Side Slips Forgiven

And you, being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He has made alive together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses. (Colossians 2:13)

The Greek word for “trespasses,” paraptoma is an interesting one. Strong’s Greek Dictionary calls it a “side slip,” which puts me in mind of Paul Simon’s old song, “Slip Sliding Away.” Vine’s Expository Dictionary calls it “a false step, a blunder.” The Bauer-Ardnt-Gingrich Greek Lexicon calls it a “false step.” Our English word “trespass” comes from a compound Latin word that literally means to “pass across.”

In the Bible, “trespass” refers to stepping outside the boundaries of God’s law, whether by unintentional error or by willful transgression. The result is death, and it affected us all, just as we were also all affected by what Paul calls “the uncircumcision of your flesh” — human nature in rebellion against God and devoid of the life that comes from Him (see Circumcision of the Heart). The good news is that though we were once dead in these things, we have been made alive together with King Jesus the Messiah. This is possible because, in Jesus, God has forgiven us all our trespasses.

The Greek word for “forgiven” here, charizomai, is not the one we usually find in the New Testament, though Paul does favor it in his letters. The root word is charis, “grace” or “favor.” Charizomai speaks of what is given or granted or released because of grace. Our English word “forgive” derives from the Latin word, perdonare (“pardon”), which means to give thoroughly or wholeheartedly. So it is a good translation here. In Jesus, God has graciously pardoned us, released us from all the ways we have violated His commandments.

There is more to it, as we will see in the next verse. But I will talk about in the next post. I am trying to keep my posts shorter, although that can be difficult because Paul’s letter to the Jesus believers at Colosse is so rich.

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The Focus of Our Faith
Paul’s Letters to the Jesus Believers at Colosse
Bite-Size Studies Through Colossians
by Jeff Doles

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Available in paperback and Kindle (Amazon), epub (Google and iTunes) and PDF.

Buried with Jesus, Raised with Jesus

Buried with Him in baptism, in which you also were raised with Him through faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead. (Colossians 2:12)

Paul quickly moves from one sign to another, from circumcision to baptism. In verse 11, he contrasted physical circumcision with a non-physical one, a circumcision of the heart. This circumcision is one Jesus does for us and is “made without hands.” It is the “putting off the body of the sins of the flesh.” That is, it frees us from the sinfulness of human nature, which is put off, stripped from us like old clothes, because it is dead and does not have the life that comes from God.

All that is left for a body that is dead is to be buried. Which brings us to verse 12, where Paul explains to the believers at Colosse that they were buried together with Him in baptism. Baptism was practiced in the Old Testament as “various washings” (Hebrews 9:10), rituals of purification. But in the New Testament it is given new meaning for the community of Jesus believers. It signifies the spiritual circumcision that Jesus has performed for us. It says that we are dead to sin and that we have been buried together with Jesus, as if in the tomb. But that is not all, for we have also been raised with Him.

Pay close attention to tense, voice and mood in this verse: “Buried with Him” and “raised with Him” are in the Greek aorist tense, indicating completed action. Both are in the passive voice, indicating what was done to and for us, not something we did for ourselves. However, the moods are different. “Buried” is a participle — “having been buried,” as the Lexham English Bible has it — and “raised” is in the indicative mood. The two go together: having been buried with Him, we have also been raised with Him. Baptism signifies both!

Just as Jesus was buried but did not remain in the grave, because God raised Him up, so baptism shows that that we, too, have been “buried together with Him” and also “raised together with Him.” Baptism is a physical sign indicating a spiritual reality, but there is also a physical resurrection coming, of which the resurrection of Jesus’ physical body from the dead is the beginning (Paul details this in 1 Corinthians 15). So baptism also prophesies our future bodily resurrection even as it portrays Jesus’ own bodily resurrection.

However, we have already been raised spiritually with Jesus. How was this done? The NKJV says it was “through faith in the working of God,” as do many other versions. So it is usually taken to mean that God raised us up through our faith in the working of God, or that we appropriate this truth through our faith. Indeed, we do come to God by faith. “By grace you have been saved through faith,” Paul says (Ephesians 2:8). However, although the Greek text can be translated as “through faith in the working of God” it can also be “through the faith of the working of God.”

So there is another way of approaching this. Actually, there are a few different ways. One is to take it as Weymouth translates it in his New Testament in Modern Speech: “through faith produced within you by God.” Adam Clarke’s commentary also treats it this way, as faith produced by the working, or energy (the Greek word for “working” is energeo) of God. This would go along with what Paul teaches us elsewhere, faith is the gift of God (Ephesians 2:8) and comes by hearing the Word of God (Romans 10:17).

Yet there is still another way to translate this phrase, and the one I am most inclined to. The Greek word for “faith,” pistis, can also mean “faithfulness,” and I think this is one place where that fits better. The emphasis here is not on us but on Jesus, in whom all the fullness of God dwells in bodily form (Colossians 2:9), and what He is doing in us. It seems to me, then, that what Paul has in mind here is not so much about our faith, even though that faith comes to us from God, as it is about God’s faithfulness.

Having been buried together with Jesus, we have also been raised up together with Him through the faithfulness of God’s work. Baptism is an outward, visible sign of this inward, invisible condition.

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The Focus of Our Faith
Paul’s Letters to the Jesus Believers at Colosse
Bite-Size Studies Through Colossians
by Jeff Doles

Preview with Amazon’s “Look Inside.”

Available in paperback and Kindle (Amazon), epub (Google and iTunes) and PDF.

Circumcision of the Heart

In Him you were also circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the sins of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ. (Colossians 2:11)

Here we see one of the issues of the Judaizing influence that was trying to make its way into the Church at Colosse: the matter of circumcision (removal of the foreskin). In the Old Testament, circumcision was a token of the covenant God made with Abraham (Genesis 17:11-14) and was passed down to his descendants as a sign. Every male Israelite was to be circumcised. It marked them out as belonging to the chosen people.

Now there were Jewish teachers coming into the churches, saying that Gentiles who believed in Jesus, the Jewish Messiah, needed to be circumcised, and this would make them full and complete members of the people of God. That is contrary to the heart of the gospel, which is that we are made complete in Jesus the Messiah, who is ruler over every principality and power, and in whom all the fullness of God dwells in bodily form (Colossians 2:10).

And yet there is still a circumcision for all those who are in Jesus. As important a sign as physical circumcision was in the Old Testament, and one commanded by God, God was much more concerned with what was going in the heart, the inward reality of which circumcision was meant to be the outward sign:

Therefore circumcise the foreskin of your heart, and be stiff-necked no longer. (Deuteronomy 10:16)

And the LORD your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your descendants, to love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live. (Deuteronomy 30:6)

Circumcise yourselves to the LORD, and take away the foreskins of your hearts. (Jeremiah 4:4)

The physical rite was the cutting away of the flesh and symbolized faithfulness to the covenant God made with Israel. Removing that little fold of skin, however, could not produce what it signified. But Jesus has accomplished for us what physical circumcision never could. Paul says, “In Him you were circumcised.” The Greek text has it in the aorist tense and passive voice. The aorist tense means that it has been completed; the passive voice means that it was something done for us, not something we did for ourselves.

