves apart. That's right. That there's this little idea, this little cult of secret, special knowledge, and we have this. There's the inside, and there's the outside. And Paul is really writing into that context saying, no. No. No. No. You don't have anything. We have everything in Christ. There, there is no little subset of specialized magic knowledge that Jesus is not excluded. Right? You wanna exclude Jesus in your little, little secret club, but he has it all and he gives it all. So your little cordoning off of information of secret knowledge is bogus. It's all in him and it's all for you. That's essentially the context in which he's addressing it.

Was that their special knowledge was so far wrong. It was terrible. Right. It's not only that they have incomplete knowledge, what they do have isn't even accurate. Exactly right. And that's really what he's, what he's going after. And so, in as much as he's advocating for the supremacy of Christ, the dominance of Christ, it's a little bit like the book of Hebrews is. We, we won't get to Hebrews till almost the very end. But in the same way that Hebrews portrays the supremacy of Christ, Colossians is really good for that if you want to get some really meaty stuff. Well, I'll show you my two favorite passages on that in a minute. Okay? In fact, let's, let's maybe do that. That's probably where I want to spend our time. If you flip over to it, this passage here, I want you to notice this one at the top. It's one fifteen to twenty. So I'm going to give you guys a minute. At your tables, you, you can read it out loud at your tables, but I want you to have a chance to kind of, like, immerse yourself in this, and then we're going to. Okay?

