Alive in Christ

Good morning. It is an encouraging service. We have a full service this week because we wanted to celebrate the baptisms and really that new identity that we all have when we believe in Christ and are united with him. And it really leads us to the question, who am I? Back in the 90s, when I was a young man, there was a phrase that went around, and people would say something like, I need to find myself. We need to take a break. We need to step back from the business of life, and I need to find myself. The question is, how did you ever lose yourself? Or as one great philosopher once said, wherever you go, well, there you are. I joke about that, but really there's a significant problem with identity. Our culture faces even more now an identity crisis. Who am I? Where do I look to discover who I am? And what are the most important things about me? The problem when we ask this very important question is that we're oftentimes tempted to look inside. Who am I? Who do I think I am? Who do I feel like? This morning, we're going to hear the call of God to look up. Not look within, but to look up. Because our creator, designer, savior has spoken clearly, this is who you are. This is what I created you to be. This is who I sent my son to recreate you in and give you a new birth. This morning we're thinking about who we are as Christians. May the image of God restore to be an image of Christ, to grow up to him, to be sealed in the Holy Spirit by what he's done for us. And I pray that if you're not a Christian this morning, you'll hear of this identity that God has given us, a privileged position, that in Christ we can know God and be known by God, to love God and be loved by God. Baptism is a representation of that new identity. It's changing who you are, and the work of Christ changes who we are, and baptism signifies that new change. And this morning, the good news is, it's a message that can be received. We're in Colossians chapter two. Colossians chapter two, verses six to 15. Six to 15. Let me read our text. Therefore as he received Christ Jesus the Lord so walk in him There's the big idea You've received Christ. So walk in him Rooted and built up in him and establishing the faith just as you were taught abounding in Thanksgiving See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty the seat according to human tradition according to the elemental spirits of the world and not according to Christ For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily. And you have been filled in him who is the head of all rule and authority. In him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ, having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised him from the dead. And you, who were dead in your trespasses, and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him. Having forgiven us all our trespasses by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands, this he set aside, nailing it to the cross. He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame by triumphing over them in him. If you're taking notes, the one simple big idea, walk in the new life of Christ. Walk in the new life of Christ. And there's four points. They all flow from that. Walk in the new life of Christ because you received him. Walk in the new life of Christ because Christ fills you. Walk in the new life of Christ because Christ has made you alive. Walk in the new life of Christ because Christ forgives you. Walk in the new life of Christ because you received him, verses six to eight. Because Christ fills you, verses nine and 10. Because Christ has made you alive, 11 through 13, and then because he forgives you, that last half of 13 and 14. Let's begin with walk in the new life of Christ because you received him. As you received Jesus the Lord, so walk in him. We have to make sure we get the first point and that it's you've received him and therefore walk. You don't walk in order to receive him. And notice there the word receive, that's a powerful declaration there. What kind of things do you receive? A gift. It's not earned. It's received. And notice what the gift is that you receive. It's Jesus Christ. It's God himself. God has given us the most important, most special gift he could ever give us, and it's himself. It's not just truths. It's not just laws and expectations. It's not just warnings. He's given us Himself. Because God is a God of relationship. God has designed us to love Him, to be loved by Him. He gives us Himself. More specifically here, the Father gives us His Son. The gift came by Jesus being born of a virgin, walking among us. The gift was promised beforehand that I will be with you, I will be for you, I will be your God, you are my people, and then Jesus came and actually walked with us. It declares he's the bridegroom who purchases the church with his own blood. It's personal. The God of all glory who created us, after we sinned, gives himself to us to be received as a gift. Now notice, it's not something that's a myth. It's not merely teaching or moral lessons. It's God giving himself over to us. And to just jump ahead a little bit, let's