Colossians 1:15-23 The Crucifixion of the Creator

You are listening to the podcast of Recast Church in Matawan, Michigan. Our desire is to help you draw near to God by growing in faith, community, and service. This message is by Pastor of Teaching and Vision, Don Filsek.

Thanks for listening.

Easter, Palm Sunday, and the Cross in Colossians

I'm surprised we're not going to be in the book of Genesis. You guys came expecting to hear from the book of Genesis, and that's not where we're going to be. I forgot to mention that last week, but this is Palm Sunday this week, and so I thought that it would be good for us to reflect a little more on the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ over the next two weeks, and then the following week we'll be back in Genesis.

Anybody, has this Easter kind of snuck up on you? Like, next Sunday is Easter. Like, sometimes, some years it seems like I'm thinking about it way in advance, and then other times it's like, pop, and there it is.

It's like, oh, next week is Easter. That's pretty amazing. The reality of it is that for many of you who have been raised in the church, you recognize the crucifixion of Jesus and his resurrection are two things that you know should be central to your lives.

I mean, do you guys kind of recognize that? Like, raise your hand if you recognize that something to do with the death of Jesus, something to do with his resurrection ought to be central, but how many of you are being honest?

If you're being honest, you recognize that a lot of things in our lives crowd that reality out. Is that true? So that it often doesn't become the main thing that we're focusing on when we wake up in the morning, but we've got a to-do list or things to accomplish or a lot of stuff going on, and all of a sudden that just kind of has a tendency to fade into the background as just a little bit of extra noise back there.

But exactly what happened there at the cross sometimes gets lost in the shuffle, and so for that reason this morning, I want us to zoom in and focus on the significance of the cross through the book of Colossians.

We're going to be looking at what Paul has to say about what is significant about the cross. And in our text, the Apostle Paul is going to answer three questions, and yes, I know that it's hard for some of you to believe, but this is two weeks in a row where you're getting basically a three-point sermon from me.

Okay, so write that down or something. But the first question that Paul is going to answer in our text is, who is this Savior? Who is he? Who is Jesus Christ? The second thing is, how has he saved us?

Or another way to put that is, what has he done to save us? And I think we all have some notion of that, but we're going to walk through what Paul has to say from Colossians. And then the last answer is, why has he done that?

Why has he saved us? So who is he? How has he saved us? And then why has he saved us? And those are answered in Colossians here. By the end of the text, I hope that we have a much better understanding of the big picture implications of the cross.

Sometimes it becomes so personal to us that we don't understand the big picture of what God is doing in the scope of the whole world scene and history and all of that through the cross. But in reality, 2 ,000 years ago, a man was nailed to a wooden cross just outside of the gates of Jerusalem by the Romans.

But if we are to believe what Scripture says here in our text this morning, then the crucifixion of Jesus was nothing less than the self-sacrifice of the creator of the universe. The one in whom, for whom, by whom, and through whom all of creation exists.

And he is the one we find on the cross dying to reconcile us to God. And that should have a significant impact and weight on us as we think about the implications of Good Friday coming up. So I want you to open your Bibles to Colossians chapter 1.

If you take the Bible that's in the seat back in front of you out, you can turn to page 843, and you'll be right there in Colossians 1. And we will be reading Colossians 1, verses 15 through 23. So again, Colossians 1, 15 through 23.

I'd love it if you'd have a Bible open in front of you so you can follow along. And then if you don't own a Bible, please take that paperback one with you that's in the seat back in front of you. Don't take the person sitting next to you.

Don't take their Bible. But you can take the one in the seat back in front of you and take that home with you. But follow along, Colossians 1, 15 through 23. The very words of God to us this morning. He, that is Jesus Christ, we go back in context to verse 13.

He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his Son. Now we're going to start talking about Jesus here. He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.

For by him all things were created in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities. All things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things.

And in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell.

And through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross. And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in his body a flesh by his death in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him.

If indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard, which has been proclaimed in all creation under heaven, of which I, Paul, became a minister.

Let's pray.

