In 1928, Donald Gray Barnhouse led a Bible conference at Montrose, Pennsylvania for about 200 young people and a few older people. One day, two old ladies complained that some of the girls were not wearing stockings. These ladies wanted Barnhouse to rebuke those young girls. Looking them straight in the eye, Barnhouse said, The Virgin Mary never wore stockings. They gasped, and they said, She didn't? Barnhouse said, No. In Mary's time, stockings were unknown. So far as we know, they were first worn by prostitutes in Italy in the 15th century, when the Renaissance began. Later, a lady of the nobility scandalized the people by wearing stockings at a court ball. Before long, everyone in the upper classes were wearing stockings, and by Queen Victoria's time, stockings had become the badge of the prude. Well, those ladies who were holdovers from the Victorian epic had no more to say to Barnhouse. He did not rebuke the girls for not wearing stockings. A year or two later, most girls in the United States were going without stockings in summer and nobody thought anything about it. two girls under attack because they weren't wearing stockings. There are all kinds of people who do those kinds of things even in our day and age. As we near the end of the church age, heretics will become more and more visible and vocal. The doctrine of demons will be presented in seductive ways that will entice many people. It will seek to rob people of confidence, rob people of value, rob people of their joy. False Christ and false doctrines will come at believers from every angle in an attempt to sway them from their focus on Jesus Christ. God never wanted His people to give in or budge one inch from their true focus on the Lord. God knew the danger and so did Paul. And even though the Colossians were disciplined and stable, they still could be swayed. So when Paul writes Colossians 2, verses 16 to 19, what he says to them is, in view of the fact that you are complete in Jesus Christ, Do not allow yourself to be judged by the legalist or robbed by the mystic. Now, I want you to notice how verse 16 begins with a conjunction, therefore. That is both inferential and continual. Being inferential, it bases the challenge on the previous verses, meaning, in view of the fact that you are complete in Christ, and in view of the fact of all that He has positionally done for you, don't allow yourself to be judged or robbed by a legalist or by a mystic. You continue in your relationship with Jesus Christ. You blossom in your relationship with Him and in your understanding of the Word of God. And do not allow a legalist or mystic to sway you by their seductive and enticing words. There will always be those, ladies and gentlemen, who will try to get you to go back under the Old Testament law. There will always be those who will try to convince you that Jesus Christ is not enough. There will always be those who will tell you you're missing some real mystical experience, and they'll also try to communicate to you that your relationship with Christ is not enough. Paul's point is, don't let that faze you one bit. You keep at your focus on Jesus Christ, you keep blossoming in your relationship with Him, because that is the key to a spiritual life. Now in Colossians 2, 16 to 19, there are two main commands that Paul gives to the Colossians. Both of them are imperative verbs. Command number one, do not let yourself be judged by the legalist. I'm reading from Colossians 2, verses 16 and 17. Therefore, no one is to act as your judge in regard to food or drink or in respect to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath day, things which are a mere shadow of what is to come, but the substance belongs to Christ. Now the present tense imperative verb, judge, with a negative prohibition, let no one judge you, let no one act as your judge, indicates that this was action that was already in progress and it needed to be stopped. In other words, there were Jewish legalists who had snuck into the church of Colossae and they were judging and they were trying to decree one's spirituality based upon one's adherence to the Old Testament law. Many of the Colossians were being pronounced as unspiritual and many of them were pronounced as being lacking in their own spiritual lives because they were not conforming to the Judaistic legalism. They were free in Christ. They were living like they were free in Christ and they were being made to feel like losers because they didn't keep the law. Now there are three specific spheres of Old Testament law that were being used as a basis for judgment against these Colossian believers. Sphere number one, believers were being judged in reference to food. Verse 16 says, let no one act as your judge in regard to food. There were some who were using the Old Testament mosaic dietary food laws as a basis for determining who was really spiritual. Now there's no question that under the Old Testament law for Israel there were strict dietary codes. Read Leviticus chapter 11, for example, and you'll see that that was true. However, it is also equally clear that those codes were completely abolished by Jesus Christ. The truth was specifically stated by Jesus Christ in Mark chapter 7 and verse 19 when he declared all foods clean. It was specifically revealed to the apostle Peter that all foods were clean and you could eat any food. and that was specifically written by the Apostle Paul in Romans 14 and verse 