Partners in Christ

Remember my chains. Grace be with you. This is the word of the Lord. Well, here we are in the eighth and final week of our series in the letter of Colossians, which we've called the All Sufficient Christ: Why Jesus Is All You Need. It's been a wonderful journey going through this first century letter written by Paul under house arrest in Rome to a church he'd never visited, but he'd heard about through Epaphras.

And Epaphras was a Colossian gospel worker who had come to Paul and told him that there were these false teachers in this church that were troubling them. They were not telling them to deny Jesus, but they were saying to them, you need more than Jesus. Jesus is great, but you need more. You need to become more Jewish. You need to have more heavenly experiences.

You need to be more severe and strict if you want to have fullness in the Christian life. And so Paul wrote this letter to convince the Colossians that the gospel that Epaphras passed on to them from him was the true gospel, and that in Christ, they had everything that they needed. Let me just take you back through the letter, just have a little journey again of what we've covered over these eight weeks. So in week one, we looked at growing in Christ. We looked at chapter one at Paul's thanksgiving and prayer.

He gave thanks for different things that were happening in the Colossians. He thanked God for their faith, their hope, and their love. And we learned that if an apostle is thanking God for that in a church, that's probably something we want to have in our church as well. We want to be characterised by faith, hope, and love. And then he shared with the Colossians what he was praying for.

He wanted them to know the will of God and to keep growing and bearing fruit. But remember, the reason he wanted them to know the will of God is because the false teachers were troubling them, saying, actually, God's will is not just Jesus, but you've got to add on to Him. And Paul's saying, no, I really want you, Colossian Christians, to know that Jesus is all sufficient. And then in week two, we looked at the unrivalled Christ.

Towards the second part of chapter one, Paul had that hymn, that song, where he had this exalted image of who Christ is. See, one of the ways that Paul combated false teaching at this church, where these false teachers were saying you need Jesus plus something, was just to lift up the all glorious, all sufficient Christ of the church. He talked about Jesus who was the image of the invisible God, the One whom all things were made through, the One by whom all things were made, the One who holds and sustains the whole universe together. And as we looked at that picture, it became foolish. Why would you even add on to, how can you even add on to, someone who is as preeminent and supreme and exalted as Christ is?

And then in week three, we looked at the mystery of Christ. We looked at the end of chapter one and the beginning of chapter two, where Paul talks about his own ministry. He talked about how much he suffered and struggled and laboured to get this full and true gospel out. He talked about how he struggled for the goal of maturing God's people. And to that end, he proclaimed Christ.

He proclaimed the gospel. He suffered and struggled. This gospel that he received from Epaphras was something that Paul thought was worth suffering for. It was not a half gospel, it was the full gospel. Then in week four, we looked at fullness in Christ. We're into chapter two, and these false teachers may have been saying to the church at Colossae, hey, you need to add these things on if you want fullness, if you want to be like a proper full-fledged Christian.

And Paul was saying, actually, no, all the fullness of deity dwells in Jesus bodily, and you have been filled in Him. The fullness of Christ dwells in you. Don't be distracted by the empty promises of something more somewhere else. You already have everything you need in Jesus. And then the next week, we looked at freedom in Christ.

Paul actually tackled the false teaching at Colossae head on, and he talked about how these Colossian false teachers, they were caught up in shadows, the shadows of the Old Testament. They were telling these Christians, you need to be more Jewish with your diet, you need to be more Jewish with the holy days you celebrate. And Paul was saying, actually, Christ is the substance that those shadows pointed to. And they were talking about being harped up on these spiritual visions they were having in heaven, as if that made them more mature than the church. And Paul's saying, no, you're already in Christ who is in heaven.

He is seated on the throne. You have access to Him. You don't need to have these spiritual visions to be more mature. And then he also pointed out how these false teachers were severe about discipline. They said, you've got to overcome sin in your life, you've got to be strict, you've got to be harsh with yourself if you're going to overcome it.

