Colossians 1:15-16 - Christ, The Preeminent One

Good morning, everyone. Good to be back in Texas. How you doing? We got some cold weather where we just got back from in Alaska, so you guys have thin blood by now. We still have thick blood, so we're not used to it yet, but it's great to be back.

Good to see all of you. In the Sunday school lesson this morning that Matt was teaching, I noticed a scripture in there where it said, you probably remember where it said, let's see, Matt, you might can help me with it.

It said something about that if you go into the room of mourning, they call it a room, the room of mourning is better than the room of laughter, because when you go through the room of mourning, your heart grows.

Isn't that something? Great lesson by the way. I was able to listen to Matt's Sunday school lesson from last week on the ship, and then Ben, I heard it this morning on the way to church. That's why my phone messed up in Sunday school.

I was trying to turn that off, and it took control of my phone, and Ben started preaching while Matt was teaching. I'm going to blame it on Ben. It couldn't have been the operator of the phone, right?

But seriously, I had the sound button clicked off, and the volume turned down, and it did that. Now how does that happen? Is that even possible? Could anyone else do that besides me? And Satan. I guess he worked through my phone.

Not through me, but through the phone. Anyway, I went in the kitchen finally after Sunday school, and still tried to do it again, and I finally got rid of it. Anyway, sorry about that. But listen, Matt, your lesson last week was tremendous, and this week was a great continuation of that lesson.

I learned a lot, and I heard Ben's sermon on the way to church this morning, and it was great last week. Thank you guys so much. And then John King, I heard it, you know, when he preached it Sunday before last, and it was fantastic.

So really appreciate everybody holding down the fort while we were gone, and we had a great trip. Katie and Dave and their kiddos went with us, and we had to spend all that time together, and it was a really wonderful time.

So if you ever get the chance to see Alaska, you should probably do it, because if you want to see God's creation, it's just outstanding right there. And we got some great photos. If you want to see them at lunch, I'll show them to you, but it's just mountain after mountain, snow-capped mountain, and then glacier after glacier, and contrary to what the liberals want you to think, the glaciers are still there.

In fact, some of them are growing bigger, which is interesting, considering what they think is happening. But anyway, it's great to see God's creation. So good to be back with you, and I will not take any more time to chat, because we need to get going here, and let's pick up in Colossians chapter 1.

We had spent some time in the first part of that chapter looking at God the Father and what the Scripture says about Him, and then down around about verse 12, it starts to talk about the Son of God, the Eternal Son.

And so we have to talk a little bit about the triune nature of God as we study Colossians, and specifically the deity of Jesus Christ is huge in this book of Colossians, this letter that Paul wrote to the church at Colossae.

So we started out speaking of Jesus Christ in Colossians 1, 12, and 13, and 14. It speaks of Him first. It says who He is. He is the King of God's kingdom, and He is God's dear Son. And if you remember, the word for dear there is agape, which is interesting, because in English it really doesn't mean dear.

It means loved, His loved Son, and it has a little article the in front of the word loved and in front of the word Son. So He is the Son, the loved, not a son, the Son, and not a person God loves, but the person that God loves.

That's fascinating just to look at the little Greek words there and the little articles in that. Secondly, we talked about that He is the image of the invisible God, and that is sort of the last thing that we were talking about, and we see that in verse 15 of Colossians 1, who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature.

Now that one sentence right there, it requires quite a bit of study, because to you guys, there's nothing problematic in that verse, but when you get out there in the world system, especially in the religious system where so many churches in these end times are preaching false doctrine, Jesus said there'd be many false preachers in the end times.

They are here. They're with us, and they're everywhere, and in every church that you go to, you need to check out everything that person says with the scripture, because they will use scripture, but normally what happens is they use it out of context.

So I saw it happen on the ship. Dave was talking about we went to a Bible study. I think Dave went every time. I went about three times to it, but one of the people taught, and he went deep on the Holy Spirit, which is fine with us, but some groups in this country act like we don't believe in the Holy Spirit.

We don't believe God can heal. We don't believe the Holy Spirit lives in us and moves in us and gives us power, or maybe they'll say we believe in the indwelling, but we don't believe in the anointing.

