Focused on Fullness

Grab your message notes that are there in your bulletins. Focused is the name of our summer series. The notes look like this: It's a verse-by-verse study this summer in the book of Colossians in the Bible. Here is the question for today: Our souls were made to connect with God, but what if our approach has been all wrong? What if the basic standard human approach to God doesn't work?

I want to start with a true but somewhat embarrassing story from my life, as so many stories from my life are. One day a couple of years ago, I'm in Scotts Valley, and I want to see a matinee at the theaters there. I get in my car and crank the key, and it won't start. The engine is dead. It might have had something to do with the fact that I left my lights on while I was watching the matinee again. So I had to call AAA again, and it was like the third time that year. I felt like an idiot, completely embarrassed.

When the AAA guy gets there, while he's hooking up my battery to his charger, I asked him, "Can you tell me a story? What is the stupidest call that you have ever been at?" You know, kind of like, make me feel less of an idiot, please. He says, "Well, I got one for you. One time I get called out, and the guy says, 'My car won't start.' He tells the AAA guy, 'Frankly, I don't know if you'll be able to help because I probably know a lot more about engines than you know.' This guy points to a sticker on his front window. It's actually a big truck, and the sticker is a parking sticker to NASA. He says, 'I am literally a rocket scientist.' He says, 'My specialty is rocket engines, and my car wouldn't start for the last hour. I have checked every connection and every wire. I even hauled out the diagnostic tool that we use at NASA to try to diagnose my problem. I've been at it for an hour. I cannot figure it out.' He folds his arms and looks at the AAA guy like, you know, you're a mortal non-PhD; you could not possibly deconstruct this mystery, kind of throwing down the gauntlet, right?

The AAA guy looks into the cab of the truck, and he says instantly he sees the problem. The guy simply doesn't have his automatic transmission in Park. So he tells me, 'René, I reach in, flipped his automatic transmission into Park as quickly as I could, and I turned his key. The engine cranks.' He says about two to three seconds after I arrived, his car is running after he tried to fix it for an hour. He tells me, 'I didn't even charge him because it was worth the mic drop moment. Get this: to point to his NASA parking sticker and say, "Ready to launch, rocket man," and just walk away.'

Sometimes our problem in life is that we overthink it, right? When really the answer is so simple. So much of the spiritual life is like that too. Jesus is consistently and constantly simplifying what the Pharisees and teachers of the law are complicating, right? The Apostle Paul is constantly simplifying what the false teachers in those early churches are complicating. This was the case with his letter to the Colossians. We've seen in the series that the book of Colossians in the Bible is really a letter penned by the Apostle Paul to Christians in this city called Colossi. It's on the west coast of what is now Turkey. Culturally, the Colossians were Roman people who had become Christians. But now there were teachers in their church claiming to be spiritual experts, kind of enlightened masters, saying, 'We can teach you some extra spiritual secrets to kind of take you neophyte Christians to the next level.' They're rolling out all kinds of things that these brand new Christians have to do to really take their Christianity to the next tier.

The Apostle Paul hears about this, and he says, 'Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, time out! Your own teachers are complicating and overthinking something that is really very, very simple.' What he says next is for you. If you've ever felt like your love for God is fading, like your spiritual life is missing the spark, and you've tried all kinds of ways to get that engine started again— you've read books, you've gone to Bible studies, you've gone to conferences, and nothing seems to work—you might just be overthinking it. So let me simplify it for you.

We're going to start today in Colossians 2:8, where Mark left off with his wonderful sermon from a couple of weeks ago. In this section of Colossians, here's what is happening: Paul is reaching through the cab of the truck, flipping the transmission into Park, and turning the key. He's simplifying it for the Colossians in terms of their spiritual life. Watch this: he says, 'See to it that no one takes you captive.' Now, excuse me, the word he uses there for captive was used in another Greek writing to speak of kidnapping, plundering, robbery. He's saying, 'Colossians, you people were so free when you first put your faith in Jesus, but you've been kidnapped. You've been plundered. You've been robbed of your simple joy through hollow and deceptive philosophy.'

Now, the word philosophy means something in English, but really in those days it referred to any system of teaching. But don't miss this: he's saying their own teachers in their church, in their Bible studies, their approved elders and pastors have been teaching this hollow and deceptive philosophy that is enslaving them. How? Paul says they're teaching, watch this, 'depends on human tradition and the basic principles of this world rather than on Christ.'

