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Let's read again now in the second chapter of the Epistle to the Colossians, and first of all in verse eight. Take heed, lest there shall be anyone that makes spoil of you through his philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ. For in him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. Verse sixteen: Let no man therefore judge you in meat or in drink, or in respect of a feast day, or a new moon, or a Sabbath day, which are a shadow of the things to come.
But the body is Christ's. Let no man rob you of your prize by voluntary humility and worshiping of the angels, dwelling in the things that he has seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind, and not holding fast the head, from whom all the body, being supplied and knit together through the joints and bands, increases with the increase of God. If you died with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why, as though living in the world, do you subject yourselves to ordinances such as handle not, nor taste, nor touch?
All which things are to perish with the using, after the precepts and doctrines of men, which things have indeed a show of wisdom in will worship and humility and severity to the body, but are not of any value against the indulgence of the flesh. Once more, as we begin this last session, let's look at our layout of the general thought flow of the epistle, so that we can take our bearings as to where exactly, uh, we have come.
And on our last occasion, we were trying, however briefly, to deal with this wonderful paragraph two in the second movement of the epistle that talked of our need as being dead in trespasses and in sins, and how God in his wisdom has made us alive through the marvelous strategies and tactics of the cross. Now we come to this final paragraph three, final in the second movement, that has to do with the strivings of the religionists, the mystics, and the ascetics. We noticed in our first session this morning how all the final paragraphs in each movement deal with the topic of spiritual striving.
And perhaps it is appropriate that we have left a consideration of it until this last session, because you may feel just like that, that this last session takes a lot of effort and striving to get through. Well, it will all add reality to your spiritual studies. But now, at length and at last, Paul is going to come round to deal with recipes for the development of spiritual life that are unhelpful, to say the least, and some of them are absolutely false and bogus. I suggest we notice at the very first, uh, of our study, the proportion that Paul devotes of this letter to exposing what is false.
How many lovely things he has told us about the Lord Jesus, positively about him and the glories of our salvation, before he start mentioning these false things. And when he has mentioned them, oh, what more lovely things he will have to tell us about the Lord Jesus and the true methods of spiritual discipline. And his example is one that perhaps that we are wise to follow. We must mention from time to time false and unhelpful things to expose them. God give us the wisdom to do it in the proportions such as the apostles, uh, themselves employed. And God give us the grace to do these things in their true context.
We shall find, as we read these things, that, uh, Paul is saying that none of them is helpful, some of them are false. We must understand him in the context of what he's talking about. If we read some of his other writings, then we should find him, uh, mentioning a lot of considerations that will lead us to a balanced view in this whole debated area. We mustn't suppose that this paragraph is the only thing that Paul ever wrote that impinges on this topic. God give us then likewise, in our ex- exposure of what is false, to seek to develop a balanced mind and not become extremists.
So now let us look at some of the, uh, false methods of holiness as Paul deals with them, and see how they are contrasted with the true. Going back to, uh, verses eight and nine of chapter two, we have the question of philosophy, better called theosophy nowadays than philosophy, for philosophy itself is a highly respectable art, if not a science. What Paul is talking about is what we nowadays would call theosophy. But notice the contrast he makes.
It may help us to sum up what is right and what is wrong. He says that this man's empty theosophy is after the tradition of men. Why would you go after the tradition of men when there is open to you all the vast treasures that are in Christ? In him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead. You only have to put them together to see the folly of going after something that is merely of human origin and something that is divine. Then later, in verses sixteen and seventeen, he talks of Jewish food laws and festivals.
Meats and drinks, festivals and Sabbaths. And of these things, he says they are a shadow of the things to come. He immediately contrasts it with, as he puts it, the body, but the body is Christ's, that is body in the sense of the reality. These were at best but the shadows that pointed forward to the coming great reality. The reality itself is Christ, of course, and his great salvation. You only have to put the contrast side by side to see the answer to the question, why would you go for the shadow when the reality is available?
And then in verses eighteen to nineteen, he comes to the question of Jewish and perhaps also pagan mysticism. Techniques for inducing visions and out of the body states, and so forth and so on. Once more, he contrasts these things with the real thing. He says that the man that goes in for this kind of Jewish or even pagan mysticism and inducing visions and ecstatic states and what have you, is puffed up to no purpose, it's all empty, by his fleshly mind.
Granted, there's something going on inside his head, but it's mere puffing up and is to be contrasted with the head. Watch your heads, my brothers and sisters, yes, and what goes on inside them. We mustn't be misled by thinking that everything that goes on inside our little heads is worthwhile or is real. We want to make sure, as distinct from being puffed up by a fleshly mind, that we hold the head, which is the Lord Jesus.
