Bible Commentaries
Colossians 2

IV

CHRIST’S RELATION TO THE FATHER AND THE UNIVERSE

Colossians 1:23-2:7.

This chapter commences with a question based on the King James Version of Colossians 1:23: "Which was preached to every creature which is under heaven." In my younger days the Hard Shell Baptists used this passage to prove that the commission in Mark 16:15-18, commanding to "preach the gospel to every creature" was literally and finally fulfilled by the apostles to whom alone it was given. They supported their contention by citing the fact that the "signs" in Mark 16:17-18, which were to accompany and confirm missionary work had long since failed, and therefore missions were ended; that the "signs" were a part of the commission, and whoever now claimed authority to do mission work under that commission must show the signs or stand convicted of imposture. I used to press this point on Missionary Baptist preachers to see how they would answer it. Finally one of them passed the question back to me, "You are a Missionary Baptist yourself – how do you answer it?" My reply was this:

1. Mark 16:15-18 must be construed with Matthew 28:18-20. The perpetuity of the Matthew commission appears from "Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world," and from the fact that the "make disciples of all nations" is co-extensive with "teaching them to observe all things, etc.," which Hard Shells themselves admit to be binding now.

2. Even after Paul had written, "which was preached to every creature which is under heaven," he himself went right on in the mission work and commanded others to do the same, which examples prove the continuity and perpetuity of the commission. So also does Peter, as appears from his letters written after Paul wrote Colossians. And so, also, does John. See particularly the letter to Gaius long after Colossians, in which John commends Gaius for helping the missionaries and condemns the Hard Shell – Diotrephes, (vv. 6-10).

3. We must look to the apostle in subsequent teaching to learn if the "signs" are always to accompany the mission work, or are to cease when their accrediting purpose is accomplished (1 Corinthians 13:8; 1 Corinthians 13:13).

4. The accuracy of the King James Version of Colossians 1:23 is questionable. The revision thus renders Mark 16:15, "Preach the gospel to the whole creation," and renders Colossians 1:23, "which was preached in all creation under heaven." Compare Romans 10:18.

5. Whatever the rendering, the Hard Shell interpretation is manifestly erroneous. The gospel must be preached to all the world, generation by generation, and not merely to one generation. The church, as the pillar and ground of the truth, must continue to instruct the angels in the manifold wisdom of God until Jesus comes (Ephesians 3:10) and must, by its mission work, exhibit the glory of God throughout all generations (Ephesians 3:21). Ephesians was written after Colossians.

6. Paul was operating under a direct commission given subsequently to the one in Matthew 28 and Mark 16, (see Acts 9:15; Acts 22:14-21; Acts 26:16-18), and transmitted to others the carrying on of the same mission work (2 Timothy 2:2).

The next item in the analysis is the parenthetical explanation of the apostle’s mission to the Gentiles, and his consequent concern for these Colossians. That item of the analysis extends from Colossians 1:24-2:7. He is expounding here the object of his mission to the Gentiles.

We recall that when Paul was so long a time at Ephesus, the capital of the Roman province of Asia, in which were these Lycus valley cities, that representatives from this Lycus valley attended these meetings, among whom were Philemon and Epaphras, of Colosse, who were both converted. And while he himself at the time of this great meeting, did not personally visit these Lycus valley cities, those who were converted by him did visit them and plant the gospel there; so the establishment of the churches there was indirectly attributable to him, and so he would have an interest in them.

But apart from that fact, he was the Christ-appointed missionary to the Gentiles, and they were mostly Gentiles. In this valley there were some Jews. The population was blended. While ethnologically most of them were Phrygians, they were a mixed people; some were Jews, some Greeks, and some Romans. But he was concerned because the whole Gentile mission had been turned over to him, as to Peter and the other apostles was given the mission to the Jews. So we note when Peter writes a letter to these very people later, he confines himself to the Jewish inhabitants, thus: "Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to the elect who are sojourners of the dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia." While Peter writes to the elect of the sojourners of the dispersion – to the dispersed Jews – Paul writes as an apostle to the Gentiles. What is the difference between the "to whom" that Paul wrote and the "to whom" that Peter wrote? Paul wrote as an apostle to the Gentiles, and the whole cast of his letter is Gentilic. Peter wrote to the Jews of the dispersion, and the whole cast of his letter is Jewish. So then, because Paul was the apostle to the Gentiles, it is a matter of concern to him that they should take on false doctrine.

