Good morning. Let's open this
morning's service with hymn number 37 in your hardback temple, number
37, How Great Thou Art. Let's all stand together, number
37. All four verses. oh lord my god when i in awesome
wonder consider all the works thy hands have made i see the
? I see the rolling thunder ? ? Throughout the clouds the universe displayed
? ? Then sings my soul, my Savior God, to Thee ? ? How great Thou
art, how great Thou art ? ? How great Thou art ? Then sings my
soul, my Savior God, to Thee ? How great Thou art ? How great
Thou art When through the woods and forest glades I wander And
hear the birds sing sweetly in the trees When I look down from
lofty mountain grandeur ? And hear the brook and feel the gentle
breeze ? Then sings my soul, my Savior God to Thee ? How great
Thou art, how great Thou art ? Then sings my soul, my Savior
God, to Thee ? ? How great Thou art, how great Thou art ? And
when I think that God, His Son not sparing, Sent Him to die,
I scarce can take it in. ? That on the cross my burden
gladly bearing ? ? He bled and died to take away my sin ? ?
Then sings my soul, my Savior God, to Thee ? ? How great Thou
art ? ? How great Thou art ? Then sings my soul, my Savior God,
to Thee ? How great Thou art ? How great Thou art ? When Christ
shall come ? With shout of acclamation ? ? And take me home ? ? What
joy shall fill my heart ? ? Then I shall bow in humble adoration
? ? And there proclaim my God how great thou art ? ? Then sings
my soul, my Savior God, to Thee ? How great Thou art, how great
Thou art ? Then sings my soul, my Savior God, to Thee Please be seated. Good morning. We're going to be in Colossians
chapter three. the first hour this morning,
if you'd like to turn with me in your Bibles to Colossians
3. Let's pray together. Our merciful heavenly Father, We thank you for the glimpses
of your greatness and your glory that you have revealed to our
hearts. Lord, forgive us for not being
able to express how great thou art as we ought. Lord, we long
for that day when we will be able to worship you without all
the hindrances of this world and our flesh and sin. And this
corruptible is made incorruptible. And Lord, when we're able to
shout with the angelic hosts, truly, truly, how great thou
art. We ask Lord for your Holy Spirit
to enable us now to see a little more of your glory. to understand
a little more of your grace, to have a little more of thy
dear son, who himself is our life, reveal himself to our hearts
and enable us to worship you. Thank you for his accomplished
work of redemption. Thank you, Father, that we have
one who stands in our stead, one who has taken on himself
the full responsibility of our salvation, and he has been successful. Lord, lift him up and draw us
to him. We ask it in Christ's name. Amen. I'd like for us to look at the
first 11 verses in Colossians chapter 3, and I want you to
notice the conclusion of the 11th verse, Christ is all, and
in all. What a simple, glorious declaration
of the Lord Jesus Christ. And I feel sure that there will
be some more messages just concerning that one point. But this morning, I'd like for
us in this first hour to look at the first 11 verses of this
chapter as a whole. And I would remind you that when
this letter was written by the Apostle Paul, when it was penned
under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, The entire letter
was a message in itself. And so when we look at God's
word, we often take small portions of it and try to understand them
in the context of the entire Bible. But this letter would
have been read in its entirety to the church at Colossae. And
we see in chapter four, look, turn over just a page to chapter
four. And look at verse 16. This was
Paul's final encouragement to the church. He said, and when
this epistle is read among you, cause that it be read also in
the church at Laodicea. So this letter would have been
circulated as a sermon and it would have been read in its entirety. Now I make that point in order
to say that if we just begin at chapter three without any
consideration of the first two chapters and we are tempted to
try to apply these admonitions in practice without the consideration
of all that's gone before, we will find ourselves under the
law. We will find ourselves trying to put into practice something
that it is impossible for the flesh to do. So as we consider
this text in light of Christ being all, let us remember that
Christ is all and in all in everything that the Lord is telling us. Notice that the verse begins
in verse one, this chapter begins in verse one, if ye then be risen
with Christ. You see, this is just for believers. You have to be in Christ. and all that went before, circumcised
with a circumcision that's not made with hands, and having made
peace with God through His blood, and He being the fullness of
the Godhead bodily, and you being complete in Him. So, in order
for us to have any real understanding of what now is going to be said,
we have to be found in Him. We have to be looking to Him
for everything. Because what God requires, God
must provide. God must provide. And these things
are only provided in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. who
himself is our redemption, who himself is our wisdom, who himself
is our righteousness, and who himself is our sanctification
before God. So, notice that I want to call your
attention to some verbs in this text. Verse one, if you've been
risen with Christ, seek. You see, there's no way to seek
those things which are above unless we have spiritual eyes.