And finally, he comes in verse twenty three to what you might call asceticism, legalistic asceticism. Ranges of disciplines, touch n- handle not, taste not, touch not, the development of willpower, uh, uh, and severity to the body, asceticism being the technical term for it. It is common to many religions. Alas, it has long since invaded Christianity. Notice the contrast he makes. This kind of asceticism has a show of wisdom.
It looks very impressive when you first meet it, but in actual fact, it isn't of any value. So these are the things that we're going to think about briefly in this session. And we start with the first of them, with theosophy. And I don't want to say much about it. I suspect that few of us here present are liable to be involved with it, though even here in Belfast you may have some friends, you'll see, uh, that uh, are involved with it in Christian science or other some such things which are based on Hindu philosophy and come very near to theosophy itself.
It is an age-old, hoary old theory that pretends it knows all about the powers, the principalities and powers that lie between humankind and God. It will eventually tell you that it believes in the great world spirit. But if you were to ask them straight, is Jesus the Christ? And you really push them hard, they would say no. The Christ, they would say, is the great world spirit. Jesus lent himself to the Christ, and the Christ used Jesus as the Christ has used many another religious leader, but Jesus isn't the Christ.
Jesus is now a refined spirit of the seventh degree, or what other else other degree they put him in. They will tell you that amongst the advanced spirits there is a white brotherhood of men and women like Jesus who finished their life on earth in such state of perfection that now they are available to help you on your road. Don't ask whither to. Some of them may be very real, but you would be unwise to follow such a so-called white brotherhood. In the ancient world, among the Greek philosophers, there were serious men who, contemplating the imperfections of our, our created universe around us, disease and sin and devastation, decided, as they tried their best to work out these things without the aid of revelation, that the great God couldn't possibly be responsible for this universe in the state of imperfection it is in.
They thought it would be, uh, a slander to suggest that the Almighty, the One, the Supreme was responsible for it. And so they suggested there must be many lesser beings, demiurges, the maker of mankind, who, being less able and less perfect than God himself, created this world and control it. And when that kind of philosophy was taken over and made a religion of, as it was in some circles, then, of course, they held that if you wanted to come at last to fellowship with the supreme deity, you must come through the mediation of these intermediary powers, principalities and powers.
And so they spun their theories. And Paul is telling you straight here that this is, is false. Don't be taken in by it. It will carry you away like plunder. Carry you away from what? It will carry you away from the Lord Jesus Christ. And all the tremendous riches that there are in him. For now, Paul asserts the difference between the two. These are, he says, these theosophies, but the traditions of men. In Christ- Christ Jesus, the fullness of the Godhead dwells bodily, and you are complete in him.
He's the head of all principalities and powers. Granted that there are in this universe great spiritual powers, with powers originally delegated to them from God. It remains true, as the middle paragraph of Movement one reminded us, that Christ was their creator. And now the, the central paragraph of, uh, cha- uh, of the second movement is going to tell us that he is the head of them. That is exceedingly important to get hold of in the practical question of our fight against sin, our developing holiness.
Do you see that idea that the world was not made by God but by some subordinate, uh, powers, or as in Zoroastrianism, that the power for good and the power for evil are equal and independent, can have its devastating, uh, effects on anybody who believes it. Suppose there were two equal gods, one a good god and one a bad, as Zoroastrianism has taught. Then, in wrestling against evil, you wrestle against something that has the status of the ultimate. Deity itself. It isn't true.
Oh, thank God it isn't true. Evil may be strong, but it's not absolutely strong. Why, even the devil himself was originally and still remains a creature of God. Our blessed Lord was his creator, and at this moment our Lord is head of all principalities and powers. And young man, if I would give you advice in business, don't go to the new errand boy or the clerk in the office and the reception desk. If you want to get on, go to the top man. Isn't that good advice? It's good advice in business, you know, if you want to get anything done, go to the top. And when it comes to spiritual life, oh, don't bother about principalities and powers.
You want to get on, gentlemen, ladies, go to the top. Go to the blessed Lord Jesus. He's head of all principality and power. And I'll tell you something else that's marvelous about him. He still has a human form. When last his disciples saw him go, he went with a body that they could feel and touch. And at this present moment, enthroned, he's a man still. Oh, how kind of God to give us someone who is human as well as divine to concentrate our attentions on. We are humans, you know, and in our present state, too much concentration on spirit powers can have harmful effects.
