If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.
Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. On account of these the wrath of God is coming. In these you too once walked, when you were living in them. But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator. Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free; but Christ is all, and in all.
Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.
(Colossians 3:1-17 ESV)
I’ve decided to stop putting the series title in the title of these posts. There’s no real need to continue that.
After my last couple of posts, this is all probably beginning to sound like a lot of legalistic jargon. “Put off this” and “don’t do this…” are probably ringing in your ears (or eyes, since you’re reading this right now). But don’t worry, now we’re on to the reason behind all of this: Jesus! Like I said at the beginning of this series, this passage of Scripture is all about Jesus. It tells us the proper response to the salvation that He has graciously given us.
By the way, if you want to study this topic of putting on the new self a bit more, I recommend reading Ephesians 4:17-32. It’s somewhat different from Colossians 3:1-17, but it’s also incredibly similar.
Now we’re on verses 9-11: “Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator. Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free; but Christ is all, and in all.”
So I’m going to skip over the part about not lying to each other for a moment. For one, it’s pretty clear what that means: don’t lie to each other. You can’t get any clearer than that. But also, I think it has a reason that it fits into this passage and particularly this sentence, so I’m gonna get back to it in the next post. As for putting off the old self…well, once again, I’ve already gone through that quite a bit.
So after we’ve taken off the old self, we put on the new self! What is this new self? We’re gonna get into that in this and the next several posts (yes, there are more to come, please bear with me). One thing you’ve probably already inferred is that it’s not everything else I’ve talked about: sexually immoral, angry, and hateful. Sounds like a vast majority of the world, right?
But what’s the first thing that we learn about the new self? It “is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator.” Notice a few things about that sentence.
One, it hasn’t “been renewed.” It is “being renewed.” It’s an ongoing process. It’s not just a one-time thing, like we just stop sinning one day and never sin again; it’s something that will go on for the rest of our lives. It’s a real sign of our salvation, because the unsaved are slaves to sin and have no choice but to give in to it (Rom. 6:20). We have the option to fight it, to shed sin like filthy old clothes (which is, incidentally, the idea that “put off” has in the Greek) and put on the new, clean clothes of our new selves. But we will never be perfect at it until we are in Heaven with Christ.
Two, we are “being renewed in knowledge.” Colossians 1:9 talks about being “filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God.” By knowing the will of God, we can walk in it and bear fruit for the Kingdom of God. This is how we grow spiritually. The new self is a spiritually mature self. We come to know the will of God, and God Himself, by reading His Word. “All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work” (2 Tim. 3:16-17).
Three, it’s being renewed into the image of something. It’s not just made into a brand new, totally original thing. We are being made into the image of Jesus Christ, the creator of all things (Col. 1:16). That’s our calling. That’s our purpose, to reflect the glory of Jesus Christ to the world by our words and actions. The new self reflects God’s glory to the world. Why? So that others may glorify God as well. “Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation” (1 Peter 2:12). That visitation could be either the judgment that comes. But it can also be that the Gentile will be visited by God and His saving grace and so glorify God when he remembers your testimony. Reflecting the glory of God can lead people to Christ! So, get reflecting! We’ll talk more about reflecting God’s glory in the next several posts.
Read the rest of this series:
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