And Paul teaches, actually, no, Jesus died to sin at the cross. And because you are in Jesus, you've died to sin in Christ. His death was your death to sin, and His rising to life is your rising again to life. So we see that in chapter three, if then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above. So Paul combats the false teaching at the Colossian church by pointing them to the all sufficiency of Jesus.

Then we looked at new life in Christ in Colossians chapter three, that we've been made a new humanity, and we have new clothing that we're meant to wear. We put off the old clothes of sin, like malice and slander and gossip and hatred and division. We're to put on the new clothes of compassion and kindness and humility and forgiveness, and ultimately love, which binds us all together in harmony. And then last week, we looked at relationships in Christ. How the heavenly lordship of Jesus doesn't make us pie-in-the-sky, heavenly-minded, no-earthly-good people. It actually gets applied down to earthly realities like marriage and work and parenting, and transforms the way we do those things.

And now we come to the final week in our series and the final part of Paul's letter to the Colossians. We're looking at partners in Christ. This is a list of diverse people from all sorts of different languages and cultures and genders and classes working together for the gospel. So if you have your Bible with you or your Bible app, please open up to Colossians 4:7-18. And the reason, if you're here and you're not a Christian yet, welcome.

It's great to have you here if you're seeking. We are so glad that you're here. You're welcome to ask questions here. We want to engage with you in that. And the reason you want to listen to this is because there's something surprising about this passage.

You see, in Australia, we value multiculturalism. We talk about being a multicultural nation, and that's a good thing. But when the rubber hits the road, what actually sustains unity when people are so diverse? There's actually a lot of division in our nation. There are Palestinian and Jewish Australians fighting with each other.

There's hurt and division between indigenous and non-indigenous Australians. What actually can sustain unity when people are so diverse and so different? What you're going to see in this passage is an example of loving, deep unity between people who were so different that someone in the first century ancient world could not have imagined that this was possible. And you're going to be challenged to think about what created this unity. If you're a Christian here, let's just remember that we live in the hyper-individualistic West.

It's so easy for us to just individualise our Christianity, to treat ourselves as if we have our own sort of personal spiritual program, and to forget that we've been called together into one body. Paul said that in Colossians three. He said, let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. We've been called together in one body. We're not individuals leading our own personal spiritual lives.

We are called by God together to be God's people. But the thing is, we're all messy. People are messy. Sometimes they hurt us. Maybe another Christian or a pastor or a Christian leader has hurt you before.

Maybe you're not really sure if you can trust the people around you. Maybe you just like doing things your own way, and you don't really want to partner with people who are going to get in the way of how you do things. How do we partner together as one body when we're all messy and difficult? We're going to see in this passage a living example of gospel partnership across all sorts of social barriers, and we're going to be exposed to gritty realities. This is a realistic list of people.

There are people in this list who will actually betray others later on down the track. There are some who once refused to work together who are now working together in this list. What we have at the end of Colossians here is an example of Spirit-inspired community, a partnership of very different people with their own mess and differences, forgiving and loving and partnering together. What created this kind of unity? Well, let's find out.

Let's open up our Bibles to Colossians 4:7-18, and we're going to break open this passage by asking three questions. First, who are these people? Second, what binds them together? And third, what are they labouring for? So first, who are these people?

Paul mentions a lot of ancient names. It's easy to get lost. So what I did this week, I asked AI to create an image of the people in this passage to help us stay on track, and obviously it's a fictional image. But I'm going to run through from left to right who these different people are in the passage and explain who they are and why they're so different, to help us get a sense of why this is incredible and amazing that they're united together. So first of all, on the left, we've got the two letter carriers. We've got Tychicus and Onesimus.

