Welcome to Reign of Grace. This
program is brought to you by Reign of Grace Media Ministries,
an outreach ministry of Eager Avenue Grace Church in Albany,
Georgia. It is our pleasure and privilege
to present to you the gospel message of the sovereign grace
and glory of God in the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. We pray that today's program
will be a blessing to you. Thank you for listening. And
now for today's program. Welcome to our program today.
I'm glad you could join us. If you'd like to follow along
in your Bibles, I'll be preaching from the book of Colossians.
This is an epistle that the Holy Spirit inspired the Apostle Paul
to write to a group of believers in a city called Colossae. And
so it's the book of the Colossians, the epistle of Paul to the Colossians. Paul had been used of God to
start a gospel church in this place. And like all those cities
back then that had the Greek and the Roman influence, they
were very steep, that the city was very steeped in idolatry,
the philosophy of men and women, and all of a sudden here comes
in the truth of the gospel of God's grace in Christ Jesus. And apparently this was a smaller
group of believers, but Paul is writing to encourage them
to continue in the faith. And so I've entitled this message,
Rooted and Built Up in Christ. This is what he mentions in verse
7 of Colossians chapter 2, that's going to be my text, where he
talks about rooted and built up in him, that is in Christ,
and established or established in the faith, the faith, that
is the doctrine, the truth of Christ, which God had revealed
to them and they believed, And he says, as you have been taught,
abounding therein with thanksgiving. And that's the issue of godliness,
the ethic. of true Christianity. It's not
law, but it's love. It's not some kind of a reward-based
offering which we earn things from God, but it's an act of
love and grace and gratitude because God has freely given
His people everything he requires and everything we need for salvation. So let's go back up to verse
one, just reading some verses here. The apostle writes, verse
one of Colossians 2, he says, for I would that you knew what
great conflict I have for you and for them at Laodicea. Laodicea
was another city where there was a church established, sort
of like a sister church. And Laodicea was a city that
is mentioned in the book of Revelation by the Apostle John as the Holy
Spirit revealed to him the seven churches. Laodicea was the last
of the churches and it was a church that had fallen away from the
truth. Now here, as Paul writes, this
church was still faithful. But the Bible speaks in 2 Thessalonians
2 of what we can call the great apostasy. Now that has to do
with churches, or we'll say bodies of people, who at one time claimed
to believe the true gospel, but had fallen away from the truth. And that's a problem in our day
today. It's an epidemic. Christ told
his disciples in Matthew chapter 24 and in other passages that
as we neared the end of time, the end of this world, his second
coming approaching, that there would be a great falling away
from the truth. And there would be millions of
people, and I know this is a shocking thing to so many people, but
you've got to read this in your Bible. There'd be millions of
people who would be Christian in name only, but not truly Christian
in doctrine. They would deny the doctrine
of Christ, the doctrine of His person and the doctrine of His
finished work, the doctrine of God, the doctrine of man, the
sinfulness of man, and our need of salvation by grace, the gospel. They deny the gospel. They would
opt out of the true gospel and go for a false gospel of salvation
conditioned on the works and the wills of men and women. and
not conditioned on Christ alone, who by himself, as the surety,
the substitute, and the redeemer of his people, fulfilled all
conditions to secure their salvation unto the end. And you have all
kinds of human doctrines and human philosophies entering into
the visible church. and the apostate church, let's
put it that way, that had fallen away. So Paul says, I have a
great conflict, a great care, even a fear in the sense of being
drawn away from the truth. And we'll see what it is in a
minute. He says, so I would that you knew what great conflict
I have for you and for them that lay out to see it, and for as
many as have not seen my face in the flesh. Paul had been there,
but there were many who were in that church who had not met
him face to face. And so he says in verse two,
now listen to this. He says that their hearts might
be comforted And where's the comfort of God's people? It's
in Christ now. It's not in our doings and in
our efforts, in our achievements. The gospel shows us that our
comfort is in Christ. Comfort ye, comfort ye my people,
saith the Lord. That's back in the book of Isaiah.
