For the Christian, Christ is the superior One … and our place of security and completeness is in acknowledging Him and rejoicing in His supremacy.
The letter to the Colossians has a number of features relating to specific problems facing the believers there. For example, there are warnings against teachings which would encourage angel-worship and against being brought into bondage to man-made rules and procedures. On the positive side, there is the constant emphasis on the importance of our relationship with Christ: Christ in you the hope of glory; Christ Jesus the Lord; so walk in Him; buried with Him in baptism; raised with Him; (you) died with Christ; your life is hid with Christ in God; Christ is our life; Christ is all; ye serve the Lord Christ; and the mystery of Christ.
The Gnostic Challenge
The background to this is a teaching which threatened the Colossian believers. This teaching was going to develop in the second century into a heresy which came to be known as “Gnosticism.”. The word “Gnosticism” derives from the Greek word gnosis, meaning “knowledge.” These false teachers encouraged Christians to aspire to special knowledge, which, they alleged, would be attained through visions, higher states of consciousness, fastings, and communication with angels. They taught that all material things, including the human body, were evil. Since, according to them, the material universe was evil, it could not have been created by God, but must have been created by an angel at some remove from God. This led to a pre-occupation with angels, the threat posed by their power, and the need to placate them.
Against all this, Paul calls the believers to remember that their salvation, by the power of God, rests on Christ. The Christian’s security depends on what Christ has done, therefore all believers are accepted on the same basis; there are no first-class and second-class Christians. The answer to the heresy lay in a well-founded faith in Christ, an understanding of His person, a confidence in His power, and a joy in His service. Hence the wonderful paean to the glory of Christ in chapter 1, verses 15-20.
Among the details in those six verses are passing references to angelic beings, mere servants under His divine sovereignty because they are His creatures. There is also in these verses an insistence that, in relation to the church, Christ is supreme, the One who purchased salvation by His own blood. His cross also has a cosmic significance, so that Christians need not fear cosmic powers (whether called angelic, demonic, or occult). We need not fear occult dominance if we hold simply to Christ as our Lord.
It is probable that, in verse 19 of chapter 1, the “fullness” referred to is to be connected with His victorious work in redemption, “that in all things He might have the preeminence.” The KJV of verse 19, “For it pleased the Father that in Him should all fullness dwell,” surely gives the essential sense, though the manuscripts do not explicitly include “the Father”: the words are supplied to give what must be the correct meaning. We can never boast of our superiority, for all that we are before God is what the work of Christ has made us.
This heretical teaching would have had Christians believe that fullness of Christian experience depended on seeking a mystical, ecstatic experience. This, they said, would make one a “complete” Christian, with mystic knowledge. Paul says no; for the Christian, Christ is the superior One, superior to all others, and our place of security and completeness is in acknowledging Him and rejoicing in His supremacy. It is a false ambition which causes us to seek to be super-Christians. God has made provision for us all to be complete in Christ as we bow before His supremacy and are happy to be joined with all His own, redeemed in glad union under Him.
The Gnostic Challenge
But the second reference to His fullness adds another dimension. In chapter 2, verse 9 we read, “For in him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily.” We note that this is followed immediately by, “And ye are complete in Him, which is the head of all principality and power.” The heretics urged believers to seek fullness (or completeness) in following their heretical procedures and disciplines. Paul’s answer is that “ye have received Christ Jesus the Lord” (v. 6). He exhorts the Colossians to walk in Him, to seek stability there, and to continue joyfully in Him.
Notice the word “dwelleth” in verse 9. This is a permanent fact about the essential nature of Christ. He lost nothing of His deity when He became true man. He had a body. His physical presence on earth was not a fantasy. He could touch and be touched, could be hungry, tired and sleepy, and could feel the slights to which He was subjected. But His eternal divine character remained unchanged, before incarnation, during the years of His earthly life, and now in His exalted place at God’s right hand.
“The fullness of the Godhead” is an important expression. Christian progress depends, not on a monastic regime, but on our link with the exalted One who came down for our salvation and linked us to Himself. While upon earth He spoke with the full authority of His divine person, for example in forgiving sin. He was not simply godlike; He was God, in the full sense of the word. He was not a superman. As a man He lived in dependence on His Father. Yet He was truly God. He has not become more fully God since His resurrection, or since His ascension to where He was before, in heaven’s highest place. He was fully God before He died, or rose, or ascended. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are all alike God, and yet God is one.
But, for the heretics, the word which would cause real shock was the word “bodily”—the fullness of the Godhead bodily. They taught that our bodies, like all material things, are evil. The Bible does not teach this. We use our bodies in doing evil. That is because we ourselves are evil; it is not a question of our bodies being material and therefore evil. Christ lived in a body which was never used for evil purposes. We remember the messianic Psalm 40, as quoted in the New Testament: “a body hast Thou prepared Me,” then almost immediately, “to do Thy will, O God” (Heb. 10:5-7). He had a real body and lived a life of utter holiness. When His disciples saw Him, they saw His body, yet there was an important sense in which He could say, “he that hath seen Me hath seen the Father” (Jn. 14:9). Having been born into a true human life upon earth, He was crucified, rose, and ascended bodily to heaven’s throne. None of these changes altered the truth that “in Him dwelleth the fullness of the Godhead bodily.”
Our safety is in our link with Him: “Ye are complete in Him.” The sense is that in Him we have been given fullness and now stand in that fullness. This is the birthright of every true believer; it is not the badge of a select few. Paul urged the Colossians to “hold the Head”; that is, to cling tenaciously to their place in Christ. He came to bring us to Himself; He paid redemption’s price at the cross, confounding all His occult foes by His death. He cancelled the debt that stood against us, becoming accountable for it on His cross. When He appears He will appear as “our life.” “Every one that hath this hope set on him purifieth himself, even as he is pure,” said John (1 Jn. 3:3, RV). A hope set on Him purifies, even as He is pure. By contrast a bondage to ascetic severity is “not of any value against the indulgence of the flesh” (Col. 2:23).