Set your mind on him who, though he is God, is God incarnate and is veritably human. But let's move on to the next things that are unhelpful. The Jewish food laws and festivals. You will see that that is what they are because Paul says of them in chapter two verse seventeen, which are a shadow of the things to come. The writer to the Hebrews will explain in more detail what is meant by that phrase. Israel's religion was given her by God, including the food laws, including the festivals, or most of them at any rate.
But they were, says Paul, shadows of the good things to come. Now the reality is here. Why would you want the shadow? Yes, of course, the shadows were good in their day and taught Israel a number of important lessons, but now you've got the reality. Why would you want the shadow still? Oh yes, see young Nibs, he's four years old or more in his bath, and he's surrounded with a lot of toy ships. Well, he's getting a lot of fun of it now. Who knows, one of these days he might grow up to be an admiral, you never do know, do you?
And uh, uh, uh, be captain of a real boat, you'll see. So getting to know a thing about uh hi- uh hydrodynamics or whatever it is in the bath, uh, and the sinkability of boats and things isn't a bad lesson to learn, even at the tender age of four years old, and by the medium of what, after all, are only toys, shadows of the coming big thing. You'd be distressed to see him at forty in his bath with, with toy boats, wouldn't you? And why go in for the shadows now, when you can have the reality? Under the law, says Paul in Galatians, God had to treat his people like infants and put them under all sorts of rigorous disciplines.
But now that the Son of God has come, and he sent the spirit of his son into your heart, you're grown up sons. Be grown up sons and act like grown up sons. Embrace the reality and let go the shadows. Notice that Paul isn't saying that the shadows were bad. And if you had pressed him, he would have admitted that the shadows were laid down by God. We must bear that in mind. You'll notice when Paul says, let no man therefore judge you in these matters, he is talking about people who are so immersed in these shadows and keeping their food laws and their f- days of festival and holy days and things, that they get upset if they see you as a Christian not observing these food laws and days.
And in other parts of his writings, Paul will tell us that we must be careful with other people's genuine conscience if they feel that they must observe certain special days still. One man thinks he can eat meat, the other eats only vegetable. We must learn to be gracious and careful, and we must not judge the man who does eat if we think we oughtn't to, and he mustn't despise us either. God give us that gracious, balanced heart and mind, you'll see. There are still some people who feel under obligation to keep some of those Old Testament rules and regulations about food and the keeping of special days like the Sabbath day.
But what Paul is talking about here is the value of these rules and regulations for the promotion of spiritual life. And one, you'll see what is the use of the shadow when you've got the reality. And second, it can happen, can't it, that people get so enamored of the shadow that they don't want the reality. It happened in our Lord's life. I can only just remind you of one of the major themes of the Gospel of John. How that our Lord Jesus went up to the temple from time to time on the occasion of some of these festivals.
For instance, in chapters seven and eight and nine and ten, John records how our Lord went up to the tabern- the temple at the Feast of the Tabernacles. And there f- were the priests daily taking the water from the pool of Siloam and, uh, pouring it at the base of the altar in memory of the day when centuries before Israel had been in the wilderness and God had had Moses smite the rock, and the physical water came out to satisfy their physical thirst. Well, it was a lovely thing to remember, wasn't it? But when all was said and done, it was by now a shadow of the coming good thing. And the coming good thing, what was that? Why, that was our Lord, who stood and cried on the last day of the feast, if any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink, and out of his inward parts he'll throw rivers of living water.
This spake he of the Spirit. Here was the reality of which that was but the prototype and the shadow. But when our blessed Lord offered himself as the reality able to dispense the gift of the satisfying gift of the water of the Holy Spirit, there were some of them, many of them, who didn't want it. Caiaphas was furious. This young man from Nazareth daring to suggest that after a week long of pageantry and ceremony and ritual and robes and lights and incense and sacrifices galore, anybody could possibly be left unsatisfied. He was furious, plotted the death of the Lord Jesus.
Sometimes happens that people get so enamored with the shadow that when the reality is offered, they don't want it. And we must, um, watch that, mustn't we? Even with our own Christian observations. How many folks there have been in some countries that would have kept the Sabbath day, thinking that God requires Christians to keep a Sabbath day as a Sabbath, and has kept it as rigorously as possibly it could be kept in these northern parts. And yet, if you ask them, have they that rest of God? Do they know what the glorious rest of salvation is, in which they cease from their own works and trust the Savior, absolutely certain of entering one day into the great rab- Sabbath rest above, they'd shake their heads and tell you they don't have that rest of heart.
