Heavenly Thinking on Earth, Part 1

And now turn, if you would, to Colossians chapter three. I'll be preaching from the first four verses that I'll read, but I want to read all the way down through verse 17.

So preaching the first four verses, one through four. But in order to set us up for the afternoon preaching, we'll go all the way through 17.

So when you have that, please stand. If, then, you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is.

Seated at the right hand of God. Set your mind on things that are above, not on things that are on the earth.

For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you will also appear with him in glory.

Put to death, therefore, what is earthly in you, sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry.

On account of these, the wrath of God is coming. In these, you too once walked when you were living in them.

But now you must put them all away. Anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth.

Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices, and put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator.

Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free, but Christ is all and in all.

Put on, then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another, and if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other, as the

Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these, put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.

And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you are called in one body, and be thankful.

Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God.

And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the

Father through him. Amen, God bless the reading. And now, if he will the proclamation of his word, you may be seated.

So we've been in this book just for a couple of few weeks. And as I told you when we started, we're gonna do this in eight messages.

It's gonna stretch actually to nine messages, I'm gonna preach next week in the afternoon to finish this off.

But clearly I wasn't able to pick up everything in this rich, wonderful book of Colossians in these short messages.

And so I brought to you this one idea, which I've been sort of hammering on, which is the sufficiency of Christ.

That God, through and in Christ, actually accomplishes the promises of God, which in him are yes and amen, and he is sufficient for these things.

Now sufficient sounds like a small word, doesn't it? But sufficient's a good word, because it means that the promises of God, our growth into the image of Christ as we avail ourselves of the means of grace, all these things in Christ are amen.

All these things in Christ are yes, and Christ, by his spirit, accomplishes them in us and through us.

In a word, he is sufficient for these things. So this is where we've been going.

This is where we've been for the past few weeks. And we're finally getting to something I mentioned last week you're getting anxious for.

When's the practical part? Oh, pastor, when are you gonna get to the part of Colossians where Paul tells us what to do?

What am I required to accomplish? What's my part? We're getting there.

And we're getting there at Paul's pace. A little quicker than if I had a year or so to go through this book, but we're still taking a section at a time.

If then you have been raised with Christ, seeing that you've been raised with Christ, not if the possibility might exist that maybe you got raised with Christ.

He's speaking to those who have been raised with Christ, assuming the truth of that first part. If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above.

And there's your practical part. You who have been waiting to know what to do, you who have been anxious for that imperative where God commands you and says, here's the way you need to respond to these things, seek the things that are above where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.

Set your minds on the things that are above, not on the things that are of the earth.

These four verses are theology at its highest. They glorify the risen Savior and they include the resurrection.

He's going to appear. He's going to appear because he's ascended. He ascended because he was resurrected after his death for us.

Theology at its highest, glorifying the Lord Jesus Christ. The Savior sitting now at the right hand of God.

And so they bring forth his ascension. They bring to us his glorification. His sovereignty is in his position on the

Father's right hand. His coming return and with that our ultimate glorification are all there, all in these four short verses, tightly packed yet fairly easy to unravel.

And it's theology at its highest because theology at its highest means something to us on this earth.

Theology at its best says something to us about how we need to respond. Often from especially

Paul explicitly. Therefore, he says, based upon all these things I've told you, all these what we call in Greek the indicatives, the statements of fact, what

Christ has actually done for us. Who God is, who Christ is, what the cross meant.

The indicatives lead to the imperatives. Therefore, you need to do this or that and all the things that we have.

That's theology at its best. Not just some academic thing that we debate about. No, it's something that means something.

It tells us something about Christ Jesus. Tells us something about God and then leads us to do something about it while he has us remaining here.

These four verses portray Jesus Christ and they show us the way to him. We're told where he is.

He's above, he's there. It tells us what we're to do. We're to seek him and it tells us how we're to seek him.

By using the mental abilities that God has given us and tells us the basis for it all. Because we died, we died to self and our life is now in him.

Our life is now hidden in him. And it also gives us motive here. As Paul reminds us that Jesus will return.

He is coming back and he's coming back soon. He is at the door. Do I know when that door is going to open?

Jesus said not even he knows when the father will say go. But we know it's imminent and we know it will happen.

Maybe not in our life, maybe before we finish the service. And when he does, what does this verse tell us or these verses?