Well, the anointing is the same to me as the filling, and we believe in it and possibly know more than they do about it, which is interesting, because they act like we don't even believe in it, but the truth is they get out of context so much when they discuss it, they get it wrong, and this gentleman that taught, his very first point, most of his points were very good, but his first point, he took a verse that had nothing to do with what he talked about, had nothing to do with, well, it was the verse where it says that Jesus breathed on them, and they were his apostles early on, even before Pentecost, where it says he breathed on them and they were filled with the Spirit.

Remember that verse? And he said that is teaching the anointing of the Spirit, and it's not, because the very next verse shows that one of those disciples wasn't even saved yet. How are you going to get anointed with the Spirit if you're not even saved yet?

So he took it out of context, even the very next verse showed it, but he didn't read that verse, and it's all over the country, maybe all over the world, but I know in the American church, it's so much so that no one understands the 10 rules of proper Bible interpretation, or they do understand them, but they cheat to prove a point.

They want to prove that they hold so dear that all of their buddies would kick them out of the group if they stopped teaching that. Even if they saw it, they wouldn't stop teaching it, so many of them, and especially the younger ones.

It's harder for young men to don't worry about getting kicked out of the group. As you get older, you don't care. You really don't care about the group. What you care about is truth, and you seek the truth.

Well, that's just one example. Well, this particular verse in Colossians 115, there are some people who actually can be quite heretical in their teaching that will use verses, several verses in this first chapter of Colossians to teach the opposite of what God means by what he says because they cheat and they take things out of context.

This church doesn't allow that, and if you ever see me teach something that's not right, all you got to do is show me. You got to show me in context. You got to use all the rules of Bible interpretation and convince me I'm wrong, which you can do if I'm wrong.

Everyone in here could do that if I'm wrong. You can show me, and please don't believe anything just because I said it's so. You cannot afford to do that in this day and time. You've got to be in the Word, checking everything out that all of our teachers say, and all of us want to be corrected.

We'd like you to do it private rather than standing up and interrupting the service if possible. Come see us after the service, and if you can show us we're wrong, we'll fix it the next Sunday. That's happened before, hasn't it, Dave?

Dave's shown me some historical things I got a little bit off from time to time, and I looked and said, you're right. I just, like, I did a Biden on it. I just, sorry about that. Didn't mean to bring politics in.

It's just an illustration. I'm going to preach to you today. I shouldn't make fun of it. I'm getting there, you know. I'm going to be 70 in October. Maybe I've got ten more good years. Isn't he 82 or something?

Ten more good years, hopefully. Anyway, so let's take a look at this. Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature? Well, you know, one thing that, one key word here that people get wrong, and I think we touched on this the last Sunday I was here before the trip, was image.

And even I have gotten, even I have gotten that wrong. I shouldn't say it that way. I am a man, all right, so I got it wrong in a lot of my preaching earlier in my life because I used the Strong's Dictionary definition for image, which you wouldn't think that's wrong.

So you have to be careful with Greek. Sometimes you need to look at the big wide dictionary and look at, you know, go back and look at all of how the Greek word is used, especially how it's used in the Bible.

But that word for image that we talked about last time, it literally means to strike, like to have an image on the bottom of a, what do you call this thing? A die. Put it on some leather and hit it with a hammer and then it puts that on the leather.

That's the, a lot of times in profane Greek, that's what it means. Icon is the word, it usually means that. It doesn't mean that in this verse. And you can look at the greatest Greek scholars who've written anything about the word and how it's used in the Bible.

And, and they are pretty much all in agreement that actually what it means is the real and essential embodiment of something, which is a little different. It's not just like an image of something. It is the real essential embodiment of that thing.

So let me, let me give you an example in scripture. I'll turn to second Corinthians three 18 and I'll show you the same word where the word, and it is translated image again in the English and the King James, but you'll see that it doesn't mean like a cheap copy of something.

It doesn't mean that at all. And you'll see, you'll see clearly how the words use. And this is how scholars of scripture can sometimes look at profane Greek and say, well, yeah, that is how Plato used it, but it's not how Paul used it.

It's not how the Holy Spirit used it in the Bible. And the way a lot of times you can figure that out this way is use the rule of proper Bible interpretation. The rule that says, let the Bible interpret the Bible.

You know that rule, right? Let scripture interpret scripture. So go look and see how that word is used in other places and it'll shed great light. So let's look at this second Corinthians three 18. Um, in that I'm not going to read the verse, but in that particular verse, it talks about, uh, the work of the spirit and the heart.