Now, this phrase 'basic principles of the world' is key to understanding everything about to say in this message. It's just a key to discern it in your spiritual life, but it can kind of be a hard phrase to get your head around. So really put your brains into gear here. This has a lot of nuances in the Greek that I want you to understand. I think it's going to transform your life; I really do. The word originally meant the elemental spirits in Greek mythology. They were sort of the most ancient gods. They were the godlike beings who created all the other gods of Greek and Roman mythology. They were the godlike ancestral spirits who invented Greco-Roman religion, which was based on systems of sacrifice, like you see in this relief sculpture on the screen. You sacrifice the cow or the pig or the chicken, and if the gods liked it, you got good crops or good fortune, and if they didn't like it, you didn't. It was kind of a business arrangement. One ancient expert I read said Roman religion was like a business contract: you did this for the gods, they did that for you if you did it right. There was tremendous performance pressure: am I performing enough to please the gods?

Now, my pause, this phrase evolved to mean the basic operating system of society, the way their whole world worked. Because almost every relationship in the Roman Empire, between people, between businessmen, even between father and son, mother and daughter, it was based on the Latin phrase quid pro quo. We still use this phrase in English today. It means this: for that, I do this for you, you do that for me; you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours. There's no gifts, there's nothing free, there's no grace; it's all performance-based. This was the basic principle of their world, the way their world worked. Now, does this carry over into modern society at all? Sure, it does in many ways. Our American culture is still based on this idea.

I want you to think about this: in practically every area—sports, work, school—you are judged by your performance based on what you do and whether it's good enough. If you want something, you have to work for it. This is such a part of our American culture. Like, finish these popular sayings in American culture. Just shout it out: there's no such thing as a free lunch. If you want something done right, do it yourself. No pain, no gain. And so a lot of people assume God works according to the basic principles of the world. Like, finish this one: God helps those who help themselves. You know, that's not in the Bible. In fact, the point of the Bible is God helps us because we cannot help ourselves. God saves us because we cannot save ourselves. God helps us because we're powerless to overcome our self-destructive tendencies.

But what happens is the basic principles of this world, the quid pro quo idea, is so pervasive that Christians start to think God operates that way. Christians start to think God will only bless them if they work for it: do more, work more, serve more, give more, pray more, quid pro quo. They do something, so God owes them something. But that's the basic approach of this world to God. That's not the basic approach of heaven.

Now, to help you understand the difference, I put a chart in your notes at the bottom of page one: basic principles of this world compared to the gospel. I want to just really quickly run through this because one of these two columns will become the basic sort of operating system software that you, the hardware, run on. Really, one of these two. In my life as an adult, I made the transition from one operating system to the next. Which one, honestly, are you operating on right now? I know many of you, maybe most of you here today, are Christians, but which operating system are you operating on right now?

The basic principles of this world are performance-based; the gospel is grace-based. By grace, I mean everything I have is all a gift of grace from God. My very life, my salvation, it's all just a gift of God. I haven't earned it. The basic principles of the world are about willpower; the gospel is about God's power. The world is about what I've achieved; the gospel is about what I've received as a gift. The world is about my activity; in other words, if I'm good, then God will bless. The gospel is about my identity. I'm already blessed. I'm a child of God. I'm forgiven. I am royalty. I'm seen as pure and holy and blameless in God's sight, so I am moved by gratitude to behave that way in keeping with my identity.

The world system is about knowing the principles, the rules, the to-do list. The gospel is about knowing the person, the person of Christ, letting my imagination be captured by the love and the power and the significance and the beauty of Jesus. The system of the world is human-centered; the gospel is Christ-centered. Now, let me stop there. Look at this part of the chart. That right there is a great litmus test for you to apply when you're picking up a book in a Christian bookstore, when you're listening to somebody speak at a conference, when you're listening to me speak on this platform. Is this really a gospel message, or is it a message just kind of based on the old Roman quid pro quo, got to work to earn it system? And the way one litmus test is: does this help me focus on Jesus and his beauty, or does this cause me to focus more on myself? Right? This is really a crucial litmus test.

