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How is it that we spot the fake? We have to be really familiar with the real. And there are all kinds of ideas and philosophies that are going to be thrown and present themselves as truth. But we're able to discern between the truth and a lie because we are grounded, rooted firmly in the Word of God when we understand the text.
You're listening to When We Understand The Text. Committed to the sound teaching of the Word of God. For questions and comments, email whenweunderstandthetext at gmail .com. And don't forget our website, www .utt .com.
Here's our host, Pastor Gabe.
Thank you, Becky. New video is up entitled Essential Doctrines. You can find it at our website, www .utt .com. Borrowing an example given by the Bible Answer Man, Hank Hanegraaff. Love his program. I catch it sometimes.
Anyway, he took the word doctrine and made it an acronym. Each letter corresponds to a different essential doctrine. It's a great way to remember which of those doctrines are necessary for saving faith.
So, again, you can find that video on our website. And we've got a new one that will drop before the weekend, entitled, simply entitled, Who Is Jesus? No, that's not based on the Greg Gilbert book. I have that book, but I haven't read it yet.
It actually comes from one of the podcast episodes that we did. I think it was right before I went into Colossians 1 .15. And I went through a list of like 40 different Bible verses that describe who Jesus is.
Well, I've compiled all of that into one 90-second video. And so that's the next one that is going to come out. And, again, as mentioned and as Becky has said, you can find all of our videos at our website, www .utt .com.
We're back in Colossians 2 today. Colossians 2, verses 1 through 5. If you want to open your Bible and join with me there. Let's open up with prayer as we come to the Lord today. Our gracious Heavenly Father, we thank you again.
And we thank you always with a spirit of thankfulness filled in our hearts that you would give us your word and that you would give us your spirit to understand your word. That we might be able to have insight into the mind of God.
We can know you no other way except through Jesus Christ our Lord, the image of the invisible God. And his word that was given to us by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. I pray that we take this seriously.
God, help this to be something that we come to with zeal, desiring to know God. As John Piper has put it, desiring God. That's what we want out of every Bible study, to know you more. To know Christ is preeminent and that through Jesus Christ, we have everything that we need for life.
And we pray and ask for your guidance upon this text today. In the name of Jesus, Amen. Colossians 2 verses 1 -5. I say this in order that no one may delude you with plausible arguments. For though I am absent in body, yet I am with you in spirit, rejoicing to see your good order and the firmness of your faith in Christ.
Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him, rooted and built up in him, and established in the faith just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving. I figured since I concluded my prayer with thanksgiving, I would throw in that extra verse there.
Okay, I want to jump back to verse 2, where Paul is hoping for the hearts of the Laodiceans and the Colossians to be encouraged, knit together in love, to reach all the riches of full assurance of understanding and the knowledge of God's mystery, which is Christ.
We grow together in knowledge, in love. How do we do that? By growing together in Christ. We have this wonderful prayer that Paul prayed for the Ephesians. Ephesians 3, beginning in verse 14. He says, I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of his glory, he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and the length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.
Now, this understanding that the love of Christ surpasses knowledge doesn't mean that it's unknowable. It means that we never get to the end of it. So the more that we study it, the more that we desire it, the more that we store it up in our hearts, the more and more of it we will want, and we will never run out.
We will never run out of that journey, of that adventure, of that seeking of the love of Christ. Jesus is everything. He is all that we need, and we need nothing else. There is no knowledge in this world, there is no understanding that can give us deeper meaning than all that we can know in Christ Jesus.
This is what Paul wants the Colossians to know as well. God's mystery is Christ, and in Him are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. The beginning of wisdom and knowledge is Christ. The end of wisdom and knowledge is Christ.
And he goes on in verse 4 to say, I say this in order that no one may delude you with plausible arguments. So remember the presentation that Paul is giving to the Colossians, a group that he's never met before, a church that he's never been to before, and he sees it as his first priority in this letter to present to them Christ Jesus.
