Let's open our Bibles this morning
again to Colossians chapter 1. Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ
by the will of God, and Timotheus, 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 of the love which you
have to all the saints. or the hope which is laid up
for you in heaven, whereof you heard before in the word of the
truth of the gospel. which is common to 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 Epaphos,
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, do 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 you 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 to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in
light, who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath 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 and 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, the firstborn from the dead,
that in all things he might have preeminence. The title of the
message this morning is The Preeminence of the Lord Jesus Christ. Last time, some of you will remember
that we looked at Paul's prayer, which is recorded in verses 9
through 14. And I mentioned that when we
began reading verse 9, we would read all the way through to verse
17 before we came to a period, 195 words in that sentence. Now this morning we're looking
at verses 15 through 18. It was according to verse number
7, Ephaphis, from whom those in this church at Colossae had
learned the gospel. God raised up a church here.
You know what the Apostle Paul said to the Corinthians is always
so. Paul said, I planted, Apollos
watered, and God gave the increase. Only God is able to save a sinner. Man may preach the gospel. But
God takes the gospel according to his purpose and regenerates
his people so that we come to believe and have faith in Christ. Now, we see here that Ephaphis,
this servant of the Lord who had brought the gospel to this
group in Colossae, that he had traveled 1,000 miles, a little
over 1,000 miles, to visit the Apostle Paul in
Rome. Now that's something in itself,
isn't it? I mean, he didn't get on an airplane
and fly to Rome. No, that was a hard trip. And
he came to Paul, Paul was of course a prisoner at this time,
and he came to Paul with both good news and bad news. The good news was, of course,
that this church, they experienced these three graces, faith, hope,
and love, and they were growing. The Lord was adding to the church.
There was growth here, both spiritually and numerically, they were growing. But the bad news was, in this
church, as in so many of the churches to whom Paul, inspired
of God as he was, wrote letters, There was some problem, and it
usually was a problem that someone had come into the church, false
teachers, and they began to teach something that was not so. They
began to undermine the gospel of Jesus Christ. Now, man by
nature hates the gospel. Now, men, they don't hate what
is called the gospel in so many places. But the true gospel of
the Lord Jesus Christ is odious to the natural man because it
strips man. It brings man down and tells
man that he must be dependent totally upon the grace of God. Salvation is not by works. It's
not by merit. No. It's by the work of the Lord
Jesus Christ and Him alone. Now, it seems that the teaching
that had been brought into this church, and you see it as you
go through the epistle, the letter of Colossians, You see, and this is what William
Hendrickson said in his commentary on the New Testament. He said
the teaching that was brought into this group of believers
seemed to be something like this. Faith in Christ, though fine,
I always have that but, faith in Christ, though fine, as far
as it goes, but it's not sufficient. It's not sufficient. In other
words, Christ is not an able savior. That there's something
that must be added to Christ and his work in order for a person
to be saved. To make up the difference, as
we go through this letter, we see that you've got to You've
got to practice certain ceremonies, and these ceremonies mainly came
from the law of Moses. But not only that, they brought
in this matter of angel worship, angel worship. And if you notice
in chapter 2, here in Colossians chapter 2 and verse 8, he says,
beware lest any man spoil you. This is a problem right here.
In a nutshell, beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy
and empty or vain deceit. After the tradition of man, after
rudiments of the world, and not after Christ. These teachers,
they couldn't sing the chorus that we sometimes sing, Jesus
Christ has made to me all I need. He alone is all my plead, he
is all I need. Wisdom, righteousness, and power,
holiness forevermore, my redemption full and sure. He is all I need. They couldn't sing that. They
couldn't sing and testify and rejoice in the truth of the gospel
that Jesus Christ is a sufficient Savior, that He's all a person
needs, that we are complete in Christ and outside of Christ,
there is no salvation. He's the only way to the Father.
He shows the preeminence of Christ, and that's what we're going to
look at this morning in these few verses, the preeminence of
Christ in creation and then in redemption. But first, his preeminence
in creation, verse 15 through 17, he is the image of the invisible
God. Notice that, the Lord Jesus Christ
who is the image of the invisible God. In the Old Testament, in
the Old Testament part of our Bible, whenever men heard the
voice of God, and some men did, God spoke to Abraham. whenever
there was an appearance of God to men. And he did appear to
some men as the angel of the Lord. I read this past week about
Jacob wrestling with that man at the brook, Jabba. And certainly
that was the angel of the Lord. But those appearances and those
voices at Mount Sinai, you heard a voice. That's what Moses said,
you heard a voice. But you didn't see any shape.
