1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:05,220 I acknowledge the Lord's presence and ask His blessing on our study of His Word this 2 00:00:05,220 --> 00:00:06,220 morning. 3 00:00:06,220 --> 00:00:15,040 And now, Father, we come thanking you that you, the fount of every blessing, are pleased 4 00:00:15,040 --> 00:00:23,920 to be here with us and to minister to our hearts and to enable our hearts to respond 5 00:00:23,920 --> 00:00:28,960 that we might give ourselves without reservation to you. 6 00:00:28,960 --> 00:00:34,880 We thank you for the death and resurrection of your Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, and for 7 00:00:34,880 --> 00:00:40,360 the blessed truth that we'll examine this morning, that we died with Him and we live 8 00:00:40,360 --> 00:00:43,400 in Him. 9 00:00:43,400 --> 00:00:49,160 We pray that you, by the Spirit, will open our hearts to the truth. 10 00:00:49,160 --> 00:00:51,760 Be our teacher today. 11 00:00:51,760 --> 00:00:55,600 In Jesus' name, amen. 12 00:00:55,600 --> 00:01:03,560 I invite you to open your Bible with me to Colossians chapter 3. 13 00:01:03,560 --> 00:01:12,160 On September 7, 1988, patrolman Gary Dockher answered a 911 call. 14 00:01:12,160 --> 00:01:18,280 In the midst of his response, the man he was talking with, Lister Derringer, pointed it 15 00:01:18,280 --> 00:01:23,400 right at his forehead and pulled the trigger. 16 00:01:23,400 --> 00:01:29,800 For the next seven and a half years, he lay in a hospital bed in a coma. 17 00:01:29,800 --> 00:01:32,800 At times he was able to respond by blinking his eyes. 18 00:01:32,800 --> 00:01:38,560 At other times, it was as though he was not there at all. 19 00:01:38,560 --> 00:01:39,560 His family prayed. 20 00:01:39,560 --> 00:01:42,120 It's a Christian family. 21 00:01:42,120 --> 00:01:45,880 They prayed that God would heal him, that God's will be done. 22 00:01:45,880 --> 00:01:50,120 Earlier this month, they came to the point of believing that it must be God's will for 23 00:01:50,120 --> 00:01:52,620 him to go home to heaven. 24 00:01:52,620 --> 00:01:54,560 They faced a difficult choice. 25 00:01:54,560 --> 00:01:57,800 His lungs were filling with fluid. 26 00:01:57,800 --> 00:02:05,680 And then in that last moment, when it seemed that every hope was gone, he spoke. 27 00:02:05,680 --> 00:02:11,080 And for the first time in seven and a half years, he acknowledged his family, knew them 28 00:02:11,080 --> 00:02:12,440 by name. 29 00:02:12,440 --> 00:02:16,400 He has no recall of what's happened over the last seven and a half years. 30 00:02:16,400 --> 00:02:17,800 He might want to go back to sleep. 31 00:02:17,800 --> 00:02:18,800 I don't know. 32 00:02:18,800 --> 00:02:22,680 There are some aspects of it that aren't very pleasant. 33 00:02:22,680 --> 00:02:30,080 But what a miracle to know of a man who after seven and a half years of unconsciousness 34 00:02:30,080 --> 00:02:33,860 would come back to life. 35 00:02:33,860 --> 00:02:36,760 They called it a miracle. 36 00:02:36,760 --> 00:02:38,400 And it is a miracle of sort. 37 00:02:38,400 --> 00:02:42,900 But I want to tell you this morning of a greater miracle than that. 38 00:02:42,900 --> 00:02:49,440 I want to remind you of someone who was cruelly crucified and put into a grave who was not 39 00:02:49,440 --> 00:02:54,920 just in a coma, but who was dead. 40 00:02:54,920 --> 00:02:59,420 And after three days in the grave, he rose again from the dead. 41 00:02:59,420 --> 00:03:01,600 He came back to life. 42 00:03:01,600 --> 00:03:05,640 Now that, my friend, is a miracle. 43 00:03:05,640 --> 00:03:11,360 The apostle Paul is referring back to that when he writes what he does in chapter three, 44 00:03:11,360 --> 00:03:12,360 verse one. 45 00:03:12,360 --> 00:03:22,760 If you have been raised up with Christ, keep seeking the things above where Christ is seated 46 00:03:22,760 --> 00:03:27,120 at the right hand of God. 47 00:03:27,120 --> 00:03:34,160 With this verse and the following paragraph, the apostle turns a corner in his letter and 48 00:03:34,160 --> 00:03:41,980 begins now to show the church the practical ramifications of what they believed. 