Father, this is a glorious passage. I feel like I could do harm to this passage just because it's such a beautiful reality of who Christ is. So, Father, I pray that as we get an opportunity to take this apart, we get an opportunity to praise and worship now, as we even now get an opportunity to hear a testimony of the life change that has been brought about from an individual in our church.

Father, that you would be honored and glorified, that Christ would be lifted high, and that we would recognize him as the one worthy of worship, the creator, the sustainer, the one who has made all things, and the one who is the rightful purpose of all things.

And, Father, I pray that you would bring honor and glory to yourself through our praise and worship this morning.

In Jesus' name, amen.

Dan Frazier’s Testimony of Conversion and Restoration

At this time, I'm going to ask one of our members, Dan Frazier, is going to come and share his testimony of what God has done in his life. And I think that we've kind of gotten away from this in the past, and I'd like to start doing something like this more frequently, that you might get to know other people and hear their story.

But I didn't coach Dan in what to share, and it's amazing after hearing him in first service how much what he shares just ties right in with the message this morning. So, glad that you're here, Dan. Let me grab your...

I wrote this down after I talked with Don last week, and I'm going to read from it. I'm not the best reader, but I'll do the best I can, because I can't memorize all of this. It starts out, On Easter weekend, just a few weeks or a few years ago, I came to Recast for the first time.

A few days ago, Don asked me if I would be willing to tell the church what Jesus has done for me. Working through my wife, Sam, Jesus brought me back to the church. As a child, I attended church with my family, but never really had a connection with Jesus.

Bible reading was not encouraged, and the church for me was a regimented program that one would do to hopefully get to heaven. In my mind, sin could only be corrected by doing enough good deeds to offset the bad deeds that I had done.

In my late teens and early 20s, I had given up on the church, thinking that I could get to heaven on my own. I did not need any of those weak Bible-thumper hypocrites who went to church on Sunday only to be sinning on Monday.

Guided by our culture, I was hard-headed, stubborn, selfish, knowing it all, a tough guy, determined to do things on my own because after all, I could do anything. I was a paratrooper in the Army, a police officer, a fireman, and a race car driver.

I had danced with death more times than I could count, and I'd come out on top every time. Nobody could tell me what to do or how to do it. I could get to heaven on my own, and I did not need anyone's help to get there.

I was lost. Working through my wife, Sam, Jesus brought me back to the church. If it had not been for Jesus guiding her, I would not have attended church on that weekend a few years ago. Sam had been attending services here at Recast for several months before I decided to attend with her.

Sam had assured me that this church was different from any others that I had attended as a child. She assured me that this church was not the judgmental, finger-pointing type that I thought it would be, so I decided to give it a shot.

I would give it a few weeks to test it out. That will be three years ago next weekend. Since that Easter Sunday, what has Jesus done for me? Sam, Nate, and I have all been baptized, and we attend church services regularly when we are at home on the weekends.

Jesus has brought my family closer together. My relationship with Jesus has helped me to grow as a husband, a father, and a fellow man. Jesus has helped me to learn what happiness and fulfillment really are and that, I'm sorry, what happiness and fulfillment really are all about and that service to our community is a duty to our fellow man.

Jesus has helped me to forgive others and realize that we are all sinners and that none of us are deserving of God's grace. Jesus has shown me that I cannot get to heaven by doing good deeds, that only through God's grace and Jesus' gift of salvation will we reach heaven.

Jesus died for our sins. And finally, Jesus has taught me to read the Bible and to continue to learn through its teachings and that even though all of us are not as gifted as others, it is everyone's duty to spread its good word.

Very grateful for the band and for Dan Frazier sharing his testimony and just kind of bringing things together in worship. And like I said, sometimes you don't necessarily coordinate these things and then the song selection and then Dan's testimony just fits in really well with the message this morning.

But go ahead and make sure you get comfortable. I know we just took a break, but I think there's more coffee and donuts and juice and stuff like that. And make sure you have your Bibles open in front of you too to Colossians.

And that was page 843 in case you lost your place during all that connection time and all that stuff. So have that open in front of you so you can kind of walk through the text with me as we go. But I want to start off just by saying, unfortunately, I think that for many of us, we have a tendency to jump straight to the resurrection at Easter time.