just look at just as you were taught. Okay, Christ has to be received as he was taught. Last week we looked at the Great Commission. Make disciples as you're going, baptizing teaching them to observe all that I have commanded. Christianity requires teaching. It requires someone who's going to teach who Jesus is. It requires that declaration from what God has declared in his word. And so I want to just highlight that, praise God, the two young men who are coming to be baptized have been well taught. Because God put in their path men who opened the word of God, pointed them to Christ. I want to say thank you to Pastor Joey Tomlinson of Coastal Community Church. and the obvious fruit of his investment in Clark and the way Clark clings to the gospel, trusts the gospel, and has a hunger for God's word and to grow. I praise God for Pastor Ben. And as we'll hear later, picked up Fernando to go play soccer. Nine years later, after we've prayed, and waited, now rejoice, get to see the fruit of the faithful teaching. And he's not the only one, but just highlighting that God gives us teachers who make him known, and as we lift Christ up, he draws us to himself. And I wanna get back to this main point. As you receive Christ, walk in him. Now, the idea here is you're walking No matter what. Walking just refers to that normal everyday life. Walking to the grocery store, walking around your neighborhood, walking around your house, whatever you're doing, whatever you're about, whatever you are busy doing, that's what walking refers to. It's the normal everyday of life. It refers to how we talk, how we think, how we work. There's a newness that comes with Christ. Because we've received God himself, we're supposed to walk differently. We're supposed to live differently. He didn't just die to forgive us of our sins. He died to give us a new life to walk differently. Those being baptized today are taking on the name above all names. They're taking on that new identity in a public declaration. They've already been sealed with that new identity by faith, but now this new recognition in baptism is symbolically saying, we're not gonna walk in him. Now, let's be very clear here. There are truths to be received, and there's commandments to be obeyed. Receive Christ, so walk in him. It does not say, walk in him so you will receive him. If we get this wrong, we mess it all up. We also think, if we think we've gotta do something to earn God's favor, we mess up the gospel. If we think we are not expected to do good works after God's given us his favor, we mess things up. So there's some basic truths to hold onto here. First, We are saved because of the work of Christ. He died, he rose. We are saved because of the work of Christ. Faith alone in him gives us that new life. That's how you receive it, by faith. Secondly, we're saved because of the work of Christ. Secondly, we are saved to then seek out the good works that glorify Christ. Work is a fruit of the salvation. It is not a cause of the salvation. Our work is a fruit of the salvation. It is not a cause of the salvation. Third, receive Christ without any notion that you deserved it. If we got what we deserved, if we got what is our right, we receive judgment, we receive condemnation. We'll look at that a little bit later. We receive Christ humbly, realizing we're getting a gift we do not deserve. Receive Christ so that you can now walk in the right direction. As the hymn says very simply, Jesus paid it all, and all to him we owe. Verse six and seven also point out some other interesting declarations. Rooted and built up and established. Now, Paul's just mixing metaphors like a boss here, right? Rooted is horticulture, built up is construction, and established, that's actually legal. He's mixing all these metaphors up because these are important, and notice just the confidence with which he's declaring you've received him and can now walk in him. Rooted. Think about this, Psalm 1, you want to be a tree planted by water so that those roots grow and get the nutrients it needs so that tree grows strong and bears fruit. It's very important that your roots are in the right source. Even if you have shallow roots, even if you have some just small roots, even if you're just now being planted in the gospel. It's about the source. It's not the strength of your faith. It's not about the strength of the roots. It's the roots are in the right source. Rooted in Christ. That builds us up. That changes us. We move towards Christ. We become more like him as our roots are in the right source. He is the source and he is the goal. And then this word established. This has a legal connotation. because in Christ forever God has declared not guilty. Forever Christ has been declared the Savior and in Him we're declared a son of God to be loved and known by God. It's a legal position that cannot ever be changed because God has declared it. Christian, we're to be rooted up. Rooted and established and built up in Christ. And then there's that very last word in verse seven. Abounding in thanksgiving. How could we be anything else but grateful? Because we've received