13 minute read
My Pulpit Message notes
from TT 144
by TIMES TODAY
My Pulpit Message - notes
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Grow in Proclaiming Christ
- There is One more supreme than anyone, or anything we consider important.
- Paul says in verse 21 that He is the One whom we proclaim.
- The nature of human beings is that when you encounter something good, important, you can’t help, but proclaim it. You go to a good restaurant and you like it, you proclaim it to your friends and family members. You watch a good movie and you proclaim it to those around you. You go to a good school, you tell other parents about this good school. You publicly declare and announce about an important thing.
- What Paul tells us in the book of Colossians is that Christ is supreme.
- From this passage I counted the number of times that Christ is mentioned, or His personal pronoun, or His possessive pronoun and over 26 times Christ keeps being repeated that Christ is supreme.
- It is this Christ who is supreme that we ought to proclaim. It is this Christ that Paul says in verse 28, “He is the one weproclaim!. Not a system or religious attitudes, but Christ is the One that we proclaim.
1. The One Who is Proclaimed
2. The ones who proclaim Him
3. The process of proclaiming Him.
The One Who is Proclaimed
- His name is Jesus Christ, the beloved Son of God. Verse 15 is a build up from verse 13 and 14. “13 For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, 14 in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.”
- So, it is regarding this Son that he loves that Paul now pens this hymn, because from verse 15 to 20 is actually a song/ hymn that as Paul ponders on this beloved Son that he things of this Son that God loves that Paul pauses and this section is written as a song.
- Who is this that we proclaim? Verse 15-20
1. Jesus is supreme over creation. verse Col 1:15-17
- Paul starts by telling us that this Christ is the image of the invisible God.
- One of the questions that has plagued humanity is what is God like? To some God is like this huge mountain and so it is like a point of reference to us to worship Him. To other He is like this huge humongous tree and we look at it and we are amazed at God. To other, God is like this thing I have fashioned and placed in a corner in my house. As a result of this question different images have been formed to depict Him.
- Brothers and sisters, Jesus is the true image of the invisible God. In Christ we get to see the unseen God. In Him we get to understand the unfathomable God. In Him we get to approach the holy God. In Him is the image, the manifestation of the invisible God, a God that cannot be seen looked at us and said, I will communicate myself in a manner that you will understand. And so God became a man, that we may no longer have to ask the question, what is God like? because in Christ, then we are able to see the invisible God.
- Read through the gospel. Don’t we see the nature of God as He quieted the storm? Do you not see His power over sickness as He healed the woman with an issue of blood? Do you not see His power over demons as He cast out the legion? Do you not see His power over sin as he forgives the paralytic? Do you not see His power over death as He raises Lazarus from the dead? As He rises from the dead on the third day and lives forever more.
- I wonder if you can see God and His compassion in Christ as He looks at the crowds and they
look helpless as sheep without a shepherd. - Do you see Him the friend of sinners found amongst those who are the outcast of society and yet loving them when no one would and transforming them when no one, or nothing else could?
- Jesus, the Son of the God, is the image of the invisible God. He makes God real to us. He is flesh and blood that we can relate to so that we may no longer need to ask, what is God like, so that we may not have to go back to traditional African societies trying to look for something else while Jesus is here, revealing the invisible God.
- Paul continues to tell us the He is the firstborn over all creation. Many have stumbled over this statement. Many religious statements have argued from this statement, ‘if Jesus is the firstborn of all creation then it means that He was created first.
- if you are a good Bible student then you must pause at that particular verse and ask, ‘what does it mean that Jesus is the firstborn of all creation, because how we understand that term ‘firstborn’ it expresses priority in order. But what Paul is arguing here is not priority in order, rather Paul is arguing, priority in rank. That Jesus is not the firstborn of all creation, meaning He was created first, but that He is supreme over all creation.
- Paul goes ahead and qualifies his statement because verse 16 is a qualification over what Paul has said about Jesus being firstborn over all creation. “For in him all things were created…” So Christ cannot be a creation Himself.
- Paul continues to argue over Jesus being the firstborn over all creation by reminding us that Jesus is the source of creation. He is the one who created everything that there is. But also that Jesus is the sustainer of call creation. Verse 17,
- Paul labours in telling us the totality of what Jesus created by telling us, He created things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible.
- Because there was this strange teaching in the church at Colossae he reminds them that even the thrones, rulers, principalities, these things that you are lured to worshipping and giving reverence to, even those things were created by Him. He is supreme over all creation. This is the One we proclaim, brother and sisters.
- Hebrew 1:3 “The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word.”
- Jesus is the one who hold you together as an individual. If not for Christ holding you together, what would have been the outcome of your life? Jesus is supreme over all creation.
