In these verses Paul does much more than refute Judaism; he shows us how we have become partakers of God's fullness in Christ. God has included us in the death and resurrection of His Son. When we believe this we do not only indicate that we hold this for true, but also that we agree with God's verdict when He condemned us to death on the cross. The fact that someone else was executed in our place does, in no way, diminish the depth of our guilt. The glory of the resurrection and the fullness of eternal life begin with this confession of guilt.
The apostle emphasizes particularly the freedom in Christ which we receive in all of this. We as Gentiles were dead and uncircumcised, and we were not included in God's covenant with Abraham. We were spiritually dead because our spirit was dead. And since our spirit is the organ that enables us to have fellowship with God, we had no fellowship with Him. We were all born into world with a spirit that could not function. When we turn towards God in conversion and confession of our sins, the Holy Spirit gives us the experience of regeneration so that the line of communication with God is restored. The key to this communion is the forgiveness of our sins.
It is only a small step from our trespasses to the law that condemns us. We must look into the reasons Paul gives for establishing a link between the law of God and demonic activity. Paul says that the law threatened us and opposed us because it condemned us before God and made us guilty of death. Death, obviously, is an invention of Satan. That is where the link is. When Jesus conquered death, He conquered the devil. As an expression of the will of God the law is, of course, perfect. We discover the law opposing us, not because it is evil, but because we are, and the law provides proof of our guilt.
Paul draws a condensed picture of the vicious circle in which man finds himself. Being in the power of demonic spirits man sins against God. The perfect will of God becomes the document that certifies man's lostness. Our debt to God is too immense for us to pay. It is impossible for us, as fallen human beings with a soul that is torn apart and ravaged by sin, to come before God with a payment for our debt that would meet the standard of God's glory. But now God has destroyed the proof of our guilt by canceling the written code of law that testified against us. There is no longer any document that God could use as proof against us in a court case so that we would be found guilty. God tore up the debenture. "He paid a debt He didn't owe, I owed a debt I couldn't pay …" as the songwriter wrote.
No other writer of the New Testament gave us as many original interpretations of the death of Jesus on the cross as did the apostle Paul. It would be an interesting study to trace them all and analyze them all. In this epistle Paul paints a picture of our Lord on the cross as a documentation of our guilt. When He died, the document that was proof of our guilt was torn up. In the epistle to the Galatians, Jesus is shown as the personification of the curse that is upon our lives. In the first Corinthian epistle, Jesus is our foolishness that is crucified. Through the depth of shame of the cross of Jesus Christ, we become living human beings; not just vegetating men and women who breathe and move, but living, as God is living with an indestructible life that brings us into His glory.
The victory Jesus won over death and the devil is the beginning of our rehabilitation. Just as the father in the parable of the Prodigal Son, God answers our confession of sin, not only, with forgiveness, but with our rehabilitation. [ 36 ] "But the father said to his servants, 'Quick! Bring the best robe and put it on him. Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. Bring the fattened calf and kill it. Let's have a feast and celebrate. For this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.' So they began to celebrate." In the same way as the father of the Prodigal put his best robe on him, so God clothes us with the glory of Christ's resurrection.
The cancellation of the written code means the defeat and disarmament of Satan, who counted on being able to use the code to accuse us before God. The prophet Zechariah sees Satan doing this in the vision the angel shows him. "Then he showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the LORD, and Satan standing at his right side to accuse him. The LORD said to Satan, 'The LORD rebuke you, Satan! The LORD, who has chosen Jerusalem, rebuke you! Is not this man a burning stick snatched from the fire?'"[ 37 ] This same vision also gives us a picture of rehabilitation.
John calls Satan "the accuser of our brothers." In Revelation we read: "Then I heard a loud voice in heaven say: 'Now have come the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God, and the authority of his Christ. For the accuser of our brothers, who accuses them before our God day and night, has been hurled down. They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death.'"[ 38 ] Satan is disarmed by the blood of the Lamb, by our testimony and our willingness to give our lives for the Lord. The first and most important factor in this victory is the blood of the Lamb. Satan's attempt to use God's righteousness against God meets with total defeat. He is the author of sin and he tries to accuse his victims before God, whose righteousness he despises, but his ruse is exposed. There is an anecdote about Martin Luther, who was presented by Satan with a long list of his sins. He told the devil to write on the document: "Paid by the blood of the Lamb." The story says that Satan dropped his quill and ran away.
