Col No.19 The True & The False

I'd like us to read together a psalm and the 84th psalm is one which strikes me as being particularly appropriate to our service this morning. If we were in the Church of Scotland and well versed in the tunes of these psalms then perhaps we could sing it, but at least we can all join in reading it together. Psalm 84, a psalm in which the author glories in being in the house of God and in seeking the Lord.

Read it together please with me. Psalm 84. For the living God, yea, the sparrow hath found an house, and the swallow a nest for herself, where she may lay her young, even thine altars, O Lord of hosts, my King and my God.

Blessed are they that dwell in thy house, they will be still praising thee. Blessed is the man whose strength is in thee, in whose heart are the ways of them, who passing through the valley of Barker maketh a well, the rain also filleth the pools. They go from strength to strength, every one of them in Zion appeareth before God.

O Lord God of hosts, hear my prayer, give ear, O God of Jacob, behold, O God, our shield, and look upon the face of thine anointed. For a day in thy courts is better than a thousand. I had rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than to dwell in the tents of wickedness.

For the Lord God is a sun and shield, the Lord will give grace and glory, no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly. O Lord of hosts, blessed is the man that trusteth in thee. And the 16th verse to the end of the chapter, and I'm reading from the new international version of the Bible.

Colossians 2, from verse 16. Therefore do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a religious festival, a new moon celebration, or a Sabbath day. These are a shadow of the things that were to come.

The reality, however, is found in Christ. Do not let anyone who delights in false humility and the worship of angels disqualify you for the prize. Such a person goes into great detail about what he has seen, and his unspiritual mind puffs him up with idle notions.

He has lost connection with the head, from whom the whole body, supported and held together by its ligaments and sinews, grows as God causes it to grow. Since you died with Christ to the basic principles of this world, why, as though you still belong to it, do you submit to its rules? Do not handle, do not taste, do not touch. These are all destined to perish with use, because they are based on human commands and teachings.

Such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom with their self-imposed worship, their false humility, and their harsh treatment of the body. But they lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence. Now you may care to have your Bibles open at the second chapter of Paul's letter to the Colossians.

And as we come to our 19th study from this epistle, I want us to direct our attention on the 20th and following verses in that chapter. You may know that the Apostle Paul on one occasion wrote a similar letter as this, not to a group of people, but to one man, Timothy. And he was very concerned that Timothy should be true to his calling as an ambassador of God and always proclaim the word of the Lord correctly.

And so he says to his young friend, study to show yourself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth. And I argue that one of the reasons why we're going through this epistle is because we, like Timothy's counterparts in the 20th century, want to be informed in the word of God. Sometimes we wrestle with things that are difficult to understand, that Peter concedes.

He said he had the same trouble when he was reading Paul's epistles. Some of the aspects of theology, of biblical truth, needed a great deal of concentration before you could grasp them. But so delightful is the word of God that it's worth every ounce of study, every little piece of nervous energy, for such an investment brings with it great returns.

Another comment in the New Testament concerning the word of the Lord enjoins us to earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered to the saints. Why do you have to contend for the faith? Because you see, down the years of Christian history, the faith has always been under attack. And this is another reason why we come together on a Sunday morning in depth to examine the word of God.

You do not just require platitudes from the pulpit. You don't want some simple little homily to take away and say how sweet that was. The milk of the word is for babes.

The meat is for mature people. And we must realize that in the 20th century, as in the first, there are those who would wrest the truth from the grip of Christian people. So not only the preacher, but the ordinary member of the congregation is to be informed as to the essentials of the gospel.

The Christian church was never a club for those who are ignorant. The Christian church is a society of men and women who follow Jesus, whose mind was illuminated to the truths of God, and whose body and his day-by-day action illustrated what he proclaimed. Similarly, ourselves, we are to grow in grace and in the knowledge of God.

So may God's word this morning, though requiring attention for us to excavate and find the gold that is buried within, may it illuminate our minds and transform our lives. This will be the last occasion when I shall have the need to draw to your attention that Paul, when writing to the Colossians, was concerned that there were heretical teachers there trying to modify, to dilute the Christian gospel. He's been dealing with the particular opposition from these Judaizers and these Greek philosophers almost for the whole of this chapter.

But when you go into the third and the fourth chapter, you'll find that the argument he believes has been won, and no longer will he have to make reference to the opponents of the gospel. Last week, however, we discovered in the few verses that we were looking at that there were some people who were adding to the gospel, who believed that by some regulations imposed upon the church, there were other things that people had to do to be saved, rather than just believe in Jesus and confess their sins. And then there were those who, not so concerned with external regulations, claimed to have an inner revelation superior to that of the Christian faith.

Gnostics, knowledgeable people, so they claim to be. And the apostle has to deal with them too. And then you remember how he redirects all who are lost in the cul-de-sac, and he says, look, the basic thing that is necessary is that you hold on to your faith in Jesus, who is the head of the church.