When Jesus comes back in all his glory, you, believer in Jesus Christ, you who

Paul calls faithful and beloved in Jesus Christ, I who love the savior that you love, we will be glorified with him.

When he comes in his glory and calls us to himself, we too will finally, after all these years of groaning with all creation,

Romans 8, be glorified with him. That's all in these verses. Just in these four verses.

Theology at its best. You remember Epaphras, who's the one who came to Paul probably in prison and told him what might happen at the church in Colossae?

Now it doesn't appear that these things, these problems, these heresies, these misteachings had actually infused themselves in there.

But it seems like Epaphras went to Paul and said, you know, these things are all out there. And people have been raised in them.

And all my church are people who lived like that in which you once lived, as Paul's put it.

And so Paul, we need some extra teaching. We need some protection. I need you to send me back with something to show the church how to resist those things.

His concern was that false teaching shouldn't be allowed to even get a threshold. You know the proverb about the camel's nose?

Won't you let the camel put his nose in the door of the tent? Pretty soon the rest of the camel's going to be in there. So it's sort of a camel's nose thing.

The rest of the creature's gonna find a way in. It's like a little leaven, leavening the whole lump. And so without a single heresy or misteaching or misguidance named specifically in this book, we have to assume, and I think it's a good assumption, that these things were out there and were a danger to the church but hadn't quite gotten in.

So it's preemptive. But what were the false teachers going to do?

Whether they were Gnostics, whether they were Jews trying to bring the law of Moses into play, whether they were

Stoics, whoever they were, whatever they were teaching, what were they trying to do? Trying to do the same thing that the world would do for you today.

You wanna know what the practical side is? The practical side is to resist what the world would do, what

I think they were trying to do here in Colossae and the reason Paul says that set your mind, set your seeking, all that you want, all that you look for, all that you strive for, where?

Above. Above, get your eyes off this earth. Get your spirit, your desires, your wants, your needs off the things that this earth has to offer.

And trust God to give them to you as you need them. But where do we set our sights? Up, above, you've been raised with Christ, so seek above, put your mind on things above.

Now what they try to do is take attention away from Jesus Christ, to lower our sights ever so much away from Christ and really onto myself, onto me, to these methods of attaining their goals, whoever they were, to the mundane, to the profane, to the earthly, to the soil -ish, to whether I speak in tongues or I keep my hands down when

I pray, to whether I weep or for sorrow at Jesus' suffering or weep for joy at his resurrection.

And they look at these things and say, ah, there's the sign of whether you're really saved or growing in the Lord. Paul says, no, none of that.

He says, look up, young man, look up, husband, look higher, wife, slaves, masters, children, the whole household of God, lift the eyes of your heart and gaze upon our

Savior, Jesus Christ. Seek him, seek after him, seek and think. Those imperatives, verses one and two, the reason, we could say, the motive is in verses three and four, it's something like this.

You've been united to Christ in his death and resurrection. Seek him in this life as you await his coming glory.

You've been united with him, you've died with him. Seek him, seek him who took you from a living death for a dead in our trespasses and sins in which we once walked, who gave you true life.

The scripture says he made alive. So what is it we're to seek?

Why are we to seek it? It's very simple, really, it's to seek Christ because by virtue of God's predestining will and mercy, you've been brought into union with his death and resurrection.

This is the assumption of that little word if. We might think of it as since, seeing that.

Since you've been raised with Christ, or seeing that, or assuming the truth of this, you've been raised with Christ.

As a consequence, as a proper response to that, seek continually, seek throughout your life that which is above.

Seek in this context denotes a man's general philosophical quest. What are you looking for in this life?

People are always looking for parameters by which to live, a worldview that puts everything into focus for them, that explains things like where do we come from?

Well, I only know of one worldview that tells us that, and that's that in the beginning, God made. We can stop there and say, there it is, that tells us all that, but this is what

Paul says, is you can have so many worldly things coming into you and say, no, not in the beginning, God, in the beginning, what is it, a big bang, and where did that come from?

They won't tell us why it was there in the first place and all these other things. Seek that which is above as all these worldly things come towards you, as these plausible arguments take you away from focus on Christ.

You go, wow, that really makes good sense. That man has a PhD from Cornell or something like that.

He must know what he's talking about. Seek things that are above. Seek things that are in heaven.

