Download 7/21/13, Colossians 1:15-29, Jesus

Colossians 1:15-29
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JESUS
Colossians 1:15-29
Luke 10:38-42
Rev. Stephen H. Wilkins
Georgetown Presbyterian Church
July 21, 2013
You might remember, from over 20 years ago, that movie “City Slickers.” It was about
three men—old friends from way back, and now approaching middle age—who spent some
vacation time each year doing something daring that would pose a profound contrast with the
button-down yuppie lifestyle they lived most of the time. The plot of the film revolves around
their decision to spend a vacation together going on a cattle drive—helping a bunch of
seasoned cowboys move a herd of cattle across the big plains of the West with the hope that,
in the process, they might get in touch with their more primitive selves, and find out something
useful about the meaning of life.
The boss of this cattle drive is a leathery old cowboy named Curly, played masterfully
by Jack Palance; Curly is one of those characters who lives up to all of our stereotypes about
cowboys. He's mean and he's tough, and he can do anything with a rope or a whip or a knife.
But in his tough and rugged way he's also very wise.
In one scene of this movie, Curly is riding alongside one of the city slickers—the
character played by Billy Crystal—and their conversation turns philosophical.
Against the backdrop of an open sky and roughhewn mountains and clear streams and
jaggedly beautiful scenery, Billy Crystal's character turns to Curly and says with longing,
“Your life makes sense to you.” To which Curly replies: “You city folk. You worry a lot. How old
are you? 38?”
“39,” the man says.
“You all come up here about the same age. You spend fifty weeks in the city getting
knots in your rope and you think two weeks up here will untie them for you. None of you get
it.”
Curly pauses a minute and then he goes on, “You know what the secret to life is?”
“No, what?” says the man.
And then Curly says, “One thing. Just one thing. You stick to that, and everything else
don't mean nothing.”
“That's great,” says the Billy Crystal character, “but what's the one thing?”
Curly looks at him for a minute, and says, “That's what you've got to figure out.”
Even though that movie came out over 20 years ago, I think there's still a lot of truth in
it. Ultimately everything in life boils down to one thing; and we've got to figure out what (or
who) that one thing is.
I'll tell you what Paul says that One Thing is: It's the same One Thing that Jesus
indicates to Martha that Mary has chosen.
The One Thing is Jesus Christ.
As the early church spread into the Gentile countries, the church was exposed to more
and more false teachings and foreign religions and philosophies. The church in the small
commercial town of Colosse, located about 100 miles east of Ephesus on the part of the
Roman Empire that is currently known as Turkey—The small town of Colosse was no
Colossians 1:15-29
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exception for the early church. The church had been established by Paul, but later on Paul
had become alarmed at false teaching that had crept into the church and had pushed the
gospel of Jesus Christ aside.
It was probably an early form of a philosophy called Gnosticism that became
predominant in the century after the death and resurrection of Jesus. Gnosticism held that
there were two realms, the physical and the spiritual. The physical realm was bad, and the
spiritual realm was good. In the Gnostic worldview there was such a dichotomy between the
material world and the spiritual world that God would have nothing to do with the material
world. In fact, God didn't even create the material world; the material world came about
through a series of “emanations” that came from God—the further they spread from God, the
more material they became, until finally you have earth and human life. The Gnostics held
that lesser powers, “offshoots of deity,” as one scholar calls them, were thought to inhabit the
stars and rule over our destiny; therefore the lesser powers had to be appeased, placated,
worshiped.
Evidently elements of Gnosticism began to creep into the church in Colosse, because
Paul refers in a negative way to things such as “thrones... powers... rulers... authorities,” or
“powers and authorities,” or “worship of angels.”1 And later on he warns the Colossians, “See
to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends
on human tradition and the basic principles of this world, rather than on Christ.”2
It is against this world of competing religions and philosophies that Paul reminds us
that only one authority is worthy of our faith—Jesus Christ. “[Jesus Christ] is the image of the
invisible God,... by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and
invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him
and for him... God was pleased to have all his fulness dwell in him...”3
There is no doubt as you read through the letter to the Colossians that Paul is setting
the record straight, and he's just laying out one option, Jesus Christ. In Colossians Paul
“proclaims the absolute supremacy and the sole sufficiency of Jesus Christ.”4 Over any and
every other being or power or authority Jesus is superior, for in Jesus the fulness of God was
pleased to dwell. Jesus is God incarnate; there is no power or authority greater than the
power and authority and sovereignty of the God of the universe—and that's who Jesus is!
It is in Jesus that all things are reconciled to God, through the blood of Jesus on the
cross; no other agent of reconciliation can claim that, nor do we need to pursue any other
means of reconciliation.
Jesus Christ—he's the One Thing. Everything in the Christian faith boils down to
Jesus. Everything in the Christian faith holds together only in Jesus. Apart from Jesus, outside
of Jesus, all is false, meaningless.
You may or may not have noticed, but most of my sermon texts come from the
gospels. Of the nearly eight years I have been here, which would entail just under 400
sermons that you have endured, over two hundred of the sermons have as their scripture
lesson a reading from one of the gospels. That may sound like only a little more than half of
the sermons, but when you consider that there are 66 books in the Bible, and only four of the
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See Colossians 1:16, 2:9, 2:15, 2:18
Colossians 2:8
Colossians 1:15-19
Curtis Vaughan, in Gaebelein, et al, eds., Expositor's Bible Commentary, vol. 11 (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1978), p.