And it's from the Lord Jesus Christ that all spiritual blessings flow, and all energies proceed. And the people who get engulfed with heretics, heretical teaching, are those who have not held on to the head, who are not in a close spiritual relationship with the Lord Jesus. Well, then the apostle wants to clear all this up, once and for all.

In the 4th and the 8th and the 16th and the 18th verses, he's made reference to these false teachers, and from the 20th to the 23rd verse, he summarizes all that has gone before. And he spells out for us, if we're prepared to examine and sift what he has to say, what are the aspects of true faith, and what also are the facets of a false faith. So let's look at the aspects of true faith, which really contain for us the touchstone of biblical Christianity, and enable us to examine our own belief and walk of life in the 20th century, to see if it lines up with the Word of God.

The aspects of true faith, they're to be discovered in the 20th and the 21st verse, I argue. And there are two things that are said, and one is said positively, and the other is said negatively. The first thing is this, the first touchstone, the first way of checking whether your faith is a biblical one, is to see if it allows for a participation in the death of Jesus, and negatively, to ensure that it allows no modification in the method of the gospel.

Look at the first thought, this idea of participation in the death of Jesus, as being vital to true Christian faith. Wherefore says the apostle Paul, if ye be dead with Christ, this is the touchstone, this is the yardstick, it's in this area that you can test whether or not your so-called belief is a genuine or an invalid one, whether it's biblical or unbiblical. Isn't it amazing that the apostle uses the metaphor of death, and says that you can't really be a Christian unless you've died.

What does he mean? We'll come to the twelfth verse again, and we looked at that verse in some detail, you remember, a few weeks ago. There the apostle is talking about baptism. We're going to witness this evening a baptismal service.

Three of our ladies will be immersed in water, and they will be saying, they will be showing, as they are dipped in this water, that the day came in their life when they surrendered themselves completely to Jesus. That's what conversion is. In one sense it's a resurrection, but first of all it's a death.

It's saying that I no longer want to live the old way of life. It's saying that I not only acknowledge that Jesus died on the cross of Calvary for me, but I want to so participate in His death, that that old sin-stained lifestyle no longer is seen within me from day to day. The dead man literally ceases to be what he had been before.

So it is with the Christian. The true test of a biblical faith, first of all, expressed positively is this. The believer participates in the death of Jesus.

So the apostle, referring to these Colossians, says, if ye be dead with Christ, then certain things follow. Well, what does dying with Christ really entail? Obviously it's not a physical death, but it's certainly a spiritual death, and in some ways a moral death. That is, death to an immorality and a resurrection to a new code of ethics in Jesus.

What has the Christian died to? Well, listen to Romans chapter 6 and verse 11. Likewise, says the illustrious apostle Paul, reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin. So if I'm a Christian, ideally I die to the sinful nature that used to be part of my personality.

But more than that, the apostle, when he writes to the church in Corinth, in the second letter and the fifth chapter, says in the 14th and 15th verses, that because Jesus has died for all, they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him which died for them and rose again. What does that mean? Well, in a word, I die to self. A Christian who's participated in the death of Jesus has died to selfishness.

That's one of the things that Jesus never was, selfish. He was selfless. Naturally speaking, we're all selfish.

We're all critical. We're all concerned for number one. That's part of human nature.

But when one becomes a Christian, you die to that. Die to number one. Open your life so that the personality of Jesus by his Spirit flows through you.

Jesus was dead to sin. He was dead to self. And as I die with Jesus, so these aspects of his personality are created in me.

Dead to the law. Romans chapter 7 and verse 6 says, But now we are delivered from the law that being dead, wherein we were held, that we should serve in newness of spirit and not in the oldness of the letter. We learned about the law, did we, not a little while ago when looking at the 14th verse of Colossians 2 in particular.

There's nothing the matter with the law in itself. It was a good law. But the trouble was the law couldn't give innately.

It had no power to cause the one who received the law to keep it. The law exposed our sin. That Jesus came along and he fulfilled the desires, the demands of the law that we had broken.

And the condemnation that is also inherent in the law which was directed towards us because we had broken, because we had broken it, that no longer applies. There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. So I'm dead to the law.

I'm never going to be judged by the law of God because that law I have broken. But Jesus has kept the law and his righteousness has been attributed to my account. So a person who has died with Jesus, who has participated in his death, has died unto sin, he's died to self, he's died to the law, and what's more, he's died to the world.

The Apostle Paul in Galatians chapter 6 says this in the 14th verse, that God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ by whom the world is crucified unto me and I unto the world. Jesus was not a materialist. His concern was for spiritual reality, to worship the living God.

Now there was a time when in unbelief our objectives were completely different to what they are now, that we have become Christians. A time when worldly standards mesmerized us. A time when our objectives twinned with those of the worldling.

