Sure, I'll go to church every week
if that helps me feel more righteous.
Sure, I'll tithe or give offerings
if that helps me feel more righteous.
And what we're seeing is any severe or religious activity
can have the appearance of wisdom, in Paul's words,
but the concern is whether or not
they actually serve to sanctify us.
Hello, we're gonna be continuing our series in Colossians,
starting with Colossians 2, 16 through 23,
which says,
Let no one disqualify you insisting on asceticism
and worship of angels,
going on in detail about visions puffed up without reason
by his sensuous mind,
and not holding fast to the head from whom
the whole body nourished and knit together
through its joints and ligaments
grows with a growth that is from God.
If with Christ,
you died to the elemental spirits of the world,
why, as if you were alive in the world,
do you submit to regulations,
such as do not handle, do not taste, do not touch,
all referring to things that perish as they are used,
according to human precepts and teachings.
These indeed have an appearance of wisdom
in promoting self-made religion
and asceticism and severity to the body,
but they are of no value
in stopping the indulgence of the flesh.
So as I was preparing and praying about this message,
one of the things that I felt convicted about
was making sure that as we started talking about
what Paul is cautioning in this passage,
that we wouldn't get lost in the weeds
of different religious practices that happened back then,
but we could get to the heart of the message
that Paul is really trying to share with us.
The question in Colossians, what makes a man good,
is being asked in the form of a warning
about some of the lies
the Colossians were starting to believe.
In warning them, he wants to help ensure
that his audience isn't deceived
into thinking that their righteousness
comes from anywhere but Jesus as the head of their lives.
He wants to encourage the Colossians
into a confidence that cannot be disqualified
based on what rules they follow,
rather than where they find their identity,
which is in Jesus.
Paul refers to things like asceticism
and the worship of angels and severity to the body,
which are all things that could convince of righteousness
while still missing the mark that is Jesus.
The word asceticism really unveils this deception.
Asceticism means severe self-denial
for the sake of religious or spiritual growth,
meaning I'm going to do everything I can
to justify myself to God
without actually having to admit that I have a need for him.
Sure, I'll go to church every week
if that helps me feel more righteous.
Sure, I'll tithe or give offerings
if that helps me feel more righteous.
And what we're seeing is any severe or religious activity
can have the appearance of wisdom in Paul's words,
but the concern is whether or not
they actually serve to sanctify us.
The core of this deception that Paul is addressing is pride.
It's pride in us that tells us that we have reason to boast
or to feel confident apart from Jesus.
It's pride in us that tells me I can be justified
by what I do rather than what Jesus did.
It's when I start to think that the good things that I do
are what make me good.
The way that Paul puts it to help us
is he describes it as a shadow.
And what a shadow does is a shadow bears the image
of a thing, but it lacks the substance of a thing,
meaning what we do can act as a convincing indicator
that we are good,
but it could be the very thing keeping us
from what ultimately makes us good, which is Jesus.
Watch what Paul calls the things the Colossians
were being convinced to do earlier in verse eight.
He calls them philosophy and empty to see
according to human tradition,
according to the elemental spirits of the world
and not according to Christ,
meaning to say that
They find their origin not in God,
but they find their origin in the pride of man.
The unique danger that we encounter
in thinking that we are made good
by the types of things Paul is talking about
is that of all of my sins, I could be a coward
and still recognize that I have a need for Jesus.
I could be lustful and an adulterer
and still recognize that I have a need for Jesus.
I could have a horrible temper
and still recognize that I need a savior.
Most of my sins actually shed a light
on my need for a savior.
But the reason why the devil wants so badly
for you and me to succumb to the sin of pride
more than any other is because if I'm prideful,
I actually lose my ability to recognize
my need for a savior.
C.S. Lewis puts it like this in his book,
Mere Christianity.
Pride can often be used to beat down the simpler vices.
Teachers, in fact, often appeal to a boy's pride
or as they call it, his self-respect
to make him behave decently.
Many a man has overcome cowardice or lust or ill temper
by learning to think that they are beneath his dignity.
That is, by pride.
The devil laughs.
He is perfectly content to see you becoming chaste
and brave and self-controlled,
provided all the time he is setting up in you
the dictatorship of pride.
Just as he would be quite content
to see your chill blades cured
if he was allowed in return to give you cancer.
For pride is spiritual cancer.
It eats up the very possibility of love,
contentment, or even common sense.
First Corinthians one says this,
but God chose what is foolish in the world
to shame the wise.
And God chose what is weak in the world
to shame the strong.
God chose what is low and despised in the world,
even the things that are not,
to bring to nothing things that are
so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.
And because of him, you are in Christ Jesus,
who became to us wisdom from God,
righteousness and sanctification and redemption,
so that, as it is written,
let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.
Wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption
find their foundation in the person of Jesus
and give us reason to boast, just not in ourselves.
It's Jesus that makes us good,
which is why Paul finishes his thought
in Colossians three by saying this.
He says, if you then have been raised with Christ,
seek the things that are above, where Christ is,
seated at the right hand of God.
Set your minds on the things that are above
and not on the things that are of the earth,
for you have died and your life is hidden
with Christ in God.
When Christ, who is your life, appears,
then you also will appear with him in glory.
It's the same call that Jesus places on his hearers
at the Sermon on the Mount.
We can either choose to build our lives
on the foundation of sand, which is the world,
or we can choose to build our lives
on the solid foundation of Jesus,
which is secure at the right hand of God.
Now, with all of that being said,
I don't want the takeaway of this message
to be that it doesn't matter what we do.
It's actually the opposite.
My encouragement to you as you digest
what's being said in Colossians two
is that as we build our lives with Jesus as the foundation,
what we do would not be an expression
of our striving to be good on our own,
but an expression of our faith.
James 2.26 says,
"'For as the body apart from the spirit is dead,
"'so also faith apart from works is dead.'"
So let's give life to our faith by the good that we do.