with you. I'll be looking at Colossians chapter 3 verses 12 through 17. If you don't have a Bible, you can find the text on the back of your order of worship. So I say to you, hear the word of God. Put on then as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and if one has a complaint against another for giving each other as the Lord has forgiven you. So you also must forgive. And above all, these put on love which binds everything together in perfect harmony and let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts to which indeed you are called in one body and be thankful. I'm going to stop there. Let us pray. Father, I pray this morning that as we consider your word that you would just come and reveal the gospel to us in it. Show us not just how we are to live but why it is we are able to live that way in the first place. I pray that you would open the eyes of the blind and the ears of the deaf. I pray for myself that you be in my head and in my thinking, in my heart, in my understanding and in my mouth and in my speaking. In Christ's name, we pray these things. Amen. Amen. Well, if you were here last week, remember I told you that an easy way to understand the whole book of Colossians is to really think of it as a theological episode of the television show What Not To Wear. If you've ever seen What Not To Wear or if you've not seen it which I've seen parts of it, I'll admit but then again I have all women in my house. What's your excuse? Remember what Not To Wear is basically they take a woman who is deemed by someone to be a fashion nightmare. They write a letter to Clinton and Stacey, the host of the show I guess and they determine yes in fact this woman is a fashion nightmare. We need to intervene and they go in and they basically on one hand they tell her who she is and they tell her what she should be and then they begin to do two things. They begin to go through her wardrobe and tell her what Not To Wear which in most cases is everything in her wardrobe. You shouldn't wear these things and then what they do is they take other things and say you should wear these things. With your personality and your body type and your hair type and all these things, certain things go with that and certain things don't go with that and at the end of the show, the woman is always beautiful. In the Book of Colossians Paul basically is doing the same thing, right? He goes any diagnosis to the Colossians. Here's who you are. You're broken and you're alienated from Jesus because of your sin. You're wearing very ugly clothes right now. Your wardrobe, your own clothes are as filthy rags but here's the good news of the gospel that Jesus came and when he died on the cross what he did in fact was take your dirty clothes, your filthy rags and put them on himself and give you his robes of righteousness. In other words he exchanges wardrobes with you. He gives you his goodness and takes all of your badness and then after that what should you do? Well Paul says well here's what you do. He hear the things you should not wear and hear the things you should wear. In other words, hear the things that go with that outfit Jesus has given you and hear the things that don't go with the outfit that Jesus has given you and last week we talked about what don't go with that outfit, what not to wear, just like Clint and Stacey. You remember what Paul said basically what doesn't go with this outfit, this righteousness of Jesus is first of all he started with sexual immorality and he worked it all the way back to idolatry and then he said the next thing really that doesn't go is anger, wrath, malice, all of these things and he worked that all the way up to foul language. Those just don't look right with with the outfit you're wearing. In other words if you're a Christian they don't look right and you remember foul language I talked about just if you don't remember it had nothing absolutely nothing to do with cussing. Foul language at the end of the day at least according to Paul is when you trash talk other people, when you gossip about other people, when you complain about other people and don't talk to him that is much worse than cussing. Am I advocating cussing? No but what I'm telling you is what Paul said is that's not your biggest problem and so last week I remember it all culminates in basically says don't lie to one another and then it culminates and he says here in this place there is neither Jew nor Greek circumcised or uncircumcised or barberian or sythian any of these things but all is Christ and Christ is in all. In other words the reason Paul is telling us that we need to put on certain clothes and take off other clothes is because the ultimate goal is not just reconciliation with God but reconciliation with each other. In other words the kingdom of God is sort of like a party. In order to go to the party you've got to be wearing the right clothes and Paul says the only way we can pull this party off and make it a success is if everyone's wearing the right clothes and the party is going to have people from everywhere it's going to have Jews and Greek circumcised, uncircumcised black, white, male, female they're all going to be in the room and only if they're wearing the appropriate garments are things going to work and so he told us what garments won't work in order to build community and today basically he's going to tell us what garments do what we should put on so we're going to look at three things this morning we're going to look at the priority of grace we're going to look at the product of grace and we're third thing we're going to look at is the piece of grace that's P-E-A-C-E let's look first at the priority of grace
