Blown Minds
Colossians 1:11-20
Tony’s Overview Video
How to Use
Preparing to teach
- Read the Bible Lesson by Tony Cartledge in this month’s issue of the Nurturing Faith Journal
- Watch Tony’s Video for this session
- Select either the Adult or Youth teaching guide and follow the directions
Click to read the Bible Lesson by Tony Cartledge
Key Text: Colossians 1:11
“May you be made strong with all the strength that comes from his glorious power, and may you be prepared to endure everything with patience…”
Do you feel strong and confident, able to do what God has called you to do?
The first church I served was (and still is) named Loco Baptist Church. The congregation lived up to its name when it called me – at the age of 20 and with no theological training beyond Sunday School – to become its pastor.
At the time I suffered from the illusion that age and a lack of experience didn’t matter because I was brimming with confidence. Looking back, I cringe at some of the sermons I preached to those poor people.
Still, good things happened. The church grew a little. I learned to baptize in a small outdoor pool sunk into the ground a few yards from a dusty dirt road. We completed a fellowship hall whose construction had stalled, and we put a new coat of white paint on its white clapboard sides.
To paint the high gable, two men propped a tall ladder on the slanted tin roof of the porch. My older cousin Bo said “Preacher, we’ll hold the ladder. We figure you’ve probably been livin’ better than the rest of us.”
Thus shamed into feigning more confidence than I had, I climbed up and slapped paint on everything I could reach, including some angry yellow jackets swarming from a hole at the very top.
In today’s text, Paul talks to the Colossian believers about a kind of confidence and strength that arises from more than youthful hubris: it comes from the power of God.
Christ and strength (vv. 10-17)
We have no evidence that Paul had personally visited Colossae, and when he wrote this letter to the church, he was confined to a prison cell, probably in Rome.
But he had heard about them.
He had heard that the Christians in Colossae and their neighbors in Laodicea were being confronted with a syncretistic form of the faith that included Jesus but demanded more. Paul wrote to defend his understanding of the gospel and to insist on this belief: Jesus is enough. [DD]
Paul began by identifying himself, noting that Timothy was with him, and greeting “the saints” in Colossae (vv. 1-2). Paul considered all Christ-followers to be saints, not because he thought they were morally perfect, but in the sense that they were God’s set-apart people.
He then broke into a long and complicated sentence (vv. 3-8) offering thanks for the church’s adherence to the gospel message they had learned from a colleague named Epaphras, a native of the area who had also evangelized the neighboring towns of Laodicea and Hieropolis.
After thanking God for the Colossians’ faith, love, and hope in Christ, Paul assured his readers that he was praying for them, asking God to bless them “in all spiritual wisdom and understanding” so they might “live lives worthy of the Lord” and “bear fruit in every good work as you grow in the knowledge of the Lord” (vv. 9-10).
Is that what is happening in our lives?
Paul knew that bucking temptation and culture is not easy, so he prayed that the Colossian believers would “be made strong with all the strength that comes from his glorious power” (v. 11a). The repetition shows the depth of Paul’s emphatic concern. He knew the believers would need strength to “endure everything with patience” (v. 11b).
Despite the difficulties of life and faith, Paul encouraged his readers to give thanks to God and find joy even in their struggles, remembering their hope of an eternal inheritance “in the light” (v. 12). [DD]
Light and darkness are timeless contrasts, often used for artistic effect. Rembrandt was famous for his portraits, which typically featured dark backgrounds and the masterful use of light to draw attention to faces.
Paul drew on this metaphor to remind his readers that in Christ we find the strength and the motivation to resist our darker natures and live in the light. “He has rescued us from the power of darkness,” Paul wrote, “and transferred us into the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins” (vv. 13-14).
For Paul, people had two options when confronted with the gospel: they could continue living in darkness, or they could follow Christ into the light. Paul’s readers believed in demonic powers that were characterized by darkness and held sinful people in their sway – but Paul offered a better way.
To encourage his readers, Paul emphasized what Christ had accomplished, a primary theme in Colossians. The verbs behind “has rescued” and “transferred” are in the aorist tense, indicating completed action. The word for “have” is an active verb, suggesting a present state. Because of what Christ has already done, we now have redemption from sin and the hope of an eternal inheritance. Nothing else is needed.