01:15 to 20. So pick somebody at your table to read it and go through. And I've listed a whole bunch of stuff there, but we'll pull it out together. So take a minute, read it together, load it into your brain, and then we'll talk about what he's saying here. Okay? Poor Doug's over here alone reading to himself. It's very sad. Sad. And just so you know, it's also here too. Okay. So you can go either side. Alright. Did you guys memorize that real quick? You got it loaded in? All right. Now you guys, here's the thing. What would you, if you had to put a title over this passage, just that paragraph, or if you, if you filed it in your brain as, oh, this is a preeminent example of blank, or this passage is about X, how would you do it? What title would you give to this paragraph? Yeah. Gary? I would say this is saying that Jesus is the same as God. Okay. Excellent. Okay. Very much so. Colossians one is one of those texts that we look at when we defend the deity of Christ. Colossians one is a passage about Jesus being God. It's a very strong demonstration of that. That is true. However, there's one other thing that I think is worth seeing that is kind of the, the, the blinding brightness of the deity of Christ in this paragraph can block us from seeing something else. You may see something else that is specifically not the deity of Christ in this passage. Although you could be forgiven if you mistake it for his deity. Do you know what's going on here? Yeah, Fred? The al he's the alpha and the omega. Okay. That that's language that means that he's God. Has full knowledge of the end. Okay. So that, that is true. But that would still fit under the broad heading. Because he is God, he's before all things, he knows all things, he is the, he is the eternal one. That's all true. But it's all true under the heading of his deity, of his godness. So yes. But there's something that's actually outside of that but just not super obvious. Firstborn. Okay. Say it again. Firstborn. Okay. Firstborn of the dead. Okay. There's twice, okay. I will say the firstborn is meaningful but there's two firstborns here. What do you think firstborn from the dead means? The firstborn. Okay. Yes. He is the first one to be, right, raised from the dead. And that may or may not be consistent with his godness, but you're good. What's the other firstborn? Okay. So twice. He's the firstborn of creation. He's the firstborn from among the dead. The firstborn of all creation is a little bit closer to what I'm trying to get you to see. Sorry. Hang on. I can't find the switch. How do I do this? You know what it is? Take a look at the very first line. What does this line mean, you guys? He is the image of the invisible God. Man. What does that mean? Say it loud. Man. He's a human being. That's what he's saying. And when we read this, he's the image of the invisible God. You could take that and be like, oh, you know, it's John 1:1. In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. A statement of his deity, and the rest of the passage is a statement of his deity. It's not. When he says he's the image of the invisible God, do you know who else is the image of the invisible God? You are. Zipporah is. Right? That's a statement of his humanity. When you see language of image of God, don't think God, think human being. Right? He is. So this is not just a statement of the deity of Christ, though it is that. It is also, if we wanted to, what do we call it when we say that Jesus is both man and God? We have a really silly word for that or silly phrase for that. Do you know what we call it? I accept the union. Who on earth just said that? That is right. Okay? We call it the, you will never say this in any other context in your life, but it is called the hypostatic union. Right? And why you need to know that, I don't know. Alan, why do you know that? Just, just read good books. Right? Okay? So it is the idea that he is both fully man and fully God in one thing. That's what this passage is really about. It is an affirmation of his role. He is a human being. He's like you. He's like, has body parts like you. He's born of a woman like you. He lived and dies like you. I mean, he's a person. Okay? He's the image of the invisible God. And then this next line, the firstborn over all creation. Not obvious what that means. What does that phrase mean? What is it again? Okay. Now bless your heart, and that's not true, but that's what I wanted you to say, so thank you. Okay? Okay? So if you think that he is the first born of, like, what does it say? What's the preposition? First born over? Okay. That's a clue. Okay? It's not that he's the first born of creation. And if it was, the J Dubs would be right. If it if he's the first created thing, if what it means is he's the first thing God ever made, we have a huge problem. Do you understand this? He is not the first created thing. He's uncreated. In the beginning was the Word. In the beginning, he was with God. He's always been with God. There was never a time when the Father was and he wasn't. We'll come back to the weirdness of, I'll put an asterisk on that in a second. It does not mean that he was the first thing God ever made. He's not the first created thing. What does it mean to be the first born over? Scott? Okay. That's still, that, that is true, but that's not what this phrase means. His position is preeminent. Position. Bless your heart. This is the right, okay? He is a preeminent position. When you see firstborn, think about primogeniture. Okay? Think about who gets to be when the king of England or the queen, when the queen of England dies, who gets to be king? The firstborn. The firstborn gets to be king. That's what this means. Firstborn over creation, what it means is he is the heir to the throne and he rules the world. It's a statement of his kingship. It's the psalm two-ness. Ask of me, and I'll give you the nations as your inheritance. It's, it's Matthew 28. All authority has been given to me. It's, it's Philippians two. He goes to the lowest place and therefore God exalts him to the highest place. It's a statement not of his priorness. It is not a statement of his first creationist. No. No. That's not that. It is a statement of his preeminence. This human being who bears God's image just like you do has nevertheless been exalted to the highest place to reign as king. And then, okay, so we're, it's this whole statement. And then finally, you get to what you thought it was about all along. For, by him, all things were created. What does that mean? There's no trick to this one. Okay? It's John 1. And what did you say, Sam? He is the creator. That he is the creative agent. That when God made the world, everything that has been made, he makes through the Son. And now, from this point on, so he's a human being. He's been exalted as king, but he's also the one who made everything. From now, we're on a roll. He made everything. What does that include? Things in heaven, things on earth, visible and invisible, thrones, powers, rulers, authorities. All things were created by him, and, get this, for him. That's your house is his house. Your kids are his kids. Your money is his money. Your talents are his talents, meaning your capacities, your gifts. Right? All things were created by him and for him. He is before all things. Is this what one of you said over here? This part of the room? Before all things. Did somebody say that? Prayerness? Somebody said this. It's true. Whoever, whoever that was. He really is before all things. That's very John 1:1. Right? He holds all things together. That's fascinating. What does that mean? That in him, all things hold together. What does that mean? He sustains. He is the sustainer. Gary? Everything. It is, if you're a physicist, it basically means he's the strong nuclear force that we don't understand. Like, what holds the positively charged protons together in the center of an atom? Jesus. Like, he holds the universe together. Right? And he's the head of the body, the church. He's the beginning of the firstborn from among the dead. Now we get to the other firstborn. He is, what is the other way that Paul says this? That he's the firstborn from among the dead. He uses another illustration for this in 1 Corinthians 15. Do you remember? First What does that mean? Who said that? Who said firstfruits? First. Does that mean? Yes. Recognizing as humans. What? But it also goes back to the garden and the firstfruits that were in the garden return to that place. Well, okay. So when you go to the garden, I would say it's the first part of the harvest. It's the sample of the harvest. What’s true—the first wheat that we pick is gonna be indicative of the entire batch of wheat that we harvest. Right? And so, if he rose from the dead, Julie Wright will rise from the dead because she is hidden in him. Right? And that's good news.