and verse 12 Paul says put on them as God's chosen ones holy and beloved compassion kindness humility meekness and patience so Paul wants to tell us what what we should put on what enables community what is the first accessory that goes with the righteousness of grace he says put on therefore holy as God's chosen ones holy and beloved you can't go anywhere until you start there that's the priority of grace what is Paul saying there he's saying to the church the same thing he said to Israel by the way in other words the the language he uses here is the same language that Moses used of Israel and Moses used it of Israel because God had chosen them out of everyone else so a couple things are going on here for one Paul is inferring that the church is now the new Israel that the church has has has not necessarily replaced Israel but the church now is Israel and all remember there's neither Jew nor Greek here that Israel should be brought in to the extent that they trust in Jesus but more than that the priority of grace is just this the first few words he says put on then as God's chosen ones some translation say as God's elect what is Paul saying here posting the basis of getting along the basis of humility compassion kindness all of these things is grace and the foundation of grace is just this that God chose you you did not choose God that there's nothing good about you that would impress God that in fact not not only did God choose you because you weren't that great but God chose you because of how bad you were because the worse you are the better he looks in his grace the deeper your sin the the the more magnificent is his grace when he is shown as the one who takes it on himself and forgive it and Paul says as God's chosen ones holy and holy in the Old Testament in here means set apart the God God came to you and if you you'll remember that every now and then I'll I'll say a statement like this God always initiates with sinners have you ever heard me say that every week don't I God always initiates God chooses whom he will and he sets them apart for his purpose he says God's put on then as God's chosen ones holy and beloved beloved means that that you are the object of God's love and why does God set his love upon you let me give you a hint of why he doesn't set his love upon you let me read to you the same language as you see it in Deuteronomy chapter seven this is Moses Moses talking to Israel he says for you are a people holy to the Lord your God the Lord your God is chosen you to be a people for his treasure possession out of all the people who are on the face of the earth it was not because you were more in number than any other people that the Lord set his love on you and chose you for you were the fewest of all peoples but it is because the Lord loves you and is keeping the oath that he swore to your fathers that the Lord brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt so why why did God choose Israel it wasn't because they were the greatest of nations it was because they were the smallest wasn't because they they had the biggest and best of everything it's because they had nothing why because the Lord loved them the question is why does why does why did the Lord choose you why does the Lord draw you or me in is it because of how good you are it's not because he is chosen to love you that's the the foundation of grace that's the priority of grace without that all the rest of it doesn't make sense because if you've if you understand that you've come to the table with nothing that you brought nothing and that the only reason you are here the only reason that you have a relationship with God assuming you do is because God saw fit to come to you and open your eyes and draw you unto himself how could there be any room for pride in that how could there be any room for for for for for dissension Paul says if that's who you are you should be look this way how could you not you should be a compassionate kind and everything else how could you not it reminds me I know I've told you the story before because what's interesting to me is really Presbyterians are the ones who historically have embraced this more than anyone else right that you might have heard the language of reformed theology people say are you reformed in your theology and when you say yes I'm reformed my theology what that means is you believe that God initiates with centers that you had brought nothing to the table everything I preach every week and Presbyterians have historically been the ones who champion that on one hand and yet Presbyterians on the other hand have historically been the ones who have been the least compassionate least make least gentle why how can you be the ones who champion a certain theology and yet on the other hand embody what is the opposite of what what the byproduct should be and the answer is just this is because oftentimes we know our theology but we don't experience it have you experienced the grace of God because if you experience God's grace rather than just know it you it changes your life it's sort of like the difference between knowing the words of a song and knowing the music do you know the music of the gospel and it reminded me of the story I was thinking about it this morning and I know I've told you before when I was in seminary I was working for Presbyterian Church and the pastors of a very charismatic denomination began taking a few classes with R.C. Sproul while I was in seminary and one thing led to another and all of a sudden they understood grace they understand that they were totally unable to come to Jesus in another themselves and that God had chosen and initiated all these things and it changed everything and I remember these pastors having a meeting with my pastors I was an intern so I got to be in the room and sort of sitting on the back edges and they were talking about issues of worship and at one point the head guy from the charismatic sites said given what you guys know about your theology how could you not dance in worship how could you not you guys don't even raise your hands it's not even important enough if you really understand what this means how could you not be excited