How the cross and resurrection changed everything

—Colossians 2:8–23

Andrew Fountain – June 2, 2019

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Goal

That you get a really firm grasp of the single most important idea in the whole of Christianity.

1. What God is like

How God is different to us
Qualities we share with God
Our experience of God

2. God and the Spirit World

The Different Kinds of Beings in Existence
The Pagan world view and avoiding it
Evil & Suffering—It’s Origin & Destiny

3. How the World got Broken

Virtually everyone will agree that something has gone very wrong with this world…

How the cross and resurrection changed everything

How the World got Broken (recap)

Solution: The New Creation
How it works: Union with Christ Col 2:8–23
What this means for us

How the World got Broken

The universe was beautifully and carefully constructed
A place of order, harmony, beauty and perfect love, but surrounded by chaos
The first human’s task was to spread this harmony over the whole earth
The stability of this reality depended on them maintaining their allegiance to God
This enabled his life to be constantly flowing into them
They were given a very simple thing to mark their allegiance—don’t eat from a particular tree

How the cross and resurrection changed everything

How the World got Broken (recap)

Solution: The New Creation
How it works: Union with Christ Col 2:8–23
What this means for us

The Plan

The whole fabric of the universe is now damaged
It is beyond simply patching up.
To rescue us God has to do something radical.
The plan is this: God would make an entirely new kind of reality that is perfect, and invite everyone to become part of it.
“The new creation”

New Creation/Kingdom – John 3

“I tell you the truth, unless a person is born from above, he cannot see the kingdom of God.”
The man was confused by this and replied
“How can a man be born when he is old? He cannot enter his mother’s womb and be born a second time, can he?”
Jesus explained that this creation begins inside us in an invisible way—it is “spirit” rather than physical.
“What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit.
Do not be amazed that I said to you, ‘You must all be born from above.’”

Two Creations

We have bodies of flesh because we are born into this world.
We enter the new reality by being “born from above”
God puts his Spirit in us, making us his children. (more about this next week)
Right now this new reality is just inside us, but one day the physical world will also be renewed.

How did Jesus do it?

Jesus came from heaven taking on a human body,
died in his physical body,
and then was raised from the dead as the very first human of the new creation.
That is why he was called “the firstborn from the dead” Rev 1:5
If we are joined to him, the same thing happens to us

How the cross and resurrection changed everything

How the World got Broken (recap)

Solution: The New Creation
How it works: Union with Christ Col 2:8–23
What this means for us

Outline of 2:8–23

(8–10) Beware of being cheated—because you have everything
- (11–14) United with Christ
(15–23) So don’t be cheated—because you have everything

Read the passage:

Colossians 2:8–23

The heart of this passage:

In him you were also circumcised
with a circumcision made without hands,
in stripping off the body of the flesh,
in the circumcision of Christ,
buried together with him in baptism,
in whom you were also raised together with him
through faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead.
And you, being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh,
he made alive together with him,

forgiving us all trespasses,
wiping out the record of debt against us with its decrees,
that which was hostile to us, even this he has set aside,
nailing it to the cross.

Explain the verses

death pictured as circumcision
- Even in the Old Testament, circumcision was a picture of a new beginning
- It was done on the “8th day”, the first day of a new week
  - picturing the start of a new creation
- Israel were told that their hearts were to be circumcised
  - they were told this mean to have a new and living heart
bury—raised
- death—life
- “Together with him” Paul has actually coined new words here
when someone was crucified, they would nail a list of their crimes to the cross
- Our crimes were nailed to Jesus’s cross
- Not transferred to him, as a separate entity
  - but he put his arms around us and said “let’s do this together” and then he did it all
The core message of the gospel is union with Christ
- Once I used to teach the Gospel in terms of scales
- I once made a pair of scales to teach this to children
- In one side goes our sin (heavy stone) and the other goes our good works (no substance)
  - Then we take the righteousness of Jesus and it balances it out
However much truth there is in this image, it is not how Paul presents the Gospel
- Not a cold, legal transaction with scales,
- but union with a living person
This is the same as being “born again” (=born from above)
- The life of God is now in you
- You are literally his child, born from him (although not a God)
Joined at the shoulder
Implications of being united with Jesus
1. Our destinies are inseparably connected
  - Story of the sinking supertanker and the helicopter
    - Let’s illustrate this with two people
  - we are totally secure
2. We actually have died
  - and we have been raised something else

How the cross and resurrection changed everything

How the World got Broken (recap)

Solution: The New Creation
How it works: Union with Christ Col 2:8–23
What this means for us

The Torrey Canyon Disaster

18 March 1967

Romans 8

What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?
He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?
Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies.
Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us.
Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?