But no, because I'm a Christian, I've died to that. These Colossians, they're a completely different entity within the Greek city of Colossae itself. Because in one sense, they're dead men.

Dead to sin, dead to the law, dead to self, dead to the world. You see, my dear friend, this whole teaching of participation in the death of Jesus is vital for you to understand. I do not just come to the cross as a sinner to have my sins forgiven.

It's not just the place where redemption is applied to me. It's the place where a new lifestyle is imposed upon my personality. I live under the shadow of the cross.

Christ cannot have died for me if I haven't died with Him. Let me repeat that. It's the most profound statement that I bring to you as we study this part of God's Word.

Christ cannot have died for me unless I have died with Him. This is no magical approach to the cross where Jesus has died, therefore, my sins are forgiven, and that's all that there is to it. No.

You see, in the death of Jesus, I am involved as a participant. He has died for my sin, and I have died to sin myself. I have died to self.

I have died to the world. And it's only in the measure that I have died to these things that I really fully appreciate the significance of Calvary. This only-believism, this simple approach to the cross, is not biblical.

There is more to salvation than simply believing that Jesus died for sinners. It is necessary for people to participate in the death of Jesus themselves. So the first aspect of true faith is participation in a death, the death of Jesus.

And that's followed by a negative. Because I participate in the death of Jesus, then my faith will not allow for any modification of Christian theology and belief into a method. I can't reduce it to a method, to a system.

This was the danger at Colossae, and this is what the Apostle is here saying. If ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances? Touch not, taste not, handle not. What's he referring to here? Well, you see, there's a sort of resurgence of Phariseeism creeping in at Colossae.

What basically was the tenet of Phariseeism? Well, these Pharisees were saying that the laws of God in the Old Testament in themselves were not sufficient, so they had a whole depository of law which had grown up over the years, and they were so concerned about this, even how you washed a cup and the trivia of life. And there were some who were coming along to these Christians and they were saying, look, just participation in the death of Jesus is not enough. There are certain prohibitions, certain regulations, certain rules, and these must be kept.

They're vital to your faith. And outside of these things, there's no salvation. Referred to here in terms of the rudiments of this world or the spiritual powers of evil that we were once subject to.

Well, Paul is saying, don't let Christianity be reduced to a system, to tradition, to mere externals, to legalism. This is always the temptation of the Christian community to move Christianity from its center of gravity within the soul to a mere external law-keeping. You know, sometimes we make a difference, do we not, between Christianity and churchianity.

That's a sort of evangelical phrase. And we denounce churchianity, this business of going to church once, twice on a Sunday and going through a routine. And we say, that's not real Christianity.

And that's true. That's the external, you see. And there's a tendency in man always to go to the circumference, whereas Christianity starts at the center.

It speaks not just in terms of prohibitions, but it speaks in terms of a death with Jesus, a participation in His death. And it's at the center of my personality where Christianity really takes hold. And as a result of that, some of the things on the circumferences are dealt with.

You don't start with the circumferences, Paul. You start with the heart of the matter, participation in a death. That's basic to Christian belief.

And this allows for no modification into a method. Well, those are the two aspects of true faith as spelt out in these verses. But there are facets of a false faith that the apostle here works out.

And here you need concentration, but it's easily attainable, your understanding of this, if you'll concentrate. What are the facets of a false faith, Paul? Well, says the apostle in the 22nd verse, following through what he said in the 21st, touch not, taste not, handle not, which all are to perish with the using, after the commandments and doctrines of men. A false faith, humanly, is contrived.

Humanly, it is contrived. The latter, the false faith, can modify the genuine faith. This is the problem with the sects.

They come along to the word of God and they modify the word of God. This is the problem with liberalism. This is the problem with Roman Catholicism.

Adding to the faith, humanly, bringing your mind to it and placing something else alongside, modifying it. Take, for instance, what's happened in the history of Christian theology to the Lord's Supper. First, it was a very simple, basic thing of eating bread and wine and using these as symbols of the death of the Lord Jesus.

By the time of the 3rd and the 4th century, you've got a fellow by the name of Ignatius coming along and saying, using such language of these symbols, being the medicine of immortality. And by the Middle Ages, we were being told that this was the body and the blood of Jesus. Transubstantiation of the whole dogma of Catholicism had taken over and transformed something that was basically simple into something that was superstitious and complex.

And when you use human reason and add to a biblical faith, then you move into falsehood. And the first facet of a false faith is this, humanly, it is contrived. So the apostle makes reference to the commandments and doctrines of men and says to the Colossian Christians, don't be attracted or influenced by such at all.

A false faith humanly is contrived. Outwardly, it's a charade. Which things have indeed a show of wisdom in will worship.

