Introduction / Review:
John 5:39 - You search the scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me
John 8:24 - I told you that you would die in your sins, for unless you believe that I am (he) you will die in your sins
Wise Up About Wisdom (Colossians 1:15-20)
- As God, he is the Creator . (Col 1:15-17)
- As God, he is the Authority . (Col 1:18)
- As God, he is the Savior . (Col 1:19-20)
Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!
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00:33-00:34
Alright, Colossians 1, are you there?
00:35-00:36
Alright, let's pray.
00:37-00:43
Father in heaven, we believe that this book is Your Word.
00:43-00:46
And I pray, Father, that we would treat it as such.
00:48-00:55
We would respond to it as if You Yourself are speaking directly to us, because You are.
00:56-00:58
Tune our hearts into what You have to say.
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In Jesus' name, Amen.
01:01-01:11
We're in a series called "Bible Basics." We're looking at the Bible as a whole, and along the way, we are meeting some people and learning some lessons.
01:12-01:18
All these messages are available on our website, but in case you missed any, here's what we've covered so far.
01:18-01:22
Abraham taught us what it means to have faith in the Lord.
01:23-01:30
Joseph taught us what it means to trust in the Lord, and Moses taught us what it means to be dependent upon the Lord.
01:30-01:33
Joshua taught us what it means to have courage in the Lord.
01:34-01:38
Saul taught us the dangers of being disobedient to the Lord.
01:38-01:41
David showed us what it's like to worship the Lord.
01:42-01:48
And Solomon last week showed us what it means to get wisdom from the Lord.
01:50-01:53
Well, we're going to jump quite a bit after Solomon.
01:53-01:56
I'm going to make a very long story very short.
01:56-02:04
that after Solomon, the nation of Israel was divided, and they were judged for their sin by being sent into exile.
02:05-02:12
While God in His grace allowed Israel to return to their land, and eventually, while living in their land, they were under Roman occupation.
02:13-02:21
And that is the chapter of history that God did the most personal and profound thing that He's ever done.
02:22-02:24
He showed up in the form of a man.
02:25-02:29
Today, in this ten week series, today is the main event.
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Because we're going to be talking about Jesus Christ.
02:32-02:39
I don't imagine you expected a series on important people from the Bible without mentioning the most important person in the universe.
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Jesus Christ.
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Bible Basics, I mean, literally, this entire book is about Jesus Christ.
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Really? Yes, really.
02:51-02:54
Look at what Jesus said about the Word of God.
02:54-03:18
Jesus said, "You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life." He was speaking to a group of people that thought, "Well, if I just read this and keep the rules, I'll have eternal life." But Jesus said, "It is they that bear witness about Me." Jesus said that the Bible, the entire Bible, is about Him.
03:19-03:25
So today we're going to just answer one simple question.
03:26-03:27
Who is Jesus Christ?
03:29-03:30
I'm sure you've heard the name.
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But who is He really?
03:33-03:39
I can't possibly overstate this, but this is the most important question you will ever answer in your entire life.
03:40-03:42
Who is Jesus Christ?
03:42-03:44
Why is this question so important?
03:45-04:17
You know, there's a certain phrase that you hear here that should always get your attention, and that phrase is, "You're going to die." I want you to see how Jesus used that phrase. John 8, 24, Jesus said, "I told you that you would die in your sins." He doesn't just mean physically dead, He means spiritually, eternally dead. "I told you that you would die in your sins, for unless you believe that I am He, You will die in your sins." Interestingly, the word "he" was not in the original writing.
04:18-04:23
Jesus didn't say literally "I am he." That was added literally.
04:23-04:31
Jesus said, "For unless you believe that I am, you will die in your sins." Why would He say it that way?
04:32-04:50
Because God in the Old Testament to Moses said that His name is "I am." Jesus here is saying, "Unless you believe that I am, unless you believe that I am the I am, you will die in your sins." In other words, your eternity hinges on who you believe Jesus Christ is.
04:51-04:52
Let's see what the Bible says.
04:53-05:00
In Colossians 1, Paul, under inspiration of the Holy Spirit, wrote this letter to a church that was plagued by false teachers.
05:01-05:04
And there were all kinds of different opinions about who Jesus is.
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And truth be told, not much has changed.
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Because today there are a lot of different opinions about who Jesus Christ is.
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And cults, false religions, are founded on wrong ideas of who Jesus Christ is.
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No one in history has been more misrepresented than Jesus Christ.
05:30-05:38
The cults, straight from the pit of hell, have badly distorted who He is, even to this day.