Tychicus, this man on the left here, he was one of Paul's most trusted gospel workers. If you look up his name in the Bible, he comes up in Acts, he comes up in the letters of Timothy and Titus. Paul is often mentioning him as a fellow worker that he trusted. He entrusted Tychicus with carrying this letter to the Colossians, and he says in verse eight, I've sent Tychicus to you for this very purpose, that you may know how we are and that he may encourage your hearts. There was a tradition they had with ancient letter carriers, where they would often read out the letter and sometimes elaborate or explain, and I think that's what Paul means there by encouraging your hearts.

He wants him to read out this letter and to help explain and apply it to the Colossian community. So we've got Tychicus there. He was from the province of Asia. Not Asia as what we think of today, but Roman Asia, what today we would call modern day Western Turkey, the people that we beat in soccer. Amazing.

I just think that first game was awesome, the soccer was great, the second game not so much. But anyway, if you're Turkish, we love you. Bless you. So he comes up in the letters of Timothy and Paul. He is Asian in terms of Roman Asia, or today, Western Turkey, a trusted coworker.

Onesimus is next. Notice he's dressed very simply because he was actually a runaway slave. He was from the church in Colossae. He was a slave in the household of a man called Philemon. That ring a bell?

That's the next letter we're going to look at after the series. And he's coming back with Tychicus. You see, this letter ends with a punch. This runaway slave, who in that culture and time could have been at least imprisoned for what he's done, is coming back, maybe sheepishly, to the congregation carrying this letter that is going to be read to the Colossians. And so he's coming back, but what is probably even more radical is the way Paul refers to him.

You see, Aristotle, the Greek philosopher, he called slaves literally just animate tools. That was how low a view he had of slaves. But Paul talks about Onesimus like this, verse nine. Onesimus, our faithful and beloved brother, who was one of you. Isn't that beautiful?

He calls Onesimus a faithful and beloved brother. It seems like Onesimus actually became a Christian when he ran away, maybe through Paul's ministry. He says he's one of you. He's not a tool. He's not to be treated as a slave.

He's actually to be considered a brother, part of the family of God in this church. And we're going to explore the issue of slavery in the first century next week when we look at the letter of Philemon. But these are the two letter carriers. Next, we've got Paul's Jewish partners. I've asked AI to put those little Jewish caps on them for you to kind of identify them from the rest.

And Paul is very grateful for these brothers. He says that they are a great comfort to him, and he says that they are the only workers among the circumcision that are labouring with him for the kingdom of God. So even though Paul has spoken against the Colossian false teachers in this letter, and the Colossian false teachers, I'm actually more and more convinced that they were of Jewish background, maybe Greek Jews. I could be wrong on that, and some scholars will disagree with that.

But they had very Jewish heresies. Remember, they're caught up in shadows, telling the Christians, if you want to be a full Christian, you've got to have a Jewish diet. You've got to observe Jewish holy days. And so Paul, after he's spoken against that, doesn't want the Colossians to think that he's anti-Jewish. Paul, obviously, himself was a Jew who believed in Jesus, and he also wants them to know that these are legitimate Jewish background gospel workers.

If they ever come to the church, they should receive the ministry of these guys. So first of all, he talks about Aristarchus. Aristarchus was another fellow worker and travel companion of Paul. He was a Macedonian Jew. In Acts 19, he was dragged by a mob during the riot in Ephesus.

So this guy had some scars for Christ in his ministry. Then we've got Mark. Mark is the writer of Mark's gospel. We've got four gospels at the beginning of the New Testament, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Mark is the writer of that gospel.

But before he wrote that, he and Paul had a rocky history together. We read in Acts 15 something that happened. It says, and after some days, Paul said to Barnabas, that's Mark's cousin, let us return and visit the brothers in every city where we proclaimed the word of the Lord and see how they are. Now Barnabas wanted to take with them John called Mark, Mark from our passage. But Paul thought it best not to take with them one who had withdrawn from them in Pamphylia and had not gone with them to the work.