168).
Colossians 1:15-29
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books have the word “Gospel” in their title, then you can conclude that I have emphasized the
Gospels more than any other section of Scripture.
There are two reasons for this. The first is that one time a long time ago I was at a
conference and the Bible teacher was Dale Brunner, who was a Presbyterian minister and a
professor on the faculty of Whitworth College in Washington State. He was speaking to a
bunch of pastors, and somewhere in his teaching he exhorted us to use the gospels as our
Sunday sermon texts. His rationale was simple: We only have one hour a week to
communicate an important message to the people who come through the doors of the church,
so we should focus on what is most important: Jesus Christ.
So I took that advice when I came here, and made a point of using the gospel lesson of
the weekly lectionary calendar as my sermon text as often as I could, while using special
seasons to pursue other themes or sections of Scripture. And in the process I became
convinced of another reason to preach so much from the gospels—because in the person of
Jesus we find the fulness of God; in the person of Jesus Christ God communicates himself to
us in a way that transcends words and vocabulary and rules and instructions. God came to us
in human form, and communicated himself to us in a way that we can understand. When we
look at Jesus, we see God.
It is in Jesus Christ that we encounter God. You want to know about God's
righteousness? Look at Jesus. You want to know about God's attitude toward sinners? Look
at Jesus. You want to know about God's love? Look at Jesus. You want to know about God's
power to rule over life and death? Look at Jesus.
It is in Jesus that we encounter God.
Let's face it. Life is a search for ultimate meaning. Life is a pilgrimage in which we seek
a right relationship with God. Until we can find the way to have that right relationship, then
there is a restlessness that keeps us wandering aimlessly and an emptiness that keeps us
hungry and thirsty and longing for fulfillment.
And there is but one thing, or rather one Person who can calm the restlessness and
satisfy our deepest needs—Jesus Christ. As Augustine famously said, “My heart was restless
until it found its rest in thee.”
Jesus is the One Thing.
Jesus, who created all things in himself and for himself, gives dignity and worth to this
world, including to you and me. No longer do we need to despise the material world, because
Jesus created it and redeemed it. The created world has the imprint of its Creator. You and I
have the image of our Creator, for we were created in his image.
Jesus, who is the head of the body, the church, is the One Thing to unite us and bring
us together. Jesus is the One in whom we are united, Jesus is the One in whose name we
come together. “It is in him that everything holds together. Christ has primacy in the Christian
community, nothing else. We are not held together by our shared experience, our agreement
on social [or political] issues, our way of worship, our enjoyment of one another's company, or
any other characteristic of our own.”5 We are held together by Jesus Christ.
Jesus is the One Thing.
In the midst of all of Paul's elevation of Christ as the One Thing, he includes the
promise that in Christ we are presented to God “without blemish and free from accusation”-and then Paul adds a condition to the promise, namely that we “continue in [our] faith,
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Richard Christensen, “Colossians 1:15-28”, Interpretation, July 2007, p. 320.
Colossians 1:15-29
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established and firm, not moved from the hope held out in the gospel.”6 In other words, taking
hold of the “One Thing” isn't a one-time proposition. It's not a one-and-done thing that we can
put behind us and move on in another direction. It is the embracing of a new life, a life that is
inseparable from Jesus Christ. Elsewhere Paul will urge us to continue to live in him.
If all you get of Jesus is one hour a week on Sunday, or maybe hearing his name used
as profanity throughout the week—if that's all you get of Jesus, then you've missed the One
Thing. You can't just fill up on Sunday and expect it to take you through the rest of the week.
You have to embrace Jesus every day, intentionally.
Faith in Christ is never a one-time occurrence; it's embracing Christ, learning of Christ,
letting Christ become alive in us, allowing Christ to work in us. Faith in Christ will impact and
transform our work, our play, our leisure, our relationships, our finances, our concern for the
world around us, our reaction to the strangers we encounter, our outlook in the face of
adversity, our attitude in times of trouble.
The One Thing is a forever thing, not a part-time thing. You can't separate Christ from
the Christian life. Indeed, you can't separate Christ from life itself.
In the story of Mary and Martha, a sharp distinction is drawn between the endless
activity of Martha who tends to so much that she has lost sight of Jesus, and the tender
devotion that Mary demonstrates as she sits at the feet of Jesus, taking in everything that
Jesus says. What does Jesus say to Martha, who is worried about dirty dishes and food that's
not getting served on time? “Martha, Martha, you are worried and upset about many things,
BUT ONLY ONE THING IS NEEDED. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken
away from her.”7
How about you? How many things are you worried and upset about?
Only one thing is needed.
I bet some of you thought maybe the sermon title in the bulletin was a misprint.
“Jesus.” That's all it says. You probably thought we accidentally deleted something from the
title, didn't you?
But really, once you say “Jesus”, what more can you add to that?
Only one thing is needed.
What's your One Thing?
Rather, who's your One Thing?
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Colossians 1:22b-23a
Luke 10:41-42