Paul does not elaborate concerning the fact that the law is a complicated combination of the moral law and the ceremonial law. The moral law demands a holiness of life which is equal to the holiness of God Himself. The ceremonial law provides both for the death as well as for the forgiveness of the offender. The fact that it was an animal that died instead of a man does not change the principle of the law. In fulfilling the ceremonial law when He died on the cross, Jesus took upon Himself the guilt of our trespass of the moral law. He washed us from our sins in His own blood.[ 39 ] That is why the devil can no longer point a finger at us. Our sins were laid on Jesus, and He carried them away. The only one Satan could point a finger at would be Jesus Himself. The accuser is rebuked. "The LORD said to Satan, 'The LORD rebuke you, Satan!'"[ 40 ] The case is closed. The accuser is exposed as the culprit and the deceiver.
2:16-23
"Therefore 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 belonged 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. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory."
"Therefore do not let anyone judge you." (2:16) "Do not let anyone ... disqualify you for the prize." (2:18) "Do you submit to its rules" (2:20) These words contain the same admonition as above, and they are directed against the influence of gnosticism and Judaism. The point Paul wants to make is that Christians should not become the victim of those doctrines. A Christian is like a sheep among the wolves, and he should be on his guard so that he will not be devoured.
There is little we can do, of course, if others judge us. What Paul means is that, if other people condemn us or judge us on certain points, we should not be concerned. On the other hand, though, Paul says, in other places, that our eating and drinking should be influenced by our surroundings. In Romans 14 and I Corinthians 8, he emphasizes that our actions should be governed by love for others. The situation in the Colossian church must have been different. There were young Christians who were in danger of missing the important principles. We have to come to liberty in Christ first before we can put restrictions on ourselves out of love for others. And the issue here is the ceremonial law not the moral law. We will never be free to lie, to steal, to commit adultery or to break any of the moral laws.
"Do not let anyone judge you," pertains probably to meat offered to idols or to animals that had not been slaughtered according to the Jewish ritual law. It is also possible that it involved eating of animals that were ritually impure. There is no example of the latter in the New Testament beside the vision of Peter in Acts 10:9-16.
The issue is a whole complex of Old Testament ordinances which had found their fulfillment in the work of our Lord Jesus Christ. Paul calls these ordinances a shadow of the reality of Christ. They are a picture, a print on paper of a Person and of the reality of the Kingdom. A picture, as a representation, is not without value. But if we prefer the picture over the living person, then something is basically wrong with us. That was the sin of the Jews to whom the epistle of the Hebrews was addressed. They rejected Christ because they wanted to hang on to the rituals of the Old Testament. As long as we see the ordinances and precepts regarding food and religious festivals as an image of Christ, we are free to do with them what we want. But if we don't recognize the reality of Christ, we miss the purpose of the ordinance. The danger in observing the ceremonial part of the law is a very subtle one, if we do not discern what it expresses.
The danger in verses 18 and 19 lies on quite a different level. In the preceding verses the question was the choice of our liberty in Christ. Here the matter is disqualification for the prize. Clearly, this is a reference to gnosticism, which taught that man was on such a low level in the order of creation that he could not enter God's presence. He had to climb up via a complicated system of stairways, in which one had to be initiated. Paul calls this "false humility and the worship of angels." Worship of angels comes from the devil. We see this in Rev. 19:10 and 22:2,9: "At this I fell at his feet to worship him. But he said to me, 'Do not do it! I am a fellow servant with you and with your brothers who hold to the testimony of Jesus. Worship God! For the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.' " "I, John, am the one who heard and saw these things. And when I had heard and seen them, I fell down to worship at the feet of the angel who had been showing them to me. But he said to me, `Do not do it! I am a fellow servant with you and with your brothers the prophets and of all who keep the words of this book. Worship God!' "
The difference between false humility and true humility is clear. True humility is not self conscious. True humility does not talk about itself. Uriah Heep in Charles Dickens' book David Copperfield presented himself as "umble," but this humility was a cover-up for his baseness. Paul unmasks this kind of humility as unspiritual and puffed up. True humility comes from the Holy Spirit. "Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me ...." Any kind of humility that is produced by our sinful nature plays into the hands of the devil.