And there arose a sharp disagreement, so that they separated from each other. That was ten years before Colossians was written. Ten years ago, Paul refused to work with Mark. It seems like he felt that Mark had deserted them, that he was flaky, that he was not faithful, and so he refused to partner with him in difficult, costly, important gospel work, getting the message out. But then we see in our letter to the Colossians that he's part of Paul's ministry team, so to speak, and he's a comfort to Paul.

Something's changed. And then around five years later after Colossians was written, Paul says this in 2 Timothy 4: get Mark and bring him with you, for he is very useful to me for ministry. Something's changed over these ten, fifteen years. There's been reconciliation. There's been transformation, and we're going to look at that in a few moments together.

And then the last Jewish gospel worker that Paul refers to is Justus. He's called Jesus in our passage. He was also called Justus. See, Jesus was His Hebrew name, or Yeshua. That was a common Hebrew name.

So Paul has to, you know, he's speaking to a Christian community, he has to distinguish that this is not Jesus of Nazareth. This is Jesus called Justus. It was common back then, because they lived in a world that spoke mostly Greek, to have a Greek name as well as a Jewish name. So Jesus', or Yeshua's, Greek name was Justus.

So I'm just going to put Justus there just to keep it clear. Same with Paul. His Jewish name was Saul, and his Greek name was Paul, which he used to relate to the Greco-Roman world. That's what's going on there. So these are the three Jewish guys that Paul is grateful for, that have been an encouragement to him.

Next, he talks about Epaphras. We've heard about Epaphras before, haven't we? He's a Colossian. He's the one who went to Paul to tell him about what was going wrong in the letter of Colossians, and we heard about him in chapter one. Paul said in verse seven, just as you learned it, that's the gospel that you learned from Epaphras, our beloved fellow servant.

He's a faithful minister of Christ on your behalf. Just notice how in our chapter, Paul is really commending Epaphras to the church. It makes sense because they were probably wondering, when the false teachers came, did Epaphras get the full gospel across to us? These false teachers are saying we haven't got the full thing. So Paul's saying that Epaphras is a faithful, beloved gospel worker.

He tells them how he's praying for them. He tells them how hard he works for them. He wants them to receive Epaphras' ministry and to stand firm in the gospel that they initially received from Epaphras. He's also like a regional pastor working among the churches, because Paul talks about how hard he works among Laodicea and Colossae and Hierapolis. So I'll just put a map on the screen if it's there.

You can see how close the churches are together. There's this little triangle here, Hierapolis, Laodicea, and Colossae. They're about 10 to 15 k's apart. You could walk to each one within a few hours. So Epaphras seems to be like a regional pastor that's going to each church and shepherding and sharing the gospel and helping God's people keep growing and maturing.

So Paul mentions him again. Then we've got Luke. He was the beloved physician. He is the writer again of scripture, of the gospel of Luke and the book of Acts. We see him come up a lot towards the end of the book of Acts.

He's a companion of Paul's. And then we've got Demas. He's mentioned very briefly in our passage. Just to remind you of how he's mentioned, Paul says, Luke, the beloved physician, greets you, as does Demas. It feels like Demas is mentioned as sort of just a quick mention for him.

Some of these other guys, he said they're faithful, they're beloved, they've comforted me, but then he says, Luke greets you, as does Demas. It seems like Paul has some concerns about Demas, that he's not sure he's reliable or maybe godly or loves the Lord. See, even though Paul is all for loving unity, he's still wise and discerning about the people he's working with. And this isn't pure speculation from me, because later on in 2 Timothy 4, three to four years later, Paul says, Demas, in love with this present world, has deserted me and gone to Thessalonica. See, this man in this list would actually later betray Paul and leave him for some kind of worldly reason.

Maybe he loved money and he had business in Thessalonica. That's why I asked AI to give him a bit of gold trim on his robe. He's maybe a bit more wealthy. I don't know. I'm just making it up.

