SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 3/2/2017
10:43 PM
My Worship Time Focus: PT-3 “Settled
in Understanding”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Colossians
2:2c-5
Message of the
verses: “and attaining to all the
wealth that comes from the full assurance of understanding, resulting in a true
knowledge of God’s mystery, that is, Christ Himself, 3 in whom are hidden all the treasures of
wisdom and knowledge. 4 I say this so
that no one will delude you with persuasive argument. 5 For even though I am
absent in body, nevertheless I am with you in spirit, rejoicing to see your
good discipline and the stability of your faith in Christ.”
We have been talking about the deity of Christ, which as
mentioned is something that some of those in the Colossian church were having
trouble with. You cannot be a true
believer, a born-again Christian without knowing that Jesus Christ is truly God
who came in the flesh. There is no way
that anyone could be saved without the second person of the godhead coming to
earth to take on flesh and blood in order to die on the cross. In our study of John 17 we read in the first
verse “Jesus spoke these things; and lifting up His eyes to heaven, He said, "Father, the hour has come;
glorify Your Son, that the Son may glorify You,” and the time that Christ was
talking about was what had been planned from eternity past, and that is that
the second person of the godhead go to the cross to pay for our sins.
Paul tells us that Jesus Christ is the One in whom are “hidden
all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge,” making Him the only One who is
sufficient. John MacArthur writes “Hidden
is from apokruphos, from which we get
our English word apocrypha. It was used
by the heretics to refer to the writings containing their secret
knowledge. But there is no hidden
spiritual knowledge necessary to salvation and sanctification outside of
Christ. The treasures of wisdom and
knowledge in Christ, however, are hidden from all but Christians.” There is little difference in our world today
who say that it has to be Christ plus “something,” and that something could be
whatever they want it to be in order to be saved, perhaps Christ plus “good
works.”
We also need this knowledge not only for salvation but it
is also critical to assurance of our salvation because doubts can creep in, and
these doubts can also be about His ability to do what He has promised.
We
will now look at verse four in a way that a man named Lightfoot paraphrases “I
wish to warn you against any one who lead you astray by specious argument and
persuasive rhetoric.” The NASB
translates it as “I say this in order that no one may delude you with
persuasive argument.” What was going on
in the Colossian church is similar to what goes on in all false claims about
Jesus Christ and that is to attack the deity of Christ, and His sufficiency to
save and sanctify, or even both. Paul
writes to Timothy what is really going on here in 1 Timothy 4:1 “But the Spirit
explicitly says that in later times some will fall away from the faith, paying
attention to deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons,” and that is not only
what was going on then, but what continues to go on now.
Paul
has warned the church to stand firm and actually rejoices that they are doing
this. He, as mentioned, has never been
to this church before as he did not begin it, and so he is “absent in body”
from them as he is now in prison, but Paul does say that he is present in
spirit. “5 For even though I am absent
in body, nevertheless I am with you in spirit, rejoicing to see your good discipline and the
stability of your faith in Christ.”
John MacArthur writes “Taxis
(good discipline) and stereoma
(stability) are military terms, perhaps suggested by Paul’s close contact with
Roman soldiers during his imprisonment (cf. Acts 28:16; Phil. 1:13). Taxis
refers to a line of soldiers drawn up for battle, whereas stereoma refers to the solidity of a formation of soldiers. Taken together, they express Paul’s joy that
individually and collectively the Colossians were standing firm against the
attacks of false teaching. His goal for
them is that they remain settled in their present true understanding, and not
yield to doubt from those attacks.”
3/2/2017 11:16 PM
No comments:
Post a Comment