Colossians Day 4
Exhortations to the Colossian Church
What Are You Filled With Today?
Colossians 2:6 – 23
“[A]nd you have been filled in him, who is the head of all rule and authority” (Colossians 2:10)
Although a French physician (Anthelme Brillat-Savarin) stated in 1826 that “You are what you eat,” the idea that our health is defined by our diet has been around for thousands of years. This idea also applies to our spiritual health and strength, and our spiritual view of the world. So, what should we be filling up with?
Colossians 2:6 – 23 is packed with instructions on good spiritual eating and our life as Christians. First, Paul reminds us that since we have received Jesus as Lord, we must continue growing. “Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving” (Colossians 2:6 – 7). We get to walk with God; now that is something to be thankful for.
Then, Colossians 2:8 – 23 tells us what this walk will look like. Our view of philosophy, i.e., the love of wisdom, is challenged. While the Bible tells us that love of wisdom is good (Proverbs 2:6; James 1:5), the wisdom itself is not our god, and only godly wisdom is good (James 3:17). The person Jesus — and a relationship with Him — must fill us before we can properly digest other knowledge.
The phrase “you have been filled in him” (Verse 10) is better understood as “you have been made complete in him.” Although this phrase doesn’t have to do with eating, Jesus in his ministry told us that He is the bread of life (John 6:48; Luke 22:19). So, fill up!
Colossians 2:9 – 15 is a grand description of why Jesus-in-us is superior to any other things that might be filling us. He is superior because to be filled with Jesus is to be filled with God himself!
Through Jesus, we are:
- brought into the family of God by the hands of God.
- raised from the dead by forgiveness from God.
- made debt-free by the cross of Christ.
- on the winning side of the battle for our soul.
- free from Old Testament law.
Colossians 2:16 – 23 challenges us to understand our freedom from the law and sin. Most of us don’t feel any need to keep Old Testament rituals such as feasts, sacrifices, holidays, and dietary restrictions, which were temporary symbols of the real thing. But do we fill our lives with similar activities that crowd out the reality? The reality is Christ in you. To be filled with Christ is to be filled with grace and truth (John 1:14).
We are reminded that as believers we are dead to the world, and alive in Christ, and therefore have victory over sin — victory that can not be won any other way (John 8:36).
Be assured that when the church (i.e., believers in Jesus) is firmly attached to Jesus as head, “the whole body” is nourished. Look to him for nourishment so you grow in God.
“ … Christ in you, the hope of glory” Colossians 1:27
In Jesus Christ,
Andy Nordquist