And I think with good cause, right? I mean, it would probably be justified in some way that resurrection comes to our minds when we think of Easter because that really is the central point. But that's if we're kind of fortunate and anything comes to our mind at all.

I mean, I think sometimes we can just kind of get fuzzy and hazy about these things. And if we're honest, Easter, Good Friday sneak up on us so quickly that we really sometimes have very little time to reflect it on.

It's like, oh, I better think about resurrection and then it's over and off we go our merry ways. So I think some of us maybe when we think of resurrection, like what comes to your mind or when you think of Easter, you know, maybe you have some fuzzy notion of Jesus in shining robes or maybe, you know, the stone rolling away, you know, some of those kind of cool things.

Or like the Passion of the Christ probably now runs through your mind. How many of you have seen that movie, The Passion of the Christ? Yeah, quite a few of you. There's one super cool scene that's at the very end of that movie.

You guys remember the resurrection scene? It's not really dealt with in depth, but there's just like the sound, like you think the credits are going to roll, and then there's the sound of the stone rolling away.

Do you guys remember that part? And then you see, all you can see is just like his hand and his thigh right here. And then you can, like as he steps out in the light, you can see the light through the hole in his hand.

Do you know what I'm, do you know the scene I'm talking about? I always get chills during that part. That didn't strike you guys? Some of you are like, I saw the movie and I don't remember that. You have to go fast forward to the end.

It's super cool. It's just like, whoa, that's awesome. But what comes to your mind when you think of the resurrection? What is it that you really think about? My goal this morning, and I think Paul's goal in Colossians, is to start back a ways.

So he's not going to start with the resurrection. He's going to take us back, but he's not just going to take us back to the crucifixion. So he doesn't go from Sunday back to Friday. He goes, let's take a step back even further and let's go Sunday, Friday.

Let's go back to eternity past. Okay, let's start there. Because Paul wants to introduce you to the Savior. He wants you to know who he is. In order to introduce you to the Savior, he's got to go back a ways.

He's going to have to go back in beyond history in order to show you who is this guy hanging on this cross? Who is this guy bleeding and dying for the sins of the world? And sometimes we start there without recognizing who is he?

And that makes all the difference in the world when we find out who is this man hanging on this cross, bleeding and dying for us. And so that's my intention this morning, is that we might have some understanding of who he is.

And I don't take for granted that everybody in the room has a healthy understanding of who the Savior is. I know that some people, we come from a variety of backgrounds. Some of you were raised in church.

Some of you, this is the first church you've attended. There's a variety of different backgrounds and situations. And I wonder sometimes if those who have been raised in the church maybe even are a step behind in their understanding of who Jesus Christ is because you've become so familiar with him that all of the statements that I can say about him are just so many cliches or so much Sunday school lesson or so much, like I've already heard that, been there, done that.

Do you know what I'm talking about when I say that? It can just become so routine and rote that we do this every year and Christmas is about the little baby in the manger and Easter is about Jesus' resurrection.

And we can speak in very general terms without getting to the place where we really recognize what it is that we're talking about here. Some significant events that can just easily just go whoo. So like thinking about who Jesus is, was Jesus a miracle worker?

Like you read the Gospels and you kind of can walk through maybe some of the Sunday school lessons you heard when you were a kid or whatever. Was Jesus a miracle worker? Yeah, absolutely. Was he more than that?

Well, yeah, okay.

Not just a miracle worker. What about a super good teacher? Just brilliant teacher, able to just give us, convey like heartfelt, deep teaching about the way we ought to live and ethics and things like that.

Was he a good teacher? Yeah, yeah, he was an awesome teacher. But he wasn't just that. And so most of us have in that phrase, more than that, we have the notion that he was God in flesh, right? How many of you kind of knew that?

Like you knew, at least you were supposed to believe that. Most of us believe that is true, right? Do you believe that is true? A handful of you, kind of hands going up and down and I don't know. Hard to keep count when you do that.

