Let us turn to God's Word in that chapter that we read,
Colossians chapter 3, and turning in particular to
the passage from verse 12 to verse 14. Colossians 3.12 puts
on Therefore, as the elect of God,
holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind,
meekness, longsuffering, forbearing one another, and forgiving one
another, if any man have a quarrel against any, even as Christ forgave
you, so also do you. And above all these things put
on charity which is the bond of perfectness. So the Apostle
here speaks of the Christian graces. In the earlier parts
of the epistle we have quite remarkable verses that speak
much of the glories that belong unto the Lord Jesus Christ. Wonderful
Christology in those previous chapters. Chapter 1, for example,
and there at verse 14, we read of Christ in whom we have redemption
through His blood, even the forgiveness of sins, who is the image of
the invisible God and the firstborn of every creature. And then again,
verse 19, He 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 these great statements they continue in the second chapter
verse 3 there in whom I hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge
speaking of the Lord Jesus Verse 9, in him dwelleth all the fullness
of the Godhead bodily, and ye are complete in him, which is
the head of all principality and powers. How poor, glorious
in Christ, in his person, and in his work. And as we come to
the closing chapters, we have the more practical aspect, the
outworking, as it were, of these great doctrinal truths. And so
when we read here in the opening verses of this third chapter,
he speaks of those who should be Christ-like. And is that true
of us? Do we desire to be true followers,
disciples of the Lord Jesus? If ye then be risen with Christ,
he says, seek those scenes which are above, where Christ sitteth
on the right hand of God. Set your affection on things
above, not on things on the earth, for you are dead, and your life
is hid with Christ in God. Or do we truly desire that to
be like unto the Lord Jesus Christ of whom we have spoken in such
a fulsome fashion in the opening two chapters of this epistle? Well, if we would be like the
Lord Jesus, we must know something of mortification. because that's
what he goes on to speak of. Mortify, he says in verse 5,
put to death therefore your members which are upon the earth, fornication,
uncleanness, inordinate affection, and evil concupiscence, and covetousness
which is idolatry. Again at verse 8, but now you
also put off All these anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy
communication out of your mouth, lie not one to another seeing
that you have put off the old man with his deeds. How important
then is this truth of mortification, the crucifying of the flesh,
the putting to death of the old man. But it's not enough to have
this negative aspect alone not enough to be mortifying we think
of the words of the Lord Jesus in the gospel there in Luke chapter
11 and verse 24 Christ says when the unclean spirit is gone out
of a man he walketh through dry places seeking rest and finding
none he says I will return unto my house whence I came out and
when he cometh he findeth it swept and garnished then goeth
he and taketh to him seven other spirits more wicked than himself
and they that enter in and they enter in and dwell there and
the last state of that man is worse than the first it is not
enough then just to be mortifying putting to death there must also
be something positive And isn't that what Paul also says in this
chapter, verse 10, put on the new man which is renewed in knowledge
after the image of him that created him. And then more particularly
in the word that I read for our text this morning here at verse
12 following, put on therefore as the elect of God, holy and
beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness,
long-suffering, forbearing one another and forgiving one another. If any man have a quarrel against
any, even as Christ forgave you, so also do you. And above all
these things put on charity, which is the bond of perfectness,
the Christian graces. And as we come to look at this
portion, I want this morning to take up the chief, the most
preeminent of all these graces of the Christian. And we have
it of course in particular here in verse 14, above all these
things put on charity, that is love. It's the word agape, as you know
there are more than one word that's rendered love in the New
Testament. But agape love is the greatest
of all love. And that's what's being spoken
of. It is the bond of perfectness, says the Apostle. So to take
up that theme of the chief Christian grace. To be Christ-like. We sang in that opening hymn,
that lovely hymn of Charles Wesley that centers on Christ and he
is that one that the hymn writer speaks of as divine love, love
divine or love's excelling. He said that's what Christ is. He is that one in whom we see
the wonder of the love of God and we are to love the Lord for
who He is, we're to love Christ in His person and that's what
Paul has been speaking of really in the opening chapters of this
epistle we're not just to love Christ for what He has done in
order to save us, His work, we wonder at that that He should
