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CHAPTER FIVE

 GOVERNMENT BY GRACE

CHANGES AND CONSTANCY

NO IDLE CONTINUANCE

Colossians 3:1-17

Changes here are to enable constancy,
express continuation
and form  character in Christ

Is it too hard for the potential devotee to LIVE in Christ ?

Is His very magnificence a spur to departure, lest one be left in the rear, straggling ?
or is the danger of hypocrisy, before such standards as are His to be considered a foul in advance, so that the sincere depart before the start, and continue in the blatancy of misrule and rebellion against their Maker as a preferred option, to salvation ?

Scarcely!  but to the eye of sin, clouds pregnant with rain can spell drought, such is the lively imagination that has not yet found in God, the Rock that does not move, the friend, who does not betray and the comfort which strengthens without limit, and even to bruised reeds can bring a spirit better in strength than stainless steel, which is merely material!

Thus let us consider the realities: You have, as Christ declared, to be yielding yourself as a seed that goes to the ground, so that it may grow (John 12:24-26). Gone, admittedly, is your (perhaps deemed) comely little, rotund, seedy style, and disruptive of mere complacency is the breaking out of root below and shoot above; but  it is highly productive and produces far more, not only in quantity, but quality, and being grounded, for which it is made, it flourishes.  For any man, made in the image of God, you spring to life (Titus 3:3-7), and the grandeur of God, supreme, supernal, eternal, then becomes your basis, base and delight.

In other terms, you leave your littleness of self-belief, self-containment or self-sufficiency, a mirage in any case, for it is never the case that life can be lived by, with, for and from oneself; for it is as far beyond your control as the stars past Pluto. Moreover,   life in God is divine,  so that for fellowship with that life, not only required but ready for donation is a total transformation as in II Corinthians 5:17ff. and Titus and John 3.

But whom do you gain ? Do you want to rule the universe ? You cannot, and might as well admit it. Perhaps you want to  rule some other nation, if an Arab craving Israel's destruction, or an emperor, or a terrorist. But in the end, you cannot rule even yourself, if your mind is set on what YOU deem best, and not on the revealed, verified, validated word of the living God (cf. SMR,  TMR). There is ONLY ONE God, ONE book from His mind to man, ONE sacrifice for sin,  ONE resurrection of the Saviour, ONE day of the resurrection for all believers, ONE way to go with the sacrificial Saviour, and that is WITH HIM.

As surely and indeed more so, as the DNA COMMANDS a material basis for life in a material world, so that mind which can analyse and in part manipulate it, and spirit which directs the aims, imaginations and perspective, can operate as it does in all mankind where disorder has not already muted the masterpiece, SO does God command, not merely commend, the way for connection, protection, inspection and in the end, resurrection. To abort the end is like aborting the beginning.

Spiritual miscarriage is the terminus for sin, and it has a long background in indifference, intoxication of spirit and sheer folly for many generations; and a sure birth is not so common!

Here lies the challenge. THIS is the hard part, for you have, to do this and to receive life eternal, to part with every imagination of the heart; but then it is that the marvel for faith occurs. Thus, as you trust fully in Him and abide in Him, delighting yourself in the God of creation and redemption, of resurrection and rest, it is then that He is willing to give you the desires of your heart (Psalm 37).

It is a matter of GIFT with God, gracious gift; and the gift of eternal redemption (Hebrews 9:12),  everlasting life and the masterpiece of divine meaning for life, which is His own since He made it and none comes close to its freedoms and functions but those whom He has engendered by command, it is free. It costs to receive it, but once received it is He who keeps it (John 10:9,27-28) as a purchased possession, bought back from triviality, untruth and the dim clouds of confusion into the clarity of truth that withstands every foe, assault and lives in a peace past understanding, because now the soul understands God! (Jeremiah 9:23-24). It is as if the pure snowy waters from a distant mountain come rushing down to the valleys to bring a purity and a coolness that delights the waiting thirst (Jeremiah 18:13-15).

Indeed, this He reveals, in showing the power and presence of God over against its absence, using the illustration of a nation which turned from its earlier paths in a later generation:
 

^"Therefore thus says the LORD:

 "Ask now among the heathen, who hath heard such things:
the virgin of Israel has done a very horrible thing.

^"Will a man leave the snow of Lebanon which comes from the rock of the field?
or will the cold flowing waters that come from another place be forsaken?
Because My people hath forgotten Me,
they have burned incense to vanity,
and they have caused them to stumble in their ways from the ancient paths,
to walk in pathways and no on a highway,
to make their land desolate and a hissing ..."

 

When a life is redeemed, the Holy Spirit brings help and counsel, liveliness and hope, even assurance, that of eternal life (Romans 8:16, Ephesians 1:1-11). To be sure, this brings discipline as needed (Hebrews 12). Just as your computer may have programmed reviews, so does your God review you, when you are His, not merely by initial production, but by free restoration in Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour.