05:38-05:45
For example, the Muslims believe that Jesus is a prophet, but it's blasphemous to call Him God.
05:45-05:57
The Mormons believe that Jesus is the brother of Satan, created by Elohim through a sexual act with Mary, who is one of Elohim's wives.
05:57-06:05
The Jehovah's Witnesses believe that Jesus isn't divine, but He was actually a creation of Jehovah.
06:07-06:12
The Christian scientists believe that Jesus was just an enlightened Christian scientist.
06:12-06:20
That that word "Christ" refers to an advanced degree of consciousness that everyone has to some degree.
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That word "Christ" is a title, by the way.
06:24-06:27
It means "the anointed one." It means he's the Messiah.
06:27-06:28
Christ isn't his last name.
06:28-06:29
It's a title.
06:30-06:33
But the Christian scientists have chosen to redefine that.
06:35-06:44
Scientologists believe that Jesus was an advanced human who had a "strong energy glow." I don't know what that means either.
06:45-06:48
False teachers often seem to be fans of Jesus, okay?
06:50-06:54
Just because somebody mentions the name of Jesus doesn't mean that they understand him.
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In fact, many false teachers seem to be fans of Jesus.
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They don't deny Jesus, they dethrone Jesus.
07:01-07:03
And that's a problem, according to Jesus.
07:05-07:11
Several years ago, this was before kids, Aaron and I, we were in big lots.
07:12-07:12
I know.
07:13-07:15
You're like, "What are we paying that guy?
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I didn't know he was such a high roller." Yes, we were in big lots.
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I only treat my lady to the best.
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We were in big lots.
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We ran into this lady, complete stranger.
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We remember this, Aaron.
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We were a complete stranger, and we got to talking as an older lady.
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And I don't even know, I don't go looking for these things, I don't even know how this happened, but we started talking about spiritual things, and I found out she was a Jehovah's Witness.
07:40-07:49
And in the conversation, she made some comment about the heaven and earth being eternal, as the Jehovah's Witnesses believe.
07:49-08:55
And I said, "Well, actually, the Bible says that this heaven and earth are going to be burn up because God's going to create a new heaven and a new earth and she's like the Bible does not say that wouldn't you know what aisle we were in the aisle with the Bibles and the Bibles of big lots read just like the ones that you have on your lap like Pastor Jeff I got my Bible with big lots good well I grabbed the Bible from the shelf and I said actually I flipped open to us 2nd Peter chapter 3 verse 10 and I showed it to her I said actually this is what the Bible says. And how do I forget this? She looked at it, she goes, "Well I've never read that." I'm like, "Well you're reading it now!" She's like, "No, I don't believe that." And that was sort of how the conversation ended because like what else can I add to that? Really. You're looking at the Word of God and you're like, "Here's my point with with that little story. Maybe sitting here today or you're listening to this on our website and you're not sure about Jesus.
08:57-09:02
But in a few minutes, you're going to understand how God's Word views Jesus.
09:02-09:07
You're going to see some things in the Bible about, you know, this is what the Bible says about Jesus.
09:08-09:10
And you might be like that Jehovah's Witness lady.
09:10-09:16
You might say, "Well, I've never read that before." And my response to you will be, "Well, you've seen it now.
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You have to do something with it.
09:19-09:19
You have to.
09:21-09:40
How ignorant was that woman to see what God's Word says, and just be like, "I'm going to pretend that I didn't see that." And how much more ignorant would you be to see what the Bible says about Jesus Christ, and just walk out and be like, "I'm going to pretend that I didn't see that." Because your eternity hinges on this, people.
09:41-09:42
You've got to do something with it.
09:43-09:45
So who is Jesus Christ?
09:46-09:49
Well, if you want the short version of the sermon, here it is.
09:51-10:02
"Jesus is preeminent." I tried to think of the best word that I could think of to describe Jesus in one word, and I couldn't think of anything greater than this.
10:02-10:05
And actually, this is the word that God Himself uses to describe Jesus.
10:05-10:17
So I'm like, "Well, if God used it, I'm going to use it." The word "preeminent" means "most important," means "superior." And you're like, "Jesus is preeminent over what?" Everything! Everything!
10:19-10:22
That's the short version, and if that's all you're interested in, you can go.
10:23-10:30
But if you're like in the camp of, "Can you be more specific?" Yes, I can.
10:30-10:33
Colossians 1, jot these three things down.
10:34-10:38
First of all, number one, as God, He is the Creator.
10:40-10:56
Verse 15, talking about Jesus, the Holy Spirit tells us, "He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation." That's the first thing you need to know about Jesus.