You heard a voice. But listen, the point is, every
time in the Old Testament there was a voice, God speaking, or
God in one of those pre-incarnate appearances, it was always the
Son of God. It was never the Father. And so this is what Paul is saying
here. He is the image of the invisible
God. Here the Son of God is the image
of the invisible God, who is Himself God. Now that doesn't
mean that He's merely like God, but He is the same. He is one
with the Father and the Holy Spirit. Is the Father eternal? He's eternal. Is the Father all-powerful,
omnipotent? He's omnipotent. Is the Father
all wise? Omniscient? He's all wise. Every characteristic or attribute
that is true of the Father is true of the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the image of God. He's eternal. You know, in the
first epistle of John, John tells us these two things about God
and in this order. God is light. The sun is light. And that speaks of his holiness,
doesn't it? We sang that hymn just a little
while ago. Holy, holy, holy. The thrice
holy God, the seraphims. that Isaiah saw in his vision
of God. What did they proclaim one to
the other? Holy, holy, holy. God is light. He's the image of the invisible
God. God is light, he's light. And
the same thing is true when we are told God is love. He is love,
he is love. He is the Son of God who reveals
God. He's the image of the invisible
God. So that he told his disciples
in John 14, he that hath seen me hath seen the Father. He that hath seen me hath seen
the Father. And then notice the second thing
that Paul tells us about. He's the firstborn of every creature. Now this is where sometimes people
go astray. They think, well, he's the first
creation of God. You've got these people, and
they're called Arians in the church. That's just a name for
people who believe that God created another God, and that other God
is Christ. He's the highest creation of
God, and then by Him, He created all things. You've got the Jehovah's
Witnesses today, and that's exactly what they're teaching. And it's
an old, old era. And I'm sure that they use this
verse of scripture to promote that and to teach that. Well,
He's the first, as it says here, the firstborn of every creature. What does that mean? Well, you
know, Paul is not saying in verse 15 what he denies or says just
the opposite of in verse 16. And remember, he didn't write
in verses. He wrote a letter here. He's
not saying that Christ is the firstborn and then saying in
verse 16, for by him all things were created in heaven. and that are in the earth, visible
and invisible. Well, listen, if he's the creator
of all things, then he himself is not a created being. Without him, the scripture says
in John chapter one, all things were made by him. And that's
the one who in verse one there, in the beginning was the word
and the word was with God and the word was God. The Word, the
eternal Son of God, and without Him was not anything made that
was made. Now, you say, well, how do you
understand this then, brother? How do you understand that He
is the firstborn of every creature? It's in relation to creation. He is the firstborn in reference
to creation. You know, in a family, And you've
seen movies and read stories along this line. The firstborn
in the family, he inherited everything. He might have five brothers,
younger brothers, but the dignity and the rule and the inheritance
all went to the firstborn. And the Lord Jesus Christ here
is the firstborn of all creation. He inherited everything. Everything is His. Everything
is His. And the wonderful thing for a
child of God, a believer, is we are joint heirs with Him. He's the heir of everything.
The firstborn of all creation. And we are heirs with Him of
all things. The firstborn. And then I want
you to notice the apostle's use of the word all things in this
verse. He uses it four times, all things. For by him were all things created
that are in heaven and that are in earth, visible and invisible. Whether they be thrones or dominions
or principalities or power, all things were created by him and
for him. He is before all things. and
by Him all things consist." In other words, He's showing the
preeminence of Christ by using these words, ìAll things were
created by Him.î That means everything. He created Heaven. You see, Heaven is a place. He
said, I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go to prepare
a place for you, I will come again. Who created heaven? He
did. He created all things. He created
this world. He created all men. He created
you. You know, that's the reason I
think some people get Next up, what's my purpose? Why am I here? You're here because He created
you and He created you for Himself. He created all things and He
created all things for Himself. And until and unless you or I
come into that relationship with Him, we don't have any purpose. We don't recognize any purpose
to life. But oh, when you come to know
Christ and know that He created you physically the first time,
and if you're saved, He's created you again in the new birth. You were created for Him, for
His glory, to live for Him. What a privilege, right? What
a blessing to know I'm here and the purpose of my life is not
just to make all the money I can and it's not just all the things
that the world seeks after. Oh no, my purpose is to glorify
God. My purpose is to live in such
a way as to bring glory to His name. And if a person doesn't
see that and doesn't seek that, they don't realize, they have
no purpose in life, no purpose whatsoever. All things include
all things in heaven and all things on earth, visible and
invisible. Those things in heaven are invisible.