Okay? So he's all of these things, firstborn from the dead so that, and here's really the punch line. In everything, he has a supremacy. He's the best human. He is God on earth. He reigns over all things. What he does, we do. He is the leader that we follow. In every conceivable way, God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him and, through him, to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood shed on the cross.

You guys, this path, this paragraph, can be read multiple times, and I've read it to you once emphasizing all the words— all, all, all. The fullness. But here's my preferred way to read it. He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by him, all things were created, things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities, all things are created by him and for him. And he is before all things. And in him, all things hold together. And he is the head of the body of the church. And he is the beginning of the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy. For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him and through him, to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood shed on the cross.

It is one of—I would suggest to you, it is one of the highest statements of Christology anywhere in the New Testament. It's one of those it'd be worth memorizing. It'd be worth dwelling on this, going through it line by line—that his, he is better—it’s the book of Hebrews condensed into a paragraph. Right? It's the absolute complete and utter dominance in every category of Christ. Perfect human being. He is God. He's king, creator, sustainer, reconciled, the self-existent, crucified head of the church. And we are to bow our knee before his supremacy in all things.

And rather than fearing man, we should fear him. Rather than honoring wicked people, we should honor him. Rather than obeying the state or the anything that's in contradiction to him, we should obey him because he is in all categories before all things. Alright? So if nothing else, out of Colossians, I would think that's the probably the most important passage we want to get to.

The Significance of Christ's Supremacy

Comments on any of that? Questions on that? You see it all? Human being, God, it's all there? Alright. Let me do the second, I think, the second most important passage here. Go down a little bit on your document where I say Colossians also contains one of the clearest statements of Christus' victor. Alright.

Former fellows. Okay. This is where you, this is your moment to shine because we've talked about all this stuff. Alright. What is Christus Victor? Anybody wanna take a shot at what that means? Chris, can you do it? Make it loud for the folks in the back.

Make it loud for the folks in the back.

I think it's the Christus Victor of our salvation.

Okay. That's good. So, Christus Victor—that's, that's excellent. Christus Victor is the answer to what question? What topic are we discussing when we talk about Christus Victor? The battle of our salvation. Okay. Is made victorious through Christ. Okay. That's true. But I’m fishing for a term that, if we wanted to categorize this in, like, a theology textbook. Do you know what I'm looking for? Why did Christ have to die? Okay. Good. Why did he die? Yes. You wanna throw something on there? What happened on the cross? Okay. Good. What happened on the cross? And there, but, but if we're being, say it. Yeah. So we have different theories. The phrase I'm fishing for, you guys, is atonement theory. Okay? And, you know, if you're not used to saying hypostatic union, you're probably not used to talking about atonement theories, and that's totally fine. But welcome to seminary.

When we look at the cross, there was a lot going on on the cross. And whether you know it or not, you probably think that what was happening on the cross can be summarized really in one way, and you're right, but there's more going on than we tend to talk about. Okay? So, in an evangelical setting like this, the preeminent atonement theory has a name. Do you know what it is? Do you like to read my mind game? Are you guys tired of this already? The primary way we think about what Jesus did on the cross, do you know what we call it? Do you know this? You don't know this? Very good. Who said that? Okay. Very good. Next, nice work, parrot.