Christ. We can walk in a newness of life. We can be built up, established, rooted, as we've been taught. How can we not be thankful? Grumbling has no place in the Christian life. As we look up and just think about all the things we've received. If I could speak to the children for a moment. Children, I wanna share something with you. One of the greatest blessings and privileges you can have is a parent who opens a Bible and wants to teach you. One of the greatest blessings you have right now is a parent who's patiently trying to guide you through your education and your training and to help you be established and rooted in Christ. Be thankful. I could take a moment right now and let you just turn to your parent and thank them. Go ahead. Be thankful. Be thankful that God has put parents, put you in a home where your parents want you to be rooted in the gospel. We also see here a warning in verse eight. walking in the new life as you receive Christ and he's been taught, there's a warning for Satan. See to it, behold, watch out. You know the danger's coming, you're watchful. The very nature of this warning is do not be taken captive. In Ben's prayer, he prayed Colossians 1, 13 to 14. This is a great memory verse for Colossians. He has delivered us out of the domain of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of his beloved son. That's the memory verse for Colossians. But hear that word delivered. He's going back to the Exodus language where Israel was in Egypt enslaved and God delivered them. We are delivered in Christ, but notice you can be taken captive again. You can enslave yourself. by believing a philosophy, by believing a lie. Now, we think about philosophy, and I just want to be very clear, true philosophy is seeking the happiest life. True philosophy is pursuing what is the best, most satisfying life, and the early Christian fathers, they called Christianity the ideal philosophy, because it truly led us to the one who created life, who knew life, and could give us a happy life. Being taken captive by empty deceit is not trusting the God of truth, but just think about that phrase, empty deceit. How many lies out there are promising you a better life? And they're all contradicting one another. If you just had this thing, if you just had this one thing, then you would be happy. We can even go back to the garden, the very first lie in human history. Adam and Eve had only heard truth from God, and then the serpent shows up and he says, well, you know what? God can't be really good. He wouldn't really say not to eat that one tree, right? I tell you the truth, Satan says. I'll give you a promise. Eat it and your eyes will be opened and you'll see like God. The most dangerous lies are the ones that are half-truths. The Bible tells us their eyes were opened, but they didn't see something better than God. They didn't see something like God. They saw sin and they felt shame. When we want something more than what God has, we always end up with less. Christ is a true teacher. There's two ways in which human traditions, right? The emptiness seed is according to human tradition. There's two things we do with our human traditions that corrupt the gospel. One is we like to add something to the gospel. We like to add a restriction. We like to add something that would add a special element of super spirituality. And that makes us feel better because we've added something that makes us extra super spiritual. And then we can look on others and condemn them and feel better about ourselves as we know that we've got something that's extra super spiritual. The other one is we like to find loopholes. Reasons why we can break certain commandments and still feel fine about it. We like to either add to it or take away from it. and it's all in the name of me and so that I might feel better. No, this is empty deceit. This is empty self-deceit. It's not according to Christ. We all believe these lies. If only I had Christ plus something. If only I could make Christ give me what else I need and then I'd be happy. Maybe it's a spouse. Maybe it's a child. Maybe it's a friend, maybe it's a job. These are all good things. But if we think what will truly satisfy us and bring us that satisfaction that only comes from above is what we need, this earthly life, if Christ doesn't supply that, I can't be happy, then we're misguided. We're believing a lie that's empty. And it isn't just saying I want something I don't have. It could be saying I want something better than what I have. You need to be on guard. So how do you know if the teaching you're receiving is from Christ or man? How do you know if the teaching you have is a human tradition or from the very word of God? Here's some questions, and we'll post these in the weekly announcements if you wanna see them later, just to be clear. Here's some questions you can ask yourself. Does the teaching lead to honor and thanksgiving toward Christ? If yes, then yes, that's the kind of teaching you're looking for. That's the kind of teaching according to Christ. If it leads you to have a higher view of Christ, Yes. Second question, does the