This circumcision is one “made without hands.” Not a physical one performed by a man with a knife, but a circumcision of the heart. “Putting off the body of the flesh,” is how Paul has it here (in the oldest Greek manuscripts). The NIV says, “the putting off of the sinful nature.” Paul frequently used the word “flesh” (Greek, sarx) to refer to human sinfulness, the state of those without the life and power of God at work in them. The circumcision Jesus performs, the circumcision of the heart, frees us from the deadness of our fallen human nature and breathes new life, divine life, the life of the Spirit of God, into us.

In the Old Testament, circumcision was a sign of who God’s chosen people were, through whom He would bring the redemption of the whole world. Now what matters is not circumcision or uncircumcision, but “faith working through love” (Galatians 5:6). What Paul means is faith in Jesus, God’s Messiah, Redeemer of the whole world, His love working in and through us.

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The Focus of Our Faith
Paul’s Letters to the Jesus Believers at Colosse
Bite-Size Studies Through Colossians
by Jeff Doles

Preview with Amazon’s “Look Inside.”

Available in paperback and Kindle (Amazon), epub (Google and iTunes) and PDF.

His Fullness and Ours

For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily; and you are complete in Him, who is the head of all principality and power. (Colossians 2:9-10)

There are two mysteries Paul is speaking of here and the second is dependent upon the first: In Jesus the Messiah all the fullness of the Godhead dwells in bodily form. And in Him, Jesus, we have ourselves been made full. Paul’s concern is that we be not robbed — plundered! — of these twin truths. For it is in these, not in Jewish ethnos and ritual or pagan mysticism, that we discover all fullness. And it is “fullness” (Greek, pleroma) that the false teachers were offering, through ascetic practices and the worship of angels, but were not able to deliver.

All the fullness of God dwells in bodily form. This goes back to Colossians 1:19, where Paul identifies it as a matter of God’s sovereign pleasure that all the divine fullness should dwell in Jesus. Now he tweaks that to emphasize that this fullness dwells bodily, in human form. John says the same thing, though in a different way: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God … and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:1, 14). The nature of this fullness is such that Jesus declared, “He who has seen Me has seen the Father … Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father in Me” (John 14:9, 11).

Everything God is can be found in Jesus. Indeed, everything God is, Jesus is. All the fullness of humanity and all the fullness of divinity are in Him. He is not half and half, half human and half divine; He is fully both, fully human and fully divine. He is not the demigod the false teachers might have supposed Him to be; He is the God-man!

Jesus is filled with all the fullness of God, and those who belong to Jesus are filled with Him. Earlier, Paul revealed the mystery, “Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Colossians 1:29). Jesus is in the Father, and we are in Jesus, and being in Jesus, we are “complete.” The Greek word (pleroo, from which comes pleroma) means to be full or fulfilled and is set in the perfect tense and the passive voice. The perfect tense refers to something that has done; the passive voice means that it has been done to or for us, not something we have done to or for ourselves. So, in Jesus we have been made full, with the result that we are now — already! — full and complete in Him.

What the false teachers offered, through the tradition of men and the elemental spirits, but could not deliver, has been done for us in Jesus the Messiah. And now Paul adds a stinger: This same Jesus is the head over all principality and power. This goes back to Colossians 1:16, where Paul teaches that Jesus is the creator of all things “visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers.” All of them, including whatever angels and spirits there may be, have been created through Him and for Him. He is Lord over them all, and He is in us and we are in Him.

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The Focus of Our Faith
Paul’s Letters to the Jesus Believers at Colosse
Bite-Size Studies Through Colossians
by Jeff Doles

Preview with Amazon’s “Look Inside.”

Available in paperback and Kindle (Amazon), epub (Google and iTunes) and PDF.

Don’t Be Plundered

Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of men, according to the basic principles of the world, and not according to Christ. For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily; and you are complete in Him, who is the head of all principality and power. (Colossians 2:8-10)

“Beware.” The Greek word behind it literally means “to see,” but Paul uses it here to warn the Jesus believers at Colosse: “Be careful that nobody spoils your faith through intellectualism or high-sounding nonsense” (J. B. Phillips, The New Testament in Modern English). “Watch out for people who try to dazzle you with big words and intellectual double-talk. They want to drag you off into endless arguments that never amount to anything” (The Message). There are people who would “cheat” you — literally, to take you captive and carry you away as spoil — to plunder you!

Paul does not mean that all philosophy is “vain deceit,” he has a particular one in mind. The Greek word philosophia literally means “love of wisdom” (philo, love and sophia, wisdom). The false teachers Paul warns about presented themselves as possessing a special, secret wisdom not available to everyone. They learned to speak persuasively but their philosophy was hollow and deceptive, a toxic mixture of Jewish and pagan folk religion, mystical tradition and occultic teaching that was very strong in the region.

“Tradition of men” and “basic principles of the world” (stoicheion) is how Paul calls it. The “basic principles” are elemental spirits of nature, the worship of which is what these false teachers were promoting (as we will see later). The Message puts it this way: “They spread their ideas through the empty traditions of human beings and the empty superstitions of spirit beings.”

Paul chided the believers at Galatia over the same sort of issue: “But now after you have known God, or rather are known by God, how is it that you turn again to the weak and beggarly elements [stoicheion], to which you desire again to be in bondage?” (Galatians 4:9). These were pagan ways of thinking, dressed in Jewish garb and presented as Christian faith. But they were seriously out of alignment with who Jesus is and what He came to do.

That is how such false teachers would plunder us, by pulling us away from Jesus. They cannot pull Him away from us, because He will never deny His own. But they can waste our lives away — our life with Him — by “high-sounding nonsense” and “endless arguments that never amount to anything.” That would be a great tragedy, because it is in Jesus, not in human traditions or elemental spirits, that all the fullness of God dwells. And it is in Him alone that we are “complete,” literally, have been made full. In other words, we share in His fullness!

Be very watchful, then, and don’t let yourself be plundered and pulled away from Jesus as the center of your faith and life.

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The Focus of Our Faith
Paul’s Letters to the Jesus Believers at Colosse
Bite-Size Studies Through Colossians
by Jeff Doles

Preview with Amazon’s “Look Inside.”

Available in paperback and Kindle (Amazon), epub (Google and iTunes) and PDF.