Okay. And we might sometimes throw an extra letter in there, p. PSA, penal, as in penalty, substitutionary atonement. The way that we think about the cross overwhelmingly, and it's accurate, is penal substitutionary atonement. That there was a penalty. Mickey did all these—I can't even tell you how terrible they were. All these terrible, terrible things, and she needs to be punished for it. But it's okay because we're not gonna punish her. We're gonna punish a substitute in her place. We have a substitute that takes your penalty so that you don't have to. That's how we understand the gospel. This is how we understand the cross, and it's all true. It is Mickey's only hope. It is my only hope because I did worse things than she did. And Jesus shows up, and he says, you know what? Don't punish him. Punish me instead, and he becomes our substitute. And that's what was happening on the cross. That's all true. That's all accurate. It's what Isaiah 53, which is probably the most important passage in the entire Old Testament, is all about—that God has laid on him the iniquity of us all, and by his stripes, we are healed. Yes. Yes. Is this ringing a bell? It's all true.

However, if we think that's a complete answer, we're mistaken because he was doing a lot on the cross. And the earliest, the first, the number one time that the cross was predicted is not about penal substitutionary atonement. What's the—we call it the proto gospel, the proto euangelion. What—is that? What is the first time that the Old Testament looks through the future and sees the cross? Genesis three. Okay. Turn there for a second. I want you to see this. And I want you to be, I want you to just recognize that you cannot fit penal substitutionary atonement into Genesis three. It's just not there. Not, well, at least not this verse. This is when, in Genesis three, the snake has ruined everything. Eve took the bait. Adam goes along with her. Everything's a mess. And in 3:15, God says this:

So the Lord God said to the serpent, because you've done this, cursed are you above all the livestock and all the wild animals. You will crawl on your belly and you will eat dust all the days of your life. And watch this, verse 15. And I will put enmity between you and the woman, between your offspring and hers. He will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.

You guys, there's more going on there than that notion that you're gonna go on a hike with your Boy Scout troop and get bit by a snake and step on his head. Okay? That’s not what it's talking about. It is saying that there is going to be this giant cosmic battle that will play out, and the net result of it is gonna be that someday, some woman is gonna bring forward a child. Back to the seed language. Right? The seed of the woman, which is weird because women don't have seeds. Okay. That's an odd thing. Some woman with this very subtle hint without the help of a man is gonna bring forth a child, and that child is gonna get into a contest with this snake, and there's gonna be two deaths. He is going to die. He's gonna be pierced by this snake in the process of killing the snake. And then the story goes on. This right here is the first time there's an anticipation that the snake who snuck into the garden, who usurped power, who has destroyed everything, is going to be killed, but he's gonna be killed by someone who dies in the process of killing him.

K? That right there, this is the first time that we hear of God's redemptive purposes. And then when it finally, and there's a whole lot of detail, a lot of color will get added to it. But by the time we get to the New Testament and when Jesus comes, he is coming. It is true that he's coming to bear sin. He's coming to be my representative. He lives the perfect life and gives me credit for it, and he dies a heinous death in my place. Both of that—that is true. But he has also come to crush the snake. And this passage here in Colossians 2:13-15 is probably the clearest statement of that.

And I say it all because I think that as we understand when we look at the cross, we understand what he's doing. If you look at the cross and you see his substitution for you, that's a good thing, and you should praise him for it. But you should linger a little longer because there's a lot of stuff going on there. This is how he puts it:

When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the written code with its regulations that was against us and that stood opposed to us. He took it away, nailing it to the cross. And then hear this, and having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.

That is the victory of Christ over the serpent. That in the most shocking and surprising way, he became victorious by being killed. And what Satan perhaps thought was his own victory was in fact his undoing. This is the moment—this is Genesis three. This is the biting, the snake biting his heel and him crushing the serpent's head. It's all happening right there. And so, basically, this is a great big statement of Paul just saying, he won. He reigns. He's in charge of all things, which just continues this theme of the absolute total dominion and supremacy of Christ who is victorious over the serpent, who has defeated your enemy, ascended a throne, and then begun a new kingdom that you're invited to be part of.