I call attention to some expressions in Colossians 1:24. He says, "I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and fill up on my part that which is lacking of the afflictions of Christ in my flesh for his body’s sake, which is the church." Did Dr. Gordon in his book on the Spirit rightly interpret that passage, "I fill up on my part that which is lacking of the afflictions of Christ"? Or does Paul’s suffering have anything to do with Christ’s sacrificial suffering, in order to the salvation of man? Or does he mean that his sufferings supplement the nonsacrificial sufferings of Christ? Some of Christ’s sufferings were for our example and others were not. As proof I cite 1 Peter 2:20: "For what glory is it, if, when ye sin, and are buffeted for it, ye shall take it patiently? but if, when ye do well, and suffer for it, ye shall take it patiently, this is acceptable with God. For hereunto were ye called: because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, that ye should follow in his steps." So we may now follow the example of Christ’s sufferings, except that expiatory part, and our sufferings may supplement his sufferings except that expiatory part. There we cannot come in. Those who deny the substitutionary or vicarious expiation of Christ are accustomed to quote this passage from Peter and this passage from Paul to show that the sufferings of Christ were merely martyr sufferings, not unlike Paul’s martyr sufferings and Peter’s, and serve merely as an example of patience, and that they had no expiatory nature. It is necessary to emphasize this point as to the distinction between what he did as a vicarious sacrifice for sinners and the ordinary sufferings of Christ, such as we and all of his people participate in. He himself refers to this when he says, "If the world hateth you, ye know that it hath hated me before it hated you. If ye were of this world, the world would love its own; but because ye are not of this world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you. Remember the word that I said unto you, A servant is not greater than his lord. If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you; if they kept my word, they will keep yours also.”

In Colossians 1:26 we have a word that needs explanation. What does Paul mean by "mystery"? He says, "I was made a minister according to the dispensation of God, which was given me to you-ward, to fulfil the word of God, even the mystery which hath been hid for ages and generations, but now hath been manifested to his saints." What is this mystery? He explains it in the next verse: "To whom God was pleased to make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles." In the letter to the Ephesians he elaborates on that mystery this way: "Wherefore remember that once ye, the Gentiles in the flesh, who are called Uncircumcision by that which is called Circumcision, in the flesh, made by hands; that ye were at that time separate from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of the promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus ye that once were afar off are made nigh in the blood of Christ. For he is our peace, who made both one, and brake down the middle wall of partition, having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances; that he might create in himself of the two one new man, so making peace; and might reconcile them both in one body unto God through the cross, having slain the enmity thereby: and he came and preached peace to you that were far off, and peace to them that were nigh: for through him we both have access in one Spirit unto the Father. So then ye are no more strangers and sojourners, but ye are fellow citizens with the saints, and of the household of God" (Ephesians 2:11-19).

The mystery then was this – that in the beginning of the human race God had purposed not to make any discrimination between people, and salvation was to be as free to one nation as to another and that in electing the Jews and isolating them from all other people, it was not done because they were better than other people, nor was it done to confer special grace upon them, but simply to make them the depository of his truth for the time being, which in the fulness of time would include all the human race. This is the mystery. But the Jews supposed that God was partial to them – that they were not merely the custodians of revelation for all mankind, but that between them and the Gentiles there was a wall that could not be broken down. They would stand up on that wall, glorying in their sanctity, and saying to outsiders, "You dogs! Don’t touch me! I am holier than you!" They carried that so far that they would go home from the crowded streets, immerse themselves, and wash their clothes to remove possible defilement by contact with a Gentile. Paul does not use the word "mystery" in the sense that what he now reveals is mysterious, but that his revelation makes clear what was once a mystery – that the purpose of grace for the whole human race was veiled in the Old Testament times but unveiled in New Testament times.

So John, in Revelation, talking about the scarlet woman, says that she is "mystery," meaning that for the time being the truth was veiled under a symbol. The symbol was a woman dressed in scarlet, sitting upon a beast. All Bible critics confront the question, What is the meaning of "mystery" in the New Testament? It has several meanings. The context determines in each case. Paul in a letter to Timothy says, "Confessedly, great is the mystery of godliness," and then gives all the elements of that mystery of godliness, commencing, "God made manifest in the flesh."

In Colossians 2:2 he says, "That their hearts may be comforted, they being knit together in love and unto all riches of the full assurance of understanding, that they may know the mystery of God, even Christ." The idea is that God, out of Christ, is a mystery, unknowable, but in Christ he is declared and the mystery solved.