Jesus is enough. We can have confidence that the love and power of God in Christ are sufficient to release us from sin’s dark clutches, bring us into God’s light, and give us the strength and wisdom we need to grow with patience and joy.
Christ and creation (vv. 15-17)
In vv. 15-20, Paul sets forth a wide-ranging description of Christ’s divine activity from beginning to end, a lyrical passage that many scholars consider to be an early hymn or confession that Paul quoted as a reminder of what the Colossians had been taught. [DD]
The section begins with the affirmation that Jesus “is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation” (v. 15). God is typically imagined as an unseen reality beyond human vision, but in the person of Christ, Paul says, we see God. [DD]
The great and mysterious God revealed in the Old Testament – the God whom no one could look upon and live – that God took on a human face in Jesus Christ, and so became visible.
Other belief systems popular in the ancient world taught that a primary god created (or gave birth to) a second generation of gods, who were then responsible for actually creating the world and humankind. The hymn’s reference to Christ as “the firstborn of all creation” might seem to suggest that Christ was God’s first creation, who then took responsibility for creating everything else.
The term “firstborn” could mean either first in time, or first in rank. With firstborn sons, the two went together, but in this text, the word clearly indicates a rank of preeminence. Jesus had authority over all creation. [DD]
The image of Christ as “firstborn” does not indicate any subordination to God. This is clear from v. 16, which attests “for in him all things in heaven and on earth were created” (v. 16a, see also John 1:1-5).
First century peoples commonly believed in a variety of unseen powers, thought of as varying ranks of angels or demons. Royal terms like “principalities,” “powers,” or even “thrones” were used to designate the invisible beings thought to inhabit the atmosphere, engage in “spiritual warfare,” and influence life on earth.
That is why Paul went on to affirm that every aspect of creation comes through Christ, including “things visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or powers – all things have been created through him and for him” (v. 16b).
Paul did not claim to have special knowledge of these presumed powers, nor did he expressly affirm their existence – but he did insist that anything created owes its existence to Christ, and is thus subordinate to him: “He himself is before all things, and in him all things hold together” (v. 17).
In these words, Paul declared that Christ is not only the creator, but the sustainer of the universe. On those days when we may feel that our world is falling apart, it is helpful to recall Paul’s affirmation that Christ holds all things together. The same powerful Christ who constrains protons in the nucleus of an atom can hold broken hearts together and give us hope to face another day.
Christ and the church (vv. 18-20)
The second stanza of Paul’s poetic confession again uses the term “firstborn,” but clearly in support of the affirmation “He is the head of the body, the church” (v. 18a). Paul’s contemporaries did not understand the brain as we do, but they knew that the head controls the body. If the church can be described as a body, then Christ is clearly its head: the same Christ who rules the universe gives special attention to believers as the “the body of Christ.” [DD]
Christ is the head of the church because he is the founder of the church, “the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he might come to have first place in everything (v. 18b).” [DD] First place in everything, that is, including our lives.
With v. 19, the confession shifts from “firstborn” to “fullness” as Paul proclaims Christ as the one in whom “all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell” (v. 19). False teachers might claim that Jesus was only a partial manifestation of God, but Paul was emphatic in his insistence that Jesus Christ is fully God and fully sufficient for us.
Believers have no need to concern themselves with other spiritual beings, whether real or imagined, for God in Christ has reconciled all things to himself through his death on the cross (v. 20). Whatever is fragmented or fractured in the universe, Christ has the power to make whole – including us.
Adult Teaching Resources
Download the PDF of teaching resources for this lesson.
This PDF contains the Teaching Guide, Digging Deeper, and Hardest Question pages.
Read Scripture online: Colossians 1:11-20
Youth Teaching Resources
Parent Prep
We see people claiming to be “#1” all of the time whether it be in sports or the first chair in band. We have expectations to be the best. Sometimes this drive can take us too far and we can put other things first. Our priorities can become out of balance and what should be the most important are not.
Additional Links/Resources
Read Scripture online: Colossians 1:11-20
Download the PDF for youth teaching resources using the button below. This PDF contains the Teaching Guide for this lesson:
Video
Encourage youth to check out this video ahead of the lesson.
“Priorities” from MovieComm
Via www.yotube.com
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