Pauls Epistle to Colossians (13)

I think today's set of notes set a record as far as length, and knowing the

world, we're going to get through 17 pages of notes, of course.

But as I mentioned earlier, the passage we're dealing with is one that is used, it's cited

frequently in confessions to advocate or defend the understanding of infant

baptism.

And so I thought I would take the occasion to address that in

some measure.

And increasingly, I'm aware that, you know, these notes are not just for us here,

but they're going out to many places and to,

I don't know, maybe 25 or 30 pastors in Africa and India.

And so these things are important.

And I'm thinking also, how can they be helped and instructed as well?

And so I'm mindful that some of these notes are more than what we can cover on

a Sunday.

Morning.

I hope you understand that.

But I think that it will help us.

Well, today we want to affirm the centrality, sufficiency, and the fullness of life

that we Christians have in Jesus Christ.

And we'll stress or emphasize how it is that we experience this fullness as Christians.

We're continuing to work through this rather complex paragraph of Colossians 2.

The paragraph begins with verse 6, continues to verse 15.

And of course, that's in the Greek text that we're following as far as the grammar.

And there are two major divisions in this paragraph, which coincide with two Greek sentences.

The one sentence is verses 6 and 7, and the second very long sentence is verses 8

through 15.

And the first sentence commands Christians to walk in him.

And then the second sentence, the emphasis based upon the second

finite verb, there's only one finite verb covering all of that, verses 8 through 15 in the

Greek text.

And it carries the idea of beware or see to it that you are watching in him,

being on.

Guard.

And so that's the outline that we followed.

And I think this is what the third Sunday that we're in this, in this paragraph.

And so watching in him, verses 8 through 15, we began to address this last week in a measure.

And what Paul was pressing, of course, stressing was the identity and sufficiency in Jesus Christ alone

in the faith of these Christians.

And this Paul regarded as both a preventive and a corrective to false teaching

that was plaguing, corrupting the church at Colossae.

And so the errors that had troubled the church were not according to Christ.

In other words, these false teachings would direct the Christians to other things, to other matters

that essentially had nothing to do with Jesus Christ directly.

They obscured the Lord, directed them to other things, took their eyes off the Lord, the

focus on the Lord, the centrality of the Lord.

And the apostle then explained in verses 9 and 10, they should see their sufficiency and fullness in Jesus Christ

and him alone.

For in him, the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, and you have been filled in him

who is the head of all rule and authority.

And so we might set forth these words in this outline.

Verse 9, in him, Jesus Christ, God is incarnate.

And then verse 10a, the first part of verse 10, Christians have been filled in him.

God is fully in Jesus Christ, and Christians are filled in

Jesus Christ.

The excellent commentator F .F. Bruce set forth the meaning of these verses within the context of

Paul's epistle that addressed the error threatening the church at Colossae, and he had this good

way about him.

He could stand back, see the context, and show you how any particular verse or few verses fit

within that context.

And he does that quite well here.

The teachers of error might talk as they would of the fullness of divine being, which was filtered down to this

world through a hierarchical succession of spiritual powers.

Bruce is talking about incipient Gnosticism that was beginning at the time.

And Gnostics believe that God is so holy in spirit and man is so sinful in his

flesh, physical, that God cannot come to us directly, but there must be a

mediation of various degrees of angels.

And so it's like God, and then Jesus, and then Michael the archangel, and down

to angels until it finally gets to us.

And so Bruce is commenting about those teachers of error that said you can only know

God and experience the fullness of God through a series of intermediaries, hierarchical

succession of spirit powers.

Christians had something better.

They had Christ, the personal revelation of the Father, the one mediator between God and

man, the one in whom the plenitude of deity was embodied.

Far from there being any inherent impossibility in the nature of things for God to communicate directly with this

world, one who shared fully in the divine nature had become flesh and tabernacled among

men.

And not only so, but Christians by their union with him shared in his very life, and that's what it

means to be filled in him.

