Eyes to See

Would the Lord’s people please
open their Bibles to Paul’s epistle to the Colossians, where we can
resume our study of this letter, a heartfelt and very personal
letter to a church that Paul had never even visited. Even
though these believers were unknown to him personally, Paul could
not have his warm affection for them dampened, and we can feel
that in this letter. Paul began this letter with a
statement of gratitude, one long sentence there in verses three
through eight, an enthusiastic declaration of thanks for the
blessings that this church had received, and for what a blessing
they were to the apostle and Epaphras. One of the primary
themes of verses three through eight was God’s grace in saving
the people of Colossae. Paul had heard of the ready reception
of the gospel and their enthusiastic faith in Christ. The gospel had
done its incredible work in the lives of those in this community,
just as it does everywhere that it takes root. It was their faith,
their love, and their hope that bore witness to their conversion. That is the cause of Paul’s fervent
expression of gratitude here in those verses. The Colossians
were exhibiting the fruit of salvation. In the latter half
of that section, three through eight, particularly verses five
through eight, Paul goes on to articulate four magnificent features
of the gospel. This is where we were last Lord’s
Day. And we learned of the inherent trustworthiness of the gospel,
what Paul called in verse five, the word of truth. We heard of
the individual impact of the gospel, that it had indeed come
to the Colossians, and not just come to the Colossians, but had
begun to change and convert so many. Thirdly, we learned about
the common effect of the gospel, that this shouldn’t surprise
anyone that it had this effect on the Colossians, because it
has that effect anywhere that it is received. We saw that in
verse 6, the gospel had gone out into all the world and was
bearing fruit. And then lastly, we learned of
the personal communication of the gospel, that the gospel had
been carried to Colossae, almost certainly by Epaphras himself,
and not just carried there, but as it was delivered, it was received
by the Colossian people. And that is an awful lot for
which to give thanks, but the Thanksgiving portion of Paul’s
opening does draw to a close, and he quickly transitions to
another aspect of prayer. We studied a couple of weeks
ago, I mentioned ACTS. Paul has just finished the thanksgiving
portion of his prayer, and he moves directly into the supplication
portion, the request. If you would, I want to take
this in full, verses three all the way down through verse 14.
It’ll set the context for us as we turn to the request portion
of Paul’s opening. Verse three, we give thanks to
God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always for you
since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and the love
which you have for all the saints because of the hope laid up for
you in heaven. of which you previously heard
in the word of truth the gospel which has come to you just as
in all the world also it is constantly bearing fruit and increasing
even as it has been doing in you also since the day you heard
of it and understood the grace of God in truth just as you learned
it from Epaphras our beloved fellow servant who is a faithful
servant of Christ on our behalf and He also informed us of your
love in the Spirit. For this reason also, since the
day we heard of it, we have not ceased to pray for you and to
ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in
all spiritual wisdom and understanding, so that you will walk in a manner
worthy of the Lord and please Him in all respects. bearing
fruit in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of
God, and strengthened with all power according to His glorious
might for the attaining of all steadfastness and patience, joyously
giving thanks to the Father who has qualified us to share in
the inheritance of the saints in light. for he who rescued
us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom
of his beloved son in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness
of sins. As I indicated, Paul makes his
transition very abruptly here from thanksgiving for God’s grace
to the Colossians to his prayer for them. And as simply as I
can put it, Paul appeals to God that he would graciously supply
these believers with eyes to see. He desires that they would
be gifted with a spiritual vision, to develop a godly perspective
for their course throughout their Christian life. There are glorious
features. of spiritual insight, and Paul
presents to us three, three glories of a godly perspective. I want
to go back to verse 9, where we’ll start this morning, and
the nature of this week and the preparation, I don’t know how
far we’ll get. We may get through the entirety
of this. If we don’t, we’ll pick up next
Lord’s Day. Eyes to see, that’s Paul’s desire. Three glories of a godly perspective. And the first thing that Paul
tells us about is his request for spiritual insight. this he
addresses in verse nine, for this reason also, since the day
we heard of it, we have not ceased to pray for you and to ask that
you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual
wisdom and understanding. And when Paul begins here, for
this reason, he’s obviously referencing back to something that he has
already said. He’s providing an explanation
for something But what, we might ask, which reason? And the best answer to that is
to look back to verses four and five, to the good report that