He said, the Lord hath given double for all your sins. That
is, he hath put away our sins by the blood of Christ, And doubly
so, He has given us a perfect righteousness, whereby we stand
justified before God. That's the imputed righteousness
of Christ. And that's a gift from God. And so, that their
hearts might be comforted, being knit together in love, now brought
together in love, and unto all riches of the full assurance
of understanding. See, it's not just love as a
feeling, it's love with understanding. And what is that? That's love
and truth, not just love. See, it's not just an emotional
thing here. Now, nothing wrong with emotional. I always tell people this. We
get emotional over the gospel and over the fact that God has
saved us by grace, but we're not emotionalist or we're not
a church of emotionalism. Now, emotionalism is that way
of thinking that determines salvation by how you feel. Now, you may
have heard people say they go into a religious service, and
it might be kind of a tear-jerking service, something that'll draw
out your emotions, and then they'll say something like this. They'll
say, well, I know the Spirit of God was there. I just felt
it. Well, my friend, let me tell
you something now. If the truth was not preached from the pulpit
of that church, if it's not believed by those who enter into this
emotional state, It's not the Holy Spirit. And that's what
emotionalism is, judging the presence of the Spirit, judging
salvation, judging the blessing of God by how you feel, not by
what is preached. Now understand that. To the law
and to the testimony, if they preach not according to this
word, there's no light in them, no matter how it makes you feel.
We have to understand that. So he says, verse two, unto all
riches of the full assurance of understanding to the acknowledgement
of the mystery of God and of the Father and of Christ. Now,
what is that acknowledgement of the mystery of God that brings
the full assurance of understanding? It's the knowledge that God gives
us by revelation through the preaching of the gospel in the
power of the Holy Spirit. I'm not ashamed of the gospel.
It's the power of God unto salvation, to the Jew first, the Greek also,
unto all them that believe, to the Jew first, the Greek also.
For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to
faith. As it is written, the just shall live by faith. So
it's the preaching of the gospel. Now that's a mystery. And the
reason it's a mystery is because man does not know it or want
it by nature as he's naturally born. If we know it, it's because
God reveals it to us. You know, in Christ, back over
in Matthew chapter 11, let me read this to you. In Matthew
chapter 11, right before he spoke the words, come unto me all ye
that labor and are heavy laden and I'll give you rest. Well,
he says in verse 27 of Matthew chapter 11, listen to this. He
says, all things are delivered unto me of my father and no man
knoweth the son But the Father, God the Father reveals his Son
to his people. Neither knoweth any man the Father
save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him. So back
here in Colossians 2, when he talks about the mystery of God
and of the Father and of Christ, he's talking about that truth,
that knowledge, that understanding. that God gives his people under
the preaching of the gospel that they might know God, the only
true God, and Jesus Christ, whom he has sent, the glorious person
of Christ, the finished work of Christ. Who is Jesus Christ? See, that's a mystery until God
reveals it. When Christ asked the disciples,
he said, who do you say that I am? Christ said, you're the
Christ, you're the Messiah. come from God, the Savior of
sinners. And Christ told him, he said,
blessed art thou, Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood hath not
revealed this to you. You didn't know that naturally,
but my Father, which is in heaven. Christ is God manifest in the
flesh. He's God-man, every bit God and
every bit man without sin. And that's the type of person
that he had to be in order to do what he came to do, save his
people from their sins. His name shall be called Emmanuel,
God with us. And so God reveals that, and
then he reveals the work of Christ, the accomplishment of Christ. What did Jesus Christ accomplish? in his obedience unto death on
the cross. Now, many people today believe,
well, he died to make salvation a possibility if we do our part. And that's not what he did. That's
not in the Bible, and that's not the gospel. That's a false
gospel. Jesus Christ came to obey the
law unto death on the cross as the surety, the substitute, the
redeemer, the life-giver, the protector and preserver of His
people. He died to save His people, and
all for whom He died shall be saved, because He put away their
sins. Their sins cannot be charged
to them. Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? It's God that justifies. They
cannot be condemned. Who can condemn us? It's Christ
that died, yea, rather is risen again, seated at the right hand
of the Father, ever living to make intercession for us. He
is the propitiation for our sins. That propitiation is a sin-bearing
sacrifice that brought about satisfaction. for by one offering
he hath perfected forever them that are sanctified. And that's
a mystery until God reveals it to you. Now you may hear it in
the scripture, you may hear me preach it, but if you don't believe
it, it's because it hasn't been revealed to you. If it's ever
revealed by God, you'll believe it. And I always tell people
this way, if God reveals his truth to a sinner, There's three
things that sinner cannot do. He cannot ignore it. You can't
get away from it. You may try, but you can't get
away from it if God's revealing. He cannot deny it. You cannot
deny it if God's revealed it to you. And thirdly, you cannot
leave it. That is, you'll stay with it
because he preserves his people. Well, look back at Colossians
2. It says, talking about the father revealing himself in Christ,
and verse 3 says, in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom
and knowledge. All the things that God gives
to his people by his grace in salvation through Christ is revealed
in Christ. They're hid in Christ. And that
doesn't mean they're hidden from view, even though sinners by
nature cannot see them. It's not that they're hidden
from view, but they're stored in Christ so that it cannot be
taken away. These people who tell you that
you can be saved and then lost again, they don't know what they're
talking about. They'll say, well, if that's
true, I'll just go out and sin all I want to. Well, go sin all
you want to if that's the way you think, but that's deadly.
