If you have your copy of scripture, go ahead and turn to the book of Colossians, Colossians chapter one. We're looking this morning at verses 15 to verse 20, Colossians 1, 15 through 20. If you hit the book of Matthew in the New Testament, take a right and go ten books and you'll find Colossians, Colossians chapter one, verses 15 through 20. And I'm surprised I didn't say left because I'm horrible at that. I actually have to do L. OK. Colossians 1 15 through 20 before we do look at God's word this morning. Let's pray And let's ask his blessing on it and that he would send it out with power That we may be changed by the preaching of his word. Let's pray God, we come to you and we lift up our voices to you that you who dwell in unapproachable light, which no man has seen or can see, would reveal yourself in your son, Jesus Christ, who is the exact representation of your person, who is the brightness of your glory. That Father, you would reveal yourself to us in the one who said, if you have seen me, you have seen the Father. We pray that you would help us, Lord, as we come to some of the deepest and most profound mysteries in all of the scriptures, in all of the universe, in all of reality, that Father, you would do the glorification work that You do of Yourself and Your Son in the power of Your Spirit. We pray that Your Word would come with clarity and boldness and conviction, that You would make us attentive, that You would remove all distractions, that You would give both the one who preaches and those that hear grace, that we might do these things as an act of worship. Father, we plead with You. We plead with You to bless the preaching of the Word this morning. We ask these things in Jesus' name. Amen. Colossians 1, beginning in verse 15. I'll back up to verse 13 for us for the context. There, the apostle has said that God the Father has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. And then he writes, 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 or consist. And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the first born from the dead, that in everything he might have preeminence. 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." This ends the reading of God's wholly inspired and inerrant word to us this morning. Well, a few years ago, I was having a conversation with a friend who is a somewhat well-known author and theologian about a book that he had just written and had just come out, had just been published, and my friend was telling me how he had been at a convention of Christian authors, and it was one of the largest Christian book conventions in North America, and that a woman who was a journalist for a well-known Christian magazine had asked if she could interview him because the sale of his book had gone so well and she wanted to go around and talk to all the best-selling Christian authors at this convention and what my friend went on to tell me was that she actually sat down with him and and started the interview by asking him how it was that his book sold as well as it did. And my friend didn't really understand why she was asking this question. You don't ask someone why your book sells so well. A book sells well because it has something to offer, something to say, and people want to read it. But what the newspaper or the magazine journalist was asking my friend this question for was because the cover of my friend's books, which one of our congregants actually designed, had a bubble word caption that said Jesus. And that was all it said on the front cover. And the journalist went on to tell my friend that his was the only book in the history of all the conventions she had ever done that had the word Christ or Jesus in it that was a bestseller. There had been myriads of books about spirituality, about wholeness and fullness, about financial security, about spiritual fullness. in all of these ways to have a great marriage, all these ways to have all these practical things that Christians seem so caught up with. And my friend had written a book about Jesus as an evangelist out of the fourth gospel, and the front cover merely said Jesus on it. Now, it shouldn't really surprise us. It shouldn't really surprise us. The journalists surprised about my friend's book. And it's it's selling so well because the Apostle Paul here in Colossians is dealing with really the same problem. The gospel had come to the Colossians through this guy named Epaphras, this minister friend of Paul's. And the gospel had taken root. And these people who were basically pagans to the core, idolaters to the core, never hearing anything about God or Jesus Christ, had believed the gospel. Their lives had been changed. The gospel had taken root. And along comes another group, just like in Galatians, you had the Judaizers. Here comes another group telling these new converts, well, if you really want fullness, If you really want knowledge, if you really want to grow in spirituality, if you really want to grow in wholeness, What you need is some special knowledge. And in chapter two of this book, Paul go on to say they came and they talked about philosophy and they talked about angels. They talked about angel worship and they talked about dietary laws. And it was probably an amalgamation of all of those things, philosophy and angel worship and dietary laws, ceremonial rituals. And they were saying, if you really want it to be complete, you need all of these things. You need to know about all these things. So the Apostle Paul confronting that issue, he confronts it very basically. He takes the doctrine of Jesus and he holds it in front