If you have your Bibles, brothers and sisters, would you turn with me, please, to our text for this morning? It's found in Paul's letter to the Colossians as we are working through this book. And we look this morning at verses 8 through 15. We saw last week that our faith, our belief, what we have received in Christ Jesus, the Lord, must have an impact on our life. in terms of how we walk, in our growth, in our knowledge, because these are the things that then lead to our thanksgiving overflowing. He's already stated, though, that we have to be aware of the danger that is present. And so follow as I read, beginning at verse 8 of chapter 2. It's printed on the front of your bulletins, by the way, if you didn't bring a Bible this morning. Hear the word of God. See to it 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 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 and 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. 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. Let us pray. Father, open our ears, open our hearts to your word this day, to its truth and power and beauty. And Father, I pray that you would open my mouth, my lips, Lord, that you might use these words and that you might, Lord, purify them so that, Lord, I would set forth truth from your word. This we ask in Jesus' name, amen. Amen. Paul sets before the people, before the Colossians and before us a warning. It's broad, but it's clear. Notice he isn't warning us about, like I said to our children, armies and folks who are coming at us with swords and knives. We, in that kind of attack, respond pretty quickly, don't we? The flight or flight reaction kicks in very quickly. Those are things we recognize. He's not worried about those kinds of dangers. We're going to see them. We're going to flee. or by God's grace we'll learn how to fight properly in them. But this is a lot more devious, these dangers that he's presenting. These are the challenges to your security, to your walk in Christ, and they can come from all kinds of corners, Jewish or pagan, earthly powers or those in the heavens, and likely they will encounter false teachers who will come claiming to know and follow Christ. He's already seen that happen in other churches. They will likely face it as well. And so Paul tells us we need to be like the fencing foil or the fencing saber, on guard. Be ready to defend yourself, to know your protection. You need to be resting perfectly in Him. That's going to be the recurring theme throughout this section. Because your protection, your real protection, we will see lies in him. There's a very present danger. The language that Paul uses here, see to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, is very strong. He doesn't want you to be carried off as as spoil, to be taken off into activity, captivity, we might say, he doesn't want us to be kidnapped, because it has that kind of force to it. And the concern is that intellectual deception, the philosophies, the empty deceit that can mislead us. Speculative systems of thought in Greek or Roman culture, surely he's considering these things. But it also can refer to all sorts of systems of belief, magical practices, anything dealing with theories about God or gods and the world and the meaning of life. And it will, as I say, encompass both Jewish and pagan schools of thought, philosophy, and argument. They're going to be presented, as he said back in verse 4, as plausible arguments Maybe it would sound really good. There could be some tempting ways to explain the world and your place in it. And so he says, see that no one takes you captive. According to, through philosophy and deceit, according to human tradition, according to or depending on that which depends on human tradition or elemental spirits of the world, or anything that is not according to Christ. First, he says, beware of those things which depend on human traditions. Now, in the ancient world, the old, things that had been around for a long time were not to be casually dismissed. Longevity meant it had stood the test of time. And so the age of a religion or a philosophy helped to, quote unquote, authenticate it. Of course, today, the exact opposite is true. We're completely enamored with the new, the most exciting, the latest innovation. The old is, maybe I should say the old are suspect. They're just stuck in those old-fashioned ways. They're not enlightened. Belief in God, moral absolutes, doctrines like heaven and hell, all those are just rooted in the ignorance of the past. We need a fresh look at things, even a fresh look at the Bible. For centuries, brothers and sisters, it was understood, by that I mean it was self-evident, it just showed it, there was no really denying it, that mankind, men and women, left to themselves were dangerous. Left to ourselves, we do very bad things to ourselves and to one another. To me, one of those old suspect things, you know, it still seems self-evident. Ah, but not in the modern thinking. No, people are basically good. Such a premise, such an idea leads to some disastrous policies and the support of seriously flawed programs, not to mention the complete undermining of the gospel and the work of Christ. If we're all good, we don't need Him. Now, traditions aren't inherently evil, but when they undermine, when they contradict the traditions that we have received, that which has been set before us, brought to us in the work and ministry of Christ in the proclamation of the Gospel, when they begin to undermine or contradict that tradition that we have received in Christ, They've crossed the line from benign to malignant and they don't need to be old to be deadly. Beware of those things that depend on human tradition. Beware of those philosophies which depend on elemental spirits. Now, I would like at least another week to be studying this passage because there are some real challenges in translating and interpreting this passage and here's one of them because some will translate that not elemental spirits but elemental principles or fundamental principles of the world. Now to be sure, no, we can be sure that this philosophy belongs to the material world which Christ created. It belongs to the realm that is dominated by sin and death, by the flesh and