Christ is all, and is in all (Col. 3:1-15)


The last few weeks the lectionary has taken readings from Paul’s letter to the Colossians. We’ve been focusing on what he has to say about the Body of Christ. The theme the first week was “Christ in you (that is, the church), the hope of glory.” Last week the theme was “you have been given fullness in Christ,” The church has been given the fullness of who Christ is, and we saw that in the way fours aspects of the church or four spiritual streams, reveal to us the fullness of Christ. This final week, in chapter 3, Paul gets down to specifics of how we are to live together as Christ’s body. Our theme today is “Christ is all, and is in all.”

The passage begins, "Since you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set you minds on things above, not on earthly things." Paul is making the distinction between earthly things and things above. Obviously he’s not speaking spatially but metaphorically—the things above are the things of God, the things of Christ, rather than things that the world likes to lure us into.  “For you have died with Christ, and you have been raised with Christ. Your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.” Through our participation in Jesus’ death and resurrection, our old life has died, and we now have a new life in Christ. Christ is our life. What does Paul mean by saying your life is now hidden with Christ? Usually we think of things hidden as having been put in a safe place where they won’t fall into the wrong hands, like a hidden treasure. Paul has the same idea here, that the treasure of our lives is safely hidden with Christ in God for all eternity. Our souls, our true selves, are perfectly safe in him, so that nothing can hurt us. That means that we don’t need to live fearfully. We don’t need to live defensively. We can put down our defensive attitudes and self-centered earthly behaviors. In fact, Paul says in verse 5, we should put that behavior to death. He uses another metaphor in verse 9. He says, “You have taken off your old self with its practices and have put on the new self which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator.” Like changing your clothes, you take off the old and put on the new. Take off the old self and put on the new self.
The past couple of years there has been a PBS TV series on Masterpiece Theater called Downton Abbey which has been a runaway success. Maybe a lot of you have seen it. It’s about a wealthy English family around the time of World War I. You could call the TV series a costume drama as the costumes and sets are beautifully lavish. In fact, in several episodes the plot turns on costume, on proper and improper dress. In one episode Lord Grantham’s clothes have been meddled with and he has to wear black tie to dinner instead of white tie. It’s a crisis. In another episode the Irish chauffeur who becomes Lord Grantham’s son-in-law, wants to wear his tweeds to dinner instead of white tie. Thankfully, peace is restored when he is finally persuaded to wear white tie to dinner. Proper dress was not an insignificant thing in Edwardian England. In our own casual age, we are less aware of or concerned about proper dress. But Paul wants us to think about proper attire for Christian character. What are the right clothes to wear?
The clothes to take off are the old self-centered behaviors that he lists in verses 5-9: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires, greed, all forms of idolatry, anger, rage, malice, slander, filthy language, lies and so on. It’s not a complete list. We could add other things mentioned elsewhere in the gospels or Paul’s letters such as gossip, judging or blaming others, a self-righteous attitude, possessiveness of any kind. These things proceed from a self-centered defensive heart that puts one’s own wants and desires ahead of the well-being of another person or ahead of the well-being of the church as Christ’s body. These attitudes of the heart arise when the self or the ego is running the show. These clothes have got to go.  Take them off. They’re filthy rags anyway. They are inappropriate attire in the church because Paul says, “Here there is no Greek or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all.” In the church there is no place for self-centered distinctions, no place for I’m better than you, or what I want is more important than what you want. “But Christ is all, and is in all.”
When we recognize this truth, we discover the mind of Christ. Instead of the mindset that says it is my life and needs in competition with yours, suddenly we see that “Christ is all and is in all.” He completes all that we are and need in and through each other in his Body the church. We discover that through Christ’s spirit of love we have wonderful fellowship with one another, even in our differences.  In fact, it’s the differences that make us a complete body. Remember two weeks ago we talked about having our spiritual glasses on and seeing Christ in one another. When you put on your new clothes, be sure to put on your spiritual glasses too so you can see that “Christ is all, and is in all.”
