Observation, Interpretation, Application: Colossians 1:15-20

This is a work I did for a preaching class a few years ago for an Observation, Interpretation, and Application of a particular passage of Scripture.

Colossians 1:15-20 was my choice of Scripture for this task.

I pray it is encouraging and edifying to you, and that it puts a bit more brightness on the wonder and majesty of the true Light; our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, the Lord of Glory.

(Feedback, Questions, Critique, and Dialog welcome.)

The Preeminence of Christ

15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. 16 For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. 17 And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist. 18 And He is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things He may have the preeminence. 19 For it pleased the Father that in Him all the fullness should dwell, 20 and by Him to reconcile all things to Himself whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross.

-Colossians 1:15-20.

O: We must not miss the fact that all things were made not only through Christ, but by Christ, in Christ, and for Christ. He is the beginning of all things that have existed, currently exist, and ever will come into existence. Everything ever made, that is being made, and that will be made, even down to the smallest particle of a substance, never did, nor ever will exist if He is not its sole initiator. Humanly speaking, nothing is made out of nothing. Therefore, if something is made from nothing, we must then venture into the realm of a higher power, a creator outside of creation itself, leading us ultimately to a divine nature that exists; a Being who is uncreated, and that without substance, being the Creator of all, who is God Himself. Now, inasmuch as He is God, who took on substance, being that of the man Jesus Christ, yet also God Himself, is the One through, by, in, and for whom all substances exist. All things were made for God’s glory.

John 1:1-3 says, 1 “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made.”

Hebrews 1:1-3 says, 1 “God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, 2 has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He (God) has appointed heir of all things, through whom (Christ) also He (God) made the worlds; 3 Who (Christ) being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power….”

I: In Colossians chapter 1 we quickly notice the authority of Christ and His position in creation. When we say firstborn, we have to dissect the word a bit further than our first thoughts from the text before we can conclude a sentence that would entail its objective origin, because it does in fact have a differing semantic.

This semantic is specific to its origin, and like no other. The word firstborn, in this Biblical context, is a word that we must take a second look at. When I hear “firstborn”, my mind can quickly interpret this word as meaning “the first one, not the second one”. This word for mankind literally means born first. If I am my mother’s oldest child, to her I am her first born child.

However, when we talk about creation and the Creator of it, we suddenly enter into a different semantic which is quite opposite than that of mankind. Christ is not the firstborn over all “mankind” in regards to the above description, but He is the firstborn over all creation. Christ is to be understood as the exact imprint, or exact likeness of God and always existing with God.

We can also say likewise, that the position of Christ is separated from mankind because of His miraculous incarnation, or specifically how He came to earth. No intercourse involved with God and a woman as some claim; nor a man with a woman. Christ was literally born of God, not of man!

I believe I would be doing us a disservice here if I were to not mention a very important doctrine. That is the doctrine of Trinitarianism; or the Trinity.

Trinitarianism holds wholeheartedly, without a shadow of a doubt, that YHWH is three persons possessing one divine nature. There is no explicit Scripture for the trinity, in that, the word “trinity” is not there. But, I do believe the understanding of the Trinity is explicit in Scripture. And what a way for God to show us the reality of Who He is.

Let’s look at 1 John 5:6-10.

6 This is He who came by water and blood—Jesus Christ; not only by water, but by water and blood. And it is the Spirit who bears witness, because the Spirit is truth. 7 For there are three that bear witness in heaven: the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit; and these three are one. 8 And there are three that bear witness on earth: the Spirit, the water, and the blood; and these three agree as one. 9 If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater; for this is the witness of God which He has testified of his Son. 10 He who believes in the Son of God has the witness in himself; he who does not believe God has made Him a liar, because he has not believed the testimony that God has given of his Son.

–Gods Deity is Preeminent.

• God the Father, in His divine perfection and nature, could not come to earth as God the Father because the essence of His divinity has nothing to do with, and in fact cannot come into contact with the essence of imperfection or sin, or wrongdoing. Those two natures will never exist [together].

The essence of these natures being: Immortality vs. mortality; Morality vs. immorality. 

-Christ’s Deity is Preeminent.

• God the Son, the ‘Word’, Jesus Christ, in His humanity, never lost possession of His Deity because He is the Son of God. He, as the Son, possesses all that the Father is, in His nature as the God-man, Jesus Christ.

-The Holy Spirit’s Deity is Preeminent.

• God the Holy Spirit, is the Promise of, and the Testimony to, both God the Father and God the Son in that YHWH is infinite, eternal, and unchangeable in His divine attributes. Such as His being, wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth.    

                     

He is most important and above all. Preeminent in and over both His creation and His creatures, for He is God. We see this clearly in His Word as He talks about Himself. God did not simply want us to know Him as the coming Messiah, who is Jesus, the friend of sinners. Jesus also wanted us to know that He is God over all. The preeminent One who is Just, and utterly hates sin. He is justified and glorified by His hatred of lawlessness, those who practice lawlessness (Ps. 5:5), and His inflicted punishment for lawlessness.

God the Father put His own wrath upon God the Son (Isaiah 53:10.

In a book from the Hobbs College Library entitled “Preaching By The Book”, the author R. Scott Pace, when it comes to preaching, shares a very keen insight of the Trinity and says this:

“So the Spirit of God who inspired the Scriptures enables us to interpret them, fills us to proclaim them, opens the hearts of the listeners to receive them, and supernaturally applies them to their lives. Therefore, the comprehensive work of the Spirit, in conjunction with the revelation of the Father and redemption through His Son, firmly establishes a trinitarian theology of preaching that serves as the basis for our practical approach to the sacred text.”

A: God, the Creator of heaven and earth desired to make Himself known, and show us the way back to Him. But, along with the mystery of who He is, we get to see His beautiful handiwork in creation. God has not only given us explicit evidence of Himself in created things such as the sky, trees, mountains, beautiful sunsets, seasons, and other tangible things we behold the beauty of, but He has also given us that evidence in His Word. He is in all, He is the Creator of all, and He is to be glorified and worshiped first, and above all.

If God, desiring to have a relationship with His people, had not come to earth as God in the flesh to eat with them, live amongst them, walk and talk with them, and do the miracles He did before them, the complaining atheist may then be onto something to claim that God does not exist. But, for humans to understand how they got here, what they are here for, and who they are here for, God had to become the God-man, Christ Jesus.

For God, who is YHWH, Holy and Perfect, could not have come down as God the Father and also make Himself known, or else the Bible would be wrong in claiming that no one has seen God. The blood is the only way for God to have exposed Himself, and it is by that very blood with which we are washed and cleansed of our sin so that we may see God! As Colossians 1:20b says, “having made peace through the blood of His cross” .

The blood is of the God-man, Jesus Christ, the Preeminent One, and firstborn over all creation!

(All Scripture is taken from the New King James Version of the Bible.)