that's the point here the context isn't worship but the context rather is compassion humility meekness gentleness given what you know of your theology how could you not be compassionate and make and gentle how could you not be you see because if you're a Christian you're almost saying by by claiming to be a Christian what you're claiming to say is that you have actually experienced those things that Paul is of monitoring you to to live out if you're a Christian what that means is you've experienced the compassion of God that the Hebrew and Greek they're actually some in the King James that translates it literally means bowels of mercy the God has shown that compassion on you you've experienced the humility of God as you see Jesus the second person of the Trinity become a man and be obedient even to death on a cross you see the gentleness and meekness of Jesus as he gently calls you and says please come unto me all you who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest have you heard that if you are not a Christian here today that is yours for the taking would you take it the next place Paul goes from from the priority of grace is basically the product or the byproducts of grace and it's it's really interesting what the byproducts of grace are in other words if you understand that is God who chose you and you didn't choose him and that you're now compassionate and meek and gentle what does that look like in the life of the church and notice what Paul says in verse 13 he says bearing with one another and if each if one is a complaint against another forgiving each other is the Lord has forgiven you so also you must forgive and above all these put on love which binds everything together in perfect harmony this actually surprised me this week when I was studying this it surprised me because when Paul says you know the natural out where the first thing he says is bearing with one another and you know what that means in Greek and here's why it surprised me it says it basically means something like a grudging acceptance of someone else's differences and what's Paul's point here the beautiful thing about the Bible is that it's realistic in other words Paul says the first outworking of grace is that you're able to bear with you're able to grudgingly accept things about someone else that bother you you're not willing to to to to vilify them or break community or are you it's interesting I mean a lot of people leave churches because they're unwilling to bear with this person or that person or the pastor or the elders or something and Paul says the first outworking the first product of grace is you're able to bear with people who are different than you why because if you really understand grace you know that that person is not the only one with issues that you've got your own issues and in as much as the other person bothers you what grace says is Tommy you like woodworking yeah got a log for you to work on then your eye dude in other words remember Jesus had take the log out of your own eye before you take the splinter out of someone else's and Paul says bearing the grudge grudging the bear with and not the other people are different I mean the best the best marriage advice that Judy and I got was from a guy named Ron Brownies or campus minister I think he took us both separately and said to us you know Tommy Judy what I want you to do before you really jump into this I want you to think of three things that you can't stand about the other person and and realize that ask yourself if these three things never change am I going to be able to live with them for the rest of my life do I still want to go through with the marriage why would he ask that question it's because you all of us have issues and they may or may not get better over the course of our life and even if they do get better over the course of our life they may not get that much better and I felt sorry for Judy during that time because she had such a hard time coming up with three actually I felt bad for she had such a hard time narrowing it down to three that would be more reasonable but the point the point is if you really understand grace you realize that that other people need it as much as you do and then Paul does something interesting because he addresses conflict here and Paul gives a different option for conflict than Jesus does remember what Jesus said if you have something against your brother what should you do go tell him in other words go confront your brother and if he repent you want him and if he doesn't then take two more and tell him again and if he doesn't repent then then take the whole church and tell him again and if he doesn't repent then then have nothing to do with him Paul gives another option both of them are appropriate by the way and what's Paul's option Paul's option is one that we almost never think of because it's right there in front of our face notice what he says he says bearing with one another if one has a complaint against another forgiving each other as the Lord has forgiven you is that a novel concept or what if you have a complaint against someone else forgive it but Paul doesn't say forgive it could he give it because you know if those of you have kids and you tell your child you know Johnny you know you need to forgive your sister well Johnny's no reason to forgive well why would he but Paul does something here he says forgive just as the Lord has forgiven you in other words what does forgiveness mean forgiveness means just this it means to pay someone else's bill and Paul's of monitoring us here he says if you really understand grace you're willing to pay someone else's bill they've offended you and you say instead of of exacting justice from them instead of instead of exacting their pound of flesh what you say is I will pay that bill I'm gonna eat it this time and what enables you to do that is the cross you look at the cross and you say at the cross Jesus paid