It is better so, than being ragged. Indeed, it also brings the fruits of the eternal to what had been merely an earthly soul. It is not burdensome, though it is no sleep (I John 5:1-4).  Consider then what Colossians and Romans have to tell us, yes, and add II Corinthians with it; for here is an outline and an avenue of great prize, that required great price, which God Himself in Person has paid (II Corinthians 5:17ff., Matthew 20:28, John 8:58).

Ponder, then, Colossians 3 in particular, with Romans 6, 8 and II Corinthians 5, and see some of the summary realities of the Christian life. Consider, that currently, instead of relief, there is rage in this world, instead of peace, there are psychiatric dealings because of emptiness, confusion, lack of clear ideas, ideals, understanding, and people wallow in out of bounds wildernesses, in bonds of delusion,  calamitous if not in pride, then in conspicuous superficiality, inept, ungainly and often odious. If it is so in the millions of the misled, milling in their self-imposed cages, it is even more obvious in the nations, where peace is so dismal as almost to appear delusion when it appears for a short time, and lies intermarry with hatred, and self-exaltation mingles with false claims till any appearance of justice becomes like a stark flash of lightning on a dark night.

Consider the word of God,  for a change perhaps, and not the word of man; for we are all the work of God, by the word of God in our very genes, and the sooner we realise that it is not even genius but the generating God whom we need, the better. If the world is to pass (I Corinthians 7:31), and not surprising, being near death and running down (Isaiah 51:6, cf. Waiting for Wonder Appendix), it will, then do not pass with it to worse than oblivion, indeed to shame (Daniel 12:1ff.)

  I  EMPLACEMENT Colossians 3:1-4

Eye-target, Mind-set and Life Exchange are found in one's source,
your life being under the tutelage and with the inspiration of Jesus Christ

Thus in that Christ died for you, being one of His,
so hidden in Him and His works,
you now have substitutionary sacrifice for you
(Galatians 3, Colossians 2:14, Matthew 20:28),
identification with Him in His death for you,
with consummation to  come when all is exposed and you, as now hidden,
will then be with Him in His glory (Matthew 13:43, Philippians 3:20-21).
That is the advantage of reality: it works and finally wins: this is HIS victory,
to become yours also.

II  DEATH-SENTENCE  3:5-7

This is levied on the eruptive volcanics of vitiated man.
They have no place, and instead of plate tectonics, you have a celestial plateau for life

Here Christ's death for you is seen also in this, that He died for you as representing you,
now His. Accordingly, evacuate all residual encumbrance as rubbish -  as in Philippians 3:8.

III  CHANGE OF CLOTHES  3:8-9, and 10-14

A) Put off ...

Strip off the odour of the old man, personality, life
 

B) Put on

'You have put on,'  this is past  for the Christian,
but the dry-cleaning is continual (I John 1:7-2:2).
Value your new  clothes and their upkeep (Isaiah 61:10).

Let us now join together what we saw in the EMPLACEMENT,
with this PUTTING OFF and PUTTING ON.

Do not be put off by what is put on; for it has its base and indeed basis in Christ alone, proffered in death on behalf of all, received in life by SOME, namely those who united with Him in death by faith, find life in Him through operative grace and dispensed ransom (Romans 6:5-6).

Three sites cast light on this, Romans 5, 6 and II Corinthians 5. Thus in Romans 5:14, we look at the base case: By Adam's offence DEATH REIGNED. It implicated and applied to ALL men. In 5:16, we learn that there is a vast thrust of grace, so that as through one all died, so through One sacrificial Person, the free gift comes from many offences, set for one justification. The free gift moreover came directed towards justification for all men (5:18 cf. I John 2:1-2), but for all that, it is

"those who receive abundance of grace
and of the gift of righteousness"

who

 "will reign in  life through the One Jesus Christ."  

You can neither biblically squash the grace of God as if it had no bearing at all on ALL; nor can you extend the righteousness of God as if it reached to the life of any who do not receive it. It is perfectly just and perfectly clear.

Thus in II Corinthians 5:14, we have this:

"We judge this: that If One died for all, then all died."

Here you see first, the universal sweep, for if Christ as representative, God for man, died for all, all are shown implicated, deserving of death and requiring salvation. But it has the more intense and central meaning at once made clear in the following 5:15.

"He died for all, that those who live should live no longer for themselves,
but for Him who died for them, and rose again ...
Therefore if any man is in Christ, he is a new creature."

Here is the operative section. The expansive grace and love relates to all, is sufficient for all, is needed by all, and like the Paschal Lamb is presented on behalf of all, but by no means is that person covered whose heart is not with it, in effect placing the hands of faith on the head of the Lamb as in Leviticus 4. The priest does not do that for you!