We come into this world spiritually blind. We come into this world
like blind Bartimaeus. We come into this world like
the man who was born blind in John chapter 9. We are spiritually
blind. We cannot seek those things which
are above except we be risen with Christ. And the only way
to be risen with Christ is to be crucified with Christ. And the only way to be crucified
with Christ is to be put in Christ from the foundation of the world.
So Christ, who is our life? When Christ lived a life of perfect
righteousness, he lived it on behalf of his people. And we
look to his life for our righteousness. When he laid his life down for
the sheep on Calvary's cross, Paul said, I am crucified with
Christ. We were in him and God's justice
was satisfied for our sin through the shedding of his blood. And
if we were crucified with him and then we lived with him, then
we shall also be risen with him. And if we've risen with him,
then we shall also walk with him. You see, the fear is that
we, apart from God's grace, would be like a man who told me one
time, he said, you know, the first 11 chapters of Romans are
just sort of preliminary. The real meat of the book of
Romans begins in chapter 12. You don't know who I'm talking
about, I'm not going to tell you, but I can tell you that this
man stood before a congregation of
people and said, Greg's preaching was making even me doubt my salvation,
implying that you all know if anybody here is saved, I'm saved. So you see the self-righteousness
in all of that. But he thought that, you know,
the first 11 chapters, which was, which is the foundation
of the declaration of the gospel of God's free grace and the finished
work of Christ. And then in chapter 12, it says,
you know, therefore, and there begins, and Paul's letters were
always that way. So, The first two chapters of
Colossians are not preliminary. They are essential. They're not just something, okay,
well, we got that out of the way, now let's get on to the
real meat of the thing on how we live. And that's just the
opposite of how we ought to see this. If you be risen with Christ,
then you'll have the spiritual eyes to seek those things which
are above. Notice verse two, set your affections
on things above. Now that word affections means
thoughts. Set your thoughts. Don't, not on things of the earth.
Don't think like an earthly person, a natural man. You have the mind
of Christ. And we've been given the truth
in Christ. And so the Lord is admonishing
us to, and these verbs are in the present tense, which just
simply means that he's not saying, you know, go home and think about
this and do this sometime later on, or, you know, you've done
this in the, no, do it now, now. Seek and set now. And, And they're also in the
active voice, which is the opposite of the passive voice. In other
words, it's not something that's done to you. It's something you
do. You seek those things. And it's an imperative, which
means that it's a command. So God is commanding us, those
who are risen in Christ. We're not looking to what we're
doing in these verses as in any way for the hope of our acceptance
before God. All of our acceptance before
God is found in Christ. And yet, if we be in Christ,
if we died in Christ, if we've been risen with Christ, then
we walk in Christ and we look after Christ. We live in Christ. We live on
Christ. We live to Christ. We live for
Christ. Christ, as I said, and we're
quoting from this text, who is our life? You know, most people who have some understanding
of the Bible, or some knowledge of the Bible I should say, go
through life trying to make Jesus the most important thing in their
life. And they end up living a miserable
life because they're torn between
making Jesus the priority of their life versus all the other
things that scream for their attention in the world. And they're
always conflicted. Most people have just enough
religion to be miserable. And Christ can't be the first
priority in your life. You're a believer. Christ is
your life. He is your life. Outside of Him,
you have no life. We're not saying, you know, make
Jesus the first and most important thing in your life. Without Christ,
you have no life. And in Christ, we have life. Light has come into the world.