Seek Jesus Christ at the right hand of God. Look to his image. Seek. Seek in this context is that general philosophical quest and it's the word that's used to translate the

Hebrew word bakash, which is Hebrew for seek, and that's in Jeremiah 29, 13. I think it's appropriate to use it here where Jeremiah says to exiled

Israel, you will seek me, which is God, you will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.

I mean, seek Jesus. Look to him. He is your quest. He tells us, seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness.

That's in Matthew chapter six. And Jesus also said, seek and you will find, using the word in exactly the same form as we have in Colossians 3 .1.

A present, active, continuous effort of seeking after the image of Christ Jesus.

Seeking after him. Now, we put all this together, God allows himself to be found by those whose heart is bound to the quest for him.

What does it mean to seek him? Well, the description we have of Jesus, the only accurate description, is in the scripture.

So to seek Jesus means to read his word. To seek Jesus means to read his word and it divides soul and spirit.

It divides the joints and the marrow. It tells us the true intents of our heart. In a word, it presents the difference between you or me and the

Lord Jesus. And to seek him says, okay, the scripture has put this before me. Now I see this difference.

Now I see a failure on my part or a defect on my part compared to him. And there's no end to failures when we compare to Jesus.

No end to defects. So one at a time, brethren, one at a time, seek after him and let the scripture tell you where you differ.

And I would suggest to you that we differ in every way from him, but you can't take care of those, but one at a time, by repentance and prayer, that's seeking after Jesus.

That's seeking things that are above. That is the work of the Holy Spirit within you. See, by directing our focus to things that are above where Christ is and not on things of the earth, he's setting aside the dangerous teaching of human philosophy, of asceticism, worship of angels, and all the rest, the things we've talked about over the last couple of weeks.

Things of the earth, the inventions of men. You know, seeking is hard work.

It's meant to be hard work. It's worth it. It's worth the effort because the reward at the end is to be more like Jesus Christ.

We'll always be infinitely less than Jesus Christ. We never will achieve the perfection in this life.

That cannot happen, but the quest is a good one. The results are marvelous when you make one incremental step towards that one whom you seek.

We repent of that one sin, and because of repentance, you don't click that one site anymore.

You don't give that backlash from your mouth. You don't think that covetous thought of your neighbor.

Just that one incremental step is what it means to seek after him, and that's the reward of it.

It's a good effort. It's worth the strain. It's worth the self -humility, and letting the scripture humble us as we see just how far we have to go.

But since we have so far to go, it doesn't mean we stop trying just because we won't get there. No, this is a quest that no matter how far you get, as long as you are progressing towards him, it's worth it.

You know, I used to backpack. We did the John Muir Trail, and those passes just get so long.

You're just going up, up, up, and there's switchback after switchback, and you see somebody coming down, and they're going so fast. How much further is it?

It's a, oh, just a little ways is the usual answer, and that's the answer I would give when they'd ask me when I was on my way down.

But when you finally get there, and you're able to look north and say, how did

I ever come that far? And you look south, and say, how will I ever get that far? This quest's so much more than a backpacking trip, though.

How will I ever get that far as you look up? Not north and south like I did on the top of these passes.

Look up. How will I ever get there? Well, you'll never get there, but how will

I approach by seeking him? Through prayer, through repentance, through study of the

Scripture, through the communion of the saints, through all the means of grace, God has given us the things that are above where Christ is.

To seek after something implies that the thing being sought is worth the effort, and brethren, if it's

Christ you seek, obviously, it's worth the effort. John chapter five, verse 44,

Jesus said, how can you believe when you receive glory from one another and do not seek the glory that comes from the only

God? Seeking glory from each other, trying to look good for each other,

I sit down, not raised above, not where Christ is, where you are, where I am, impressing each other.

We say, hey, that was a great whatever you did. You got glory from me.

What good does that do you? Probably by the time you get home, you're gonna forget all about it. How can you believe when you receive glory from one another and not the one that comes from the only

God? Romans two, verse seven, to those who have patience in well -doing, seek for glory and honor and immortality.

It's all God, right? He will give eternal life, but for those who are self -seeking and do not obey the truth but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury.

Nobody works hard, nobody goes through extra training and a lot of effort to get a poorer -paying job.

Would you? Would you go take an extra class, learn a new skill because that job, that skill would get you is a lesser job, less benefits, longer hours, worse pay?

Of course you wouldn't do that. I mean, no one seeks a fool for a husband or a nag for a wife, but think of it this way.

