A Real Heart for Church

I invite your attention to this evening to Colossians chapter 2 and our Sunday evening services we've been looking at the book of Colossians which talks about the Lordship of Christ, the very good topic to follow up the corals music with this evening as they focused upon the coming of Jesus as the babe and the manger, the one who came in that manger, the one who was the babe came for us as a savior, not just as an object of pity because he was such humble surroundings, but he came to be the savior of the world, the king of kings and Lord of lords. And Colossians talks about the Lordship of Christ. We have looked at chapter 1 which deals with the Lordship of Christ in creation and the church that he is the creator and he is preeminent in all things in the body of Christ, the church. Tonight we begin chapter 2 of Colossians and we're going to look at the first five verses this evening, chapter 2 deals with the Lordship of Christ in doctrine. Now it is in this chapter that Paul confronts head on the teaching of the cult that had become very popular in Colossi and that was beginning to affect the church, the young church there in Colossi. Remember we talked about this cult, Psalm, it was a cult which denied the deity of Christ, which said that Christ was the lowest of a series of emanations or angelic beings that came from God, each having a little less deity than the one before it, and finally you get all the way down here to one who would walk on earth and that was Jesus and he really didn't resemble God much at all. So this particular cult denied the deity of Christ and in chapter 2 Paul is going to take that teaching on and deny it and teach what is true about the person of Christ. But in the first five verses he begins with his heart of concern for the church. The church was in Paul's heart and Paul's heart was all for the church. That's what the first five verses are all about. Paul's concern for the church and there's a good lesson for us here as we talk about Paul's concern, Paul's heart for the church and the lesson is this, where is our heart? When we think of the church that for which the Bible says Jesus came and gave his life, he died for the church, of course he died for the whole world as well but included in that or his people, the church. And if Jesus gave his life for that, where is our heart for the church? Do we have the same heart for the people of God, the work of God, the church of God is our heart, all wrapped up in the things that are the concern of God and certainly were the concern also of the Apostle Paul? You know it's easy for those of us even in ministry who serve the church to just kind of start cranking out duty, cranking out responsibility rather than really from our hearts serving the people of God. You teach the Sunday school class, you lead in a wanna group, you may be involved in a week night ministry here at Johnston Chapel. You know how easy it is to slip in that performance mode, how easy it is to kind of slip into that thing of just cranking out that duty week after week and say, okay, I gotta go again tonight, gotta get this thing done, gotta fulfill this ministry without really a heart for what we're doing here at the church. So let's focus on Paul's heart for the church and what that teaches us about the kind of concern we ought to have having the church of God in our heart. First of all in verse one, he tells us about the nature of that concern. He said, I want you to know how much I am struggling for you and for those at Leotusia and for all who have not met me personally. The nature of that concern is that his concern was in the form of a great conflict. There is a great conflict going on in his own heart and life for the church. The word struggling, you see, he says there, I want you to know how much I am struggling for you and for those at Leotusia, a neighboring town which also had a church there. I'm struggling for you, he says, if you go back to verse 29, it's the same word he used back in verse 29 of chapter one where he said to this end, I labor struggling with all his energy which so powerfully works in me. The word struggling as we saw last time in chapter one was a word which is an athletic term. It means to agonize over, to train hard, to put yourself into it. It's a term that indicates intense effort and energy directed toward the nature of the activity or what's in the heart. And for here, it's Paul's concern for the church. As Paul is concerned for the church, he has an intense striving and struggling in his heart for the church. That is equal to that of an athlete competing to be the very best in his or her sport. Now the struggle in this case is not a physical one like an athletic endeavor. The struggle in this case is an anxiety and a concern that Paul has in his heart. And that anxiety and concern is worked out that struggle is fleshed out in prayer. In fact, if you look at chapter 4, verse 12, Paul talks about a co-laborer who had the same struggle for the church at Colossi. Chapter 4, verse 12, a paparus who is one of you and a servant of Christ Jesus sends greetings. He is always wrestling in prayer for you that you may stand firm in all the will of God mature and fully assured. So the same word struggling, striving in prayer. This concern, this anxiety for the well-being of the church, this heart concern is expressed in prayer. That's where the agony takes place. That's where the striving and the struggle takes place. It's in prayer. If we really have a heart concern for God's work on this earth, for his work in this world, it will be expressed in the agony of faithful, consistent prayer. And you all know if you attempt to pray at all, that's hard work. It's not easy. It can become a struggle that