17. Dietary codes are gone. So any person who tries to convince you that you're more spiritual if you eat this or you don't eat that, any person who tries to say that you're more or less spiritual because of what you eat or don't eat is a legalist. And don't listen to them, and don't believe what they're telling you, and don't let them phase you one bit. Several years ago, we had some people in our ministry in the Chicago area who went to some seminar, and that seminar tried to put them back under the Old Testament law, and a few of those people started becoming convinced that they were really more spiritual and healthy if they didn't eat pork. Well, we started a series of fellowship dinners, and one of the families was in our group who was a real proponent of this idea. The host home was always that which would provide the meat, So Mary asked me, what should we have to eat for meat? And I said, without batting an eye, I want to serve ham. We will serve ham. It's time for them to grow up. And at the meal table that night, We uncovered a batch of meat which was under tinfoil, and after we blessed the food with joy in my heart, I took that tinfoil off to reveal a luscious-looking ham. I grabbed it, started passing it around. I didn't care what these legalists thought, because their ideas about you're more spiritual or less spiritual by what you eat means nothing in the mind of God. Dietary restrictions are gone. This couple needed to grow up. Now there are those today who postulate the idea that you're more spiritual if you don't eat meat, or you're more spiritual if you don't eat pork, or you're more spiritual if you don't do this or do that. That is pure nonsense. It doesn't come from the Word of God. You're spiritual by your relationship with Jesus Christ. So Paul says, don't let anyone judge you for your food. The second sphere that Paul addresses is believers were being judged in reference to drink. Verse 16 of Colossians 2 reads, Therefore, no one is to act as your judge in regard to food or drink. Now there were certain laws of drink which the Old Testament required. For example, a Nazirite, who was one completely set apart unto God in the Old Testament, was not to drink any wine, strong drink, vinegar, or grape juice. In fact, he wasn't even allowed to eat grapes during the days of his separation, according to Numbers 6, verses 2-5. He couldn't drink Welch's grape juice. He couldn't drink anything that came from the vine. Apparently these drinking codes carried over into the New Testament age because there were still some who were maintaining even in the Apostle Paul's day that real spirituality was determined by what a person did or did not drink. Now we live in a day and age in which this kind of thing is still going on. There are those who postulate the idea that you really couldn't be spiritual if you drink a glass of wine. There are those who would say, boy, there must be something wrong with your spirituality if you drink Coke, coffee, or tea. When we moved to Pocatello, Idaho, there was an older man who came and visited me from the Mormon church. At the end of our meeting, I invited him and his wife for a cup of coffee. He said, oh, we don't drink coffee. So I invited him to drink tea. Oh, we don't drink tea. So I invited him to have a can of pop. Oh, we don't drink pop. I said, okay, you come over and drink water. I'll drink all of the above. They really believe that somehow they are enhancing their spiritual life with some pseudo-spirituality of what you drink or what you don't drink. These are people who deny who Jesus Christ really is. They deny that He's second member of the Trinity. And yet they think, believe it or not, that they're somehow being more or less spiritual by not drinking a can of pop. Ladies and gentlemen, our spirituality is linked to Jesus Christ, period. It has nothing to do with what you eat or drink. It has everything to do with your relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ. Don't ever allow anyone to judge your spirituality by what you eat or drink. Now, obviously, if you're getting drunk, then judgments must be made, and that certainly is a sinful issue. But no one has a right to say that you're not spiritual because you do or you don't drink this particular drink. The third sphere in which believers were being judged is they were being judged in reference to days. In verse 16, I'm continuing to read from what Paul writes in Colossians, Now, the words in regard indicate that people were being judged as to how they shared or participated in the Old Testament legal days. The early church met together on the first day of the week, which is Sunday. Dr. John Eady says that many believers met both Saturday and Sunday, the Lord's Day. Saturday was the Sabbath, Sunday is the Lord's Day, until about AD 364, when the meeting on the Sabbath was condemned by the Council of Laodicea. Since Laodicea is named in Colossians, it's clear that this day legalism was attacking the church in Paul's day. Now there are three specific time-related Old Testament days that apparently were being used as a basis to judge the Colossians, and these Colossians who were just going to church on Sunday were being made to feel like second-class citizens in their relationship with God because of judgments that were being made against them. The three days named here all come out of the New Testament. It refers to years, months, and days. Some were being judged