the devil. that we're sure of, don't be taken captive according to things that depend on elemental or fundamental principles or elemental spirits in the world. But we're not, we're sure that it's from the material world, we're just not sure which it is, elemental spirits, those principles, those basic ideas, The NIV, for instance, translates it that way. I think looking at verse 16, just after our section here, let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath. These were sort of elemental, fundamental principles in the pagan world. You had to somehow appease the gods or the forces, and you would do it by keeping of days, by making offerings and sacrifices, by foregoing certain things. That's one possibility. The other, however, is to translate it elemental spirits, and those can be either the impersonal elements of the universe, those things thinking that they're governed by angels or thought to be lesser gods, or what I think is more likely here, elemental spirits are those personal malevolent powers at work in the world, the dominions and rulers and authorities of chapter 1 verse 16, the principalities and powers that are at war in the heavenly realms with God, with Christ. And so these deceptive, reasonable-sounding, pleasing philosophies are at their root, the work of these elemental spirits Their work is not unintentional, but wickedly intentional. And so in verse 8, those elemental spirits are being placed in sharp contrast with Christ, whose power and authority is without equal. As I say, I'd like more time to study it, but I think it is appropriate for us to understand these as those elemental spirits. On guard, beware. But most importantly, beware of the human traditions, beware of these elemental spirits that are setting things before us like Satan in the garden. Most importantly, be on guard for anything that doesn't depend on Christ for its power, its truth. Anything that is not according to Christ, there's the third warning. Flee, if it's not in accord with what you've received, the truth of the gospel. Because what it's intended to do is to take you back into captivity. No matter what kind of freedom it offers or deliverance might be set before you, it is the road to captivity. And so what will now be set before us is the hollowness and the empty deceit of the world's philosophies. being set in contrast to the fullness of Christ. We know the danger. We need to know the enemy. That's true. But we need to know more of Christ. This is what Paul is driving us to. It's what he wants us to grasp. He wants us to see our sure defense He wants us to know our Savior so well that we're like the conductor of a symphony who knows the piece so intimately that when the French horns come in an instant late, he knows it immediately. He might not know the specific horn, but he knows what's happened. Or when those second violinists just get carried away and they have to crescendo ahead of everybody else. He knows it. He hears it immediately. and can bring it under control. Where's your sure defense? Your best possible defense is to know the truth and to lay hold of it. Because our defense, our protection, our security, our fullness, our life lies in this. God in Christ. Christ in you. Christ over all. This is our sure defense. For in Christ we read in verse 9, in Him, for in Him, there it is again, 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. Your first defense is that God is in Christ. Jesus doesn't just have attributes of God. He has the fullness of deity, the whole fullness of deity. Try and get your head around that. That fullness of deity dwells bodily in Jesus Christ. There's the incarnation, the fullness of God brought into the body, into a human body It's not a shadow that body is not a shadow. It's not a representation. This is not virtual reality This is not avatar Where Christ is the body of Christ is? Animated by the fullness of God, but the fullness of God is still back there somewhere else just animating this body My son has one of those oculus rift goggles. You know that puts you in the virtual world It's the strangest thing to have your mind telling you, you are on a roller coaster, and you are continually trying to tell yourself, no, I am sitting in a chair, I am not moving. Virtual reality, no, because my body wasn't moving. Virtual reality, God is somewhere else, but he's animating Jesus, no, no, Christ is the fullness of God, true, solid, genuine, present. He's not an image that reflects God. It is God made visible. Christ. God in Christ. Here I can rest. And Christ in you. And you have been filled in Him who is the head of all rule and authority. The fullness of God in Christ Now Christ in you, the hope of glory, the world will try and tell you what is lacking. Try to convince you of it. Turn on the radio, turn on the television, and thousands upon thousands of people and companies will try and tell you all the things that you lack and that you're going to need if you're going to really be satisfied. And of course, the lie behind that, the deception behind that, isn't so obvious, but there is a deceiver and a deception behind it. There is a philosophy behind it that drives this, that says, what you have is not enough. No. You need to pay attention to yourself, your needs, your desires, your feelings, your wants. You are the center. Everything revolves around you. And when you finally grasp that and understand that, and when you begin to live that way and accept all of these things that will now fulfill you, whatever your desires are, oh, now you've made it. There's the lie. You, you need to pay all and more attention to yourself. You are the center. Therefore, we will supply everything you need. No, you only need Christ in him. is perfect fullness. And you have been filled perfectly and completely in Him. If anyone tells you you need more, if they say you need something else, don't you know you've been qualified to share in the inheritance of life in Christ? Verse 12, chapter 1. They're just trying to drag you back into slavery. No, I don't think advertisers think of themselves that way, but that's the bottom line. If it's all about you, they just want you back in that slavery. Flee, run, find your sure defense, Christ in you. In him we receive a