of him and he says, all of those issues, all of them, are resolved in the person and the saving work of Jesus. And if you want fullness, and if you want completion, and if you want wholeness, and if you want to be filled, you need one who is himself the infinitely full God. One who is himself a fountain of living waters, one who in himself can say to you, if you knew who I was, you would come to me and I would give you living water and you would never thirst. One who can satisfy the deepest needs of men and women, not just at the beginning of the Christian life, not just when you first believe, but throughout the Christian life. And so Paul solves this dilemma just as my friend did by writing a book about Jesus. Paul has written under inspiration of the Holy Spirit in Colossians, a book about Jesus and about fullness in him. Well, we're going to see this morning three things. First, we're going to see as Paul begins to unpack this, he's just told them, he's just told the Colossians that they have the forgiveness of sins in Jesus. And so it would be fitting for him then to tell them more about this one in whom they have the forgiveness of sins. And he's going to tell them three things. First, he's going to say that Christ is the creator of everything. Christ is the creator of everything. And then secondly, he's going to tell them that Christ is the sustainer of everything. And then finally, he's going to tell them that Christ, that Christ Jesus himself is the builder of the church, that he is the creator, that he is the sustainer, and that he is the redeemer of God's people. We'll notice there in verse 15 that Paul begins what is really one of two descriptions about Jesus in the Bible that is the most magnificent, the most grand, the most glorious way you could ever think about Jesus. He says he is the image of the invisible God. Now, interestingly, Paul is saying you can't see God. You can't see God. That's a big hang up for a lot of people. Well, I can't see God. I would believe I would believe him if I could see him. I've had many people tell me. If I could see God, I would believe him. Let me put this as frankly as I can. People saw Jesus and still didn't believe. He is the image of the invisible God. When men saw Jesus, they saw God. They didn't see a God. They didn't see one who wanted to be like God. They saw God. They didn't see a God consciousness in Jesus. They saw God in Jesus. because Jesus is God. And the Apostle Paul is going to say that Jesus is the very image, the very image, not like Adam and us being the imago Dei, the stamped image upon us. We are the imago Dei. We are the image of God in Adam. But Jesus is the very substantive, equal with God image of God. He is, in the words of Jonathan Edwards, God appearing to himself. Jesus is God appearing to himself. In the Godhead, there are three persons, the Father, the Son and the Spirit, and the Father and the Son. delight in each other, have mutual enjoyment of one another, fellowship with each other. Jesus is God appearing to the Father, the Father is God appearing to the Son, and Jesus entering into time and space, taking a human nature to himself, is God manifest in the flesh. And so when we read the Gospels, and we see this man, this man Jesus, this poor Galilean carpenter, going around working miracles, healing people, raising the dead, teaching things that men had never heard, saying things that men had only wished they could have heard, seeing before their eyes things that no one ever had seen, and then raising himself from the dead after suffering a shameful death on the cross. When you see that Jesus from the manger to the grave, you are to think this is God. I remember as a boy, children, I grew up in church and I remember one sermon because I had a dead evil, unbelieving heart. I remember one sermon. It was on Palm Sunday and a minister was preaching emphatically about Jesus coming into Jerusalem on the donkey. And he said, it is God on the donkey. It is God on the donkey. And for whatever reason, I remember that only thing I remember from a boy in church, it is God the donkey and so the Apostle Paul says he is the image of the invisible God the firstborn of all creation now he is not saying he was created don't get hung up like the cults do because the Apostle will go on to say he's greater than the angels so if he's greater than the angels and he's greater than men he can't be an angel and he's more than a man because he's over all creation and the Apostle is going to say he creates all things but He is the firstborn of all creation. He is the eternally begotten Son. The Father begets the Son in eternity from eternity. He has no beginning, but it is given to Him to be the Son. He is not the Father. And so Jesus actually reveals the Father to us. He reveals God the Father. He says to Philip in John 14, Philip says, show us the Father. And it's sufficient. And Jesus says, how long? Have I been with you, Philip? And do you not know me? He who has seen me has seen the father. The father was in the son, but the son is the son. The father is the father. The son is begotten of the father. And the father gave it to the son to be the one over all creation. Now, notice what Paul's going to say. He's going to say that Christ is the Christ of creation. He's going to say in verse 16, by him. All things were created. In Greek, it's panta, all, it means all. It's a very special word, it means all. By him, all things were created in heaven or on earth. Now, that excludes any other sphere of anything. Heaven or earth. Everything that's created, anything, the tiniest atom