The fullness of God dwells in him, and we're filled in him.

That doesn't mean we become gods in him, but we experience the life of Christ fully

in him.

If the fullness of deity resided in him, his fullness was imparted to them.

Without him we must remain forever dissecta membra, uncompleted, unable to attain the

true end of our existence, in other words, the reason for which God made us.

But united with Christ, incorporated in him, we find ourselves joined in a living bond with

him in which he and we complement each other as the body does the head and the

head the body.

What a wonderful description of where Paul is

going with this whole matter.

And so here in these verses before us in this paragraph, the themes are set forth of God's fullness

in Jesus Christ and God's work through Jesus Christ in bringing his people salvation and glorification

as well.

I want to read the paragraph noting the phrases in him and with him.

Now actually this is that verse 8 should not be indented because the paragraph begins with verse 6

in the Greek text, but let me read it for us.

And as we do, I want you to notice the phrases in him and with him.

Everything is centered in Christ.

See to it, in other words, beware that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit according to human

tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world, and not according to Christ.

For in him, here is the first expression, the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, and

you have been filled in him who is the head of all rule and authority.

In him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands by putting

off the body of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ, having been buried with him

in baptism in which you were also raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God who raised him from

the dead.

And you who were dead in your trespasses in the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together

with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses by canceling the record of

debt that stood against us with his legal demands.

This he set aside, nailing it to the cross.

He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame by triumphing over them

in him.

And so you see, just in every way he keeps directing people back to Christ,

the centrality of Christ, our sufficiency in Christ, our fullness in Jesus Christ.

Well after the apostle declared the truth that Christians had been filled in him, he then

related when it was and how it was that God brought them into this state of blessedness.

And so he sets forth their union with Jesus Christ that was affected in their regeneration, that

is their new birth, spiritual birth, and displayed in their baptism.

He references baptism.

And so let's consider the phrases and the clauses of this passage.

This is not an easy passage.

It is a difficult passage to work through.

And many make claims, I'm finding, they make statements regarding this passage, and it seems to

me they haven't read it carefully.

First, in him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands by

putting off the body of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ.

That itself is going to take some explanation, isn't it?

Here, the circumcision without hands is a reference to our new birth or regeneration.

We were delivered from our former way of living for sin by our regeneration.

We have been filled in Jesus Christ because our God had delivered us from our sinful lives by causing us to

be born again or regenerated.

This is what William Hendrickson rightly said about this.

Paul's thought at this point can perhaps be paraphrased somewhat as follows.

Colossians, do not allow these teachers of error to deceive you as if, in order to

triumph over the indulgence of the flesh and to attain to the full measure of salvation, you

need to be literally circumcised.

That seems to be what the false teachers were telling them.

You were already circumcised, is what Paul is arguing.

Yes, you were circumcised with a circumcision that excels by far the right

that is being recommended so strongly by the teachers of error.

You were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands by the putting off

of the body of the flesh in the circumcision of Christ.

And that's exactly right.

Now, of course, in the Old Testament, God had given physical circumcision to Abraham

in order to bring his people into a physical earthly covenant relationship with himself.

They entered into that covenant through physical birth and physical circumcision.

All of Abraham's male descendants were circumcised.

They were promised earthly blessings, including numerous offspring.

They were promised physical health and wealth.

They were promised a long, blessed life in a land that God promised to give Abraham and his descendants.

Their responsibility in keeping covenant with God was to have faith in him as their God.

And later, God had declared to this people, his people, that their faith was to be manifest

in their obedience to his law that he gave them through Moses.

But the physical circumcision that God commanded them as a sign of their covenant, although it distinguished

them as God's people from all others in the world, was not a life -changing.

Experience.

It served to foreshadow the need of the spiritual circumcision of the heart,

which is regeneration, or what the New Testament refers to as the new birth.

Jesus telling Nicodemus, you must be born again, even though Nicodemus was circumcised.