And it's described as quote, changing us the Holy spirit as he works in our heart, changing us from glory to glory into the image of the glorified Christ. So it's not like we're a cheap copy, uh, or an image we're actually, uh, we're actually, I think the best definition is what I said a minute ago.

Um, where'd I put it? Oh, I, I discarded it already, but it's actually the embodiment of that thing. And that's who we are. We are, Christ lives in us and we're the embodiment of Jesus Christ. So we talked about that last time.

And, uh, you know, that is, that is really great. Um, and there's a couple of others, uh, in first Corinthians 15 49, it says that the image of the earthy and the image of the heavenly and is talking about Adam and Jesus, the first Adam and the second Adam.

And when it says the image of the earthy, it just means he's a man. And when it talks about Jesus and says he is the image of the earthy, it doesn't mean he's a cheap copy of a human. It means he is a man, right?

So that is what this word likeness actually means in biblical Greek. It means the embodiment of something, not just an image of something. I think that is, uh, quite important to understand that. So now let's talk about, uh, let's move to the next thing.

The invisible God. Have you ever wondered what that means? Uh, somebody, let's see, how about Ben and Charlotte? How much did I cover last time? Cause Ben's like 12 days. Uh, cause I neglected to mark my notes.

Did I cover the invisible God very much or did I just start getting into it? That's what I thought. Okay. So let's talk about that a little bit because here is, I think we ran out of time and so I just stopped.

Um, but where it talks about the invisible God, um, here's, here's the thought on that because it's difficult to tell. I don't know if you've thought about this before, but does that mean that the father is literally invisible or does it mean he's just in a, he's not really in a place.

It's hard to talk about the father. He's, he's, he's outside of time and space, wherever that is or whatever that is. We speak as a man, we just call it a place. Okay. I thought about writing a book about it.

I had been talking about writing books a long time and I'm launching Monday because I've got key people in key places in three different companies and everything's running smoothly and I now have time to do it.

So I'm going and I thought about one title is the fourth heaven. Would that be interesting? Cause the Bible talks about three heavens, specifically lists the third heaven and second heaven and so forth.

But it implies the fourth heaven because I don't know if I'd really call it a heaven, but it's where the father dwells, which is outside of time and space. And uh, so you think about that. So when it says he is invisible, does it means he's invisible or does it mean you can't see him because you're not where he is?

See, it could mean either one, couldn't it? So we need to ferret that out and see what you think it means. And uh, I think it's kind of interesting. So let's talk about that for a moment. And as we do it, let's look at some of the scriptures dealing with it.

First John one 18, take a look at that. And uh, I like you to turn to him if you can, if you have a Bible or phone or whatever you're looking at with your Bible in it, take a look at first John one 18.

All right. So Jesus is speaking here. No man has seen God at any time. The only begotten son, which is in the bosom of the father, he had declared him. It's not Jesus speaking. It's the apostle John. It's the Holy spirit speaking through John.

No man has seen God. That means the father. No man has seen the father at any time. The only begotten son, which is in the bosom of the father, he has declared him. Okay. So does that mean no man has seen God because they're not where he is or he's invisible?

Well, it's not real clear on that one, is it? It's not super clear. That's what I said, isn't it? It's John chapter one, not first John. Sorry. John one eight. I'm looking at it. It says right here, John one 18.

Sorry. Maybe I don't have 10 years to 82. I'm not sure. I may be like, you know, more mature than the average 70 year old. I don't know. Okay. John one 18. No man has seen God at any time. The only begotten son, which is in the bosom of the father, he has declared him.

I saw everybody kind of looking around. I'm wondering why is everybody looking around? Okay. Wrong verse, but it doesn't define exactly what invisible means yet. But we do know that no man has seen the father except one person.

Who is that? Jesus Christ is the only person, only man, woman, boy, or girl that has ever seen the father. And we know that so far, just from a couple of scriptures we've looked at. Now that tells us one thing is that no man, woman, boy, or girl on the earth could know God without Jesus, because you can't because God is in a place you can't go right now.

He's, he is outside of time and space. Your sin does not even approach him. He cannot be in the presence of sin. He's not in time. He's not in space. And you couldn't even know about him. If Jesus Christ who has been with him, didn't tell you about him.

Now you could know he existed by the stars and everything, something made him. So, you know, there's a God, but you couldn't know anything about God. So we, we talked about that a little last time too.