and everything in that atom that holds that atom together was created by Jesus. The sun and the moon and the stars were created by Him. The angels were created by Him. Man was created by Him. The animals were created by Him. The world was created by Him. Space, to the deepest parts of space that we have no idea how far space reaches, were created by Jesus. Whatever has been made was made by Him. John will tell us in the Gospel, John, that Jesus, the Word, was with God, and He was God, and then He'll say, all things were made by Him, and without Him, nothing was made that was made. Without Jesus, nothing was made that was made. Now, that makes Jesus supremely important. That makes Jesus supremely important because Jesus isn't a man that began to exist in 86. AD 6 or whenever he's born in the manger. That's not when Jesus began Christ Existed as the eternal Son of God equal with the Father from eternity and he made all things and so when we read in Genesis 1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth we read by apostolic authority in the beginning Christ Created the heavens and the earth Now, that has enormous implications, not just to answer an intellectual itch about whether I believe in creation or whether I believe that man is, you know, a homo sapien sapien that evolves through some long process of billions of years. That's not why we're being told that we're being told that so that you would know that there's nothing in this world that can be interpreted or understood or truly known without knowing Christ. St. Clair Ferguson puts it so wonderfully, the humblest Christian who knows Christ knows something about everything without knowing everything about anything. The humblest Christian who knows Christ knows something about everything without knowing everything about anything. Because Jesus Christ has made this world, that means the trees outside, the sun in the sky, the clouds, the moon, the stars, it was all made by Jesus. And Paul will go on, notice what he'll say, He'll say it was made by him and he'll go on to actually say it was made for him. For by him, all things were created in heaven and earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities, all things were created through him and for him. This world was not created for you. This world was not created for you to stomp around and enjoy and do what you want to do. This world was created for Jesus. It was created by Jesus. through the authority of the Father and working of the Spirit for Christ. That means that the entire world and all the nations and all the kingdoms and all the political powers and all of the people who practice other religions were created to worship Jesus. Because this is His world. His stamp is on it. There is no place under heaven, in the words of Abraham Kuyper, that Jesus doesn't say, mine. There's nothing. There's no place. He made it all for His glory. He made it all for His honor. And I imagine if you created the world, it would be wrong for you not to say that you created it for yourself. If you create the world out of nothing, you get to say, mine. And Jesus does that and He says, mine, mine, mine, mine, mine. And that means anybody sitting here. Even if you don't belong to him savingly, nevertheless, you are his creature and you were created for him and you were created by him. And all the mysteries of the universe can only be understood in him. All the fullness is in him. Notice what Paul will actually say. Notice what Paul will actually say in verse 18, he is the head of the church, the body, he is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he may have the preeminence in verse 19, For in him, all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell. Now, there's another reason why Paul's telling us that Jesus was God and man. Yes, God and man in two persons, the infinite God, the finite man united together in one person, two natures, one person, two natures, one person. Paul's telling us that because of verse 14, because notice what he says in verse 14. He says, in him we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. And so the question, the great question that Paul is tackling here, and what he's saying explicitly, which he's been hinting at all through this book, he is saying that the blood that Jesus shed at the cross was the blood of God. Now, God doesn't have blood. God's a spirit. He's infinite. He's eternal. He's unchangeable in his being, wisdom, power, wholeness, justice, goodness, and truth. He is all those things. And yet the blood that Jesus shed at the cross is counted as blood of infinite value because it's the blood of the one who is himself God and man in one person. And so when God the father sees the blood of his son at the cross, he is satisfied. His wrath is satisfied. Now, let me say, let me say that The beauty of Christianity is that it's the only, if I may say this cautiously, logical, it's the only logical system of explanation of anything. How can someone that is not of infinite value redeem a multitude of people? How can someone who is only equal in value to you, another person, redeem more than just another person? How can someone's soul substitute for another's soul unless they are of more value? Now, Jesus being God is of infinite value. He is of eternal value. The Father chose the Son to be the Redeemer in eternity. The Son said, yes, my Father, I will go. I will lay down my life for them. I will shed my blood for them. And the Father said, when you do, my son, I will see that blood and that blood will be a sufficient sacrifice for all the sins of all my people who have