Joy in Gospel Transformation

It's interesting, I think, to stop and consider what we celebrate as a culture. We actually heard of one this morning, didn't we? An engagement. Weddings. One of the biggest probably celebrations anyone will ever put on in their life is their wedding day.

Birthdays. We love it when people win. You know, best in class. The team wins a competition. We congratulate people when they get a spot in university, receive an award or land a promotion.

We even get excited about new things, a new house, a renovation, a new car, a new boat. Now, of course there's nothing wrong with celebrating those things. There are some things which our culture celebrates that we probably wouldn't want to celebrate. You only had to turn on your TV last night to find some of that. But is that it?

Is that really all there is for us to get excited about? Weddings, birthdays, promotions, so on? And if you were to think back over the last month, the last year, was that pretty much the sort of thing that you got excited about? Was there anything else? That as you looked at someone else's life and you said, well, isn't that great?

I've got to go and encourage them about that. Well, Paul, as he starts this letter, as he does in multiple places, he has a list of things he wants to thank God for in the people's lives. He's going to praise God. He does. He praises God for them and as we see that, we see what excites Paul in the lives of other people.

And so we want to consider what it is that excites Paul but then we want to look at, because what he prays is really more of the same so that he can be even more excited and praise God even more. So there's kind of two halves here. There's what Paul is giving thanks for and what he's praying for. We're going to kind of look at both of those bits this morning. Well, he starts the letter, I'm not going to spend too much time on verses one and two, he identifies himself.

The letter is also from Timothy, though for the rest of the letter it's "I" this and "I" that, so I don't know if Timothy was just kind of there in the background or if he just said, "Yeah, that's a great letter Paul, let's send that together." I don't know but Paul is sending it, he's sending it to the Colossians who he's never met. You'll notice in verse four and verse nine that he's heard of their faith. Heard about you, he says. You see, Epaphras, it seems, has come and told Paul about this church in Colossae but he's never been there.

Nevertheless, he's heard of things in that church that he wants to encourage them in and wants to correct them in and kind of at the heart of this letter is a call to be faithful to God, to Christ as their only source of life and salvation and so on. And so he calls them the faithful brothers and sisters in Christ right at the beginning. But as I say, we're going to look at the prayer and in verse three he starts off like this. We always thank God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ when we pray for you because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all God's people. I guess that's pretty clear what he's excited about.

He's excited about their faith in Jesus Christ and he's excited about their love for God's people. Now I'm assuming that it goes beyond that, that they don't just love God's people, but love for God's people was, is seen in the New Testament as a sign of being a believer, of the Spirit having worked in your life. Now that kind of makes sense because many people in the world don't really like Christians. We don't have it too bad here but the tide is turning. But more than that, in that time to love the people in the church was to break down all kinds of social barriers.

There were people from different races and countries, men and women, slave and free, sort of master and slave in the one church. Now in society those groups would be all separated out. You wouldn't, you know, you wouldn't if you were a rich person you wouldn't talk to a slave. You wouldn't hang out with them anyway. Races didn't mix and yet in the church, everyone got together and they loved one another.

Now, I don't know that that's quite the same today and yet the church is supposed to be a motley crew if you like. A bunch of people from all different places and all walks of life. People that wouldn't necessarily hang around one another normally and yet they do. And when they do, that's a sign that the Spirit is at work. Paul's excited about that.

He thanks God for that. Their faith is also a sign that the Spirit is at work. I guess that's kind of obvious but sometimes those of us who have grown up in the church can take our belief in Jesus for granted. After all, we might have come to it over time, almost naturally. It just seemed kind of obvious to us as we grew up in the church.

But if you've seen someone come to faith, perhaps they were rejecting it and hating it and arguing against it and then suddenly they believed in it. Well, it's quite obvious that the Spirit had to work but that's the same work that's happened in a person that's grown up in the church. If it wasn't for the Spirit, we would read this book and it would seem utter madness to us. Nothing would make sense. We'd think it was just foolishness.

The fact that you don't is the work of the Spirit and Paul is excited by that. They heard the gospel and they believed. What's interesting as we read on is that he attributes this faith and love to the hope they have. Verse five, the faith and love that spring from the hope stored up for you in heaven about which you have already heard in the true message of the gospel that has come to you. Now Paul's not saying the Spirit wasn't involved.

