Remind us of how great our God
is and remind us of how great our God is for us and what great
things He has done for us. I was just going to read the
first 22 verses of Colossians and then we'll look at those
just in a sketch as it were. And I wanted to spend some time
looking at Colossians 2 verse 10, that famous verse. Ye, you
are complete in him. But let's begin where the Holy
Spirit begins in this letter. Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ,
by the will of God, and Timothy our brother to the saints and
faithful brethren in Christ which are at Colossae. Grace be unto
you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. We
give thanks to God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ praying
always for you since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus
and the love and of the love which you have to all the saints. for the hope which is laid up
for you in heaven, whereof ye heard before in the word of the
truth of the gospel which is come unto you as it is in all
the world and bringeth forth fruit as it doth also in you
since the day you heard of it and knew the grace of God in
truth as you also learned of Epaphras our dear fellow servant
who is for you a faithful minister of Christ who also declared unto
us your love in the Spirit. For this cause we also, since
the day we heard it, did not cease to pray for you and to
desire that you might be filled with the knowledge of His will
in all wisdom and spiritual understanding. that ye might walk worthy of
the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work,
and increasing in the knowledge of God, strengthened with all
might, according to his glorious power, unto all patience and
long-suffering with joyfulness, giving thanks unto the Father,
which hath made us meet, made us qualified to be partakers
of the inheritance of the saints in light, who hath delivered
us from the power of darkness and has translated us into the
kingdom of his dear Son, in whom we have redemption through his
blood, even the forgiveness of sins. who is the image of the
invisible God, the firstborn of every creature. For by Him
were all things created that are in heaven, that are in earth,
visible and invisible, whether they be thrones or dominions
or principalities or powers. All things were created by Him
and for Him. And He is before all things,
and by Him all things consist. And He is the head of the body,
the Church, who is the beginning and the firstborn from the dead,
that in all things He might have the preeminence. For it pleased
the Father that in Him should all fullness dwell. And having
made peace through the blood of His cross, by Him to reconcile
all things unto Himself, by Him, I say, whether they be things
in earth or things in heaven, and you that were sometime alienated
and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath He reconciled
in the body of His flesh through death. to present you holy and
unblameable and unreprovable in His sight. Salvation is looking unto Christ. We look unto Christ and then
we look unto not just Him but what He does. As John says, Behold
the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world Our life
begins looking to the Lord Jesus. Look unto me and be ye saved. Life, spiritual life, is looking
unto Jesus. And this will never finish. Our life with the Lord Jesus
began in eternity. It began before there was such
a thing as time. Our life with Him began in that
eternal covenant when God's children were the gift of His Father to
His Son. What a gift we are, given by
the Father to the Son. What a wonderful treasure. We
are. Solomon says that believers have
ravished the heart of the Son of God. We have ravished his
heart. He says to us, you are all fair,
my love, my dove. There is no spot in you. And
it will be for all of us who know the Lord Jesus and love
Him, have had His gospel come into our lives in power. We'll
see Him. We will one day see Him as He
is. We'll see His face. We'll see
Him as He is because we will be like Him. What God begins, God completes. What God speaks in His Word is
done. As much as our flesh doesn't
want to see it, as much as our minds, which were alienated,
continue to struggle against these things, God has begun His
work. And the work that He begins is
the work that He finishes. And in these verses from 12 down
to 22, we have a wonderful, seven wonderful descriptions of the
work of our God. In verse 12 we give thanks to
the Father who has made us meet, made us qualified. God the Father made us qualified. It's a carpentry term where you
gently and carefully and with great precision shape a piece
of wood and the mortise and the tenon fit together. How many
times the Lord Jesus must have thought about that in that carpenter's
shop. It's the work of carpentry to join timber together, to make
them fit. We are made qualified to be partakers
of the inheritance of the saints in light. the light of God in
that place where we will no longer need the light of sun or the
moon. He is our light. He will give
us light. He lights our path down. We are
made partakers. We have been delivered from the
power of darkness and these are all And the old King James, it
says, hath. It's a done activity, a finished
activity of God. He hath delivered us from the
power of darkness. And he hath translated us into
the kingdom of his dear son. We were captives. We were born
into this world captives, and he delivered us. There's a wonderful
verse I've been studying while I've been away, and it's in Isaiah
26, verse 12. It says, Lord, you will establish
peace for us, for you also have done all our works in us. Thank God He's done all of our
works in us and all of our works for us. And then it says in verse
13, O Lord our God, Other masters besides you have had dominion
over us. I don't know about you, but you,
like me, if you are a believer now, know what captivity we were
in. What captivity in our minds. What captivity in our bodies. What captivity in darkness. We thought we could see so clearly
and yet it was darkness. Oh Lord our God, other masters
besides you have had dominion over us. And then read the next
part of that beautiful verse. But by you only we make mention
of your name. To proclaim this God and to proclaim
this gospel is a gift, is the great gift of God, to come to
see the Lord Jesus as He really is. This hope, verse 5, is laid
up for you in heaven, which you heard before in the word of the
truth of the gospel. And quite simply, God's children
know the word of the truth, of the gospel, because God will
deliver them. The thing that we most need delivering
from is religion that looks like it has the word of God, it looks
like it's the truth, and it looks like it's another gospel. Almost all of us here would have
to own the fact that that's where we were and that's what we had
to be delivered from. The greatest darkness in this
world is a darkness that looks like light. He's delivered us
from the power of darkness. And He doesn't stop there, does
He? For God to pick us up and to deliver us. All His own work. And He's translated us into the
kingdom of His dear Son. The King's dominion. What a kingdom
that we are in. And what a King that we have.