Consider also that word "assurance." We have three samples of its use: We have faith and the assurance of faith. We have hope and the assurance of hope. We have understanding and the assurance of understanding. There is a distinction between a man’s simple faith in Christ and the assurance of that faith. Faith, hope, and understanding are all objective, in that they go out of us and take hold of an external object. But assurance is subjective. It does not raise a question concerning the merits of the object of faith, but rather the question, Do I really believe? So with hope and understanding. Hope looks to certain things reserved in heaven; assurance of hope is a kind of certificate to a person that thoroughly satisfies him that his hopes are well grounded.

These Gentiles did not understand that the gate of salvation was to be just as wide open to them as to the Jews. When they took hold of it they took hold of it timidly. So Paul says, "I want you to get full assurance of understanding that you are entitled to this – that God meant you just as much as he meant a Jew." We see that if the Gentiles could reach full assurance of understanding that they were entitled to salvation under the same law and the same terms as the Jew, then Judaizing teachers could not subvert them, could not shake them by saying, "You must be circumcised in order to be saved." The reply would be, "I have an understanding of that matter, and I have full assurance of the understanding, and I know that I do not have to become a Jew in order to be saved."

So Paul continues in Colossians 2:4: "This I say that no one may delude you with persuasive speech." That is exactly what was taking place there. There was a false teacher in Colosse who was endeavoring to make proselytes to his philosophy, and one part of that philosophy was that they must observe all sabbatic rituals, whether the seventh-day sabbath, monthly sabbath, or annual sabbath. That is precisely the point that this false teacher was trying to make. Paul says to these Gentiles, "I have a deep concern for you, and I want to lead you into a clear practical understanding of this gospel, lest somebody come and delude you with persuasive speech."

In Colossians 2:6 we have another variation of the same thought: "As therefore ye received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him." In other words, "You received him by simple faith, without conformity to Jewish ritual; continue as you commenced." Compare Galatians 3:1-3, "O foolish Galatians, who did bewitch you, before whose eyes Jesus Christ was openly set forth crucified? This only would I learn from you: Received ye the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith? Are ye so foolish? Having begun in the Spirit, are ye now perfected in the flesh?"

He continues the assurance thought: "Rooted and builded up in him and established in your faith, even as ye were taught." Those three words, "rooted," "builded up" and "established" contain the thought he was trying to impress: "I want you to be so well indoctrinated that you cannot be turned aside by specious error."

The same thought prevails in his letter to the Ephesians in his prayer, Colossians 3:4-19: "For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, that ye may be strengthened with power through his Spirit in the inward man; that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; to the end that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be strong to apprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge, that ye may be filled unto all the fulness of God." That is one denomination and another – between justification and longer emphasize doctrine. We would be amazed if we were to call up our entire church membership, and as each one comes up begin to catechize to see if every member was thoroughly indoctrinated in the faith once for all delivered to the saints. Many of them cannot discriminate between one denomination and another – between justification and sanctification. Herein the Presbyterians excel the Baptists – in the use of the catechism.

Where a church has been faithfully ministered unto by a pastor who selects, not high sounding texts whose mere sound led him to the selection, but who has from his deliberate conviction preached from the themes that they needed for their rooting and grounding and establishment in faith, that man will have an indoctrinated church. But there is a class of wishy-washy, "milk and cider" preachers who would rather say it does not make any difference what one believes if the heart is all right; it does not make any difference how he is baptized; they do not care whether he is a member of the church or not. That class of preachers raise up congregations to become the prey of any evangelical tramp or crank. Such an ill-trained congregation does not make even good militia, much less veteran soldiers.

To illustrate: Recently a Boston Baptist preacher, moderator of an association, published in The Baptist Watchman a full four-page article that would degenerate a vertebrate into a jelly fish. He denies that baptism is a prerequisite to church membership, denies that a church has anything whatever to do with receiving members or judging of their qualifications, affirms that when a man believes it automatically makes him a member of the church, prefers to make baptism essential to salvation rather than essential to church membership. In a word, the whole article is made up of "airy nothings" without a stalwart thought in it. The wonder is how that man ever got into a Baptist church. It must have been automatically, for no true Baptist church, if it had been consulted, would have received him.