Does this make sense? Okay. Questions about that Christus Victor, PSA? And here's what I need you to know. If you can live with the bothness of that, I think you should. Sometimes you might be in a circle. I'll just warn you this: if you're ever in some circle and you say something about the victory of Christ and Christus Victor, it's possible that somebody's gonna look at you sideways. Some Christian could look at you sideways. Do you know why? Curious if you know. I'm throwing you into, like, a theological pool that you might not be familiar with.

Yeah. Parrot?

Catholicism and, like, the Brazilians and everything, the South?

Okay. I don't know about the South, the global South. Unpack that for me. I don't know—I don't—I'm not exactly sure where that goes. The socialist, like, the liberation?

Yeah. Okay. Good. Okay. So that's probably very, it's probably adjacent, very close to what I'm thinking here. Here's the thing: some people love Christus Victor because it's a substitute for penal substitutionary atonement. And that might—that may or may not be true of this. Some people understand. Okay. So there's people who think that once Jesus really did suffer the wrath of God on the cross as a substitute for us. I'm one of those people. Okay? There are also people who think that I'm wrong and that God is not a wrathful God and that he would never do that—and that that Tim Henderson's understanding of the gospel is essentially divine child abuse—that it's a wicked thing to say that God would punish his innocent Son so he wouldn't have to punish these other people. What he could just do is just not punish them because he's God, can do whatever he wants to do. And that Tim Henderson believes in some bloodthirsty God and that you should be more pacifistic like me, and then you'd understand that PSA is a bad thing. Okay? That camp exists. Right? I think they're all wrong, but they exist. And when they exist over there and they downstream PSA, they trot out Christus Victor. And they say, no, no, no. PSA isn't true. There's no penal substitutionary atonement because God is not wrathful. Never would have done that. You misunderstand the entire thing. The real answer is he was just beating Satan. I mean, yeah, he was basically defeating Satan. And so, affirm Christus Victor, not PSA.

Does this make sense? Okay. So now another group shows up and they hear somebody say, rah-rah, Christus Victor. And they think, hey, are you one of them? Are you one of those guys that denies penal substitutionary atonement? Are you one of those guys that doesn't know how to read Isaiah 53? Are you one of those guys that doesn't know how to read Romans three? And I may have put you in a thinking, like, well, I don't know. I don't know. They're both true. Sometimes they are pitted against each other. Christus Victor is the pacifist's response to penal substitutionary atonement. That is not what I'm advocating for. I am telling you—they are absolutely both true, but I am not setting that up as many people set them up as oppositional. I think there is no opposition. They're both true. And there's more, by the way, if we wanted to really be honest about it. There's more going on even than these two things. By the way, if we wanted to really be honest about it, there’s more going on even than these two things. So, I'm a huge advocate of Christus Victor, but I'm not advocating for it against the truth of penal substitutionary atonement. You alright? Was that too confusing, or is that clarifying? You alright? It's all true. There's a lot going on.

The third thing, by the way, the third atonement theory that I think is worth embodying is what we call moral exemplar. That, on the cross, Jesus was not only suffering the wrath of God. On the cross, Jesus was not only defeating Satan, but, on the cross, he was showing us how to live. He was giving us, this is the model. Peter says he left us an example that we should follow in his steps. In our life, we fully enter into the salvation he purchased for us when we imitate the one who goes to the lowest place and thereby is exalted to the highest place. So, I would suggest that you, if you ever—you know, somebody asks you in a hallway somewhere, hey, what are your atonement theories? Do you subscribe to? You would say, well, penal substitutionary atonement, because Jesus suffered my wrath and—and—and God punished him instead of me. And, of course, I advocate for Christ's victory because Jesus is victorious over all things and he defeats Satan, but he is also my example. My life is meant to be lived in imitation of him as I step into the reality he purchased for me. What do you think? Right? That's how, that's how you want to do that. Okay? Anybody sitting on attack? Can you live with that?