A king, in verse 14, who has redeemed us through his blood. It was a costly redemption. But
it was a redemption that was won because our sins were forgiven. They were dealt with. And the
remarkable thing about this passage of scripture from verse 12 down
to verse 22 is that there are seven great things that he's
done. He's made us qualified. He's
delivered us. He's translated us. We have redemption. And then in verse 20, it says
He's made peace through the cross. Verse 21, He has reconciled. Verse 22, He presents and the
Holy Spirit and our Apostle Paul started in that great list of
seven wonders of redemption and he stops in the middle. Let's
stop in the middle and look again at our great God, our great Saviour. Verse 15. He's the image of the invisible
God. The image of the invisible God.
We cannot see God who is invisible. But as the Lord said to Philip,
in that upper room that night, he was to be betrayed just before
he died. He says, Philip, if you've seen
me, you have seen the Father. If you have seen the Lord Jesus
in his glory, you have seen God. You have seen the God of this
universe. He's the firstborn of every creature.
It doesn't mean that he was a created being himself. It just means
that He is the One with preeminence. He is the One with the rights
of inheritance. And the next verse makes it really
clear, doesn't it? Verse 16. For by Him were all
things created. When you look at this universe,
every little tiny bit of it is His. All things were created. Things that are in heaven, things
that are on the earth, visible and invisible. Whether they be
thrones or dominions or principalities or powers, no matter what they
are, the kings of this world, the dominions of this world,
the principalities of Satan, other powers, all things were
created by Him. He doesn't lose control of His
creation ever. It is His to reign over. It is His to rule over. All things were created by Him
and for Him. By Him and for His glory. He is before all things. He is
the Creator. He comes before all things, and
all things have their existence because of Him. By Him, all things
consist. All things are held together
by Him. And He does all this for a purpose,
brothers and sisters. He is the head of the body, the
Church. He is our head and we are His
body. We cannot be separated from Him. We cannot be taken away from
Him. His body will be perfect. His body will be complete. And He's the beginning. Firstborn
from the dead. the first resurrection, the first
fruits of that great resurrection, that great promise that we will
all be resurrected. In the twinkling of an eye, the
earth will give up the dead and we will meet God in the air. We will be resurrected, brothers
and sisters. We must be resurrected. Our future is a future beyond
the things of this world. And He will have preeminence. He will be seen to be glorious. How glorious will He be seen?
Verse 19, for it pleased the Father that in him, in the Lord
Jesus as our mediator, should all fullness dwell. All fullness of mercy, all fullness
of grace, all fullness of glory, all fullness of all spiritual
blessings, all fullness of power for his own. And he's done it
here and Paul goes back to tell us again what He's done for us. He has made peace through the
blood of His cross. To make peace presupposes that
there was in our lives a time when we had no peace with God. We were enemies in our minds,
it says, alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works.
