If you have your Bibles, please turn with me to Colossians chapter 2, Colossians in the New Testament chapter 2, and this morning we're going to be in verses 9-14. Colossians chapter 2, verses 9-14. One of our professors at Frontier School of the Bible used to say that snow reminded him of the purity. that we have in Jesus Christ. And I'm reminded of Isaiah 118, though your sins are as scarlet, they will be as white as snow. Now we might want spring to come, but snow is a good reminder to us that our sins have been purified in Jesus Christ. They have been washed as white as snow. What a great truth for us. Well, as you have your Bibles open to Colossians chapter two, and as we approach this passage today, we are no doubt confronted with the reality that the resurrection of Jesus Christ and his accomplishment on the cross has been, and continually is, spiritually linked in a powerful way to the believer in Jesus Christ. Please follow along with me in chapter two, verses nine through 14, beginning in the ninth verse. For in him all the fullness of deity dwells in bodily form, and in him you have been made complete, and he is the head over all rule and authority. And in him you were also circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, in the removal of the body of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ, having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised up with him through faith, in the working of God who raised Him from the dead. When you were dead in your transgressions and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He made you alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our transgressions, having canceled out the certificate of debt, consisting of decrees against us, which was hostile to us, and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross." Heavenly Father, I want to thank you for this opportunity that we have to be able to come into this place and to hear your word. We thank you that Jesus Christ came to this earth, lived a perfect life. He died a complete death, and then three days later, resurrected from the grave. We give you praise for that, Lord, and we thank you for it. I want to pray that you would bless our time this morning as we have this opportunity to look into your word. I ask that you would use your word in a powerful way. And for that, we will praise you. In your name I pray, amen. The Apostle Paul, as he was writing from a prison cell in Rome, had a deep concern for and a burden for the people of God. These people were getting caught up in a form of teaching that led its hearers away from the simplicity of the gospel, and the clear teaching of God's grace. Notice with me what Paul writes in Colossians 2, verse 8. He says this, see to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception according to the tradition of men, according to the elementary principles of the world, rather than according to Christ. Now this warning was for the true church of Jesus Christ. In chapter 1, verse 2, Paul addresses his audience as the saints and faithful brethren in Christ who are at Colossae. and then he assured them in chapter 1 verse 4 that he had heard of their faith in Christ Jesus. Now I want us to pay special attention to verses 5 and 6 where Paul mentions in verse 5 that these believers in Christ Jesus had heard the word of truth the gospel. And now notice with me that the gospel and clear grace teaching, what that produced in the lives of these believers in verse six, it says that the gospel which has come to you, just as in all the world also, it is constantly bearing fruit and increasing even as it has been doing in you also since the day you heard of it and understood the grace of God in truth. If ever there was a time in our nation's history for believers to stand upon and to proclaim the grace of God and the Word of God, it is today. God's grace is rich and it is free. God offers His grace to any who would believe in His Son to save them from their sin. It is good to be in the house of the Lord today. Christ secures all that we have been given by God through the death and the resurrection of Jesus Christ. In fact, I do not want you to leave here this morning without this main thought, that the resurrection of Jesus Christ is the key to all of the spiritual blessings that believers possess. Let me say that one more time. The resurrection of Jesus Christ is the key to all of the spiritual blessings that believers possess. It would be profitable and good for us to consider the importance of the resurrection in our lives as believers, especially on a day like today. Well, this morning we're going to see that the Apostle Paul answers two very critical questions in relation to the importance in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. And that first critical question that the Apostle Paul answers in relation to the importance in the resurrection of Jesus Christ is this. That first critical question is, what does the resurrection mean for believers? If you are here this morning, and you have trusted in Jesus Christ to save you from your sin, then what does the resurrection mean for you? What does the resurrection mean for me? We see the answer to