Behold Him there, the risen Lamb, my perfect, spotless righteousness. The great, unchangeable I am, the King of glory and of grace. One with Himself, I cannot die. My soul is purchased by His blood. My life is hid with Christ on high, with Christ my Savior and my God. That is a wonderful reality that we, who are trusting in Christ, have. That by our finite nature, we are prone to forget. This morning, we turn our attention again to Paul's letter to the Colossians. Paul's letter to the Colossians will be picking up at chapter 2, verse 16. very briefly i want to bring us up to speed to where we are it's been a while since we've been in this letter together in the first part of this letter paul powerfully and vividly presents the gospel the gospel of jesus christ who he is what he's done and over and over again he's made it clear that Jesus Christ, God in the flesh, is alone sufficient to accomplish the complete redemption of his people. And the theme of this letter is summed up in chapter 2, verse 6, where Paul shifts from his focus on the gospel to the implications of the gospel for God's people, saying, just as you have already received Christ, continue to live in Him. Now, some at Colossae were promoting a program that they claimed would enhance this enterprise, that would somehow enhance the worship of the people, that would somehow advance them in holiness. These people counted themselves Christians, but by their practices and by their teachings, they denied the sufficiency of Christ. They wanted to add things to the Christian life in order to help people get along and to get on and to live that life which is worthy of the Lord and pleases Him in every way. You see, to their way of thinking, this life required more than simply continuing to live in Christ. It requires something other than Christ alone. In chapter 2, verse 9, Paul warned the saints against this deceptive philosophy that if they gave way to, it would carry them away into captivity. And then as we considered last time, and as we read for our assurance of pardon this morning, Paul assured them once again that it is Christ alone who has accomplished our perfect deliverance. Our resurrection from death to life, our redemption from sin, and our rescue from the tyranny of the devil. Christ alone has accomplished these things. Christ alone has set us free. It is as He promised. If the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed. And with that re-announcement of the freedom that we have in Christ, Paul continues in our text this morning in verse 16, Therefore, therefore, bearing in mind the freedom you have in Christ, Paul goes on to say, Do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink. Or with regard to a religious festival, a new moon celebration, or a Sabbath day. These are a shadow of the things that were to come. The reality, however, is found in Christ. Do not let anyone who delights in false humility and the worship of angels disqualify you for the prize. Such a person goes into great detail about what he has seen. And his unspiritual mind puffs him up with idle notions. He has lost connection with the head, from whom the whole body, supported and held together by its ligaments and sinews, grows as God causes it to grow. Since you died with Christ to the basic principles of this world, why, as though you still belong to it, do you submit to its rules? Do not handle, do not taste, do not touch. These are all destined to perish with use because they are based on human commands and teachings. Such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom with their self-imposed worship, their false humility, and their harsh treatment of the body, but they lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence. Since then you have been raised with Christ. Set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things, for you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. And when Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory. Here ends the reading of God's Word. Well, in these verses, Paul summons the saints to guard your freedom in Christ. And we'll consider this summons in two points. First, that in Christ you have been freed from earthly regulations. And secondly, that in Christ you have been freed for our heavenly calling. Christ has set us free from something in order to set us free for something. And Paul begins his warning by warning the saints against forgetting or denying that in Christ they have been freed from earthly regulations. They had heard the gospel. They understood their freedom in Christ, but these new people had come in, these new ideas had come in, and they were in danger of forgetting the gospel. And the core of Paul's warning is in verses 16 and 18, kind of set in parallel. He says, Do not let anyone judge you or disqualify you. Now, the NIV adds for the prize, in order to help us grasp a picture, an analogy, That the perseverance in the Christian life to the end, which is what Paul is calling us to, is like running a race for a prize. You have to cross the finish line. So what Paul is saying here is don't let anyone sidetrack you, derail you, distract you, have you stop. Don't let anyone sidetrack you from continuing to live in Christ alone until the end. Well, with what will they try to judge you? And with what will they try to disqualify you? With earthly regulations for achieving holiness or adding to holiness, earthly regulations for enhancing your worship. Now it's clear from verses 16 and 17 that Paul is warning against using the Old Testament ceremonial law. Law that God gave his people. Law that directed their worship of him. And Paul is saying you can't use that law to judge anyone's holiness or to measure anyone's worship. Do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink with regard to a religious festival, a new moon celebration, or a Sabbath day. These all have reference to the ceremonial law given in the Old Testament. And when Paul tells us this, he reminds us that God did not give the law, including this ceremonial law for men to obey in order to make us holy or in order to make us worshipful. The law of God cannot make men holy. And the law of God cannot make men merciful or worshipful. It's God who makes men holy. And it's God who gives men's hearts to worship. God's people, Old Testament or New, are holy because God sets them apart