Epaphras had brought regarding his church, a report of their
faith, hope, and love. Paul puts essentially a timestamp
on his prayers for the Colossians when he says there in verse four,
that he had been praying for them since he heard of their
faith. This was the point in time when
the Lord burdened Paul to pray for this church. Well, that timestamp
is a near echo of what Paul explains here in verse nine. He refreshes
that timestamp. He takes us back to verse four
and says, since the day we heard of it, since the day we heard
of your conversion and the fruit of your conversion in your faith,
love, and hope.” So it’s best to see Paul’s explanation here
in verse 9 really as an explanation of Epaphras’ very positive report
as detailed in verses 3 through 8, all of it. It was this report,
the grace of God at work in the Colossian believers, that prompts
the apostle to passionately pray for this church. This is the
reason. And it’s right here that I want
to call your attention to something really incredible. We tend to
be most inclined to request prayer and to pray for Those who are
struggling, a job loss, a sickness, some injury, some cause of heartache,
someone wandering away from the faith, those are the prayer requests
that we issue forward and that we tend to respond to in prayer. Those are the prayer requests
that capture our attention and they tend most to draw us to
prayer. And there’s nothing inherently
wrong with that. We should pray for the needs
of others. But there are other equally important
prayer matters that tend to go overlooked. It’s not the case
here in this passage. Because instead of focusing on
needs, hurts, sicknesses, Paul instead prays especially for
those who are doing well spiritually. That’s upside down from what
we do. The Colossians are solid in their Christianity. These
believers have been faithful. They are committed to Christ
and they are growing. And so instead of prayer for
some urgent difficulty, Paul’s urgency is prayer for their greater
usefulness to Christ. that God would add to the grace
already bestowed upon them that they might have an even greater
positive impact on those around them. As I said, what an incredible,
truly radical adjustment to our prayer lives. Pray for those
who are doing well spiritually. We would do well to emulate Paul’s
example here. We need not leave off all the
other kinds of prayer requests, sickness and hurt and need, but
neither should we neglect this very positive aspect of prayer,
a prayer for added measures of enabling grace, radically different. So Paul says that this news of
God at work in the hearts and lives of the Colossians produced
in them faith in Christ, love for one another, and eternal
hope That’s what prompted him to pray on their behalf in the
first place. And if you recall, those graces had already elicited
Paul’s gratitude to God. But for Paul, he could not be
content with the beginning only of a good work. He desires to
see that work completed to the full. And in light of the grace
that God had already given, Paul prays for more. Because He had heard of God’s
grace at work within the Colossian church. He says, we have not
ceased to pray for you. And he says here in verse nine,
that that was the reason for his continued prayer on their
behalf. It’s a reiteration of what he had said in the opening
section of verse three, praying always for you. Some commentaries
treated these statements as just mere hyperbole. Just an intentional
exaggeration. But even if Paul truly did not
pray for them every minute of the day, neither did he stop
praying for them at any point. He prayed for them on a regular
basis. And in that sense, he had not ceased to pray for the
Colossian church. Paul makes a similar statement.
in his epistle to the Ephesians at roughly the same juncture.
Chapter 1 verses 15 and 16, for this reason, I too, having heard
of the faith in the Lord Jesus which exists among you and your
love for all the saints, I do not cease giving thanks for you
while making mention of you in my prayers. But this appeal This
appeal before the throne of grace is not just a general prayer
on their behalf, kind of like we tend to do, bless all the
missionaries in the whole wide world. It’s not just a general
prayer. Paul makes a specific request
here. And we see it at the end of verse
nine. He asks that they would be filled with the knowledge
of his, that is God’s, will. This word ask is now the narrower
word for prayer, not just prayer in general, but that of asking
or petitioning or seeking God’s favor in some way. This is the
most popular word for prayer in the New Testament, rendered
to ask or to request. It expresses the direct request
made to God. Several weeks ago, as I said,
we took up that acrostic. ACTS, adoration, confession,
thanksgiving, supplication. This portion of Paul’s prayer
would fall under the S, supplication, making a request of God, petitioning
Him. And here, Paul’s specific appeal
to God on behalf of the Colossian believers is that they might
be filled with the knowledge of God’s will. In other words,
that they might know without a doubt what it is God wants
of them, how He wants them to live. This word filled is a very
frequently used word in the scriptures and very descriptive. Listen
to just a few examples. Jesus likened the kingdom of
God to a fishing net, in Matthew chapter 12, tossed into the sea,
of which Jesus says, when it was filled, filled to overflowing,
they drew it in. Filled to overflowing. The gospel of Mark records the
beginning of Jesus’ ministry with these words. The time is
fulfilled. The kingdom of God is at hand.