And here in Colossians 2 .11, it's described as a circumcision made without hands, in contrast

to the circumcision made with hands.

And the Old Testament spoke of this need for a spiritual circumcision.

For we read in Deuteronomy that even when Israel committed to God that they would keep the law, they were

without the heart to do so.

They did not have the desire or the ability to do so.

Well, they had a desire to do so, or at least they expressed that, but they didn't have the ability to do so.

In Deuteronomy 5, if we read about Moses rehearsing the Ten Commandments to Israel,

Deuteronomy is the second law, deutero, second law, namos, law, Greek namos, is

the rehearsing of the law a second time, 40 years after the Exodus.

The first generation died out, he's rehearsing the law to the new generation about ready to go into the

Promised Land under the leadership of Joshua.

And here we read Moses' words.

So it was when you heard the voice from the midst of the darkness, referring back to Sinai, while the mountain was

burning with fire, that you came near to me, all the heads of your tribes and your elders.

The people came to Moses, and you said, surely the Lord our God has shown us his glory and his greatness, and

we've heard his voice in the midst of the fire.

We've seen this day that God speaks with man, yet he still lives.

And now, therefore, why should we die?

For this great fire will consume us.

If we hear the voice of the Lord our God any more, then we shall die.

For who is there of all flesh who has heard the voice of the living God speaking from the midst of the fire as

we have and lived?

You go near, hear all that the Lord our God may say, and tell us all that the Lord our

God says to you, and we will hear and do it.

And so the people said, we don't want to hear God directly, Moses, you go on our behalf.

And it's really the beginning of a prophetic and priestly ministry, formal

prophetic ministry.

Moses went to hear from God and came and delivered that news to the people.

Now look at verse 28 and following, then the Lord heard the voice of your words when you spoke to me, and the Lord said

to me, I've heard the voice of the words of this people which they have spoken to you, they are right in all that they have spoken.

It was good that they wanted to keep the law of God, and God commends them for that.

By the way, in my old dispensational days, I remember, I think it was a comment of Schofield, maybe I

shouldn't say that because my memory might be faulty, but their

teaching was that Israel was coming under the law as

a covenant of works, and they were formally under grace, the grace of Abrahamic covenant.

And they shouldn't have agreed to obey the law, they should have rejected the law, no God, we want to stay under grace, not

law, incredible.

God here said no, it's good that they said that they wanted to keep the law of God, but look at

the exclamation that God gives, revealing their great need, oh that they

had such a heart in them that they would fear me always, keep all my commandments, that it might be well with them

and their children forever.

However, they didn't have a heart to do so.

Even though they had been physically circumcised, even though they had been given the law, even though they said they would keep

the law, they didn't have the heart to do so.

Because physical circumcision had not transformed them, they needed a circumcision of the heart.

And so even back in Deuteronomy, God revealed that they were in need of their hearts, needing transformed so that they

would be able to conform themselves to the law of God.

Now that's Deuteronomy 5 at the beginning of the book, and then we can look toward the end of the book of Deuteronomy,

Deuteronomy 30, verses 1 and following, and we read that God intended that He would

do this work of grace in His people, Deuteronomy 30.

Now it shall come to pass when all these things come upon you, the blessing and the curse which I have set before you,

you shall call them to mind among all the nations where the Lord your God drives you, and you return to the Lord your

God and obey His voice according to all that I command you today, you and your children, with all your heart and with

all your soul, that the Lord your God will bring you back from captivity.

You see God through Moses had rehearsed the blessings of keeping the Mosaic Covenant

and the curses if they failed to do so.

And if they failed to do so God would jettison them out of the land, exile them.

But here He is telling them, He is foretelling a return of those exiles

which took place under the leadership of Nehemiah, Ezra, and Zerubbabel after the

Babylonian exile.

God brought them back into the land, and here He says that He would do so.

The Lord your God will bring you back from captivity and have compassion on you and gather you again from all the

nations where the Lord your God has scattered you.