The light is the life of men. Here we are. This, in light of who Christ is, in
light of who you are in him, in light of all that he has accomplished
in our salvation, in light of the fact that you are saved completely
by God's free and sovereign grace, As ye therefore receive Christ
Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in him. So walk ye in him. Only by God's grace can we seek
him. If you then, look at the text,
if you then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above. Psalm 9 verse 10 says, thou hast
not forsaken them that seek thee. Thou hast not forsaken them that
seek thee. And we're seeking the blesser, not the blessing. The Lord Jesus Christ himself
is the blessing. He is the blessing. That's what
he said to Abraham. I am thy shield, thy protection. I am thine exceeding great reward. How many times we find ourselves
seeking the hand of God rather than the face of God. We all
do it. We go through this world and
we have a need and we're looking for a handout. The blessings that meet our need
come with the blesser. They come with the person of
the Lord Jesus Christ. Seek him. Seek me with all of
your heart and you'll find me. Seek and you shall find. Knock
and it shall be. This is the promise of God. And
only a believer can do these things. Left to ourselves, we are unable,
unable to seek God. No man seeketh after God at any
time. Listen to Psalm 14 verse 2, the
Lord looked down from heaven to see if there were anyone in
the world that would seek God. Now God is looking down from
heaven and he's peering into the hearts of every man to see
if there's any man that would seek after him. And here's his
conclusion. They have all gone astray. They
are altogether filthy. There is none that doeth good.
No, not one. So that's what we are by nature.
Of course, this is the verse that Paul quotes in Romans chapter
three, when he describes our sinful state. Oh, Lord, if I'm
going to seek you, you're going to have to enable me to seek
you. You're gonna have to cause me
to seek you. You're gonna have to give me eyes to seek you.
You're gonna have to put in my heart a desire to seek you. If
you don't do that, I won't seek you. I'll seek everything else
in the world, but I won't seek you. Psalm 27, verse eight. Now here's
the voice of faith. Here's the voice of faith. When
thou saidest, seek my face, my heart said unto thee, thy face,
Lord, while I seek. God says, seek me. My heart says,
Lord, that's what I want. That's what I want. I wanna seek
you. I wanna know you. I wanna know you. I wanna know
the fellowship of your suffering. I wanna know the power of your
resurrection. I'm not yet apprehended that
which has apprehended me. But this one thing I do, one
thing, forgetting those things which are behind, I press towards
the prize for the mark of the high calling in Christ Jesus.
Oh Lord, enable us to seek you, seek you. What did the Lord say
to Martha about Mary sitting at the Lord's feet? Mary has
chosen that one thing needful, one thing needful. There's one
thing you need. There's one thing I need, that's
Christ. Must have Him. And only He can
give us a desire for Him. And if you're, If you're saying
right now, yes, Lord, you have put it in my heart to seek thee,
to know thee. That's the evidence of faith
and grace that God gives. We're seeking the blesser. And with the blesser comes the
blessing. You remember in 2 Kings chapter
6 when the prophet Elisha was in a little town called Dothan
and the king of Syria was raging war against Israel's king. And
every time that the king of Syria would make plans to attack Israel,
God would give to Elijah the understanding of those plans
and Elijah would communicate it to the king so they were prepared
to defend themselves against the Syrians. And the king of
Syria thought that there was a spy among his ranks. And someone,
when he got his counselors together, someone finally said to him,
I said, oh, no, King, there's a prophet down in a lot down
in Dothan. His name is Elisha. He's telling
the king of Israel everything that you're planning. He's telling
it. He goes on to say he knows what
you say in your bedchamber. He knows the secrets of your
heart and your plans, and he's communicating all that. And so
they go again. Syria sends the army down to
take care of Elisha, get rid of him. and surrounds Dothan
with an army of the Syrians. And Elisha's prophet comes out
of the, you can see this little house, you know, out in the middle
of the wilderness. And the prophet, the servant of the prophet comes
in and says, he says, what shall we do? They've surrounded us. They're gonna destroy us. And
the prophet says to his servant, he says, don't worry about it.
