The all-sufficient Christ gives freedom from human regulations
See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the basic principles of this world rather than on Christ. 9 For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, 10 and you have been given fullness in Christ, who is the head over every power and authority. 11 In him you were also circumcised, in the putting off of the sinful nature, not with a circumcision done by the hands of men but with the circumcision done by Christ, 12 having been buried with him in baptism and raised with him through your faith in the power of God, who raised him from the dead.
Expressed positively, continuing in Christ means all that the apostle has held before us in verse 7. Expressed negatively, it means not letting oneself be carried away by human teachings that do not honor Christ or recognize the all-sufficiency of what he has done for man’s salvation. Such errors were being promoted by false teachers in Colosse. Paul did not want the believers there to be misled by clever arguments.
The apostle never dignifies the Colossian heresy by describing all its features, but from what he says here in verses 8 and 9 and also in verses 16, 18, and 20 of this same chapter, we can conclude that this false doctrine was a rather clever and devious mixture of Jewish ideas and pagan philosophy. Those who promoted this false teaching claimed that it was a more complete form of Christianity.
For all its wisdom and supposed sophistication, the Colossian heresy failed to acknowledge the all-sufficiency of Christ. At the very moment he penned these words, Paul knew that those false teachers with their Christ-denying errors were trying to make the Colossian believers their prey and lead them away as captives. Paul’s advice to the besieged Colossians is simple: Don’t let the false teachers succeed. You belong to Christ. Don’t let anyone kidnap you by false teaching and make you spiritual slaves.
The enemies of the gospel were trying to take the Colossians’ souls captive by a religious system based not on divine revelation, but on human reasoning. This system claimed to offer explanations of divine things according to ideas generally acceptable to men. It was no doubt cleverly presented by its proponents. Perhaps they even were sincere about it. It seemed both logical and learned, as do many systems of religious thought and morals invented and proposed by human beings.
Nevertheless, this religious system and all others like it are not only hollow and empty; they are dangerous and deceptive. They are invented by men and used by men for their own purposes. Those who propose such teachings and systems and traditions are like traders in fake stock. They try to persuade people to surrender valuable stock in exchange for something worthless.
The phrase “the basic principles of this world” is probably best understood to mean the elementary religious ideas of sinful human beings by which both Jews and Gentiles vainly tried to earn God’s favor. Such false ideas have lurked within the sin-blinded hearts of human beings since the fall. They enslave people to earthly laws, customs, and traditions. To these basic principles of this world, people or their teachers attach the idea of merit. Thus they attempt to pay for sin and to set things right between themselves and God by their own efforts. The Colossian false teachers were presenting notions about things like circumcision, festivals, food and drink, and the worship of angels as ways of achieving salvation, or at least a more complete Christianity. The false teachers presented their ideas as a more sophisticated form of Christianity. They looked down with haughty disdain on those who held to the simple gospel of salvation by grace through faith in Jesus.
It’s that way today too. Many modern teachers of religion present what seem to be sophisticated and clever systems of belief, complete with impressive-sounding terminology and logical explanations. They also look down on those who hold to the simple gospel and who put their trust in a verbally inspired Bible. They regard such believers as intellectually deprived and spiritually naive, but here Paul dismisses all human religious speculation as hollow and deceptive philosophy. He makes it clear that those who propose clever human religious systems are captives to the elementary religious ideas of the unconverted world.
In marked contrast to such hollow and deceptive philosophy, the apostle sets forth the all-sufficient Lord Jesus Christ. He reminds his readers that in Christ alone all fullness dwells, and in Christ alone believers themselves are made full. The statement in verse 9, “In Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form,” is another key doctrinal statement of the New Testament dealing with the person of Christ. Very simply, yet very powerfully, it tells us that Jesus is both God and man in one person. It tells us that all the characteristics that belong to God dwell in Christ, not only as the Son of God but also as the Son of man. When Jesus took on a human nature, the fullness of the Godhead was actually contained within his person and within his body.
Human reason rebels at the idea that within the human Christ that men could see was contained, and still is contained, all the fullness of the majesty of God. That’s like saying that all the water in the ocean is contained in a pitcher held in one’s hand. Nevertheless, that is exactly what the Bible says when it tells us that all the fullness of the Deity dwells in Christ.
It is evident from Scripture that Jesus was a man. He was like every other man in stature, appearance, habits, and needs. It is also evident from Scripture that God is extraordinary. He is eternal and present everywhere. He is allknowing, all-powerful, all-wise. He is all goodness and love. Yet in the human nature of Christ are contained all the extraordinary characteristics—yes, the very substance and being—of God. When Jesus was conceived in the womb of Mary, God himself took on human nature and became man. When Jesus died on the cross, God died. The body and blood that bought our redemption did so because all the divine fullness dwelt in the human nature of Christ.
This truth is a divine mystery. It is something that we cannot even begin to comprehend with our sin-limited human reason. But it is something we know and believe, because God clearly reveals it to us in passages of his Word like this one. Such inspired words of Scripture assure us beyond all doubt that Jesus Christ, the God-man, is our allsufficient Savior and Lord. Since all the fullness of the Deity dwells in Christ, he is the all-sufficient Savior, and we can find all that we need for our spiritual fullness and complete salvation in him.