49 00:03:41,980 --> 00:03:48,480 This verse and the three following it serve as a coupling, tying together the doctrinal 50 00:03:48,480 --> 00:03:53,780 portion of the book with the practical application. 51 00:03:53,780 --> 00:04:00,600 The word if is in that particular sense in the Greek language, which does not imply doubt, 52 00:04:00,600 --> 00:04:03,920 but it really implies certainty. 53 00:04:03,920 --> 00:04:11,720 If then you have been raised up with Christ, and that is the case, is what the apostle 54 00:04:11,720 --> 00:04:13,800 is saying. 55 00:04:13,800 --> 00:04:21,120 Or since then, you have been raised up with Christ. 56 00:04:21,120 --> 00:04:25,920 The Colossian believers, you see, had been told that they needed something more than 57 00:04:25,920 --> 00:04:27,980 what they had. 58 00:04:27,980 --> 00:04:36,040 They needed to gain, said the false teachers, some secret mystical knowledge of God, a superior 59 00:04:36,040 --> 00:04:40,400 knowledge beyond what they had at that time. 60 00:04:40,400 --> 00:04:45,960 And they were told they would get that knowledge through mystical experiences, through the 61 00:04:45,960 --> 00:04:54,160 worship of angels and the rigid ascetic denial of the flesh. 62 00:04:54,160 --> 00:05:00,760 The apostle sees this teaching for what it is, an attack against the gospel of Christ. 63 00:05:00,760 --> 00:05:07,400 And so he writes to affirm the fact that in Christ, believers are complete. 64 00:05:07,400 --> 00:05:09,600 We need nothing more. 65 00:05:09,600 --> 00:05:12,240 We have died with him. 66 00:05:12,240 --> 00:05:14,000 We have been buried with him. 67 00:05:14,000 --> 00:05:18,520 We have been raised from the dead with Christ. 68 00:05:18,520 --> 00:05:28,520 What more could believers possibly need than what Jesus Christ has done for us? 69 00:05:28,520 --> 00:05:32,960 But when he states, as he does in verse 1, that we have been raised up together with 70 00:05:32,960 --> 00:05:40,600 Christ, what does Paul mean by that? 71 00:05:40,600 --> 00:05:48,600 He means that the resurrection we have already undergone entails a new position and a new 72 00:05:48,600 --> 00:05:49,600 obligation. 73 00:05:49,600 --> 00:05:56,540 And I want you to think about those twin truths with me this morning for a few moments. 74 00:05:56,540 --> 00:06:06,680 In being raised up with Jesus Christ, we believers in Jesus have a new position. 75 00:06:06,680 --> 00:06:14,840 What is said about us in this verse is something that is essentially true about us. 76 00:06:14,840 --> 00:06:19,640 Something that is essentially true. 77 00:06:19,640 --> 00:06:27,920 It says something about who we are fundamentally inside, regardless of what our feelings may 78 00:06:27,920 --> 00:06:31,800 be at any given moment. 79 00:06:31,800 --> 00:06:35,760 There are times when I don't realize that I'm a citizen of the United States. 80 00:06:35,760 --> 00:06:37,160 I just forget it. 81 00:06:37,160 --> 00:06:40,280 I take it for granted. 82 00:06:40,280 --> 00:06:45,080 There are some times when I'm ashamed of being a citizen of the United States because of 83 00:06:45,080 --> 00:06:48,920 some things that our nation does or says in the world. 84 00:06:48,920 --> 00:06:53,080 I have different feelings about being a citizen of the United States. 85 00:06:53,080 --> 00:06:58,440 But that does not change the fact that fundamentally I am a citizen of this country. 86 00:06:58,440 --> 00:07:06,160 Likewise, there are times when I forget what it means to be raised up with Jesus Christ. 87 00:07:06,160 --> 00:07:10,920 Or I have other feelings and I wonder, did I really experience the resurrection? 88 00:07:10,920 --> 00:07:18,520 How could I live the way I do and respond the way I do if I'm alive in Jesus Christ? 89 00:07:18,520 --> 00:07:24,520 And what Paul says about us here is fundamentally, essentially true about us no matter what our 90 00:07:24,520 --> 00:07:28,800 feelings may be at any given moment. 91 00:07:28,800 --> 00:07:36,240 Not only is it essentially true, what he says about us is eternally true, regardless of 92 00:07:36,240 --> 00:07:42,840 the manner of living that we may exhibit at some point in our lives. 