to be holy. He claims them as his own and he distinguishes them from the rest. And he says, you are my holy people. And he gives to them his law, including the ceremonial law, for them to express, to show, to work out, to present to the rest that they belong to a holy God. So in the Old Covenant, Israel was to practice these laws in order to display to the nations that they were distinct and that they belonged to the Lord God. The people among the nations could eat and drink whatever they liked. The people of Israel may have liked it, but they couldn't eat it because they were to display their holiness before a watching world to eat only what God said was clean. And throughout the nations, there's all manner of worship conducted publicly and privately to all manner of gods and gods. But the Israelites were to display their holiness, their belonging to God by public worship in the way and at the times he appointed annually, yearly at these festivals, monthly at new moon celebrations and weekly on the Sabbath day. These are all ways of expressing the holiness that God had bestowed upon them. And Paul is warning the Colossians and reminding them that these laws, these particular ceremonial laws of the Old Covenant do not apply to the New Covenant people of God. It's not how we are to show that we belong to God. They have no place in the church, Paul says. They no longer demonstrate our holiness. Why? Because, as Paul says, they are a shadow of things that were to come. The reality, however, is found in Christ. And like shadows which are temporary and fleeting, these laws were put in place with the knowledge that at the coming of Christ, the light of the world, they would dissipate. They would disappear. They would be no more. Obedience to the law cannot make God's people holy, nor can it make them worshipful. Instead, the law, as presented, presses upon us our lack of holiness and our lack of worship. And it points us to our need for a Savior whose holiness is perfect and whose worship is true. So Paul is warning the Colossians, he's had no place in the church. But that's not all that was happening at Colossae. In addition to trying to bring the saints back under the weight of the condemnation of God's law, they were adding to that burden their own rules, their own regulations based on human commands and teaching. They had prescriptions for maximizing holiness. They probably had books to sell. They sounded very lawful. Do not handle, do not taste, do not touch. Don't defile yourselves. Sounded very lawful, doesn't it? But it denies what Jesus taught us. That there's nothing outside of us that defiles us. Just like it's nothing outside of us that makes us holy. No thing. It's what comes from the heart that defiles. And it's what comes from the heart. A renewed heart. That makes us holy. They also had prescriptions for improving our worship experience. Make it more interesting, more lively, more engaging, more important, more beneficial, more effective. They promoted the worship of angels, the worship of creatures rather than the Creator. And in this they turned the saints away from worshiping God through the one and only mediator between God and man, and that's the man, Jesus Christ. They were preoccupied with visions. They wanted direct connection with God. They wanted to see God. They wanted to commune with God. They wanted to hear from God apart from His Word. They had all manner of prescriptions for how to achieve this end. But in the end, they were turning the saints away from the Word of God. And beyond that, they imposed whatever idle notions, whatever crazy ideas they came up with on the people as though they were the Word of God. And they went into great detail about what they had seen. And they tried to release their souls to God by treating their bodies harshly. They tried to separate their spirits from the trials of this world so that they could draw near to God. And in the doing, they denied the fall that we all share in Adam, soul and body. But more importantly, they deny the redemption that Christ has come to give His people, body and soul, together. There is no place for this separation. The people of God, to separate soul from body is to die. And in the name of life, they were pursuing death. Paul warns in verse 23 that such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom. They look good. They're appealing. They make sense, it seems. But in fact, they're foolishness. The worship they promote is self-imposed. Do-it-yourself religion. It has nothing to do with the worship God desires. The humility they delight in is false. they really are puffed up with themselves, full of pride. And for all their supposed spirituality, being spiritual without being religious, their reasoning was actually unspiritual. They didn't have the Holy Spirit. They were striving in themselves. And Paul says that those who were promoting these things had lost connection with the head, meaning Christ. they were dead to Christ trusting in themselves and in their own resources to make themselves holy and to make themselves worshipful they'd lost connection with the head and all their rules and regulations to improve their worship and enhance their holiness lacked any value Paul says that's a zero sum no value to restrain sensual indulgence, to restrain sin or to advance righteousness. They have no value. They can keep you busy all day long, week long after week long, year long after year long, but they have no value because they have no connection to the head. They are, as Paul says in 2 Timothy chapter 3, lovers of themselves who have a form of godliness but deny in its power. that's what Paul warns against but in that warning it makes it clear that that's not so for the saints that's not the state of the saints the saints are not dead to Christ the saints have died with Christ and we have died to the condemnation of the law and we have died to all other earthly regulations and not only that we have been raised with Christ therefore through faith we are in connection with the head and it is in connection with Christ that we as individual saints as we as the communion of saints that we as the body of Christ grow as God causes us to grow and Paul snaps the Colossians to attention with this question in verse 20 the NIV says sense. It assumes it's true. He's really raising the question to say, is this