If any of you are driven out to the farthest parts under heaven from where, from there the Lord your God will gather you

and from there He will bring you.

And then the Lord your God will bring you to the land which your fathers possessed and you shall possess it.

That happened, He fulfilled that.

He will prosper you and multiply you more than your fathers.

And then here it is in verse 6, and the Lord your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your

descendants to love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul that you may live.

And so whereas in Deuteronomy 5 God expressed the absence of a heart

to do His will, in Deuteronomy 30 He said there is going to be a time come after you have

broken the law, transgressed the law, I have exiled you out of the land, I'm going to bring you back and I'm going to

circumcise your heart so that you will love me and follow me.

And that is of course a prophecy of what Jesus Christ came and did.

The people were unable and over time would show they were unwilling to order their lives according to God's law.

And on one occasion much later when the Lord was denouncing rebellious Israel, He spoke these words to them,

circumcise yourselves to the Lord, take away the foreskins of your hearts,

you men of Judah, inhabitants of Jerusalem, lest my fury come forth like fire and burn

so that no one can quench it because of the evil of your doings.

Physical circumcision was not enough.

They needed to have a circumcision of the heart, that sinful heart transform,

change, that sinful nature propensity cut from it.

And later still after God had judged Israel for having transgressed His covenant, He declared to His prophets

repeatedly the time would come when He would cause them to return from exile.

He would then circumcise the hearts of His people so as to secure their love for Him and their

compliance to His law.

And so we read for example in Jeremiah 24, 4 -7,

Again the Lord, the word of the Lord came to me, saying, Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, like these

good figs, so will I acknowledge those who are carried away captive from Judah, whom I have sent out of this place for

their own good, into the land of the Chaldeans, that would be the Babylonians.

For I will set my eyes on them for good, I will bring them back to this land.

He did so.

I will build them and not pull them down, I will plant them and not pluck them up.

And here it is, Then I will give them a heart to know Me, that I am the Lord, and they shall be

My people, and I shall be their God.

They shall return to Me with their whole heart.

And so there again God says He is going to give them a heart.

They didn't have a heart back in Deuteronomy 5.

He promised that He would circumcise their heart, and here again He is saying that He will put within them a

heart so that they will love Him and conform to Him

entirely.

It is declared in Ezekiel 36, verses 23 and following,

God declared, I will sanctify My great name, which has been profaned among the nations.

Ezekiel was a prophet to the Jewish exiles in Babylon, which you have profaned in their midst,

and the nations shall know that I am the Lord, says the Lord God, when I am hallowed in you before their eyes.

For I will take you from among the nations, gather you out of all the countries, and bring you into your own land.

Again He did that.

That is a prophecy of what Nehemiah did, Ezra did, Zerubbabel did.

And then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean.

I will cleanse you from all your filthiness, and from all your idols.

See His people would be different.

This is not all the people that came back, but His elect, that remnant, those Jews that believed

on Jesus, they had their hearts transformed, they were given a new birth,

they had circumcised hearts.

And so Ezekiel 36, 26, I will give you a new heart, and put a new spirit within you.

I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh, give you a heart of flesh.

I will put My Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My

judgments.

In other words, you will keep My Law, and do them.

And then you will dwell in the land I gave to your fathers.

You shall be My people, and I will be your God.

And they did.

Now granted AD 70 happened, and the Jews were exiled from the land, but

this permanent dwelling in the land foreshadows the new heavens and the new earth that the New

Testament delineates for us most clearly.

For indeed God promised these people, and these only, I will deliver you from your uncleanness.

I will call for the grain and multiply it, bring no famine upon you.

These would have been evidences of God's blessing to these people in this time.

I will multiply the fruit of your trees, the increase of your fields, so that you need never again bear the reproach of famine among the nations.

And then you will remember your evil ways and your deeds that were not good, and you will loathe yourselves in your own sight

for your iniquities and your abominations.

Not for your sake do I do this.