But this is a real list of real people, and Demas deserted Paul. Next, we've got Nympha. She was a wealthy woman who hosted the church in Laodicea in her home. She enabled ministry to happen in her house. And then we've got Archippus, who was a gospel worker set apart in Colossae, but it seems like he's either discouraged or he's tired or he's flaking out, because Paul tells them, verse 17, see that you fulfil the ministry that you've received in the Lord.

He wants the Colossians to pass that message on to Archippus. I think that just reminds me again that whether you're set apart as a gospel worker like myself, or whether you're part of the family of God and you've got secular work or whatever you might be doing, we're all partnering together for the gospel, and sometimes I'll need you to speak to me like Archippus. Sometimes if I'm tired or if I'm going through a tough season, you need to come alongside me and say, Ben, remember that the Lord called you, see that you fulfil your ministry. Keep going. I encourage you and you encourage me.

We're all working together for the gospel. Now this is quite a diverse range of people we've got here in this passage. You've got people from different parts of the empire, people from different ethnic groups and religious backgrounds, different genders, different classes, different ages. When you read this passage, you could think that these are Jews and Greeks, or this is male and female, or this is slave and rich, but Paul wants us to see these people through a new lens. He's been teaching the Colossian church that these human categories have been transcended in Christ.

They're not obliterated, but they're transcended. Christ has become greater. What we're seeing is the new humanity in Christ at the end of Colossians four. This is what Paul was teaching about earlier in Colossians. So when Paul had that exalted hymn about Jesus in chapter one, he said this about Jesus.

He said, and He is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead. Now when Paul says He's the beginning, it's not that he's saying Jesus was created, that this was His beginning. He's saying that He's the firstborn from the dead, that He is the beginning of the new creation.

Jesus' resurrection not only vindicated the fact that He was the Son of God and not only proved that He died for our sins, but it was also the beginning of the new creation. And we too, 2 Corinthians says, if you trust in Jesus, I'm paraphrasing a little bit, but you are a new creation. In fact, in Colossians two, Paul says, verse 13, and you who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with Him. Remember how I shared a couple of weeks ago that when you put your faith in Jesus, you become united to Jesus. Like a branch that is grafted into a tree, Jesus is the tree, and you come to share in the life of Jesus.

You come to share in the history of that tree. His death is your death to sin. His rising again to newness of life is your spiritual rising to newness of life. You are a new creation, and we together are the new humanity in Christ Jesus. A first century Roman or Jew could not imagine the partnership among these people at the end of Colossians four.

It just would break the categories of how they think in that world. How did that happen? How did these people become a loving, unified family of God? Well, let's explore that next with our second question. We've asked who are these people, and now we're going to ask what binds them together.

Well, first of all, we could say it's love. Remember how Paul spoke about Tychicus and Onesimus at the beginning? He said in verses seven and nine, Tychicus is our beloved brother, and with him, Onesimus, our faithful and beloved brother. That's very warm emotional language. The Greek word there is used to talk about someone who is dearly loved, prized, and valued.

Love bound these people together. Love is the greatest of Christian virtues. That's why Paul put it at the top of the list for how Christians are to relate to each other in this new humanity we call the church. Because after telling Christians to be compassionate, kind, humble, patient, forgiving in chapter three of Colossians, Paul then says in verse 14, and above all these, put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. What binds Christians together?

It's love. But where does this love come from? Is it something that I just decide, I'm just going to conjure that up from within? I'm just going to love these people. Or is it that Christians are just nicer than people out there?

They're just more loving. Is that what it is? Well, no. Paul talks about your love in the Spirit in Colossians 1:8. This love that binds these Christians together, it's from the Spirit.

It's from above. It's from God. See, the love that binds these Christians together is not because they're lovely people on the inside. Remember, Paul was formerly a hell-bent murderer intent on destroying the church. He wasn't a nice guy. But God saved him by grace, and he came to experience and know the love of Jesus.