You've been raised with Christ, so raise your eyes and look to where he is. He's above, he's at the

Father's right hand. He's in the place of power, prestige, of absolute, unbridled sovereignty. The most quoted psalm in the

New Testament, Psalm 110, and there the Father says to his son, Jesus Christ, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool.

Seek to obey him. Seek to obey Jesus who's conquered our enemies. Seek to be conformed to his image, to Jesus who has given us his spirit to work and to mold us that way.

It's a work of God within you. It's a work of God that he gives you. He does the work, but he gives you the work to do.

I cannot reconcile those for you. I can tell you that God says, do this, I make it possible,

I make it necessary, and without me, said Jesus Christ, you can do nothing, and yet he says, grow in holiness and sanctification.

Our responsibility is to grow. Our responsibility is to seek, and God is the one who makes you want to seek.

God is the one who makes the seeking productive. When you seek me, you will find me when you seek me with all your heart.

Seek him to guide you away from the inventions of men, away from the plausible arguments that ultimately detract from the glory of Christ and cause your foot to slip.

Brethren, it's as simple as keeping your eyes above, keeping your thoughts and your spirit and your intentions focused upon him and him alone.

As Jesus Christ said himself, and all these things will be added to you, when you seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things that we worry about day by day, clothes and cars and jobs and food and raising our children, all these things will be added to you.

Not promising it'll be easy, but it's promising that a good and loving and sovereign

God will add to you what is necessary and what is right. Seek him.

Look up. Look up. Look up in prayer. Look up in scripture.

Look up as you see others who are that example of Christ to imitate. Look up.

Eyes off self. Eyes off others. Look up to Christ. Verse two says set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on the earth.

More accurately, the Greek has things up or above, things up, think about. So think is in the same form as seek, okay?

Seeking and thinking in the original language are the same. Present, active, continuous, and imperative, which is the command form.

So as we seek Christ constantly, also think about him. Just as constantly. And that's one of Paul's favorite words, this word think.

Reorient your whole person by thinking Christ's thoughts after him. What are Christ's thoughts? It's a scripture.

At my first church, a guest preacher, I'll name, Howard Hendricks, he quoted something that's very common.

I'm sure you've heard this before. He's talking about people who are too heavenly minded to be of any earthly good.

Have you heard that? Anybody heard that? Am I the only one who's heard that? Oh, thank you.

No, it's very common, it's a platitude. Always too heavenly minded, he's always thinking about Jesus Christ. He can't do any good here because all he thinks about is

God. What good is she around here? Because all she thinks about is where she needs to repent. No, get your eyes on the earth, can't you?

Can't you help people out around here? Of course we help people out. Every Saturday we're in the food pantry.

By God's grace, we help out as much as we can. Things above, think.

Think constantly. Not too heavenly minded to be of any earthly good. That's very clever, that's really cute.

It's culturally commendable, but you know what else it is? Wrong. It's absolutely wrong to be heavenly minded is to be of earthly good.

You wanna be of earthly good? Be heavenly minded. You wanna do good in this life for other people? We should want to, we're merciful people.

God sends a rain on the just and the unjust alike. So yes, let's help people out. How do we do that?

How do we best do that? By seeking Jesus. By being so heavenly minded that we are of earthly good.

Not so heavenly minded we're of no earthly good. It's the opposite. Being so heavenly minded that we become good here on earth.

Do good for people. It's the only way we can be of use here.

You know, if God created the heavens and the earth, which he did, the seas and all that it contains, then it only makes sense to think about what he has made, which is everything, and think about it his way.

To think about all that he has made, which is ourselves as well, in continuity with the way he made us.

With the way the maker made us. Now verses one to 20, or 15 to 20 in chapter one, says very clearly who is our maker.

Jesus Christ. He's our maker. And that's why we set our thoughts on him. We wanna live consistent with he who made us.

And we could actually say remade us. As he told Nicodemus, you must be born again. One of my favorite verses, 2

Corinthians 5, 17. If anyone is in Christ Jesus, he is a new creation. Something new.

Something different. You ain't what you were. You're able to put your mind above. You're able to put your thoughts above.

You're able to look high up to Jesus Christ and want him, which you couldn't do before. He's a new creation.

The old has passed away. Behold, the new has come. Think thoughts consistent with him who made you new.

If he made you, then we certainly wanna live the way he made us. And not antithetical to it any longer.

