The introduction to my new Bible study series, “Cleaning out the Closet...of your heart”, continues with a background check into this New Testament letter, which I often referred to in my teaching days as the 4th of the vowel books. I referred to it as such because Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, and Colossians were easily confused during Bible Sword drills until I read somewhere that these four books of the New Testament were listed in vowel order. Galatians has a lot of A’s, Ephesians has E’s, etc. (Now didn’t that tidbit make this worth reading?!?) But, please continue anyway!
As we begin our background check, we notice at the very beginning of the letter that Paul identifies himself and Timothy as the writers of this letter and acknowledges the church in Colosse as the recipient. Bible scholars will attest to the fact that Paul was not responsible for starting that church, but as we continue to read through chapter 1, we quickly see that he and Timothy had heard about them! Right from the start he describes them as holy and faithful.
In verse 3 Paul expresses a prayer of thanksgiving for this church and emphasizes their faith in Christ and their love for all the saints. The importance of this statement will be seen in greater light later in the study.
Considering Paul’s numerous usages of the word knowledge through this letter, it is believed that early forms of Gnosticism were beginning to creep into that dear church. Basically, Gnosticism taught that the root of any religious experience was built on deep inner knowledge. Paul, therefore, expresses throughout chapters 1 and 2 that the source of true knowledge is Christ. He also reassures them that by Him (Christ) and for Him all things were created, and in Him all things ‘consist’, or, are held together.
Keeping this thought in mind, we can see how Paul’s prayer in chapter 1, verses 9ff, could include one of Paul’s purposes for writing this letter to these faithful believers. We can see this particularly in verse 10 when he states, “…that you might walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing Him, being fruitful in every good work and increasing in knowledge of God ." He reiterates that purpose a little later in what we have marked as 2:2. (Remember, this was written as a letter and was not divided into chapters and verses at that time.)
A similar purpose was to impress upon the Colossian believers of the importance of not only knowing Christ, but, as mentioned above, Paul also makes it a point to emphasize the pre-eminence of Christ, and the role that should play in their (and our) lives. When we make Christ number 1 in our lives, it will affect how we live our lives. It will affect our ‘wardrobe’ as we will see in chapter 3.
We will discuss this issue in more detail next time as we take a quick peek at chapter 2.
Stay tuned!
Debbie
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