can become an intense battle with the spiritual forces of darkness that seek to interrupt that communication with God. So the nature of Paul's concern is it's a deep inner struggle, a concern that is expressed in prayer. But the thing that amazes me is Paul is praying this way, struggling this way in prayer, expressing this anxiety and concern in his heart for people that he has never met. He says, I'm praying for you and for those that lay out to see it. And all who have not met me personally. Remember we saw in the introduction to this book that Paul did not found the church at Colossian. Paul was preaching in a neighboring major city called Ephesus and from Ephesus, the book of Acts tells us that the word of God spread throughout that whole region. And Colossian was one of the neighboring cities, few miles down the road that received. The gospel, but Paul had never visited that city. Paul had never been there. He'd never met these people. And even though he had never met them, had never been with them personally, his heart was for them. Now that tells me something. That tells me that this heart of concern, which is expressed in faithful prayer, is not based upon personal friendship or relationship with each other. We can have this heart concern for people that we may have never met. Or people that we do not know well. It's so easy for us to think that the only thing good in a church goes on when you really know somebody well. And it's important to get to know people well for fellowship purposes. But to have this heart of concern, all we need to do is develop a heart for God because God's heart in us expresses itself in concern for people that we may have never met. Or at least we do not know well, which tells me that we ought to be praying for one another whether or not we know each other. You hear someone mentioned, like was mentioned tonight, the Garmin family. And some of you know the Garmin's. They've been in our church for many years. But some of you don't. Some of you who may be newer to us do not know who the Garmin's are. It doesn't mean that because you don't know them, you shouldn't agonize in prayer for them. Paul was praying in that way for people he'd never met. Because that family is a part of our church, we all want to be behind them in prayer at this time. Even though we may not be able to put a face with that name, we may not be able to picture who that is. They are part of our fellowship. They need our prayers at this time. So this kind of concern, the concern for the church is expressed to the body as a whole. Even though we may not know everybody to the same level of knowledge or friendship, we still pray for one another and have a heart concern for one another. So that's the nature of Paul's concern. Then I would have you to see the purpose of Paul's concern in verses two and three. Paul tells us that he has three purposes behind this concern for the church. He mentions all three of them in these two verses. The first one is that he wants them to be strong in heart. Notice he says in verse two, my purpose is that they may be encouraged in heart. So he wants them to be strong in heart. Now we have to understand the concept of the heart in the Bible. In our culture today, we think of the heart as the seat of the emotions. And when we talk about feelings, we talk about our heart expresses this. I love you with all my heart or I just feel this deeply in my heart. We think today of the heart being the seat of the emotions that was not true in Bible times. You know what the seat of the emotions was in Bible times? That's exactly right. I'm glad you said it and I don't have to. You hear that? It's the bowels. The bowels are the seat of emotion because when we feel something deeply, we feel it in the gut, right? Part of the expression, but that's where we feel it. We feel it in the gut when we feel something very deeply. And that's the way Bible people expressed depth of feeling. They didn't use the heart. They used the bowels to express deep feeling. In fact, let me just give you a few verses in case you're thinking I've gone off the rocker here, kind of gone off the deep end. Let me give you a few verses that describe this. And we'll put them on the screen in Psalm 22. Psalm 22 in verse 14. The Psalmist in a time of greatness stress says, I am poured out like water and all my bones are out of joint. My heart is like wax. It is melted in the midst of my bowels. Now what he's saying is my heart is since it's something feels something very deeply, but the way I feel it is in my bowels. It's in the midst of my bowels. Now this is an expression in Psalm 22 of actually the suffering of Christ on the cross. And so the depth of feeling is expressed with that part of the body in the Bible. This is the King James translation. Most of the newer translations go ahead and translate it by the term that we would associate with feeling to buy heart. But the literal idea in Bible times was the bowels. Now look at this verse in Song of Solomon chapter 5 and verse 4. This is an expression of love. When Solomon comes to the room of his wife at night and she's already in bed and so forth, she says, my beloved put his hand by the whole of the door and my bowels removed for him. I would not suggest you use that as expression of love for your husband or wife, but that is how they express those kind of things in Bible times. Rather than saying, my heart yearned for you or my heart went out to you, they would say, my bowels were removed for you. So I just don't say that to your husband or wife about loving them, but that's the way it was expressed in Bible times. In Lamentations chapter 2 and verse 11. This is Jeremiah lamenting over the destruction of the city of Jerusalem. He says, my eyes do