that in this passage of scripture this morning. Now our culture tries to push this idea that Easter is supposed to be like any other day. They might elevate an Easter bunny or think that the best part is that this is a day where we can color Easter eggs and have an Easter egg hunt. But for the believer in Christ, this day is so much more because of the fact that our lives are hidden with Christ. And today we celebrate the fact that our Savior is not still dead in a grave, but that His tomb is completely empty. What we're going to find as we look at these answers in verses 9-12 is that there are four answers that the Apostle Paul gives. What does the resurrection mean for you and for me? that we find is in verse nine, and that answer is this, that in Christ, believers are full, not empty. Believers are full, not empty. Verse nine says, for in him, all the fullness of deity dwells in bodily form. What the resurrection means for believers is this, that we are full in Christ, not empty people. And in the context of chapter two, as Paul is warning his readers of the perils and following after deceptive teaching that would lead its hearers away from the gospel, he is bringing to them the reality that they do not need any kind of teaching that would seek to elevate works or philosophy that would subtract from the reality of who Christ is and what he has accomplished. I love what Warren Wiersbe said on this, he observed this, that Paul gave the true and lasting antidote to all false teaching. All fullness is in Christ and you have been made full in him. Why then would you need anything else? Why would you need anything else? This day is distinct from any other day out of the year because it is a day where we celebrate a risen Savior. His tomb is completely empty today, which then destroys the notion that Jesus Christ was just a historical figure or a a great speaker who knew the secret of what it meant to win friends and influence people. When Paul writes here in verse 9 that in him all the fullness of deity dwells in bodily form, he uses a Greek word for fullness that carries this idea that it is the sum total. One preacher of old said that Jesus' deity wasn't just 99.44% but 100%. When Jesus Christ came to this earth, He came to this earth as a complete man, the incarnation. He took upon himself flesh. He was 100% man. And what we find in verse 9 is that He too was 100% God. In whom all the fullness of deity dwell, He is the God-man. Therefore, He is above all earthly teaching or philosophy. And furthermore, what we are going to see in this passage stems from this truth that Jesus Christ is God and He was able to do what He did in this passage because he is God, distinct, completely distinct from anyone else who has ever lived before him and after him. Which brings us to our second answer this morning of what the resurrection means for us. That second answer is this, that in Christ believers are made complete. Believers are made complete. Notice with me in verse 10, it goes on, and in him, you have been made complete, and he is the head over all rule and authority. Now, I have a confession to make. I've been here at Bark River Bible Church now for about four years, and I, for the first time, stepped foot into the Donut Connection in Escanaba just a few months ago. Katie and I brought the kids and I was almost overwhelmed at all of the possibilities of donuts that were on the menu. Now if you don't like the donuts with the hole in the middle, you can get donuts with filling. And there are all kinds of options. They have strawberry filling, blueberry filling, apple raspberry filling, chocolate angel filling, and the list goes on. Then to top it off, if you go to their website, they have a slogan on their site that says, fill the hole in your life. What's the message? Grab a donut and you will be satisfied, right? Grab a donut and you'll be satisfied. Here is the reality. I believe that God places a vacuum inside all of us as human beings that only Christ can fill. A donut might satisfy temporarily, but eventually you're going to want another one. Jesus Christ alone can satisfy the spiritual need that we all have. And for the believers that the Apostle Paul was writing to, he wanted them to understand that they would not be satisfied by the empty philosophies of this world. They would not be satisfied if they placed themselves under the chains of legalism, under the chains of mysticism, or under the chains of asceticism. They would not find any kind of lasting freedom in those things. Sure, there is a temporary satisfaction that might come when we replace God with something else for a temporal time, but Jesus Christ alone provides for and meets the eternal need that we have to be satisfied in Him. When Paul writes to these believers, and in Him, you have been made complete, that thought carries the idea that Christ alone can make us full. Kenneth Weiss says that this thought of being complete in Christ is a participle in the perfect tense. Quite literally, it means that you are in Him, having been filled full with a present result, that you are in a state of fullness. Now, don't confuse this verse to mean that when you believe on Jesus Christ, you