Say it again?

Okay. Bob said, okay. So, there is, there is a competing theory of atonement. It's called ransom theory, and I think it's not true. Ransom theory is the idea that what Jesus was doing on the cross was, he was paying Satan to win us back. Just like, you know, somebody might kidnap Chris and then say, if Gina could come up with a million dollars, she can have him back. And then we pay the kidnapper a million bucks and then we get Chris back. Right? That's a ransom. Some would say that Jesus was paying a ransom to Satan to free us from him, and I reject that wholeheartedly. Satan got nothing out of the deal. He was defeated on the cross. So, when Jesus says, "The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many," some would say, oh, yeah. Yeah. That's what he was doing. And I think there's an illustration of value in as much as Jesus was paying a price, but he wasn't paying it to Satan. Satan did not benefit from the exchange. He may, I'm not sure. He may have mistakenly thought he was benefiting. He may have been gleeful in it possibly, but he's wrong. It was, in fact, Christ's triumphant victory over him.

Alright. Good enough. We got, I got a few more minutes, and here's what I last, here's what I want to spend my last couple minutes. Take a look at this thing about going back to religion, staying in the gospel, moving forward to religion. This is an important thing. You'll see it happen in Colossians. It, it actually happens a lot. It happens in Galatians very clearly. And when it does, it's always reflecting on something that Jesus has said. Jesus says, essentially, you think there are two ways to live, but in fact, there are three. If you go back and watch the stories that Jesus tells, he will often do this thing where there's two characters. Right? There's the good guy and the bad guy. The good guy is some religious Jew. The bad guy is some dirty sinner. Right? So he'll tell a story about the tax collector who goes up to the temple of God and standing next to him is a Pharisee, and you're like, oh, this is gonna be good because it's gonna be some great story. We might tell the story about, I don't know, in our context, who would be our favorite good guy? I mean, it's us. Right? So, you know, and an evangelical and a Muslim do thus and such. Right? Or some person who I identify with and some person I don't identify with. There's these two characters. And invariably, when Jesus tells this story, so you've got this Jew, this religious person, and then you've got this tax collector or prostitute or, you know, Samaritan. Now we love them. The Samaritan, somebody that's in the story, what always ends up happening is that the bad guy turns out to be the good guy. Have you noticed this in Jesus' stories? It always has this like flip on it. Okay? But when he does the bad guy, it's not just that they don't get to be the good guy because they're bad, it's because they embody this third place. So, the way you could think of it is there's this category of the religious versus the irreligious. And so, Jesus sets it up. Okay. So, we got a religious guy. We got an irreligious guy. Who do you think is the good one? You're like, the religious guy, of course, because you're religious. And we're like, you know, a bunch of religious people. And that is never Jesus' answer. He always says there's a religious guy, there's an irreligious guy, and there's this third category that is gospel. And it is not what you thought it was. He does it over and over again. There's religious, there's irreligious, and then there's gospel.

In, in Galatians, this whole thing shows up with, like, they're becoming more and more religious. The people in Galatia, they're coming out of paganism. They're stepping, they've become Christians, and now they’re sliding out of their Christianity into this ceremonial circumcision thing. It's like, no. No. No. Because when you go forward into religion, when you're becoming Jews now, you're actually going back to your paganism. He says to former pagans that are becoming, like, circumcised Jews, that you're going back to these weak and miserable principles. And there is this very difficult line, it seems, for Christians to live in—imputed righteousness, credited grace, real faith in a crucified savior—and we could slip off and just fall back into, no, immorality and license. We could fall off and slip into religion and ritual and, you know, pleasing ourselves. And what he's doing here in this letter is saying, don't do it. So, watch it. He says, 3:3, this is, don't go back to irreligion. He says, put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature—sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires, greed, which is idolatry. That's all going back to irreligion. Just live in this pagan life. He says, don't do it. Because of these, the wrath of God is coming. You used to walk in these ways, right, when you were pagans, in the life you once lived. But now, you've gotta rid yourself of anger, rage, malice, slander, filthy language from your lips.