When we by faith are connected with a Savior in whom all fullness dwells, we too are filled to the limit. We have all that we need for time and eternity, the fullness of every spiritual blessing. We have no need for human philosophies or schemes that are developed in accord with the elements of this world. None of these traditions, philosophies, or schemes could ever add a single thing to that which Jesus has already made complete. In divine matters, addition always equals subtraction. When human beings try to add to the completeness found in Christ, they lose. Only to those who abide in the all-sufficient Christ and in him alone will the blessings of his fullness flow.
Christ’s fullness and sufficiency also include his absolute rule over every power and authority in the spirit world. As part of their complicated religious system, the errorists in Colosse seem to have taught that spiritual beings (powers and authorities) could somehow affect believers’ lives apart from Christ. We know they advocated the worship of angels (see 2:18). Paul counters this false speculation by reminding his readers of the truth he has already set before them in 1:15,16, the truth that Christ is the supreme Lord over all created beings, including those that inhabit the spirit world.
Apart from Christ, good angels cannot help believers; and with Christ, believers will not be harmed by evil angels. So why should Christians look for something more or try to add to what the Savior offers, when in him they already have everything they need? The false teachers said, “You need Jesus, plus . . .”; Paul says, “You need Jesus, period.” In Jesus, believers have complete fullness and need not fear any power in heaven or on earth or under the earth.
Some of the ideas being promoted by the false teachers in Colosse were obviously Judaistic in character. We met the Judaizers in this book once before, in connection with our study of Philippians chapter 3, especially verses 1 to 6. These people were Pharisees with a Christian label. They insisted that believing in Jesus was not enough for salvation; Christians also had to observe a certain number of the outward laws and ceremonies that Moses had given to the Old Testament Israelites. Like the Judaizers in Philippi, the false teachers in Colosse put a great deal of emphasis on the ceremony of circumcision. Paul’s remarks in verses 16 and 17 of this chapter indicate that they also called for adherence to Old Testament dietary restrictions and strict observance of Old Testament festivals and Sabbath laws.
By insisting on these things, these teachers claimed that they were supplementing Christ’s work and thus making themselves better, more complete Christians, but in reality they were trying to establish and fill a need where there was none. They were like beggars who claimed that they had a good business opportunity for people who were already wealthier than they were.
Paul refutes those who insist on circumcision as a condition for salvation by reminding the Colossians, as he reminded the Philippians, that believers in Jesus possess a vastly superior circumcision not done with hands. By insisting upon physical circumcision as an outward ritual that supplements Christ’s work, the Colossian errorists had reduced circumcision to what Paul calls in Philippians a “mutilation,” a mere physical operation. There was absolutely no promise of God connected with it.
The circumcision that believers receive is a spiritual thing. It is a truly beneficial and blessed putting off of their old, sinful nature through the work of the Holy Spirit in their hearts. When the Spirit brings believers to faith in Jesus, their old sinful nature, like a filthy garment, is cut off and thrown away. Then the dominant force in believers’ lives is the new nature created by the Spirit, a nature that loves God and seeks to serve him. Because they have this new nature, believers’ bodies are no longer instruments of sin but instruments of righteousness for God.
As long as believers live on earth, the old nature will continue to lurk within them and try to regain its mastery over their lives. But the Holy Spirit, who gave believers their new nature, daily renews and strengthens that nature through the power of the gospel. Thus he enables believers to defeat the sinful nature with its lusts and desires. What was a mere physical operation like circumcision in comparison to the spiritual operation that the Holy Spirit had already performed within the hearts of the Colossians?
The Colossians had received this spiritual circumcision, Paul says, in Baptism. Incidentally, by making a connection here between Old Testament circumcision and New Testament Baptism, Paul indicates that in the New Testament, Baptism has taken the place of circumcision. The Old Testament circumcision, as God gave it to Abraham, was a sacrament, a means of grace by which God made the male children into members of the covenant line and sharers in the covenant promises God made to Abraham. Those covenant promises centered on the Savior from sin that God promised to send from Abraham’s descendants.
When Christ came, he fulfilled all those covenant promises. Before he ascended into heaven, he gave Baptism to his New Testament church. When they were baptized, Paul assures his readers, they were buried and raised with Christ through faith. Jesus died and was buried as the substitute for all mankind. The sins of the whole human race were nailed with him to his cross and buried with him in his tomb. He bore the punishment that satisfied the Father’s divine justice, and on Easter morning God raised him up in a great declaration that his atonement had been accepted and the world was saved.
In Baptism, Paul says, the Colossians had been made personal sharers in all of that. Through Baptism they had been brought to faith or strengthened in faith, which personally joined each of them to Christ. Through Baptism each one had personally received the blessings Christ had won for them. By virtue of their union with Christ in Baptism, God regarded Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection as if they were each individual believer’s own death, burial, and resurrection. Through Baptism the Colossian believers’ sinladen natures had been crucified and buried with Christ, and a new nature, created by the Holy Spirit in God’s image, had arisen in their hearts. Their status had been changed from objects of God’s wrath to members of his spiritual household. All these blessings and more were spiritual blessings bestowed by Christ, transmitted to individual believers through Baptism and received by faith.
Again, what a contrast there was between this blessed spiritual circumcision connected with the promises of God and the outward, mechanical circumcision advocated by the false teachers. That circumcision was performed on the body, and its supposed merits were connected to no divine promise but only to the deceptive religious theories of men. New Testament believers have no need for circumcision as a religious rite or a meritorious act, and they should not be intimidated by those who claim they do. New Testament believers, by virtue of their being baptized into Christ, have received a far better circumcision, the spiritual circumcision of heart and life.