offended an infinite and eternal God. Our sin necessitates that the creator of the universe come and shed his blood to pay that price. Now, I don't know about you, but I could sit probably all day and just think about that, that if indeed Christ is the creator with the father and the spirit, and we are creatures who have rebelled against him, denied him, rejected him, hated him. The Bible says we hated him. But then he, of his own accord, comes and lays down his life for us and sheds his blood for us. And the creator against whom we sin redeems us through that blood and forgives us and does everything for us. How could we not marvel at the infinite wisdom? The infinite wisdom. Listen, Christianity in America, I fear, is missing this. Paul doesn't want us to miss that. He's saying he's the creator. And that means that he is a sufficient redeemer. And so that's where Paul is going. Look at verse 18. He is the head of the body of the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might have preeminence. So because he is the creator, he is a sufficient redeemer. He is creator. He is sustainer. He is redeemer. He is sustainer. He is sustainer in that he carries all things along, that Jesus right now upholds all things. Because he is God, he has that right. We're not deists. We don't believe God wound the world up and let it go and you and I just do what we want. And, you know, we don't know if he's really intimately involved. The Apostle Paul says that he is sustaining all things by the word of his power. The writer of Hebrews says he's carrying everything along, that everything that happens, everything. Let me say this as emphatically as I can, because you may never hear this again in your life. Everything that happens, God is in control of, has ordained, has decreed, and Jesus is upholding. All the good, all the bad. It doesn't make Him evil. It makes Him in control. It does not make Him evil. It makes Him God. He is in control of everything. He sustains everything. There's no chance. There's no coincidence. There's no fate. There's no destiny. There's God's constant upholding of His eternal purposes in Jesus Christ. And Jesus is in charge, and that means, for us, which we'll get to in a second, is the church. That means that we have a Christ we can trust in difficult times, in hard times, in perilous times, through anything that we may go through, because we know that he is upholding all things, that all things hold together in him. And then Paul says, he is the head of the church. Now, if you were to ask the average Christian, what is a bigger deal? Creating the world or creating the church? I never do dialogue with you all, but I want to hear an answer. What do you think is the bigger deal, creating the world or creating the church? Everybody's following Bill here. Creating the church is a vastly bigger deal than Christ creating the world. Let me read to you the words of one author. He says, Christ is the architect of the world and its constructor in a sense in which none could be who is not divine. He is no less than God. He is God, the Son, God so conditioned that he is the sent one of the Father, but nevertheless, God. We saw him already in this chapter placed before us in his majesty as the originator of the material universe to whom the starry skies are but his robe. to be put on and put off in season, but here he is the doer of a yet more wonderful achievement. He is the builder of the church of the faithful. It is a bigger deal that the Christ who is creator would condescend and save anybody and build a church in this world and do anything for people like us that don't deserve it. That is a huge deal, that the God who should destroy us in his wrath saves us in his mercy, that the God who should want nothing to do because we so marred his image, we have so marred the image in which man was created, that he would enter into time and space and shed his blood for you and me. That is a vastly bigger deal than him creating everything out of nothing. And so when I hear the debates about creation and evolution, and I think about the gospel, I think, Why are we not focusing more on the significance, so much more on the significance of what Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the Eternal Son, accomplished at the cross? Well, notice what Paul says in talking about Jesus's building of the church. He says, in verse 18, that he is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead. Now, what does he mean by that? What he means by that is that when Jesus stepped out of the tomb on the third day, he stepped out as the head of a new humanity, having redeemed not just people, but a new creation, having redeemed the people for himself, who in his resurrection, our resurrection is secure. In his resurrection, our resurrection is secure. Again, Sinclair Ferguson has a great illustration. When the first man walked in the moon and they said, this is one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind. Jesus stepped out of that tomb. It was one small step for Jesus. It was one giant leap for people that needed to be redeemed. He is the head. He is the firstborn. He is the head of a new humanity, of a new creation. You know, it would do us no good. Let me say this very clearly this morning. It would do you no good to have God in heaven representing you if he did not have a human nature. It would do you no good as fallen sinners to have God representing you in heaven without a human nature because what Christ has done in being the firstborn from the dead is that now a man sits on the throne of God. A man sits on the throne