The power of grace is the power to justify sinners based upon
a righteousness that they had no part in producing, but one
which Christ has produced for them by His obedience unto death. And we had nothing to do with
that personally. We were in Him legally and redemptively
and spiritually. But now the power of grace goes
further than that. It doesn't stop there. It goes
to the very heart of man in the new birth. That's the spiritual
aspect of salvation. And it grabs hold of the heart
and keeps a sinner looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher
of our faith. Now look at verse four of Colossians
2. He says, in this I say, lest any man should beguile you with
enticing words. Now here's the problem. Here's
what Paul was fearful of. False preachers would come in
and try to draw professing believers away from the truth that is in
Christ, from their profession and confession of faith. Now,
let me make this perfectly clear before I go any farther here.
If a person could profess to believe the truth, the truth,
and then later be drawn away, what does the Bible say about
such people? Well, let me give you an example
of it. And you'll find it in passages like this, 1 John 2.
And listen to 1 John 2, this is verse 18. He says, little children, it
is the last time, the last age. Now the last days, you know,
we all talk about these are the last days. Well, the last age,
the last time, the last age, the last days, span from the
first coming of Christ, beginning with his death, burial and resurrection
from the dead, his ascension under glory, all the way to his
second coming. That's the last age. When Christ
comes again, that'll be it. Now, I will agree, we're probably
in the last of the last days. But John recognized in his day
that we're in the last time. And look at verse 18 of 1 John
2. He says, and as you have heard that antichrist shall come, even
now are there many antichrists, plural, whereby we know that
it is the last time. Now, Antichrist is that spirit
that claims to be in Christ, to believe Christ, and to follow
Christ, but denies the doctrine of Christ. And so he says in
verse 19, now this spirit of Antichrist that is pervading
in some, he says in verse 19, they went out from us, they left
the gospel. They left the true church. And
he says, But they were not of us. They weren't really part
of our true spiritual fellowship of grace and truth and love.
For if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued
with us. If they had been truly saved,
they would have stayed with us. But they went out that they might
be made manifest that they were not all of us. And that's the
case. So go back here to Colossians
2. He says in verse four, and this I say, lest any man should
beguile you with enticing words. Grab your mind and your attention. That's the beguiling. Satan beguiled
Eve. You remember Paul spoke of that
in 2 Corinthians 11, I believe it's verse three. He talked about
how he feared of the Corinthian people. that they would be beguiled
just as Satan beguiled Eve in the garden. They should be beguiled
and taken away from the simplicity that's in Christ. And what is
that simplicity? It's the singularity, the singleness
that all of our salvation, all of my salvation is wrapped up
in one person and one work, the person of Christ and the work
of Christ on the cross. to save me from my sins. His
blood, His righteousness alone, nothing added and nothing taken
away. So he says in verse 5 of Colossians
2, For though I be absent in the flesh, not physically with
you, yet am I with you in spirit. joying and beholding your order
and the steadfastness of your faith in Christ." Paul was so
happy and he was rejoicing to hear that they were continuing
in the faith. And that's by the grace of God
now. He's not throwing accolades upon these people. He's not handing
out Sunday school pens. You haven't missed a service.
He's not doing that. He's not giving awards to them.
He's thanking God. And he says in verse six, as
you have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in
him, continuing Christ. Walk in him with the assurance
of faith that Christ is your only hope. And this is where
he gets to our text. Now verse seven, he says rooted
and built up in him. I'm rooted, I'm established,
I'm founded in Christ. He's the foundation of His church.
He's the chief cornerstone. He's the head. He's the heart,
life of His church. Rooted and built up in Him, growing
in grace and knowledge. What is it to grow in grace and
in knowledge of Christ? It's to learn more of Him. It's
to see more of His glory, even in light of our sinfulness and
depravity. Knowing that apart from Him,
I'm nothing. Without Christ, I'm nothing.