They that are with us are greater than they that are with them. And you can just see the young
man thinking, the old man's lost it. You know, how can he say
such a, he hasn't seen what I saw. He hadn't seen what I saw. And here's the point of the story. What did Elisha say? Lord, open
his eyes that he might see. Open his eyes that he might see.
And the young man went back out and there were flaming chariots,
a host of heaven surrounding the army of Syria, blinded their
eyes. And Elisha ends up taking the
whole army down to the King of Israel and delivers them to the
King of Israel. Open their eyes that they might
see. He left to ourselves, all we
can see is the natural world. That's all we can see. All we can see are the works
of the flesh. They that are after the flesh
do mind the things of the flesh. And that's all the natural man
can see. But they that are after the spirit, they mind the things
of the spirit. For the flesh profiteth nothing. It is the spirit that giveth
life. So that's what the Lord's saying to us here. He said, don't
look to fleshly, outward evidences. Seek those things which are above.
Set your affections on things above. We're Christ-seated at
the right hand of God. And I love that word. That word set is a participle,
which just simply means that you can add ing to it. Okay,
so really what the Lord is saying is setting your thoughts on things
above. Continue to set your thoughts. Our computer at home got a virus
in it, something some time ago. And every time we would turn
it on, I mean, every time we would go to use it, we would
have to reboot it. and turn the whole thing off
and turn it back on and it would work for one time and then the
next time we'd have to do the same thing. We're constantly
rebooting this computer. Finally got it fixed, but I thought
about that. Setting your thoughts. How many
times do we have to reboot our thoughts? Why? Because we have
a virus in us. It's called sin. And the screen
of that computer was just, I mean, it was just so confusing you
couldn't read anything on it. Is that not the way we, what
sin does to us? And the Lord says, setting your
affections on things above. Every time you have to keep going
back, don't we? Keep going back. We're constantly
being drawn away to the things of this world. All the troubles
and responsibilities and trials and lust and things of this world
are taking us away from Christ. And we're always in need of resetting. Resetting. This word, look at our text again. If you then be risen with Christ,
seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth, sitteth
on the right hand of God. Now that word is in the perfect
tense, and the perfect tense means an action completed, never
to be repeated. That's the perfect tense. So
when the Lord Jesus Christ ascended back into glory, he took his
rightful place. The father said to him, sit down
here at my right hand until I make thine enemies thy footstool.
Christ has been seated at the right hand of the majesty on
high for over 2000 years and nothing has ever threatened his
seat. And so now the Lord's telling
us, look, with those eyes of faith that the Lord gave you
in your new birth, if you'd be risen with Christ, seek those
things which are above, where Christ sitteth. You see, the things that are
above are only found in Christ. What do we need from Christ?
Well, we need Christ. What comes with Him? Christ,
who is your life. Let's read this whole text together.
Verse three, for you are dead and your life is hid with Christ
in God. When Christ, who is our, or is
your life, is our life, shall appear, then shall you also appear
with him in glory. I need a right standing before
God. The Bible calls it righteousness. We have no righteousness left
to ourselves. Christ Jesus the Lord is our
righteousness. God has made him to be our righteousness. If I'm going to stand in the
presence of a holy God, I've got to have one who has satisfied
the demands of God's holy law, who can stand in my stead as
my righteousness. This is not some sort of, you
know, you'll hear men talk about the righteousness of Christ as
if it's some sort of a legal transfer that takes place in
heaven, where God credits to the account, imputes to us. I don't think the term imputed
righteousness is found in that phrase in the scriptures. But men will say, well, he's,
He's charged to our account as if it was just some sort of a
legal agreement that the Father made with the Son. You know,
if I have Christ, then I'm righteous. For as He is, so are we in this
world. Christ Himself is my righteousness
before God. What else is it that I need from
heaven that I should seek those things which are above where
Christ sitteth on the right hand of God? Well, I need wisdom. Christ is my wisdom, my understanding,
my knowledge, my light. Christ himself is the light of
the world. And you say, well, this seems
so It seems so nebulous, ethereal. It just seems like it's not anything
I need. Well, how does the Lord reveal
Himself? He reveals Himself in His Word,
doesn't He? Right now, we're looking for
Christ spiritually through the revelation that has been made
of Him in His Word. Christ is my sanctification,
my separation from sin, my separation unto God. He that sanctifyeth and they
that are sanctified are all as one. Wherefore, he's not ashamed
to call them his brethren. Christ is my sanctification.