You couldn't know anything about God without Jesus. And that's why the great religions of the world, there's only one that's true. And that's biblical Christianity because Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, all of them just have one God.

And if they were correct, you would never know that God because he's not in time. He's not in space. He's not where you are. So you only know him when he comes into time and space. And he only does that through two ways.

And that is the person of Jesus Christ, the son of God, and the person of the Holy spirit, both of whom are God. But the father doesn't come here. You couldn't know him without the word of God, which is Jesus.

Jesus is the word. So we know Jesus has been with the father. Now let's keep reading. Look at first Timothy and it really is first. It's not just Timothy first Timothy six, 16, or as president Trump would say, Timothy one, six, 16.

He did that with Corinthians. I think in a speech one time instead of first Corinthians, he said Corinthians one, and then he gave the chapter and the verse. Okay. First Timothy six, 16, who only has immortality dwelling in the light, which no man can approach unto whom no man has seen nor can see.

Now that gives me more information, that phrase right there to whom be honor and power everlasting. Amen. So Jesus, it's kind of refers back to John chapter one, verse 18 and other verses in John, where Jesus talks about that he's been with the father or first back to that.

And it says, Jesus is the only man who has immortality, which makes him God. Uh, he dwells in the light, which means when Jesus said, I've been with the father, no man's been with him, but I've been with him and I declare him.

Uh, no other man can approach the father and no other man has ever seen the father, which is what John one 18 said. But now it adds more information, nor can any man see the father. Now, uh, that's interesting.

Ben, can you do me a favor and look that and see if it's what tense it is where it says can see I should have done it and I didn't. Um, uh, first Timothy six 16 nor can see. I want to know if that's future tense present or whatever, or heiress to whom be honor and power everlasting.

In other words, honor to Jesus because he's been in the presence of the father. He's the only one who ever has. So let's give him honor and glory and so forth. That's what the verse is talking about. But doesn't it seem to indicate that not only is it true that no man has seen God, but no man can see God.

So would you tend to think maybe that means actually invisible where it says he's invisible. It means he's invisible. What do you think? Talk to me. I don't mind. This is class. All of a sudden you think, does that prove it in and of itself or do we need more?

I think we have more. I'm not sure we have a better one than that. You got one. Oh, pretty clear. Thank you. Ben's going to look up the tense because that'll help them to know that too. They should match.

So look up. See, they should vote. They're going to be in the same tense, but okay. So, so that means, uh, heiress without respect to time, like it doesn't mean past, present or future. Usually it's rendered present in English, but it has no respect to time.

It just means man can't see God. So you're right. Okay. So let's look at another one though. Go with me to regular John, clarify myself, six, John 45, no, John six 45, John chapter six, verse 45. I I'm, I would think what Dave senior said, let's see a few more.

All right. Um, you got it. John six 45. It is written in the prophets and they shall all be taught of God. Now that's a fact. Oh, I'd love to get on a rabbit trail there, but I won't, you know, I lie when I say I won't.

Right. It's happened before. Not this time. Every man, therefore that hath heard and learned of the father comes to Jesus. Well, man, that's tempting to get on a rabbit trail. All right. Verse 46, not that any man has seen the father except that word save is an old English word.

It means except, except he, which is of God. He has seen the father truly, truly. I say unto you, he that believes on me hath everlasting life. I am the bread of life. Okay. Now that one kind of reverts back to John one 18.

It shows us that none of us have ever seen God. Only Jesus that has this word. It says, save he, which is of God, he had seen the father. And, um, I think if you look up the word, see, you can check me.

Anybody that's got a phone, uh, that word for seen in verse 46, John six 46 is going to be kind of a good translation would be observe. It doesn't literally mean to strike the eye in the Greek. It means to observe something.

Uh, because there's a scripture that says nowadays, for those of us who has seen and believe on the Christ will be saved. It doesn't mean you have to see him obviously, because we haven't seen him physically, but it means he's observed him.

You've read the scriptures and you've observed his life and you know him from his word, which is spirit and truth speaking to you who he is saying with the father, right? So we observed the father that way.

And we observed Jesus that way, but, um, it doesn't necessarily strike the eye, but then you might want to look it up, Ben. There's another verse. Uh, and I'm sorry, I would have looked these up seriously.

I was, I expected to do the hospital visit with John yesterday at one o 'clock in Baylor and Dallas supposed to have the surgery. They didn't do the surgery till five and it wasn't over till eight. And then I had to drive home.