really true? He says, if you have died with Christ to the basic principles of this world, as you say, why as though you still belong to it, do you submit to its rules? What you're doing? You claim to have died with Christ, but yet you submit yourselves to those things that he's freed you from. How can this be? In short, he calls on the Colossians saints to examine themselves. Examine yourselves. Not to see whether you are holy enough, not to see whether your worship is true enough, but whether you are trusting in Christ alone. Not only for your righteousness before God, but for your holiness to be conformed to his image and for your worship to be in spirit and truth. Who are you counting on? Yourselves and submitting yourself to all these rules or to Christ who has set you free? Well, it's clear from ancient history that the Colossians needed this warning and that they did not heed it. It took some time for the seeds of error to take root and to grow, but eventually they came to full bloom. The Council of Laodicea, 300 years after this letter was written. I know that's hard for us to conceive in a nation that's only 200 and some years old and has a congregation that's only 50 years old but after 300 years in a congregation these heirs had finally taken hold and they were determined and declared to be idolatrous because they were in fact worshipping angels. in time they became known as the Church of St. Michael, the Archangel, who was worshipped as their founder and their defender. Indeed, they had lost connection with the head. But see, this Word of God comes to us that came to the Colossians, and it comes to us today in the Church of Jesus Christ, in this time, and in this place. And in recent history, the church is clear that the churches still need this warning. I was raised Roman Catholic and the Roman Catholic Church is well practiced in burdening saints with earthly regulations. But more and more Protestant churches, even those that call themselves Reformed, are adopting earthly regulations that bind the consciences of God's people apart from His Word. and manipulate their worship experience. There's so much that could be said. All I can allude to is the principles. This is at play big time in the churches. Many of the churches known as the emergent church, those offering alternative worship or those who are practicing vintage Christianity, these are a couple of the taglines that they use to identify the experimentation that's going on in the worship of the church and in the practice of piety. And I say to you that Paul's word to the Colossians comes to the churches today and says those are earthly regulations. They have no power. They have no value. They're not for the people of God. These practices are bent on turning the Christians in on themselves to measure their holiness and to strive in their own strength to do better and to look into themselves and to see how effective worship is for them what is doing for them and what can we do to enhance worship for me and takes our eyes off of Jesus Christ and such earthly regulations especially with regard to worship are established enough in the campus ministries of many Christian colleges that they are posted on their websites. They're not done in a closet. People of God, especially young people, I must warn you, and how I wish I didn't have to, but I must warn you that you will be exposed to all manner of idle notions. All manner of crazy ideas that will be presented to you in the name of enhancing your holiness or improving your worship that will actually be enticing you to adopt earthly practices that will threaten to disconnect you from Christ. They'll do this because they'll turn your attention to yourself and to your own resources and away from Christ and His sufficiency. This is a somber and serious warning and it abides on the church today. Guard your freedom in Christ. Through faith in Christ you have died with Christ to all such earthly regulations. but there's more Paul continues in chapter 3 verses 1 to 4 to remind the saints and to assure us that in Christ we have not only been freed from earthly regulations we have been freed for our heavenly calling Paul continues with an exhortation and appointed encouragement for the saints if you have been raised with Christ set your hearts and your minds on things above, not on earthly things. Now Paul is not here drawing the distinction between the holier heavenly things and the unholier earthly things, like there's some kind of spiritual material divide. That's not what he's saying. He says, give your heart's attention and your mind's attention to heavenly things or to things above. Why? Because that is where Christ is. seated at the right hand of God. He's your sufficiency. Give your heart and your mind to Him. But not only that, for those who have died with Christ and have been raised with Christ, that is where your life is. Now, hidden with Christ in God. So set your hearts and set your minds on heavenly things where Christ is and where your life is now hidden in Christ. Now what are we to think of that? How is that possible? All of our senses tell me that I am here and you are there. How can the lives of the saints how can our lives be hidden in Christ with God when we can see each other, one another, in this room. Well, it indeed is a mystery. It is a mystery that is better to consider in terms of when rather than where. We tend to think spatially. Earth here, heaven up there, we're here, Christ up there. But the language of the Bible is more about when than where. Paul says that our lives are now, that is, already hidden with Christ in God. And he also says that when Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory. The Apostle John says the same thing in chapter 3 of his first letter. He says, Dear friends, now we are children of God. Already we're children of God. And what we will be has not yet been made known. But when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. Something's true now. Something's true not yet. Something's true already. Something will be true then. And this is to speak to us as creatures who are bound by time because we can't hold the two together. God does. We can't. And so we have to think of this then or now and then already and not yet as a span of time. That's how we will live it. That's how we'll experience it. And we can call it the