To illustrate again: One day a man called at my house who denied that a church was either an assembly or an organization at all, saying that it was merely a living community. God help us when such jellyfish views about the church are taught by those in authority!

Two parts of this letter are of transcendently great importance. One is the doctrine and the other is this part – the fourth item of the analysis. Let us look at what the analysis says:

Polemics against the false teacher and teachings at Colosse (Colossians 2:8-3:17).

(1) As limiting by a false philosophy the sufficiency of Christ and their completeness in him.

(2) Polemics against the folly of this philosophy in accounting for creation, and in defining sin, and in the insufficiency of its means for conquest of sin, such as (a) a Pharisaic observance of an obsolete sabbatic ritual, (b) a self-imposed humility, (c) the worship of angels, supposed to be emanations from God, himself unknowable, (d) a bondage to impracticable ascetic precepts based on the idea that sin resides in matter, which precepts were but expressions of will worship and powerless to hedge against temptation or to subdue the passions, or to supply objects high enough to incite to love motives.

(3) Against its substitution of a mystic knowledge ("gnosis") as a standard instead of the gospel (Colossians 2:16-23).

(4) But the gospel on the other hand raises us with Christ and makes us sharers of his life and exaltation, supplies us with heavenly objects of thought and desire, and pledges our manifestation in glory with Christ (Colossians 3:1-4).

(5) It shows sin to be an awful nature called the "old man," resident in mind, not matter, and expresses itself in fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, covetousness, anger, wrath, malice, railing, shameful speaking (Colossians 3:5-9).

(6) It provides for the real conquest of sin by regeneration puts off the old man and puts on the new man, a recreation after the image of God, expressing itself in a heart of compassion, kindness, lowliness, meekness, forbearance, forgiveness, love, and by the sanctifying instrumentality of God’s word, and by spiritual worship, in teaching, prayer, and song, and by supplying the dominant motives in all word, deed or thought, the glory of God (Colossians 3:10-17).

(7) It glorifies in Christ all races, nations, social castes (Colossians 3:11).

There was a false teacher, not teachers – it was one person. We do not know who, but there was one prominent man there in the Lycus valley who possessed and held this false philosophy. This philosophy was partly Pharisaic in its adherence to the sabbatic ritual, and partly of the Essenes in its ascetic teaching. This philosophy held that the world was not created by God, because God is unknowable and cannot touch man and things, but that it was created by emanations from God – eons – and therefore, instead of worshiping God, they worshiped eons, or angels. They said that they should not worship God because they could not know him. They worshiped intermediate beings that came in touch with them.

Then this philosophy taught that as sin resided in matter, the way to conquer it was by conformity to ascetic precepts – that one should retire from the world, live like the Essenes in a cave on the border of the Dead Sea, not marry, have just as few clothes as possible, all the time working on the destruction of the body, because there is where sin resides, since the soul is all right. That was one phase of the philosophy. Paul was combating that, as shown in his doctrines: Christ in his relation to the Father, the universe and its intelligences, and that by him, in him, and unto him was creation, and that he was before all things, and in his relation to the church.

With reference to sin, notice what things he enumerates as expressions of sin, and see whether it be of the body: "Evil desire, covetousness, anger, wrath, malice, railing, lying, shameful speaking out of your mouth." Some of these are overt acts, but sin, according to that teaching, resides in the soul and not in the body. The body is merely used as an instrument in a great many sins, but sin does not reside in the body. To show further how Paul was controverting this philosophy as to the nature of sin, he calls it the old man, the old Adam. How then is sin to be conquered? It is to be conquered by something that will change the nature – that will put off the old man and put on the new man. That is regeneration, and then follows a sanctifying power that will carry on the regenerating work, so that instead of the deeds of the old man like anger, wrath, malice, etc., we put on the deeds of the new man, like love, kindness, a heart of compassion, forbearance and forgiveness. Then he goes on to show what instrumentalities are necessary to bring this about: "Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly." So we see the difference between the two philosophies in question.

QUESTIONS

1. State the Hard Shell contention based on the King James Version of Colossians 1:23, and reply to it.

2. What is the difference between the "to whom" Paul is writing and the "to whom" Peter later writes?

3. Expound Colossians 1:24, "I fill up on my part that which is lacking of the afflictions of Christ," and show Dr. Gordon’s interpretation.

4. What the meaning of "mystery" in Colossians 1:25 and elsewhere by Paul, does it mean the same thing when used by the Synoptic Gospels and by John in Revelation, and does it mean the same thing when used in the classics and by modern secret societies?