Let it be known to you.

Be ashamed, confounded in your own ways, O house of Israel.".

And that's the experience of Christians, isn't it?

You're going along, life is going fine as a Christian, and then all of a sudden you remember something you did

back when you were unconverted, and you break out in a sweat, don't you?

My God, how could I have done that?

That's characteristic of the Christian, when he has remorse over his past

deeds.

And then Ezekiel 11, 29, we also read it, again this idea of return.

I will just drop down to verse 19, the bold italic.

Then I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within them, and take away the stony heart of their flesh.

Give them a heart of flesh, that they may walk in my statute, keep my judgments, and do them, and they shall be my

people, and I will be their God.

That's a covenant relationship.

And notice again these people are obedient to God and to His law.

And John declares in 1 John, this is one of the ways you can know you're a Christian, if you keep the commandments of God.

The spiritual circumcision of the heart is a work of God in which He causes the sinner to be born again,

thereby securing for God, His love for God, and His desire to live in

compliance to God's law.

And what Paul was declaring to the Christians at Colossae, is that they had been the objects of this work of

God's grace, bringing them salvation.

Again Colossians 2, 11 reads, in Him also you were circumcised, with a circumcision

made without hands, by putting off the body of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ.

He's declaring to them that they were the recipients of these glorious promises in the Old Testament.

You've been spiritually circumcised.

It's a circumcision of the heart, spiritual circumcision, not physical circumcision by which

the true Israel of God may be distinguished.

Even today among evangelicals they think Israel is to be identified as physical

descendants of Abraham.

That's the true Israel.

That's not what Paul declared.

Paul declared the true Jew is not one who is circumcised physically, but circumcised spiritually,

as Abraham was by the way.

And so Romans 2, Paul declared circumcision is indeed profitable if you keep the law, but

if you're a breaker of the law, your circumcision has become uncircumcision.

In other words you're regarded as not one of God's people if your life is not ordered according to God's law.

And therefore if an uncircumcised man, physically uncircumcised, keeps the righteousness requirements of the law,

will not his uncircumcision be counted as circumcision?

In other words that would indicate here's a man who's circumcised of heart.

He loves God.

He keeps God's law.

If he fulfills the law, judge you even with your written code and circumcision, or a transgressor of the

law.

And then he makes this declaration, which is earth shattering.

It changes everything.

For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly, nor is circumcision that which is outward in the flesh,

but he is a Jew who is one inwardly, and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit,

not in the letter, whose praise is not from men, but from God.

The true Israel, the true Jew, is the one who has been born again by the Spirit of God

through Jesus Christ.

And Paul declares in Romans 4, it doesn't matter whether you're Jewish or Gentile, if you have the

faith of Abraham, you're a child of Abraham.

And God way back in Genesis said to Abraham, you will be the father of many nations.

And we who believe on Jesus have been spiritually circumcised in heart.

We are the Israel of God, the people on whom the promises of God rest.

It's not physical descendants of Abraham that's the true Israel, but rather those that are tied to

Jesus Christ, because in Him the fullness of God dwells bodily, and you are filled in Him.

All the blessings of God promised to God's people are centered in Jesus Christ.

And Paul argued that too, didn't he, in Galatians?

Because when God gave His promises to Abraham He didn't say unto your seeds, but to your seed, singular

meaning to Christ.

The spiritual promises of God to Abraham were centered in Christ, and therefore those who

are in Christ are filled in Christ.

Every blessing of God that comes to us from God is in Jesus Christ and Him alone.

This is profound.

This would change a lot of geopolitics in the world if this were understood rightly.

And so Israel in the Old Testament was comprised of physical descendants of Abraham brought into covenant

relationship with God in a physical covenant through physical circumcision.

Israel in the New Testament is comprised of spiritual descendants of Abraham, whether Jewish or Gentile,

brought into covenant relationship with God through spiritual circumcision.

It is in this way that Abraham fulfilled God's promise to him that he would be a father of many nations.