He doesn't talk about Christian living right away. That comes later on in Colossians 3. He doesn't address any false teaching. That's coming up later on in this particular chapter. First, he presents Christ.
He presents Him as preeminent above all things. In Christ, we are fully satisfied. We have everything that we need, and we want for nothing more. We have everything in Christ Jesus because there's going to be some philosophers that will come about, and Paul has heard word of a particular philosopher that's come into Colossae and has said, I've got the knowledge that you need to unlock the secrets of the universe.
Here it is, all right? But Paul is presenting Christ in this way before he even confronts any of those ideas so that the Colossians understand, if you've got Jesus, you've got everything. So if somebody comes along telling you, it's fine if you believe in Christ, but you need this idea also, run from it because you don't need anything else but Christ.
And this concept, these ideas, these philosophies are present in our world everywhere. It's basically Oprah's entire spiritual foundation is this idea, oh yeah, you're a believer of Christ, great, but you also need this.
And just about everything that she presents in terms of spiritualism is the other thing that you need to find fulfillment in life. So Oprah's a big purveyor of that, and you'll find plenty of other philosophers and spiritualists out there who will present the same thing.
It's all over the place in our world. And so Paul wants the Colossians to first know Christ, and you need nothing else but Christ. There are other arguments in the world, there are other philosophies and ideas that might sound good, right?
Because he says in verse 4, I say this in order that no one may delude you with plausible arguments. They might sound right, but you don't need that information. If it is anything that is apart from Christ, you don't need it to find any greater fulfillment than you already have in Christ Jesus.
Whenever I have the chance to share with a youth group, there's a period where I tell them to turn in their Bibles to the passage of Scripture that we're going to be studying. And about at that point as they're opening up their Bibles, I will tell them, you know, if there's anything that I wish I had done more of when I was a teenager, middle school and high school, I wish that I had read my Bible more.
Those are great years to study the Scriptures, and I wish I had taken advantage of those opportunities more as a teenager. So to hopefully encourage those high school students to do that more in their teenage years.
And I say to them, take your Bible everywhere. I know that we live in a culture and an age where you can have a Bible with you on your cell phone, your smartphone or your tablet or any of these other kinds of things.
And so it's not as common for me anymore to go into a place and tell a group of people to open up their Bibles and actually hear Bible pages rustling. Usually it's just a person grabbing their iPad or their smartphone and punching it up there, and boom, there it is, ready to go.
So you don't get that great sound of Bible pages turning anymore. But there's something about holding the Bible in your hand. There's something about being able to read those words off the page. And it also shows something to another person.
People recognize the Bible. They know what it is. Or if they don't know what it is, they can ask what it is, and then the door is open for you to be able to share the gospel with somebody else. But there's something about having the Bible.
Whereas you have the Bible on your smartphone or your tablet, nobody knows that's what it is that you're reading. But when you have your Bible open, they know that's what you're reading. And I'll tell those students, take your Bible with you everywhere.
When you're at school, carry your Bible with you from class to class. There are not any rules in school that can prevent you from doing that. And at some point, someone's going to ask you why you carry your Bible around, why they catch you reading it in class or in other places.
And that's a great way for you to be able to tell them, well, I need my math book to understand math. I need my biology book in order to study biology. I need my English lit book to understand English literature.
All of these books that have to do with things that I need to learn while I exist in this world. But all of that knowledge and all of that information will pass away. It will not go with me into the next life.
But this book here, the Bible, this has the words for eternal life. And as Jesus said in Mark 13 31, heaven and earth will pass away. But my words will never pass away. And so you've got your Bible that you carry with you from place to place, from class to class, that becomes a tool that you can use to witness to somebody else about the true words of God, the words to eternal life that we have in Christ Jesus.
There's information in this world that's important. You should study. You should do your homework. All right. You should go to the seminars and classes that you need to go to in order to know how to do the job that you do properly.
That's all information that is useful and important, making the most of the opportunities that we have and being good stewards with the abilities and the opportunities that God has given to us. We do need to do those things, but we also need to understand that that information and that knowledge will pass away.
