Paul's Recipe for Life
First of all, I want to thank Don for the privilege of sharing the pulpit today. I truly count it an honor to open the Word with you my family.
Please pray with me ..
Today we are going to look at a portion of one of my favorite epistles of Paul. The book of Colossian provides both majestic theological truths but also extremely practical direction concerning how we are live our lives. Truths about who we are and about who Jesus is.
For example
about Jesus we learn
These are wonderful truths - rich in meaning. Meaning that needs to be mined for it's practical realities. Yet when someone comes to us and says "So and so did such and such to me." It is not very practical to say - "but you are seated in the heavenlies." What I love about this book, is that Paul also lays out very practical guidelines about how to treat one another, how to love another. And it is in this practical context, that Paul lays out what I am calling his recipe for life.
Now I need to provide a little disclaimer here about recipes. [Hopefully I won't say it as fast as they do on those drug or car commercials] "....". But we need to be very wary of "recipes for life" - for two reasons.
First, we live in a culture that is fed on fast food, taught in sound bites and have become attention span impaired culture. We are always looking for quick and easy answers to lifes great challenges. We as Christians are particularly susceptible.
Just listen to the titles or subtitles of seven of the books from the list of top ten non fiction books for August.
All great sounding stuff. But frankly, I think these books promise more than they can deliver. The world would have been transformed long ago if these books (and books like them) did what they claimed. God has made this world wonderfully diverse and complicated. As a result, real life does not readily lend itself to recipes of this sort. It would be like going into Borders and asking if they have something on "How to do brain surgery [pause] at Home."
Again, don't get me wrong, there are good principles in these books but be wary of them as recipes.
The second problem with recipes, is that, even if they work for some, they won't work for all. What happens if you read "How to be a Contagious Christian", do all that they say and all you ever transmit to your friends and family is the flu?
With that disclaimer aside, let's look at the text: Colossian 1:26-2:7. I will be reading from the New American Standard:
We proclaim Him - admonishing every man and teaching every man with all wisdom, so that we may present every man complete in Christ, For this purpose also I labor, striving according to his power which mightily works within me.
For I want you to know how great a struggle I have on your behalf and for those in Laodicea and for all those who have not personally seen my face, that there hearts may be encouraged, having been knit together in love and attaining to all the wealth that comes from the full assurance of understanding resulting in a true knowledge of God's mystery: that is Christ himself - in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.
I say this so that no one will delude through persuasive argument. For even though I am absent in body, nevertheless I am with you in Spirit: rejoicing to see your good discipline and the stability of your faith in Christ.
Therefore, as you have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, having been firmly rooted in Him and now being built up in Him and established in your faith; just as you were instructed and overflowing with gratitude.
The part of the text I want to concentrate on this morning is in Col 2:6-7
Paul's recipe for life is pretty simple. As you received Christ Jesus as Lord - so walk in Him. In the same manner, in the same way, with the same kind of attitudes, with the same focus as you first received Christ, that's how you are to walk. Return to your first Love he says. What gave you life when you received Christ, is what will give you life now.
Now let's think about that for a minute before looking at how Paul elaborates on this. What were some of the key elements in your coming to faith in Christ. What factors were absolutely central to it.
Paul highlights the two most important ingredients:
In Verse 7, having been firmly rooted [in Him], and now being built up in Him and established in your faith.
Let's first look at how Paul views the centrality of the person of Jesus Christ:
For Paul, Jesus Christ was central to becoming a Christian. And here in the book of Colossians, Paul is trying to make a number of points. And he puts Jesus at the very core of all of points he is making:
If you have your Bibles, look with me at how Paul develops this:
This is very basic stuff. But this is the way Paul lived. Jesus was the core of his life. That's why in other letters he says things like:
It's not I who live, but Christ who lives within me
For me, to live is Christ: to die is gain.
But he also knew that it is precisely this key ingredient that the Colossian church had increasing left out of their life.
And the Holy Spirit knew that we increasingly leave Jesus out as we move on in our Christian faith.