5. Expound the word "assurance," in Colossians 2:2, distinguish between "knowledge" and the "assurance of knowledge," between "faith" and the "assurance of faith," between ’hope" and the "assurance of hope," and apply the context showing the value of the "assurance of knowledge."

6. Show the variation of the same thought in Colossians 2:6-7.

7. What similar expressions in Ephesians 3, and what the application there?

8. What defect in many Baptist churches, what the kind of preachers that promote it, and wherein do Presbyterians excel us at this point?

9. Illustrate by the article in The Baptist Watchman and by a modern definition of the word "church."

10. What the two very important parts of this letter, and what a brief summary of the second as indicated in the analysis and the brief discussion which follows?

Verses 8-17

V

HUMAN PHILOSOPHY VERSUS THE ENDURING GOSPEL OF CHRIST

Colossians 2:8-3:17.

This chapter continues the exposition of Colossians. While on broad general lines, the main teaching part of the letter has already been considered, we need to examine somewhat in detail certain words and phrases in the long paragraph commencing Colossians 2:8 and ending Colossians 3:17. In Colossians 2:8 "spoil" has the sense of captives – "make you a spoil," and in the same verse, on the word "philosophy," note –

1. The derivation of the word – literally "a love of wisdom," i.e., human wisdom, or reasonings, in accounting for things, as opposed to divine revelation in accounting for things.

2. The province of philosophy. Certain matters come legitimately within the realm of human philosophy upon which its reasonings and even its working suppositions may be heard tentatively, its conclusions, or hypotheses, continually subject to modification as investigation affords new light.

But certain other matters are entirely outside its realm, e.g., whatever is supernatural cannot be settled by natural reasonings.

Whatever touches ultimate origin and destiny lies entirely outside the realm of human science, and hence when human philosophy attempts to settle matters beyond the reach of human science it becomes mere speculation. Its dogmatic claims are, as the apostle here puts it, "vain deceit." All its voluminous, varied, and contradictory literature upon these subjects from the beginning of time till this hour is as valueless as the "airy nothings" of a dream. If every book of it were burned today in one huge bonfire, as were the magical books of the Ephesians, the world would be better off.

The only light in it all is the light of its burning. See 1 Corinthians Colossians 1:18; Colossians 2:16.

Do not understand me to deny all legitimate scope to human philosophy. Within bounds it has a great place, but even in that place its value may be greatly overestimated. I am quite sure that more than half of the matter in the textbooks on philosophy in all our schools, colleges, and universities is the most worthless rubbish, and some of it rank poison.

I am not talking of science. A man who denies the value of science – real science – rails at God’s appointed method by which man is commanded to subdue the earth and lay under tribute all nature’s potentialities. The predicate for all schools of human learning is God’s dower of authority to man over land and sea and sky, and his commission to subdue the earth. Here in the natural world human philosophy is the avant-courier and handmaid of science. It supposes, it experiments, it makes myriads of tentative explorations and flights, shedding off the failures, utilizing and improving the successes, and thus ever contributing to the enlargement of science.

Philosophy becomes a fool only when it invades the realm of ultimate origins, destinies, and the supernatural. Here it is vainer than a peacock, and blinder than a mole, which, burrowing under the earth, is a fine judge of earthworms, but utterly incompetent to become a critic of landscapes, sky views, and ocean wonders.

"Ne sutor ultra crepidam." On these matters all God’s treasures of wisdom and knowledge are stored up in Christ, who is the only revelator of God’s hidden things. A human philosophy which, leaving out God (deifying instead, Chance or Fate), leaving out man’s highest nature and highest relations, leaving out distinction between matter and spirit, attempts a scheme of the universe and the related human life – perpetrates a folly unworthy of preservation in human literature. Observe next in Colossians 2:8,

3. "After the tradition of men." "Tradition," that which is handed down – transmitted from father to son, or from one generation to another – may be either good or bad according to its origin or subject matter. In the New Testament the word is accordingly used sometimes in a good sense, sometimes in a bad sense. Paul commands Timothy to pass on to other good men the deposit of good doctrine which he had received from Paul. If the original matter be a revelation from God, it does not cease to be good because, "handed down," provided only it be held sacredly intact and transmitted unimpaired. The supreme test of an oral "tradition" is its conformity with the word written. The Pharisees made void the written word of God with rabbinical traditions. And so tradition in the early Christian centuries began that undermining of the simplicity of the written gospel which culminates in our day into that which is another gospel or no gospel.