fail with tears. My bowels are troubled. My liver is poured out upon the earth. This is all expression of deep anxiety and concern that we would express with the heart today. Even in the New Testament, 1 John 3, 17. But who so half this world's good and see if his brother have need and shut it up, his bowels of compassion from him. Now again, most newer translations talk about if you close up your heart to this person, but in Bible times they express the city, the emotions with the heart or with the bowels. Now the reason I say that is because when Paul talks about being encouraged in heart, he's not talking about feelings. In the Bible, feelings were expressed with the bowels. The heart was always the center of the person, particularly the thinking capacity, the ability, the mind, the ability to think was expressed with the word heart. Look at this verse in Proverbs 4.23. Above all else, guard your heart for it is the well-spring of life. The idea is everything that you do say, think, the attitudes you have begin in your heart and in the Bible, that is an expression of the way you think. Your attitudes, your mind, specifically, your intellect, your will, those kinds of things. It's not talking about feelings. And so when Paul says my purpose, my concern for this church is that they be encouraged in heart. He's talking about that they be encouraged in their minds. The word encouraged has to be strong. It's the word which means to strengthen and lift up someone to encourage them in that way, not just to speak kindly to them, but to actually lift them up. So the point is this. What Paul wants for the church is that their heart, their mind, the way they think and look at life, be strengthened by the word of God. And that's the way we are strengthened in our minds by learning more about what the Bible teaches, about life and about God and about His plan for us. As we learn more about that, our minds are more involved with that. We become strengthened in our hearts. So it is exposure to the word of God that dictates what we believe and how we think, that then everything that comes to us is passed through that grid. And everything we hear, read, see, all of that comes through that grid of what the Bible teaches us. And so the Bible informs everything that we believe about life. That's what he's talking about here. When he talks about being strengthened in heart, he's not talking, not talking about having good feelings for each other. He's talking about being stronger in our commitment to truth from our minds. So that's one of Paul's concerns for the church. And that ought to be all of our concern for the church. That we have strong hearts, that we'd be encouraged in the sense that we believe and understand God's Word and we know what it teaches. And everything we look at in life comes through the grid of this book. And this word of God informs everything we believe. That's being strong in heart. The second purpose of Paul's concern is that we be united in love. You see it there in verse two? My purpose is that they may be encouraged in heart and united in love. I love the word united. It's a word which literally means to be knit together or stranded together. The idea is the human body. The body is knit together this way. In fact, sometimes in the Bible, the body is spoken of as being knit together. And of course, our bodies are knit together. It's not like this part of your arm goes down to here. From your elbow to your wrist, that's all one segment, has everything it needs to operate. And then from here down to the fingertips is a whole new deal which has its own systems of organization. No, the whole thing's knit together. The bones are knit together. There are tendons and ligaments which tie everything together. And there are nerves which run the whole gamut and veins and arteries which tie everything together. Everything is knit together which indicates that it's all kind of blended together. It's all dependent on each other. This arm cannot function. We're it not for other parts. The body being able to function. It's all knit together. And that's what unity in the church is all about. Unity in the church means that we are all in the same body. We're knit together. Our lives are intertwined. We're dependent on each other. We need each other. We can't do the Christian life and we can't live out the Christian life in isolation. We're dependent on each other. So we're knit together. And the thing that knits us together is love. Now there are several reasons why love knits us together. The word love here means to put another person first. It means to concern for the good of another person. It's unselfish. It's sacrificial. It means you're not looking out for yourself as much as you're looking out for someone else. And it's that kind of love that knits us together. That makes us united. That makes us one. Now I love what John says about this kind of love. We're just going to look at it real quickly. In 1 John chapter 3, he describes this kind of love that knits us together. 