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He is the image of the invisible God.
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Image, let's talk about that for a second.
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Wait, wait, wait, wait.
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Doesn't the Bible say that we are made in God's image?
11:05-11:10
Yes, we are made in God's image, but Jesus is the image of God.
11:11-11:23
The word "image" actually is translated "icon." And that's used in the Bible back in Matthew 22.20, talking about the image of Caesar on a coin.
11:24-11:30
Think about that. The average Roman would not have seen Caesar.
11:30-11:35
You know that they didn't have TV and Internet and all the things today.
11:35-11:38
We all know what the president looks like.
11:38-11:41
We all know what leaders of other countries look like.
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But in that day, a lot of people would not have known what Caesar looked like face to face.
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All they had was an image on a coin.
11:48-11:51
That was the only representation they had.
11:51-12:02
So if you would go to one of the Romans who's never seen Caesar, like, "What's he like?" "Well, I guess he's like this." You see, God gave representation of himself, not on a coin.
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the representation God gave of Himself was in the form of a person.
12:08-12:10
God's like, "Do you want to know what I'm like?
12:10-12:20
I will walk among you as a man, and that man's name is Jesus Christ." So understand that Jesus isn't like God.
12:20-12:24
Jesus is God, and everything that God is, is Jesus.
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Jesus said in John 14, verse 9 to Philip, He said, "Whoever has seen Me has seen the Father." So if you want to know what God is like, Jesus said to look at Him.
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The second part of that, it says, "the firstborn of all creation." Now that word "firstborn," that's an interesting term, because it doesn't always mean chronologically the first born.
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Actually, this word is used figuratively all through the Bible.
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It means the highest ranking, the number one, the priority.
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You see, the firstborn in a home oftentimes was chronologically the first child that was born.
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But that title went to the child that had the place of honor.
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Sometimes it wasn't firstborn, but even in the Bible, sometimes the position of firstborn would go to a younger child.
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It just means the position of prominence and honor, the highest ranking, numero uno.
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Like I said, the Bible uses the term "firstborn" figuratively throughout.
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I'm just going to give you a couple of examples.
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I want you to see this term "firstborn" literally means "position of honor." Exodus 4.22 and Jeremiah 31.9, God calls Israel His firstborn.
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Israel was not the first nation to live on the earth.
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But God says Israel has a place of honor.
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Job 18.13, talking about a disease, it's called "the firstborn of death." It wasn't the first disease to ever exist on the earth.
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But God says, "It's the worst." Isaiah 14.30 talks about the firstborn of the poor.
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It wasn't the first people on earth who were ever poor, it's talking about the poorest of the poor.
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Why are you stressing this?
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Because cults use this term to say, "Well, Jesus was the first person created." It says right there.
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And you are going to see in a second, He is clearly not teaching that.
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The word "firstborn" is "place of highest position." And it says here that Jesus is the firstborn of all creation.
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Creation is always under attack.
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Which is how the devil wants it.
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And this is a whole other sermon series, but the false teaching of evolution constantly bombarded in media and in schools.
14:50-15:00
I remember in school having to write in a biology class an essay about how evolution worked and we were graded based on how well we could repeat that.
15:00-15:04
Why would the enemy want us to constantly be bombarded with evolution?
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The reason is because if we don't think Jesus created us, we will not acknowledge His right to rule over us.
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That's a sermon series for another time.
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Look at verse 16 for the person that thinks, "Well, Jesus is a created thing." Think of verse 16, "For by Him all things were created in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities.
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All things were created through Him and for Him." All things.
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All things were created, the last phrase says, "through Him and for Him." You need to underline that in your Bible.
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Because many people go to church with the idea of getting something from Jesus.
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Now listen, don't misrepresent me, don't misunderstand me.
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We are broken people and we desperately do need some things from the Lord.
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That's absolutely true.
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We are hurting.
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There are people here today that are hurting, that need the kind of healing that only the Lord can give.
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I am not discounting that.
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I think too many times the mindset of going to church or finding a church or shopping around for a church is the idea of I want something for me as if God's up there just waiting to serve me and yes God does want to he does want to bless you and God does want to do awesome things for you but when you look When you look at a passage like this, I think too often we just get it backwards.
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Instead of saying, "I want something from Jesus," you look at a phrase like this, it says, "All things were created through Him and for Him," and I have to ask, "What does He want from me?
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How can I serve Him?" And church, you need to personalize this truth.
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I am here because of Jesus, and I am here for Jesus.
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How would that change the church culture?
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If people went to church with that mentality?
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Instead of, "I'm looking for a church that can give me what I want." How would it change if people said, "You know what?