The greatest danger is that this false humility disrupts the functioning of the body of Christ. If we see ourselves as members of the body and we understand the place we occupy in it, we will be protected from all kinds of dangers. True humility makes us function as members of Christ's body.
Paul's reasoning is logical. If it is impossible for us to live in direct communion with the Lord and if we need all kinds of middlemen in order to get through to Him, we are members of a body which is not connected with the head. And this means that we cannot have fellowship with one another as fellow believers.
The image of a body is an illustration Paul loves to use, and we find it several times in his epistles. This emphasis is paramount in chapters Rom. 12:4-8 and I Cor. 12. The body illustration, however, is seen in other letters also, like in Eph. 1:23; 3:16; 4:4, 12, 16; 5:23 and in this Colossian letter we find it in 1:18, 24; 2:19 and 3:15).
The third admonition, in vs. 20, says: "Do not submit to its rules." We say again that this does not pertain to our moral conduct but to a series of rituals which were fulfilled in the death of Christ. Paul gives three reasons for his advice:
1- Our identification with the death of Christ,
2- Our new relationship with "the basic principles of this world," and
3- The fact that actually we no longer live in this world.
1- Our identification with the death of Christ
This principle was foreshadowed in the laying on of hands which preceded the killing of the sacrificial animal. We read in Lev. 1:4 and other verses: "He is to lay his hand on the head of the burnt offering, and it will be accepted on his behalf to make atonement for him." This gesture symbolizes substitution. The person who brought the sacrifice indicated that what happened to the animal should actually happen to him. In a sense it was the man who died. The death of our Lord Jesus on the cross makes this much more real for us. As in the case that a sacrificial animal was used, so is our identification with Christ in His death. The identification requires an act of the will from the person who brings the sacrifice. As far as God is concerned, we are all crucified with Christ. But unless we accept this personally, we do not experience the consequences of it. We lay our hand upon Christ to indicate that we have been crucified with Him.
2- Our new relationship with "the basic principles of this world"
The clause "Since you died with Christ to the basic principles of this world" is not very clear. The RSV is even more obscure, saying: "If with Christ you died to the elemental spirits of the universe." The KJV comes close to the NIV with: "Wherefore if ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world." We have to see what the Greek says and how that should be
interpreted. The word is "stoicheion." Paul uses this word also in Gal. 3:3: "So also, when we were children, we were in slavery under the basic principles of the world." There our being subjected to the basic principles of the world is linked to spiritual immaturity. It seems that we do have to think in terms of demonic powers, as the RSV indicates, territorial demonic powers that influence man's thinking and behavior for certain periods of time. In Eph.2:1,2 we see clearly that there is a connection between the acts of men and demonic influences. Paul says there: "As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, In which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient." Even in modern times we speak about "the spirit of the age."
What seems strange is that Paul puts the keeping of the ceremonial law in this category. The tradition of the ceremonial law was good and holy, but the devil used this to harden the hearts of men by robbing the tradition of its content. Jesus describes the Pharisees in that way in the parable of the sower as the seed that fell along the path and was picked up by the birds.
Without the working of the Holy Spirit tradition becomes a weapon in the hand of the enemy. The devil always tries to draw the attention of man upon himself. Eccentric and egoistic people are an easy prey for him, especially if they are religious. But, being crucified with Christ, means that our ego has been nailed to the cross and this robs the devil of his handle on us.
Man is a most complicated creature and it is very easy to deceive oneself. The most important prayer we can utter in this respect is David's prayer in Ps. 139:23,24 - "Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting."
But Paul does not only deal with the ceremonial law in these verses, because he mentions "human commands and teachings." That phrase cannot be applied to the law. We have to think about the Talmut and the Mishna, in which the law was interpreted, sometimes, into the most ridiculous details. Jesus reacts to this kind of interpretation when He chides the Pharisees and scribes in Matt. 23. The Bible propagates nowhere "harsh treatment of the body." It remains true that Jesus, as the Lamb of God, fulfilled the whole of the ceremonial law. In that respect have the Talmud and the Mishnah lost their value.