In the system of the world, we provide the sacrifice to God. In the gospel, God provides the sacrifice for us. Ultimately, the basic principles of this world lead to either arrogance or despair. Arrogance because some people love to-do lists, and they're pretty good at checking off the to-do list. What are the rules? I'm keeping them, and they imagine, 'I'm doing pretty good. I'm better than most people.' Or despair because everybody else thinks, 'I can never be good enough. I keep failing. I'm never sure if I'm doing it right.' But the gospel of grace leads to humility and gratitude. Humility because I realized I don't deserve anything. I don't deserve anything. And gratitude because I realized yet I've received this astounding generosity from God.

Now, look at this chart again, and please listen to what I'm about to say carefully because this could save you a lot of pain, and I know this from personal experience. Think about this: the book of Colossians we're studying this summer was written because teachers in their congregation, Christian teachers, were teaching what sounded like good religious principles, but they were really just basic principles of the world with a Jesus label slapped on it. Now, has that ever happened since? For 2,000 years of Christian history, that has happened from time to time in Bible studies, in small groups, from church pulpits, in church denominations, in Christian books, at Christian conferences, over and over and over again. And I know because I bought into this line of thinking. I was a Christian. I believed in Jesus, but I was living on the left side of this column with all my mind, with all my heart, trying to perform to earn the approval of the gods. But I just, you know, referred to the gods as the Lord. But really, it was the same old Roman paganism.

Here's what it sounds like: it sounds something like this, okay? You want to go to heaven when you die, right? So accept Jesus into your heart. Did you do that? Good. Now, don't you want to live more fervently for God? Don't you want to demonstrate to him that you truly love him? And if you truly love God, you need to pray harder and fast longer and learn how to seek him more deeply and try more spiritual disciplines and be better and be holier and be perfect. Almost imperceptibly, the focus turns from just an adoration of Jesus and what he did for you to slowly, imperceptibly, the focus turns almost exclusively to me and what I'm doing and what I need to do and how I never feel like I'm doing enough. Never enough, never enough, never enough.

Now, what's the opposite of that sense of emptiness spiritually? Well, Paul talks about it in the next verse. This is so key. Paul says, 'That's the basic principles of this world, not Christ, because in Christ, although what? Fullness of the deity lives in bodily form. All the beautiful characteristics of God, those character qualities of God, exist in a bodily form in the incarnate Christ. And watch this: now you have been given fullness in Christ. He is the head over every power and authority.' Love that word repeated there: fullness. Say that word out loud with me: fullness. Say it again: fullness. In Christ, you have fullness. You don't have to do more to earn God's blessing. He pours every blessing upon your life the moment you trust in him as your Lord and Savior. You are complete. You are full right now.

The secret to the Christian life is so simple. It's not simplistic, but it's really very simple. You just turned the key, and the key is Jesus. It's all about Jesus. When you see the fullness of God in Christ and you see the fullness that you have been given in Christ right now, then you begin to make choices in keeping with that identity. You can tell I'm emotional about this because this is, again, very personal for me. For so much of my Christian life, my mindset was one of scarcity. I didn't have enough holiness, and I didn't have enough of God in me, and I needed to get more. I felt like it was all not enough, and I was transformed when I realized I have fullness in Jesus. In fact, what about you? Ask yourself: am I living in a mindset of scarcity or fullness? The more you focus on your fullness in Christ, the more settled and secure and satisfied you will be.

In the next few verses, Paul doesn't leave it theoretical. He gives three examples of just how this concept of fullness can change your life. Page two: three truths that are true about me right now in Christ. For some of you, just seeing these is going to set you free. Number one: in Christ, I am fully included. Fully, fully, fully included. You ever had the emotional pain of being rejected by somebody, even by good religious people? I kind of warn you, these next verses sound weird, but they've got a great liberating truth. So let's explore these and learn what they mean, starting in verse 11: 'In him, Jesus, you were also circumcised with a circumcision not performed by human hands. Your whole self, ruled by the flesh, was put off when you were circumcised by Christ, having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through your faith in the working of God who raised him from the dead.' Wow, a lot of words. What is that all about? Especially, what is all this about circumcision, right? What is the story there?