And so I didn't get a chance to look these up, uh, having a sermon done a month ago, but usually what I do when I go over it, uh, the night before I'll, if I see a word, I want to look up, I'll look it up, but that would be a good one.

Let's see if it means to strike the eye and, uh, let's see where, which we're in. Yeah. Okay. So it means to strike the eye. It doesn't mean it doesn't mean to observe what is the word. Can you pronounce it?

Okay. All right. So that's good to know. So that indicates Jesus has seen the father. So the other verse indicates we will never see the father. And it says we can't see the father. This one says Jesus has seen the father.

So, um, does that mean he can be seen or does it just mean he can be seen only by Jesus because Jesus is God. So I think when you put the two together, it means that, um, Jesus has seen the father in the sense that he has been with him before time began before anything was created.

And he has observed the father, but here's what I think when we see the father, the only place we've ever seen the father, and we didn't see him, but in the wilderness tabernacle on top of the mercy seat was the Shekinah glory.

And then in the temple that was built later, both of which were resemblances of the actual throne in heaven, right? And the mercy seat that's really there, the Shekinah glory shined over it. Only one man could see that ever.

And that was the high priest once a year, remember, and he had to go in with blood or he would have been destroyed and, and the proper sacrifices had to have been done. And he goes in and he sees the Shekinah glory.

Well, that is a type or a picture that one man pictured Jesus is the one man that's seen God, right? It pictures that, but in reality, in the third heaven, right now, you still have the same thing. You have the Shekinah glory over the throne and you have the lamb who is Jesus physically in heaven.

You have the Holy spirit depicted by the seven lamps, both in the throne and in the eyes of the lamb, uh, who ties the father and son together and us together with them and with each other and all that John saw all that, but you're not really seeing the father.

When you see that you're seeing a little bit of God's glory. You're seeing a little bit of the resplendent light, which is a picture or a symbol that the father exists, but you're not seeing God. Bible says you hadn't seen him says you won't ever see him.

That used to bother me. I asked Otis about it once. He said, don't worry, brother David, you'll see God. I said, how? He said, through the eyes of Jesus. I thought that's a nice answer. Not sure it helps, but it's a nice answer and a correct answer probably.

But anyway, so sit, so now, you know, we're, here's what we know. The Bible says he's invisible. Uh, Jesus says he's seen him, but I think it means more in the sense of he is with him and in all eternity past, you have to put a date on it because we can't speak like God, but there's no time there.

But all of that time before time began, Jesus was with him and he sees him as he is. He's the only one that has seen the father as he is. I don't believe that means the father has a body. I don't believe he has arms and leg and a head like the Jehovah's witnesses and the Mormons think.

Uh, I don't believe he had, even though in the book of revelation, there's a hand that comes out of this kind of glory and hands the book to Jesus. I believe that hand is just a resemblance of, there was no body.

There was no person that you saw. You saw the, you saw the Shekinah glory in the light and a hand that handed the book, something handed the book to Jesus. And that is where, you know, I've said so many times that the Bible is remarkable because it's a book that came from a place.

That's not a place where there is no time. And it came into time and space and we have it. Well, that's a, that is a picture of how that happened, but it doesn't mean God has a hand. The father, uh, it's anthropomorphic, which means we tend to give human characteristics to God, which he doesn't really have, but it helps us to understand him a little bit, but it doesn't mean he has a body.

So I think I lean towards thinking it literally means invisible that the father is invisible because he is not made out of stuff. All right. He is a pure spirit being now. Um, I think these verses shed light on it.

Let's see. We've got a one more look at first John four 20. If a man say, I love God and hated his brother, he is a liar because he that loves not his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen?

So I don't know, you know, it, it pretty well indicates invisible. But what's interesting is the passage that we're dealing with indicates that he is in fact invisible. So I think that's good to deal with that.

Now let's go to the next word in the verse. Now I'm back in Colossians, uh, chapter one and verse 15. So verse 15 says he is invisible and the word in the Greek means invisible. All right. So now what about the firstborn?

Do you see how this could be problematic? What are the Jehovah's witnesses and Mormons teach about Jesus and the, and the Gnostics in the first century, uh, almost 2000 years ago taught the same thing.

Uh, what do they teach about him that he's a created being that some say he's an angel that he's created just like Lucifer was created. Uh, or they just say he's a created being and guess which verse they use to try to prove it.