come and do all that is necessary by the life that He lived and
the death that He died having loved His own we're told how
He loved them unto the end, even the death of the cross But how
we should wonder at who He is, and the glories that belong unto
His person. I often think of those words
that we have at the beginning of the epistle to the Hebrews,
where again we see Paul speaking so much of the wonder of the
person of Christ. He says, God, who at sundry times
and in diverse manners, making time past unto the fathers by
the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by His Son,
whom He hath appointed Heir of all things, by whom also He made
the worlds, who, being the brightness of His glory, and the express
image of His Person, and upholding all things by the word of His
power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down on
the right hand of the Majesty on high, being made so much better
than the angels, as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent
name than they. For unto which of the angels
said he at any time, Thou art my son, this day have I begotten
thee. And again, I will be to him a
father, and he shall be to me a son. And again, when he bringeth
in the first begotten into the world, he says, And let all the
angels of God worship him. And of the angels, he saith,
who maketh his angel spirits and his ministers a flame of
fire. But unto the Son, he saith, thy throne, O God, is for ever
and ever. A scepter of righteousness is
the scepter of thy kingdom." How Paul speaks, then, of Christ
and the wonder of who He is, that He really is God, the eternal
Son of God, God manifest in the flesh. and so here in these previous
verses in chapters 1 and 2 that we've already referred to such
as that in verse 9 of chapter 2 in him dwelleth all the fullness
of the Godhead bodily how we are to love him then for who
he is that he is God and yet he's a man he's a real man and
he fills for us in all our throats He's touched with the feeling
of all our infirmities. He was tempted in all points
like as we are, yet without sin. Or that we might be those then
who truly love Him and set our affections in on those things
that are above, where Christ is, at God's right hand. If so, we'll desire to be putting
on these Christ-like graces. Well, let us consider what he
says here. First of all, the way in which he addresses
these believers at Colossa, and the names, the names which he
addresses them by, here in verse 12. He says, Put on therefore,
as the elect of God, holy and beloved. This is the designation that
He gives them. They are the elect, they are
holy, and they are beloved. Well, let us consider the significance
of the name that is given to these believers. They are the election of grace.
And that election, as we know, is an eternal election. According
as he hath chosen us in him, Paul says to the Ephesians, before
the foundation of the world, before God created, he had made
choice of a people. According to the eternal purpose
which he purposed in himself, says the Apostle, Their names
are written in the book of life from the foundation of the world. They are the elect, and that
election is an eternal election. And as it is eternal, I'm sure
these are truths that we're all so familiar with, it's also a
sovereign election. God says, I will have mercy on
whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will
have compassion. So then, it is not of him that
willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy. It is sovereign, it is free.
There's nothing in those who are the objects of His choice
that causes them to make such a choice. God's election of His people
as it is eternal before creation so it is sovereign and it is
free. But it is altogether that that
is rooted in love. Remember the words of Romans
8.29, it's whom he foreknew. We've remarked many a time on
the significance of that foreknowledge. It's not just a foresight of
things that would yet come to pass and that God would act on
what he foresees in men, no. he foreknows his people in that
intimate way he has set his affections upon them they are the objects
of his love whom he did foreknow he also did predestinate to be
conformed to the image of his son Jeremiah says the Lord appeared
of old unto me saying I have loved thee with an everlasting
love therefore with loving kindness have I drawn And all that love
of God, here in His love, says John, not that we loved God,
but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation
for our sins. God loved those who were dead
in trespasses and in sins. And He loves them to such a degree
that He sends His only begotten Son to be the propitiation. And
all that that theological word implies, propitiation, it reminds
us of the holiness and the justice of God. He will by no means clear
the guilty. Sin must be punished because
of who God is. and he visits that dreadful penalty
that was the sinner's just desert and he visits it upon the person
of his only begotten son. Our God's love then is that that
lies behind the doctrine of election. John says we love him because
he first loved us. God's love is first. It's something
in the creature. It's all of God. They are those
who are the elect. And they are those who are beloved.