divine circumcision. Now, there's a question that comes here, an important one. In him all the fullness of Christ dwells bodily, and you have been filled in him, the head of all rule and authority. In him, verse 11, also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands by putting off the body of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ. Now, this is, no doubt, this is absolutely glorious. These were folks, these were primarily Gentiles. They didn't have that sign on them of circumcision done with hands at eight days. No, they have a circumcision done without hands, done by God, done in him. It is a spiritual circumcision. It is perfect. Now, if the topic hasn't come up among the Colossians already, it's going to. because somebody's going to tell you, look, unless you have that sign, you're excluded from citizenship and you are foreigners to the covenants of promise, as Paul says in Ephesians 2. But Paul would argue vehemently, here, Romans, Galatians, Philippians, that the right of circumcision was not necessary for their inclusion in the kingdom of God. It is not necessary for our inclusion. in the kingdom of God. As a matter of fact, he will argue, go back into Romans 1 and 2 and then follow, he would argue that the cutting away of the flesh never dealt with the real problem, which of course is a sinful heart. You could be circumcised in the flesh but remain completely uncircumcised in your hearts, and that goes all the way back to Deuteronomy. Christ does what physical circumcision could never do, He delivers us from the power of sin in Him. That's what Paul sets before them as their sure defense. You have been delivered from the power of sin in your perfect circumcision. His, I believe, His perfect circumcision. done by putting off the body of flesh. In him you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands by putting off the body of flesh by the circumcision of Christ. Now the NIV and some other translations interpret it to mean that, interpret it in a way that says we put off this sinful body, this sinful nature. It's implying that our body of sin was put off. I'm not convinced. I'm not saying that's an impossibility by any stretch, but I'm not convinced. Paul has not used flesh in that way, in that fashion of sinful nature in the book of Colossians to this point. It's been used already four times, simply referring to the physical body. And the language, the exact language that we have here is used in 122 and is translated the physical body, body of flesh. I think it's more likely, let me get a little technical here for a moment, that this is not a subjective genitive but an objective genitive. All I mean by that is that we're looking at the circumcision that Christ experiences. I think that is a strong possibility here. It is a reference, a graphic reference to his death because that putting off of the body is the stripping off of the body of flesh which Christ endured on the cross. And if I read it correctly, then what Paul has done is he set before them the things that are of the first importance. that Christ died, that Christ was buried, that Christ rose from the dead and rose from the grave, clearly expressed and demonstrated in His coming in power. Our sure defense is God in Christ and Christ in you, who has finished the work, delivering us from that bondage to sin, cutting away not just the flesh, but taking away the sinful heart. Our sure defense, God in Christ and Christ in you. And yet, to bring even greater assurance, Christ over all. We look to the one who, as it says in 10, is the head of all rule and authority. It is his power that has raised us from the dead. That sets an interesting picture before us, doesn't it? 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 then in verse 13 and you who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh Now wait a minute. I'm already dead I'm dead in my sin. I'm dead in my sinful nature my trespasses my my being foreign to the covenants of the promises, my trespasses and the uncircumcision of my flesh. I'm already dead. You see the picture? I'm dead. And now, by God's grace, recognizing somehow, by God's grace and mercy, my inability to see that apart from Christ, I am dead in trespasses and sins. by faith, by trust. I believe. I look to Christ to deliver me from my death. And so now, coming in faith in my baptism, I'm buried with Him. And so not only am I dead, I was dead in sin. Now I'm dead to sin. The dead thing that I am, I'm buried with Christ in Him. And the thing that belonged in the grave, my sins stayed there. And with Him, I am raised up to life. So we too were dead, we were buried, and we were raised. And now Paul includes himself. Not you, but we. He was made alive together along with them in Christ through the forgiveness of sins. Jews, Gentiles alike, it doesn't matter because God in Christ, Christ comes overall canceling the debt. Oh, I love this language in verse 14. He cancels, canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. He set it aside, nailing it to the cross. Here is his power being exerted over all things. Now, that is referring when we speak of this record of debt. Again, it can be understood as a metaphor, if you will, for the written law code, for the Mosaic law. But I don't think that's what's being set before us here. This is a business term. This is a commercial term. This is a record of debt. It's an IOU. It's a note that acknowledges a debt that is to be paid, and it's signed by the debtor. Look over in Philemon, verse 19, and you'll see Paul writing to Philemon about Onesimus, and he says, I'm writing this in my own hand. See, my name is on this. I will make good on Onesimus' debt. I will take it. My name is on it. I bear that debt. Well, brothers and sisters, that record of debt has my name on it. It has your name on it. It's what you owed and we know it. In spite of the modern philosophies that would try and convince you to the contrary, you must deny it you must subvert it, you must hold it down, you must try and do everything that you can to cut it out of your heart because God has not left us without the witness. Until we sear that conscience and no longer listen to it, oh we know, my name is on that debt. But when Christ cancelled that