But yes, yeah, God in flesh. But what does that mean? And Paul is going to put some flesh on that notion. That was not in my notes. It's not in my notes.

I'm serious.

That just came to me. Sorry, first service did not have to endure that pun. But then I went through a little bit of a crisis at one point in my life. And I don't know if anybody in the room, a couple of people came up to me after first service and said I could relate to that really well.

But I went through a little bit of a crisis. I was studying in Bible college for two years and then I transferred to Cornerstone. I was studying up at Grand Rapids. I was a junior in college, taking all these theology classes and really wrestling through scripture.

And there came a point in my life where I actually asked this question. Is it okay to worship Jesus? And I don't know if you've ever asked that question, if you've ever thought in those terms. But we believe in Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, right?

That's pretty well revealed in scripture. And I mean it's a rock solid doctrine of the faith, the Trinity. You don't see the word Trinity there, but boy it's pretty clear. And you're going to see some elements of it in this text here.

Some pretty deep and mysterious things in the nature of God. But is it okay to worship Jesus? And another way to state this is is it okay to worship Him? Does worshiping Jesus detract worship from the Father?

And I almost kind of had in my mind as a junior in college, I was struggling with this and I was like, is God the Father kind of like, okay guys, you're giving too much attention to my son here. You're making too much of him.

I'm it, okay, I'm it. And he's my emissary, he's my minister, he's doing my thing. But give honor where honor is due kind of thing. Can any of you understand that mindset or that understanding that I was trying to wrestle through?

Well as we walk through this text, I think we're going to come out the backside of this text going, there is no way that you or I are ever going to offer too much worship to Jesus Christ. That is not possible.

You will never give Him so much honor and glory that the Father goes, oh, whoa, whoa, you're stealing from me now. Because we're going to see that they are one in the same. That's the mystery of the Trinity.

That's the mystery of the understanding of what we see here in this text and in other texts. Who is this guy on the cross? And that, I hope that by the end of this, you have just a radical understanding of who is there bleeding for you and me.

And so let's start in verse 15. It starts right off with a bit of a conundrum. You need to have your thinking caps on during this entire talk. I mean, I'd like you to have your thinking caps on every Sunday.

But particularly, this starts off with this phrase, He is, speaking of Jesus Christ, He is the image of the invisible God.

Huh?

He is a, you mean you can see Him, but He's reflecting something that's invisible? Are you getting what I'm saying? There's a little bit of a mystery. You have to kind of try to wrap your mind around this.

In what sense is Jesus the image of that which is invisible? Invisible things don't reflect, right? Do they have a reflection? Invisible things, does the air have a reflection? No, invisible things don't reflect.

And yet, the concept in this text is that Jesus Christ is the reflection, the visible manifestation of that which cannot be seen. The Father who is not seen can be clearly seen and understood accurately through the Son of God, through Jesus Christ.

You want to know the Father? Get to know the Son. He has shown us the Father clearly and distinctly and accurately. Study the Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Dig in to know who God is and how He works and the things that He does.

You will see in Jesus the Father. Is that a radical statement from Paul, by the way?

Would you guys agree with me?

He's saying that this man raised in Galilee, this carpenter's son, is the image of the invisible God, the Father. Is that radical?

It is.

And now he's just going to start adding on to this and he's going to add on to it. And I kind of alluded to it in my prayer, but I wonder if I'm not going to do injustice to this. This text is a beautiful, amazing hymn of praise to Jesus Christ.

And I think sometimes I fear that like love, the more you dissect it, the more you break it apart, the worse it is. And sometimes I wonder if I don't do that to the text at times. But we're digging in and I hope that you see the glory of Jesus Christ in this as we go.

So he clearly and accurately shows us who the Father is. And then we also see at the end of verse 15 that he's the rightful heir of all things. Unfortunately, the terminology that's used here, and it's not a poor translation, it's just a poor understanding of what firstborn means.

So he is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. What we might tend to get in our minds is therefore that Jesus is the first created thing. Because of the way that we have in our minds the understanding of firstborn, when you or I hear firstborn, we think of priority of time.