I've just been saying the Spirit brought this about and then faith and love. He's not saying that but he's saying the Spirit works with something. The Spirit uses something to produce faith and love and what is it that he uses? Well, he uses the hope stored up for them. That is not the feeling of hope or the sense that something better is coming, but the thing that's actually coming, that is the glories of heaven, life with God, praising God, enjoying God, enjoying the marvellous new heavens and new earth, a place where there's no evil or harm or sickness.

It's joy and peace and freedom. A place beyond our imagining. Paul says, as you look toward that, knowing that you have that through Christ alone, through faith in him alone, through His death and resurrection, as you look forward to that, faith and love just spring out of you. This hope that you look forward to causes love for the saints to come from you and faith in God to come from you. Now how does that work?

Well, for faith, if you go to the book of Hebrews it says faith is being sure of what we hope for, certain of what we do not see and then it has a whole list of people who listen to God and believe Him. In particular, they listen to the promises of God and they believe Him. You see faith requires that there be something that is coming that's been promised to you by God and you accept that. And so, for example, Abraham believes that God is going to give him a son. Abraham believes that though he's asked to sacrifice his son Isaac that God will give him back.

Moses gives up the life that he had in the palace. I don't know if you ever thought about that but Moses had been adopted by the princess. He had it pretty good, the riches of Egypt and he chooses to identify with the people of God. Why? Because he believed God.

He believed that the way of life was with God and so when Paul says, "I know your faith. I've heard of your faith." I don't think he's just saying, "Well, you said you believed and that's I'm really excited." I'm sure that that was part of it but he's seen their faith in action. The hope which they have is causing them to live a certain way, to be willing to give up things now for the sake of the kingdom, to avoid temptation in order to serve others.

Now they might be good things that they give up but they're willing to put things aside now for the sake of working toward that hope. We just did that actually when we gave to the church. I mean I don't know if you were thinking, well I could have spent this on a coffee or something. Could have had coffee this morning.

Right? But you put it in the bag. Why? Because you're willing to forego that money now for the sake of the kingdom because you're looking forward to something better. I was reminded this week that John Piper, who you probably know of, he sold huge numbers of books. He doesn't get any of the money.

Early on in his book writing career he decided that the money would go elsewhere. I'm not sure where it goes whether it's to his church or to mission or what but it doesn't go to him. He just gets paid well. He's retired now but he just was paid by the church like I am. He didn't want that temptation of riches. Riches aren't bad but for him he said, "I don't want that.

I'm putting that aside because I want to focus on the hope that is coming." So that's faith. You only do that if you believe the promises of God. The same I think goes for love. Love springs from hope as well, not only because in order to love properly one needs to sacrifice, don't you?

You can't love well without being willing to give things up and the hope that is coming allows us, enables us to do that because the thing that we give up is a drop in the ocean of the joy that is to come, but also my hope is not just that one day I will be in heaven and I will meet with Jesus, just me hanging out with Jesus. No. It's that I will be there with a great throng. Thousands, millions, billions of people gathered around the throne of God worshipping God. You see these people here with you, they're brothers and sisters in Christ.

They have the same destiny as you if they're a disciple of Christ. You will live together forever and that's going to help me to love. Hopefully it helps you to love other people especially if they're being annoying or difficult. If they sin against you it helps you forgive them. It helps you encourage them because you're family.

You have a shared destiny. You're all going to be with Jesus and so like family, there's a special bond with family isn't there? It's like that. Our shared future enables us to love one another. And so Paul is excited because he can see that these people are being transformed by the message of the gospel, the gospel that tells them about this hope.

And you'll notice there that he's not just excited about them, he's excited about the whole world. The end of verse six is "in the same way the gospel is bearing fruit and growing through the whole world." It's transforming lots of people. Notice it's not him. It's not "I am transforming people over the whole world" or even Epaphras or Timothy.

It's the gospel. The gospel is transforming people. The gospel is what changes people. It's what brings about faith and love and hope. Now I just mentioned that because in a world of kind of high-tech, you know, research into methods and techniques and programs and all the rest of it, we can end up doubting the gospel, that the gospel can change people.

But the gospel taught and lived does change people and when it changes people that should excite us. In fact, it should be one of the most exciting things in our life. It should be the sort of thing that we praise God for. It should be the sort of thing that we go to people and say, "That's fantastic." Now that can be a bit awkward.

"You're so much more loving than you were last week." I don't know. But maybe there is a good way of doing that, isn't there? When you see someone and it's probably going to be slowly over time, growing in their love for people, being willing to trust the promises of God, put things aside for the advancement of their kingdom, for their own good, for the good of their family, and for the good of the church, when you see that in people, we should be praising God for that and letting them know as Paul does here. This is very encouraging for the Colossians, I would think.