He has made peace. He's made peace between us and
God. The thing that separates a holy
God from people like us is sin. A holy God cannot dwell in the
presence of sin. He must take sin away so that
peace can flow. Peace like rivers. And he's done
it to reconcile all things unto himself. By him, I say, whether
things in earth or things in heaven. He has brought things
back together. As he prayed in John 17, he prayed
that last night. Did God the Father answer his
prayer? I believe he did. He says at
the beginning of that great prayer, he lifted up his eyes to heaven
and said, Father, the hour has come. Glorify your Son, that
your Son also may glorify you, as you have given Him authority
over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many
as you have given Him. And this is eternal life, that
they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you
have sent. He's reconciled us. There is
now, between God and His people, peace. Perfect peace. I don't feel it all the time. In fact, I never feel it when
I look at myself. I never feel it when I look at
the circumstances around me. Peace with God is looking to
the Lord Jesus, who is the Prince of Peace, and He is our peace. And we not just look to Him,
we look to Him on that cross. He's made priests through the
blood of His cross. On that cross, He took, as it
were, all of the sins of all of that bride. and they became
His. And God the Father took out that
sword of His holy justice and He slew His darling Son. He slew Him because of our sins. He slew Him because He said our
sins were His. He took responsibility for them
before the world began. and justice, the holy justice
of God, cried out, enough, it is finished. He's finished. What has he finished? He's finished
all that we have just read about. In this body of flesh through
death, verse 22, He's reconciled us, he's made
peace. Verse 20, through the blood of his cross, to reconcile
all things to himself. In verse 22, in the body of his
flesh, through death, we have been reconciled again. And then
he has this beautiful phrase that we use so often, to present
you. holy and unblameable and unreprovable
in his sight. Do you know one of the meanings
of that word present? It's so beautiful. I hope the
Lord lays it on your heart. The word to present can also
mean to stand beside. What a wonderful picture, that
in that great day, he will stand beside us. He will stand beside
us. He'll hold us, as Isaiah 40 says,
He'll hold us in His heart. On that great day, He'll stand
beside us. He'll present us holy and unblameable. Holy as God is holy. Unblameable. Who's going to blame
us in heaven? Satan's not there, sin's not
there. There will be no blame for God's
children. They will be holy and they will
be unreprovable in His sight. In the sight of Him who sees
everything, whose knowledge is infinite, who has seen our sin
and seen our weaknesses, seen our failings, in His sight. He'll stand beside us. He'll present us. We'll be presented
to God as the trophies of His work. All the praise, all the
glory, all of the salvation is His. What has man done in all
of these verses? Where are the ifs? He just does it all. It's all
an act of sovereign grace, brothers and sisters. It's all He's doing. We're going to turn over and
look at that great verse 2.10. But you see, if we take 2.10
back to these verses that we've just looked at here, it says,
in verse 10 of chapter 2, ye are complete in Him. What are
we? We've just looked at it. We are
completely qualified. We are completely delivered from
the power of darkness. We are completely translated
into the kingdom of His Son. We are completely redeemed. We are completely forgiven. We are completely brought to
a place of peace. We are completely reconciled. We are completely perfect in
Him. We are completely and perfectly
presented to the Father, displayed before all creation. Let's just,
before we turn to chapter two, look back again at who the you
are. Let's go back to Colossians chapter
1. Chapter 1 verse 2. The you. The you are people who
are called saints. Walking this earth are people
who are called holy ones by God. They are people, in verse 2,
who are faithful. They are people who are recipients
of grace and recipients of peace from God. They are people who
love the saints. They are people who have been
given by God a living hope, not a hope for this world, but a
hope that's laid up in heaven. They are people who have heard
and have loved the Word. They have loved God's Word. They have loved the truth of
God's Word. And they have loved the Gospel. There is just one Gospel. There
is just one Word. There is just one truth. and they are people for whom,
in verse 6, the gospel comes. Not just in words, the gospel
comes in power. It's a gospel that comes and
bears fruit, verse 6, bears fruit in people who know the grace
of God in truth. It's a gospel that comes in power. It's a gospel that strengthens
us. What a great word from our God.
You are complete in Him. We are in ourselves weak, poor,
helpless, and unworthy. But in our God, we are perfect,
and complete, and holy, and unblameable. The word complete can mean fullness, It can mean that we are, as Colossians
2 says, we are as complete in Him as He is completely the fullness
of the Godhead bodily. He's full of grace and truth. We are complete, without limit,
without qualification, without conditions. Whatever we are in
the Lord Jesus, we are completely. Whatever we have in Jesus, we
have completely. Nothing can ever be added to
faith in the Lord Jesus. Whatever is added to faith in
the Lord Jesus is the object of people's worship. You take
it away from them and you'll know how much they worship it.
You take away their righteousness. You take away their good deeds. You take away their choosing.