And Paul just makes it so simple. Seek and think. Seek above, which is Jesus. Think above, about Jesus.

Those are the two imperatives. Those are the commands. Seek and think. Both raising our sights away from this mundane passing globe.

This mindset, far from drawing you away from your duties here on earth, sanctifies what we do here on earth.

First Corinthians 10, 31, in the context of nothing more exciting than eating and drinking. If you eat and if you drink, what does he say?

Do all for the glory of God. Just eating and drinking, yeah. Eating and drinking when you're seeking above, when you're thinking above, when you're looking to Christ.

Even when you're eating that steak or that oatmeal. It's to the glory of God as you seek what is above.

It's because of Christ that my employment works to God's glory. It's because of Christ that my wifely submission to my husbandly love are to God's glory.

Paying your bills, living within your means, saving for retirement, providing for inheritance to your children, all mundane and earthly stuff, right?

Pastor, aren't you telling me to think about things that are so much more important than that? No. I'm telling you that as you look above, as you seek after Christ, those things which are part of our responsibility here on earth according to the scripture are now sanctified and to the glory of God.

All to the glory of the Savior when done while seeking him and thinking about him. Paul says again, what he starts with, seeing that you've died with Christ, if then you have died with Christ.

He says in verse three, for you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When God, when

Christ who is your life appears, then you will also appear with him in glory. Now here's the reason behind the seeking and the thinking.

You've been waiting for the practical side of Colossians where I tell you finally what to do after all this theology that Paul set forth and hopefully

I've made clear to you over the last few weeks. Here it is. Your life is hidden in Christ.

When he appears, you'll appear with him in glory. Until he appears and we appear with him in glory, what do we do? Seek and think.

It's just that simple. It's the reason behind it here is that we've died and our life is with him.

Jesus carries your life in him. You who are deadened to trespasses and sins in which you once walked when you sought your own pleasure and thought only as far as this mortal life, you, me, made us alive together in Christ.

Now you have died to all that. Now you've been raised above all that because of Christ, in Christ.

That's really what Paul's saying here. It's so simple. Seek and think about him who raised you above all that.

Death is used in the New Testament sometimes in a literal sense. Most importantly, I would argue, Christ died for our sins.

The man, Jesus Christ, there's only one God and one mediator between man and God. The man, Jesus Christ, God became flesh in Christ Jesus and Christ Jesus as man literally died.

Not metaphorically, not spiritually. Don't let somebody turn it into some mythical fantasy for you.

Don't go with the, who's the Muslims who say he fainted on the cross? Like those

Roman experts who would not know the difference between dead and fainted? No, no.

Christ died, now that's literal. And it's used here in that metaphorical sense.

You're dead in trespass and sin. We're biologically alive, so it doesn't mean literally dead. And you've died with Christ?

Well, you weren't really on the cross with him, were you? Neither was I. So it's a metaphorical use. And in that vein, it means what?

It means the end of something. You've died with Christ. It's just what I said from 2 Corinthians 5, 17.

If anyone's in Christ Jesus, he's a new creation. The old has passed away, you've died. And the new has come, you're alive in Christ.

It's all consistent, it's all really saying the same thing. Jesus said whoever finds his life will lose it and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.

Now the word death is not there, but that's what it meant. Romans 6, one through three. What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may bound?

By no means. How can we who what? Died to sin still live in it.

Sin's still there in the world and unfortunately in us. But if you've been raised with Christ, then you died to your love of sin.

I pray God you have died to your love for sin. We will sin as long as we're in these bodies until Jesus Christ comes back and perfects all this creation including us.

But God willing our love for sin has been put to death. It's still there, but we don't love it.

You died to that worldly ease in which you once tolerated it in yourself and in others. Paul points out that sin and an ever clear and present danger to us is no longer the character of your life.

It's no longer the character, it no longer defines you. Christ is the character, Christ is your definition.

Therefore you cannot wallow in your sin anymore. Romans 6 -11, so you must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ.

This is Colossians 3 all over again. Seek and think about Christ. Live as though your life is in him because dear ones, it is in him.

Romans 7 -4, likewise my brothers, you have also died to the law through the body of Christ so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead, that's

Jesus, in order that we may bear fruit to God. So the terror of the law with its holy and yet impossible demands is dead.