teaching lead you to boast in who you are or what you've accomplished? No, that is not teaching according to Christ. Does the teaching lead you to boast in who you are and what you can accomplish? If so, that is not teaching according to Christ. Third question, does the teaching lead to love for Christ, church, and my neighbor? Does it promote a love for others that God has commanded? Then yes, that's teaching according to Christ. The next question, does the teaching lead me to be judgmental toward my neighbor, harsh and critical? No, that's not teaching according to Christ. Another question, does the teaching lead you to trust God and his word more? Yes, that's teaching according to Christ. Does the teaching lead you to trust yourself and your abilities? No. That is not teaching according to Christ. We need to be on guard because there is a lot of teaching masquerading as if godly when it is not according to Christ. Our next point, the second point. Walk in the newness of life because you've received him. We've heard an exhortation to walk in him as he's been taught. A warning now, walk in Christ because Christ fills you. Verses 9 and 10. For in him, that is Christ, the wholefulness of deity dwells bodily, and you have been filled in him who is the head of all rule and authority. We can look back, you can read it later, but Colossians 1, 15 to 20 is a hymn. It's an early hymn of Christianity, we believe. And there's a pattern there. He is. He is. And there's great declarations. He's the image of the invisible God. He's a creator of all. He's before all things. He is the head of the church. He is preeminent. He's the one who has all authority. And you can hear that language here. In him the wholefulness of deity dwells bodily. We celebrate this at Christmas. The virgin birth, God becoming man, fully God, fully man. God has come down to be with us and for us. Jesus Christ is God. And then verse 10 takes that another direction, and you have been filled in him. He's fully God, to the full, and now we have been filled. You have been, it's a past action, it's a perfect action. You have been filled with him. He's the one who created all, who is sovereign all. He's the one who has perfect salvation and love. He fills us, which I believe refers to the completion and full satisfaction of who we're supposed to be and what we long for. He created us for himself and our hearts are restless until we find rest in him. This is an important declaration because I fear we oftentimes all treat religion kind of like a cocktail. A little bit of this, a little splash of that. You know, Jesus might be some portion of your religious cocktail that you think is going to fill you, but if he is not all and only, You're not getting the fullness and enjoying the fullness. The exhortation here, do not add Christ to your idolatry, do not add your idolatry to Christ. We do not add to him, we do not take away from him. He alone satisfies. He alone heals, helps, and forgives. Walk in him because he fills you. He has all rule and authority. The next point, walk in Christ because you are made alive. Because you are made alive. Now this whole section really captures one of the most important truths regarding salvation. It's called union with Christ. God has come down to have a covenant relationship with us. We saw this in Israel when God said I am with you and I am for you. He is committing himself to a people for their benefit. Or when God said, I will be your God and you will be my people. Now Christ has come down in the flesh and he is with us. And his language of union with Christ points out that covenant relationship like a marriage. Or what's mine is hers and hers mine. In the same way, what is Christ is his church and his church is his Christ. There's an exchange. The debt we owe, he takes. The riches of righteousness that he has, we receive. Union with Christ is seen in the phrases. In him, we've already seen. In him the fullness of deity dwells. In him we have been filled. Verse 11, in him you were circumcised. Verse 12, buried with him in baptism. Verse 12, raised with him, verse 13, made alive together with him. All these truths are related. They're blessings that are all received at the moment of your first reception of Christ. He does the work that changes your forever identity. Now that you are in Christ, you're dead to sin. Now that you're in Christ, you've been raised up with him. Now that you're in Christ, you can say, notice him. Now that you're in Christ, you can live for him. If you think about these phrases of circumcision and being buried and being made alive, I wanna make sure we understand that there's a number of ways in which he's alluding here. First, he's talking about the very work of Jesus Christ that we thought about last weekend. that the very actions first begin with Jesus Christ and the historical actions, the historical work that he accomplished last weekend. We see there death on the cross. Your transgressions are nailed to the cross, verse 14. We see there being buried. And then we see there being raised to life. The first thing we need to appreciate about this