become a God, or that you obtain some form of deity. What Paul means here is that in Christ, believers find the satisfaction of every spiritual want. If you are here today as a believer in Jesus Christ, and you believe that you will find satisfaction in anything other than in Jesus Christ, you are dead wrong. This world can only satisfy for a short amount of time. And this world pushes out all kinds of teachings, all kinds of philosophies. But the only satisfaction in this life comes from Jesus Christ. It is only in Him that we will find ultimate satisfaction in life. We are complete in Him as believers. Which brings us to our 11th verse, and in that 11th verse, we find our third answer to this question of what the resurrection means for the believer. In Christ, believers are given spiritual significance, verse 11. Our third answer is just that. In Christ, believers are given spiritual significance. Please read with me, verse 11 says, and in him you were also circumcised with a circumcision made without hands in the removal of the body of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ. Now we have to ask ourselves, what is the difference between the false teaching of circumcision in the book of Galatians and the false teaching of circumcision found here in Colossians? Well, the church in Colossae had false teachers who were suggesting that you needed to work out physical circumcision practically in your life in order to grow in your spirituality. Whereas in the book of Galatians, the false teachers were saying that you needed to be physically circumcised in order to be saved from your sin. And the Apostle Paul addressed this in Galatians 6, verse 15, and wrote, For neither is circumcision anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creation. So it is here in Colossians that we have been given this truth in verse 11, that it is because of Christ that we have been spiritually circumcised. Paul says, you were also circumcised with a circumcision made without hands. Therefore you will not become a more spiritually mature Christian among the spiritual elite if you are circumcised. One writer observed this about the significance of circumcision. They wrote, though it was a physical operation, it had a spiritual significance. Often in the Old Testament, God warned his people to turn from their sins and experience a spiritual circumcision of the heart. People make the same mistake today when they depend on some religious ritual to save them. And I would go so far as to say that people also make the same mistake today when they are trusting in some kind of religious work to somehow obtain some sort of higher spirituality. Yet none of that is possible apart from Jesus Christ. We have been given a new life and a new birth and have been made a new creation all because of the finished work that Christ accomplished on the cross through the resurrection. Well that takes us now to our fourth answer to this question. And that fourth answer of what the resurrection means for believers is found in verse 12. And that fourth answer is this, that in Christ, believers are identified with him. Verse 12, believers are identified with him. Please follow along with me in verse 12. Having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised up with him through faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead. In Christ, believers are identified with him. Now, as the Apostle Paul combated the false teachers in Colossae, which were the Gnostics who literally placed themselves above everyone else as individuals who claimed to have superior knowledge, he wanted the believers in Colossae to realize that whatever the superior knowledge was that the Gnostics claimed to have did not come close and was not as important as the reality that these believers were identified with Jesus Christ through faith. Now, contextually speaking, when Paul addressed the spiritual circumcision that took place through faith in Christ, combined with these other terms in verse 12 of having been buried with Christ in baptism and having been raised up with Him through faith, we know that Paul is speaking about our spiritual identity with Jesus Christ that took place the moment we placed our faith in Him. Thomas Stegall says it well. Every believer in Christ today who has been born again by God's grace can say on the authority of God's word that he has died with Christ, been buried with Christ, and has risen with Christ all through the baptizing ministry of the Holy Spirit. That took place the moment you placed your faith in Jesus Christ. Water baptism simply pictures this reality. When we have our baptismal service this summer, we are going to physically baptize those who have made a profession of faith in Jesus Christ, which pictures what transpired spiritually in their lives. Now, I want to mention to us this morning that none of this transpired through the empty philosophies of this world. We were not made a new creation or identified with Christ by believing in the higher philosophies and academics. or teachings of this world. College students, I want to challenge you in your thinking. Be on guard against any form of philosophy or teaching that would seek to reduce or