That information and that knowledge also will not fulfill us. It will not sustain us. It will not give us anything of eternal value. We find all of our eternal significance in Christ only. Now we can take the knowledge and the information that we gain in this world and we can lift it up into praise to God.
Then it becomes eternally significant. When we take everything captive and make it obedient to Christ, every thought captive and make it obey Christ, as Paul said to the Corinthians. So there are ways that that knowledge and information can be used to glorify God.
But none of that knowledge and info makes life more satisfying than we can find in Christ Jesus. He is all sufficient. And in him, when we are in Christ, we need for nothing else. So these are the things that we need to understand as Paul is presenting this before the Colossians.
Here's how we apply this to our lives. Here's how this works out in our horizontal development. If you understand what I mean by that, our vertical development is the relationship that we have between us and God.
Our horizontal development is the relationship that we have between man and man through Christ Jesus. As the Holy Spirit is working out in our lives, applying the words of Scripture that we read. So as we work these things out horizontally, we come to a deeper appreciation of Christ and who he is, understanding that he provides for our every need.
In Christ we need for nothing else. There is no knowledge in this world that will give us any greater satisfaction or any additional satisfaction than what we can find in Christ our Lord. How do we guard our hearts and minds from false teaching?
How do we prevent ourselves from being pulled away by half-truths and falsities and these other kinds of things? It's by being fully committed to Christ and having our foundation of wisdom and knowledge built upon him.
I think of the counterfeit money illustration, and surely you have heard this illustration before. How does a person who works for the government, whose job is to spot counterfeit bills, how is it that he does his job so well?
How does he know what counterfeit money looks like? It's because he has first studied the real thing. He focuses entirely on the real hundred dollar bill, so that when a fake hundred dollar bill comes across the desk, he knows there's something wrong with that.
Now, counterfeiters will study counterfeit money. They will look at those things. I've seen the big binders that they have where they'll go through the binder and they'll say, okay, here's a counterfeit bill.
Here's why this bill was counterfeit. I can't remember where I was even at to be shown these things, but I just remember getting a tour of a facility one time, and they pulled out these big binders that had the counterfeit bills in them, and they went through.
Now, here's what's wrong with this bill, and here's what's wrong with this bill. Some of the differences were so minute that to my untrained eye, I never would have noticed what the fake bill looked like if it was not pointed out to me.
There are folks that study the counterfeit money so they know what the counterfeit bills look like, but they first study the real. That's first. That's priority. They study the real money, and they get really familiar with the real, so then when something is not real, they immediately notice there's something wrong with that particular bill, and the same needs to be true for us as Christians.
Now, there are times when in order to reach a person who might be swayed by a false teaching, we might need to understand something about that false teaching, like if you're trying to win somebody out of Roman Catholicism or you're trying to win somebody out of Buddhism.
I actually had a conversation with a guy who claimed to be a Buddhist just a couple of weeks ago, and as I was telling him some things that he believed as a Buddhist, he actually was very clueless to realizing that that was something that a Buddhist believed, so it was like he really was just clinging to Buddhism because he thought it sounded good, but he really knew nothing about it, so he claimed to be something that he really wasn't, and so that was one way that I was able to show him, you really don't know what it is that you're claiming to believe.
Let me show you the truth, and then I gave him the truth of Scripture. There's also been a couple of Mormon missionaries that tried to convert me one time, and when I was telling them some things about Mormonism, I could kind of tell.
They didn't say this because I don't think they wanted to admit it, but I could kind of tell in their expressions. They had no idea that Mormonism believed that or could not affirm one way or the other whether what I was telling them about Mormonism was actually true, so there were aspects of their own faith that they didn't even know, and then I was trying to present to them the Word of God and show them the truth.
Here's what truth looks like, what you are following as a counterfeit, so there's sometimes when knowing the counterfeit can be beneficial to help win a person out of that false idea that they are following, but when it comes down to it, what we need to be really familiar with is the real.