1 John 3 verses 11 through 18. And he says two things about this kind of love that really knits us together that forms unity. The first thing he says about this kind of love is that this kind of love has an absence of jealousy. There's no jealousy in this kind of love. Versus 11 through 15, he talks about cane and able. Notice he says in verse 11, this is 1 John 3, verse 11, this is the message you heard from the beginning, we should love one another. Do not be like cane who belonged to the evil one and murdered his brother. Why did he murder him? Because his own actions were evil and his brothers were righteous. You remember the story. cane was jealous of the fact that God accepted Abus sacrifice and did not accept he is. And so there was a jealousy thing in there which was characterized by hatred rather than love. Love is the absence of jealousy. And in the body of Christ it means we rejoice when other people are blessed. It means we rejoice when other people are honored. We rejoice in the giftedness of someone else. If we see someone that's gifted in an area where we're kind of a clutz, you know, spiritually, we're rejoicing in the fact that they're gifted in that area. They can do some things that we can't do. We're not jealous of their gifts or we really don't love each other. So it means that we we rejoice in others giftedness. We rejoice in others usefulness to God. If some people are greatly used of God in an area that we would like to be, we're not jealous of that. Loving each other means that we rejoice in how God is using that person in that ministry. And we don't feel like, oh, I've got to be getting some of that lime light. No, no, that's jealousy. So love is the absence of jealousy. Secondly, John says love is the absence of indifference. It's the absence of indifference. Verse 16, he says, this is how we know what love is. Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. And this is how we do it. Verse 17, if anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth. When we see the needs of other people, we reach out to them to help them. That's love. And it's a person who is a brother or sister in Christ so that we can love everybody in the church. This way, although we may not all be at the same level of friendship. That's not the issue here. Friendship is not the issue. Being together in the body of Christ is the issue. And if we are brothers and sisters in the body of Christ, we love each other by reaching out to meet each other's needs. That's what really gives a church unity. We're not talking about political oneness. We're not talking about educational oneness. We're not talking about social likeness. We don't all have to be alike or think on every issue alike. But to love one another which presents unity in the church or promotes unity in the church, to love one another means that we have a heart concern for each other. That rules out jealousy. That rejoices in what happens good for others. And that rules out in difference. When we see a need, we will step in to try to meet it as best we can. That's what promotes unity in love. And so Paul's concern for the church is that they be strong in heart, but secondly, that the church be united in love. And we ought to have that same concern for the church. It ought to be the heartbeat of ours because I believe it's the heartbeat of God that we be united in love. Not letting things divide us, but that we love one another. We are rejoicing for one another and we meet each other's needs because we are in the family of God. Not because we know somebody well and they're a good friend, but because we're in the family of God, that ought to be our heartbeat. United in love. The third purpose of Paul's concern in verse two and three is that they be settled in their understanding. So we want them to be strong in heart, united in love, but settled in understanding also in verse two, he says, in the middle of the verse, so that they may have the full riches of complete understanding in order that they may know the mystery of God, namely Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. Okay, he wants them to have all the riches of understanding and these riches of understanding, he wants them to have in two areas. He mentions them in verses two and three. He wants them to be convinced to have full understanding of two things. Number one, the deity of Christ. He says it there in verse two, that they may know the mystery of God, namely Christ. The mystery of God is that which God reveals about himself. We talked about this before, but the word mystery in the New Testament has to do with something which was not revealed in the past, but which is now revealed by God. So what he's talking about is that which is revealed about God, namely is in Christ. In other words, whatever we want to know about God is found in Christ. Everything that God is, Christ is. Jesus Christ is the perfect representation. The image of God as Paul said in Colossians 1, he is God in human flesh, the deity of Christ. Paul wants the church to be settled in its understanding of that. There can be no question about the deity of Christ. Secondly, there should be no question about the all sufficiency of Christ in verse three, in whom speaking of Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. In other words, all that we need for a relationship with God is found in Jesus Christ. Now please listen to this. If you don't get anything else tonight, listen to this. Everything you need to have a personal relationship with God is found in Jesus Christ. This cult was teaching that you had to have a lot of other things and secret knowledge that only people in that group knew about. Beware of any group that promises you secret knowledge. God's not trying to hide anything from you. God's not trying to keep back knowledge from you and hold it back for a few people who have advanced in certain areas. No, all that God wants you to know and all that God wants you to experience is found in Jesus Christ. The all sufficiency of Christ, everything you need to have a personal relationship with God is found in Him. You know why? Because it was Jesus Christ who came to this earth as we heard sung about just a while ago. He came to this earth as a baby for the express purpose of becoming a man so that he would lay down his life as our Savior to die on the cross for our sins. And when Jesus died on the cross, he was taking our place. He was bearing our punishment for our sin. He was our substitute. And