93 00:07:42,840 --> 00:07:49,400 It is possible for one who has been raised with Jesus Christ to live on the level far 94 00:07:49,400 --> 00:07:57,360 below that, to live in the flesh and not in the Spirit. 95 00:07:57,360 --> 00:08:02,940 That does not change what the apostle says is eternally true. 96 00:08:02,940 --> 00:08:11,340 You see, we have a new position and that position is unchangeable. 97 00:08:11,340 --> 00:08:19,040 It is a standing that God gives us by grace, that we are so identified with Jesus Christ 98 00:08:19,040 --> 00:08:22,560 that we have been made alive in him. 99 00:08:22,560 --> 00:08:24,360 But what does this mean? 100 00:08:24,360 --> 00:08:31,440 Well, obviously it's not referring to the physical resurrection. 101 00:08:31,440 --> 00:08:36,200 Because well, I say obvious because I can look out there and you can look up here and 102 00:08:36,200 --> 00:08:40,240 you know we don't have a new body yet. 103 00:08:40,240 --> 00:08:45,200 When he says that we have been raised with Christ in the sense that it's a historical 104 00:08:45,200 --> 00:08:53,320 act done once and for all, he's not talking about the physical resurrection. 105 00:08:53,320 --> 00:08:58,280 Anymore than he's talking about a physical death when he says in verse 20 of chapter 106 00:08:58,280 --> 00:09:03,760 2, since you have died with Christ. 107 00:09:03,760 --> 00:09:09,520 He's not talking about physical death there, nor is he talking about physical resurrection 108 00:09:09,520 --> 00:09:11,200 in chapter 3 verse 1. 109 00:09:11,200 --> 00:09:14,160 Now that's coming. 110 00:09:14,160 --> 00:09:16,480 It's coming. 111 00:09:16,480 --> 00:09:24,240 And one day we who believe in Christ will be raised up with him physically. 112 00:09:24,240 --> 00:09:26,380 But here he's talking about another truth. 113 00:09:26,380 --> 00:09:30,400 It is the spiritual resurrection. 114 00:09:30,400 --> 00:09:36,480 From our death in sins, Colossians has a twin epistle. 115 00:09:36,480 --> 00:09:39,640 Do you remember what it is? 116 00:09:39,640 --> 00:09:42,800 We talked about it months ago now. 117 00:09:42,800 --> 00:09:46,520 The book of Ephesians is a twin epistle with Colossians. 118 00:09:46,520 --> 00:09:49,520 You find many of the same themes in the two books. 119 00:09:49,520 --> 00:09:54,520 Turn back to Ephesians for a moment. 120 00:09:54,520 --> 00:10:00,800 In Ephesians chapter 2 it says, and you were dead. 121 00:10:00,800 --> 00:10:03,160 Paul doesn't say here you were dead with Christ. 122 00:10:03,160 --> 00:10:08,920 He says you were dead in your trespasses and sins. 123 00:10:08,920 --> 00:10:13,840 He's going back to another truth, and that is that we were united with Adam by our natural 124 00:10:13,840 --> 00:10:20,520 birth and in his sin as well as ours we're dead. 125 00:10:20,520 --> 00:10:24,460 We are dead spiritually in our trespasses and sins. 126 00:10:24,460 --> 00:10:26,720 He says we walked in them. 127 00:10:26,720 --> 00:10:28,780 We lived in them. 128 00:10:28,780 --> 00:10:35,140 The spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience, the spirit of darkness, controlled 129 00:10:35,140 --> 00:10:39,500 our lives and we walked after what that spirit wanted. 130 00:10:39,500 --> 00:10:41,200 We indulged the flesh. 131 00:10:41,200 --> 00:10:43,840 This is all past tense. 132 00:10:43,840 --> 00:10:48,200 When you were dead spiritually, you lived like it. 133 00:10:48,200 --> 00:10:54,720 But verse 4, God being rich in mercy because of his great love with which he loved us, 134 00:10:54,720 --> 00:11:02,840 and when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ. 135 00:11:02,840 --> 00:11:08,180 By grace you've been saved and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly 136 00:11:08,180 --> 00:11:12,080 places in Christ Jesus. 137 00:11:12,080 --> 00:11:21,940 The apostle in Ephesians as well as in Colossians is reminding us that though we were spiritually 138 00:11:21,940 --> 00:11:31,400 dead at one point and separated from God and lived like it, now we have been united to God. 139 00:11:31,400 --> 00:11:34,680 We have been joined to Jesus Christ. 