by their participation at yearly festivals. Now in Leviticus chapter 23 there were annual feasts or festivals of the Passover, the unleavened bread, the first fruits, the wave loaves, the trumpets, the atonement, and the tabernacles. These were separate annual feasts that were to be celebrated at specific times and they were to be celebrated in the Old Testament economy of the nation Israel in specific ways and they had specific purposes. Some of the Colossians who had come to faith in Jesus Christ were being judged on the basis of whether or not they participated in those yearly festivals. The irony of all of this is that not all of the festivals demanded by God were still being practiced, which means the legalists who were judging others were not even keeping all of the yearly festivals in their own lives. Legalists are like that. They love to walk around pointing their finger and judging others, but they don't like to deal with things in their own lives. I knew a man who judged people on the basis of the music that they liked to listen to, yet he himself was so addicted to pornography, he had a secret hiding stash in his own home, which was later uncovered and discovered. Now, this is a guy who is out protesting against music in a park, and yet in his own life, he was just a phony. That's what a legalist is. A legalist points the finger at everybody else and doesn't realize, look, you need to deal in your own life with things. The second determination is some were being judged by their participation at monthly new moons. Now every month there were special Sabbath day observances based on the position of the moon. It was important that Jews celebrate their festivals and precisely the day that God had prescribed and since they did not carry calendars in their wallets, they used the moon as a basis to determine when a new month began and when a month ended. Dr. Merrill Unger describes how Israel did this. On the 30th day of the month, watchmen were placed on commanding heights around Jerusalem to watch the sky. As soon as each of them detected the moon, he hastened to a house in the city kept for this purpose and was examined by the president of the Sanhedrin. When the evidence of the appearance was deemed satisfactory, the president stood up and formally announced it. uttering the words, it is consecrated. The religious observance of the day of the new moon may plainly be regarded as the consecration of a natural division of time. Now believers back in Paul's day were being judged as being spiritual or not spiritual on the basis of whether or not they went to these special Jewish monthly meetings. And I have known in our dispensation of time Christians who have fallen into the same trap. I've known of some women who thought that another woman couldn't be spiritual if she didn't go to their women's monthly Bible study fellowship deal. And I had a series of ladies who used to go to these kinds of things come and say to me, You know, when we go there, we discover that there's a lot of gossip that's taking place, and there's not a lot of serious study of the Word of God. The fact of the matter is, when they come to difficult passages in the Scripture, they tend to jump right over them. And yet, they were judging women who wouldn't go to these monthly Bible study fellowship meetings as lacking in spirituality, when in fact, the women who were staying home probably were some of the most spiritually minded women who were alive. See, that kind of thing still goes on today. And Paul says, don't allow anyone to judge you on the basis of their monthly meetings. And the third determination is some were being judged by their participation at weekly Sabbath days. I'm reading from Colossians chapter 2 and verse 16, or a Sabbath day. Christians met every Sunday, the first day of the week. And many of the Christians were being deemed as unspiritual and not right with God because they didn't go to all the Saturday Sabbath meetings at their local synagogues. Some were being made to feel inferior because they did not observe all of the Old Testament legal days. They were being told their commitment to Christ was lacking, that their relationship with God was lacking because they did not show up at their legal day ceremonies. Believers were being judged by their food, by their drink, by their days. Legalists were telling them their relationship with God was not complete. Their relationship with Jesus Christ was not enough to make them complete before God. And Paul is saying, I want to tell you, when you have Christ in your life, you have a full relationship with God. Don't let anyone judge you in these arenas. They don't have the right because they don't have the relationship. You know, there are churches all over the country that still judge people by these same standards today. They invent legalistic rules and laws that you cannot find in the Bible. For example, can you show me in the Bible where it says we ought to have a Good Friday service? Can you show me in the Bible where it says we ought to get people up real early in the morning on Easter and have a sunrise service? And yet, boy, I want to tell you if a church has one and some people don't show up and they just go, well, we're going to church to worship God at our normal time. That group that goes to Good Friday and sunrise services will just lash out against those who don't do that because they are branded as unspiritual and less spiritual