Okay? But he is also at the same time saying, hang on. Don't go forward into religion. Look at the, the rightmost column. Therefore, do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink with regard to a religious festival, a new moon celebration, or a Sabbath day. These are a shadow of the things that were to come. The reality, however, is found in Christ. So, there is a great risk that you now that you're a Christian, you're just gonna start doing all these Christian things all the time, and you're gonna start thinking like, oh, this is where life is found. As long as I'm keeping all these ritualistic ceremonies, and that's where all my—I get points for that. He says, stop collecting points because you're so religious. Don't go back to being some, you know, sexually immoral pagan. Instead, look at what we do. It's in the middle. Since then, you've been raised with Christ. Set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. And when Christ, who is your life, appears, then you will appear with him in glory. That is what Paul is inviting students because Jesus is so great, our lives are to be about him. They're not about ceremonial fulfillment. They're not about all the debauchery we've come from. But we're gonna stay right here. Our hearts are fixed on him. We wanna be like him. We wanna love him. He's our, he is our treasure. He is our prize. He will clean up the stuff that needs to be cleaned up. He will disabuse us of our inclination toward religiosity because he's the good thing.

Does that make sense? Watch for it. You'll see this just as a paradigm. Watch for this. Paul does it frequently. Jesus does it all the time. Watch for the claim that there are not two ways to live. Your choice is not between religion and irreligion. There are three ways to live, and the best option of all is gospel. Live in that place. Does that make sense? Okay. It shows up everywhere. And I have, like, one more minute. Let me just simply say this. I'll, I'll alert you to this, and then I'll let you guys go.

Somebody, Sam, are you? Somebody said Ephesians and Colossians have a million parallels. There's a whole long list of them that are all detailed in the Ephesians document. Oh, and I forgot to get my accordion thing. We'll get out—Daron, you mind grabbing that, go to that closet and grab that, brown-looking suitcase thing. We'll throw that up here. One parallel that is worth noting, look at the very bottom of the page. In Colossians, Paul is gonna say, "Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom," as you sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God. And whatever you do in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

In the parallel text in Ephesians, he says, "Don't get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery." Thank you, Daron. "Instead, be filled with the Spirit." And then it's good. It's good to hear the same language. "Speak to one another, the psalms, hymns, spiritual songs. Make music in your heart to the Lord, giving thanks to God the Father for everything in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ." They're unmistakable moments of parallel right there. But what are we to be filled with in Ephesians? Spirit of God. And what are we to be filled with in Colossians? The word of Christ.

It is, you know, the Holy Spirit. This is an interesting thing. Over and over and over again, if you read this, you're gonna find this strange correspondence between things that are said to be true of the spirit of God and that are substituted over in other places to be said to be true of the word of God. So I just listed a couple other examples here. John 3 says we're born again by the Spirit. Peter says we're born again by the word of God. Right? Spirit of God, what are you born again by? The Spirit of God or the word of God? Well, it's the answer is both. If you look at John 16 and 17, just within John's own passage, he's gonna talk about the Spirit of truth and the word of truth. And there is something in there for us to chase down—that whatever is true of the Spirit of God, is very often described to be true of the word of God. Whatever is true of the word of God, is true of the Spirit of God. There's an interchangeability between God's word and his Spirit.

And that has all kinds of implications we can't unpack right now because it's time to go. Okay? Good enough for now? All right. So go read Colossians, hunt for those treasures, find them, and we'll do it again next week. Thanks for coming.