And this is what Paul declared in Philippians 3 .3, we are the circumcision, Paul is including himself

and those Gentiles in the church at Philippi.

We are the circumcision who worship God in the Spirit, rejoice in Christ Jesus,

in other words we are centered in Him and Him alone.

Rejoice in Him and have no confidence in the flesh.

We don't put any confidence in our physical descent, physical circumcision, anything we do,

don't do, we put our confidence in Christ and Christ alone.

And so Paul stated those who have faith in Jesus Christ are spiritual worshipers through the Holy Spirit.

They are the true Israel, the true circumcision, those who have been spiritually circumcised, their hearts

and lives were committed to Jesus Christ and they trusted in Him alone for salvation.

Now as we look at verse 11, what is meant by the words, in Him also you were circumcised with a

circumcision made without hands, and then here these two phrases, by putting off the body of the flesh

and by the circumcision of Christ.

What was Paul talking about in those two phrases?

Well the first expression, by putting off the body of the flesh, describes both the literal death of

Jesus, He basically put off His flesh when He died upon the cross, and then

secondly it describes the believer's spiritual death that we underwent with respect

to our former life.

We died with respect to who we once were.

That former life before Christ is no longer, we died in Christ.

Here again is a good word from F .F. Bruce, he was an English commentator, he was at the University of Manchester.

And what I really liked about him is he was a true New Testament biblical scholar, but he engaged all

the liberals and he did it with utter confidence in the authority and

inerrancy of Scripture.

And he took them to task and he won the day.

And I had great respect for him when I was dealing with these matters in the past.

Here are his words.

No longer is there any place for a circumcision performed by hands.

The death of Christ has affected the inward cleansing which the prophets associated with the New Covenant, and

this our baptism is a visible sign.

Insofar as the putting off of the body of the flesh refers to the death of Christ, the expression readily

intelligible, especially in the light of the earlier mention of the body of his flesh in connection with his

death in chapter 122.

But the expression in our present passage includes also the Christian's baptismal

experience.

What is involved is much more than the removal of a small piece of flesh as in old circumcision,

it is a removal of the whole body of flesh.

What Baal describes as putting off the old man, reckoning one's former self with its

desirous and propensities to be dead as a necessary prelude to putting on the new man,

putting on Christ himself in his resurrection life.

What they believe puts off is the whole personality organized for and geared into rebellion

against God.

That former way of life is over, it's dead, it's buried in and through our union

with Christ in his death.

What about the second phrase, what is the meaning of the circumcision of Christ?

There have been several proposals to its meaning, some have said Paul is referring to the actual physical

circumcision of Jesus when he was 8 days old.

Others however say this circumcision of Christ is a reference to Christ's death on the cross, and

that is what is accurate I believe, is talking again about his death on the cross.

Here again are Bruce's words, what was their baptism?

It was in the first place a participation in the circumcision of Christ.

This circumcision of Christ is not primarily his circumcision as a Jewish infant of 8 days old,

it's rather his crucifixion, the putting off of the body of the flesh of which his literal

circumcision was at best a token anticipation.

In other words the physical circumcision of the male child was a token, a

foreshadowing of the putting off of the body of death, of sin

itself.

Very good.

Well we see this to be true when we also consider the next clause of verse 11, having been buried,

and here's the phrase again, with him in baptism.

The Apostle connects the experience of salvation which involves the new birth with baptism.

In a number of places in the New Testament baptism is so joined with the initial experience of coming to

salvation it is seen as one event.

I was in a conference a little over a week ago and Michael Haken

talked about this, how in the first century baptism and conversion was seen as one event.

They believed they were baptized, the same day, Pentecost.

But he explained that this was true really in the early church with the Jewish context.

All the Jews had an understanding of all the truths of Scripture and they embraced Christ,

Jesus as the Messiah and they were ready to be baptized.

But it was shortly, not long, after the first century that the early churches began to

practice a period in which they would have persons trained and taught

after professing faith in preparation to their baptism.

