Scripture Colossians
1:15-20
Jesus came to pay a debt He didn't owe because we owed a
debt we couldn't pay
SECTION 1 Christ is mediator of Creation
Col 1:15-20 He is the image of the invisible God, (How
can the invisible be made visible? He does not serve as a representation –
rather he is the invisible God in visible form- the essence of who God is has
taken on flesh. Rom 1:20 For since the creation of the world
God's invisible qualities — his eternal power and divine nature — have been
clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without
excuse. Col 2:9 For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form But
wait – aren’t we created in the image and likeness of God? Yes, but we are a
representation bearing similarities too; where Christ is actual image – God
made flesh…not an image like God, but
actual God. Think of it this way – we adopt his image,
Jesus is the one and only begotten – natural born Son of God. Jesus can’t
deviate from that image – as adopted children, we can break away from that
image so that Paul tells us in Col 3:10 put on the new self, which is being
renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator.) the firstborn over all creation. (Firstborn
does not mean the child who came first, rather it means the one with the status
of the firstborn as in Ps 89:27 I will also appoint him my
firstborn, the most exalted of the kings of the earth. Paul shows Christ as not the
best of creation, rather the one OVER all creation. This is how he is able to perform miracles
like stopping the storm on the sea or turning water into wine.) 16
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 were
created by him and for him. (Whether
there are visible thrones and rulers on earth or invisible powers and
authorities in heaven – ALL THINGS were made BY CHRIST and created FOR CHRIST) 17
He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. (God in Christ did not create the world
and then walk away. He has remained the
spiritual gravity that holds all things together. He is the reason all things exist and
therefore he remains constant in his creation.
Even those who do not believe in Christ owe every breath and thought to
Him without whom no one exists.)
But being over and in
and through all of creation is not enough for understanding who the invisible
God made visible in Christ. There is more…
SECTION 2 Christ is
Lord over God’s New order = the Church
18 And he is
the head of the body, the church; (I don’t know how many ways I can
emphasize the importance of the church. And we have opportunity to participate
in Christ’s creation – the every-where-ness of God as well as participate in
Christ’s church the right-here-ness of Christ with the one who created them both and lives
by, in, and through them both. What ultimately happens to creation is
completely tied to what happens to the church in Christ.) he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in
everything he might have the supremacy. (Talking about the church – it is
not about us, but about his redemptive work done on the cross – the church must
preach the cross of Christ - 1 Cor 1:22-24 Jews demand miraculous signs and
Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling
block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called,
both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.
Firstborn from among the dead not to assure us of a later resurrection only but
of resurrection power NOW IN HIS CHURCH!
Phil 3:10-11 I want to know Christ
and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his
sufferings, becoming like him in his death, 11 and so, somehow, to attain to
the resurrection from the dead. WOW not a later resurrection but to
know that same power that raised Jesus form the dead now – the power of the
cross to redeem me from my sin and make me fit for heaven and a part of his
body – the church – working in the world for him and through him.) 19
For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, (In the OT God
dwelt in a temple and in places and only in part – now ALL of who God is dwells
in a person – in Jesus through his body the church – not a stone temple but a
living body – you and me.) 20 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. (The
Christ of Creation Glory becomes the Christ of Cross humiliation – The creator
of life is experiencing painful suffering and death to have creation and the
church’s purpose fulfilled – new life for his dying creation – salvation for
you and me.)
The first section is
Christ bringing life into being (creation) by the power of his spoken word,
“Let there be…and there was!” The second
section is Christ bringing life to his body – the church – his people – by shedding
his blood and dying on the cross.
How does the invisible
God of creation become visible in Christ after the resurrection?
In her book The God Who Hung on the Cross, journalist
Ellen Vaughn retells a story of how the Gospel came to a small village in
Cambodia. In September 1999 Pastor Tuy Seng (not his real name) traveled to
Kampong Thom Province in northern Cambodia. Throughout that isolated area, most
villagers had cast their lot with Buddhism or spiritism. Christianity was
virtually unheard of.
But much to Seng's surprise, when he arrived in one
small, rural village the people warmly embraced him and his message about
Jesus. When he asked the villagers about their openness to the gospel, an old
woman shuffled forward, bowed, and grasped Seng's hands as she said, "We
have been waiting for you for twenty years." And then she told him the
story of the mysterious God who had hung on the cross.
In the 1970s the Khmer Rouge, the brutal,
Communist-led regime, took over Cambodia, destroying everything in its path.
When the soldiers finally descended on this rural, northern village in 1979,
they immediately rounded up the villagers and forced them to start digging
their own graves. After the villagers had finished digging, they prepared
themselves to die. Some screamed to Buddha, others screamed to demon spirits or
to their ancestors. One of the women
started to cry for help based on a childhood memory—a story her mother told her
about a God who had hung on a cross. The woman prayed to that unknown God on a
cross. Surely, if this God had known suffering, he would have compassion on
their plight.
Suddenly, her solitary cry became one great wail as
the entire village started praying to the God who had suffered and hung on a
cross. As they continued facing their own graves, the wailing slowly turned to
a quiet crying. There was an eerie silence in the muggy jungle air. Slowly, as
they dared to turn around and face their captors, they discovered that the
soldiers were gone.
As the old woman finished telling this story, she told
Pastor Seng that ever since that humid day from 20 years ago the villagers had
been waiting, waiting for someone to come and share the rest of the story about
the God who had hung on a cross.
Cross of Christ
George MacLeod wrote:
I simply argue that the cross be raised again at the center of the market place as well
as on the steeple of the church, I am recovering the claim that Jesus was not
crucified in a cathedral between two candles: But on a cross between two
thieves; on a town garbage heap; at
a crossroad of politics so cosmopolitan that they had to write His title in
Hebrew and in Latin and in Greek…And at the kind of place where cynics talk
smut, and thieves curse and soldiers gamble. Because that is where He died, and
that is what he died about. And that is where Christ’s people ought to be, and
what church people ought to be about.