dethrone Jesus Christ from His place in the universe. He is alive today by the power of God through the resurrection of the dead. I'm reminded of this truth and it's no wonder that the Apostle Paul reminds us in Ephesians chapter 1 Verses 19 through 21, he says this, these are in accordance with the working of the strength of his might, which he brought about in Christ, when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion and every name that is named, not only in this age, but also in the one to come. Notice with me the end of verse 12. The Apostle Paul says that it was God who raised him. Who? Jesus Christ. God raised him from the dead. Do not fall into any kind of philosophy or teaching that would seek to captivate your thinking in regards to Jesus Christ and who he is and what he has accomplished. Well, in order to secure the spiritual blessings that we have in Christ through his resurrection, Jesus Christ needed to die a complete death, which leads us directly into the second critical question that the Apostle Paul answers in relation to the accomplishment of the resurrection. And it is this, how does the resurrection accomplish this for believers? If you are here today, you've trusted in Jesus Christ. We know what the resurrection means for us. We have seen those answers. We have seen that we have been made full in Christ. Christ is higher than the philosophies of this world. We do not need anything else in Him. We are complete. We are given complete satisfaction in Jesus Christ alone. We are given spiritual significance and we have been identified with Jesus Christ. When Jesus Christ resurrected from the dead, He validated the ministry that He came to do as He set Himself towards the cross. In fact, through His resurrection, He validated what He accomplished through His death. In this section, we will see that Christ accomplished two things for the believer as he set himself towards the cross and died a complete death. Verse 13, we see that first accomplishment. In Christ, believers have been forgiven. We see that in verse 13, please follow along with me. When you were dead in your transgressions in the uncircumcision of your flesh, He made you alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our transgressions. In Christ, believers have been forgiven." What an accomplishment. We have been forgiven of our sin. Now I need to say this as we move forward. This is not going to be easy to hear. but it needs to be said. God, through His Word, has given us a truth about ourselves that is so contrary to religion that it has, in a sense, led me to believe that this truth could only come from God, and it is this, that we are so dead in our sin, we are so depraved that we deserve the wrath of God. God has shown us in His Word that He is holy and perfect. Take, for instance, 1 Peter 1.16. We read, because it is written, you shall be holy, for I am holy. Then look at us, in 1 John 1, verse 8, we find this, if we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us. Do you see the difference here between God, who is holy, He's perfect, He's just, He is without sin. Do you see the difference here between God and man? Oh, we do find the glory of God. In Romans 3, verse 23, we find the glory of God. Is it that you and I can work or somehow do something in order to obtain that glory? Let's find out. Romans 3, verse 23, here is the sobering truth. This verse says, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. You have sinned, I have sinned, we've all sinned. Therefore, because of our sin problem before God, we stand in great need to be forgiven of our sin problem. You know, a lot of people believe They believe that if you do enough good works, then they will somehow be allowed into heaven with God by their good works. But listen, it's not a matter of whether or not our good works somehow outweigh our bad works before God. The question that you and I need to answer is this, what are we going to do with our sin problem before a holy God? What are we going to do with it? Now this news is, it's heavy news. But thankfully, it doesn't stop here. God saw our sin problem. He saw that problem. He saw that we stood in need of forgiveness. So He sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to die on a cross. so that he could take our sins upon himself in order to pay the punishment that we deserve. Romans 6.23 does say, for the wages of sin is death. That death there is separation from God in a literal place called hell. But, the verse doesn't stop there. But the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. My question for you is this today. Do you believe this? That Jesus Christ alone can give you a right standing before God? Or are you trusting in your own works to save you from your sin? What is it? The people that Paul wrote to here believed in Christ alone to save them from their sin. Notice with me what Paul says in verse 13, he writes here, When you were dead in your transgressions in the uncircumcision of your flesh, Before these believers believed in Christ alone to save them from their sin, they were spiritually dead because of their transgressions or sins. Listen, there was a time before I trusted in Christ alone to