Rooted and Built Up in Jesus

As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, rooted and built up in Him and established in the faith, as you have been taught, abounding in it with thanksgiving. (Colossians 2:6-7)

Paul wants the Jesus believers as Colosse to continue living according to who Jesus is: both Messiah and Lord. They have begun in that faith and now he wants them to “walk it out.”

Verse 7 elaborates. Paul speaks of being “rooted and built up.” Mixing these metaphors is not new for Paul, and that should probably tell us something about how important they are for our understanding. In Ephesians 3:17, he speaks of believers being “rooted and grounded in love.” In 1 Corinthians 3:9, he says, “For we are God’s fellow workers; you are God’s field, you are God’s building.”

“Rooted” is an agricultural metaphor; “built up” is an architectural one. Craig Keener, in The IVP Bible Background Commentary says of this verse, “The Old Testament prophets used this language for Israel (if they obeyed God, they would take root, be planted, built up, etc.), and early Christians probably took this language from their preaching of the Old Testament.” Use of this kind of language identifies the New Testament Church along with obedient Old Testament Israel as the people of God.

We should pay attention to the tenses of these words, though they are not readily apparent in most English translations. Wuest’s New Testament: An Expanded Translation, however, captures them well: “having been rooted with the result that your are firmly established, and constantly being built up in Him and constantly being established with reference to the Faith.”

In the Greek text, the word for “rooted” is a perfect, passive participle. The perfect tense means that it is something that has already been done, with results that continue. The passive voice means that is some that has happened to us. God is the one who roots us in Jesus.

The Old Testament often spoke of the people of the Lord as being “planted.” For example, those who delight in His instruction are like trees “planted by rivers of water, that brings forth fruit in its season” (Psalm 1:3). In another psalm, the writer sings about God’s relationship with Israel, “You have brought a vine out of Egypt; You have cast out the nations, and planted it” (Psalm 80:8-9). The prophet Isaiah speaks of Messiah, who will come to comfort all those who mourn in Zion, “that they may be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that He may be glorified” (Isaiah 61:3). This is the work of God in our lives.

In Colossians 2:7, the word for “built up” is a present, passive participles. The present tense, in Greek, speaks of a continuing process. Paul shifts metaphors with “built up,” which gives us a picture of construction. We are God’s building, “having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone” (Ephesians 2:20) But we are a particular kind of building: “in whom the whole building, being fitted together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord, in whom you also are being built together for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit” (Ephesians 2:21-22). We are God’s temple, being built together (not just as individuals but as God’s people) to be a dwelling place for Himself. Peter picks up the same theme in his letter, teaching us that we, “as living stones, are being built up a spiritual house,” with Jesus as the chief cornerstone (1 Peter 2:-6). Again, this is the work of God in our lives.

The word for “established,” bebaioo, is also a present, passive participle, indicating a continuing process. It is a word about firmness and stability, and it is used here of being stabilized in the faith. Not just “in faith” but “in the faith.” The content of faith is as important as the act of believing it, and the content Paul has in mind is the Messiah, Jesus, the Lord. The NIV translates bebaioo as “strengthened.” In stability there is strength. As we continue to “walk” in Jesus, we will become stronger in the faith, being strengthened by God. We will not be confused or wavering in faith, nor susceptible to those who would try to charm us away from Jesus.

“As you have been taught.” The believers at Colosse had received the good news about the Lord Jesus from Epaphras (Colossians 1:7). This is the same faith Paul taught, and it stands in sharp contrast to the message being brought by the Gnostic teachers and Jewish mystics who worshipped angels instead of Messiah.

Paul adds a thought about thanksgiving: “abounding in it [the faith] with thanksgiving.” Thanksgiving is about being appreciative for what one has received: in this case, the good news of Jesus the Messiah. Thanksgiving is important to the stability and strength of our faith, for what we do not appreciate we will eventually become discontent with and let go.

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The Focus of Our Faith
Paul’s Letters to the Jesus Believers at Colosse
Bite-Size Studies Through Colossians
by Jeff Doles

Preview with Amazon’s “Look Inside.”

Available in paperback and Kindle (Amazon), epub (Google and iTunes) and PDF.

Walking It Out

As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him. (Colossians 2:6)

The Jesus believers at Colosse were holding steady together. Paul encourages them now to continue in the path on which they have begun. They had “received” Jesus the Messiah. The Greek word, paralambano, indicates that Jesus, that is, the message about Him, had been presented to them and that they had taken hold of Him by faith. They had learned the gospel, the “good news” about the Messiah from Epaphras, who most likely learned it from Paul.

Now they were to “walk” in it, or more accurately, in Him, Jesus. “Walk” is a metaphor for how one lives. It is a continuous process, one step after another in a consistent manner. It is progressive, not regressive. That is, it is moving forward, not turning back or straying from the path. It is active, not passive. That is, it is something we do, not something that happens to us. When we receive Jesus, we are in Him. That part is passive, part of who we are. But then, being in Him, we proceed in accordance with who He is and who we are in Him. We walk it out.

This particular construction, “Christ Jesus the Lord,” notes A. T. Robertson, in Word Pictures in the New Testament, is not used anywhere else by Paul. “Hence it is plain that Paul here meets the two forms of Gnostic heresy about the Person of Christ (the recognition of the historical Jesus in his actual humanity against the Docetic Gnostics, the identity of the Christ or Messiah with this historical Jesus against the Cerinthian Gnostics, and the acknowledgment of him as Lord).”

Docetism (from the Greek word dokeo, “to seem”) taught that Jesus was purely spirit and that his physical body merely “seemed” to be real. Cerinthianism made a distinction between Jesus and Christ, teaching that Jesus was merely human but that the Christ descended upon him at his baptism. Paul however, in calling Him “Christ Jesus the Lord,” identifies Him all in one — in His humanity, His divinity and His messianic identity.

It is in the fullness of this Jesus, who is man, messiah and Lord, that we now live. Having received Him by faith, we continue in the truth of who the Messiah, Jesus, the Lord, really it. Hold steady to that and do not allow yourself to be charmed away from Him.

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The Focus of Our Faith
Paul’s Letters to the Jesus Believers at Colosse
Bite-Size Studies Through Colossians
by Jeff Doles

Preview with Amazon’s “Look Inside.”

Available in paperback and Kindle (Amazon), epub (Google and iTunes) and PDF.

Holding Steady Together

Now this I say lest anyone should deceive you with persuasive words. For though I am absent in the flesh, yet I am with you in spirit, rejoicing to see your good order and the steadfastness of your faith in Christ. (Colossians 2:4-5)

The Greek word for “deceive” here is paralogizomai, which means to miscalculate, reason falsely or mislead. “Beguile” is how the King James Version puts it. The word for “persuasive words” is pithanologia, which appears only once in the New Testament. According to A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament, by Bauer, Arndt and Gingrich, it speaks of the “art of persuasion” and is used here of “plausible (but false) arguments.”