So your firstborn is the one that was born first. We think of it in regard to time, not in regard to inheritance laws, because that's so far removed from what is central to our culture. Far removed from the concept of firstborn as the rightful heir.

And so let me illustrate this from a different biblical perspective of explaining to you the way that firstborn works in Hebrew culture. And I'll give you an illustration from the Old Testament. So there was a guy who was king of Israel.

His name was Saul. He had committed three really grievous sins against God in the face of the nation, like public sins. And for his three public sins, he was going to be removed from the office of king.

And so God was going to raise up a king after him. So he sends a prophet named Samuel, summarizing here, he sends a prophet named Samuel to this guy's house named Jesse. And he says, bring out your sons.

One of your sons is going to be the king of Israel. So he lines up all of his sons, all seven of his sons, and he probably lines them up tallest to shortest. And Samuel kind of checks them out. Oh yeah, you're big, rough and tough.

And going on down, and he's looking at each one of these sons, kind of going, are you, God reveal to me, is this the next king? And he's going to anoint one of these kids king. All the way down, all seven, he gets to the end and he looks at Jesse and says, Jesse, I think none of these are the king.

I think you're holding out on me. Do you have another son, maybe? Is it possible that you have another son? Because God's told me to come here to this place. One of your sons is going to be anointed. He says, what does he say?

Oh yeah, yeah.

Well, the run of the litter, the youngest kid, the little guy, is out watching the sheep because we can't leave the sheep alone, right? And of course you're not going to select him.

He's not the toughest.

He's not the biggest. He's not the strongest. So I just assumed, and Samuel says, no, go get him. Go get this other kid. And who is this kid?

David, King David,.

The greatest king of all of Israel. And he goes and gets him, brings him in, and Samuel says, this is the one. And he anoints him. And throughout the Psalms, you can look this up in Psalm 89 if you'd like a reference, David is referred to as the firstborn.

He's the youngest of eight kids,.

And he's what?

He's referred to as the firstborn. Does that kind of run counter to our understanding of the word firstborn? But he's declared God's holy firstborn, his preeminent highest of kings on the earth. And he is declared to be over his brothers who were all born before him.

But the word firstborn is that he is declared to be the rightful heir of the throne, the one that God chose. So are you getting how firstborn has a different nuance in Hebrew than it does in English? It's not saying that he was the first among all, the first of creation or something like that.

It's ultimately saying that he is the rightful heir of all creation. The firstborn was not equal to his siblings. The firstborn was over all of his siblings and one day would be chief. And I think that as we go through this hymn of praise to Jesus, you're gonna have a hard time convincing me that Paul's primary motive in this one word, in this amazing hymn, is to indicate the origin of Jesus, that he started at some point in history.

Because let's go on and look at what's going to come next here. In case there's any doubt about who this Messiah is, verse 16 says, for by him, Jesus, all things were created in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities, all things were created through him.

All things made by Jesus, all things made through Jesus. Jesus had initiative in creation. Now some of you were here when we walked through, we were walking through the book of Genesis. We've already been through the account of creation.

And Jesus was involved in that process by which God spoke and things sprang into being. Jesus was there. Jesus and God and his spirit hovering over the waters, the text of Genesis tells us, father and son and spirit united in the function of creator.

One. One creator, father, son, and Holy Spirit. Divine mystery. Unless we think that the father gave the son a bit role to play like, hey, well, why don't you create the water and I'll create the mountains and everything else.

He didn't just give him like some bit role. All things were created by him and through him. Who are we talking about again? What is the context that I'm trying to set this in? The one hanging on the cross.

All things created by him, all things created through him, in heavens and on earth, invisible and visible, all powers and authority. Can you see how Paul is trying to sum up everything in creation? Even the invisible things, like our soul, like the oxygen we breathe, all things visible and invisible, whether in heaven, the spiritual realm, whether here on earth, whether in the sky, in the heavens, where the stars and all of the planets and all of those things exist.

Everything created by him and through him. But now, two little words at the end of 16 that just blow my mind. I cannot get past these two words. Look at the end of verse 16. What are the last two words?