gospel is that it is a Salvation that has been accomplished. Christ has finished and accomplished all the work. If Jesus is not raised, we are to be most pitied. It's something he has done. He died to take away our sin. He died to take on our debt so that he would then rise again to give us new life. The first point of what Paul is exhorting us is we have to know what Christ did. The second, it's how that is applied to us. First is his work on the cross, second his work in us. The second thing here is the work in us. We were buried with him in baptism. We were raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God. This is really where we see this circumcision language. Verse 11, this is extremely important for what Paul's arguing here. In him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands. This is not like the old covenant promise that something would happen by putting off the body of the flesh. Flesh refers to sin nature. That desire and function inside of us that's opposed to God. Christ is circumcised. It's not something we do, that's not something we have done with our own hands, it's something Christ does. It's something internal. This is why we wanna look at the work that Christ does inside of us. Jesus teaches in Matthew 15 that what defiles us isn't something that happens to us, it's something that comes from within us. Our hearts are what produce the sinful desires, and when we act on those sinful desires, we sin. The heart is the most problematic, difficult organ we have in the sense of it's the seed of sin. It's the root of sin. The problem we have is we can't cleanse our hearts. We can't wash away that sin that corrupts. As we sang earlier, there's a treason inside. There's a sin that it poisons everything. Earthly speaking, we don't have a remedy for that. Christ has come. He washes the heart. He regenerates the heart. He brings the kind of change that we need. Here's the main change here that we need to focus on. We usually think that our problems come from outside and the solution we can find inside. What the Bible says is the problems that we really have that are most significant, they come from inside and the solution comes from outside. The solution comes when Christ completed his work on the cross and his resurrection. The solution comes from outside when the Holy Spirit comes and applies that new heart transformation. That's what saves us. What's wrong with us is on the inside, the solution comes from outside. If you're not a Christian, Christ alone can bring about this change. There's no matter of good works that you can try to do to outdo that whatever bad works you feel guilty of. There's no matter of different changes of practice and habit and thought that you can do to cleanse the heart and to change it. It's something God must do. It's something God wanted to do and so he sent his only son to die for your sin and to rise to give you a new life, a new heart. How do you get this? Receive it. Receive it by faith. It's not how strong your faith is, it's that your faith is in the right solution. The third thing that's significant about this union with Christ language, it's what Christ accomplished on the cross, it's what Christ applies internally. Third, for today, it's tied up to his ordinance of baptism. The symbol that we're going to apply here in a few moments, It symbolizes the inward change that has taken place. It is not causing that change, but it symbolizes. You were buried with him in baptism. You were raised with him in life. This is why we immerse. Pictures, you're dying to that old self. You're rising again to the new life of Christ. Christ has brought about a new change in you. We wanna encourage you this morning that baptism helps your faith. Clark and Fernando, we pray that baptism this morning helps your faith. If you're a baptized believer and you're watching and bearing witness of this, baptism helps your faith. Baptism is the initiatory sign into the church. Baptism is a reminder that you have died to sin in Christ. Baptism is a reminder that you're alive anew in Christ. Baptism is a reminder that your name is now tied to the name above all names. And He holds you fast. The name above all names is being tied to you today. because we see his work in you, and so we want you as a church to be encouraged. Because we see his work in you, we want you to be encouraged, and so by applying baptism, by giving you the sign, his name is being tied to you. Another point I wanna make, the name above all names is being tied to you today because we want to walk with you. Be committed. There's a great encouragement from baptism, there's also a great commitment. Be committed because that name above all names is being tied to you. Third, we are applying that name above all names, Jesus Christ, because we see his calling upon you. Be challenged. Be encouraged, be committed, be challenged. The last point we see here is walk in new life because Christ forgives you. Walk in new life because Christ forgives you. And really this is just a further point of the fact that God made us alive. We were dead in our sin, God made us