I think it's one of the values of hearing things like testimonies and ministry reports. I always used to love in Riverbank. We don't hear it so much here in Redlands but we used to hear about the gospel and all the people who were being converted in India. Well, that's awesome. I mean, that's something to get excited about and maybe you know missionaries who are doing work and you can get excited about that, but that's what should be pumping us up as we see in other people's lives the great work of the gospel?

Well, one way that you will react to seeing that and one way you will react if you're excited by that is that you'll actually want to pray that more of that happens and that's exactly what Paul does. We have verses three to eight where he is telling them how excited he is to see the work of the gospel in their lives but then he says in verse nine and following, "And so I pray for more of the same." Now that's worth noting just as a start. If you are going to want to see this in people's lives, you're going to need to pray for it. This is God's work.

Notice actually that Paul says he hasn't stopped praying. We continually ask God. It's not that Paul thinks that the more he asks the more likely God will be to answer. It's not as though God is a being that we can kind of twist His arm, that through just the right system and sequence of prayers by having lots of people pray or pray over and over.

No. That constant prayer shows a great desire of heart on Paul's part. He so wants it that he prays continually. Well what does he pray for? Verses nine and ten.

"For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you. We continually ask God to fill you with the knowledge of His will through all wisdom and understanding that the Spirit gives so that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and please Him in every way bearing fruit in every good work growing in the knowledge of God." Well, it's fairly obvious I think what Paul's praying for there isn't it? He wants them to know God's will. God's will that comes through wisdom and understanding from the Spirit so that they can live a life worthy of God.

So they can live a life that pleases God. Now that in itself is remarkable, isn't it? That we could live a life worthy of God, one that pleases God. Think of what we were before we were saved. Self-absorbed, living for our own pleasure and happiness.

We rejected God. We lived in darkness. That's the word Paul uses down here in verse 13. He's rescued us from the dominion of darkness. Now you might not think of yourself as living in darkness.

You might think of your neighbours as living in darkness. I mean, all we're nice middle class people who live fairly decent and honourable lives, aren't we? We live in communities that grew up in culture shaped by Christian values. So that is less and less the case. And so we can sometimes struggle to see the darkness but the darkness is there.

I've recently been talking to some of the teachers in our church and also seeing some stuff in the media. Teachers that work in public schools, although I'm sure it's not only public schools and there is darkness there. Not in the school but in some of the kids' lives. Kids who are neglected by their parents, hated by their parents, not fed, not cared for, abandoned even. Kids who know no other way of relating than anger and shouting.

Parents who are violent with teachers and so it goes on. Friends, the seeds of darkness are in each of us and it's certainly evident in our culture and in that state we don't please God but Paul is saying here that we can actually please God. Jesus has rescued us and He can teach you how to please God. That's awesome. So how do you please God?

Well, you need to grow in the knowledge of His will. How do you do that? Well, takes that wisdom and understanding says Paul. So where do they come from? The Spirit says Paul.

Okay. Well let's just sit and we'll wait for the Spirit to give us wisdom and understanding. Just sit here. Wait to be zapped. Well that's not how it works is it?

It doesn't work that way partly because we're sinful. And even though we've been rescued and we can please God, the sinful nature's still there. That self-pleasing, God-rejecting thing is still in us. We're fighting against it and so when people say, "Well I feel led or God is telling me to do X, Y and Z. This is what's wise and sensible in this situation."

But how do they know that it's not just their sinful and selfish nature dressed up? I don't think I can always tell and so I need an external solid unchanging something to rule that by. How am I going to work that out? I need something external to myself. Something that's not marred by sin.

Well that's this, the Bible. You see the Bible is not the boring second cousin or ugly cousin to direct revelation from God. No. This is the revelation of God. This is the Spirit-inspired word.

The very words of God used to stir our hearts, to convict us, to challenge us and to encourage us and give us hope. So to learn wisdom, we're going to need to learn how to process the world in light of reality. That's what wisdom is. To learn to process the world in light of reality and the ultimate reality is that God is God. So the fear of God is the beginning of all wisdom.

So we're going to need to dig in here to understand wisdom and we're going to need to dig in here to gain understanding as we read passage after passage where God, the hero of the Bible, shows Himself and shows how He interacts with people and as we dig into that we'll gain understanding of who God is and what He likes and what He hates and how He wants us to live, you see. This is how we gain wisdom and understanding. Now we can't do that by ourselves often. We can read the Bible by ourselves but some things are difficult and so we need each other. We need the church.