the only way you can come into a personal relationship with God is through receiving Christ as your Savior, recognizing the work He did for you on the cross is all that it takes to get to heaven to have a personal relationship with God. It's not being a part of a church. It's not trying to live a good life or getting baptized or anything that we do. It is simply through Jesus Christ and His death on the cross that we come to know God and we get in His family. So all the treasures of wisdom and all that God wants us to know, all that we need is found in Jesus Christ. The auspiciousity of Christ. Paul wants the church to be settled in our understanding about that. The deity of Christ, the auspiciousity of Christ, everything is about Him. Not about us, it's about Him. So that's the purpose of Paul's concern. But the church will be strong and heart, united in love and settled in understanding. There's three great qualities for a church to have. That ought to be our concern, our heart and burden. But quickly before we leave tonight, let me just give you the reason for Paul's concern in verses four and five. Paul talks about the reason why he's so concerned about the church at Colossus. Two reasons. Number one, in verse four, the presence of false teachers. He says, I tell you this so that no one may deceive you by fine sounding arguments. That's exactly what was happening in Colossus with this cultic group that was trying to get into the church and take over the church. Now what makes false teaching so dangerous is that quite often false teaching majors in persuasive speech. That's what Paul's talking about there in verse four. No one deceive you by fine sounding arguments, by eloquent smooth talking. And in our day, it doesn't have to just be speech because of the use of media today. It can be a very well-produced television program, a colorful brochure or magazine, a polished image, a wholesome appearance, skillful use of the media. That can wow people. That can kind of bull people over. And the danger of a false message sometimes gets grits over by all the production to where people are insensitive to the falseness of the message. Paul says, I want to warn you about fine sounding arguments that really have no substance. Be sure to test everything by the word of God. The reason for Paul's concern was the presence of false teachers. The second reason was the absence of Paul. Not only were they the presence of false teachers, but the absence of Paul, Paul said, I'm not there to warn you about this except through this letter. He says in verse 5, for though I am absent from you in body, I am present with you in spirit. By the way, that's some people's life verse. Having sinned in church in the last month. Well, I've been there in spirit, brother, you know, I've been with you, you know, absent body, but I'm there in spirit. You know, that's some people's life verse. But Paul was in prison. That's the reason why he couldn't be there in body. And he said, I'm with you in spirit because he was in prison. I remember preacher Jimmy used to say, you're not excused from church services unless you are in the hospital or in prison. Remember that? There are only two excuses. And so that's kind of what Paul say here. I'm absent in body. I'm present with you. But the reason he was absent in body is because he was in prison in Rome for his faith. But even though he was absent from them, he was joyful. He says, I delight to see how orderly you are and how firm your faith in Christ is. Those two words orderly in form were military terms that had to do with how military troops lined up and marched in step and held their shields over them so that no arrows could penetrate. It was called the Greek fail-anks. And they had a certain way of marching and organizing themselves so they were almost an impenetrable force. The idea that Paul is getting across is that here in the church, they have stood firm. They have maintained a consistent stand against this false teaching that was going around in their area. Even though it was threatening the church, up to this point at least, they had stayed faithful to the Word of God and had resisted that false teaching. But Paul was concerned because of the presence of false teachers and the absence of his own presence there to teach and to warn and help guide them. Paul really had a heart for the church and that's what set Paul apart. He had a real heart for the church. Even for people he had never met, his heart went out to them. And his heart for the church that agonized in prayer was that they might be strong in their hearts and that they might be united in their love and that they might be settled in their understanding on the person and work of Christ. And in the midst of such false teaching, in the midst of all kinds of threats to the church, that is exactly where our heart needs to be as well. I hope it is for all of us and that our heart will continue to grow together for the church. Let's pray together. Father, we are grateful to you today that you've given us this opportunity to be here in the church, to be with God's people, to look into your Word, to worship together, to hear the wonderful music of the season, to be able to focus upon the one who came as a babe, who came to be our Savior. You're so thankful Father for the opportunity to be here. You're gracious to us to give us this opportunity. We know Lord there are many people who love you, every bit as much if not more than we do, who because of illness or other reasons maybe where they live and parts of the world they cannot gather like we do here. So we're very thankful for this opportunity. Help us Father to have the same kind of heart for the church that the Apostle Paul had. We ask in Jesus' name, Amen.