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I'm looking for a church where I can serve Jesus Christ.
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He's the Lord, and I was created for Him.
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I'm looking for a place where I can work for Christ.
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It certainly changes the way we look at church, doesn't it?
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Verse 17 says, "He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together." This isn't a metaphor.
17:45-17:48
"All things hold together." It's not a metaphor, it's not just some figure of speech.
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Like, "Well, my grandma kind of held the family together." No, what this means is Jesus literally, He physically holds the entire universe together.
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How do you know that?
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Because Hebrews 1.3 says that He upholds the universe by the word of His power.
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What does that mean?
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Well, I did a little studying this week.
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You know the nucleus of an oxygen atom has eight positively charged protons and eight neutrons which neutrons have no charge.
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Well, like charges of electricity in magnetic poles, they actually repel each other, right?
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You remember when you were kids and there were those magnets that had the N and the S on it?
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And if you put the N and the S, they would stick together, but if you tried to put an N and an N, they would actually repel each other.
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Anybody else do this?
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Okay, you know what I'm talking about?
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Somebody here is like, "What's a magnet?" All right?
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Google it, I guess.
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Okay, so if like charges actually repel each other, the question is, what holds the nucleus of an oxygen atom together if it's just positively charged protons?
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Why don't the atoms just fly apart?
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Well, scientists have been baffled by this, and I did some digging this week to try to figure out how does science explain this?
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I know what the Bible says, but how does science explain this?
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And I found the answer.
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Do you know how science answers this?
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It's called, are you ready for this?
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It's called strong force.
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Any follow up questions?
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What's strong force?
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Yeah, that was my follow up.
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You know what we call it?
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Jesus, that's what we call it.
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It's Jesus.
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He literally holds everything together.
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He made everything and He holds it all together.
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As God, He is the Creator. Secondly, as God, He is the Authority.
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Look at verse 18.
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It says, "And He is the head of the body, the church.
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He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything He might be preeminent." There's that word.
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First of all, it says He's the head of the church.
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Now when the Bible says "head of the church," it doesn't mean like he's the president of the church.
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You know, the Bible uses a lot of different analogies to describe the church, and one of them that's most frequently used, the sustained metaphor, the Bible says the church is a body.
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We are a body of believers.
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And we are one, but we are many parts, and each part has different functions, just like a human body.
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But also in this metaphor, and this is what the Holy Spirit is talking about here, Jesus Christ is the head of the body.
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So what is a body that doesn't have a head?
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What do you call that?
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You call that dead, right?
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If a body doesn't have a head, it's dead.
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What do you call a body that has more than one head?
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A monster.
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You see, the church is dead without Jesus Christ.
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See, this speaks to His authority Because the head commands the body.
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When you move, it's because your head has told your body to move.
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When you walk, that has to come from your brain telling your legs to move.
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When you move your hand, it's your brain telling your hand what to do.
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And if you're telling your hand to do something and it's not doing it, you would say, "There's something seriously wrong, right?
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I need to go to the doctor because my body's not responding to what I want it to do." In the same way, church, we have a major problem when our church body is not responding to what the head wants the body to do.
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Our authority is Christ and His Word.
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Our power must be from the presence of Christ in us.
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Otherwise, if that is not the case, if Jesus Christ is not the head of this church, then we are not even a church.
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We're just a club of nice yinzers that get together and sing songs.
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He says that Jesus is the firstborn from the dead.
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There's that term "firstborn" again, right?
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Jesus was not the first person ever to resurrect.
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Again, that term "firstborn" means, not chronological, but place of prominence.
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In other words, Jesus Christ is the greatest person to have ever resurrected.
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Why? Because Jesus Christ's resurrection guarantees ours.
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As God, Jesus Christ is the Creator. As God, He is the Authority.
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And finally for today, as God, He is the Savior.
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He is the Savior.
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Verse 19 says, "For in Him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell." You see, Jesus wasn't a piece of the pie.
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He was the whole thing.
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All of God, present in Jesus Christ.
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And you're like, "Pastor Jeff, can you explain that?" The answer is, "No, I cannot." He is way too big for me to explain.
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And you're never going to meet anyone that can explain God, because He is awesome.
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Verse 20 says, "And through Him to reconcile to Himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of His cross." Reconcile all things. That does not mean everyone gets saved.
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The word reconcile literally means to change or to exchange and what this literally means is restore.
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In other words, to sum up everything he's saying in verse 20, he's saying all things are going to submit to Jesus Christ.
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That's what he's saying.
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Everything one day is going to submit to Christ, making peace by the blood of his cross.
