That Church
(Colossians 1: 1-14)
I’ve told this story before, but it’s worth repeating to serve as a reminder of whose we are. I don’t remember the circumstances, but I was having a conversation with someone I had just met and eventually I was asked by this person what I did for a living. Normally, when you tell someone you are the pastor of a church it’s a conversation stopper, but in this particular instance when I told him I was the pastor at Community United Methodist Church in Port Hadlock his response was: “Oh, that’s the church that helps the homeless.” I was taken aback but recovered quickly and said, yes, we do what we can, all the time thinking to myself what a great reputation to have as a local church. You see, more often than not, when you tell someone, you are the pastor of a church the person you are speaking with immediately wants to tell you about their bad experience with organized religion. All you can do is listen, say you are sorry for their experience, and that we do all we can not to be that bad experience. Being a church that is growing in love for all the world’s people, and being known at “that church” is what our scripture reading for this morning is all about.
And that’s exactly what the Apostle Paul was writing about in our scripture reading for this morning. He addresses his letter to the “holy and faithful” brothers and sisters in Christ in Colossae. He identifies them as a people who are in a relationship with a holy God and set apart to reflect God’s holy character in everyday life. And after conferring grace and peace upon them from God the Father, he says: We always give thanks to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you. We’ve done this since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and your love for all God’s people. Yeah, the Colossian church is “that church”, a church that has a reputation for showing the love of Christ for all God’s people. Paul wants them to know that he thanks God for the gospel’s dynamic effect in their church and throughout the world and he commends the congregation’s faith in Christ, love for others, and hope in God’s future. His congratulatory thanksgiving to God implies that their Christian faith was made possible only by the preparatory work of the Holy Spirit in their hearts. Their “love for all God’s people” serves as proof to Paul that their conversion is genuine. With an “atta-boy” letter like that I’d be willing to bet that the Colossian church was good for another ten thousand miles. It feels good to be affirmed and validated.
He goes on to say: You have this faith and love because of the hope reserved for you in heaven. You previously heard about this hope through the true message, the good news, which has come to you. What the apostle is saying is that the Colossian’s faith and love spring from hope. This hope consists not of a generally optimistic attitude about life, but of the divinely supplied assurance that God’s promises of redeeming the cosmos will one day come true. He backs up this assertion when he says: This message has been bearing fruit and growing among you since the day you heard and truly understood God’s grace, in the same way that it is bearing fruit and growing in the whole world. He knows this because word has gotten back to him from Epaphras who helped plant the church and reported back to Paul of their active and engaged Spirit-infused love for others. Because of this, Paul continues, since the day we heard about you, we haven’t stopped praying for you and asking for you to be filled with the knowledge of God’s will, with all wisdom and spiritual understanding. He tells them this so that they can live lives that are worthy of the Lord and pleasing to him in every way: by producing fruit in every good work and growing the knowledge of God; by being strengthened through his glorious might so that they can endure everything and have patience; and by giving thanks with joy to the Father. Paul underscores how significant he thinks what they are doing as a church when he says: He made it so you could take part in the inheritance, in light granted to God’s holy people. He wants them to know that because they truly understand the Gospel of Jesus Christ, that God looks favorably upon them as a church that reflects the true light of Christ. He wants them to understand because of their faith and hope in the future they have been rescued from the control of darkness and transferred into the kingdom of the Son, being set free through the forgiveness of their sins.
Paul’s effusive praise of the Colossian church is almost embarrassing, and I imagine the members of the congregation upon reading this letter wondered what all the fuss was as they were just doing what God wanted them to do. But when you think about it, for Paul the Colossian church was a bright spot for him, a church that really got it as opposed to the churches he was writing other letters to that were mired in controversy and false teachings. Being the Apostle to the Gentiles hadn’t been easy for Paul as he had faced much opposition and was now imprisoned, under guard, in Rome awaiting trial. He may have been wondering if this little church out in the middle of nowhere was an anomaly. What did they get that the others couldn’t see or refused to embrace?
Well, God’s Word is not just for our information, it is for our transformation. That was the problem with many churches then and continues to be a problem with too many churches now. I know because Teresa and I have attended churches like that, churches full of people who have professed Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior, been forgiven of their sins, and are now just waiting for Jesus to come back, and if he doesn’t return in their lifetimes, they still know their future is secure. But these churches hadn’t been transformed like the Colossian church had. They may have had faith in Jesus Christ, but they were falling short on showing genuine Christian love for all of God’s people, you know, those people. You see, becoming a Christian means beginning a whole new relationship with God, not just turning over a new leaf or determining to do right, to be a better person. New believers, truly new believers, have a genuinely changed purpose, direction, attitude, and behavior. They are no longer seeking to serve themselves but are bearing fruit for God. They’re not canning fruit and putting it down in the root cellar for a later day.
We, on the other hand, can hope in what God has for us in heaven because we know that our future destination and salvation are sure. Because of this we are free, truly free; to live for Christ and love others the way God intends them to be loved. And because of this love for one another, Christians can have an impact that goes far beyond their neighborhoods and communities. It’s infectious and hopefully spreads throughout the world one church at a time multiplying and changing lives for the better in spite of what the world desires.
But there will be resistance, pushbacks, and criticism. Some will say that all of this “touchy-Feely” stuff is just the work of “woke” socialists. Some versions of Christian spirituality are suspicious of good works, confusing them with “works of righteousness” or “works of the law”. I think that’s just an excuse for those who can’t be bothered, don’t want to get their hands dirty, who are suspicious of people wanting something from them, Christians who think somebody else ought to do it. If they don’t want to do it that’s on them but don’t expect a “Colossian-style”” letter from the Apostle Paul. Biblically faithful Christianity has always prized good works as the fruit of a genuine faith glorifying God. The Colossian congregation understood that and enthusiastically lived into it.
Love is a by-product of our new life in Christ. As Christians we have no excuse for not loving because Christian love is a decision to act in the best interest of others, even the others that don’t look like us, vote like us, speak like us, love like us, or think like us. And now, since people in all their diversity and from every segment of a divided humanity are now streaming into the body of Christ, this genuine love for all God’s people would also suggest a growing love for all the world’s people just like the love felt and expressed by the Colossian church, the church Paul singled out as “that church” because of their faith in Christ and their love for all God’s people.
Let us pray.
Gracious and loving God, move us by your Spirit to be “that church”, a church you can point to, a church that serves as an example of what it means to actively live into the Gospel of your Son, our Savior, Jesus Christ. Help us to look out into our communities so that we may see the pain and suffering of others and to be the church that extends the hand of love, mercy, and grace. May we be beacons to others who are searching in the darkness for a church that will accept them as a brother or sister, a church that will willingly share their burden. Send us people to love and then send us more. This we pray in Jesus’ name, Amen.
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That Church
Because of this love for one another, Christians can have an impact that goes far beyond their neighborhoods and communities.