False teachers can be very charming, feeding you and deceiving you with arguments that sound good on first hearing but fall apart on closer inspection. That is why Paul wanted the Jesus believers at Colosse to be woven together in love and have the confidence that comes from knowing and experiencing God in an intimate way through Jesus the Messiah.

Most of these believers Paul had probably never seen in person but he knew about them through Epaphras, who related to him their faith in Jesus and their love for all the believers everywhere. So, though he was not with them “in the flesh,” he was able to identify with them “in the spirit” and perceive their spiritual condition. And what he saw in them filled him with joy. He rejoiced to see their “good order” and the “steadfastness” of their faith in the Messiah.

The Greek word for “good order” is a military term, which Paul uses metaphorically. It means that they held the line without any breaches. The word for “steadfastness” is similar. They were holding steady in their faith against the attacks of the enemy, maintaining a solid formation like a Roman phalanx.

It is important to remember that a line is not a line of one nor can one man form a phalanx all by himself. Paul is not writing to a collection of individuals but to a community of faith. They were not each one left to fend for themselves but were all in this together. They were a tight band of believers with a common love for one another and a common faith in and love for the Lord Jesus. And there was great strength in that.

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The Focus of Our Faith
Paul’s Letters to the Jesus Believers at Colosse
Bite-Size Studies Through Colossians
by Jeff Doles

Preview with Amazon’s “Look Inside.”

Available in paperback and Kindle (Amazon), epub (Google and iTunes) and PDF.

Woven Together in Love

I want you woven into a tapestry of love, in touch with everything there is to know of God. Then you will have minds confident and at rest, focused on Christ, God’s Great mystery. (Colossians 2:2 The Message)

Paul had an intense desire — and concern — that the Jesus believers at Colosse be “woven together into a tapestry of love.” Because he wanted them to know and experience, in a very intimate way, the revelation of God in Jesus the Messiah. The one does not come without the other. Until we are bound to each other in love, we will not really know or understand God — because love is of God and God is love (1 John 4:7-8).

God Himself is “woven together” in love. The early Church Fathers have a special word to describe the relationship of Father, Son and Holy Spirit: perichoresis. It is a Greek word made up of two parts: peri, which means “around,” and choresis, from which we get the word “choreography.” It was used to describe the interaction, the interrelationship, the divine dance of the three persons of the Godhead. Love in love with love.

They mystery of God, which is not hidden away for a select few but is made available to all, is revealed to us in Jesus the Messiah by the Holy Spirit. Divine love throughout. God so loved the world that He gave His Son (John 3:16). “Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends” Jesus said, and then He did. And “the fruit of the Spirit is love” (Galatians 5:22).

If we would know and experience and enjoy and dwell in this mystery, we must enter into a life of love for each other. Understand, though, that this love is not something we must work up on our own. We cannot. But it comes to us as a gift from God, who is love, and who is the giver of all good gifts. Our part is to yield to it and let it work in us and through us. As we submit to divine love, God will weave us into a rich tapestry and we will experience that love which has existed from eternity.

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The Focus of Our Faith
Paul’s Letters to the Jesus Believers at Colosse
Bite-Size Studies Through Colossians
by Jeff Doles

Preview with Amazon’s “Look Inside.”

Available in paperback and Kindle (Amazon), epub (Google and iTunes) and PDF.

Hidden Treasures of Wisdom and Knowledge

For I want you to know what a great conflict I have for you and those in Laodicea, and for as many as have not seen my face in the flesh, that their hearts may be encouraged, being knit together in love, and attaining to all riches of the full assurance of understanding, to the knowledge of the mystery of God, both of the Father and* of Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. (Colossians 2:1-3)

Paul had an intense concern for the Jesus believers at Colosse and Laodicea and the entire region. They had been targeted by Gnostic teachers who promoted a “secret” wisdom and knowledge to which only a few attained. Paul was determined to protect them from this error. Not that he did not want them to have wisdom and knowledge — he very much desired that they should experience the “mystery” of God it in all its fullness. But the Gnostics taught that God was a distant deity whose fullness was too pure for the material realm and was separated from us by a hierarchy of angelic beings.

“As many as have not seen my face in the flesh.” It almost seems like Paul says this as a dig against this false teaching. For the Gnostics, only the spiritual realm was good; the material world was not merely corrupt but was inherently evil. So Paul gets in their face, so to speak, with reference to material things: his face and his flesh. Ha!

Paul wanted the believers at Colosse to “know” (Greek, eido, to “see” or “perceive”) what “conflict” (Greek, agon, from which we get “agony”) he was going through on their behalf. This was a serious matter and he was engaged in a magnificent purpose. Let me share with you how various translations have put it:

In order that their hearts may be cheered, they themselves being welded together in love and enjoying all the advantages of a reasonable certainty, till at last they attain the full knowledge of God’s truth, which is Christ Himself. (Weymouth New Testament)

How I long that you may be encouraged, and find out more and more how strong are the bonds of Christian love. How I long for you to grow more certain in your knowledge and more sure in your grasp of God himself. May your spiritual experience become richer as you see more and more fully God’s great secret, Christ himself! (The New Testament in Modern English, J. B. Phillips)

Know that I’m on your side, right alongside you. You’re not in this alone. I want you woven into a tapestry of love, in touch with everything there is to know of God. Then you will have minds confident and at rest, focused on Christ, God’s Great mystery. (The Message)

There is one purpose here but with three facets:

• That they may be encouraged, comforted, cheered.
• That they may be knit together, woven together, bonded together, even welded together in love.
• That they may have a full, rich “knowledge” (Greek, epignosis) of God, that is, to know Him not just in theory but in experience.

This full, rich, experiential knowledge of the Father comes to us in Jesus the Messiah. He is the “mystery” of God. For the Gnostics, divine mystery was a secret knowledge revealed only to a few, but for Paul, the mystery of God was something that was once hidden but is now revealed to everyone — it is the “good news” of the gospel.

Paul’s emphasis is ever and always on Jesus. It is in Him — not in the esoteric teachings and angelic hierarchies of the Gnostics, but in Jesus alone — that we find all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge and come to experience, with confident assurance, the fullness of knowing God.

* The NKJV adds “both of the Father and,” but there is no basis for this in the earliest Greek manuscripts of the New Testament.

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The Focus of Our Faith
Paul’s Letters to the Jesus Believers at Colosse
Bite-Size Studies Through Colossians
by Jeff Doles

Preview with Amazon’s “Look Inside.”

Available in paperback and Kindle (Amazon), epub (Google and iTunes) and PDF.

The Last Things

Eschatology is a theological term that refers to the doctrine of “last things.” Some people think it is about the “end of the world.” And in one sense, it is. Not “end” as in destruction, but as in fulfillment; that is, the end or purpose for which the world was created.