I've known some people who have been young in the faith, and they have said, I'd really like to study the Koran so that I can know what's in it or study the Book of Mormon so I can know what's in that, and I have said to them, you get really familiar with the Bible first and make sure you know that intimately and well the mind of God that has been given to us in the Scriptures before you start exploring some of these other books that are other false religion books.
We need to get really familiar with the real first, and anybody who is spotting counterfeit money, that's what they do. They get familiar with the real bills, and then they're able to spot the fake bills a mile away.
So we need to find ourselves completely fulfilled by the treasures of wisdom and knowledge that are given to us in Christ Jesus, and we come to know what those treasures are when we read His Word. We open those treasures up every time we open the Word of God.
The only way you can truly know Christ is through His Word, and I will tell you that even though studying the Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John are very important. It's basically the heart of the Bible.
When a person becomes a new believer, that's really where they should start. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. The book of the Bible that I think I recommend the most often to new believers is Matthew. Read through Matthew first, or maybe Mark, or another one of the Gospels, but generally it's Matthew.
So read that first. You get to hear the words of Christ Himself. You read the Sermon on the Mount. You see the Beatitudes, and hopefully seeing yourself in the Beatitudes, because as Charles Spurgeon said, the Beatitudes don't describe how to be saved.
They describe the saved. So we see ourselves in the Beatitudes, and we see the calling that is upon us in Christ through the Sermon on the Mount and the rest of the commands that He has given. So that's often the book that I recommend first.
So that's at the heart of our beliefs is studying the Gospels. Very, very important. But all of the rest of the Word of God also tells us about Christ. It's not just the words that are red letters that Jesus spoke.
It's the rest of the Bible as well. We are told in 2 Timothy 3 .16 that all Scripture is God-breathed. All of Scripture is breathed out by God and is useful for teaching, for training, for reproof, correction, in righteousness that the man of God may be equipped for every good work.
So let us commit ourselves to the whole counsel of God. There's a ministry out there that calls themselves, isn't it Red Letter Christians, Red Letter Christianity or something like that, where they're trying to return Christians to the red letters, because that's really what it is that we need to focus on.
All of the Bible is the Word of Christ, not just Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. But we come to understand God and we come to unfold wisdom and knowledge that is found in Christ Jesus every time we open the Word of God, Old Testament or New, Gospels or Revelation.
All of it points to Jesus Christ, our source, our foundation for all wisdom and knowledge. Let us be focused upon the truth so that no one may delude us with plausible arguments. Paul says in verse 5, For though I am absent in body, yet I am with you in spirit, rejoicing to see your good order and the firmness of your faith in Christ.
Tomorrow we're going to throw in that verse that I threw in today, verse 6. Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, rooted and built up in Him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving.
Our gracious Heavenly Father, build up in us thanksgiving. Give us thanksgiving. Help us in the Spirit of God to be thankful to you for all that you have given to us. We have salvation through Jesus Christ our Lord, access to the Father because of what was done for us by Christ on the cross for our sins.
We are able to be filled up with the Spirit that we might understand the Word of God, which has been given to us for teaching, training, rebuke, correction in righteousness, that we may be fully equipped for every good work.
God, equip us for those good works in Christ Jesus, that in all that we do we might be a delight to you, that you are pleased with us, so that on that day of glory, walking through heaven's gates, it will be said to us, Well done, good and faithful servant, now great is your reward.
All glory in Christ Jesus as we pray in his name. Amen. In Revelation 3 .20, Jesus says, Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him and he with me.
Jesus is such a polite guest, isn't he? He stands at the door of our hearts if we just open up and let him in. At least that's the picture we paint with that verse, but that's not the context. Jesus is addressing the church at Laodicea to whom he gives another famous verse.
I know your works. You're neither cold nor hot. So because you're lukewarm, I will spit you out of my mouth. And he rebukes them for their complacent faith. Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline, so be zealous and repent.
That's verse 19, right before he says, I stand at the door and knock. This is not the picture of a guest looking for someone to welcome him into their heart. Jesus Christ is the master of the house. And when the master comes back, because remember, this is the book of Revelation.