You died to it because Jesus died for you. Galatians 2 -19, for through the law

I died to the law so that I might live to God. It's the same idea, it's a little bit different context. One more, Matthew 8 -22, and Jesus said to him, speaking of the man's father who was still alive,

Jesus said to him, follow me and leave the dead to bury their own dead. That father was not dead, he was alive in body, he was dead in spirit.

Now in Colossians, his use of dead means that the old affections are completely done away with. They're dead to you and you to them.

Are they? Are they? Or do we just tack on Jesus to take care of some of our guilt over some of these things?

God gave all mankind a conscience. That's one thing that differentiates us from all the animals, we have a conscience.

Are you dead to your love of sin? Only you can answer that. Do you love the law?

Scripture says you died to the law. Follow it, yes, go ahead and follow the law. We need to, look to it for guidance, for sanctification.

Let it tell you where you failed. Let it tell me where I've failed. Listen to the voice of the law.

Pay attention when you are shown what you're really like. That's James 1 -24. Endure the sharp edge as it divides soul and spirit and joints and marrow and discerns to you the thoughts and intentions of your heart, but don't love it.

Love him, love Jesus who obeyed it for you, who died for your inability, for my inability, inability that was saturated by rank unwillingness to obey it.

This is the change of affections brought about by dying to our old ways, a new mindset, a new set of desires, new hope, new strength, new life in Christ Jesus.

Back in Paul's day, the ascetics and the visionaries who promoted their loony bin theologies, they had at least one great weakness.

Their manifestation was subjective and unprovable. I've heard the same from people today who have been rescued from charismatic teaching.

They're taught that speaking in tongues is the necessary evidence of the Holy Spirit's residence within you. I think it's very similar to the things

Paul was protecting the Colossian church from, that you speak this way and you speak this long in the prayer, you do these things, you do something, literally you can put you in a class.

Our pastor Conley went through a class where he was taught to speak in tongues. That's exactly the kind of thing that Paul was fighting against in Colossae, or at least trying to keep out of there.

This outward evidence invented by man that proves something that they make in a plausible argument, something you would desire.

Paul says no. Paul says you've been raised from the dead with Christ. Your life is in him. He gave his life that we might live.

He's no myth, he's no made -up fantasy, no story about plates of gold which, when someone needed to have a look at them, suddenly vanished.

He's no crazy continuity to Peter the Pope. And Peter the

Pope, by the way, we have to think in Acts chapter 15, is the one who James told, be quiet now,

Peter. I've decided what to do. You take that one home, that one's for free.

Your life is hidden with Christ in God. Your life hidden with Christ in God.

Hidden, not a mystery, not a secret, but hidden like the treasures in heaven. It's secure, it's inviolable.

And this kind of explains Jesus' words in Matthew 6, 19 and 21. Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal.

But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal.

For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. Your life is hidden with him.

Seek him. And the seeking him, as we move closer to his image, that's the treasure. I believe that's the treasure that's being bound up and added up for you in heaven, for me.

And the more like him, the more we seek him, the more we think about him here in this life, the more it's going to be when we see him, we're gonna recognize him all the more.

Because you're gonna be that teeny bit much more like him. And we recognize that and say, there's my savior.

Like in Revelation chapter five, when John saw a lamb as though it had been slain, he didn't see a man, he saw a vision of a lamb.

Jesus, he knew right away. He saw that line, the line of Judah. Jesus, he knew right away.

Oh, that we might recognize him that quickly when we see him. Whatever form that will be, and we know it will be.

John says, we shall be like him for we shall see him as he is. That's where your life is hidden.

That's where your treasure is. A treasure we build as we look and seek after him. Again, the philosophers, the ascetics, and the elemental spirits, and all that stuff that we talked about a few weeks ago, that's still in view with their hidden agenda, with their special bits of esoteric knowledge, making you think that theirs is the key to a rich and rewarding life.

You've died. You've died to all that. Christ is what you need. You've died, that's the past event, looking back to your conversion.

And if then you've been raised, that's equivalent. You've died, so you've been raised. Those who lose their life will find it when you lose your life in Christ.

By repentance for your sin, by faith in his sacrifice, by trusting all the promises of God that in him are yes and amen.

If raised, then died, and because you cannot be raised from the dead if you're not dead.

So you died to self, and because you're dead to self, Christ raises you to himself.

Dead to the world, but alive in Christ. Seek the things that are above. Set your mind on them. It's equivalent to your life is hidden in Christ.

P .T. O 'Brien wrote here, as those who have already been raised with Christ, we now participate in his resurrection life.