of God. The universe is being ruled by a man, the God-man Jesus Christ. Let me say that. There's no more profound thought than that. The head of a new humanity, not an angel, not an animal, a man is sitting on the throne of God. The God-man Jesus Christ is representing those he came to redeem. All those who believe in him are being represented by him. The Apostle Paul would say, you, you, if you believe in him, are seated with him in the heavenly places. That changes everything for us because at the end of the day, when I say, how do I know? How do I know that I'm going to heaven? How do I know that God will accept me? How do I know that my sins are forgiven? How do I know whether I'm going to make it from here to there when I pass through the darkness of death? I don't care what Steve Jobs says. I don't. Death is not a good thing. It's not the best invention of man. It is our enemy, the Bible says. And if you're honest with yourself, death is a frightening thing. the fact that there is a risen Christ sitting on the throne of God representing us who have believed in him is what quiets our hearts, what makes us know that we will make it from here to there, and what secures for us the inheritance and everything else that God has for us all by grace, all by his mercy, all through the shed blood and resurrection of Jesus. And so, and so, You can see how Paul now in verse 19 wraps this first part of this section up. He says, 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 through the blood of his cross. This is the greatest statement, the greatest summary statement of what Jesus has accomplished. He has reconciled things on earth and in heaven through the blood of his cross. When he shed his blood, what he did was he enabled Adam and Gabriel the Archangel to embrace in the heavenly places. He reconciled everything in heaven everything on earth He reconciled for himself the world that he created by himself and for himself through the shutting of his blood How precious must the blood of Jesus be? How powerful must the blood of Jesus be? Let me tell you this morning if all that I've said is true and it is I How much should we not value the blood of Jesus for our own souls? We've been reconciled. We have been reconciled to God through the blood of the cross of Jesus. He has made peace. I love the quote of John Bunyan. Bunyan wrote the second bestselling book in Christendom, Pilgrim's Progress, and he was in jail for 12 years for doing what I'm doing right now. And Bunyan, but better, obviously, Bunyan was wrestling in his autobiography, Grace Abounding for the Chiefest Sinners, he was wrestling with the sinfulness of his soul. He was wrestling with the weight of all the wrong that he had done. You know, godly people know how bad they are. That's one of the beautiful things about the gospel. Godly people know how bad they are. And Bunyan was doubting his assurance. He was doubting his salvation. And he started meditating on this verse. He has made peace through the blood of his cross. And he said, as I walked through the field and I was musing and meditating on the wickedness and blasphemy in my heart, I thought about that verse. He has made peace through the blood of his cross. And I thought to myself, it's through that blood that God and my soul are friends and can kiss and embrace through that blood. He said that was a good day. I shall hope I will never forget it. By that blood, God and my sinful soul can embrace and kiss and will forever, forever be filled with the fullness of Jesus Christ. Jesus prayed, last thing I'll say this morning, John 17, going to the cross, final prayer. Jesus prayed that his father would bring those who the father had given him, those who would believe, to him that they may be with him and see his glory. What we're hearing about is about the glory of Jesus. That's it. It's nothing else. There's nothing else. Let me say, if you have a bad marriage, that's the solution. Seeing the glory of Jesus in your family. Having Christ as the head of your family and your marriage. You have friends that you care about that are lost. Jesus is the answer to their needs, their deepest needs. You have someone suffering. Jesus Christ, the creator of the universe, suffered infinitely more than anybody we know will ever suffer. and he did it, that he might reconcile all things in heaven and earth, and that you might be filled with the fullness of God. Let him who has ears to hear, let him hear this morning what the Spirit says to the church. Let's pray. Lord, these are mysteries too great for me to ever adequately present and proclaim to these people that you have drawn here. These are mysteries too great for us to get our minds around, and yet they are mysteries you have revealed in your word. You have revealed them for our good, for our salvation, for our fullness in Christian living. Father, we thank You that in Your Son dwelt all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. We thank You, Lord Jesus, that You are the head of the church, that You have raised us up with You when You came out of the tomb, that we came out with You as new creatures, part of the new creation. We thank You that You are now the man, Christ Jesus, glorified, sitting on the throne of Your Father. We pray that You would draw each one in this room to You. And Lord Jesus, we pray that You would again pray for us that we might be with you to see your glory as the one who has reconciled all things in heaven and earth. Lord Jesus, we pray that you would meet with us as we continue to worship this morning and we pray these things in your name. Amen.