The resurrection of Jesus Christ is usually a main topic for teaching and preaching during the spring time of the year when many are perhaps thinking of it more often. The records in the gospels about the resurrection appearances of Jesus Christ are many times taught, but also other aspects about the resurrection of Christ are of tremendous importance to the believers for their Christian walk of life. This study will set forth some wonderful truths about these aspects from an epistle to the church, and it will show and document how we as believers today can live as having been resurrected with Christ.
Colossians 3:1–4:
If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things 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 ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.
When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory.
Verse 1 lays the foundation on which everything else which follows rests. "If ye then be risen with Christ" is
what the KJV text reads, and we must notice and acknowledge that this expression is actually not a question but rather
a statement of what already is a fact. It could perhaps be better translated as "Since ye then be (have been) risen
with Christ …"
All those who believe on Christ, who are saved by grace because of faith on Christ, have
already risen with Christ. This is the foundation truth on which now the next exhortations rest when it says, "seek
["strive for" or "be diligent in pursuing"] those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of
God."
Jesus Christ is no longer down here, but rather his is above, at the right hand of God. He has been received
up in to heaven, he has ascended. We are now to seek those things which are above, i.e. we are to seek heavenly things.
We have a heavenly calling, we have citizenship in heaven, which we have been granted since we have indeed risen with
Christ.
Verse 2 then exhorts, "Set your affection on [think of, be mindful of] things above, not on things on the
earth." This in essence is a repetition of the exhortation of verse 1, just put into different words. How many people
of the world seek only those things which are on the earth. They of course do not have anything else on which they
could set their affection. Things which are above are completely hidden from them, they are unknown to them, and in
some cases they are completely refused by them. These people rather rely on that which they can see, hear, taste, smell
or touch, on earthly things. We however should be setting our affection on, we should seek – and this is a command
– things which are above! We do this on the basis of having risen with Christ and being able to live
accordingly.
Verse 3 continues this thought a bit further, "For ye are dead …" We have already died with
Christ, i.e. our old nature, the flesh, was crucified with Christ. "and your life is hid with Christ in God" which is
speaking of our new life in Christ. This new life has not yet been completely revealed. It is as of yet still hid with
Christ in God. "When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory." well, here
now we learn also the time when this shall be revealed.
1 John 3:2:
Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is.
We are now already the sons of God, we already now have been given a new life. We have died with Christ and we
have risen with him as well. But some of that new life, some of this sonship of being sons of God, has not yet been
revealed. It is still hidden and is still awaiting its revelation which will happen when Christ will appear. Without a
shadow of a doubt, we are the sons of God, there is nothing which would somehow cast a doubt on that. "But we know"
– and , by the way, this we know already now – that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall
see him as he is."
Another remarkable verse is found in 2 Corinthians 5, which again speaks of this same topic.
2 Corinthians 5:5–7:
Now he that hath wrought us for the selfsame thing is God, who also hath given unto us the earnest of the Spirit.
Therefore we are always confident, knowing that, whilst we are at home in the body, we are absent from the Lord:
(For we walk by faith, not by sight:)
We have received a spirit as a token or earnest, but we ourselves today still walk by faith and not by sight.
We now have God's Word and God's promises in His Word about what we will be one day, what all is included in this
sonship and being a son of God, but as of now we still live by faith and not by sight. Some is not know and has not
been revealed and therefore cannot be seen!
Furthermore, even Christ we cannot see today because he is not here but
above. The day is still coming in which he will reveal himself. That will be another day, not today, for the concern
then will no longer be one of faith but rather one of sight. Then we too shall see him as he is for we shall be like
him. As long as we live in this body, we are absent from the Lord and we walk by faith and not by sight.
We already
now have an earnest of the future glory and of all of that which God has prepared for His children to have. God's gift
of holy spirit which He has given to us when we believed on Christ. This is our token, our earnest, our proof, that we
have died with Christ and have been raised with him and that we will be made manifest when he shall appear and be
revealed together with him in glory.
