What's old, what's new, Col, 3:5-11

study of Ephesians and Colossians. And the thing we said, do you remember this? This was almost two years ago. The thing we said then, there were about 75 verses between the two books that are either in common or very similar. And one of the things that we pointed out was that each book has some sections that are specific and unique to each of the books. And there are also things about them that are specific to the cities that each of them was in or the church body and the things that were going on there. We went through each book so far, tracing each of the things that were unique, and where Colossians is identical to Ephesians or in many cases has less content, what we've tended to do is to continue through Ephesians.

Well, we are completed with Ephesians now, but there are a few sections of Colossians that we want to kind of backtrack and cover because they have some unique message to say or some unique way of saying it. So we're going to do that here. For example, Ephesians, this is the section that has to do with husbands and wives on marriage. Colossians, that's it. So we obviously put the time into the Ephesians passage. We've completed the Ephesian study last Sunday, so now we're going to do the shift over to Colossians for just a few of the passages there.

One of the things to remind you about is as we go into this passage, Paul, and we'd studied this previously, Paul had just said these things here in Colossians 3, verses 3 and 4, for you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God, and when Christ who is our life is revealed, then you also will be revealed with Him in glory. This is the prior context for the passage we're looking at here this morning, so keep that in mind as we step into the passage. One of the points we made as we went through it, and it's nonetheless still true, every spiritual blessing comes from where you are seated with Christ, right here. And we'll be looking at the continuing truth of that in the passage here this morning.

Okay, we'll be dividing it up into thirds, so prepare yourself for that. Let's start with the first third here. Paul starts off, therefore, consider the members of your earthly body as dead. And he starts off with a therefore. And one of the things we noted in the apologetics elective earlier this morning, Paul wrote like a logician or a lawyer, quite often, therefore, so that, because, with logical steps from one thing to the next. He does so here as well. Now, consider the members of your earthly body as dead. Now, you may feel like that a lot of the time anyway, so that's fine.

But in this particular case here, the point here, this is an imperative, so it's not just a description of how we feel when we wake up in the morning, but it is instead a description, excuse me, an imperative, which tells us as we live in our daily condition, it is to reflect our eternal position. We have already died positionally in Christ. That is to be true, carried out. in the believer's life, in your daily condition. We have been identified with Christ in His death. Positionally, that's a done deal.

So, when He tells us an imperative, it's not telling us to make our position any different. That's unchangeable and untouchable. He is saying, instead, make that eternal position apply to your daily life. Okay. Now, one of the things he's clear about here is he's talking about all the body parts, okay? Not, no exceptions. That might be a little exceptional, but okay.

Now, the one thing we want to focus on here is the fact that he'd written in Colossians 2.20, again, here's where prior context comes in, 2.20 and 3.3 that we have died with Christ, having been identified with his death. So that's abundantly clear. That is the basis of, and a statement of, our eternal position. We have died.

And one of the things also to note While Paul makes numerous statements, you've been united with Christ in His death, burial, resurrection, ascension, and seeding, he never states or even threatens an undoing of any of those. There's a one-way valve on this thing. These are things that, for the believer, are a done deal, not to be reversed. Now, the other thing that comes out on that, Christ bought us with His life. He paid the price.

As Paul wrote to the church at Corinth, we mention here 1 Corinthians 6.20, chapter 7 also has a similar reference. He said, you are not your own, you are bought with a price. And the consequence, as he wrote to the Corinthians, was to their bodies. The same thing here. We died with Christ. When Christ paid the price, he purchased us. Having died with Christ, we are dead in relationship to the flesh.

Now, let me say what that does not mean. It doesn't mean the flesh is done and gone. You might have noticed that. It doesn't mean the flesh is done and gone. It doesn't mean the flesh is unable to scream, holler, and yell. It will. But, what it means is we are positionally separated from the flesh. The flesh has no right to call the shots. The flesh has no valid claim.