For him,.

Purpose. Why does stuff exist? Why does water exist? Why do you and I exist?

For,.

For Jesus Christ.

Why does stuff exist rather than nothing exist? What is the purpose? What is the reason that there is stuff? If somebody asks you, and I'm sure we've all wondered this, why did God create anything? There's a very simple answer to that.

For Jesus.

That is why there is stuff. That is why the earth is here. That's why you and I are walking on this earth.

For Jesus Christ.

Now we're pressing into the arena of what requires a very significant faith. Jesus is the agent of creation. It was made by him and through him, but he is also its purpose. He's the reason that stuff exists.

It's all for him.

This carpenter's son from Galilee, he is the one for whom all things point to. He is the one that all things exist for. Does that stretch your understanding of who the Savior actually is?

Does it?

Probably ought to stretch us a little bit in our understanding of who is that guy? The guy on the cross?

The creator?

The one who made it all? The one for whom all things exist? And not only that, but Paul just keeps adding, just piling on these statements, and he is before all things in verse 17. And in him all things hold together.

He is before all things existed, and there's no way around the Greek language here. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together, the notion of that word, just being simply that all things are sustained continually by Jesus.

The laws of physics are real, and they serve the design of God for this world. This isn't to pit the laws of science and say, well, the laws, I mean, we think in physics we have some understanding of why things, why matter exists, and why things hold together, and all of that.

And it's not to pit faith against science in this, but it is to say in a very true sense, I believe that the material world exists and holds together because the Son of God wills it to be so. He holds us together.

He is keeping it all revolving and working and moving. Jesus is more than merely a good man who lived a good life and taught good stuff. Jesus is God in flesh. The Apostle John says, in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

Jesus called the Word of God, and He was with God before anything existed. It's preeminent. First, He was there in the beginning before all things existed, with God. Now, let's stop just here for just a moment and consider the implications of Jesus Christ for your life and for mine.

He is the creator, sustainer, the perfect image of God, the heir of all creation, and all things exist for Him. Are you a created thing? Are you part of this creation? What are all things created for?

For Jesus.

So it doesn't take a PhD to figure out what He has made you and I for.

Right?

He has made us for Christ. And our lives will not find rest until we find rest in the One who created us for Himself. Just from these few verses, we can see the claim that Jesus Christ has on our lives, but now the text continues to go on.

And what comes next might be a surprise because we're still getting to know who is this Savior? Who is this guy on the cross? And how can you top telling us that He's the ruler over the whole universe?

Has that been pretty clear so far? I want to make sure that you guys are getting this. Is it pretty clear that Jesus is ruler of the universe according to this text so far? Creator, sustainer, all things for Him, made through Him and by Him.

He's it. Right? The very image of God. And yet now we go on and we say, yeah, He's all that. He's the ruler of the cosmos. He's super awesome. He's super sweet. He's even the head of the church. Anybody kind of...

Some people actually audibly chuckled at that like at the beginning because I think that there's a misunderstanding. Does that seem like a little bit like a deflation?

Like it's like,.

He rules the universe! And He's the head of the church too.

Right?

This little thing here. Like I'm not the leader. I'm not the ultimate. Like the buck stops here. This is as much as possible. We're trying to let Jesus Christ rule this church and reign. And how many of you know...

Some of you might already be aware of this distinction. There's a difference between a little C church and a big C church. Little C church is this. This is a local gathering of the people of God in a community.

But we are just a part of this big C church thing that God is doing globally. All around the world. Across geography. But not just geography, but across time. We connect with people that we have never met before.

Through Jesus Christ.

Okay, so. He is the ruler of... He's the ruler and the head of John Wesley who has gone on before us.

Right?

Or other characters and other people that we know were historical figures who loved Jesus and were with Him. Are you getting what I'm saying? So there's this big C thing. And so what's the significance of...

Think about it from this way. It's one thing for Paul to say, He's the ruler of this cosmos. He's the ruler of this universe. He's the ruler of this world. But what do we know of this world that could kind of make that not such a good title after all?

He's the ruler of a broken universe.

Great.