New Life has come. Jesus, the Word who from the beginning was with God and is God, has come into the world (John 1:1). “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:14). In Him is life and the life is the light of humanity (John 1:4). This life is related to the kingdom of God. Jesus said that unless one is “born again” he cannot see or enter the kingdom (John 3:3, 6). The Greek words for “born again” literally mean “born from above.” It is not only new life, it is life that is higher in quality because it is higher in origin. It is life born of the Spirit of God, the life of heaven, the life of the kingdom of God breaking into the world. Jesus came to give us that life. “I have come that you may have life and that you may have it more abundantly” (John 10:10). This is eternal life and it has already begun for all who receive Jesus by faith.

The True Light has come. In Jesus is life and the life is the light of humanity. He is the “true light” who gives light to everyone who comes into the world (John 1:9). “For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ” (2 Corinthians 4:6). “For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light” (Ephesians 5:8). “Therefore He says: ‘Awake, you who sleep, arise from the dead, and Christ will give you light’” (Ephesians 5:14). “You are all sons of light and sons of the day. We are not of the night nor of darkness.” (1 Thessalonians 5:5). “The darkness is passing away, and the true light is already shining” (1 John 2:8). There is no other light to come, the true light is already here.

The Kingdom of God has come. Jesus came preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God, saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand. Repent, and believe in the gospel” (Mark 1:14-15). By “at hand,” Jesus was saying that the kingdom was now here, that it was being inaugurated. “From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven has been forcefully advancing, and forceful men lay hold of it” (Matthew 11:12 NIV). Though it has not yet arrived in all its fullness, it has already begun and all who receive new life in Jesus can see and enter in and experience its power and glory.

The New Covenant has come. Through the prophet Jeremiah, God foretold the days of the new covenant, for the old one had been broken because of unfaithfulness.

Behold, the days are coming, says the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah — not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, though I was a husband to them, says the LORD. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. No more shall every man teach his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, “Know the LORD,” for they all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them, says the LORD. For I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more. (Jeremiah 31:31-34)

Jesus instituted this new covenant between God and man, as He was perfectly suited to do, seeing that He is fully divine as well as fully human. This covenant is based on better promises and cut in His own blood (Hebrews 8:6; Luke 22:20). There is not another covenant to come; this one is eternal.

The Spirit of God has come. God spoke of the same end time event through the prophet Ezekiel as He did through Jeremiah. It would be a time when He would give His people a new heart and put His Spirit within them.

I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them. (Ezekiel 36:26-27)

Through the prophet Joel, He said, “And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out My Spirit on all flesh; your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions. And also on My menservants and on My maidservants I will pour out My Spirit in those days” (Joel 2:28-29).

This was fulfilled at Pentecost, when God poured out His Spirit on the Church. Filled with the Holy Spirit, all the disciples began speaking and praising God with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance. Peter stood and declared, “This is what was spoken by the prophet Joel,” then began quoting the passage from Joel 2, “And it shall come to pass in the last days …”

Paul spoke of being led by the Spirit and said that those who are, are not under the Law (Galatians 5:18). “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law” (Galatians 5:22-23). The Spirit leads us in the ways of God and produces in us things that the Law of Moses could never do.

New Creation has begun. Jesus is the “the Second Man” and “the Last Adam,” Lord over the new creation. Everyone who is in the Messiah (who receives Him by faith and is counted as His) is part of this new creation. “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new” (2 Corinthians 5:17). “For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything, but a new creation” (Galatians 6:15). Jesus said, “Behold, I make all things new” (Revelation 21:5).

Resurrection has begun. The resurrection of the righteous has already begun with the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. “But now Christ is risen from the dead, and has become the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep … For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive. But each one in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, afterward those who are Christ’s at His coming.” (1 Corinthians 15:20, 22-23). “And He is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things He may have the preeminence” (Colossians 1:18). Just as the firstfruits assures the harvest, the resurrection of Jesus from the dead is the assurance that all those who belong to Him will also be raised bodily from the dead when He comes again.

The reign of King Jesus has begun. After the resurrection, Jesus came to the disciples and said, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth” (Matthew 28:18). Then He ascended to His throne at the right hand of the Father. God “raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places, far above all principality and power and might and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this age but also in that which is to come. And He put all things under His feet, and gave Him to be head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all” (Ephesians 1:20-23). God has also “made us alive together with Christ … and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus” (Ephesians 2:5-6). Not only has King Jesus begun His reign, but we also have been seated in the place of ruling and reigning with Him.

Biblically speaking, we are now in the “last days,” and have been ever since the coming of Jesus the Messiah into the world. The “last things” have begun. We are living in the days of the King, between the times of inauguration and final fulfillment, when He shall come again.

The Source of Your Supply

Therefore do not worry, saying, “What shall we eat?” or “What shall we drink?” or “What shall we wear?” For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble. (Matthew 6:21-34)

The way the economy is looking, with the unemployment rate, and the housing market, and the continuing debt crisis, many people are getting more and more worried. “What shall we eat?” “What shall we drink?” “What shall we wear?” “Where shall we live?” “How shall we pay the bills, the mortgage, the debt?”

You can tell what people are worrying about by what they say. It is heavy on their hearts, and it is out of the abundance of the heart that the mouth speaks. Do not worry about these things, Jesus says. Do not let them become your focus and fill your heart. Do not speak them over and over to yourself.

The Gentiles, that is, the surrounding nations, who had no covenant with the God of Israel, sought after these things. But Jesus speaks of God as the “heavenly Father” who “knows you have need of all these things.” Not only knows but has the means to take care of all those needs.

Jesus’ answer to these questions, then, is “Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things shall be added to you.” The kingdom of God is His rule and reign in all the world, which had long been promised in the Old Testament. It is what Jesus came to announce in the good news of the gospel: “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand. Repent, and believe in the gospel” (Mark 1:15). The righteousness of God is His goodness, the faithfulness of God to His people and to keep His covenant promises. Jesus the Messiah came not only to announce the kingdom of God but to institute a new covenant based on even better promises (Hebrews 8:6), a covenant cut with His own blood (Luke 22:20).

Many people, even many Christians, look to the world, to the government, to their jobs, their bank accounts and their credit cards as their source and supply. But Jesus did not say, “Seek first the government check,” or “Seek first a good job,” or “Seek first a sound investment or a solid bank.” If we put our trust in these, we will always be let down. They may be viable channels but do not look to them as your source.

Jesus calls us to something radically different: “Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness.” Look to your Father in heaven as your source. He has all kinds of ways of getting your supply to you, ways you can’t even imagine.

Everything you need is not a goal but a by-product. Search for them and you will come up short. But seek out God’s kingdom and righteousness — His rule and reign, His goodness and faithfulness, His way of doing and being — and everything you need will “be added to you,” thrown into the bargain. “My God,” Paul says, “shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:19).