There’s no need to wait any longer. Christ’s ministry has begun.
God’s plan of redemption is almost complete. And how about this
use of the word? When John’s gospel records that
Mary came and anointed the feet of Jesus, And the house was filled
with the fragrance. Several chapters later, when
Jesus reiterates to his disciples that he would be departing from
them, he acknowledges that sorrow had filled their hearts. And so we begin to see that it’s
not that Paul appeals to God for just a little bit more of
this knowledge of his will for the Colossians. No, he says,
God, please fill them up. He asked that they would be filled
with the knowledge of God’s will. This word for knowledge is noteworthy
as well. It’s an intensified form of the
word for knowledge. Let me explain that. The basic word for knowledge
in the New Testament is gnosis, knowledge. We can all have knowledge,
but that’s not the word that Paul uses here. The word Paul
uses is epignosis, an intensified form. And if I can use my millennial
speak for a moment, what he’s talking about here is not just
knowledge, but super knowledge. Epignosis describes the knowledge that the believer not only has
in his or her head, but that he or she applies to daily life,
applied knowledge. And it’s almost as if Paul has
saved up this word for the latter half of his epistles, because
in the first six of his letters, he only uses this word three
times in that entire six volume set of epistles, Galatians, Corinthians,
Thessalonians, and such, only three times, but in the latter
portion of his collection, the last seven epistles of Paul,
he uses this word no fewer than 12 times. He employs this word
in all four of the opening of the prison epistles, And it seems
that as he drew near to the end of his own life and ministry,
he knew that the greatest need in the church was the application
of knowledge to real life, epignosis, super knowledge. God, Paul says,
I ask that these believers would really know, that they would
super know your will. Paul speaks of knowing God’s
will here. He isn’t talking about the grand
scope of God’s great plan of redemption. From eternity past
to eternity future, that we would know all the ins and outs of
that? No. The will of God that speaks to
us particularly, individually, God’s moral will for our lives. This is exactly how Jesus used
that phrase. Matthew 7, 21, not everyone who
says to me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven,
but he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Paul
puts it likewise. In Ephesians 5, 17, do not be
foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is. We need
to understand what the will of the Lord is, what He desires
of us, what He expects of us in order to obey Him. To live a life that is honoring
to God, we must know His will. To know how He desires that we
live. To be obedient to His commands.
But we cannot obey what we do not know. Imagine yourself a
new hire. You’ve just taken on with a new
company. Imagine skipping orientation. Imagine that nobody tells you
where your desk is, nobody tells you even what your job is, you’re
just expected to wander in and find something to do. It wouldn’t
work very well, wouldn’t last very long. That’s what it would be like
to become a Christian and not know what God desires of you. Just begin to wander about hoping
that whatever it is you’re doing is pleasing to God. We cannot obey what we do not
know. And so to be filled with the
knowledge of God’s will is to know and understand the moral
absolutes, the biblical principles found in Scripture. They’re presented
there for our sanctification, for our growth in Christ. And
those principles can be found only in scripture. And so to
know God’s will, we have to know God’s word. Proverbs 19, two
says, it is not good for a person to be without knowledge. And
he who hurries his footsteps errors. How important is it for
us then to look to God’s word for instruction about what he
desires of us? This principle is found everywhere
in Scripture. Hosea 4.6, my people are destroyed
for lack of knowledge. 1 Corinthians 14, do not be children
in your thinking, but be mature. Ephesians 4, that we are to be
attaining to the knowledge of God. Romans 12, we are to be
transformed by the renewing of our mind that we may prove what
the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.
The Colossians had made a good start. They had begun to learn
of God, learn of His character, His attributes, His ways, His
redemption, His commands. But they were far from complete.
They were far from mature in Christ. They were not yet glorified,
perfect. And so this was Paul’s desire
that they might grow in the knowledge of God, that they might be filled
in that regard, knowing exactly what God desires of them. His request in full here in verse
nine is that these believers would be filled with the knowledge
of God in all spiritual wisdom and understanding. Paul provides
for us here really the means. This is the means of gathering
in this knowledge of which he speaks. It’s acquired by spiritual
wisdom and spiritual understanding. That adjective, spiritual, governs
both nouns, wisdom and understanding. These gifts are spiritual in
that they are ultimately imparted to us and developed by the Holy
Spirit. And because of that, we could
think of what is spoken of here as mental excellence. Wisdom here is a broader term
than understanding. It speaks of a capacity to gather
and sort principles from Scripture. And this spiritual wisdom is
an important and recurring theme in this letter to the Colossians.