The context (Colossians 2:11-18) indicates that "the traditions of men" here rebuked by the apostle is a Jewish element of Gnosticism rather than heathen, because these traditions are in the same verse said to be "after the rudiments of the world" and not "after Christ." But what is meant here by "rudiments"? In a general way "rudiments" means what is elemental – the first principles. Of course, "rudiments of the world" may mean worldly first principles, referring to mere human origin, but this hardly accords with the New Testament usage of the word "rudiments" or with the immediate context. The rudiments of revelation were the types, shadows and ritual of the Old Testament. It was characteristic of the Jew in the time of our Lord, and is so even now that he went not beyond these rudiments. He would not see in Christ the substance of these shadows, so he never went on to maturity.

Moreover, by their traditions they corrupted and distorted even the shadows. This corruption might appear in stressing the letter which killeth against the Spirit which maketh alive. Or by their endless elaborations, interpretations, emendations, infinite trifling details they might convert the law into a burdensome yoke impossible to be borne. Or by merely human speculation on the fact that the law was given by "the disposition of angels" they might merge Jewish speculation into the heathen element of Gnosticism, a creation by eons – graded emanations from God. To meet which Paul presents Jesus as having in himself "all the fulness of the Godhead bodily." Let the reader particularly note the force of this expression, perhaps the strongest in the New Testament.

Observe (1) "Godhead." The Greek theotes means "deity" – not the weaker word "divinity" the natural force of which may be evaded, or shaded down. The expression is even stronger than John’s "The Word was God (Theos)."

Observe (2) "fulness," not in part nor in certain directions, but "all the fulness of Deity."

Observe (3) "bodily" (somatikos), i.e., "bodily-wise." The word is carefully chosen. Here Lightfoot speaks to the point: "It is not ’in a body’ for Deity cannot be so confined. It is not ’in the form of a body’ for this might suggest the unreality of Christ’s human body, but ’bodily,’ i. e., bodily-wise, or with a bodily manifestation."

Observe (4) "dwells" (katoikei): "In him dwells all the fulness (pleroma) of Deity bodily," as just before, in contrast with their vain deceit, their philosophy, he has affirmed that in Christ "all the treasures of wisdom [sop/no] and of knowledge (gnosis) are stored" (Colossians 2:3).

Observe (5) "And ye, in him, are complete," i.e., filled full (pepleromenoi). Being in union with Christ, there is no need to seek from human sources a wisdom, a knowledge, a philosophy, on the matters stated.

Observe (6) Instead of Christ being a low grade eon, or emanation from God – a subordinate angel – "He is the head of all principality and authority" – Kreek, he Kephale pases arches hai exousias. He then goes on to show that in being united to Christ they received the real, or spiritual circumcision, and their baptism was in a figure both a burial and a resurrection with Christ. In other words, the antitype of circumcision is regeneration, and baptism symbolizes Christ’s burial and resurrection and pledges our own. He then reaches his true climax in a double direction:

1. That in his death on the cross he fulfilled, cancelled, and abrogated all the Old Testament economy – took it entirely out of the way – took it forever away.

2. That on the cross he not only conquered, but made an open show of Satan and all his demons. Here he follows the imagery of a Roman triumphal procession, accorded to their conquering generals, dragging captive princes in their train. (See the author’s sermon on the "Three Hours of Darkness.") He came in triumph, by resurrection and ascension, after the battle on the cross, not to imperial Rome, but to the heavenly Jerusalem, the city of God, shouting, Lift up your heads, O ye gates, And be ye lifted up, ye everlasting doors, And let the King of Glory come in.

"When he ascended up on high he led captivity captive," i.e., he broke all the chains of bondage which Satan had bound on men, redeeming the captives of the terrible one, and he gave as largess the outpoured Holy Spirit with all his varied gifts to men. Truly that was "the crisis of this world."

Let not the reader fail to note the apostle’s conclusions from this victory on the cross:

1. Let no man judge you in meat and drink according to the Mosaic distinctions between the clean and unclean. That distinction is abrogated.