And now this hell-bent murderer who once hated this movement of Christians is now calling some of them beloved brothers. This love that binds these Christians together is from the Spirit. It's from above. It's divine love. Paul says elsewhere that those who trust in Jesus, Romans 5, God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit.

Again, it's from the Spirit who has been given to us. The love that we should have for one another is not conjured up from within. It's poured out from the Holy Spirit from above. And God concretely showed His love for us. If that feels too abstract for you, He's concretely shown it to us at the cross.

Three verses later in Romans, Paul says, God shows His love for us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. That's what God's love looks like. Love for His enemies, for rebels to His will, for people who wanted to live their own lives without recognition of Him. God showed His love for people like that, people like me, by sending His own Son to die in my place, on my behalf, for my sins. And when I put my trust in Jesus, I'm like that branch that gets grafted into Christ.

I become one with Jesus. I begin to share in Christ's life. I begin to share in the love that the Father and the Son and the Spirit have had from all eternity. I get caught up in that divine love. Jesus seems to be getting at that in His prayer in John 17, where He says in verse 26 to His Father, I made known to them Your name, Father, and I will continue to make it known, that the love with which You have loved Me may be in them and I in them.

This is that teaching I was talking about earlier, the branches grafted into the tree. It's the doctrine, or the teaching, that we call union with Christ. When you put your faith in Jesus, you are in Christ. You become one with Jesus. And it's this doctrine that is the grounds for Paul's assertion that we are united across all sorts of different barriers.

So we remember what he said in Colossians chapter three. Here, in this church in first century Colossae, there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free, but Christ is all and in all. In this church, in twenty-first century Gold Coast, there is not Aussie and Brit and Kiwi and South African and African and Asian and Brazilian. Christ is all and in all. Christ is all means Christ is everything.

He died to save us. He has become everything for us. He is the point of our lives. He is the point of our church. We're united by our shared love for Christ, and Christ is in all.

Christ is in you, the hope of glory. Christ is in me. We are united together in Christ. We are part of the one body of which He is the head. We are not our own anymore.

We are Christ's. We are not individuals with our own personal spiritual programs. We are one body. We all like getting things our own way sometimes. But now that we've experienced the love of Christ and He put His life before His own, how can we put ourselves before each other anymore?

Christ is all. He's everything. Life is no longer about me. It's no longer about you. It's all about Him, and our church is all about Jesus.

It's because of Christ's preceding love for us and because of His greater forgiveness of us that unity, and things like reconciliation, and sustained unity can happen. I mean, what happened to Paul and Mark? These two people, where once Paul refused to work with Mark ten years before he wrote Colossians, and then ten years later he's working with him, and he's saying if he comes to you, receive him. He's a comfort to me. And then a few years after that, he's very useful to me.

What happened? What changed? Well, Christ worked in these men. We don't know exactly what happened. Maybe Christ made Paul more gracious.

Maybe Christ made Mark more faithful. Maybe it was a combination of both, but Christ united them together. He reconciled them, and they were working together again for the gospel. What helped Paul keep going when Christians betrayed him? He experienced a lot of that.

That's expected. In this world, we live in a broken world, and we are in a spiritual war against the darkness, and in our church, sometimes there'll be people that leave. What kept Paul going when people left his side or betrayed him? When he was suffering in prison and Demas would desert him in a few years' time. It's Christ.

Christ is sufficient. The only thing that can keep you and I united and focused in our shared mission is Christ alone. His love is enough when others let us down. His power is enough when we feel feeble and weak. His grace is enough when it's difficult to work together.

Christ is sufficient for these things. But what was their shared mission? What is it that they were working towards? Well, let's finish our time together by asking what are they labouring for? So we looked at who they are, what binds them together, and now what are they labouring for?