than those who went to all of that stuff. It's the same kind of mindset that was back in Paul's day. Listen, Christians are not under the Old Testament law. Now that does not mean we're not subject to any law, because according to 1 Corinthians 9, 21, we're subject to a higher law, the law of Christ. Our goal is to take the New Testament and plug it into our lives so that we end up looking like a beautiful reflection of the glory and grace of God. And there are many New Testament biblical principles for the Grace Age that govern food, drink, and days that all fall under the umbrella of the Law of Christ. For example, according to Romans 14, I'm wrong if I judge another's spirituality on the basis of what he eats or doesn't eat. According to Romans 14, verses 5 to 6, I'm wrong if I judge another person's spirituality on the basis of his special day observances. According to Romans 14, I sin if I use my liberty concerning what I eat, drink, or I cause a weaker brother to stumble. I myself sin. According to Romans 14, I am right if I realize that not every believer will be at the same level and see things the same way. When it comes to gray areas, there are differences of opinions. According to Romans 14.22, I am right to keep my own personal liberties between myself and God. According to 1 Corinthians 14.23, if I do something that my conscience says is wrong, I do sin. And according to Hebrews 10.25, I am in disobedience if I do not attend church on a regular habitual basis. If we forsake ourselves from assembling together with other believers, we are in fact living in rebellion to the Word of God. But, having said that, we have no right to judge one another on the basis of things that aren't even scriptural. And I like what Dr. Ironside said, there's no commandment in the New Testament concerning the sacredness of the first day of the week and demanding that Christians observe it scrupulously for holy purposes, yet the consensus of judgment of spiritually minded believers all through the centuries has led to the honoring of this day as a time of worship, meditation, and Christian testimony, which has given it a preeminence from a spiritual standpoint that the Jewish Sabbath never had. Now I want you to notice what verse 17 of Colossians 2 says, Ladies and gentlemen, I want you to look at Colossians 2.17 because that gives us insight as to why we should not ever allow our spirituality to be determined by Old Testament legalistic things. Namely because all of those food regulations, all of those drink regulations, all of those day regulations were nothing more than a shadow of the real thing. And the real thing is Jesus Christ. You see, a shadow is nothing more than a dark reflection of a real substance. And the real substance that makes one right with the Holy God is found totally and completely in Jesus Christ. It's not found in what you eat or don't eat, what you drink or don't drink, or what days you observe that are these special religious holidays and festivals. All Old Testament things pictured in dark shadow form the full and finished work of Jesus Christ. Dietary codes and drinking codes pictured His body and blood. Eating or not eating, drinking or not drinking, pictured receiving Him or not receiving Him. The festivals all pictured His work. The picture is not bright. It was like a shadow, but it was there. Jesus Christ is the full substance of the law. When you have Christ in your life, no legal code has any claim on you. Dr. J. Vernon McGee said that he knew a woman who married a soldier, and while that soldier was away fighting, while he was away at war, she carried a picture of him in her wallet, in her pocketbook. And the picture was that which was reminding her of him while he was away, but when he came home, She hugged him. She embraced him, not the picture. The picture was not the real thing. She wanted her husband. Ladies and gentlemen, that is the way it is with Christ. The point is this, Jesus Christ is the real thing. So you don't want to be embracing Old Testament legalism, Old Testament law. You've got the real substance when you have Jesus Christ in your life. So if someone tries to say that you aren't right with God, because you don't observe their man-made traditions or laws or the Old Testament or the law or the codes. You tell them Christ is enough to set me free from all of that. I've been set free from the law. I've been set free from sin. And all of the codes that are in the Old Testament, He nailed it to His cross. You tell them they're trying to hold on to shadows and you've got the real substance in your life because you have Jesus Christ. Now the second command is in verses 18 to 19. Do not let yourself be robbed by a mystic. I'm reading from Colossians 2 18. Let no one keep defrauding you of your prize by delighting in self-abasement and the worship of the angels taking his stand on visions he has seen inflated without cause by his fleshly mind, and not holding fast to the head, from whom the entire body, being supplied and held together by the joints and ligaments, grows with a growth which is from God." Lost people are religious people. They do not have a true relationship with Jesus Christ. They're out to defraud you. They're out to rob you of your rewards, of your prizes, of joy. They're going to try to lure you into some bizarre form of religious ritual and legalism. And there are five ways that a mystic will try to pull you away from a