2. Let no man judge you on any part of the sabbatic cycle, either the seventh-day sabbath, the lunar sabbath, the three great annual sabbaths, the land sabbath or the Jubilee sabbath. They were all shadows; the body is of Christ. The whole old covenant with its sacrifices, types, ritual, and priesthood, has passed away. This passage is the death blow to all sects which observe the seventh day sabbath. They are either Jews on this point or merely keepers of a sabbath which commemorates creation. Yet when we come to consider the more elaborate arguments in the letter to the Hebrews, written a little later, we will find that "there remaineth to the people of God a sabbath-keeping" (Sabbatismos) which commemorates not rest from creation nor deliverance from Egypt, but our Lord’s rest after his greater work of redemption.

3. Let no man seek to impose on you circumcision of the flesh. Ye are regenerated, having the spiritual circumcision.

4. Let him not judge as one of the Essenes, trying to kill sin by afflicting the body, saying, "handle not, taste not, touch not" this or that. All their minute rules, all their asceticism, all their adjournment of marriage, all their retirement from the world into caves, nunneries, or monasteries, all their regimen of diet and scourging of the body is mere will worship and availeth nothing toward shutting out temptations. Allurement, lust, passion, envy, jealousy, malice, and covetousness, that run riot in the world, will find a man in his seclusion. Walls of brick and stone cannot shut out human passion. God meant for us to live in the world, but not to be of the world. "I pray not that they may be taken out of the world, but that they may be kept from the evil one," says our Lord. The true remedy is to set our affections on things above, where our citizenship is. Let the expulsive power of new affections drive the old loves out of the heart. Put off the old man and put on the new man, which, after God, is re-created unto knowledge, righteousness, and true holiness. Let the reader note that chapter Colossians 3:11 of this letter and Ephesians 4:24, both allude to man’s original creation in the image of God, and this image involved "knowledge" (epignosis), "righteousness" (dikaiosune) and "holiness of truth" (hosioteti tes aletheias).

5. Where there cannot be Greek and Jew, circumcision and uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, bondmen, freemen, but Christ is all and in all.

These five conclusions from Christ’s work on the cross constitute a priceless heritage, ever to be most jealously guarded. They are summed up as follows:

1. The distinctions between clean and unclean meats and drinks is forever obliterated.

2. The creation sabbath and all the cycle of Jewish sabbaths are superseded.

3. Circumcision of the flesh, distinguishing Jew from Gentile, is abrogated.

4. Asceticism and seclusion from the world as a preventive of temptation and passion is valueless.

5. Distinction of race, caste, society – slavery and freedom, civilization and barbarism, culture and ignorance – are all impossible in Christ. He died for man, as man. Regeneration, or the new creation, ignores all artificial distinctions. There will never be a kingdom of Jesus over Jews, as Jews. There will never be a restoration of the Jewish polity. It would be a horrible anticlimax.

Christ was crucified because he would not restore the national Jewish polity, but established a spiritual kingdom.

Seventh Day Adventism and all premillennial adventism representing Christ as coming to reign for a thousand years in a restored earthly Jerusalem over a restored Jewish nation, with the Gentile world in subjugation, nullify the cross and seek to rebuild what he there forever cast down.

Since the cross, and forever since the cross, it will be true – "Where there cannot be Greek and Jew, circumcision and uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, bondmen, freemen; but Christ is all and in all."

There will be a Jerusalem, the capital of this world. But it will be the heavenly Jerusalem – coming down from God out of heaven – after the general judgment. The Holy Spirit will infill it, according to John’s vision (Revelation 21:10-14). "The twelve gates were twelve pearls; each one of the several gates was of one pearl: and the street of the city was pure gold, as it were transparent glass. And I saw no temple therein: for the Lord God the Almighty, and the Lamb, are the temple thereof. And the city hath no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine upon it: for the glory of the Lord did lighten it, and the lamp thereof is the Lamb. And the nations shall walk amidst the light thereof: and the kings of the earth bring their glory into it. And the gates thereof shall in no wise be shut by day (for there shall be no night there): and they shall bring the glory and the honor of the nations into it: and there shall in no wise enter into it anything unclean, or he that maketh an abomination and a lie: but only they that are written in the Lamb’s book of life," (Revelation 21:10-14; Revelation 21:22-27).