meantime. In the meantime. A big theological word for us today. Meantime. But we live in the meantime. This is our life. Luke tells us in Acts chapter 1 when it began. and that's when Christ was ascended into heaven, and He was what? Hidden from sight. And the two men dressed in white told Him how it would end, that He would come again the way He left, and we'd see Him again. And until that day when Christ returns, in the meantime, Christ, who is our life, is hidden away. We can't see Him. We can't touch Him. He's hidden. But that does not mean he is not active. Acts chapter 2. Pentecost. We'll be celebrating it soon. Peter gives his first sermon and what does he say? He says, not only did Jesus Christ rise from the dead, he's ascended to the right hand of God in heaven and there he has received the promised Holy Spirit which he is pouring out before your very eyes today. Christ reigns at the right hand of God the Father in heaven and He does so through His Spirit that He's poured out and pours out on His church. And so in the meantime, in the meantime, while Christ is hidden with God and our lives are hidden with Him, it is the Holy Spirit who creates in His people new life. Through the washing of rebirth and renewal The Holy Spirit applies the gospel of Jesus Christ to sinners. He gives them life. He grants them faith. And He grants them faith that trusts in Christ alone. And Paul explains it this way in Ephesians chapter 2. God made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions. It's by grace you've been saved through faith. And it's the gift of God. And it's through faith. All you catechism students, true faith, Heidelberg Catechism 21, I hope it comes to mind, true faith, the Holy Spirit unites us with Christ. He unites us with Christ so completely, so intimately, so vitally, that when Christ died on the cross, the life we inherited from Adam died with Him. And when he rose again from the grave, we rose to life again with him. His life is our life. Christ is your life. And when God raised up Christ to his right hand, God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him. And when Christ appears again, then you also will appear with him in glory. By faith, the Holy Spirit has united the people of God. He's united you. He's united me to Christ. Our life is Christ and our life is hidden with Christ who is hidden from us for the meantime. And in the meantime, it is the Holy Spirit who communicates Christ to us. He communicates Christ through us through the means of grace which Christ established for the church. These means by which the Holy Spirit strengthens that faith which He's created in us and He keeps us united, connected to the head. Through faith, the Holy Spirit causes us to hear Christ when the Gospel is preached. To see Christ when the sacraments are administered and to really partake of Christ in the Lord's table. In the meantime. And in the meantime, the Holy Spirit is He who is at work within each and every one of us who have been given true faith to equip us and to motivate us for our heavenly calling. Yes, our heavenly calling is one day to be revealed when Christ returns. We will see Him and we will be like Him. We will be with Him. Our life will be revealed. That is the end when the meantime is over. But in the meantime, in the meantime, we have a heavenly calling for which the Holy Spirit motivates us and He equips us. And what is that heavenly calling that is pursued right here on earth? It is what Christ has freed us to pursue and the power of the Holy Spirit and that is grateful obedience to His revealed will in His Word. And in the remainder of Paul's letter, Paul will set before us many details of this lifelong calling, our heavenly calling. That can be summed up as putting to death whatever belongs to our earthly nature. Putting to death that to which we've died. And to clothe ourselves with the righteousness that belongs to us as God's chosen people. To put on the righteousness that is already ours in Christ. That's our heavenly calling. And that's what Christ has freed us to pursue. It is, as Paul introduced in chapter 2, verse 6, to continue to live in Him. Rooted and built up in Him. Strengthened in the faith as you were taught. and overflowing with thankfulness. It is, as he wrote in Philippians chapter 2, verses 12 and 13, to continue to work out, to give expression to, to manifest your salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God who works in you to will, to want to, and to act according to his good purpose. our heavenly calling is to make progress in the Christian life, trusting fully and only in the sufficiency of Christ. And to continue in this progress until Christ comes for us, whether in glory or through death. And we, in Christ, have died with Christ. And we've been freed from all the earthly regulations that would distract us and derail us and deny Christ. And we have been raised with Christ and freed for this heavenly calling to pursue it as we read this morning more and more, trusting in Christ, equipped by His Spirit. Praise be to God. Let's pray. our Father in Heaven. When we approach texts like these, we really do bump into our finite natures. The limits of our ability to grasp and comprehend. And yet, Lord, we thank You that by Your Spirit we can hear this Word and we can know its truth and we can know it truly, even though we can't explain or understand all the mystery involved with our union with Christ. but we praise You and we thank You for the gift of faith that Your Holy Spirit creates in us by the gospel of Jesus Christ by which we are joined to Him fully and forever so that we have indeed died with Him to the earthly regulations to which we give ourselves so easily. We've died to them and we've been raised with Christ and set free not only from those restraints but also set free to live as you would have us live as your people. You have made us able and you make us able and you strengthen us along the way and you've given us what we need. Lord, your word is clear. You in Christ Jesus are sufficient. He is all that we need for life and for godliness. Keep us, Lord, from being disqualified, distracted, derailed. We pray that by Your Spirit more and more our eyes would indeed be fixed on heavenly things where Christ is and where we are hidden now with Him in God. It's in His name we pray. Amen. Thank you.