To understand what this meant to these people, we've got to go back and see what circumcision meant to the Jewish people who made up the majority of the early Christian church, right? We got to go back to the very first book of the Bible, the book of Genesis, chapters 12 and 15, where God appears to Abraham, and God makes some additional promises to Abraham. He says, 'Abraham, look up at the stars.' Yes, Lord, your descendants are going to be as numerous as the stars in the sky on a dark night, even though you do not have a single child yet. Eventually, that is how numerous your descendants are going to be, and your descendants are going to be a blessing to the whole world. They will be agents of blessing, and whoever blesses them will themselves be blessed. So it's just like blessing upon blessing upon blessing is going to come out of you, Abraham, and I'm going to give them a place to live, and I'm going to give them a promise to live on and a purpose to live for. All that is known as the Abrahamic covenant. God promises a people, a purpose, a place, and a promise. And Abraham goes, 'Wow.' And then God says, 'And the sign of this amazing covenant will be the circumcision of all the males, starting with you, my man.' And Abraham goes, 'What? Now, you know what?'

From that day on, circumcision was a symbol, almost like a birthmark, that told that this person is part of that lineage, part of that Abrahamic covenant. From that time on, for thousands of years, Jewish male babies have been circumcised. Circumcision meant you are included in the covenant with God. You have a people, you have a purpose to be a blessing, you have a place in God's family, you have promises about you. Now, obviously, one of the big obstacles to worshiping the true God of the Bible for Gentiles, for non-Jewish people, was, I mean, you can imagine it. You know, mom and the kids are starting to go to temple, and they're kind of getting into Sabbath school, and they're studying the Bible. Dad kind of tags along, and all this. 'We love this idea of there just being one God who's invisible, who's everywhere, instead of the weird Roman and Greek pantheons. Man, even though I'm a Gentile, that's super appealing to me. Maybe we'll convert to worshiping this one true God of the Bible.' And then dad hears that conversion involves a little surgery. And so dad goes, 'You guys go ahead. I'm going to be waiting in the car out in the parking lot. You know, I don't know if I'm into this.'

Then Paul says, 'And then what happened was years go on, and about 2,000 years ago, the Christian communities start popping up all over the place. The Gentiles who want to be Christians are coming into these Christian communities that are coming out of the Jewish world, and the Gentiles are being told, "Great! You can place your trust in Jesus Christ, but you're kind of a second-tier believer because you have to have the surgery to be a real first-class believer, to be really included in the covenant." What Paul is saying here is so radical. He said, "Wait! Don't complicate it! It's about circumcision of the heart, not the flesh. You Gentiles can be included in God's people, and you don't have to get circumcised," bringing a huge sigh of relief from all the guys out in the parking lot.

I just realized this is like the weirdest Father's Day message ever, but here's how all the dads were invited are going, "Okay, not coming back." But here's how this applies to you: it's good news. Because male or female, Jew or Gentile, or whatever else you are, the moment you place your trust in Jesus in your heart, you are fully included in God's people and God's promises and God's place and God's purpose. People may reject you. Teams may not pick you. Interviewers may not hire you. You may have been dumped or divorced or dismissed or dissed. You may even reject you, but this means God will never reject you. Jesus will never abandon you. You are included in what God is doing. And you get this: this means you are not just economy class included. This means you are first-class sleeper seat, gourmet meal included. And don't ever let anyone plunder that identity from you. Do you see what a difference this can make in your life?

What this does in your relationships is it gives you this appealing ease. Because do you see? You are not now searching for relationships, human relationships, that sense of inclusion. You're not desperate. You're not going, "Please like me! Please include me!" Because you know you've been fully included by God. Amen? This is powerful stuff.