save me from my sin. That I was physically alive, yet spiritually dead. I had no spiritual life in me at all. Then we read of a change in verse 13. There was a point in time when the Colossian believers believed in Christ alone to save them from their sin, rather than in their own works. And the passage says, He made you alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our transgressions. Through faith in Christ, we have been forgiven of our sin problem. You see, when we come to God, His way, and accept through faith His free gift of eternal life. Then, and only then, are we forgiven of our sin. But the key is to come to Him His way, through faith, by believing in Jesus Christ. Which then brings us to the second accomplishment that Christ accomplished as He set Himself towards the cross and died a complete death. And that's seen in verse 14. That second accomplishment is that in Christ, believers have been liberated. Liberated from what? Verse 14, having canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, which was hostile to us, and he has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. Those who think that they can somehow gain access into heaven by their good works are sadly mistaken according to this verse. Because of our sin problem, there is a certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, which is found within the law of God. God's law is absolutely perfect in nature and it shows us that we are not perfect by nature. Romans chapter 3 verses 19 through 20 elaborates on this condemnatory attribute of God's law. It says, Now we know that whatever the law says, it speaks to those who are under the law. So that every mouth may be closed, and all the world may become accountable to God. Because by the works of the law, no flesh will be justified in His sight. For through the law comes the knowledge of sin. What Christ did when He went to that cross was He took the Law of God. He fulfilled its righteous demands by dying in our place. And Jesus Christ set the Law of God aside so that we are no longer subject to it. In fact, as believers, we were made to die to the law through the body of Christ. Romans 7, verse 4 says, Therefore, my brethren, you also were made to die to the law through the body of Christ, so that you might be joined to another, to him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit for God. You see, through faith in Jesus Christ, we have been liberated from that, and we see it here in verse 14, we have been liberated from that certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, which was hostile to us by the law of God. Only Jesus Christ, listen, because of who He is, only Jesus Christ is able to do this. Because unlike us, He is God. All the fullness of deity dwells in Him. Therefore, He is absolutely sinless. So when He resurrected from the dead, Jesus Christ secured for us the work that He alone accomplished as He went to the cross, which is why Easter is so much more important than an Easter bunny. It's about a Savior who is alive and who offers life to any who would believe on Him to save them from their sins. And as we end our time here this morning, we now understand what the resurrection means for the believer, And we have seen how the resurrection accomplishes this for the believer, which brings us back to our main thought today, and that is the resurrection of Jesus Christ is the key to all of the spiritual blessings that believers possess. Let's allow this glorious truth to impact how it is that we might serve Christ in the week to come while recognizing that true satisfaction in life is found only in Him, not in anything else. True satisfaction in life is found only in a relationship with Jesus Christ. Nothing else can replace that satisfaction, that peace that comes in knowing Jesus Christ. And if you are here today and you have been trusting in your own works to be right with God, then we would like to ask you to consider this, that Jesus alone can provide a way by which you can be saved from your sin. Do you believe in Him today? Let's close in a word of prayer this morning. Heavenly Father, I want to thank you for this opportunity that we have had to come into this place. to hear your word. I want to thank you for Jesus Christ, who was the only one who was able, who was capable of taking your law and nailing it to a cross. That law that was hostile to us, that showed us our sin, and also showed us our need for a Savior. I want to thank you for the forgiveness that comes in Jesus Christ. I want to thank you for him, for his life, for his death. And Father, we thank you for his resurrection. I pray that if anyone here today has not trusted in Jesus Christ to save them from their sin, help them to realize, Lord, that they can believe in Jesus Christ at any moment in time. And I pray, Lord, that in this moment right now, if anyone here has not done that, that they would. Lord, we thank you for your promise that you have given us in your word of a savior who has taken care of your law that was against us, who has provided forgiveness and offers life. Help us to live for you in a tremendous way in the week to come. I want to thank you for that. In your name we pray. Amen.