And we see the apostle is cutting to the chase, so to speak here,
these angels. These false teachers were coming
in and saying, well, Christ is not a sufficient savior. You
also need the ministry of angels. No, he's a creator of angels,
things in heaven and things upon earth, all things he created. And then the apostle says by
him, all things consist. That's a very interesting statement,
when you realize what the apostle is saying. I'm sure most all
of us, we've heard this expression, he or she is the glue that holds
this family together. Or maybe it's a business. He's
the glue that holds this business together. Now I'm not calling
Christ glue. But that's exactly what this
statement means. By Him, all things consist. Without Him, and apart from Him,
all of creation would splatter into a billion pieces. He's the
glue that upholds all things in creation. You know, Paul,
when he was preaching in Athens, Athens, Greece, and of course
that was the headquarters for the philosophers and they had
philosophers there. The scripture says they spent
all their time just wanting to hear something new. And when
Paul preached to them, he told them this statement, in him,
who's he talking about? Christ. In him, we live. and move and have our being. Apart from Christ, you couldn't
live another second. He gives you your breath. Every
breath that I take, every breath that you take just now, He gives
you that breath. By Him, all things consist. We live and move and have our
being in Him. And apart from Him, all of this
creation would come apart. You see, the preeminence of the
Lord Jesus Christ, He is the creator of all things, and all
things were made for Him. But notice, secondly, his preeminence
in redemption, verse 18. And he is the head of the body,
the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead,
that in all things he might have the preeminence. In the New Testament, we have
several metaphors or pictures of the union that exists between
Christ and the church, or Christ and every child of God. It's called a mystical union.
And by faith, we enter into this union with Christ. When you trust in Christ, when
you believe in Him as your Lord and Savior, by faith you are
in union with Christ and He is in union with you by His Spirit
who comes to live in you. And Paul said, if any man have
not the Spirit of Christ, he's none of His. But there's several
pictures of this union. The reason we call it a mystical
union is because it's mysterious. It is, it is. You know, in John
15, our Lord pointed it out by the vine and the branches. I
am the vine, you are the branches. You see, there's a union there.
And Ephesians chapter five, He speaks about the husband and
the wife, the two become one. There's a union there. And he
tells us that's a picture of Christ and his church. And then
here in this verse, the body, the human body. This is a union,
and he is the head of the body, the church. He's the head of
the body. We are in union. You know that
old fable that was taught years ago of a certain man, they called
him a saint. And the reason they called him
a saint, they cut off his head and he picked up his head and
walked about two or three miles. I like what Charles Spurgeon
said about that. He said, if I could believe that
with his head cut off, he took the first step, I wouldn't have
any trouble believing he walked two or three miles after that. He didn't take the first step.
And the reason I point this out is you hear a preacher saying,
you take the first step and God will take the second step. The
problem is man is dead in trespasses and sins and he can't take the
first step. Lord, God must do something in
him and for him first of all. And when he brings us to faith
in Christ, we're in union with him, and it's represented to
us in the body and the head. Christ is the head. And notice
he says, which is the church. And you say, well, who does that
include? Is that the Lincolnwood Baptist Church or is that the
First Baptist Church? Listen, the church here is all
of God's elect from all time, from the beginning of time until
the end. All of God's elect are included
in this church. It's the church of the firstborn,
as it is spoken of in Hebrews chapter 12, the general assembly
and church of the firstborn, which are written in heaven.