And it was common then, perhaps it's too long a period, but it was common then to wait upwards to a

year before they would baptize a convert because they wanted time for these catechumens

to be catechized in the faith before they were entered fully and formally

into the church of Jesus Christ.

But in the New Testament baptism is seen as simultaneous

with coming to Christ in conversion.

And so often times it's as though baptism is seen as the instrument of bringing

salvation, as we'll see.

And so here it says in which, that is, in baptism, we have

this experience of death, spiritual death, our former life

being no longer.

But in addition to being buried with Christ in our baptism, we also read that we're raised with him in our baptism.

And this is the third clause of this portion of this paragraph.

In which, and Paul's referring to baptism here, in which you are also raised with him through faith in

the powerful working of God who raised him from the dead.

Now notice here it was not baptism that brought about being raised, but rather it was through faith in

the powerful working of God that coincide with being baptized.

You see that?

It wasn't the act of baptism, but it was the faith that was demonstrated in baptism that

brought about and declared this union with Christ in his death and resurrection.

Not only did we die with Christ with respect to our former life, but we rose with Christ onto new life in

him.

And so we share in the resurrection life of Jesus Christ, that life which is his when he was raised from the

dead.

And so through faith, and again here at the time of our conversion, coinciding with

our baptism, we are no longer what we once were.

We are now creatures of Jesus Christ.

Now each of these two verbal ideas, having been buried with him and being raised with him, are in the passive

voice.

Do you notice that?

Having been buried.

In other words, it happened to you.

Having been raised, it happened to you.

And what Paul is suggesting here is that it's an act of God working upon us.

It's God who buried you.

It's God who raised you.

It's in the passive voice.

Everett Ferguson, it's a book about that thick on baptism in the early church that I'm working through this week,

wrote these words, "'Baptism is a confession of faith in the resurrection of Jesus by God.

It is done in faith in the activity of God who raised him from the dead.

God is at work throughout the passage.

The passive voices, works that are circumcised, were buried, were raised, are the divine passives

for what God did.

Not only did he raise Christ, but he also made the one baptized alive and forgave his or her sins.

The with Christ emphasis is obvious.

Buried with him, raised with him, made alive with him.

This is all what God did when we were converted.

He caused you to be buried with Christ, caused you to be raised with Christ, because you were in union with Christ when Christ

died.

And God caused a spiritual union to take place.".

But lest one misunderstands, Ferguson wanted to make sure that you don't see a magical quality in baptism as though that

were what brought it about, Ferguson included.

On the relation of faith and baptism in Paul, Cus concludes with references to Galatians

3 and Colossians 2, that faith can never be excluded, but Paul gives no indication of a

Christian without baptism.

And that's a good point.

No place in the New Testament is there a Christian who wasn't baptized.

One might argue, well the thief on the cross, the thief on the cross, yeah, well, you know, there's no way he could be baptized, he was

dying, wasn't he?

But every Christian that's converted to Christ underwent baptism, and that very soon

after conversion in the New Testament.

Baptism had an initiatory character for individual salvation, introduces one to the body of Christ,

but Paul warned against a magical view of baptism.

Verses 13 and 14 make this very clear.

And you who are dead in your trespasses, in the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him,

having forgiven us all our trespasses, by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal

demands, and this he set aside, nailing it to the cross.

Before we came to be in Christ, we had this great record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands,

a debt that none of us could pay.

We were guilty and damned before God due to that debt to God's justice for the innumerable transgressions

against God's law that each of us had committed in life.

But because of our union with Jesus Christ in his death, that debt that was against us was canceled.

And so as far as God is concerned, our debt was paid in full by the death of his Son on our behalf.

Wiped clean, wiped clear, debt free before God.

Now that's a blessing.

And then fifthly, lastly, Paul declares, he disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to an

open shame by triumphing over them in it.