All this last name that's given to them here in verse 12, the
beloved, emphasizes the truth of what God's election is all
about. He says here, put on therefore
is he elect of God holy and beloved and as I've said it's love that
is to be understood very much in terms of God's eternal and
sovereign election of his people look at the words that we have
there in 1st Thessalonians 1.4 as Paul writes to that church
and those believers he says knowing brethren beloved your election
of God and it's interesting because
there's an alternative reading for that verse in the margin
and the alternative reading actually follows a syntax that is really
there in the original And the margin reads, knowing brethren
beloved of God your election. They are beloved of God and there
really is the true cause of why they are the election. God's choice of his people has
nothing to do with anything in them. but has all to do with
regards to himself who is, of course, the God of love. Again,
the language that we have back in Deuteronomy 7. In verse 7, the Lord did not set
His love upon you nor choose you because you were more in
number than any people for you were the fewest of all people
but because the Lord loved you. and because he would keep the
oath which he had sworn unto your fathers after the Lord brought
you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you out of the house
of bondmen from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt. Now these words
of course have to do with the Israelites in the Old Testament
but Israel is a typical people, they're a type of the true Israel,
the spiritual Israel. The church of Jesus Christ the Lord did not set his love
upon you, nor choose you, because you were more in number than
any people, for you were the fewest of all people, but because
the Lord loved you." They are very much those who
are the beloved of the Lord. They're elect, they're beloved, but there's
also this third designation they're spoken of as holy. they're holy. And this holiness that belongs
to them, their sanctification, using another word, is a great
work of God's, the Holy Trinity. Sanctification is that that involves
God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. As we're
told there in the opening words of the Epistle to Jude, They
are sanctified by God the Father, they are preserved in Jesus Christ,
and they are caught. How are they sanctified by God
the Father? Well, they are those who are
set apart, and they are set apart by God's eternal election of
them. He set His love upon them, He
passed over others, the reprobates, He did not make choice of them,
He passes over, and He foreordains them to their just deserts. But
He sets His love upon a particular people, they are the sanctified,
the set apart, the elect. And as they are sanctified by
God the Father, so we read in Hebrews 10 and verse 10, by the
witch will, We are sanctified through the offering of the body
of Jesus Christ once for all. They are sanctified in eternity
by the Father's sovereign choice of them. In time, the Lord Jesus
himself is the one who comes and sanctifies them through the
offering of his body through the great sacrifice. Again, Hebrews
13, 12, Wherefore Jesus also that he might sanctify the people
with his own blood, suffered without the doubt. Oh, he is
sanctified, the move of God is made unto us, wisdom, righteousness,
sanctification and redemption. But as by that historic event
in time, that offering of himself, there is sanctification, so that
sanctification must be brought into their soul's experience.
And that is the work of the blessed Spirit of God, the Holy Ghost.
2 Thessalonians 2.13, through sanctification of the Spirit
and belief of the truth. Or that, wholly because the Spirit
works mightily effectually in them that they come to embrace
the truth of the gospel they reject the lies of satan they
desire to put off the old man they know something of this mortification
that we read of here putting off all those deeds of the flesh
and as they mortify the deeds of the body so they put on the
new man renewed in knowledge after the image of him that's
created him we see then the names that are given to these people
and then here we see something of the dimensions of that Christian
love which is the chief of all the graces all that follows after
he addresses them in that manner in the opening words of verse
12 he says put on, as the elect of God,
holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind,
meekness, long-suffering, forbearing one another, and forgiving one
another. If any man have a quarrel against
any, even as Christ forgave you, so also do you. And above all
these things put on charity, love, which is the bond of perfectness
or the dimensions then of this love this love of God that has
been shed abroad in their hearts love is over all we have this
word above in verse 14 above all these things
he says that that is upon that that's
over all these things And it's that love. It's that
love, of course, that he speaks of so remarkably in that 13th
chapter of the first epistle to the Corinthians. That chapter that speaks repeatedly
of charity. That great word, agape, as we
said at the beginning. What does he say, verse 4 there? Charity suffereth long and is
kind. Charity envieth not, charity
woundeth not itself, is not puffed up, doth not behave itself unseemly,
seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil, rejoiceth
not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth, beareth all things,
believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things,
charity never faileth and so it goes on. It is that that is
over and above all things. But also this love is that that
is under all things. It's the primary grace, it's
the basis of all the other graces. Calvin renders these words at
the beginning of verse 14 on account of all these put on love. Oh there must be love as the
proper basis of all that he has said previously. It is the first of the fruit
of the spirits. There in Galatians chapter 5
remember how The Apostle makes mention of that fruit. And what
does he say? Ephesians 5, 22. The fruit of the Spirit is love,
joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance. Against such there is no law. And they that are Christ have
crucified the flesh with the affections and lust. Again, we have these two coming
together. There is the mortifying, there's
the putting to death, there's the putting off. But there's
also that fruit, there's that putting on. But the chief fruit
of the Spirit is love. That is mentioned first. It has
the primary position. All this love, it's over all,
it's under all. And love, really, in another
sense, is through all. It's through all. It's the bond
of perfectness, he says. Oh, it's that that binds all
these graces together. Now abide of faith, hope, charity,
but the greatest of these is charity, Paul says at the end
of that 13th chapter in 1 Corinthians. It's the bond of perfectness. And we just sang, didn't we? In that hymn of God's, lovely
hymn, 1082. Love is the golden chain that
binds the happy souls above, and ease and hair of heaven that
finds his bosom glow with love. It binds everything together.