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Making peace sounds like there's a war.
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there is because by nature, by nature God is your enemy. We are born with a sin nature and we are sinners by choice and because we are sinners in our natural state, the way things are, naturally we are enemies of God or God is actually our enemy. I did some math.
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I'm going to throw you a bone here.
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I'm going to say, "Let's pretend that you only sin three times a day." But I'm just going to throw you a bone and say, "Let's pretend that you only sin three times a day," which is actually impossible.
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You and I sin more than that before we even have our feet hit the ground in the morning.
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Sinful, wicked, rebellious, evil thoughts, words, actions, attitudes.
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Let's say you sin three times a day.
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If you're 20 years old, that means you would have sinned 21,900 times in your life.
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21,900 times.
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If you're 30 years old, you would have sinned 32,850 times in your life.
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And if you're 50, you would have sinned just three times a day.
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If you're 50 years old, that means you would have sinned 54,750 times in your life, just three times a day.
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54,750 times in your life.
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And for the person that's like, "I don't see what the big deal is about sin," if you were to stand before a judge at the local courthouse and you had 54,750 felonies on your record, what are the chances that you're getting off?
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One of the chances that you're getting off standing before a holy God who is judge, and I think it's safe to say we have exponentially many more crimes on our rap sheet, but you know it's not even a great analogy in this sense. If I commit a crime here and I stand before the judge, that wasn't a personal crime against that judge, unless I like robbed his house or broke into his car or something, but the judge wouldn't like take it personally. But you understand, sin is very personal to God. When he says, "Don't do this," and we choose to do it, or God says, "I want you to do this," and we say, "No, I'm not going to do that," that's a personal affront against the person of God. So you're standing before a holy, perfect God that you've committed, if you're 50, if you've committed 54,750 crimes against Him, what are your chances of Him throwing the case out?
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But see, that's what makes this such a beautiful verse, because it says, "He made peace by the blood of His cross." To sum up this passage, what Paul is saying is this God, this holy, sovereign, awesome, fall on your face before Him God, this God, willingly allowed Himself to be nailed to a cross because of His love for you, because of your need for salvation, because of your need for the peace that could only come.
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This God did this.
28:02-28:35
And I need to tell you, with all due respect, if this concept of this holy, awesome God, this transcendent, created the world, by speaking it rules over every molecule in the universe, that God dying for you, If that concept doesn't blow your mind and make you want to fall to your face with awe and reverence and gratitude, then you are dead inside.
28:36-28:37
You just are.
28:38-28:43
So today as I close, I'm not going to tell you to make Jesus Lord.
28:44-28:45
I'm not going to tell you that.
28:47-28:50
Like, isn't this a place where the pastor says, "You know what you need to do today?
28:50-28:53
you need to make Jesus Lord. Well, I am not going to tell you that.
28:54-28:55
He already is.
28:57-29:04
And you can choose to acknowledge that now, or you're going to be forced to acknowledge that later.
29:05-29:12
But Philippians chapter 2 makes it quite clear that every knee will bow to Jesus Christ someday.
29:14-29:16
But today is the day of grace.
29:19-29:29
Father in heaven, as we've been praying all morning, before service, and during service, we pray again that Your Holy Spirit grab our hearts.
29:30-29:39
For the person who needs prayer, for those in our lives that we know who need Jesus Christ, let this be a place of prayer.
29:40-29:44
That we're not just talking at You, God, we are talking with You.
29:45-29:48
We are communing with You. We are seeing Your hand at work.
29:49-29:53
Father, if there is anyone here who needs to take this step, don't let them put it off.
29:54-30:00
You, Father, certainly did not hesitate when it came to pursuing a relationship with us.
30:01-30:07
Let us not be people who hesitate in responding to the work that You have done in Jesus Christ.
30:07-30:14
You have paid the debt of our sin. You have made peace by paying the price.
30:14-30:18
Let us gratefully receive that gift.
30:20-30:22
We pray in Jesus' name, Amen.
Small Group Discussion
WHOLE GROUP
Read Colossians 1:15-20
1 - How would you describe Jesus to someone who has never heard of Him?
2 - If someone thinks Jesus is great - but does NOT believe Jesus is God, can that person be saved? Why or why not? (What about Mormons and Jehovah Witnesses?)
3 - What does this passage teach about creation? Why is creation an important topic when it comes to describing Who Jesus is (ie, why did Paul talk about creation in relation to Jesus)?
4 - In what areas do people struggle in allowing Jesus to have preeminence in their lives? Why?
BREAKOUT
Pray for one another.