Now, therefore consider the members of the earthly body as dead to, and then he says, immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed, which amounts to idolatry. One of the things as I was looking at this, I noticed that each of the things he lists in this passage are listed either in the passage in Galatians 5, 19 through 21, where it talks about the works of the flesh, or the downward moral cascade that we see described in Romans chapter 1. Each of the behaviors or motivations is found, and notice that he doesn't just stick with the external behavior. He also talks about the internal character as well, what's going on inside. It matters. We'll talk about that more in a minute here.

The point being, we should consider the members of our body, this thing, as dead to the flesh, as spiritually separated from the flesh. The flesh no longer has a valid claim. It has no right to command. Verse 6, for it is because of these things that the wrath of God will come upon the sons of disobedience. Now, the King James here is revealed.

Actually, that reflects the Greek present tense a little bit better. The New American Standard that we have here kind of implies it's all in the future. The reality is that any future expression of wrath is not because God suddenly thought, oh heavens, this is horrible, but because God's stance with regards to sin has been, is, and always will be the same. going to be satisfied or placated with the condition of sin. Now, as we go into verse 7, in them, in what? In these expressions of the sinful nature.

He says, you once walked. This word once we've seen before in the form of pate, and that's not that liver stuff that you see all ground up on the platter, right? Pate, and it was used in Ephesians chapter 2, second and third verses, and then again in the 11 through 13 verses. It is used rather consistently by Paul and sometimes by Peter to describe the past life of the believer before they came to belief. Formerly, or in time past, is often used as other translations in other locations there.

Now, the next one is walked. We mentioned in the past that this is actually kind of a Jewish phrase, and it shows up even in the books of Moses, in the first several books of the Old Testament. And the walking is an individual manner of life, one foot after another, the manner in which you carry out your life step by step. That's what he's talking about there. In these expressions of the sin nature, you once ordered your life one step after the next, after the next, after the next. When you were living in them, and this word here is the idea of personal interaction, so there's not only an individual walking step-by-step on your own, there's also the character of the interactions between people. the personal interactions between people also expressed the sinful nature.

Both. Both. Now we see the distinction that he has here, but now. But now. Paul had described the former life of believers when we were going through Ephesians, and he used that word pate here in chapter 2, and also In 5-8 and in both of those places, he also did the but now.

So here's the distinction. Formerly, before you were a believer, your life was like this. Your character was like this. Your nature was like this. But now, in contrast to that, now it's like this. Now that you're past the point where you've come to believe in Christ, now you're changed. Now you're a new creature. So this pattern is consistent. He used it in Ephesians, he's using it here. Once it was like this. When you didn't believe, this is the character. Now that you believe, it's like this. So here's the distinction he's making. He's not stating a position, this is based on our position. Put them all aside.

In Ephesians 4.31, he had the expressions of the sin nature set aside, he does that here.

We, as believers, have no logical, ongoing connection to the sin nature. The picture that is used often is one of slavery, which was, of course, common in those days. And the sin nature owned the unbeliever. The sin nature owned us before we came to a place of belief. And being the slave master called all the shots. Christ has bought us.

We have no legal right to respond to the old slave master. The old slave master can scream and holler and yell as loud as it wants. We have no right, no right to respond to that old slave master. Neither does the slave master have any ongoing right to ask us to do what he's asking us to do or yelling at us to do.

Now, because the point is we now have a new nature, we are in Christ and He is in us. Christ is our new nature because we're in Him and He in us. Now, you see this of course, you look at it and you say, well that's not the nature of cows. I'm glad you recognize that. Things behave according to their nature. Cows don't fly. I have to make an exception to that. If you recall this little account here, we were blasting a well. At one point in time, at my folks' farm, they did fly. But anyway, let's forget that. Cows don't fly ordinarily because it's not their nature to do so. And let me tell you, that's quite a relief. You wouldn't want to see this.

So we have this question, what is the nature of the sin nature? What's the nature of the sin nature? He's going to tell us, okay? He's going to say, anger, wrath, malice, slander, abuse of speech from your mouth, these are the things to be put away because you have spiritually, positionally been separated from that sin nature, therefore the expressions of the sin nature are to be put away as well. What has happened to us spiritually by God's doing is indeed to have an impact upon How we think, how we are motivated, and how we behave. Now, we talk about this anger and wrath. Of course, everybody knows what that is. We know what this anger and wrath is all about. We can understand it very well. Think about that.

If somebody, some young mother, she's been running all day, she's been cleaning up all day. Her kids have just been climbing the walls. There's no question about it. And she just can't get the baby to settle down. Her husband has been sideways all day. Doesn't matter what project he's working on, he's been sideways all day. And she's really concerned about the way he's playing with the kids. Now, the dog has also been really squirrely all day. Dinner didn't quite turn out like she'd expected, okay?

And in that sort of situation, it might seem from a human standpoint perfectly okay and explainable and understandable that somebody would be angry and spewing out wrath. But what he says is, is that natural for the Christian? No. What may seem perfectly natural is now no longer natural.

Now, he says, since you've been crucified with Christ, he explained that in Ephesians chapter 2 and in chapter 3, you've died in relationship to the sin nature. The expressions that go along with the sin nature are to be set aside. They're to be set aside in our daily condition, having no logical basis in our eternal position. Not because God is sitting there waiting to zap you and condemn you, but because of the logical connection from your position in Christ. The only logical conclusion is that you put these aside. So this anger, the Greek word there is orge, it's rage as a settled and abiding pattern of mind. It's a mind stuck in rage. One of the things that this points out is that the Word, especially in this context, focuses on what's happening inside. Ever heard anybody talk about sinful behaviors and say, it's okay for me to think it as long as I don't do it? Ever heard that? Paul's saying, that doesn't fit. It's coming from the sin nature, whether it's in here or whether it's expressed.

This orgy, this anger, is like a volcano just sitting there seething. It's not blowing ash and rocks all over everybody, but it's boiling inside. That's the anger he's talking about. And this wrath, thumos, boiling agitation of feeling, expressing itself in a volcanic, explosive rage. It spews emotional hot lava over everyone else. It is this outrageous expression of wrath. What was anger and just simmering and seething underneath the surface before, now blows up in everybody else's ears and face. This is a picture of this thumos, this wrath, spewing hot lava verbally and maybe other ways on other people. Next he uses the word malos, kakos. in the Greek, bad-heartedness.

Here's it getting back to the inside part, isn't it? He's not telling us, it doesn't matter what goes on inside as long as you don't express it. You might hear people say, talk about like, you know, that's my limit, I can't express it. Oh, I can think this and that's alright, I just can't let it out. No. He's saying that's an expression too, of the sin nature. It does matter what's going on inside.

Slander. Blasphemia. We would oftentimes think of this as blasphemy. And in interpersonal reactions among the Greeks, they would just look at it as abusive speech. Speech not necessarily just directed at God, but directed between yourself and other people. It is speech that is damaging, especially pointing, as he does here, in the context of other believers.

And then he talks abusive speech, put it away from your mouth. This is a speech that is shameful and disgusting, and he says, get it away from your mouth. He says, there's no place there. And kind of the picture that we have here is, you can imagine something putrid, you wouldn't want to have it in your mouth, right? First thing you'd want to do is get it out. I think there's a show called Fear Factor where they do that. People want to get it out.

This is what he's saying. He says, this is this similar putrid, disgusting, shameful stuff. He says, you need to get it away. He says, there's no place there. And then he tells them just explicitly, do not lie. This is a negative imperative, isn't it? He's not saying, do not lie, because otherwise you'll be subject to condemnation and the judgment of the law. He's saying, do not lie because it is entirely inconsistent with your new nature, in Christ, Christ in you. It has nothing logically to do with who you are in Christ and who Christ is in you. Christ our life.

Interestingly, in the pagan cultures of the time, so as Paul was writing to these churches, and many of the people in the churches were Gentiles of pagan background, As they would look at this, some of them would be startled by this. The pagan gods did not care if you lied. As a matter of fact, some of the pagans would pray to be able to lie well. And in some cultures, like in Crete, where Paul wrote to Titus when he was in Crete, in Crete they were especially infamous for lying well.

And you were considered a hero if you could lie well and trick somebody. Here he comes to them and so he puts the negative imperative, it comes across in the Greek with this idea, it isn't just don't lie, it's the lying that you've been doing up to this point, stop it. So they've been doing it all the time, it had been a part of their culture. Can I get away with a lie? What can I get as an advantage out of a lie? It all stops here. He says that is completely illogical when you look at who you are in Christ and who Christ is in you. who is the truth, where does a lie fit? You lay it aside, you set it aside.

Every time a person comes to a place of belief in Christ and is therefore saved, belief in Christ's death for their sin, and burial and resurrection to new life. When a person places his trust in Christ's work on their behalf, God then does the work and identifies them with Christ in His death, burial, resurrection, ascension and seeding. Christ has taken their place on the cross, taken the penalty for them. When that happens, the old man all of who we were before coming to that point of belief is set aside.

Positionally, we are separated from it. Do we remember it as a human being? Yeah. Positionally, we're separated from it. We now have Christ's history instead of our own. How about that? We don't have our own history anymore. If you're a believer here this morning, you don't have your history, you have Christ's history. You wouldn't know that except for Scripture reveals it. And so we're called to put our faith in the facts here. The old man was laid aside by God's action when we believed. That's what he's spelling out there. Now he's got this contrast.

The old self, the new self, and the King James, New King James, that's the New King James I think that's in your PURAX there, has old man and new man. And that actually better reflects the totality of this old person in Adam and the totality of the new person in Christ. If you think about it, old self and new self, well, it really isn't an issue about myself. It's who am I in? Am I in Adam or am I in Christ? He's saying, you are a believer now. You have an identity in Christ, not in Adam.

Who is being renewed? kind of a progressive sense here. And what that's conveying, it's a present passive participle. Don't let that trip your tongue. Present means right now, it's continuing. Passive means the renewal is being done to you. You ever see somebody try to turn over a new leaf? That's not what this is about. This isn't about turning over a new leaf. The renewal is done by God. It's passive with respect to us. We're receiving the renewal. We're not working hard to get it. We're not working hard to make it happen. God is the one doing the renewing. Finally, it's a participle that focuses on the ongoing action there. God is carrying out a process in us. There is the position that we have, we've been made new, but there is also the process, and that's what he's focusing on here.

If you look at, it's interesting, he uses a couple of different words, and in the English those come across as very similar, and yet in the Greek he uses two different words. New, here is neos, and that's new in time. This is new in time, but then when he says renewed, Anakaina'o, that is a focus on new in kind.

We have a new person because we've been identified with Christ. We are in Christ. But it's not just new in time, although that's true. It is being made new in kind. And it is God's process. Our position, we already have. 2 Corinthians 5.17 points that out. Positionally, we've already been made new. But day by day, we're kind of catching up to it. Let me give you one example.

When you came to belief in Christ, did you understand everything about your position in Christ? No. What happens is God does things ahead of our understanding of it and ahead of our coming to catch up with the reality of what has already happened. So this is a part of what's happening. We are coming to understand what the Lord has already done, what He's already accomplished. That's why we gather here this morning to look at God's Word. That's why we study God's Word in smaller groups and individually.

What is going on is there is a renewal taking place, new in kind, in our understanding, in our life. To a true knowledge, One of the things the Scripture makes clear is that the moral and spiritual understanding of unbelievers is chronically corrupted and warped, chronically twisted. They cannot understand what is truly happening spiritually. When we become believers, we have to catch up with this sense of what has taken place in our position in Christ. God is the one who is involved in that process. He is the one renewing us. Finally here, according to the image of the one who created him. How is that renewing taking place? How is it happening? What's the direction of it? The one who created him. This is a message that we get out of several New Testament passages. One is Romans 8, 28 and 29. And by the way, this particular passage isn't in your handout there.

But we know that God causes all things to work together for good for those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose. For those whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son. You're worried about predestination? Does it bother you? Well, this is a good one. Because it means you can make all kinds of choices, you can go all sorts of different directions, lots of things can happen to you, but the ultimate end of it is you will be ultimately conformed to the image of His Son. And that's a good thing. And that's what he's looking at here in the Colossians passage too.

Let's look at another, 2 Corinthians 3.18. We all with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed. You're not evolving. You're being transformed and that also is something that God is doing. It is an ongoing process of change that is happening. It's the Lord's accomplishment. It's Him who is doing it, and we're the ones being transformed by His doing and accomplishment.

Now, in verse 11, this is a renewal being made new and kind, in which there is no distinction between Greek and Jew. Now, in the Mediterranean there, you had Jews and you had Greeks, very frequently in contact with one another. And so many of the Jews looked at the Greeks as being kind of the prime example of what it was like to have contact with, or conflict with, the Gentile world. And so Greeks was frequently used as kind of the prime example of the Gentiles.

He says, you got Jew, you got Gentile, that makes no difference in your position in Christ. Doesn't matter. You can look at your genealogy, and as a believer, your genealogy traces to Christ. You're in Him. And there's no distinction because of your earthly, ethnic genealogy or cultural background. He makes the distinction there.

Barbarians, Scythians, slaves, and freemen. The barbarians were ones that the Romans frequently contacted to the north of them. And a number of the barbarians, if they were captured, would be captured and brought in as slaves into the Roman Empire. And so people had contact with them that way. The Scythians, we'll talk about them in a minute and where they're located, but they actually had some, you know, kind of more advanced things in their civilization. But they're also a people that the Jews and others in the Roman Empire, especially the Eastern Roman Empire, came in contact with. Most of these barbarians, and that really, one of the things you'll notice that that's not capitalized is because there are several different groups of barbarians. But the barbarians were in that portion of the Roman Empire, just north of Rome.

The Scythians were from the area between the Black and the Caspian Sea there. So you'll see about where those are located. Now, most of the barbarians here, they would come in, and be captured and brought in as slaves if the Romans defeated them, similar with the Scythians.

And so the distinction there was logical. Next item is slave or free. If you look at it, everybody in the Roman Empire was one or the other. You were either owned or you were an owner or at least free. It was one or the other. And so by saying slave and free, he's including everybody.

He's saying all those distinctions. put it together, doesn't matter what your genealogy is, doesn't matter what your ethnic background is, it doesn't matter whether you're completely subject to the will of another or free to make your own choices, none of those earthly distinctions matter at all when it comes to your position in Christ.

One's eternal position in Christ is entirely defined by God and not by what things look like on planet Earth. And finally, Christ is all and in all. The context of this passage is in reference to the church. He's been talking about the church, so he's not talking about unbelievers. But what's he saying here? Everything about our eternal position in Christ and this process of renewal that he's just talked about is about Christ.

Christ is all. Christ is the definition of who we are. Christ is the definition towards which this renewal process is taking us, being conformed to the image of Jesus Christ. Every believer is in Christ and Christ is in every believer. Christ is in all. This is true of every believer. Who we are and whose life we live is all defined by Jesus Christ, by who He is and what He's done. Christ is all and He is in all.

I'll leave it to you to go through the expanded and explain portions here. But as we look through this passage here, one of the things that's abundantly clear is he is trying to get across to them, he says, you have this position in Christ which is going to make an eternal difference in who you are. You have this position in Christ which gives you a different history than what you had before. Having now Christ's history and not your own, having been identified with Christ in His death, these things which drove your motivations, which expressed itself in your behavior, are to be set aside because of who you are in Him and because of who He is in you.

Let's pray. Lord, as we look at Your Word here, we thank You for the wonderful revelations that You have for us. We thank You for the truth that isn't just hypothetical and academic. But it's truth to be lived out every day, every moment. We thank you for that. We thank you for what you have accomplished. And we look to you to teach us the reality of this truth as we trust in you by faith. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.