Paul also knew that the world, the flesh and the Devil are ever vigilant to distract us from this central reality. C.S. Lewis makes this point in the Screwtape Letters. These are letters from a Chief minion of Satan to one of his apprentices. The subject of the apprentice has become a Christian. When this happens, Wormwood is instructed to change his tactic to one of distraction - even distraction with good and Godly things.
We too can get caught up in good things - godly things and leave Jesus Christ, our first love in the dust.
Even the scriptures can be a distraction - Jesus saw this in the Pharisees and said (John 5:29):
You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life, it is these that testify about me.
Serving God can be a distraction. Jesus was asked what one should do if he wants to do God's work. Jesus answer? Was it: Make disciples? Feed the poor? Preach the gospel? Hear Jesus' words:
This is the work of God. That you believe in Me (John 6:28)
[that you spend your life putting your faith in Me]. The work of God is to put our full faith and trust in Jesus Christ.
This brings us directly to Paul's second ingredient in his recipe for life: faith. - having been firmly rooted and now being built up in Him and established in your faith. As you received Christ Jesus the Lord by faith, so walk in Him by faith. It is through faith that we are saved. And we are called to walk by faith not by sight. The Scriptures (Rom 14:23) goes so far as saying that "anything that is not of faith is sin." In other words, if we are doing good things but without faith, it is sin. This is an awesome truth.
Again, Paul knew the propensity for us as Christians to begin our lives with Christ in faith and then slowly move to rules or emotionalism or any other distraction that would prevent us from living our lives by faith.
But what is faith?
In very simple terms, faith is belief. The words for believing and faith are pretty much interchange able in the scriptures. But Biblical faith is much different that just belief. The Devils believe in Jesus - but that is not faith.
Let me illustrate the difference between faith and belief.
Imagine its winter and a friend invites you to go ice skating on Great Pond. You get there and she says: "I read in this book, that if the ice is 1" thick, it is safe for skating." She proceeds to go and cut a hole in the ice and come back and says: "The ice is 1" thick. Let's go." You can believe your friend all you want, but until you step out onto that ice, you are not exercising faith.
Faith has both an inner and an outer dimension. I am defining Faith as an inner trust and confidence in God that manifests itself in outward actions.
Faith is an inner trust and confidence in God irrespective of the circumstances
that He is good
that He loves us
that He knows best
That "come what may" I will trust Him. That, as Job said (Job 13:15)
though He slay me, I will hope in Him
Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen it says in the book of Hebrews (11:1). Faith the active and visible expression of belief. That is why faith without works is dead.
So this is Paul's recipe for life:
As you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him
As you trusted Christ by giving your life to him, now live your life with Him by continually trusting Him and acting upon that trust. Or another way of putting it:
We received Jesus by saying Yes to Him. Now, day by day, minute by minute, say yes to Him in thought (our inner man) and action (our outer man). Faith and the centrality of Christ come together very nicely in that phrase: Yes Lord
These are breath prayers that affirm both the centrality of Jesus and our faith in Him. We're going to close the sermon time today with a few minutes of silence. I know that there are areas in all of our lives where we need to say Yes to Jesus. I don't know where those areas are. This is where the recipes break down and the Holy Spirit takes over. In this time of silence, I want you to ask the Holy Spirit to give you a "Yes Lord" breath prayer. In the silence, just ask him to show you what area of your life he wants you to affirm His lordship. He may give you the words, may be a picture, maybe bring to mind some attitude or fear you have. Turn that thought into a Yes Lord breath prayer and write it on the sermon notes.
Some of you may never have said Yes to Jesus. That's okay. If you feel Him speaking to you, remember - Paul's recipe. This could be your first Yes to Him. That's the way it all begins. So this time applies to you to.
Let's pray
Lord, you are calling us to make you Lord of All, What areas are we resisting you? What things are we afraid to let go of? Jesus, give each of a Yes Lord Breath prayer.
[SILENCE]
Two more things. First, I would ask you to incorporate this prayer into your life this week. Several times each day, when you are most distracted. When Jesus is not your first thought. Take a minute and offer up your breath prayer. If you did not get a prayer during this brief silence, stay with it through the offertory and communion. Take this a time to allow the Holy Spirit to minister.
The second thing I'd like you to do is to tell someone that you have made this commitment and ask them check up on you in a week or so.