Or as the NIV puts it, such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom with their self-imposed worship. Outwardly, a charade. You know what a charade is? You've played charades at Christmas, I reckon.

It's one of the games. Perhaps not recently, but some of you years ago. Charade is something that is not real.

Something that may superficially look good. For instance, here, just inserting it back into the context of Colossians, you've got, and you remember this last time, you've got some people, 18th verse makes reference to it, who were teaching that you couldn't go directly to God in your prayer. You had to go through angels.

And it seemed to be a very humble doctrine. You remember I made reference to the first century Uriah Heep. Oh, he's so humble.

He can't go directly to God. He must go through the angels. A charade, a pretense.

A false humility. A refusal to take God at his word. God who says, don't go to angels, don't go to, quote, saints, unquote.

Come to my son. There's only one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus. The God who says, you sinners, come with all your raggedness, with all your stain, and fling yourselves in my arms, and I'll receive you.

It's a false humility that says that God cannot be taken at his word. Therefore, we must trust to other means of contacting God. And within the established so-called church, you've got a very technical term which starts to give its own appearance in the 17th and 18th centuries of super-adoratory grace.

That refers to people who've lived such good lives. They're saints, special people. And they've got such an abundance of grace that this can be transferred, you see.

I made reference to this last Sunday morning. So you come along and you pray to St. Margaret or St. Jude and you say, look, I'm not doing very well, but you did more than you're really required. You got more grace, so will you transfer a bit of this to my account? And outwardly, it's really a charade which seems to reveal wisdom, but when it's analysed, it becomes will-worship, self-imposed restrictions and regulations.

That's another facet of a false faith. Humanly, it is contrived. Outwardly, it is a charade.

And physically, it can be costly. Which things have indeed a show of wisdom in will-worship and humility and neglecting of the body. The idea of asceticism has come into the Colossian community.

Asceticism really means imposing upon your body certain restrictions and prohibitions that Jesus never asked for. Asceticism can be a very, very difficult and a very dangerous thing. The whole system of penance, of hair shirts, of exposing oneself to the climate in the most terrible weather just to endure hardship and believe that by hurting yourself physically, you will get grace with God.

Luther suffered from this. He used to whip himself in his monastery. He got no idea of salvation by faith in Jesus.

He believed that there were other things that he had to attend to. He believed that this business of neglecting the body was absolutely vital to earning grace. Whitefield was the same.

There he was at university. And sometimes he would spend the evenings and the early mornings out on the streets of his university city in the coldness of winter until his skin had almost gone black, believing that by injuring himself he would get grace with God and be saved. But, says the Apostle Paul, all these are facets of a false faith.

Humanly, it's contrived. Outwardly, it's a charade. Physically, it's costly.

And inwardly, it cannot change you. Not in any honour to the satisfying of the flesh, or as the NIV gets it more clearly, but they lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence. A man may submit himself to many regulations.

He may impose upon him a very, very hard daily routine and still harbour seven devils in his heart. There was a fellow who lived in the first four centuries or the fourth century by the name of Simon Stylites. He was one of the Christian ascetics.

You would be amazed to discover that in the Middle East he spent the whole of his life on the top of a pole. Maybe that's where the expression up the pole came from, I'm not sure. He just lived there.

Completely isolated, you see, believing that in this absurd pasture he would merit grace with God. It would change his personality. But you could stick up, or you could be on top of as many poles as you wanted and go from one to another for the whole of your life, and it wouldn't change your lifestyle, it wouldn't change your heart.

You see, only the biblical faith, participation in the death of Jesus, a refusal to modify the essentials of the Gospel, has any value in restraining sensual indulgence, brings into the person new life and new power. When a man participates in the death of Jesus, as you will see from the first verse of the third chapter next week, the Holy Spirit comes into his life and transforms him. A false faith, and here I summarize all that we've been learning from Scripture this morning, starts with the circumference.

It stays on the external. It deals with that which is secondary. A biblical faith goes right to the heart of the matter, and it says that the first step in being a Christian is to die with Christ.

And in the participation of his death, you will find certain things will fall from your personality. And the second step is to refuse to compromise the essentials of the doctrines, no matter what anyone else may teach. To the contrary.

A false faith, a true faith. I trust that we have the latter and rejoice in that. Amen.

Father, we thank you for the reminder from your Word of the simplicity of the Christian faith, dealing with the heart rather than the circumference of the matter. But may our acknowledgement of the death of Jesus be more than just an intellectual assent to the fact that Jesus died. May we know what it is to participate in that death and to die to things which, apart from the filling of the Holy Spirit, could never leave our personalities.

Lord, many of us here tried the externals first. We tried the way of will-worship and got nowhere. But we thank you that we started afresh with Jesus at the center and we ask that he may constantly lop off from our personality those things which are displeasing to him, that we may die to them and be alive only to him and to his grace for his sake.

Amen.