debt and the death sentence that it brought, He uses, once again, Paul uses a very strong word, to wipe out, to obliterate, to blot out. I'm not making those up, that's just coming right out of the lexicons. Wipe out, blot out, obliterate, what a strong word. He doesn't just write over it, paid in full. No, no, no, no. It's destroyed. There's no record to be read. You can't dig back in the files to find it and say, oh, here it is. Yeah, but we canceled that. See, it's written off. No, there's nothing to find. You can get your computer forensic guy to come in and dig down into the computer to find what's left of that. Take your server and find all of the emails that you tried to delete. There's nothing there. They're going to find absolutely nothing. It's been obliterated, that record that would stand against you. And it's nailed to the cross. That penalty of death, ah, it still had to be paid. You couldn't just pretend that that debt was never there. It would be paid and paid in full. It would be nailed to the cross. The charges were nailed to the cross in the same way it was done with Jesus. Yeah, the charges were nailed above him. King of the Jews, that was his crime. This time, though, when the charges are nailed to the cross, the guilty one isn't under them. The guiltless one is the one who hangs there. Because for our sake, God made him to be sin, who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. He took our place and gave us his righteousness. And so we died with Christ. the debt is paid, the record is obliterated. You are free. Free. Such is your sure defense. Such is the one who rules over all. Such is the one who has the powers, the power and the authority to strip the rulers and authorities of their power. He disarmed the rulers and authorities. I think we can translate that. He stripped off their power, their importance, everything that would cause his people to fear them. Whether it's those authorities and powers of this world, Because those who would humiliate Jesus, those who would send Him to the cross, who would scorn Him on the way, who would mock Him, who would think we'll just push Him to the side, because we have such power, discover themselves impotent, discover themselves stripped and laid bare before the One who rises from the dead, fulfilling His Word, ruling over all, their power shown to be what it is, only that which is given by God. I think it includes those spiritual principalities and powers. Why? Because now, who can they accuse of those whose debts have been obliterated and paid, nailed to the cross? There is no record. There is no coming and saying, this one, look at this one, look at that record. What are you going to do about that? Now, that one's mine. I'll take them and do what I want with them. Let me show you what deception, what depravity I can bring. No, there's nothing to accuse. It's gone. Your protection, your shield, your fortress has surrounded you. Such is the glory of God in Christ, Christ in you, Christ over all. Here is the triumph of the cross. It was meant to be a symbol of shame and disgrace. Instead, it's the instrument of deliverance and forgiveness and grace. Christ's glory is the cross. It's the seal of his triumph and his victory over every power that would oppose the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. It is that instrument of power to protect, to deliver, to save. and to hold it's the seal of his triumph over sin and death. And so those who would sit in the seat of judgment must now stand before the real judge and ruler. If they'd understood would they have ever sent him to the cross? Not if they knew. Brothers and sisters let me close with this. Be on your guard on guard, not against some swordsman who is going to come at you. If you're good at that, fine. But of the deceptions and the philosophies, the empty deceit, all of the instruments of the ones who would come to mislead you, to take you away, to take you back into captivity, have no fear. Have no fear. You are not left to yourself. Look to Christ. Take everything that you hear and bring it back to Christ. Is this what I've been taught? Is this what he has showed me? Is this what has filled me? Will this continue to fill me? Does this honor my Lord and my Savior? Take it back to him. Have no fear. You have nothing to fear anymore. Stand fast. Don't let anyone then try to add to what Christ has done. There are no subtractions and no additions to his perfect salvation. There are few people today who are bothered by the fact that they've not been physically circumcised. They know they're included in the covenant community. I think we can understand why it was difficult for first century Jews, but it's not an issue anymore. But, oh, are you going to have people telling you that you're lacking something? You need another baptism. This one needs to be in the spirit. You're missing something. Oh, you're missing blessings. You're not asking in the right way. You need this prayer or that prayer. Follow this form or that pattern. Oh, here's a teaching that, oh, no, the true believers, they're just following this one, or this ritual, or this new insight. It's Christ and, Christ and, Christ and, no, it's Christ in you, and you in Him, and all that Christ has done for us in Him. Everything you need for life and salvation has been accomplished and secured in Christ your Lord and in Him, united to Him in a baptism unto death and a resurrection unto life, you are secure. Nothing can separate you from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. So be wise and walk in Him and be built up in Him and be established in Him and make it your aim to know Him and Him alone. Know Him with your heart and your soul and your mind and your strength, and you will not be led astray, but will stand firm in your shield, your fortress, your God. Father, Father, help us to stand fast and firm, not led astray by anything in this world or this life, or in the world, in the spiritual realms around us. Oh, Father, what Christ has done to make us His own. Father, we do believe and trust that He will do all that is necessary to keep us as His own. So deliver us from fear, and help us, Lord, to be on guard always in Him. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen.