COLOSSIANS: STABILITY BY CHRIST'S ALL-SUFFICIENCY AND SUPREMACY

Part X: The Believer's Complete Stability In Christ From Living In False Spirituality, Colossians 2:11-23

A. The Believer's Complete Stability In Christ From Living Under The Mosaic Law

(Colossians 2:11-17)

I. Introduction

A. Today's unsettling, insecure world has led many believers to become unsettled and insecure, so in contrast to today's world, we believers need to focus on the stability and security we have in our Lord.

B. Colossians presents Christ's all-sufficiency and supremacy in ways that settle and provide security, and one way it does is teaching the believer's complete stability in Christ from living in false spirituality, with one realm of that liberty being liberation from living under the Mosaic Law.

C. Colossians 2:11-17 teaches this provision, and we view it for our insight and doctrinal stability (as follows):

II. The Believer's Complete Stability In Christ From Living Under The Mosaic Law, Colossians 2:11-17.

A. One of the characteristics of the theological error the believers at Colossae faced was pressure to observe the Old Testament laws and ceremonies, Bible Know. Com., N. T., p. 668.

B. To counter the false spirituality of believers having to submit to such regulations, Paul wrote that believers are positionally united with Christ in His death and resurrection to become free of such rules, Colossians 2:11-15:

1. First, the believer is removed from responsibility to be circumcised in accord with the rite that was established for Abraham before the Mosaic Law in Genesis 17:1-27; Colossians 2:11-13a:

a. In Christ's death, the believer was spiritually, positionally circumcised (Colossians 2:11a, 12-13a), what involved positionally "putting off" of the "sin nature" so that "(w)hat people were in Adam -- sinful, fallen, and corrupt -- was destroyed by Christ," Ibid.

b. "This putting off of the old life occurs at the moment of salvation, when a believer is buried with Christ in baptism by the Spirit (cf. 1 Cor. 12:13) and is raised with Him to new life," Ibid.; Colossians 2:12-13a.

2. Second, the believer is also liberated from obligations to heed the Mosaic Law, Colossians 2:13b-15:

a. By Christ's death and resurrection, believers have been forgiven all trespasses against the Law, 13b.

b. This occurred since the debt of sin believers owed to God that had been created by the entrance of the Mosaic Law was canceled by the nailing of that debt to the cross of Christ, Colossians 2:14. When Christ thus died on the cross, that ended the hold of that debt on the believer.

c. In addition, believers are delivered from "demonic powers and authorities" since Christ triumphed over them at the cross, and believers are thus "delivered from these evil powers which inspire legalistic rules about foods and festivals," Colossians 2:15; Ibid., p. 678.

3. Accordingly, Paul directed believers in Christ to let no one "pass judgment on" them in questions of food and drink, or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath, Colossians 2:16. This directive in Colossians 2:16 is important in view of the legalistic regulations of Seventh-Day Adventism (as follows):

a. The book, Seventh-day Adventists Believe . . ., 1989, p. 244 claims, "While Christ's death ended the authority of the ceremonial law, it established that of the Ten Commandments." Seventh-day Adventists cite Protestant Reformer John Calvin as stating, "'(W)e must not imagine that the coming of Christ has freed us from the authority of the law; for it is the eternal rule of a devout and holy life, and must, therefore, be as unchangeable as the justice of God.'" (Ibid., citing Calvin, Commenting on a Harmony of the Evangelists, trans. by William Pringle, 1949, vol. 1, p. 277)

b. Yet, though Paul's reference to "meat," "drink," "holyday" and "new moon" in Colossians 2:16 are part of what many call the "ceremonial law," the "Sabbath" was one of the Ten Commandments, Ex. 20:8-11! Just as the believer in Christ is released from the pre-Mosaic stipulation of circumcision, so he is released from the Mosaic Law's stipulation of its ceremonial laws and Ten Commandments as to their authority.

c. Though nine of the Ten Commandments are repeated for believers to heed in the Church era (Ibid., Bible Know. Com., N. T.), believers observe them because of the authority of the apostles, NOT because they are under the authority of the Mosaic Law's Ten Commandments! (Colossians 2:17)

Lesson: The believer in Christ is positionally so identified with Christ in His death and resurrection, that he has postionally been totally released from the authority of the Old Testament's rules and regulations, be they pre-Law or the Mosaic Law itself, so the believer must let no one pass judgment on his failure to observe those regulations.

Application: May we in Christ completely rest in the liberation we have from the stipulations of the Old Testament.