Let me read to you how Paul described Epaphras again in our passage because it helps us answer this question. Paul said about Epaphras in verse 12, Epaphras, who is one of you, a servant of Christ Jesus, greets you, always struggling on your behalf in his prayers, that you may stand mature and fully assured in all the will of God, for I bear him witness that he has worked hard for you. The way Paul describes Epaphras is very much like how he describes his own ministry. I want us to notice this. So back in chapter one, Paul said this, Him, that's Jesus, Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ. For this I toil, struggling with all His energy that He powerfully works within me.

See the highlighted words there? They're the same words in the original Greek language. Paul was an apostle. He was unique in his apostleship, but in his ministry here, it's something that Epaphras shares in with him. But let me just read this first.

Doctor Moo says in his commentary on Colossians, like Paul, Epaphras is always in prayer for the Colossians. Like Paul, he wrestles and contends for them. Like Paul, he seeks their maturity. And like Paul, he wants them to be confirmed in all the will of God. But don't think that Epaphras was any more special than us.

We're all called to strive for the same goal as Paul and Epaphras. Remember how Paul said, and I just read it for you, Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom. Well, Paul uses these exact same Greek words to tell all Christians what they ought to be doing in chapter three. He says, let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom. The Greek word for warning and admonishing is the same Greek word.

So Paul was unique as an apostle, but ordinary in terms of his ultimate goal. His goal as a Christian is the goal of people like Epaphras, and the goal of Christians, and the goal of our church. It is the maturity of God's people and the spread of the gospel for the glory of God. That is the goal that Paul had, that Epaphras was labouring for, that these people were labouring for, that we are called to labour for together. It's the maturity of God's people.

Ephesians four says it was to speak the truth in love to one another, to help build each other up in Christ. We're to take responsibility to care for one another's spiritual growth, and to disciple and to train up people that join us and become Christians. And it's what Paul was suffering to spread, the gospel, the mystery of Christ. Our goal is to be on mission, to get that message out to people on the Gold Coast and all around the world. This is what all of these people at the end of Colossians four were working towards, maturity and mission for the glory of God.

All the people in Paul's letter ending are labouring for the same goal. Tychicus is called a fellow servant. Aristarchus, Mark, and Justus are called fellow workers. We know Luke accompanied Paul on many of his travels and recorded them in the book of Acts. Nympha may not have been a travel companion, but she was generously hosting church gatherings in her own home, creating space and opportunities for ministry to happen.

All these people are labouring together for the same goal, the maturity of God's people and the mission of spreading the gospel. Our goal as a church is not to keep the lights on. Our goal as a church is not to have a religious association. Our goal as a church is not to keep traditions going. Our goal as a church is not to promote our own brand.

Our goal as a church is God's goal in the Bible. It's Paul's goal. It's Epaphras' goal. It's the Colossian church's goal. We are the new humanity in Christ, labouring together for the maturity of God's people and the spread of the gospel.

We are the new humanity in Christ, bound in love despite every social barrier, labouring together for those two great goals, the maturity of God's people and the spread of the gospel to the glory of God. What we have at the end of Colossians here is an example of Spirit-inspired community, a partnership of very different people with their own mess and differences, forgiving and loving and partnering together for God's purposes, maturity and mission. What creates this? Who can reconcile people that were formerly divided like Paul and Mark? Who can bring peace where there is racial division between Jews and Greeks?

Who can unite such diverse people together in love and mission? Only Christ can. He is sufficient for these things. The all sufficient Christ is everything we need, and that's the message of the letter of Colossians. Let's pray together.

Father, may we all be one, just as You and the Son are one. Christ in us and us in Christ. Make us perfectly one so the world may know that You sent Jesus and that You have loved us even as You have loved Your own Son. Father, thank You for making Yourself known to us through Jesus. Continue to make Yourself known, so that the love with which You have loved Jesus may be in us and Christ in us.

May we grow and mature in Your love. May we spread the message of Your love in the gospel. Glorify Your Son, the all sufficient Christ. We pray this in His name by the power of the Holy Spirit. Amen.