In this time of financial crisis it is vitally important to understand who your source is and where your supply comes from. Seek God and His kingdom in everything you do, watch for His faithfulness and His provision, and He will take care of you in every way.

(See also Not to Worry.)

Light in the Darkness

Unto the upright there arises light in the darkness.
He is gracious, and full of compassion, and righteous.

(Psalm 112:4)

No matter how dark things may seem, how intractable the economy may appear, how troublesome the times may look, there is always light for the upright. Who are the upright? The Hebrew word here refers to what is straight, level, right, pleasing, correct, straightforward, just, fitting or proper. It is often used of those who do what is right in the eyes of the Lord.

There are many who do what is right in their own eyes, but these are not commended before God. “There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death” (Proverbs 14:12 and repeated again at Proverbs 16:25). No, the psalm writer is talking about those who do what is right in the eyes of Yahweh: “Blessed is the man who fears the LORD, who delights greatly in His commandments” (Psalm 112:1). This psalm tells about what the man who fears Yahweh looks like and what the blessing of Yahweh looks like in his life (see Divine Portrait of Prosperity: Psalm 112). He is gracious, full of compassion and righteous (he keeps covenant and conducts himself in a way that is just). That is just the way Yahweh is described in Psalm 116:5: “Gracious is the LORD, and righteous. Yes, our God is merciful.”

The upright always have light in the darkness. This does not mean that darkness will never enter his life; indeed, darkness may be all around him. But God gives him light in the midst of it so he can see and know the blessing of God. Remember the ninth plague that came on Pharaoh and the land of Egypt when he refused to let the children of Israel go?

Then the LORD said to Moses, “Stretch out your hand toward heaven, that there may be darkness over the land of Egypt, darkness which may even be felt.” So Moses stretched out his hand toward heaven, and there was thick darkness in all the land of Egypt three days. They did not see one another; nor did anyone rise from his place for three days. But all the children of Israel had light in their dwellings. (Exodus 10:21-23)

Darkness — a thick darkness that could be felt! — covered all the land of Egypt so no one could see or do anything. It was for them a fearful darkness. No so for the people of God: “But all the children of Israel had light in their dwellings.” That is always God’s way with His people. In the Old Testament, and during a dark time, the prophet Isaiah announced a new day that was coming.

Arise, shine;
For your light has come!
And the glory of the LORD is risen upon you.
For behold, the darkness shall cover the earth,
And deep darkness the people;
But the LORD will arise over you,
And His glory will be seen upon you.
The Gentiles shall come to your light,
And kings to the brightness of your rising.

(Isaiah 60:1-3)

In the New Testament, this light is revealed. “Awake, you who sleep, arise from the dead, and Christ will give you light” (Ephesians 5:14). “For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ” (2 Corinthians 4:6). He is “the true Light which gives light to every man coming into the world” (John 1: 9). “And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it” (John 1:5).

There is nothing in the darkness or of the darkness that can harm those who belong to God through faith in Jesus the Messiah. In Him we are made right with God. In Him, we are empowered by the Spirit of God to live out the life of Jesus in the world. Even in the darkness of the world, the light arises for us and the glory of the Lord shines on us. What the psalm writer says of the upright is for all who will take hold of it by faith:

Surely he will never be shaken;
The righteous will be in everlasting remembrance.
He will not be afraid of evil tidings;
His heart is steadfast, trusting in the LORD.
His heart is established;
He will not be afraid.

(Psalm 112:6-8)

Do not be shaken or be afraid of the dark. Put your trust in God; light will arise.

True Prosperity

Prosperity is the ability to use God’s power to meet the needs of other men, whether it’s financial, or physical, or spiritual, or mental, or social, or whatever. That's true prosperity.

~ Kenneth Copeland, The Laws of Prosperity
Kenneth Copeland Ministries, 1982

Prosperity is the possession of everything you need for yourself and loved ones with enough surplus to give to those who need help. If you have only the bare necessities, you are not prosperous. And if you have all the sufficiencies of life but no more, that is not prosperity. But, if you have everything you need with something left over for the poor, that is prosperity.

 ~ Oral Roberts, My Favorite Bible Scriptures
Oral Roberts Evangelist Association, 1963

I like those definitions of prosperity. Prosperity is not just about us but about God and what He wants to do in the lives of others. I take my own definition, which is very like these, from the apostle Paul.

And God is able to make all grace abound toward you, that you, always having all sufficiency in all things, may have an abundance for every good work. (2 Corinthians 9:8)

Encouragement is a Choice

Somebody said that there is nothing you can do about discouragement. Nonsense! It is a choice. "David encouraged himself in the LORD his God" (1 Samuel 30:6). I wrote an article about that a few years back:

• How to Encourage Yourself in the LORD

The Gospel of God’s Pleasure

For it pleased the Father that in Him all the fullness should dwell, and by Him to reconcile all things to Himself, by Him, whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross. (Colossians 1:19-20)

The good news of the gospel is that it pleased the Father that all the fullness of divinity should dwell in Jesus the Son, the Word who became flesh and dwelt among us (John 1:14).

The good news of the gospel is that it pleased God to reconcile all things in heaven and on earth to Himself. When Jesus came, He announced that the kingdom of heaven, a.k.a, the kingdom of God, was now at hand — present on earth. All His works on earth were a demonstration of the authority and power of the kingdom, and He taught the disciples to pray, “Kingdom of God, come! Will of God, be done on earth as it is in heaven!”

The good news of the gospel is that it pleased God to make peace — shalom, wholeness, oneness — through the violence of Jesus’ blood shed on the cross. There the battle was fought and there the victory was won.

And you, who once were alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now He has reconciled in the body of His flesh through death, to present you holy, and blameless, and above reproach in His sight — if indeed you continue in the faith, grounded and steadfast, and are not moved away from the hope of the gospel which you heard, which was preached to every creature under heaven, of which I, Paul, became a minister. (Colossians 1:21-23)

The good news of the gospel is that it pleased God that those who were once alienated from Him, whose thoughts and works were against Him, should now be reconciled to Him in the flesh-and-blood body of Jesus. It pleased God that through Jesus’ death on the cross, we should be presented holy, blameless and above reproach before Him, now and at the last day.

The good news of the gospel is that it pleased God that we should participate in this reconciliation, not by the futility of human striving, but purely through faith in Jesus, in whom all the fullness of God dwells in human flesh. This is the “hope” of the gospel. In the Bible, hope is not about wishful thinking; it is not tentative or uncertain. It is about positive expectation, joyful anticipation.

The gospel of God’s pleasure presents us with this good news, this hope, this expectation: The wholeness of God’s shalom in the world — the reconciliation of heaven and earth, of God and humanity, through faith in King Jesus the Messiah.