Paul uses this word six times in this short epistle. In 128,
Paul says that he teaches with wisdom. In 2-3, he says that
Christ is all wisdom. In 3-6, he urges the Colossians
to teach each other in wisdom. And in 4.5, he urges them to
conduct themselves with wisdom. Wisdom is a key feature of this
letter. We’ll see it again and again.
The second word that Paul uses here is spiritual understanding.
On the other hand, it’s a narrower word. It’s used to speak of the
ability to apply this spiritual wisdom, and Paul wanted God to
impart this grace to the Colossians as well. This is the quality that enables
the Christian to take one of those principles from God’s Word,
to digest a biblical principle, and adeptly and appropriately
apply it to everyday situations. What a beautiful prayer request
this. But this prayer request is a prayer request on behalf
of Those who were already doing well. Not those who were struggling
and ready to duck out the back door on their Christianity. That
would be a much different prayer request. I was talking with someone
this week who lamented that they were not perhaps as useful to
the Savior because of their lack of training. Do we realize that
if we are in Christ, we have the greatest means of serving
one another, prayer. And so we should pray for believers
as well that God would graciously impart to them the gift of this
super knowledge by means of the supporting graces of spiritual
wisdom and spiritual understanding. that they would be those gleaning
from the scriptures, these principles by which to live. Paul routinely
prayed for his churches, even for those believers that he’d
never even met. There’s a second Gloria of developing
a godly perspective, not only the request for spiritual insight,
which is remarkable, that he prays for those who are strong
and well, but the second spiritual insight is the objective of spiritual
insight. What does it do once you possess
spiritual insight? What does it do when you gather
all this knowledge and wisdom and understanding? We see it
in verse 10. So that you will walk in a manner
worthy of the Lord to please him in all respects. Paul has
expressed his prayer, a prayer for what could be perceived as
snobbish intellectualism. The knowledge and wisdom and
understanding for which Paul prayed, this was not Paul’s desire
at all. Instead, those things served
the purpose of changing the believer’s practice for the good. The knowledge
was not an end in itself, It would change the person’s life
outwardly, his conduct, his speech, his affections, his demeanor.
The statement here at the outset of verse 10 is really an expansion,
a further explanation of Paul’s prayer request, that the Colossians
would be filled with knowledge and spiritual wisdom and understanding. This is an extension of that
request. In other words, so that as well
as the following words, to please, that sounds almost here as if
Paul is stating the purpose of being filled with knowledge,
that this is our goal, that this must be due to our effort, as
if he’s setting forth some kind of a target for the believer
to aim. He’s not. He’s not setting forth
a target here at all. He’s simply stating the spiritual
result of knowledge and wisdom and understanding. If we have
those, it will produce the latter. A godly life is the result of
godly thinking. A godly thought life will issue
forth in a godly life. If a believer is filled with
such knowledge from God, wisdom and understanding, then walking
in a manner worthy of the Lord will be the result. Such a believer
would be pleasing to God, as Paul says it here. Paul extensively
uses this metaphor of the Christian walk. It was a familiar Hebraism,
a well-turned phrase among the Jews, an illustration, if you
will. And it refers to the daily, moment-by-moment conduct by which
a person is characterized. He has a good walk. He has a
faulty walk. He has a wayward walk. It’s the
daily moment-by-moment conduct by which a person is characterized.
And Paul uses this illustration in no fewer than eight of his
epistles. Just listen, Romans 6, 4. Walk in the newness of
life. 1 Corinthians 3, 3. Are you not
walking like mere men? 2 Corinthians 5, 7. We walk by
faith, not by sight. Galatians 5.16, walk by the Spirit. Ephesians 2.10, that we are created
in Christ Jesus for good works that we may walk in them. Ephesians 4.1, walk in a manner
worthy of the calling with which you’ve been called. Philippians
3.17, walk according to the pattern you have in us. Colossians 2.6,
walk in him. 1 Thessalonians 2.12, walk in
a manner worthy of the God who calls you. Now, in none of those
passages is Paul talking about the literal step-by-step process
of walking physically. It’s a metaphor. And in employing
it, Paul refers to the whole course of the Christian’s life.