It is precisely the same in Romans 6:5:

"If we have been united together {or planted together} in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection."

There is to be a double participation if the sacrifice is to have any relationship other than a testimony of the scope of the love of God. You are united TOGETHER in death, and SO in life. Thus, as in Romans 6:8;  , we have this word:

"If we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him."

Thus as Christ was raised from the dead, so will those whom He has ACTUALLY covered, who received Him, and so were crucified with Him (Romans 6:6), be raised from the dead. So does offer to all become reception by some, and reception by any becomes death WITH Christ, the substitutionary offering becoming through faith an identification through the dynamic divine; and the result becomes a promise assured, even in the resurrection. Paul puts it in current terms in Galatians 2:20, with daily application, I Corinthians 15:31.

By faith, bundled with Him, you are blessed in Him with life everlasting.

IV ESTABLISHMENT OF ATMOSPHERE   3:10-17

- the rule of peace
- the grace of thankfulness
- the  liveliness of godly exchange
- the glowing going by the word in Christ
 

ESSENCE - Overall
 

A) SUBSTITUTION  - All Changes are for Exchange

sin for pardon; wandering for wisdom;
grubbiness for godliness; rubbish for realisation of value
vanity for spiritual sanity; petulance for patience
licence for love; quarrelsomeness for peace
waywardness for directed voyaging;
meaninglessness for a name to claim

See Romans 6:8 - the matter has  current consequences in vitality, as in
8:11 by the direct spiritual power of the living Lord Jesus Christ:
the new man is BEING renewed, like clothes that instead of wearing out, wear in.

B) SETTING - All Changes are Dynamised from God

Set your heart aloft in the Lord
Your mind on the heavenly.
Sanctify by mortification and vitalisation (cf. Ephesians 3:16, Romans 8).
Have  an express change to express the Lord, and
Name Him with a fearless exuberance (cf. Colossians 3:23),
remembering Psalm 73:23: " I am continually with Thee."

Colossians 3:18-4:6 is really a new focus in itself, and might be taken independently:
its focus is family and social  relationships.

C) THRUST - Inspiration is both outer and from within,  in Christ

In all these things, you see envelopment, but not  suppression;
that what is to be exposed is so because it is first hidden,
that what is to be manifested may be so, because it is first received by exchange;
 
that the rule of life is not vagrancy but an order inset and inbuilt,
yet not one which commands for coercion.
 

Rather does it vitalise for a hearty expression of what life should be,
may be and is continually to seek to be,
as the Spirit of the Lord indwells,
and the heart enlarges with the life that, being source, is also
both destiny and delivered through the divinity of its Mentor,
fashioned as a new installation for each one,
as a child of God, in Christ (II  Corinthians 3:17ff., I John 1:1-4, 3:1-4).

After all, if a Christian, you serve the Lord's Christ (Luke 2:26),
the source of your choices in life, of your values, inspiration of your thoughts.
In Him,  there is no renegacy. Therefore,  actually and practically do  ALL in His name,
neither in your own nor that of others.

You are HIDDEN in Him that He be the more obvious. So sing, imbibe His word, exhort!

REFLECTION

The family of God is not what calls itself so, any more than the wealthy are those who say they are rich. It is those who having repented and been covered from the guilt of sin (I Peter 2, Galatians 3), are regenerated, that is, made all over again as a car when it is smashed and then panel-beaten, though that which is of God is from the centre, the heart outwards, not from the outer part to a superficial restoration. It is those redeemed by His blood who are of His own family (Ephesians 1), that is His life-for-life substitution of Himself for the sinner at the bar of justice before God (Galatians 3); for He came from eternity for just such a purpose (John 17:1-3, 8:58, Micah 5:1-3, Isaiah 48:12-19), that He might bring many new children of God to Himself (I Peter 3:18).

It is accordingly, those for whom Christ is the Head, not only the Creator as the Word of God, whose commands are written in our cells, that we might be, but He who is the Redeemer, and whose word is written for our eyes, in His Book of Life (cf. Isaiah 34:16, Matthew 5:17-20), the Bible, that they might see. It is then His works which clear the eye of cataract, restoring the lens of life to acute vision.

What sights anoint the seeing eye (Matthew 15:13), which does not stay closed,opaque to God! and what joy to find after all, in the refreshing of the heart, that that part is not a speck in the night, like a will-o'-the-wisp, but energised to shine (Philippians 2:14-18, Matthew 5:16, Ephesians 3:16), enabled with strength to follow the will of the Saviour (Ephesians 1:19), whatever the foe.

That is the nature of divine grace, the government of God for the soul of man, of woman, of child. It is capacious, yes and far more, there is no limit to His power (Mark 11:23ff.) for those who abide in Him, His words in them (John 15:7), nor any to His love (Ephesians 3:14-21), and His abundance of grace even to eternal life (Romans 8:31-39).