Seeking those things which are above is seeking Christ. For
the blessings are all in him. He is my redemption. He himself,
he made his soul an offering for sin. We were redeemed by
his shed blood. This is Christ himself standing
in our stead to pay the debt that we owe to God. My forgiveness of sin, I've got
to be forgiven of sin. For God to remember my sin no
more, they must be put away. And only by the shed blood of
Christ, only by Him burying them in the depths of the sea and
casting them behind His back and satisfying God's justice
for my sin, can I have them put away. And if I'm gonna know anything
about forgiveness before God, it'll be found in Christ. And
if I'm gonna know anything about forgiveness with men, it'll be
found in Christ. The Lord said, be ye kind one
to the other, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as
God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you. You see, forgiveness, it
really is impossible unless you've been forgiven. And yet forgiveness
is the result of being forgiven. Seeking those things which are
above, we need to know something about the love of God. God is
love and hearing is love. Not that we love God, but that
God loved us and gave his son as a propitiation for our sins.
The Lord said, I have loved them unto the end. And he's loved
us with an everlasting love. And we love him because he first
loved us. You know, the scripture speaks
of believers loving one another and loving even their enemies.
What does that mean? What does that mean? Let me ask
you a question, child of God. Do you sincerely wish the best
for your worst enemy? The person who has treated you
Would anything thrill your heart more than for God Almighty to
pour out His Spirit and His grace on the person that has treated
you the worst in your life than anything else? Pour out more
of His grace, more of His power, more of His love, more of His
forgiveness on them than you've ever known anything about. Is
that not it? You see, the child of God can
say that about every person they know. Nothing would thrill my
soul more than for God Almighty to pour out His blessings on
you in a way that I've never known. I've never known. What greater? You see, that's, is that not, is that
not love? Now only the Spirit of God would
put that in your heart, to give you that genuine desire. Peace, joy, hope, comfort. These are those things. Assurance. These are those things that we
set our affections on. In Christ. In Christ. Turn to your left just a page
or so to Philippians chapter three. Philippians chapter three. I'm sorry, Philippians chapter
four. Philippians chapter four. Paul is now concluding this letter
to the church at Philippi. And look with me in verse eight.
Finally, brethren, Whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest,
whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things
are lovely, whatsoever things are of a good report, if there
be any virtue and if there be any praise, think on these things. You know, I got to think about
it. The law can only prosecute behavior. The law can't really
prosecute thoughts. And the law really doesn't have
the ability to monitor or manage our thoughts in any way. And
yet that's exactly what the Lord's saying here. Set your thoughts.
Think on these things. Think on Christ. Not on the things of the world.
What does this mean? Does it mean we give no attention
to the things of this world? We don't think through what we're
doing in this world? No. Don't think like a worldly when
it comes to salvation. Don't think that somehow you're
going to present yourself to God based on your works. or anything else, that Christ
is your life before God. What about when God in His good
providence sends trials and troubles and difficult circumstances into
our lives, and the fleshly way of thinking is, why me? What
if, or, you know, what if that had not, what if I had not done
that? You know, how would my, now don't, don't think like that.
That's what the Lord's saying. Set your affections on things
above. There's one who's seated at the right hand of God, who
has purposed everything in your life. Set your mind on him. You remember when Naaman the leper heard about the prophet, and
he had a, here again we have Assyrian who's the commander
of the army of Syria, and it was about at the same time as
the last story I just told. And he had leprosy. And he had
a slave girl from Israel that they had obviously captured in
a previous battle who was his servant. And the slave girl told
him, she said, there's a prophet in Israel that could heal you.