It's Ephesians 1 .19, is it not? Where it says that the power that he exerted, that he,

God the Father, exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead, he now exerts towards we who believe.

Very important prepositions. But it's the same power, that power that God exerted when he said rise to his son.

He says live to us in Christ and toward us.

He goes on and says, so our lives are to be different. Our interests are to be centered on Christ. Our minds, our aims, our ambitions, in fact, our whole outlook are to be centered on that heavenly realm where he reigns and where our lives truly belong.

Hard work, yes. Hard work, but worth the effort. It's hard work, but it's not toil.

Toil is hard, toil is exhausting, but the problem with toil is there's no end in sight. Even as hard as some of those passes on the

John Muir Trail were, I knew there was an end. Forrester Pass was gruesome.

It's the highest of the seven passes going north to south before you get into the Mount Whitney Basin. But I knew that at some point

I was gonna be stepping on the top of a pass at 13 ,500 feet and looking north and seeing where I came from, looking south, seeing where I'm going.

You need to look to where you truly belong. You need to look up. Seek up, think up.

Hard work, not toil. Not toil, it's worth it.

Verse four, when Christ, who is your life, appears, then you will also appear with him in glory. That's our hope, that when, when, not if, but when he returns, we will be raised with him literally and finally.

Then, and that's then, not if, is then we shall be like him for then, not if, but then we shall see

Jesus as he is. I load the words to the hymn. I know not when my Lord may come, at night or at noonday fair, or if I'll walk the vale with him or meet him in the air, but I know whom

I have believed and I'm persuaded that he is able to keep that which I've committed unto him until that day.

Paul was certain that he was writing to believers in Colossae. I'm certain that I'm preaching to believers here in Sunnyvale.

If then you've been raised with Christ, he was certain that they had been. Verse four though, speaking of Christ's return, even the rhetorical if, the if that means, seeing that this is the case, even language so definite and certain as that is too indefinite and uncertain for me.

So he says if Christ returns and he means when, I wanna say when. If is the right translation of the original

Greek, but let's say when. When Christ returns, when he appears in glory, when he brings us to himself, all the work then, all the effort, all the sin that we have foregone, all the repentance that's been prayed heavenward, all of it will have been worth it.

In fact, dear ones, it's worth it now. Even not knowing the when, you can be assured that Christ will return.

You can know that your life is hidden in him. You can pray to God and you can plead for faith to believe and should

God hear you and give you faith to believe and repent, you can be sure that when he appears, you will appear with him, basking in his glory.

I speak that last part to you who do not believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. I tell you, when he appears in glory and brings us to him in full glory, as he has promised, if you do not believe in him, it's a different fate.

In fact, it's the opposite. You read in Matthew seven where he tells the goats, I'm sorry, not Matthew seven, the book of Matthew, where he tells the goats, get on my left side, which is the side of condemnation, go to the punishment that is due you, body and soul destroyed forever in hell, and to his sheep, to those who look above, to we who love the

Lord Jesus Christ because he gave us faith to believe, seek and think about him on the right side.

Blessed are the father. I wanna close just by repeating something

I said a few moments ago. It was that our efforts at keeping our sights and our thoughts centered on Christ will end.

They will end one day. Today, it's hard. I mean, ask yourself, what are you thinking about right now?

This moment, what are you thinking about? Where are your sights? Are they here or are they up? Right now, this moment, stop. What are you thinking?

About lunch? Are you one of the servers? Gotta make sure you get the plate full and the food all hot?

About that plumbing leak at home that you gotta fix today so you don't have to mess with it tomorrow and get to work on time? What are we thinking about right now?

Lunch, diapers, yesterday's unresolved issue that's waiting for tomorrow. Tomorrow's probably issues that you can't get off your mind today.

There's great reward in focusing on Christ. It's hard work, but there's great reward. When Christ appears, it will no longer be hard.

The sin in the world that makes it hard will be gone. Christ will kill it off for once and for all.

The sin that is in you and me will die with the rest. Then our thoughts will be all of him and no interference from sin and our sight of Jesus Christ will exist any longer.

Our vision will then be perfected. We will continue all our life seeking and thinking of him.

When we see him as he is, there will not be sin to interfere with that view. As we grow more and more, always dependent upon him and him alone.

Amen? Heavenly Father, thank you for this day. Thank you for this word from Colossian. I pray,