So now, if we take off the old clothes of defensiveness and discontent, what are the new clothes, the proper attire for God’s holy and dearly loved people?  In verse 12 it says, “Clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness and humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other, forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you, [which is freely and without restraint]. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.” This is what the new outfit looks like. This is proper dinner dress in the kingdom of God. Don’t be boorish and come to dinner in a tank top, shorts and flip-flops. You’ll be asked to leave. Remember the parable Jesus told in Matthew 22? There was a wedding guest who was invited to the banquet for the king’s son but showed up in his street clothes rather than his finest clothes. He didn’t prepare properly for the feast in the kingdom, so he was thrown out of the party. We are saved by the grace of God, but we are also expected to respond to that grace in a way that shows we’re taking the gift seriously. We are called to grow up and become mature in Christ. We are called to make the effort to take off the old grungy clothes and put on the proper attire.
I say make the effort, because the deepest transformation of heart depends on God’s work in us. The changes we make by our own efforts are going to be superficial, simply because our own sin blocks our view from being able to see to where the deeper changes need to happen. Usually other people can see them, but we can’t see them until we let God show them to us. When he does, then we’d better address what he shows to us and not ignore it.
As you know, John and I were away from our home in Newburyport for 8 weeks earlier this summer. As you can imagine, when we came back our little back yard, which is very small, looked like a jungle. The weeds were really tall and blocking the sun from some of the smaller plants, other plants were way overgrown, little weedy vines were wrapping their tendrils around everything. The wisteria had taken over the patio. In the summer time we love to sit on our patio surrounded by our little garden and have dinner outside, but we couldn’t even do that until we got the garden under control. At first I went out and made some headway pulling up the major weeds to get them cleared out. Then last weekend John got on a roll and really trimmed back things, pulled up more weeds and cut back the wisteria, so we’ve been able to really enjoy having our dinners on the patio this week.
Our souls are like gardens that have to be regularly tended to with prayer and scripture, fellowship and sacraments with the Body of Christ. If we neglect these things, our souls become weedy and unpleasant. But when we tend them, they become beautiful and pleasant places for loving fellowship with God, others and also ourselves. One way of thinking about this is that God gives us the garden of our souls, he plants lovely things there, but we have to tend them in order for them to grow properly, and we also have to guard against weed infestations. 
What are the beautiful plants in your soul’s garden? Paul mentions several: compassion, kindness and humility, gentleness and patience, bearing with one another, and forgiveness. When you notice those things in yourself, water those plants, feed them. Give them attention to help them grow. Encourage compassionate thoughts and actions in yourself, practice gentleness and patience and forgiveness. Work at these things to encourage them to grow. But when you see weeds, don’t water them, don’t feed them. If someone says something that hurts your feelings, don’t angrily obsess over how you have been hurt, how right you are and how wrong they are, enlarging it in your mind. If you do that, you are watering the weeds. You’re watering anger and defensiveness. So what should you do? Step back and notice your feelings of hurt and anger. Notice your defensiveness. And notice how your feelings come and how they go. Your feelings are not you. Your soul is deeper than your fleeting feelings. So don’t water and feed your hurt and negative feelings. Release them to God. Listen to what God has to say to you. He is in control. Remember that your life, your true life, is hidden with Christ in God. Your soul is perfectly safe in God.
The church is a somewhat weedy place. It is weedy because people are weedy and people are the church. The church is not the church because it is perfect or because it doesn’t make mistakes. It is the church because it chooses to love one another as Christ loved us. It is the church because it chooses to forgive as we have been forgiven.

Our passage ends with these final words, “And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in the one body. And be thankful.” We are called to live in peace with one another. To let Christ’s peace dwell in us, so that we can truly offer that peace to one another. Does Christ’s peace rule in your heart? At the peace today, as much as we enjoy simply saying hello to one another, let us truly offer Christ’s peace to one another, so that peace can rule in our hearts. As we look in the eyes of one another, let us be thankful for each other. And let us remember that “Christ is all, and is in all.” Amen.