We need our growth group and the myriad of other resources that we have available and as we grow in wisdom and understanding we'll understand what God's will is. How to act in different situations and so we will learn how to please God. Well also says Paul, grow to understand God. It's interesting. He says that as you bear fruit in every good work you'll grow in your knowledge of God.

So in a way you understand God and you know how to live but also as you know how to live and you live that way you can understand God and I think that's a bit like, you know, if you go and spend a few days or a week or a month or so with someone in their house. You learn about them as you live their way. You see how they do things and why they do things and what the result of that thing is and so it is when we live God's ways we get to understand Him more deeply. We might just hear "Love your neighbour as yourself" and we might say, "Well I'm going to do that because God has told me. I don't quite understand why" but as you live that out you start to see why and start to understand why God would be the sort of God who told you to live that way.

See as you live God's way you actually get to know Him better which of course will help you live a life that pleases Him. Now all that is beyond us really and so in verses eleven and twelve Paul says, "being strengthened with all power according to His glorious might so that you might have great endurance and patience and giving joyous thanks to the Father who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of His holy people in the kingdom of light." There's no way that we can grow in wisdom and understanding without God's work in us. The little phrase there, "His glorious might," is the same phrase that's sometimes used elsewhere to describe the power that raised Jesus from the dead and so that power is at work in us. You see, you might be sitting there thinking, "Well, I've tried to live a life that pleases God but you should see what happened this week.

You should see what I did. You should see how I treated someone. You should see the way I lived. I've tried to get rid of stuff that doesn't please God but it's still there." Well you need to repent.

You need to turn and say sorry to God even if it's the seventy-seventh time and ask for Him to work in you through His glorious might. You need to ask for endurance and patience. When I first read those words my mind sort of immediately went to persecution. No, it's normally what we think of in terms of persecution but that's not, there's nothing else here that would imply that. So what endurance and patience do we need?

Well I think it's endurance and patience with our own failings. Our own struggle with sin. That takes quite a bit of endurance and patience at times doesn't it? And it can be disheartening. It can seem like we'll never change.

Like change is perhaps impossible but it's not. Because God's mighty power is at work in you. He's already begun a work in you and Paul tells us He's qualified you to share in the inheritance of His holy people in the kingdom of light. In other words, what He's begun He's going to finish and so you can even in the struggle look with joy to the Father. But do you see what Paul did there in verse 12?

He went back to the hope that we have. Didn't he? And he does more of that in verses thirteen and fourteen. "For He has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of His Son He loves in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins." You see you were in darkness but now you're in light. You were away from God but now you are His friend.

You were an enemy of His but now you are in His kingdom. He has given you redemption. He has forgiven your sins and you have hope and it's the hope that changes us. And so Paul's ultimate prayer here is that the gospel changes them. It's the gospel told through the whole Bible that reveals what wisdom really is.

It's the gospel that gives understanding. It's the gospel that reveals who God is, what He's like, what He loves, how He acts. It's the gospel that spells out who we were and what Jesus did to rescue us and it's the gospel that tells us of the glorious hope we now have. It's the gospel that tells us that God's glorious might is at work in us. The gospel.

And Paul's prayer is that the gospel changes them. It transforms them. And it's that gospel transformation that excites Paul. No end. And so if you want to see wonderful gospel change you need to pray this kind of prayer.

The gospel will, God will use the gospel to change people and having prayed that prayer it seemed sensible then to get into the gospel, to share the gospel, to speak the gospel to people and then look for the good things, the exciting things that He'll do in people's lives. Let's pray. Father in heaven, thank you that you've given us the magnificent news of the gospel. That You came to earth, You rescued us when we hated You, You died in our place, You forgave our sins, You rose again and guaranteed us new life and so we have a hope that can never perish, spoil or fade, kept in heaven ready to be revealed at the last day. Father, what glorious news and we pray that as we delve deep into that gospel that You would teach us who You are and how to live for You, that we would live in a way that pleases You.

You would fill us with faith trusting in Your great promises and love. The same love that You had for us. And so we pray that we would please You and live a life worthy of You. Lord help us to rejoice when we see the gospel at work in others. Help us to encourage others when we see the gospel at work in their lives. Help us to praise You and give thanks to You that You are at work.

We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.