Oh friend, what is the good of the shadow if you don't have the reality? Let's not throw too many big stones in the direction of Judaism. It's possible for us Christians, isn't it, to take symbols like the Lord's Supper itself, rigorously attend the Lord's Supper, but not have the reality. Yes, the reality we want, isn't it? But then we move on to the next division, two eighteen to nineteen, Jewish and possibly pagan mysticism. None of the scholars, that is the good scholars, uh, can be absolutely certain as to what kind of religious exercise verses eighteen and nineteen are talking about, and I, being a very poor scholar, shall not attempt to decide it for them.
But it would appear perhaps to be a reference to Jewish mysticism, perhaps also to some pagan mysticism. Many religions, certainly Judaism and Islam, and some forms of Christianity, as well as Hinduism, will talk to you about the possibility of having visions and ecstasies. In Judaism, at one stage, whether contemporary with the apostle or later, who knows, there were sections of Judaism that, uh, cultivated what was called in their tongue merkabah mysticism.
Briefly ex- described, it was this. It was based, so its advocates said, on the vision that God gave to Ezekiel and recorded in chapter one of that prophecy, where Ezekiel was given to see the vision of the throne of God with its attendant cherubim. From that, some of the sects in Judaism said that they too could teach you techniques so that you yourself could attain to having this vision. The techniques and the spr- the preparation would be rigorous, but they could take you on a trip, so to speak, out of the body trip, in which you ascended through the various levels of the planets and passed the principalities and powers and the serid ranks of angels, till you actually came to the throne of God and could see it in your vision.
See the throne of God, as I can see those lights in the ceiling here, and you would see it in your vision. And they would further add that in this great experience, this mystical ecstatic experience of a vision, that you would have to cultivate the principalities and powers and see that you reverence the angels. Because for your spirit to rise from the body and go on its journey through the ranks of principalities and powers to arrive at the throne of God, you would have to pass through good angels. They would expect you to reverence them, to help you on your way.
You would have to pass through evil spirits and angels, and you'd have to be very careful about those and placate them all you could. For if they didn't harm you on the way up, so to speak, they certainly would do their very worst to harm you on the way down. And it all seems so marvelous. Could I have an out-of-the-body experience and in my spirit rise up through the planets and the angels and see the very throne of God? Oh, that must be the real thing. That isn't the real thing. And that's either false or worse. Still, to be balanced, we should have to remember that God does sometimes give his people real vision.
Though how frequent the occurrence is, who would like to say? Extraordinarily few of them mentioned in the New Testament. Paul had a vision. Mm. He doesn't tell us te- he didn't tell anybody about it in his letters, at least, for thirteen or fourteen years, and what he says is exceedingly brief. Peter had a vision. John had a whole series of visions. That is true. We mustn't forget it. There's a very big difference from a vision that God gives his inspired apostles and so-called visions that people work up by their techniques.
In the Middle East, you can go to all sorts of religious practitioners who will teach you the techniques necessary, fasting and whatnot, and so forth, to have these out-of-the-body experiences. It'll be a sad day in Christendom if Christian leaders borrow those techniques, as in some quarters they seem in danger of doing. What's wrong with it all? Well, you might be suspicious when you hear about the need to placate angels and worship angels. Mightn't you?
What are you doing worshiping angels anyway? If they were good angels, they would protest if you tried it. It's a derogation of the honor of the Lord to worship angels. How much more if you start worshipping the saints? And if you're thinking of placating the devil, don't try. Or have you forgotten what the previous paragraph said? Take more than you to silence him, wouldn't it? It's Christ and his great work that has fought that fight. But what about the status of the visions that they work up?
Are they all genuine? Do they actually see principalities and powers and the throne of God? Or is it a little bit like Scrooge thought when he saw the ghost? He didn't know whether he was really there or as a bit of undigested cheese, as he put it. What about it? Oh, says Paul, notice the difference. This man is vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind. It's all to no purpose. Granted, there's something going on in his head subjectively. What use is it? No use at all, says Paul. And what relation does it bear to reality?
Well, it's nothing to do with the Lord Jesus. He's not holding the head. Oh, there is someone in that unseen world who sits in God's presence for us, says Paul. What we need to do is to make sure that objectively we hold the head, which is the blessed Lord Jesus. For you see, it is from him that all the increase comes necessary for our spiritual growth and progress. If you go in for these other things, they'll rob you of your prize. What prize? Well, of the progress that otherwise you would make if you came to the Lord Jesus.