Number two: in Christ, he says, I'm fully forgiven. I'm fully forgiven. Now here's the problem: where preachers talk about forgiveness, there are two kinds of people: self-condemning, guilt-oriented people and self-righteous, pride-oriented people. I need to address them both because they both hear this message differently. Self-condemning people, if you're a self-condemning person, you tend to lie awake at night thinking of all you've done wrong. And if you're a self-righteous person, you tend to lie awake at night thinking of all the ways you've been wronged. And it's a different focus, and I want to address first the self-condemning people. Ninety percent of your prayer life sounds like this: "God, I'm so sorry! So sorry, God! I'm just so stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid." And I want to address you because I'm one of you. My wife, Lori, has told me, "René, you are the most guilt-oriented person I know." Because I just end up feeling guilty about everything, right? Well, if you're one of those, if you're my people, watch this next verse: 'When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, in other words, before you did one thing to earn it, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins.' And guess what all means in the original Greek? I actually looked it up, and I just kind of cut and paste what all the different scholars say it means: every kind of variety, the totality, any, every, the whole. So in other words, always means what? Yeah, all! Every sin, past, present, and future, all your sins, including that one that still haunts you that you're thinking of right now that you haven't been able to forgive yourself of yet. He forgave us all, the totality, the whole, having canceled the record of our debts. And I love the psychological insight here, which stood against us and condemned us. Ever experienced that? Ever hear them stand up, hear their voices? "You are such a loser! What a pathetic jerk! You are such a fake! God is so disappointed! People knew what you know about you, man, they would reject you just like God should reject you." Look what Jesus did to shut those voices up. He took the record of our debts, which stood against us and condemned us. He has taken it away, nailing it to the cross.

Now, what does that mean? Well, in those days, when you were crucified, a list of your crimes would be nailed to the cross right above your head. You were paying the debt for those crimes. So when Paul is painting this picture, I think he's saying in a spiritual sense the legal record of your sins was above Jesus' head, meaning publicly on that cross, he paid all your debt. And what greater payment can you imagine than the blood of Jesus Christ? What can you add to that? So it is fully taken care of, 100%. No more debt to pay ever. You are fully forgiven forever right now. Amen?

So you got to ask yourself: am I hearing the voice of condemnation or the voice of grace? And when you find yourself hearing the voice of condemnation, "Stupid, stupid, stupid," on the authority of God's word, you replace it with this: "Beloved, beloved, beloved." That's going to change some lives here today.

Now, that's for you guilt-oriented people like me. But some of you are self-righteous people, like my wife. She told me I could tell you that. We joke about it because, I mean, we've both come a long way. But kind of naturally, one of us has one weakness, one of us has the other weakness. I asked her, "I'm so guilt-oriented. What does it feel like, right, to kind of tend toward pride?" And she said, "Well, you have a tendency to get defensive when somebody points out a fault. You don't like to admit guilt. You always want to minimize the seriousness of what you've done. And you tend to hear this point, and you wouldn't say this out loud, but you're almost thinking, 'Well, yeah, technically I guess I'm forgiven because of what Jesus did for me on the cross, but if it had just been me, Jesus probably wouldn't have had to die on the cross. He would have had to like get a splinter because I'm just not that bad,' right? But listen, as long as we think I'm not that bad, grace will never seem that good. A pastor named Jean LaRue posted this on Twitter: 'What do you think of this post? If the biggest sinner you know isn't you, then you don't know yourself very well.' Do you get that?

So what do you do with an awareness of your own sin? The answer is not self-condemnation, and the answer is not defensiveness and self-righteousness because they're both about self. The answer is self-forgetfulness. As I focus on Christ and I forget about myself, I see that in him, I'm fully forgiven. It's not even an issue anymore. Fully, fully, fully, fully, fully, fully for all time.

Okay, now this is getting good. Last one, real quick: right now in Christ, I am fully delivered. Verse 15: 'In this way, he disarmed the spiritual rulers and authorities.' He's talking about the evil spirits and even the pagan gods. He shamed them publicly by his victory over them on the cross. One of the things people in the ancient world were deathly afraid of was evil spirits, curses, and hexes. Even in our sophisticated society, many people are still afraid of that today. I had a friend when I lived in Portland who was so obsessed with this. She got every new book on breaking generational curses, every book on spiritual warfare, and ironically, in her Christian life, ended up focusing more on Satan than on Jesus. Listen, this verse means Jesus has disarmed the powers of darkness, and they must have needed to hear this because he's reiterating what he said in the first chapter in 1:13: 'For Jesus has rescued us from the dominion of darkness.' Jesus fully rescued you, fully delivered you, fully saved you, fully removed you from their influence. So live with confidence in that. In fact, whatever it is that you're afraid of, he is greater than all those fears.

So look back at all these points. Don't complicate the Christian life. To get the mojo back, to get the engine started again, just stay focused on the key, which is the fullness that you have the moment you place your trust in Jesus. You have it all already, and the Christian life is having our eyes opened day by day more and more to the grace of God that's in our lives, and we begin to reflect that in our daily lives, not to earn something from God, but out of gratitude for his grace.