And so Naaman goes down to see the prophet and he wouldn't even
come out of the house. He sent his servant out and he
said, go wash in the river Jordan. And the scripture says that Naaman
was wroth. He was angry. I mean, here he
was, this great man who he thought just happened to have leprosy.
When the truth was that he was a leper who just happened to
be a great man. And the scripture says that he
was wroth and he said, I thought I thought the man would come
out and then he would call upon his God and he would raise his
hands and he would heal the leper. He speaks of himself in the third
person. He says, I thought he would heal
the leper. You're not, that's, that's just,
that's man's way of thinking. Versus, versus have mercy upon
me, the sinner. Lord, I am, I am a leper. And let's, in light of all of that,
let's read these verses together. When Christ, verse four, who
is our life, shall appear, then shall you also appear with him
in glory. mortify therefore your members." I mentioned that the word seek
and the word set are in the present tense. Let me give you just one
more quick little language lesson that very, very important. I
think one of the reasons why God gave us his word originally
in the Greek language is because of this verb tense. The word
mortify is not in the past, present, or future tense. It is in a very
rare, unique tense that's only in the Greek language, and it's
called the aorist tense. Some have referred to it as the
eternal tense. So what does that mean, preacher?
Well, the word aorist comes from the word horizon. And it means
that the emphasis of the verb is on the action of the verb
without any reference to time. The emphasis of the verb is on
the action of the verb without reference to time. There is no
past, present, or future time in the Aorist tense. And so when
the Lord says, mortify your members, what he's saying is consider
them to be dead because they always have been, they are now,
and they always will be. It's the same thing that Paul
said in Romans chapter 6 when he says, Reckon yourselves to
be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God. Reckon it to
be so because it is so. It is so. He's not giving us
something. This is not present tense, something
that we do, active voice. This is the aorist tense. This is telling us who we are. You are dead in Christ. The members
that you have on this, in this earth, they are reflected in
all of these things. Fornication, uncleanness, inordinate
affection, evil concupiscence, covetousness. All these things
are in your flesh. They're in your members. And you deal with them every
day. But I'm here to tell you, if you've been risen with Christ,
those things are dead. They are dead. You see, it's
only in looking to what Christ did on Calvary's cross, crucifying
those things in his body and putting them away by the sacrifice
of himself, that we have any ability whatsoever to reckon
ourselves to be dead and to mortify those things again and again
and again and again. So here again, Christ is all
and in all. I hope that wasn't... Do you
see the emphasis, the importance of that? This aorist tense is
often in the New Testament. It's the eternal tense. It means
what is now has always been and always shall be. It's not something
you do. It's something that God has already
accomplished. And in light of the fact of what
Christ has done, mortify. Put to death. Acknowledge these
things as fleshly, dead things. Notice in verse 5, "...mortify
therefore your members which are upon the earth." Child of
God, you see these things in your flesh, don't you? These
are the things that take you away from Christ. And what's
the Lord saying? In light of who you are, in light
of the fact that you've been risen with Christ, if you have
been risen with Christ, mortify. It's a continuation. This word mortify is also a participle,
which means you just add ing to it. Mortifying, continuing
to mortify, continuing to set. It's something you're going to
do as long as you're in this body upon this earth. As long
as you are in this fleshly body upon this earth, you are going
to be setting your affections and mortifying your flesh. But
you do it in light of what Christ has done and who you are in Him.
Does that make sense? For those who have no interest
in mortifying the works of the flesh, Those who just, they're
never convicted by the Spirit of God. They don't see these
things as dead. They see them as their life.
These are the things that we participate in that gives us
life. For which sake, verse six, the
wrath of God cometh on the children of disobedience. in the which
you also walked in some time when you walked in them, but
now you have put off." Put off. These are also participles. I-N-G, putting off. All these,
anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy communication out of my
mouth. Let not one, lie not one to another, seeing that you have
put off or putting off the old man with his deeds. And put on
is a participle, putting on, putting on the new man, which
is renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created
him. Father, bless your word to the
hearts of your people. We ask it in Christ's name, amen.