Category: Colossians

September 24, Reading 3 – Colossians 4:2-18

Reading

Audio, Visual

SAA Notes

Paul gives an extended list of greetings here. Think about what the rest of the New Testament tells you about each one and consider what this list tells you that you can expect to meet in life.

SJA Notes

* Dear God, thank You for today and for Your word to us. Please teach us more of You.

“Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person.”

Grace and salt.

These are the ingredients Paul says make up knowing how to answer each person.

Our speech is to be both full of grace _and_ seasoned with salt.

Both of these together.

They are seen best, as it should be, in Jesus. How He spoke, His language and conversations.

Let us wrestle through the process of putting both grace and salt into our words.

* Father God,

Thank You for Your Son Jesus, who shows us how to live.

Thank You for Your Holy Spirit, who walks with us each day.

And thank You dear Heavenly Father, for Your steadfast love and faithfulness.

Please help us in our words, help us to be full of Your grace, seasoned with the salt that comes from knowing Your word.

Amen.

September 23, Reading 3 – Colossians 3:5-4:1

Reading

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SAA Notes

It is a great tragedy and horror that such behaviour is encountered amongst the saints. The Apostle uses the very strong words put to death (3:5)! There are also the deeds of the tongue to be rid of. Can you identify the behaviours mentioned in their subtle forms within yourself? Cultivate humility before the Lord in such things. Here is where patience and long-suffering towards others find their source.

SJA Notes

* Dear God, please help us to hallow Your Name today.

“Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free; but Christ is all, and in all.”

The good news of Jesus is a truly wonderful message. God’s word teaches us truths that level the playing field in a way that worldly ideologies cannot match.

We are all broken, dead in sin, without any ability to better ourselves.

We have all fallen short of God’s glory. There is none, not one of us, that can do good.

This levels the playing field! There is nobody better than somebody else, there are no groups of people that stand superior than another group.

In Jesus we are removed out of having to vie for power and status, pride and prestige.

Because He is the crux and pivot – Look! It is His character that we are to put on, His peace that is to rule our hearts, His word that should dwell richly in us.

And His Name that we should bear well in all that we do.

* Gracious Father,

Thank You for Your word that teaches us these wonderful truths.

Please help us to live out our lives fearing You with a holy and reverent fear.

For Your Name’s sake,

Amen.

September 22, Reading 3 – Colossians 2:6-3:4

Reading

Audio, Visual

SAA Notes

Colossians 2:9 is a clear statement of the divinity of Christ. Buried with Him in baptism is a picture of being dead to sin (2:13) and not a picture of the mode of baptism! How does the warning against asceticism (2:20-23) apply to you within our culture? Or do we face the opposite temptation – materialism?

SJA Notes

* Holy God, You are the maker of all things – Please show us Your glory as we come to Your word.

“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.”

There is so much deep and solid wisdom in this passage, in these verses.

Jesus is our root and pattern, the head and in whom the fullness of deity dwells bodily.

Through Him we are raised with Him through faith.

Because of Him the record of debt that stood against us is cancelled (its legal demands gone).

If another word comes along that temps us away from Jesus, let us turn back to Him (the Head, from whom the whole body grows with a growth that is from God).

Let us walk in Jesus today, the root of Jesse, the true vine, through whom we are grafted into eternal life.

Let us set our minds on things that are above (not things here on earth).

* Father God,

Thank You that our life is hidden with Christ in You.

Thank You that we Your people, through faith, have been raised with Christ.

Thank You Lord for all that You have done, and continue to do, for us!

Amen.