140 00:11:34,680 --> 00:11:41,560 A miraculous change has taken place as real as the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the 141 00:11:41,560 --> 00:11:43,800 dead. 142 00:11:43,800 --> 00:11:52,160 This change has brought about an indissoluble relationship between ourselves and Christ. 143 00:11:52,160 --> 00:11:55,260 How was this accomplished? 144 00:11:55,260 --> 00:12:00,080 It was accomplished by the work of the Holy Spirit. 145 00:12:00,080 --> 00:12:05,680 The Holy Spirit who participated in the resurrection of Jesus Christ in bringing him back from 146 00:12:05,680 --> 00:12:16,120 the dead is the one who has imparted to you and to me new life, resurrection life, God's 147 00:12:16,120 --> 00:12:18,800 eternal life. 148 00:12:18,800 --> 00:12:25,280 Alexander McLaren writes about this truth with these words. 149 00:12:25,280 --> 00:12:34,220 Scripture speaks of a three-fold life, that of the animal nature, that of the intellectual 150 00:12:34,220 --> 00:12:43,400 and emotional nature, and that of the spirit which lives when it is conscious of God and 151 00:12:43,400 --> 00:12:48,640 touches him by aspiration, hope, and love. 152 00:12:48,640 --> 00:12:51,160 This is the loftiest life. 153 00:12:51,160 --> 00:12:53,360 Now listen. 154 00:12:53,360 --> 00:12:59,560 Without it, a man is dead while he lives. 155 00:12:59,560 --> 00:13:06,980 With it, he lives though he dies. 156 00:13:06,980 --> 00:13:13,960 One who has not experienced spiritual resurrection may walk on the face of this earth for 20 157 00:13:13,960 --> 00:13:21,080 or 50 or 100 years and be dead. 158 00:13:21,080 --> 00:13:26,280 There is a miracle of resurrection that takes place when one believes in the Lord Jesus 159 00:13:26,280 --> 00:13:27,280 Christ. 160 00:13:27,280 --> 00:13:34,600 It is a resurrection of the spirit inside of you. 161 00:13:34,600 --> 00:13:36,880 The Holy Spirit regenerates you. 162 00:13:36,880 --> 00:13:44,880 He imparts life to you at that moment, and that life brings you into a new position that 163 00:13:44,880 --> 00:13:47,460 can never change. 164 00:13:47,460 --> 00:13:55,640 You can be never less than you are as far as God sees you right now in Jesus Christ. 165 00:13:55,640 --> 00:14:02,140 So when the apostle says, you have been raised up with Christ, remember that entails a new 166 00:14:02,140 --> 00:14:05,480 position. 167 00:14:05,480 --> 00:14:14,560 But secondly, in being raised up with Jesus Christ, we have a new obligation. 168 00:14:14,560 --> 00:14:20,360 The apostle says, since you have been raised up with Christ and have a new relationship, 169 00:14:20,360 --> 00:14:30,160 a new position with God, keep seeking the things above. 170 00:14:30,160 --> 00:14:34,000 Notice that this is a command. 171 00:14:34,000 --> 00:14:40,960 It is a command in the present tense, which means it's to be a habit of our lives. 172 00:14:40,960 --> 00:14:47,720 Since we have a new position in Christ, we are alive spiritually, we have an obligation 173 00:14:47,720 --> 00:14:53,900 to keep seeking the things above. 174 00:14:53,900 --> 00:15:01,040 By the things above, he means those issues that are related to the heavenly realm. 175 00:15:01,040 --> 00:15:07,800 The things above in this verse stand in contrast to those things mentioned in verse 22 of chapter 176 00:15:07,800 --> 00:15:17,040 2, where he talks about the things destined to perish with the using, the material things 177 00:15:17,040 --> 00:15:19,000 of the world. 178 00:15:19,000 --> 00:15:24,800 They also stand in contrast to what is said in chapter 3 verse 2, where he mentions the 179 00:15:24,800 --> 00:15:30,680 things that are on earth. 180 00:15:30,680 --> 00:15:37,400 The things that are on earth are the things that are here and now. 181 00:15:37,400 --> 00:15:42,880 Those are the things that our culture craves. 182 00:15:42,880 --> 00:15:48,480 Those are the things that our own hearts will focus on if we don't remember that we have 183 00:15:48,480 --> 00:15:53,440 a new obligation as new people. 184 00:15:53,440 --> 00:16:01,440 We are to lift our gaze above the here and now and to seek after those things that are 185 00:16:01,440 --> 00:16:04,040 of the heavenly realm. 