alive, how? Having forgiven us our trespasses. He has made us alive by forgiving our trespasses. Now forgiveness is something we all need because we all sin. Against one another, against God. Forgiveness is something we need, and what we do when we see we need forgiveness, we say, I'm sorry. Forgiveness is also something we need to actually know what reconciliation is. Reconciliation is when you say, I'm sorry, and I forgive you. And let me just be very clear, if you're not a Christian, or you are a Christian, and you're wrestling with sin right now, the one clear thing about God is He is quick to forgive. He has sent His Son to purchase forgiveness. By faith saying, God, I am sorry, I'm believing in Jesus, let me assure you that reconciliation happens quickly and swiftly as he declares profoundly throughout all the heavens, I forgive you. You need to think about what forgiveness is because it is a powerful declaration of what Christ is and it shows us who God is. Jesus tells a parable in Matthew 18, there's a king who brings in a servant, and this servant, he owes lifetimes worth of debt, millions of dollars. And the king's gonna do what the king should do, he's gonna send him to the dungeon, and that servant cries out, no, show mercy on me. And the king has mercy, and he sends him out forgiven. Now, I wanna ask, what happened to all the money? Where's the millions of dollars? The king absorbed it. His bank account is now forever less than it should be. He absorbed it. It's a sacrifice. True forgiveness is sacrificing. We see the absorption here in Colossians 2. Forgiving all our trespasses. Notice the word all. By canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands, Let's just be very clear, if we were to get into heaven and we were to see God face to face in his holy just courtroom, on all the walls would just be accusation against accusation that's right. Everything we ever said, did, thought, and desired, the record of debt is too long to even think about. The record of debt that stood against us because we've broken the law over and over again. This, he set aside. How? He nailed it to the cross. Jesus absorbed it. He has to be the just God that punishes all sins with perfect justice, and the difference is, instead of punishing us for our sins, Jesus says, I will absorb that debt. I will take upon the punishment that is deserved. I will set it aside from you if you believe. The invitation is to believe. We see how merciful God is. He pays all by taking it upon himself. If you've been with us, we see here the whole dilemma of God who takes away the sins of the world. It's not a passing over like in the Old Testament. No, sin is fully set aside from us. The guilt, the punishment is fully set aside from us because it was set upon Jesus. This is the assurance we have that we can be rooted, built up, and declared not guilty because Christ has paid it all. Our final verse. In doing so, he disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame by triumphing over them in him. There is a real spiritual warfare to be aware of, and I believe here he's speaking of Satan and the spirits who are against God, and therefore against us. And one of the key ways in which we know who Satan is is he's the accuser. And what makes his accusations so powerful is that they're true. He accuses us, not of things we didn't do, but He accuses of things we did. And if we stood alone, those accusations would stand, and we'd have to give an account before the Holy God for all the things we've done. But when Christ declares, no, I am with Him. He is with me. He is in me. I have paid that debt. He shuts up the devil. And He allows us to reject those accusations that heap up guilt. is the victor in his death and resurrection. As we conclude, what a blessing it is to receive Christ, the God of glory himself. What a blessing it is that we can walk in the newness of life, having the confidence because of what he's done, having been taught in him, knowing what is false. What a blessing it is to know he's filled us. We can be satisfied in Christ alone. We have been changed by Christ. We have died with him. We've been risen with him. We're forever forgiven in him. And so now we are urged and called to walk in him. Will you pray with me? Father, we thank you, Lord, that you are the one true God who has sent your son so that we can be free from sin, not captivated over and over again by empty deceit. We can be free to live the life that you designed us for. We can be free to know you and your love and your power and your righteousness. We can enter that heavenly song. Worthy are you, the Lamb who was slain. We thank you this morning for Clark and Fernando and the opportunity we have to just meditate upon the gospel further because of the clear gospel work you've done in their lives, the opportunity we have to come alongside of them in that work. Lord, change our hearts. We thank you that you circumcise our hearts, that you make us alive again in Christ. Help us to see how we can walk more fully, more truly, being satisfied in Christ alone. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.