We're talking about the return of Christ here. When he comes back, he expects to find alert and working servants, not lazy, complacent freeloaders acting like they own the place. Such persons will be thrown out into the darkness where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.
In Matthew 24, Jesus says, Be ready, for the Son of Man will return in an hour you do not expect. Who then is the faithful and wise servant whom his master has sent over his household to give them their food at the proper time?
Blessed is that servant whom his master will find so doing when he comes. And when he comes, it will be as a conquering king, and we will sit with him and all of the faithful at the wedding feast of the Lamb.
That's a much more glorious picture than that of a passive Jesus knocking on the door of our hearts when we understand the text. Yes, one of those verses that so often gets taken out of context, Revelation 3 .20.
And there is a well-known pastor, a well-known preacher, somebody whom I greatly admire and listen to fairly often, as a matter of fact. In the current sermon series that he is going through, at the end of one of his sermons, he did Revelation 3 .20 and called upon the lost, those who had not yet become followers of Christ, to hear Jesus knocking at the door of their heart and open up and let him in.
And he was using Revelation 3 .20 to say that Jesus is knocking at the door of your heart. And then this minister doubled down and he said that when you invite Jesus in, he's not going to come in and tell you all the things that you're doing wrong.
See, the problem with the pastor saying that is in the context of Revelation 3 .20, that is what Jesus is doing. He is telling the church at Laodicea what they're doing wrong. I know your works, he says in verse 15, you're neither cold nor hot.
Would that you were either cold or hot. So because you're lukewarm and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth. For you say I am rich, I have prospered and I need nothing, not realizing that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind and naked.
I counsel you to buy from me gold refined by fire so that you may be rich in white garments so that you may clothe yourselves and the shame of your nakedness may not be seen and salve to anoint your eyes so that you may see.
Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline. So be zealous and repent. Verse 20, behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him and he with me.
The one who conquers, I will grant him to sit with me on my throne, as I also conquered and sat down with my father on his throne. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.
So in the context of Revelation 3 .20, Jesus is not calling upon the lost to open up the door of their heart and let him in. He is calling upon a wayward church to repent of their sin and return to Christ, even pointing out to them what it is that they were doing wrong so that they might know that sin and repent of it and return to Christ.
I did not want to mention who this minister's name is because it would distract from the point and I really don't wish any ill against him. He is a wonderful and sound preacher. When he did this in his sermon series, I actually got a couple of emails from people about it because they knew that I had done a what video on Revelation 3 .20 and here this minister was, whom I've quoted before, doing the very thing that in the video I said is the wrong thing to do with that text.
It is taking it out of context and misusing it, especially the way that he was doing it. Because if somebody actually went back to the text and looked at it in context, they would realize what Jesus is saying there is the opposite of what the minister was saying that Jesus would not do.
Did that make sense? I hope I didn't throw a double negative in there. Anyway, it is so important to understand the scriptures in context, reading everything around it so that we might use the Bible in the right way.
It is not okay to just draw verses out of context and use them in any other way that we please. And I'm sure that there was somebody somewhere who got a hold of that minister because of his popularity.
I'm sure somebody got a hold of him and said, you are not quite using that verse right. And I think that you might need to take a look at that again. So thank you to those who sent me emails about that.
I did not want to read those emails or again draw attention to who that minister was because that would distract from the point. It's simply that we know and understand the scriptures in context and use them in the right way.
Knowing the truth and then we can spot the counterfeit. Lord God, help us to be focused upon your truth and help us to use it as faithful stewards of your truth. And we pray this in Jesus name. Amen.
This has been When We Understand the Text with Pastor Gabriel Hughes. For all of our podcasts, episodes, videos, books, and more, visit our website at www .utt .com. If you'd like to submit a question to this broadcast, or just send us a comment, email whenweunderstandthetext at gmail .com.
And let your friends know about our ministry. Join us again tomorrow as we grow together in the study of God's word, when we understand the text.