You see, to God, the Christian life is always more than just
right doctrine, head knowledge, It’s the application of that
doctrine to daily living that leads to honoring the Lord and
pleasing Him in what we do. Right doctrine, rightly applied,
leads to a God-honoring life, a worthy walk. And so here in
verse 10, Paul speaks of walking in a manner worthy of the Lord.
It’s a fascinating little phrase, walk worthy, and for some of
us, it puts us on our heels. We don’t even think that’s even
remotely possible. To live up to honoring the Lord
in our daily life. This word worthy originally referred
to the process of weighing some commodity, grain or vegetables,
what have you. In other words, the thing, the
thing weighed, measured up. It was worth its weight. And
so the phrase walk-worthy, it essentially sets forth the standard,
a way of living to which the Christian is called, and by which
the Christian can evaluate his or her progress. It refers to
a life that is befitting the name of Christian, a life that
measures up to its claims. Not just a claim of believing
in Christ, but a life commensurate with those claims. Paul uses
that little phrase, walk worthy, in four other places in his writings.
You can jot these down. I’ll move too quickly for you
to turn to each one. Four times he uses that phrase,
Romans 16 too. Speaking of his friend Phoebe,
that you receive her in the Lord in a manner worthy of the saints.
It should measure up. Paul, speaking of his dear friend
Phoebe there, who, if you might remember, was the likely carrier
of the Book of Romans. No small task. She was supposed
to carry Romans from Corinth to Rome. amazing lady. Phoebe was an amazing and godly
woman, but it’s not as if she was expected to be treated any
differently than other believers. Paul says here that essentially
all saints are worthy of such treatment. Fellow believers inherently
deserve our utmost affection and care and hospitality. We
are to treat saints, fellow believers, in Christ as they should be treated. That’s all he says of Phoebe.
Treat her like one of the fellow believers in your midst. He also
uses this phrase in Philippians 127. Only conduct yourselves
in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ. And here Paul uses
the same standard appended to the gospel. The good news of
Christ is a message of God’s transforming grace, and such
a message will be muddled if it is not attended with a worthy
walk, a life that measures up to the standard of the gospel. First Thessalonians 2.17, he
uses the same phrase. He was exhorting and encouraging
and imploring each of them that they would walk in a manner worthy
of the God who had called them. If they had truly turned their
backs on idolatry to follow Christ, they would indeed walk worthy. The last of the four additional
places, Ephesians 4.1, walk in a manner worthy of the calling
with which you’ve been called. Believers have been issued by
God a divine summons. We’ve been called by God himself
through his word and his spirit, and so here too is this divine
standard. But here, Even though Paul essentially
uses the same phrase in Colossians chapter 1, walk worthy, it’s
not as if he’s issuing a command, something to obey. Get out there
and do it. Go walk worthy. That’s not it
at all. He’s simply telling them the
result, what to expect if we are really filled with knowledge
and spiritual wisdom and understanding. Those graces will produce in
the believer a life, a walk that is worthy of our Lord, our Lord Jesus Christ. Paul. here pictures our Lord in glory
taking pleasure in the lives of his children. It’s an astounding
image. And we might have a bad day,
might have a bad moment, or even a bad season, but the trajectory
of the Christian’s life is going to be growing in grace to maturity. One thing is certain, In time,
we will be glorified. We will be perfected. We might
as well be moving in that direction. And so the goal of the Christian
ought to be, as Paul encouraged here to the Thessalonians, to
excel still more. We ought to desire to grow. We
ought not be surprised that one day our walk, our daily conduct,
is deemed by God himself as worthy. And so this walking worthy of
the Lord, pleasing to him, what does it look like? And in the four and a half verses
remaining, Paul tells us. Paul tells us what the worthy
walk looks like. It’s the third glory of a godly
perspective, not only the request for spiritual insight and the
objective of spiritual insight, but the benefits of spiritual
insight. What does it look like? We see
that in the latter half of verse 10 all the way through verse
14. Let’s just grab a few of these
for the moment. He says right there in the middle
of verse 10, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing
in the knowledge of God, strengthened with all power according to his
glorious might for the attaining of all steadfastness and patience. From here in the middle of verse
10 all the way down, as I said, through verse 14, Paul details
for us what it looks like to walk worthy of the Lord. And
again, these are not set forth as some kind of goals to be met,
metrics. They are to be observed. They