We are then to hold the head in all his objective reality, and we shall find that he supplies us enough for our spiritual growth. And finally, we come to this business of asceticism. Severity to the body and so forth. Paul is going to say it is of no value whatever. Only perhaps we should remember what he says elsewhere. One Corinthians nine, he says, I beat my body black and blue. So he was pretty tough with his body, wasn't he, on- for that reason. What was he talking about there?
Well, he was talking about keeping his bodily- body and their appetites under control. He'll say the same thing, eh, in this epistle, chapter three, will he not, and, uh, verse, uh, five: Mortify therefore your members that are upon the earth. The man and woman that is in touch with the risen Lord will find in him the power to discipline the body and control and put an end to its unlawful desires and actions. But you see, here he's talking of a different thing completely. He's talking of people that would be severe to their physical body in their attempt either to gain salvation or to gain the power to lead a holy life.
The dear woman that's climbing Cr- Patrick with her bare feet to gain salvation, or as she would put it, to gain re- uh, release from the temporal consequence of sin for herself or for some loved one in purgatory. Ah, would not your compassion be stirred for her, sincere as any woman can be. Enduring this suffering and striving to get salvation. Doesn't it make your heart go out? You say, oh, my dear good woman, you could have salvation here and now. An assurance that you'll never come into purgatory anyway.
You don't get that assurance by being severe to your body. And you'll see, by being severe to the body, you don't necessarily deal with what the Bible calls the flesh. One translation of this verse is not of any value to the, uh, against the indulgence of the flesh. But it's not the body at fault, is it? Hm. Let's think about the body for the moment. You know, our Lord is its creator. And matter is not basically evil, matter is good. And the believer's body is for the Lord.
We're not to injure it. We're to control it, but not to injure it. Suppose you have a motor car, Josie, and it isn't going very well. And I come along and I've got enough grease on my fingers to suggest that I'm an expert in motor cars, to see. And I say to you, oh, it isn't going, mm-hmm, ah. Well, I think what you ought to do, I've my, uh, sledgehammer here, hit it hard. That'll teach it to go. There's one thing you will conclude at once about me. I wasn't the engineer who made the thing.
Yes, of course, if the trouble is that you have filled the old oil thing with too much oil and bunged it all up, then you'll have to learn restraint and discipline in putting the oil in, and the chap will tell you, no, you shouldn't put so much oil in, you'll see. Put too much oil in, the thing will go bad, and if you put too little oil in, it will go bad as well, as you'll see. So you have to learn to be disciplined. Don't let it run away with you, putting the oil in, let alone the cost of the stuff, but don't put too much in, you'll see, because you have to discipline these engines. And so with your body. Don't put too much food in the old mouth, will you? Nor too little. You've got to learn sense in controlling it. But what if I came to you and said, you know, I'd teach this car of yours to behave?
Let's put a little sand in the petrol. That'll make it rough. Ridiculous man. He is no engineer, obviously. Let me introduce you to the engineer of the human body. It is our blessed Lord himself. He'll never tell you to put sand in the petrol. He'll never tell you to get out knives and whips and whip the body and discipline it like that. He made it. We are to keep it. He, the very body of the believer is the temple of the Holy Spirit. We preserve it as well as we can, and we honor it. And anyway, hit- hitting it with whips, that will not subdue the evil desires and the passions within.
For that we shall need the salvation of Christ and the power of his spirit. We shall need the Lord within us. This asceticism is of no value against the indulgence of the flesh. Or if you prefer the other translation, it is of no value, it leads to the indulgence of the flesh. You say, what? In what way? Because if I produce this by my great willpower, the danger is that now I become proud in my achievements, and that's the very thing that's the worst of the lot of all the works of the flesh.
What shall we do then? Well, the best thing is to be positive, isn't it? How did you get converted? How did you get saved? Peas in your shoes? Observing the Sabbath? No, of course you didn't. No, you say, I saw I was utterly ruined, and I accepted God's sentence on me, and I died with Christ. That's finished me as far as this world is concerned. Now I've received the Lord Jesus, I have a life that's hid in him in glory. The question of food and drink and whatnot could never have obtained me that life, nor all the asceticism in the world, but he gave it to me, and now the living Lord lives in me.
Oh, is that how you got saved? Well, thank the Lord for that. Well, now listen to Paul. As you receive the Lord Jesus, now walk in him. That's in him and not outside him. For he who saved you initially is the one that's able to save you to the uttermost as you are on your way to God by him. And now to our final se- session of study.