Again, the era of Colossians, the teachers were saying that there are these angelic powers

that have authority over us, and you have to do homage to them, and thereby you can

please God from doing so.

But Paul is saying this is not the case.

For not only did God forgive us our debts when we were converted, but he delivered us from slavery as well.

The forces of evil, even the devil and his minions, had power over us when we were in our sins.

We had sold ourselves into servitude to him.

We were subject to them like indentured servants due to the debt we owed.

You know what indentured servanthood is, don't you?

Shortly after Jamestown, within 20 years, they realized they needed people,

manpower to clear woods and whatnot.

And so the people over here in the colonies would basically pay for the passage

of people to come over from England, and when they came they were indentured servants.

In other words, they had to pay back the cost of travel.

And so it was commonly for five or seven years they would work off this indentured servanthood,

and then they would be granted a number of acres and plow and whatnot to get off on their own.

And so much of early America was comprised of these indentured servants.

What happened is later they found that this was so costly is when the

indentured servanthood gave way to slavery and the institution of slavery, one gave

way to the other.

But here it seems like the idea is that we were indentured servants to the devil and his minions

because of this debt that we owed, and they held over us, and we couldn't pay it, and so we were forever

enslaved.

But what Paul is saying, God has defeated those powers through the death of Jesus, those powers to

which we were formerly in servitude, and so he's delivered us into a state of liberty whereby we are free

to live before him, not in sin as formerly, but in righteousness, because God has conquered their

forces that held us in bondage, we are free in Christ.

And again I read F. F. Bruce and I thought, this is wonderful, I wish I could think like this and write like this.

The very instrument of disgrace and death by which the hostile forces thought they had him, Christ, in their

grasp, and had conquered him forever, was turned by him into the instrument of their defeat and

captivity.

As he was suspended their bound hand and foot to the wood in apparent weakness, they imagined that

they had him at their mercy, and flung themselves upon him with hostile intent.

But far from suffering their assault without resistance, he grappled with them and mastered them,

stripping them of all the armor in which they trusted, and held them aloft in his mighty outstretched

hands, displaying to the universe their helplessness and his own unvanquished strength.

Had they but realized the truth, those archons of this age, had they, as Paul puts it in

another epistle, known the hidden wisdom of God which decreed the glory of Christ and his people, they would not

have crucified the Lord of glory.

But now they are disabled and dethroned, and the shameful tree has become the victor's

triumphal chariot, before which his captives are driven in humiliating procession, the

involuntary and impotent confessors of their overcomer's superiority.

Now it's at this point we basically concluded our exposition of this

passage, and it's there that we began to address this matter of infant baptism,

commonly called paedo -baptism.

But I think we need to stop here, rather than launching off onto this whole

other matter.

I would encourage you to read it through.

I've given a lot of thought to this, and as I do so, I do so

with a humble respect.

My best friends are paedo -baptist pastors.

I mean good friends.

You know we work with them, and shoulder to shoulder in the Gospel.

But these are convictions.

They're not essential, but they're important.

They have implications.

And so let me urge you to take some time and read through these.

I don't know that I'm going to address these next Sunday, but rather we'll probably move on.

And if you have any questions let me know.

Let's pray.

Thank you Father for the wonderful glorious privilege we have as being in union

with Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior.

We confess that the fullness of deity dwells in Him, and we

also confess that we are filled in Him.

Everything that we're in need of, every possible blessing, it comes to us through Him.

Help us, our Lord, not to be distracted or diverted from the centrality of our faith and confidence,

our rejoicing in Him.

Thank you, our Father, for this wonderful work of circumcision that you performed.

Certainly not through baptism, because it was a circumcision without hands.

It was a work of your grace in which you caused us to be born again.

Help us to rejoice in Jesus Christ and Him alone, and help us to go forth from this place.

Father, living in the light of this truth, our former life with Christ is dead and gone.

And now we resolve, as you enable us by the Holy Spirit, to live for our Savior, in whose name

we pray.

Amen.