In the meantime, we can direct our thoughts to that which is above, we can set
our affection on things above and thus be not badly influenced by that which is on the earth.
In Romans 8:23-25,
this situation is also explained in some detail.
Romans 8:23:
And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.
Here we read that we are "waiting for the adoption [sonship]". We do not have to wait to become sons of God, for we already are the sons of God. But we do wait for all that which is encompassed in this sonship, we are waiting for that which is still hidden and not yet revealed and which only be revealed, such as the redemption of our body. Now, we still have a vile body but we will with the return of Christ receive a glorified body fashioned like unto Christ's resurrected body.
Romans 8:24 and 25:
For we are saved by hope: but hope that is seen is not hope: for what a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for?
But if we hope for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it.
We are waiting for something. We are waiting for that which will still come when Christ will appear and when he
will return.
In Colossians 3 we are given a few more commandments which are addressed to us as having been raised
together with Christ and which show us how and to what degree we already now can walk in a newness of life.
Colossians 3:12–17:
Put 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 ye.
And above all these things put on charity, which is the bond of perfectness.
And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to the which also ye are called in one body; and be ye thankful.
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom; teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord.
And whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him.
This tremendous section starts out with the command, "Put on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved
…" Once again, the basis is mentioned on which we now can "put on". We are already the elect of God, we are
already saints, we are already the beloved of God. We do not now put on what we are told to put on in order to become
beloved of God or to become saints or to become elect – because we still might be lost. No, no, no! We now put on
because God has already elected us, because He has sanctified us and because we are already beloved of God.
What
possibilities do now open up for us? What is possible on the ground of Christ having been resurrected? Well, the first
thing mentioned is "bowels of mercies", then follow "kindness", then "humbleness of mind", "meekness", "longsuffering"
and furthermore "forbearing one another, forgiving one another" as well as "charity (love)", finally we are to let the
"peace of God" rule in our hearts. All these things have to do with our mind, our hearts. We put these things on in our
heart, and then we let it show forth or become manifested in our outward actions
We put on all that as already
elect of God, as the saints and the beloved of God. This has nothing to do with "clothes make people", just the
opposite is true: Those people who have been made to be something are now putting on clothes becoming their status. We
do not dress for a masquerade, dress in a way which is not reflecting what we really are. We do not try to become holy,
to become beloved or to become elect by putting anything on. We put on these qualities because this is how it ought to
be for children of God. This becomes children of God, this is appropriate for children of God!
"Bowels of mercies"
is to have an empathetic feeling toward others. We do not want to build up big walls around our hearts, perhaps due to
some circumstances or other people's doings, which will not let anything get through to us. Literally, this means
"heart of compassion". We may be quick to put up protection walls around our hearts because someone does something
which hurts us. But, we should consider that such walls prevent the love which has been shed abroad into our hearts
from becoming manifest on the outside. Therefore – let's be careful with building walls! Such walls may result in
us not being able to show forth the compassion in our hearts toward others.
Next follows "kindness" — not a
harsh, over-boiling manner. "Meekness" and "humbleness of mind" — not pride and arrogance. "Longsuffering
(patience)" we already read about in Romans, for we are to wait with patience for that which will become revealed
later.
"Forbearing on another" — there may be at times a lot more to forbear than what we think at first. But
then, we do not read here, "Build up a big wall and keep your fingers out of it" or "Don't even start to forbear or
bear, just let the other crash!" No, no! We are to forbear one another.
"Forgiving one another, if any man have a
quarrel (complaint) against any" – such situations obviously existed even then already, this is not just new to
our day and time. In such situations we are to forgive one another, and in order to emphasize this truth it is inserted
here "even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye." This reminds me of a statement I've heard a few times in different
places, "If you think about what God has all forgiven you for, you will have not much of a problem to forgive someone
else!" We all were not in all that good of shape when God in Christ forgave us.
"And above all these things [in
addition to all these] put on charity [love], which is the bond of perfectness [the perfect bond]." The love of God we
have toward one another is what binds together, it is the perfect bond.
