Above All
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Intro: Identity matters
How many of you can recall when your child came home with a piece of artwork?
Locations: school, VBS, Sunday school, arts and crafts at the library
Kids are so happy and excited about their artwork.
They hand us the artwork, with its mystery of shapes and colors and designs
Leading us to ask the key question:
Can you tell me what this is?
Stonehenge is an example of this. It is a wonder. Nobody knows what it is. Is it a clock? Is it a mystical guide? It is just a piece of art that we’ve ascribed meaning to? How would we know?
To make sense of the purpose of the child’s artwork or Stonehenge, we need to ask their creator.
To understand the purpose of the created thing, we need to know the Creator.
This principle is true of us –
Our ultimate identity and purpose is found in our relationship to the One who created us. We can't understand who we are without knowing who our Creator is.
We live in a world where identity has become a hot-button issue, and many people question who they are and what their purpose is.
We in the church need to have a rock-solid understanding of who our Creator is so that we can fully comprehend our identity. Understanding the Creator comes first, and the world's grasp of who Jesus is has been grossly distorted and undermined by lies that keep people separated from Him. The world tries to offer counterfeit sources of identity, but they all fall desperately short of the truth offered to us in Jesus. It's easy to lament and wonder what the world is coming to, but the reality is that false teaching about the person of Jesus has been around ever since He walked the earth. Paul's writing to the church at Colossae was to correct those fundamental misunderstandings that false teachers were spreading.
The deception offered to the believers at Colossae was subtle. The false teachers were not trying to convince the church not to believe in Jesus at all. The false teachers didn't try to convince the church to reject Jesus; they just wanted them to open their minds and see that other beliefs could be just as valid. "They said Jesus could be prominent, but He wasn't preeminent" (Anders, 1999).
Paul knew that the church needed to correctly understand who Jesus was in order for them to understand who they were in Him. They needed to know that "Jesus is the lone, unprecedented, and amazing point where the divine and human intersect, where the otherness and wonder of the divine are linked with God's loving and redeeming immediacy" (Lyons et al., 2019). That is the message that the Colossian church needed to hear, and so does the church today. In our text today, Paul, in no uncertain terms, tells us the truth about who Jesus is, in how He relates to deity, how He rules over all creation, and how He reigns as head of the church.
Jesus' relation to God
The primary purpose of Paul’s letter to the Colossians was to confront the heresy that was spreading. False teachers suggested that Jesus was just another way to God, that other beliefs were just as valid, that salvation can be found in other ways. All these beliefs deemphasized Jesus’ role in salvation.
Paul responds to this distortion of who Jesus is in Colossians 1:15-20, where he writes:
15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. 16 For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. 17 And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.
18 And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. 19 For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, 20 and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.
Paul’s writing is very clear – Christ is supreme, and He is Lord over absolutely all things.
Paul expresses the preeminence of Christ in three different areas. First, he shares about the relation of Jesus to God. In the first part of verse 15, he writes, "He is the image of the invisible God," Jesus is the image of the invisible God. Genesis 1:26-27 tells us that humans were created in God's image, but Jesus IS God's image. He is not a created being.
I enjoy Furniture making. When I build furniture, I take the plans and I (try to) produce a quality final product. In nearly every project I’ve ever built, there is a picture of a finished product made by someone else that I can compare with my finished work. I’m sure some of you have made something, like I have, and you used this phrase – “this is what mine looks like, but this is what it is supposed to look like.”
Jesus Christ is the authentic mirror of God, perfect in every way, so when we see Jesus, we see the Father. John 1:18 tells us “No one has seen God at any time,” so Jesus makes the invisible, visible for all to see. If you want to know what we as people, the created beings, SHOULD look like, look at Jesus.
Paul knew the believers needed to understand that Jesus was not just another created being because it mattered to salvation. If Jesus had not been fully God and fully man, his death at the hands of the Romans would have just been another execution. Because He was Immanuel, God with us, God in human flesh, he was able to be the perfect and blameless sacrifice that took on our sin. Because He was God, He was able to defeat death and be our risen, triumphant Savior.
Jesus Rules all creation
Secondly, Paul writes about Jesus' superiority in how He relates to creation. Starting in the second half of verse 15 and then into verses 16 and 17, he states that Jesus was
"the firstborn of all creation, For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. 17 And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together."
The word "firstborn" in this verse causes some confusion for people because we know that Jesus was not created, he did not come into being because He is eternal. We use the term firstborn when we talk about birth order. How many of you in this room are the ‘firstborn?’ I am. Being the ‘firstborn’ came with great responsibility and importance throughout history. The ‘firstborn’ inherited the throne, they possessed power, they continued family legacies and namesakes, their position was a privilege. Paul is addressing the false teaching about the nature of Christ. Over hundreds of years, this false teaching continued, and it was built on the implication that Jesus is merely the supreme created being. Here, the word “firstborn” implies a special status and higher rank over and above others.