- In the words of Abraham Quipper, not a square inch of the whole of creation, over which Christ who is Sovereign over all does not cry, ‘Mine’. There is nothing over all creation that Jesus does not cry ‘Mine’ . He looks at you and says ‘Mine.’ He looks at your money and says ‘Mine’. He looks at your family, career and says ‘Mine’. And if all is His, then have we been living and acting as though all is His.
- We see Christ’s supremacy over redemption. Verse 18 to 20, “ And he is the head of the body,” We have moved from larger to smaller, from creation to this special institution called the church. This special group came about because the original created order was tainted by sin. That which was created in Genesis chapters 1,2,3 was tainted by sin and God formulated this redemptive plan that He would rescue for Himself a people, the new creation. So Jesus then is the head of this new creation called the church.
- Only God could attain His own righteous requirement, so He came Himself. That is why we are told in verse 19 “For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him,”and Jesus satisfied God’s justice by dying on the cross thus dying the death that was yours and mine, by right, Jesus took it upon Himself and as a result, He reconciled us to Himself.
- He is supreme over redemption that there is no other way that you and I could come to God / be made right with God other than Jesus. Anything or anyone else could not do. Jesus alone is supreme over redemption.
- So quit the other channels/systems that you have been pursuing in His place thinking that they have the ability to save you. It is only One that is able to save you / to redeem you. His name is Jesus.
The ones who proclaim Him
(Colossians 1:21-23)
If we are rightly to proclaim Christ then we must first appreciate what He has done in us.
- Paul reminds the Colossians and us “Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of[g] your evil behaviour.”
- This is also a description of us here and now, that before Jesus came and redeemed us, we were separated from God. We were alienated / enemies of God, hostile to God doing evil until Jesus redeemed us.
- Paul in 1 Timothy says, ‘I was formally a blasphemer, a persecutor and a violent opponent. I wonder, do you sometimes pause to think of who you were before Jesus redeemed you? What would you say you were before Jesus delivered / redeemed you?
- Unless we first recognise that we were first alienated / separated
from God that we were enemies and were doing evil, then we will not appreciate the grace that come with Christ. We will not appreciate the image of the invisible God did on the cross. This was our past. - Our present Col 1:22 “But now he has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body through death”. That is who we presently are. Formerly we were enemies of God. Now we have been reconciled to Him. Formerly, we could not approach God, now we can come before the throne of grace with confidence that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need. This is our present state.
- What is the purpose? To present us holy in His sight without blemish and free from accusation. That is the purpose of Christ reconciling us so that He may present us to Himself that we who were doing evil deeds, who were sinful in many ways would be presented before Him, holy, without blemish and without anyone to accuse us of anything / above reproach.
- This is important because, this same Jesus will send us to proclaim to others that are also alienated from Him. To proclaim to others that are hostile in mind towards Him. To proclaim to others that are engaged in evil deeds. This Jesus that did not consider our qualifications because all human beings consider what is your qualification, even when you want to give a scholarship to a needy child, they must be needy, but bright. You must bring something. But Jesus there is nothing you can bring. Nothing in our hands do we bring, but simply to the cross do we cling.
The process of proclaiming Him.
Colossians 1:24-
-Part of proclaiming Christ will involve suffering. “Now I rejoice in what I am suffering for you, and I fill up in my flesh what is still lacking in regard to Christ’s afflictions, for the sake of his body, which is the church.”
- Paul is not speaking about suffering for propitiation (the atoning sacrifice of Christ). It is not that he is suffering of atonement for those that are sinners, rather this is suffering from proclamation. And this brothers and sisters we will go through. We must be ready to suffer for the sake of Christ.
- Paul writing to Timothy in 2 Timothy, says ‘He who desires a godly life must be persecuted. It is not that there would be a sword on their neck, but it could be that you will be slandered, ridiculed, rejected and we must be ready to suffer for the sake of Christ as we proclaim the gospel. We must be ready to be considered fools and backward. We must be ready to be considered anti-science and anti-modernity and anti-development because we proclaim the One who is supreme over creation and redemption.
- Suffering is part of the process. - The substance is the word of God in its fullness. “25 I have become its servant by the commission God gave me to present to you the word of God in its fullness.” Not just that which we like, that believe in Jesus and you will be wealthy, healthy, prosperous. No. That is not the whole counsel of God. Paul says, I labour to present to you the whole counsel / word of God, in it fullness.
- But interestingly the process, even the style is informed by Him. So he says, verse 28, “He is the one we proclaim, admonishing and teaching everyone with all wisdom,” How? We warn and we teach. We warn people of the hell that is to come and we teach them about the heaven that is to come. We warn people about their sin and we teach them about righteousness. We warn the false teachers and we teach the disciples of Christ. We must warn and teach. That is how we proclaim.
- But in whose strength do we do this?
Paul says, “To this end I strenuously contend with all the energy Christ so powerfully works in me.” It is through Christ strength, not ours. It is His energy, not ours that we use in proclaiming Him.