Now, if you're not sure that you've placed your trust in Christ, I'm going to give you a chance to settle that issue once and for all in just a moment. But I want to challenge everybody here who has placed their trust in Christ this week: speak the truth of your fullness in Christ to yourself daily. Just try that for a week. How do you do that? Well, you can start with the verses I put on page three of your notes, and as you keep hearing the truth of your fullness in Christ, I guarantee you it is going to change your life.

Now let me close with a story I first heard years ago that applies so well to what we've been talking about today. Once upon a time, there was a wealthy man who loved his son above all things, and they both loved art. It's kind of a shared hobby. They began to build an art collection together. Every spare minute, they were out together at art auctions and art houses and art sales. The father was wealthy, and so together they built one of the rarest private collections of art in the entire world: Rembrandts, Picassos, Van Goghs.

Then war broke out. The son was drafted, and one day the father's worst fears were realized. He was told his son had been killed while attempting to rescue another soldier. Six months of mourning went by, and then a knock at the door. The father opened the front door of his mansion, and there stood a young soldier with a package wrapped in brown paper under his arm. He said, "Sir, you don't know me, but I am the man your son died to save that day. As he was carrying me out of the jungle, we were under fire, and he was shot through the heart and died instantly, but I was saved." The young soldier held out the package and he said, "I know this isn't much, and I'm not much of an artist, but he told me that you love art, and I want you to have this painting that I did of your son as I last remember him." Through tears, the father tore open the package and saw a very simple, clearly amateur portrait of his one and only son. And he loved it. He said, "You have captured the essence of my son's smile in your painting, and I promise you I'm going to cherish this above all others." And he did. The father hung that painting over the mantelpiece in his living room, and whenever anybody came over, he always showed them that painting first before he showed them any of his other masterpieces.

Well, one day the father died, and the news went out that the entire collection was being offered for sale at an exclusive private auction. Collectors and art experts from around the world gathered. But the first painting on the auction block was that soldier's modest little painting of the son. When the crowd of art experts saw that, they grew restless. They said, "One of the, you know, the Van Goghs and the Rembrandts going to be brought out." But the auctioneer just pounded his gavel and asked somebody to start the bidding. The crowd said nothing, waiting for the more serious paintings. The auctioneer persisted, "Who will start the bidding? Who will buy the portrait of the son? Do I hear three hundred dollars? Two hundred dollars?" And finally, a voice from the very back said, "I'll bid 20." And the bidder was none other than the young soldier the son had died saving. He said, "I didn't come to buy anything at all, so all I've got is a $20 bill in my pocket, but I bid it all." No one else bid anything. So the auctioneer pounded his gavel, bang, said, "Sold for $20!" And then he turned to the whole crowd and said, "The auction is now officially closed." And the crowd was stunned.

The auctioneer said, "When I was called to conduct this auction, I was told of a stipulation in the will that I couldn't divulge until now. But according to the wishes of the deceased, only the painting of the son was to be sold today, and whoever takes the son gets it all. Whoever takes the son gets it all." And he continued, "So for $20, this young man has purchased one of the world's most priceless art collections and the entire estate in which it is housed. Auction closed." And when I read that, I thought of our key verse this week. Can you read this with enthusiasm and understanding now? Let me hear you: "For in Christ, all the fullness of the deity lives in bodily form, and you have been given fullness in Christ." If you take the son, you'll get everything else the Father has to offer. So don't complicate it. Just keep soaking in the truth of your fullness in Christ every day, and that will change everything. Let's pray together. Would you bow your heads with me?

Lord, thank you for our fullness in Christ. Help us not to overcomplicate it. We just want to focus on Jesus. And I pray that if anybody here is not certain that they've placed their trust in Christ, they would do so right now, praying something like this in their hearts: "God, I want to put my trust in Christ. I'm drawn to him. I don't understand it all, but I want to experience fullness in my life and not emptiness or scarcity. And so today, I place my trust in the finished work of Jesus on the cross. I do. Help me to understand it more and grow in that more for the rest of my life. But I trusted Jesus today." It's in his name we pray. Amen.