You take away anything from them and you'll see that that is really
what they worship. Nothing can be added to the gospel
of Christ without making it another gospel. Anything added to it
is just heresy and destroys it. We have need of nothing but the
Lord Jesus. We are complete in Him. It means
to be fully supplied. Fully supplied in this world. We need righteousness. We are
made the righteousness of God in Him. We need acceptance. We are accepted in the Beloved.
We need justification. Christ is made of God unto us. Justification. We're justified
freely by His grace, without any cause in us. We must be holy. Our holiness is the Lord Jesus. We need forgiveness. We need
a clear conscience. God requires perfection. And whatever God requires of
His people, He supplies to them in the Lord Jesus and continually
brings to them as they are caused to look to Him and not to themselves. That's sanctification. Sanctification
is not a progressive thing. Sanctification is in the Lord
Jesus. It's complete and perfect. We
need grace. We need it fully supplied. We
are complete in Him. Fully, perfectly, eternally supplied
in Him. It also means satisfied. We are satisfied in Him. We are satisfied with who He
is. We are satisfied with what He's
done for us. We're complete. It means to be
filled in Him. Nothing and no one can satisfy
the souls of people except the Lord Jesus. when Christ comes
into our souls, Christ in us, the hope of glory, verse 27. Nothing can fill us like Christ
Jesus. We are filled in Him. He fills our soul. We are complete, satisfied, filled
in Him. In Him. What great words. 172 times the New Testament uses
that word to describe people. We are in Him. Not in doctrine, but in Him. Not in my feelings, but in Him. Not in my experiences, but in
Him. Not in my works, but in Him. Not in my devotion, but in Him. Not in my faith, But in Him,
faith looks away from everything in us and looks to Him who makes
us everything in Him. We are His bride. He is the bridegroom. We are the branches. He is the
vine. We are His body. He is our head. We have everything in Him. It's this union, isn't it? It's
this union which delights believers. A union that He ordains. A union that He delights in. A union that makes us so much
one with the Lord Jesus. that when God considers anything
done to us and for us as done to Him, God sees us only in His
Son and considers all that His Son has done to be ours. We are one with Him and nothing
in time nothing in our circumstances is going to change what God has
ordained in eternity. All of those great blessings
that we read about, deliverance, redemption, forgiveness, all
of those things come because of this union. We are redeemed
because of this union. We are regenerated because of
this union. We come to see Jesus who He is
because of this union and we'll come to see him face to face. We'll be resurrected because
of this union. These works are finished works. They are done works. We don't
look to a God who is trying to do anything. We look to a God
who has done all things well. We are one with Him in eternity. We were one with Him when He
lived on this earth. We were one with Him when He
died at Calvary. We were one with Him when He
rose from the grave. We are seated with Him now in
heavenly places. We are one with Him in the new
birth. We are made to be, qualified
to be, partakers in the inheritance of the saints in light. We are,
brothers and sisters, heirs of God. Isn't that remarkable? Heirs of God. This universe is
ours by right. of us being the children of God,
heirs of God, and we are joint heirs with Jesus Christ. John Kent wrote a beautiful hymn.
Let me finish by reading it to you. "'Twixt Jesus and the chosen
race subsists a bond of sovereign grace. that hell with its infernal
train shall ne'er dissolve nor end in twain. This sacred bond
shall never break, though earth should to her centre shake. Rest
doubting saint assured of this, for God has pledged His holiness. He swore but once the deed was
done. It was settled by the great 3-1. Christ was appointed to redeem
all that His Father loved in Him. Hail sacred union firm and
strong, how great the grace, how sweet the song, that worms
of earth should ever be, one with incarnate deity, one in
the tomb one when He rose, one when He triumphed over His foes,
one when in heaven He took His seat, while seraphs sang all
hell's defeat. This sacred tithe forbids their
fears, for all He is, or has, is theirs. With Him their head
they stand or fall, their life, their surety, and their all. The sinner's peace the day's
men be, whose blood should set his people free. On them his fond affections ran
before creation work began. Blessed be the wisdom and the
grace, the eternal love and faithfulness that's in the gospel plan revealed
and is by God the Spirit sealed. We have a great God. We have
a great God who reigns over this universe. We have a great God
who sits on the throne of this universe. We have a great God
who's working all things for the good of his people. We have
a great God who will bring our tears to joy. We will see him face to face.
Our intimacy will be such that He will wipe every tear from
our eyes, and He will make His people to delight in His redeeming
love throughout all eternity. Let's pray.