Colossians 2:2 and 3:
That their hearts might be comforted, being knit together in love, and unto all riches of the full assurance of understanding, to the acknowledgment of the mystery of God, and of the Father, and of Christ;
In whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.
This love is connected with "all riches of the full assurance of understanding" as well as "the acknowledgment of the mystery of God … and of Christ". This love is determined by the word of God.
Philippians 1:9:
And this I pray, that your love may abound yet more and more in knowledge and in all judgment;
Our love as well is to abound more and more in knowledge from God's Word and in all judgment in the application of the Word. This is not speaking of some kind of "blind love" and some strange "mixture of feelings and emotions" which some people think is love by which they can bridge differences in faith, sort of like "As long as we love each other enough, each one of us can believe and do and teach whatever they like about God's Word, with love we can get along quite well." This is obviously not true. Love is connected and has something to do with a knowledge of God's Word. Love is to live according to God's directives in His Word. Jesus Christ spoke of love being the keeping of his commandments. In 1 John 5:3 we can read: "For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not grievous." There must first be a knowledge of God's Word if we want to speak about the love we can read of here.
Colossians 3:15:
And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to the which also ye are called in one body; and be ye thankful.
In this verse, as well as at the end of verse 17, we read the command and encouragement to be thankful. Thankfulness, together with forgiveness, is a great key to a peaceful life. "The peace of God" can reign or rule in our hearts when we are thankful and when we are mindful of Christ.
Colossians 1:19 and 20:
For it pleased the Father that in him should all fulness 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.
Christ died for us and has made peace between us and God. This is the peace which Christ has made and which is given to us. "The peace of God … to the which ye are called in one body", we are to let it rule in our hearts and we are to be thankful!
Colossians 3:16:
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom; teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord.
As punctuated in the KJV, Colossians 3:16 appears somewhat "funny", it should be punctuated slightly differently in order to make proper sense.
Colossians 3:16:
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly; in all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another; in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord.
This punctuation acknowledges the sense given by the content of the verse much better. There are three encouragements in this verse, and each have a characterizing description with it.
Colossians 3:16:
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly …
The word of Christ is to dwell in us "richly", not just a tiny little bit once in a while. When we let the word of Christ dwell in us richly, Christ indeed lives by faith in our hearts. This is how Christ dwells in our hearts — by means of the word concerning Christ. In Ephesians 3, we read a sort of parallel passage to this one.
Ephesians 3:17:
That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love,
This does not mean anything else but that we let the word of Christ dwell in our hearts richly. It is to dwell there, have its abode there, as we believe it. This is then also the way by which we can be rooted and grounded in love. When the word of Christ dwells in us richly, it will not be all that difficult for us to walk in love since we will be rooted and grounded in it.
Colossians 3:16:
… in all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another; in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord.
Not only one can and should teach and admonish, rather we all are to do so amongst each other. This is to be done "in all wisdom", not in a manner described as "elephant in a china shop" or by just throwing some verses around. Such would have nothing to do with admonishing in wisdom, nor with teaching one another in an appropriate manner.
Colossians 3:17:
And whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus [with his authority], giving thanks to God and the Father by him.
This describes pretty much all one can do, because what else do we do aside from those things which we do in
word or in deed? All of what we do is in one of these two categories – words or deeds.
All of what we do is to
be done in the name of our lord Jesus Christ. We belong to him, we have confessed him as our lord. When we did that we
appropriates to ourselves what he accomplished on our behalf with his atoning sacrifice on the cross and what is now
available to us based on his resurrection. We died with him, we rose with him. This is sufficient reason to be thankful
to God always!
God, the Father, has already elected us, has sanctified us in Christ and has loved us. He has
raised us together with Christ, and therefore we now can put on these marvellous realities and qualities which we read
about in this section from Colossians 3. This indeed is the basis for our life now as Christians.
On the grounds
that we have died with Christ and that we have received a new life when we were raised together with him we are now
setting our affection on things above, we are seeking those things which are above and endeavor to live according to
our new possibilities which we have been given as children of God.