true focus of Jesus Christ. Number one, a mystic will try to defraud you by false humility. Let no one keep defrauding you of your prize in self-abasement. Make no mistake about this. A heretic from hell is humble. He'll come on to you and at you with some seemingly humble and lowly spirit. But mark this and mark it well. Behind the false face of humility is a mind and heart that is so proud that it will not bend or buckle to the authority of the Word of God and truth concerning Jesus Christ. False mystics are out to give the impression they're really humble. They will walk or they'll shave their heads or they'll go door to door. They'll ride bicycles rather than drive a car. They'll wear certain clothing which appears to be very meek and meager. But I want you to know this, behind all of that is a heart that is proud and arrogant which will not bend to the true word and will of God. Don't be duped by their false humility. Secondly, a mystic will try to defraud one by false doctrine. That's what verse 18 says. And the worship of angels. A mystic is out to rob you of a relationship with God by getting your focus off of Jesus Christ onto something else, like angels. Angels are revered in most cults, even worship. Moroni is so highly esteemed in Mormonism that it sits on top of the Mormon temple. We're living in a time in which many people are getting caught up with the subject of angels as if that's the really important issue. Jesus Christ is the important issue. Any teaching or system that draws attention to angels away from Jesus Christ is a false system, and a mystic will try to pull you away from the Word of God. Thirdly, a mystic will try to defraud you by his false visions. Verse 18 says, taking his stand on visions he has seen. All heretics claim to have some special revelatory information beyond that of the Bible. All heretics claim they've seen things or they've experienced things or they have some burning in their bosom. That's just the language of all mystics that are living a lie. Listen, if it doesn't square with the Word of God, it's a lie no matter how good it sounds. Mystics will try to pull you away from the written Word of God. They'll try to pull you into their experiences and visions, from Mormons to Charismatics, from Moonies to other religious systems. The message will be the same. The Bible isn't enough. You cannot be right with God simply by a relationship with Jesus Christ and the Word of God, but you've got to have my type of experience or you've got to have extra revelation from God. It's all a lie. Don't be duped. Don't let people sway you in that direction. And thirdly, a mystic will try to defraud you by his false reasoning. Verse 18, inflated without cause by his fleshly mind. A mystic is going to try to outsmart you. Make no mistake about that. His mind is inflated and fleshly. One who denies that Jesus Christ is enough to make you right with the Holy God is one who is proud and inflated. His thinking is fleshly, not spiritual. He believes he can figure out his own way to be right with God. Other than that, which God himself says in his precious word. But the point is, a mystic does have a mind. And through his vain reasoning and twisting of reality and twisting of truth, he'll try to pull you away from a focus on the Word of God and from Jesus Christ. You see, a mystic is not interested in what says the scriptures. He's only interested in revealing his own proud, arrogant opinions and his own proud and arrogant views to try and reason you away from a real and right relationship with the Lord. And finally, Paul says, a mystic will try to defraud you from the true head. Verse 19, and not holding fast to the head from whom the entire body being supplied and held together by the joints and ligaments grows with a growth which is from God. Everything about the family of God, everything about your relationship with God is contingent upon its head and the head is Jesus Christ. He is the head. Jesus Christ is the one who holds the body together. Jesus Christ is the one who gives the family of God life. All growth and potential growth in one's relationship with God comes from one's relationship with Jesus Christ and a focus on the Word of God. A religious mystic is out to get your focus way off of Jesus Christ. He's out there to take your mind out in orbit about spirituality, invent things that aren't true. He'll take you in outer space in ways that are contrary to the Word of God. He'll rob you of your growth and strength. And Paul says to the Colossian believers, don't you be budged one inch. Don't allow anyone to move you away from your focus on Jesus Christ because that is where real growth is found. Ladies and gentlemen, when you read Colossians 2 and you come to these verses 16 to 19, you must walk away with this sense of things. We must not ever allow a legalist to judge us or let a mystic rob us. Everything we need to finish as a prize winner is found in our relationship with Jesus Christ. When you have Christ in your life, And when you're focused on the word of God, you're fellowshipping in the body of the church of God, you will grow, you will become strong, you'll become complete, and don't let anyone tell you any different. What is it that makes you right with God? Jesus Christ. And when you have Christ in your life, you are complete. Father, take your word and do a powerful work of grace in the minds of all who heard it today. In Jesus' name, amen.