186 00:16:04,040 --> 00:16:15,280 A.W. Tozer, that prophetic preacher, now with the Lord over 30 years, wrote these words, 187 00:16:15,280 --> 00:16:24,520 things are for us only what we hold them to be, which is to say that our attitude toward 188 00:16:24,520 --> 00:16:37,240 things is more likely in the long run to be more important than the things themselves. 189 00:16:37,240 --> 00:16:42,840 Our obligation is to lift our eyes off of the things of the earth, not to seek after 190 00:16:42,840 --> 00:16:45,200 those things, not to focus on those things. 191 00:16:45,200 --> 00:16:50,200 We have to deal with them because we live in the here and now. 192 00:16:50,200 --> 00:17:00,560 But our focus, our gaze, is to be on those things above where Christ is seated at the 193 00:17:00,560 --> 00:17:03,800 right hand of God. 194 00:17:03,800 --> 00:17:12,720 Now the ethical outcome of this, Paul is going to talk about for the rest of this book. 195 00:17:12,720 --> 00:17:18,320 But as he begins to point us in the direction of what kind of a life we ought to live in 196 00:17:18,320 --> 00:17:25,840 a world like this, he emphasizes first of all the heart disposition. 197 00:17:25,840 --> 00:17:29,800 Keep on seeking the things above. 198 00:17:29,800 --> 00:17:37,500 He talks here about the direction of our desires, our ambitions, our outlook. 199 00:17:37,500 --> 00:17:44,680 As one who has been resurrected from the dead spiritually, we are to maintain this gaze 200 00:17:44,680 --> 00:17:50,800 now upon the things that matter to God the most. 201 00:17:50,800 --> 00:17:56,800 Curtis Vaughan says, and I paraphrase him, the believer's allegiance to Christ must 202 00:17:56,800 --> 00:18:05,040 take precedence over all earthly allegiances. 203 00:18:05,040 --> 00:18:12,040 We have earthly allegiances that are not unimportant, but there is one allegiance that takes place 204 00:18:12,040 --> 00:18:17,360 over them all, and that is the allegiance to the one who stands at the right hand of 205 00:18:17,360 --> 00:18:18,360 God. 206 00:18:18,360 --> 00:18:25,640 It is the Lord Jesus Christ in whom we live, and we are to keep seeking those things above 207 00:18:25,640 --> 00:18:30,940 where Christ sits at the right hand of God. 208 00:18:30,940 --> 00:18:33,160 How can you do that this week? 209 00:18:33,160 --> 00:18:36,660 How can I? 210 00:18:36,660 --> 00:18:43,360 We need to ask God to show us where our gaze has slipped to the here and now, and we are 211 00:18:43,360 --> 00:18:50,800 focusing on those things, and ask him rather to lift our eyes that we might seek those 212 00:18:50,800 --> 00:18:57,720 things that are eternal and that matter the most. 213 00:18:57,720 --> 00:19:03,080 Let's bow together. 214 00:19:03,080 --> 00:19:09,840 Plus our congregation this morning, all of us struggle with this. 215 00:19:09,840 --> 00:19:14,520 What were you thinking about when you came in this morning? 216 00:19:14,520 --> 00:19:15,520 Can you remember? 217 00:19:15,520 --> 00:19:17,820 Can you think back? 218 00:19:17,820 --> 00:19:25,980 That might be a hint to you as to where your gaze is, at least at this moment. 219 00:19:25,980 --> 00:19:32,380 Our obligation as those who have a new position is to seek the things above. 220 00:19:32,380 --> 00:19:42,000 Would you ask the Lord to refocus your spiritual eyes that you might seek after the things 221 00:19:42,000 --> 00:19:43,880 that relate to heaven? 222 00:19:43,880 --> 00:19:53,000 Father, I pray that this will be our experience today, that you will fulfill in our lives 223 00:19:53,000 --> 00:19:58,920 this duty that we have. 224 00:19:58,920 --> 00:20:08,320 We will not be like believers who live in the world and after the flesh, but we will 225 00:20:08,320 --> 00:20:15,200 be believers who are living according to who we are in Christ. 226 00:20:15,200 --> 00:20:22,000 May our gaze and our seeking this week reflect who we are in Christ. 227 00:20:22,000 --> 00:20:32,520 May it be true in our families, may it be true in our private times, may it be true 228 00:20:32,520 --> 00:20:36,800 at work. 229 00:20:36,800 --> 00:20:41,080 In Jesus' name, amen. 230 00:20:41,080 --> 00:20:43,400 We're going to have our offering in just a moment. 231 00:20:43,400 --> 00:20:52,080 Before we do that, I want to say this to you.