my bill and if Jesus paid my bill how could I not pay this small bill if Jesus paid everything for me how could I not give a pittance to to overlook this complaint it's amazing to me if you look at the first Corinthians chapter six or Paul's addressing lawsuits among believers and you get the sense that the whole church is just an atizi and they're wrapped around the axle and they're they're they're going to they're basically having lawsuits against one another they're hiring secular lawyers if you will and they're going crazy and Paul basically gives them this advice and the form of a question he says why not be wronged why not be wronged is the whole church's health is the whole church's fitness worth the fact of you being right any places have been killed just so one person can be right and at the end of the day you you that people say you're right and you've lost everything it reminds me of the the uh what was the movie flash of genius or the movie flash of genius it was just out it was Greg Canier and it's about the guy who invented windshield wipers and the movie was billed this is underdog story this the the story where the little guy takes on the big guy and wins and I watched that movie and it was one of the most depressing things I'd ever seen in my life because the little guy Greg Canier did take off the big guy the Ford Motor Company for about 20 years and he at the end of it the little guy won the lawsuit and in the process of winning the lawsuit he lost his wife he lost his children he lost his friends he lost everything he had just in order to say I was right and the point here the Paul would say is that sometimes it's wrong to be right sometimes it's wrong to be right sometimes you must simply forgive and if you're a human being and you're sitting in this room and you have family members and you have friends you need to hear that sometimes it is wrong to be right that's the product of grace now how do you do that what's the piece of grace let me finish up with this
Paul says above all these put on love which binds everything together in perfect harmony and let the piece of Christ rule in your hearts to which indeed you were called in one body and be thankful it's interesting Paul says in above all put on love which binds everything together if you remember last week I was talking through this last night with my daughter Abby and she said you better give me credit for that and last week remember we looked at the fact that all the you can't break any of the commandments commandments two through ten without also breaking the first commandment to have no other gods than than God when the same way here Paul says you can't obey any of these admonitions to be compassionate and loving forgiving in all these unless you actually obey the greatest commandment which is to love the Lord your God to love your neighbor as yourself Paul says all these things that love binds them all together in the language there is either that like like a huge belter as I thought of it this morning it's like a you ever seen a television commercial for the snuggie where you put a blanket on it says trouble using the remote control trouble answering your phone get the snuggie and the snuggie is a blanket that covers everything but you can put your arms through it and you can still work and move with it on that's what love is love is this snuggie that covers everything but it is it's covering everything it enables you to do what you need to do namely to be a peace with one another he says let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts and that he's not talking about the peace which passes all understanding maybe as you see in Philippians he literally means the peace which Christ achieved rule in your hearts or let the peace that Christ achieved be the umpire in other words let's say you're you're having a conflict with another member in the church and you sit down to talk about this conflict and before you talk about the conflict you look to the umpire in the umpire is the peace which Christ has achieved in other words you look again to the cross because at the cross what you see is the hostility between God and man being paid for Christ has achieved peace there Christ has achieved reconciliation there and the peace of Christ is now the umpire for every other conflict that you have in other words you were completely alienated and hostile to God and Jesus came and died on your behalf and now you sit across from someone and you're gonna have a you're gonna confront them about the fact that they sat in your pew last weekend I thought about that nothing more frustrating than someone else sitting in your pew I know that I used to sit there but you sit across from them and before you lay into them about sitting in your pew you look up at the cross and the cross the peace that Christ has accomplished is the umpire of this game and when you look at the umpire you know what it makes me think I don't even need to play the game when you look at the umpire you should be fighting over saying you know what you win because look at what Jesus has done for me unless you understand that you can't have peace with other people the last thing Paul says here he reminds me it sounds like he's talking to children he says and be thankful he just sort of throws it in there be thankful and really he's springing things full circle because thankfulness is basically appreciation for something you couldn't provide for yourself and if you understand that what Jesus has given you you couldn't provide for yourself it will change the way you interact with every person every single day of your life think about that let me pray for us father pray that um as we consider this book of cautions that you would continue to to to work in our hearts that you would make us a more compassionate gentle and meek and humble body that we might get along with one another Christ name we pray these things Amen and Amen