It's not just overall and under all, but it is through all. It
is the greatest of all the fruit and all the graces of the Spirit
of God. And he addresses these, you see,
who are very much the beloved. They've experienced the wonder
of that love of God in the Lord Jesus Christ. And so he speaks
of charity, the bond of perfectness. And we see finally here how this
love is the source of all goodness. Verse 13, he says, "...forbearing
one another, and forgiving one another. If any man have a quarrel
against any, even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye." What is he saying here? Well,
he is setting Christ before us as that one who is the believer's
pattern. None can forgive sins but God
only. And the Lord Jesus is that one
who has come as God incarnate and he has procured that pardon,
that forgiveness of the sins of all those that the Father
had given to Him, they were chosen in Him, before the foundation
of the world, now the election of grace. And as they experience
that grace of God, they are to be Christ-like in their behavior. What is the exhortation that
Paul gives at verse 10? He says, "...have put on the
new man which is renewed in knowledge after the image that created
him." Where is God's image? Well, God's
image is there in the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the image of the
invisible God. Doesn't Paul say that there in
chapter 1? And in God we have that blessed attribute
of love. Twice in the fourth chapter of
his first general epistle John declares, for God is love. And there is that sense in which
love is not simply an attribute, there are many attributes in
God. He is holy, he is righteous,
he is just, he is merciful, he is gracious. these are the characteristics
that the scripture set before us with regards to who God is
and amongst them of course God's is love but love in many ways
is more than one of the attributes it is the very essence of God
it's bound up really with the doctrine of God because God is
a trinity of persons he is one God and yet He is three persons
and He is love without reference to any object outside of Himself
because there is that eternal loving relationship between Father,
Son and Holy Ghost. The Father begets the Son, the
Father loves the Son, He delights in the Son, the Son is begotten
of the Father and that one who is daily the Father's delight
is also delighting himself in the Father and the Holy Spirit
proceeds from the Father and the Son. They're all divine persons
and there's a relationship of love. God is love in His very
essence. And believers are those in whom
the image of God has been restored or they renewed in knowledge
as it says here in verse 10 after the image of him that created
him and that renewal is in the Lord
Jesus Christ the image of the invisible God
And remember how it's John who brings out all the implications
of what these things mean as he writes there in that first
epistle. Look at the language that we
have in the fourth chapter of 1 John. Verse 7. Beloved, he says, let us love
one another. for love is of God and everyone
that loveth is born of God and knoweth God he that loveth not
knoweth not God God is love and then at the end of that chapter
he declares we love him because he first loved us if a man say
I love God and hath of his brother he is a liar for he that loveth
not his brother whom he hath seen how can he love God whom
he hath not seen and this commandment have we from him that he who
loveth God love his brother also and isn't that really what Paul
is saying here at verse 13 forbearing one another and forgiving one
another if any man have any have a quarrel against any even as
Christ forgave you so also do you nor were to be those who
are like unto the Lord Jesus Christ. What we have in these words of
the text this morning is not a matter of duty as it were before
the holy law of God but what we read here in this exhortation
is that indebtedness that we owe to the grace of God. These
are gospel precepts really. Put on therefore as the elect
of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness
of mind, meekness, long-suffering, forbearing one another, and forgiving
one another, if any man have a quarrel against any, even as
Christ forgave you, so also do you. and above all these things
put on charity which is the bond of perfectness it's in many ways a word of command
but as I said it's not just a matter of duty it's not just a matter
of obeying the commandment of God out of fear no, the motivation
is love which is the chief of all these graces of the Spirit. It's gospel. And it's the precept
of the gospel. We see time and again when the
apostle comes to the conclusion of his various epistles, when
he comes to spell out the implication of the doctrine that he's been
setting before the churches. how they are to conduct themselves
as those who are true followers of Christ and real believers
in Christ there in the opening verses of
Ephesians 5 for example he says be ye therefore followers of
God as dear children and walk in love as Christ also hath loved
us, and hath given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice
to God for a sweet-smelling savour." All believers are to walk by
faith and not by sight, but believers also are to walk in love, their
affection set on those things above where Christ is. at the
right hand of God and so Paul comes to set before
us here in this passage the importance of these various graces we sought
to say something with regards to that that is primary the chief
of all the graces of the Spirit that love of God that must be
shed abroad in there in the heart of the believer and the Lord
willing I want us to look more carefully later at the various
graces that he does mention here in verses 12 and 13, but we'll
leave the matter there for the time being. Those words of verse
14, above all these things, put on charity, put on love, which
is the bond of perfectness, where the Lord Be pleased to bless
his work.