The one we're in right now, uh, the firstborn of every creature. And so now they'll say, okay, every creature me implies he's a creature, right? I mean, it sounds like it in English. This is what's so fascinating about cult groups.

Really they're filled with very ignorant people. They're filled with people who don't have Greek and Hebrew scholars that have ever been recognized by anyone in the world. They will make up what something means or they'll misuse the Greek.

Kind of like we saw the word for a image doesn't mean what even Strong's means. And really all they have sometimes is Strong's or they just have the English Bible and they take everything from the English Bible.

And so when you take, when you look at the verse we're looking at, it's very easy to think it says something that God doesn't mean. And the only way you can know what God means is not by reading it, but by studying it in context, according to 10 rules of Bible interpretation, which include, you got to know what the word means.

You got to know what the words mean. You got to know what the grammar is in the sentence. You got to know the tenses of the verbs. You got to know sometimes where the masculine, feminine, or neuter is real important.

Like when the Bible says that tongues and words of knowledge and stuff will cease, it tells us when it says when the perfect has come. A lot of people say, well, that's when Jesus comes back, but it can't mean that because it's in the neuter.

Jesus is masculine. Second coming is feminine. Rapture is feminine. It's neuter. It's the Bible. It's when we had the only perfect physical thing in the world is the Bible. And now we have it. So you have to look at the, not only the word meanings, but also the grammar and then the context and everything else.

All right. So now let's look at this. The firstborn of every creature, because you will face this someday. If you witness much, you're going to run across a Jehovah's witness or a Mormon, and they're going to show you this verse in Colossians.

And they're going to use the very verse that you studied today. And if you don't know the meanings, they're going to use it to try to show that Jesus is a created being, which is blasphemy. All right.

So let's look at the word creature. He's the firstborn of every creature. Okay. The word every is POS. We know that word, right? But the creature, the word creature is the word. And that little word literally means this original formation, original formation.

So it doesn't mean creature. So in English, it sounds like something created creature means something created, right? Original formation, uh, is not the word creature. And you may say, well, that still sounds like something that was formed, but let's keep looking at this passage.

And I think to shed light on it, we have to look at the word firstborn as well, because when you put the word firstborn in front of a word that sounds like creature, it really, those words together are pretty strong and they start making you think, well, why is he created?

Was he a created being? All right. So firstborn is the Greek word, proto-akos, proto-tacos, like tacos. It's a Texas word. And obviously it comes from a couple of words, but it means firstborn. It comes from a couple of words, the word proto, which means first.

What's interesting is the word tokos in the Greek does not really mean born. It is translated more often into the English word interest. And you say, well, that doesn't make any sense. But if you keep following me, you'll see what it means.

Interest, the first interest. All right. Now, when you look at it in biblical language, first of all, let's go back and look at it in profane Greek. Homer, one of the Greek scholars from long ago, 3 ,000 years ago or something, he used it.

And the most often use of his meaning for this word is first in rank, not first created or firstborn, but first in rank. So if you had a King and a Prince and a pauper, you put them in rank, the King is first.

It doesn't mean any of them were created or born to the person looking at them. It just means this one's first in rank, this one's second, this one's third. That is the Greek meaning in profane Greek going back as far as history takes it, where people spoke Greek even long before the New Testament was written by the Holy Spirit.

Are you with me? Okay. So the orientation of the word is not having to do with the presence of other sons. It's just talking about first in rank. When Homer used it in sentences, in this case, it expressed the fact that people, the individual or the King, whoever it's talking about was especially dear to God.

And of course he was talking about false gods, but whoever he thought God was, he was giving an example of a person, maybe a King that was especially dear to God. It didn't mean he was created by God or that he was the first born of God.

It means he was first in rank in God's viewpoint. That's how Homer used it in profane Greek. He's first in rank and we know that from that study of Greek. Now, if we go into the biblical usage of the same word, we find that is more what it means, where it's used.

You can go back to the Old Testament and where it speaks of Israel and it says, God is speaking. He says, he is my first born, only one elect and beloved. Okay. So it uses the phrase in the English, he calls it, it uses first born again, but what it actually means is first in rank because the next words indicate that he is the only one as far as rank and interest compared to everybody else to God.

The nation of Israel was the only nation that meant anything to God at that moment. And when this was written, it was the elect nation. It was the beloved nation, but it does not mean it was birthed by God in that sense.