The Bible says without faith, it's impossible to please God.
You could just as well say it this way, without Christ, it's
impossible to please God. So rooted and built up in Him
and established in the faith, firm in the faith of God's grace
and truth in Christ, immovable. Paul wrote about that in Galatians
chapter five, in verse one, when he said, stand fast, firm, in
the liberty wherewith Christ has made you free. And don't
be entangled again with the yoke of bondage, legalism. Salvation
by the works and the will of men. Salvation conditioned on
me or you, instead of on Christ and on Him alone. Stand fast
in Christ and don't be moved away from Him. He said, because
this is what you've been taught. Look at it, verse seven. rooted
and built up in Him and established in the faith." Notice he says
the faith there. That's the truth. That's Christ.
That's the doctrine of Christ. The gospel. I'm rooted and established,
built up in Him and established in that faith. And if the Spirit
has brought me to see these things by revelation, then I can't be
moved away from them. And as I grow in grace and knowledge,
I won't grow away from Christ. I certainly won't grow above
him. I'll grow in him, knowing more of his word. Get to know
his word. And he says, as you have been
taught and abounding therein with thanksgiving. Thank you,
Lord, for saving my soul. Thank you, Lord, for making me
whole. Thank you, Lord, for giving to
me thy great salvation so rich and free. And so he says in verse
eight, continuing on, he says, beware lest any man spoil you
through philosophy and vain deceit after the tradition of men, after
the rudiments or elements of the world, and not after Christ.
You see, false preachers, will try to get people to think away
from Christ for their salvation, for their assurance, for their
reward, and get your mind upon yourself and upon others. They'll come up with philosophies.
You know, the word philosophy means love of wisdom. Well, to
a believer, a Christian, a real Christian, that means love of
Christ, who is our wisdom. Bible says, but of God are you
made in him, wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption. And so Christ is our wisdom,
all the wisdom of God found in this glorious person and his
finished work and in his word. But they'll come along with the
philosophies of men. You know, you've heard of the
Greek philosophers like Plato and Socrates and Aristotle and
many others, the Romans, even the Jewish rabbis, those philosophers
and others. And they have all kinds of different
ideas. but none of them point to salvation
by the grace of God in Christ. And when he speaks of vain deceit,
he's speaking of a deception that promotes self-righteous,
legalistic religion. That's what vain deceit is. It's
like the Pharisees and the scribes who taught people to seek righteousness
and holiness by their works under the law. And it's like preachers
who tell you that, well, they'll say Christ died for everybody,
but he saved nobody unless you do your part. That's a vain deceit. Somebody says, well, shouldn't
we do our part? Our part is to follow him by
his grace, and none of us will do that unless he draws us to
him. Bible says in John 6, 44, no
man can come to me except the father which has sent me draw
him and I'll raise him up at the last day. John chapter one
speaks, tells us that all who receive him, they're born of
God, they're not born of the flesh, they're not born of blood,
that is their physical descendancy, they're not born of their works,
the will of the flesh, and they're not born of the will of man,
it's they're born of God. See, God has to give us eyes
to see and ears to hear. And so after the tradition of
men, that's the laws and the ideas of men and not the word
of God. The rudiments of the world, he's
gonna talk about that later on when he talks about how people,
they think that what they do, what they eat, what they don't
eat, what they wear, and all of that, that means something
in the sight of God. And so the rudiments of the world,
but not after Christ. My friend, I'm here to point
you to Christ. And I'm not going to point you
to yourself or to your religion or to your denomination, your
church. You look unto Jesus, the author
and finisher of our faith. And look at what he says here.
Now, this is kind of like a summation of it. And I'm going to pick
up here next week. He says, for in him dwelleth
all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. And he goes on saying,
you're complete in him. You're completing Him, which
is the head of all principality and power. That's where it all
goes to. It's where it all builds from.
It's where it's all surrounded by the grace and the power and
the goodness of God in Christ Jesus, rooted and built up in
Him. I hope you'll join us next week
for another message from God's Word. We are glad you could join us
for another edition of Reign of Grace. This program is brought
to you by Reign of Grace Media Ministries, an outreach ministry
of Eager Avenue Grace Church in Albany, Georgia. To receive
a copy of today's program or to learn more about Reign of
Grace Media Ministries or Eager Avenue Grace Church, write us
at 1-1-0-2 Eager Drive, Albany, Georgia. Contact us by phone at 229-432-6969
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today and may the Lord be with you.