Everyone who is a member of this church, his or her name is written
in the Lamb's Book of Life, written in that book, and listen, There's
no erasing. There's no erasing from this
book. God wrote his chosen people's names down from before the foundation
of the world called the Lamb's Book of Life. The Lamb is Jesus
Christ. Behold the Lamb of God which
taketh away the sins of the world. And no one's name who's written
in that book is ever going to be erased. I heard about it so-called
church years ago. And it's one of these churches,
you know, they just run one pastor through after the other. And
so they said, well, let's don't paint his name up there on the
sign. Let's just write it up there in chalk. Pastor, David
Pledger, this week. Well, erase that. We'll write
somebody else's name next week. No, no, this book, The Lamb's
Book of Life. If your name is in that book,
you're a member. If you trust in the Lord Jesus
Christ, you are a member of his body, the church here that he's
speaking about. The organic head of the body,
this body, it may picture Christ. There's no life without the head.
No life without the head. And there's no life apart from
the Lord Jesus Christ. He said, because I live, you
shall live also. No life apart from the head,
apart from Christ. He said, I'm the way, the truth,
and the life. No man cometh unto the Father
but by me. You know, over the years, I've
been with a few of our members when they had to make a decision.
They were in the hospital with some loved one and they had to
make a decision either to take a person off of life support
or leave him on life support. And this has always been the
deciding factor when the doctor says, there's no brain activity. In other words, there's nothing,
no activity in the head. There's no brain activity because
the center to run the heart, and the center to run the lungs,
the respiratory system, it's all located in the brain, in
the head. And what a picture that is of
the Lord Jesus Christ as the head of his body, the church. There's no life, there's no life
apart from him. And did you know the growth hormone,
comes from a gland which is located in the head. There's no growth
apart from Christ. The head. If you want to grow
in the grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, study
Christ. Keep your eyes on Christ. Look
to Christ. Study Christ. And you'll never,
you'll never come to the place where there's nothing more to
learn, there's nothing more to see, there's nothing more to
comprehend. No, Christ, He's everything. He's infinite in His person. Study Him. There's no growth
apart from the head. And that's the reason, and look
here in Colossians chapter three. Let's see if I can find it now. Well, Christ, there's a verse here
in one of the chapters that follows that speaks of him as the head.
I thought it was in chapter three. Oh, no, chapter two, verse nine
and 10. For in him dwelleth all the fullness
of the Godhead bodily. And notice, and you are complete
in him, which is the head of all principality and power. Christ is the head and you're
complete in him. What a lie, what a deceit of
Satan. To come along and tell today,
it would be, well, yes, Christ, that's fine, but you also must
be baptized. No, it's Christ and Christ alone. Well, Christ, that's good as
far as it goes, but you must also do this. You must become
a member of a certain church, and you must tithe, and you must
go on visitation, and just a number of things. And those things may
be good in their place, but my friends, in the matter of salvation,
it is Christ and Christ alone. It's His blood. that redeems. It's His righteousness that justifies. You say, well, what about my
faith? Well, your faith didn't die for you. Yes, you must believe
in Christ, trust in Christ, but you don't have faith in your
faith. If your faith is like mine, sometimes it's down, sometimes
it's up. No, Christ is the Savior. We're
complete in Him. This is Paul's answer to any
and all who would teach that the church, those believers in
Colossae, those who trusted in Christ, that they had something
else, that there was more. No, Christ is all. The preeminence
of Christ, both in eternity and in redemption, in creation and
in redemption. Look with me in Revelation, and
I'll close here, but look in Revelation chapter 5. The preeminence of Christ. John
said, and I beheld and I heard the voice of many angels, Revelation
5 verse 11. And I beheld and I heard the
voice of many angels round about the throne and the beasts and
the elders, and the number of them was 10,000 times 10,000
and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice, worthy is
the lamb that was slain to receive power. riches, and wisdom, and strength,
and honor, and glory, and blessing. And notice this, and every creature
which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and
such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, heard I saying,
blessing, and honor, glory, and power be unto him that setteth
upon the throne, and unto the Lamb forever and ever." The preeminence
of Christ. The songwriter said, glory, glory
to the Lamb. All I need, all I need. By His Spirit sealed I am. He is all I need. May the Lord bless His word to
us here this morning. Let's bow our heads