There never will be a reversion to Moses. The great central truth of the cross and what it abrogates, set forth in Colossians, enlarged in Ephesians and elaborated in every detail in the letter to the Hebrews, makes an eternal break with Judaism, as is fitly followed by the destruction of Jerusalem and its temple and the eternal cessation of its sacrifices and priesthood. Therefore the author cannot bear the thought that anyone should fail to learn the lesson of Colossians 2:14-15. As the Crusaders failed, so will the Jewish Zionists. The tomb is empty. The sanctity is forever gone from the earthly Jerusalem and the land. Let Greek Catholic and Roman Catholic have their quarrels over the empty tomb and vacant temple site, regulated by Moslem police. Our Lord is not there; he is risen. The Jerusalem that now is answereth to Mount Sinai and is in bondage with her children. The Jerusalem that is above is our mother, and regeneration is our certificate of citizenship. Heaven is our Holy Land. Let us by illumination, faith, hope, and love make tours to that holy land. I am far from denying that God overruled the Crusades to much reflexive good. But the Crusades themselves, so far as their immediate purpose and hope are concerned, have no rivals in the history of folly.

I have no desire – To climb where Moses stood And view that landscape o’er – but would prefer to be caught up with Paul into the third heaven, into the paradise of God. "And view THAT landscape o’er."

I continually rejoice that I am not coming unto the dark, thunder-rocked, fire-crested, smoke-shrouded, trumpet-riven Mountain of the Law, there to quake and tremble, but unto Mount Zion, the heavenly Jerusalem, unto God the judge, unto the general assembly and church of the first-born, unto the spirits of just men made perfect, unto Jesus the mediator of the new covenant, unto the blood of sprinkling in the true holy of holies whose atoning efficacy speaks better things for us than the blood of Abel’s typical animal sacrifice. Oh! when, thou city of my God, Shall I thy courts ascend?

I have not the temperament of the archaeologist. I could never potter with Old Mortality among the tombs of men once heroes, but seek the company of living heroes. I could not be a Chinese with his back to the future, worshiping his ancestors, and am entirely without desire to go East except "by way of the West." Campbell’s Pleasures of Hope is a greater book than Rogers’ Pleasures of Memory. I lift my hat when I hear Paul shouting: "Forgetting the things that are behind and reaching out to the things that are before I press on toward the goal of the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus."

I have been scornfully asked, why the waste of the letters to the Colossians, Ephesians, and Hebrews, since Titus in less than a decade would obviate their necessity by the destruction of Jerusalem and the Jewish polity?

My answer was, because he foresaw the great apostasy which, under the guise of Christianity, would revert to the Old Testament type and revive its hierarchy, its priesthood, its human mediators, its ritual, its anointings, its genuflexions commanding to abstain from meats and forbidding to marry and which would foist on half the world a blended Jewish and heathen system of superstition, tyrannizing over the cradle, the grave and the spirit world, and over governments, while drunk with the blood of the saints.

QUESTIONS

1. What is the meaning of "spoil" in Colossians 2:8?

2. What is the derivation of the word "philosophy"?

3. What is the province of human philosophy and its value there?

4. Into what realm may it not intrude, and what the value of its literature when intruding there?

5. Into this realm beyond the scope of human philosophy, what, according to Colossians 2:3 of this letter, is the position of our Lord, and how does he make known its secrets?

6. What is the meaning of "tradition" in Colossians 2:8, and how is the word used in the New Testament?

7. What is the meaning of "rudiments" in Colossians 2:8, and to what does the New Testament usage of the word usually refer?

8. Show from the context that a Jewish element of Gnosticism is under consideration here.

9. At what point in the argument does the Jewish element blend With the heathen?

10. In what great, declaration concerning Christ does Paul meet the false philosophy? (Colossians 2:9.)

11. Meaning of "Godhead" in Colossians 2:9, and how often elsewhere in the New Testament does the word occur, and compare its force with John’s "the Word was God."

12. Meaning of "bodily," and quote Lightfoot on the choice of the word?

13. Meaning of "complete in him"?

14. What is the antitype of circumcision, and the relation of baptism thereto?

15. State the great climax of Paul in two directions.

16. State the five conclusions from his argument.

17. What is the value of the conclusions as a heritage?

18. What is the effect as to Judaism of the central truth of the cross as argued in Colossians, Ephesians, and Hebrews?

19. Wherein the great error of Seventh-Day Adventism, and most premillennial teaching?

20. What is the folly of the Crusades?

21. Will there ever be a restored earthly Jerusalem, with Christ as King over the Jews, and Gentiles in subjection?

22. What is the Jerusalem before the saints?

23. Why, in view of the destruction of Jerusalem in less than a decade, did Paul write these prison letters to make a final break with Judaism?