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The Focus of Our Faith
Paul’s Letters to the Jesus Believers at Colosse
Bite-Size Studies Through Colossians
by Jeff Doles

Preview with Amazon’s “Look Inside.”

Available in paperback and Kindle (Amazon), epub (Google and iTunes) and PDF.

A Peculiar People

Who [Jesus] gave Himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto Himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works. (Titus 2:14 KJV)

Years ago, my father had a plant nursery and flower business called “Old Weird Harold’s.” This came from three sources. First, my father’s name is Harold. Second, Bill Cosby created a character named “Old Weird Harold.” Third is this verse, in the King James Version. Jesus gave Himself to redeem us and purify for Himself a “peculiar” people. Pop knew, of course, that the use of “peculiar” in this verse does not mean weird, but he was making a play on words with a popular cultural icon. So, there you go.

The word peculiar comes from peculium, a word which had a specific legal meaning in Roman civil law but then slipped into a more common usage.

PECULIUM, civil law. The savings which were made by a son or slave with the consent of his father or master. Inst. 2, 9, 1; Dig. 15, 1, 5, 3; Poth. ad Pand. lib. 50, tit. 17, c. 2, art. 3.
     2. A master is not entitled to the extraordinary earnings of his apprentice, which do not interfere with his services so as to affect his master’s profits. An apprentice was therefore decreed to be entitled to salvage in opposition to his master's claim for it.

In the Middle Ages, “peculiar” referred to that which was “one’s own,” and that is how it is used in the King James Version.

Now therefore, if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people: for all the earth is mine: And ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and an holy nation. (Exodus 19:5-6)

For thou art an holy people unto the LORD thy God, and the LORD hath chosen thee to be a peculiar people unto himself, above all the nations that are upon the earth. (Deuteronomy 14:2)

And the LORD hath avouched thee this day to be his peculiar people, as he hath promised thee, and that thou shouldest keep all his commandments; and to make thee high above all nations which he hath made, in praise, and in name, and in honour; and that thou mayest be an holy people unto the LORD thy God, as he hath spoken. (Deuteronomy 26:18-19)

For the LORD hath chosen Jacob unto himself, and Israel for his peculiar treasure. (Psalm 135:4)

The Greek word translated as “peculiar” in Titus 2:14 is periousious. Literally, it is about what is “over and above.” Vincent’s Word Studies says that it was used of what was “specially selected for one's own.” So the King James Version translates it as “peculiar.” Other versions have it as

• A people for His own possession (English Standard Version, Lexham English Bible, New American Standard Bible)
• His own people (Contemporary English Version)
• A people who should be specially His own (Weymouth’s New Testament in Modern Speech)
• A special people (Holman Christian Standard Bible)
• People who belong only to Him (New Century Version, The Expanded Bible New Testament)
• His own special people (New King James Version)
• His very own people (New Living Translation)
• A special people for Himself (Common English Bible)
• A people that are His very own (New International Version)
• His own dedicated band (The Unvarnished New Testament)
• A people of His own private possession (Wuest’s New Testament: An Expanded Translation)
• A people He can be proud of (The Message)

The Hebrew word translated as “peculiar” in the Old Testament is segullah and speaks of wealth or that which is treasured. In Exodus 19:5, the KJV translates it as “peculiar treasure.” The LXX (also known as the Septuagint, an ancient Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures), translates the Old Testament occurrences listed above as periousious, the same word found in Titus 2:14.

In using periousious, the apostle Paul picks up on what God was doing in the Old Testament and brings it forward into the New. In the Old Testament, God created a people, Israel, to be His own treasured possession, who would be a kingdom of priests (Exodus 19:5-6). The role of a priest is to represent God before the people and the people before God, so Israel was to represent God before the nations and the nations before God. What Israel failed to do as a nation, though, was fulfilled through her Messiah, Jesus. In the New Testament, the people of God enlarged to include every believer in Jesus the Messiah, whether Jew or Gentile. Titus himself was a Gentile believer, as were many of those under his pastoral care, but Paul includes them all as God’s own people.

The good news of the Gospel is that Jesus gave Himself for us to redeem us from our sins and to purify us as His own people. Not as a loose assortment of individuals but together as a community of faith, a people who belong to God and God alone. We are His peculiar people. Not weird or geeky but special and treasured by Him.

A Mouth of Wisdom and Steps That Don’t Slide

The mouth of the righteous speaks wisdom,
And his tongue talks of justice.
The law of his God is in his heart;
None of his steps shall slide.

(Psalm 37:30-31)

There is an important spiritual connection between your heart and your mouth. Jesus said, “For out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks” (Luke 6:45). If you want to know what is in somebody’s heart, listen to their mouth for a little while — especially in pressure situations — and it will become apparent.

The psalm writer says that “the mouth of the righteous speaks wisdom and his tongue talks of justice.” The “righteous” are those who keep covenant with God, that is, who are in right relationship with God and the community of faith.

The mouth of the righteous speaks “wisdom.” The Hebrew word is hokmah and refers to understanding, mastery, prudence, or skill. The realm of wisdom can be anything and everything, including craftsmanship, administration and ethics. It produces sound judgment about what is right and what is wrong: “His tongue talks of justice.”

Words of insight and justice do not fall out of the sky. They come forth from a heart that is full of wisdom and discernment. But how does a heart get filled with these? The psalm writer gives the answer: “The law of his God is in his heart.” The word for “law” is torah and can just as well be translated as “instruction.” Wisdom and justice in the mouth of the righteous are the overflow of God’s Word in his heart.

Remember how the Book of Psalms opens. The blessed man is not the one who fills his heart with the counsel of the ungodly, or the way of the wicked or with mockery and scorn for everything that is good (Psalm 1:1). Instead, his delight is in the instruction of the LORD. He delights in it and meditates constantly upon it (Psalm 1:2).

In meditating God’s Word, he speaks it into his heart and lets it fill him up to overflowing. After that, when he opens his mouth, his words and his ways are in alignment with God’s. The result is blessing and prosperity in all he does (Psalm 1:3). Because the instruction of the LORD is in his heart in abundance, wisdom and justice flow from his lips. His leaf does not wither and his steps do not slide.

Open Wide Your Hand

Since God is gracious and giving and opens His hand wide toward us (and invites us to set all our expectation on Him) we should be gracious and giving and open our hands to give generously to others, because God wants to show them His grace, too. That is why, in addition to always giving us all sufficiency in all things, God wants to have us plenty more besides, so we may do a lot of good for others. Let us then be generous, open-handed, bountiful in our giving.