are to be watched for. They are indications that the
knowledge, wisdom, and understanding of God are having an influence
in our lives. And there are four of these marks
in all. Four indications of walking as
God would have us to walk, and we’re not gonna finish all four,
so don’t panic. Four indications of walking as
God would have us to walk brought about by the accumulation of
spiritual knowledge, wisdom, and understanding. The first
of these, the first fruit of knowledge is just that, it’s
fruitfulness. That’s what he says in the middle
of verse 10. For those who have begun to increase in their familiarity
with the Bible, such comprehension begins to yield growth. It’s
as simple as that. What Paul describes here as bearing
fruit. The more we dig into scripture,
the more we are educated and informed by the Bible itself,
the more inclined we are to fruitfulness. As we noted several weeks ago
in our consideration, just glance back at verse six, Paul uses
the same two words there. Fruit-bearing is one of Paul’s
favorite figures of speech. Paul uses both of these terms
in verse six, as we saw, bearing fruit and increasing. So that
what was true of the Christians everywhere, he said there, would
also be true, shouldn’t be surprising that it’s true of the Colossian
people. And we saw there that Paul almost certainly borrowed
the illustration from the Lord himself as employed in the parable
of the soils, remember that? Bearing fruit and increasing. In the parable of the soils,
Fruit-bearing refers to the initial indications of salvation. That’s the point of the parable,
is that not only would it produce repentance, but a life of faith. Paul may well have been using
it that way back in verse six. It at least is a possibility
that he was speaking there of conversions and the spread of
the gospel. there is that element in fruit-bearing,
in the increase, but here he is using this illustration in
a completely different sense. Here fruit-bearing refers more
to the individual’s growth in grace, sanctification, bearing
forth the fruit of righteousness in their lives. You see, Paul
has already acknowledged that these individuals in Colossae
to whom he’s writing, they were already saved. So the fruit here
cannot be salvation again. Sanctification is much more in
view here. This is the same way that Paul
uses this metaphor in Romans chapter seven. Just listen. There
in Romans 7, he suggested that fruitfulness is the whole point
and purpose of the Christian life. In verses 4 and 5, he says,
therefore, my brethren, you were made to die to the law through
the body of Christ so that you might be joined to another, to
him who was raised from the dead. Why? In order that we might bear
fruit for God. He’s not just talking about our
initial salvation there. He’s talking about our sanctification. The whole point of our union
with Christ, he says, is that we would bring forth the fruit
of righteousness, that we would live godly lives. A godly life
is right and appropriate for all genuine and mature believers. It’s to be expected. And note
this. Paul says here that the Christian
is to bear fruit in every good work. Now, we just reviewed the
solas of the Reformation. We’re not backing away one bit
from salvation by faith alone in Christ alone. Salvation is
not and could never be from works, even good works. Salvation is
by faith alone, but that said, the same God who grants salvation
also begins the work of sanctification in every believer’s life, so
that each new indication of that work of God is seen as fruit. Those good works do not save
a person, but they are an indication, the proof, that salvation has
indeed occurred. How else could such be measured? Not by feelings. No, the fruit
bearing occurs in the realm of good works, righteous standards,
selfless living, deeds of kindness, service to Christ and his body,
love for God’s people, love to one’s neighbor, and so much more.
Those are indications of fruit. These are the fruit of good works.
And such are not only present, but they are increasingly so
in the Christian’s life. You ought to be more fruitful
now than you were five years ago as a believer. In the opening of this letter, Paul
showed that such fruit bearing could be seen, as he says in
verse six, in all the world. This isn’t anything that God
is asking you alone to be and become. Everywhere the gospel
puts down roots, it could be verified in the fruit that was
produced. So if you walk into a field,
into a church, into a community, and there is no fruit, the conclusion
is there is no salvation. The Colossians themselves, he
says at the end of verse six, were producing the same kind
of good fruit. It wasn’t surprising. No wonder
then that here, as he has begun to address individual Christians,
fruit bearing is stated as an expectation. A Christian who
is growing in the knowledge of God by means of spiritual wisdom
and understanding will inevitably be producing fruit, and that
fruit will be seen in their good works. There’s a second indication,
and a third, and a fourth, and as I indicated, we will take
those up by, if God wills, next Lord’s Day. Let’s go before Him
in prayer.