3. We live no longer in this world.
In vs. 20 Paul had already made mention of this. It is obvious that these words cannot be taken in a literal and physical sense. Of course, we live in this world and we are part of it. In John 17:11, 14 and 16 Jesus makes clear what our position in this world is. We read: "I will remain in the world no longer, but they are still in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them by the power of your name; the name you gave me; so that they may be one as we are one. I have given them your word and the world has hated them, for they are not of the world any more than I am of the world. They are not of the world, even as I am not of it." The meaning of this is that we do no longer belong to the system that opposes God at the instigation of the Evil One. We are born in this world and we grow up in it, but since our identification with the death and resurrection of Christ we are free of the power that dominates this world. And inasmuch as we live in this world, we are here as representatives of the Kingdom of God.
Paul wants us to be aware of this fact and to draw the practical consequences in our daily life. Our thinking should be dominated by the heavenly glory as it is manifested in Christ. One of the greatest helps for me in this respect is John's description of his encounter with the risen and glorified Lord in Rev. 1:12-20. This glory will be ours when we shall appear with Him and others will be amazed about this glory which will shine through us. Paul says in II Thess. 1:10: "On the day he comes to be glorified in his holy people and to be marveled at among all those who have believed. This includes you, because you believed our testimony to you."
It is good to ponder these things. It will protect us from much misery on earth. The devil's propaganda can be so overwhelming, so that sometimes it seems as if there are only cancer patients and starved children in this world. We should be deeply moved by the suffering in this world, but this should not lead us to lose sight of the glory. When Paul says: "Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things," he doesn't mean that we should be immune to the suffering of others but that we should not let ourselves be led astray by hairsplitting over interpretations of laws and precepts that have been erased by the blood of Christ.
We are dead as far as the world goes and our life is now hidden with Christ in God. Nobody can touch us.
Phrases like "set your hearts on things above," and "set your minds on things above," indicate that life in the heavenlies does not automatically become part of us. We have to reach for it in faith. Heavenly realities are invisible to us. We put ourselves, in faith, upon the basis of having died with Christ and of being raised with Him. Thus the heavenly things become
accessible to our spirit.
[ 1 ]
Is. 6:11a
[ 2 ]
Gal. 4:19
[ 3 ]
Gal. 2:20
[ 4 ]
Ps. 40:7,8
[ 5 ]
Matt. 13:16,17
[ 6 ]
See Eph. 2:11 - 3:13
[ 7 ]
Matt. 18:20
[ 8 ]
John 14:15-20; 16:7-15
[ 9 ]
John 14:20
[ 10 ]
John 14:15
[ 11 ]
Matt. 22:37,38
[ 12 ]
I Pet. 1:8
[ 13 ]
Gal. 4:19
[ 14 ]
Rom. 8:26,27
[ 15 ]
Heb. 4:12
[ 16 ]
Ps. 43:4
[ 17 ]
I Cor. 1:26
[ 18 ]
Matt. 10:16
[ 19 ]
Luke 16:1-9
[ 20 ]
Matt. 7:14
[ 21 ]
Prov. 3:5,6
[ 22 ]
Rev. 14:4
[ 23 ]
Ps. 1:3
[ 24 ]
Matt. 17:20; 21:21; Mark 11:23
[ 25 ]
Dan. 3:16,17 ff.
[ 26 ]
Acts 16:24
[ 27 ]
Isaiah 8:19,20
[ 28 ]
John 7:23
[ 29 ]
See Gen. 17:9-14
[ 30 ]
Gal. 3:14
[ 31 ]
Rom. 2:28,29
[ 32 ]
Deut. 10:16
[ 33 ]
Jer. 4:4
[ 34 ]
Mark 10:38
[ 35 ]
I Pet. 3:21 (KJV)
[ 36 ]
See Luke 15:11-32
[ 37 ]
Zech. 3:1-2
[ 38 ]
Rev. 12:10,11
[ 39 ]
Rev. 1:5 (KJV)
[ 40 ]
Zech. 3:2
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