Paul said, “He who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully” (2 Corinthians 9:6). To sow “sparingly” means to hold back, to be stingy with your seed. How you sow is how you will reap. If you hold back your seed, you are also holding back your harvest. In the Greek text, to sow “bountifully” means to sow “with blessing,” and when you sow “with blessing,” that is also how you reap — with blessing! When you sow with your hand wide open, you will one day have a harvest that is larger than you can contain. You will never end up behind because you have been generous toward others, and what you sow will cause praise and thanksgiving to abound toward God. Watch how this works:

Now may He who supplies seed to the sower, and bread for food, supply and multiply the seed you have sown and increase the fruits of your righteousness, while you are enriched in everything for all liberality, which causes thanksgiving through us to God. For the administration of this service not only supplies the needs of the saints, but also is abounding through many thanksgivings to God, while, through the proof of this ministry, they glorify God for the obedience of your confession to the gospel of Christ, and for your liberal sharing with them and all men, and by their prayer for you, who long for you because of the exceeding grace of God in you. (2 Corinthians 9:10-14)

God gives us “bread,” every provision to meet our needs fully and completely. He also gives us “seed,” the more than enough, which is for sowing. When we sow it toward the needs of others, God multiplies it, increasing its fruitfulness, that is, the benefit it brings to others. That, in turn, brings forth praise and thanks to God — and we get to be a part of what God is doing in the lives of others. In this way, not only do all of our own needs get met, but also the needs of others, because we are allowing the grace of God to be abundant through us as well as to us. As we keep sowing generously for the sake of others, we will continue to reap bountifully because we are trusting in the open hand of God.

Open Wide Your Mouth

God opens wide His hand toward us and calls us to open wide our mouths toward Him:

I am the LORD your God,
Who brought you out of the land of Egypt;
Open your mouth wide, and I will fill it.

(Psalm 81:10)

This verse opens in a very interesting way. Interesting because it is exactly how the Ten Commandments begins: “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt” (Exodus 20:2). It is the basis of the Old Testament covenant. God delivered the children of Israel from Egyptian bondage and made them a nation. He revealed Himself to them by His personal name, that is, who He is, Yahweh (rendered here by “the LORD”), as well as by His office, what He is: “God.” And He said, “I am … your God,” and the implied reciprocal is “You are my people.”

In Exodus 20, this statement is followed by the Ten Commandments, which we often think of in a very negative way because … well, because of the “thou shalt nots.” But there are very positive ways of thinking about them. The psalm writers extol them, for example, in Psalm 1, Psalm 19 and Psalm 119. They loved the “law” of Yahweh. The Hebrew word torah, which is often translated as “law” can just as well be rendered as “instruction.” It is not an arbitrary set of rules to test loyalty but a practical guide that shows us the way to health, prosperity, well-being and good, positive relationship with God, others and the world around us.

More than that, though, there is something implicit — and very positive — in the Ten Commandments, especially in the way they begin: “I am the LORD your God.” This is a covenant, and the essence of covenant is exchange: We give to God everything we are and possess; He gives to us everything He is and possesses. By identifying Himself in this way and in this context, God is saying that He will take care of us. Therefore, we don’t need to seek after any other gods, or idolize anyone or anything. We don’t have to steal, lie, covet or kill to get out needs met — God will always protect and provide for us. The Ten Commandments, then, are about trusting God with everything.

So God says in Psalm 81:10, “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt; open your mouth wide, and I will fill it.” Unfortunately, Israel would not listen. “But My people would not heed My voice, and Israel would have none of Me. So I gave them over to their own stubborn heart, to walk in their own counsels” (vv. 11-12). But see what would have happened if they had trusted in Him for everything:

Oh, that My people would listen to Me,
That Israel would walk in My ways!
I would soon subdue their enemies,
And turn My hand against their adversaries.
The haters of the LORD would pretend submission to Him,
But their fate would endure forever.
He would have fed them also with the finest of wheat;
And with honey from the rock I would have satisfied you.

(Psalm 81:13-16)

God was ready to give them the finest of wheat. The Hebrew word speaks of fatness, abundance, richness, the choicest, most excellent part. He would have provided them with “honey from the rock,” to enjoy all the sweetness of life, and they would have been fully satisfied. Abundance and sweetness — this is the language of the Promised Land. If only they had believed Him.

God has likewise opened His hand wide toward us to satisfy our needs and desires — if we will trust Him. The act of faith is to open our mouths wide, that is, to enlarge our expectation toward Him. Through Jesus the Messiah, He has delivered us, just as He delivered the children of Israel from Egyptian bondage, and He will take care of us completely, just as He desired to do for them.

And God is able to make all grace abound toward you, that you, always having all sufficiency in all things, may have an abundance for every good work. (2 Corinthians 9:8)

Notice how all-encompassing this is: God gives us grace and glory — all grace, so that we can always have all sufficiency in all things. This grace is given to us through Jesus the Messiah. “He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?” (Romans 8:32). Plus abundance — not just enough but more than enough — so that we may be blessed and a blessing to others.

Which leads us to the second important way we experience the open hand of God. We’ll talk about that in the next post.

The Open Hand of God

You open Your hand
And satisfy the desire of every living thing.

(Psalm 145:16)

The Hebrew word for “open” means “wide open.” The opening of the hand is an act of great generosity. God is a giver and He opens His hand wide to pour out His gifts to us.

For the LORD God is a sun and shield;
The LORD will give grace and glory;
No good thing will He withhold
From those who walk uprightly.

(Psalm 84:1)

Command those who are rich in this present age not to be haughty, nor to trust in uncertain riches but in the living God, who gives us richly all things to enjoy. (1 Timothy 6:17)

Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning. (James 1:17)

God satisfies the desire of every living thing. To satisfy is to fulfill, or fill full. There are no voids, no nooks, no crannies — everything is completely filled in with nothing left lacking. The Hebrew word for “desire” speaks of pleasure or delight. God does not try to satisfy us with junk but gives us good things, things that are pleasing and delightful — things that are truly satisfying. Brenton’s English Septuagint (a translation of the Septuagint, which is an ancient Greek translation of the Hebrew text) has Psalm 145:16 as, “Thou openest thine hands, and fillest every living thing with pleasure.”

Some people think that God is interested only in our needs, not our desires (if He is interested at all). But the truth is that He is interested in both. Now, of course, our desires are not always what they should be. We do not always want what is good and sometimes we crave things that are harmful to us or others. But God wants to heal our desires so we hunger after those things that are good and healthy and prosperous. He does this through personal relationship with Him.

Delight yourself also in the LORD,
And He shall give you the desires of your heart.

(Psalm 37:4)

As we delight ourselves in the LORD, the desires, or requests, of our heart begin to line up with what is in His own heart — and the desires of His heart are always good and pleasant. Then He is happy to give us the desires of our heart because they are what He has wanted to do for us all along.

God’s hand is opened wide to be gracious and generous to us in every way. In the next couple of posts we will look at two ways to experience all the good things He wants to pour out on us: 1. Open Wide Your Mouth 2. Open Wide Your Hand