In verses 16-17, Paul opposed all the false beliefs and lies about Christ that were spreading. We know Paul meant what he said because he could have used other words to describe Jesus if he intended another meaning. Christ is above all creation and the phrase ‘all things’ means every imaginable sphere. Paul again echoes the language of the creation narrative in Genesis 1:1 by saying “heavens and earth,” and all things created through Him. He repeats the language of v. 15 – “visible and invisible.” All these things point to Jesus’ relationship to creation. The universe was created for Him, that is to say, “that the universe exists in order to be his domain of authority.”
Jesus’ authority exceeds any imagined human or imagined authority, and He is our conqueror and champion.
We don’t’ live in a static universe – scientifically or practically – it is constantly in motion. We’ve been living through a global pandemic that has seemingly produced chaos. It has led to increases in fear, anxiety, depression, and uncertainty. People are searching for answers, and they want something that has power over their lives to bring stability and they want something that imparts them wisdom to respond to the challenges of life. Have you been searching? Maybe these past couple years have presented you with challenges, fears, and uncertainty. Remember this - “In Him all things hold together.” Does Christ have this kind of supremacy in your life? He keeps our universe coherent and out of chaos – have you trust Him to do the same with your life?
Jesus Reigns over the church
Paul established Christ as supreme over all creation, and now he addresses another relationship with Christ – the church.
Verse 18 says
"And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent."
The Greek word for church means “the called-out ones.” We use the word church, and we forget that it really holds two perspectives. First, and probably most often, we mean the local body of believers who gather together in worship. Second, less often, is the universal body of believers throughout the world. Paul is addressing the second meaning, the church universal, which we are all a part, which many of us know from the New Testament as the body of Christ.
Understanding the role of Jesus as the head of the church has significant practical meaning to us because we, as the church, as God's people, are here to be living demonstrations of His divine reconciling grace. We are one in Christ, and just as Jesus's life completely embodied God's redeeming work in the world.
Our lives should now reflect that work, and in action, we are to be extensions of that work in the world through the gifting of the Holy Spirit.
Our sanctification as believers displays God's work in us. The victory that Jesus won FOR us by His resurrection becomes His victory IN us by the Holy Spirit's indwelling. Through the work of the Spirit, we see Christ's victory over sin and death played out in our lives and throughout our congregations as we grow in Him. His perfecting love destroys the power of sin, it builds redeemed relationships, and as we grow in the fruit of the Spirit, we can carry out the mission He gave us to share Jesus with the world. The church is not here to just provide services for its members, and it doesn't exist to ensure that the institution of the church survives. The church exists to proclaim the redemptive work of Jesus in the world and actively seek to reconcile as many people as possible to Him. We are here to carry out the mission He gave us in Matthew 28:19-20 when He said, "Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age." (Matthew 28:19-20, ESV).
Conclusion
In Jesus, we have all that we need. His redemptive work on the cross and His victory over death by His resurrection is enough; it is all that we need for salvation. This is the good news of the gospel. Because of sin, we were estranged, separated, and exiled from the Father. But Jesus, the perfect image of God, the Supreme Lord of creation, the head of the church Himself, paid the price and reconciled us to the Father. In Jesus, creation and reconciliation unite, and in Him, we find our purpose.
In Him, we find our identity, who we were truly meant to be.
In a conversation recorded in Matthew 16, Jesus asks his disciples who they say He is. In verse 16, Simon Peter replied, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God."
(Piano begins)
Now, I ask you this morning: Who do you say Jesus is? Do you know him as your Savior and Lord? This morning we've talked about Jesus as the all-supreme Creator God, the ruler over all creation, the head of the church. That Jesus loves you. He died for you. He conquered death for you—all to reconcile you to Himself. If you don't know Him yet, today could be the day. The altars are open for you, and we have people here who would love to pray with you. If you feel Jesus calling you, if He's speaking to your heart today, don't wait. Answer Him today.
For those of you who know Jesus, I still ask: Who do you say that He is. But not just with your words… Who does your life say that Jesus is? And not just here on Sunday morning where it's pretty easy to act Christlike, who does your life say Jesus is when you're running late on Monday morning and everything that can go wrong does? Who does your life say that He is when someone wrongs you? Who does your life say that He is when crosses come? When the difficulties and pain of living in a world corrupted by sin wash over you?
Do your reactions point to a faith in an all-sufficient, all-powerful Savior, who you can trust with every detail of your life because you know you serve the Lord of all creation and are deeply cherished and loved by Him? Or are they more similar to the way the world responds?
We are going to sing the chorus, "Above All," during this time, and as we are singing, really listen to the words of the song. I invite you to respond as you are led during this time, whether that is to come to the altars, pray quietly at your seats, or just sing out to God, praising Him for who He is. Respond as the Spirit leads you:
Above all powers, Above all kings
Above all nature, And all created things
Above all wisdom, And all the ways of man
You were here Before the world began
Above all kingdoms, Above all thrones
Above all wonders, The world has ever known
Above all wealth, And treasures of the earth
There's no way to measure What You're worth
Crucified, Laid behind a stone
You lived to die, Rejected and alone
Like a rose Trampled on the ground
You took the fall, And thought of me
Above all