Room for Comment

This is a write up of what I taught at this week’s small group at Converge Church (www.convergechurch.org). I am posting it because I am not sure if we will end up preaching this sermon as a part of our current series in Colossians, but because it is timely to that context and can enrich our meditations on the Word. The past two weeks we have taught through Colossians 3, the chapter in which Paul’s high Christology meets the new life of Christians in Him. This week in our Tuesday night group, I wanted to focus on 3:24, in which Paul gives the reason for the new life we live in Christ: knowledge of our inheritance as Sons of God, co-heirs with Christ.

Col. 3:23-24 Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ. (ESV)

This whole chapter has been building up what it means to live in Christ. It means to look to, have one’s hope in, the things above, and not to that which can be seen, which passes, which is transient (3:1-2). We are to look to he who is eternal life, Jesus Christ. This means letting the peace of Christ rule among us as Christians (3:15), in our local bodies, in our families, over coffee with a brother. It means letting the Word of Christ dwell in us richly (3:16), giving it authority to cut our heart open and to perform the miracle of turning stone into flesh. Above all, it means submitting to the ministry of reconciliation, to the proclamation of the Gospel, which is love. In love, pieces of the body which are themselves ill-fitting and imperfect become perfectly bound by that which is perfect, by Christ (3:14).

Thus, having explicated and unpacked what it means for Christ to be all in all (3:11), Paul give the reason, the motive power of this change within us, which is our hope in Christ and the beautiful inheritance we find in Him. We have received such a wonderful grace that we are now free to show grace to others. We can trust all things to God the Father, who judges justly. Thus, we can forgive; we can love; we can have unity. These things are humanly impossible, but with God all things are possible, and so we are free to hope all things.

This means that we are free to leverage our satisfaction in Christ, in our inheritance, against all the disappointments that attend life in these last days. This also means that we are motivated by compassionate hearts which bleed for the lost, which are willing to be all things to all men, to efface ourselves and our dreams in order to pursue Christ’s dream, which is the glorification of the Father in the presentation of a beautiful Church. This inheritance we find in Christ is spiritual, and our role as Christians is priestly.

When I set out to teach on 3:24, I asked the question, “What is the nature of this inheritance, and what is its value?” Having been meditating on Psalm 16 (which we are memorizing currently), I was chewing on vv. 5-6:

The Lord is my chosen portion and my cup; you hold my lot.

The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places; indeed, I have a beautiful inheritance.”

The language of “portion” goes along with the language of inheritance, and it has a meaning which is often linked to the inheritance of land, or the division of portions of land to inheritors. Here David is praising God, not for the inheritance he has as a son of Judah, but because he has preferred the inheritance of the Levites, which is the Lord himself.  In Ezekiel 44, among other places, we find that the Levites’ inheritance was the Lord himself, and that they were to be given no portion of the land of promise. Also, they were to eat the first-fruits of the sacrifices dedicated to God for the forgiveness of sin.

Here, I am struck by all of the parallels, which I had not noticed before, between the lot of the Church in the New Covenant, and the lot of the Levites in the old. Like them, our inheritance is not physical (land), but spiritual, in Christ. Like the Levites, we are called to be separate from the world, holy. This is true of all Israelites, but the Levites in particular were called to make sacrifices, and we are as well. We are now called to make spiritual sacrifices of our lives (Rom. 12) which are holy and pleasing to God. Obviously the purpose of our sacrifice is different, since we have justification in Christ alone, but our lives are still essentially priestly. Also, like the Levites, we eat of the offerings given to God for the remission of sins. Every Sunday at Converge, we take communion, in which we partake of the first-fruit of God, Jesus Christ, the Lamb who was slain for the sins of the world. He is our sacrifice, and we are his priests given the task of stewarding his grace and cooperating in the work of the Church.

All of this is positive, but there is also a negative element. The Levites were NOT given a portion of land. They were not given the task of building a kingdom on earth, but on being a temple of the living God which is of heaven. This task is the task of the Church today. We, likewise, are NOT given earthy kingdoms to work toward, to hope for and to welcome with our hearts, but rather one that is of heaven.

1 Peter 2:9-12: But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.

Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul. Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation. (ESV)

We are called out of the world, and into heaven. Out of darkness, and into light. Out of the kingdom of man, and into the Kingdom of God. We are called to follow the example of Christ as Christ-ians.

1 Peter 2:21-23: For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps. He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth. When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly. (ESV)

To be more specific, Christ gave up his rights to God-ness, rather taking the form of a slave. Likewise, we are to follow, giving up our rights to man-ness, rather taking the form of a slave.

Phil. 2:5-9: Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. (ESV)

Likewise, as priests in the Kingdom of God, we are to be obedient to the cruciform love of God, which gave himself up for the salvation of others. Does this mean that love exists in a vacuum apart from justice? No, rather, the love of God is that which kills in order to give life. Therefore, we are called as priests in the fear of God to be holy and separate from defilement.

2 Cor. 6:14-7:1: Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? What accord has Christ with Belial? Or what portion does a believer share with an unbeliever? What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; as God said,

“I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them,

and I will be their God,

and they shall be my people.

Therefore go out from their midst,

and be separate from them, says the Lord,

and touch no unclean thing;

then I will welcome you,

and I will be a father to you,

and you shall be sons and daughters to me,

says the Lord Almighty.”

Since we have these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from every defilement of body and spirit, bringing holiness to completion in the fear of God. (ESV)

Ex. 19:6 would add that we are to God “a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.”

This kingdom of priests is the glory of Jesus, just as the wife is the glory of her husband. We will be presented to Him before the Father, a scene which is portrayed gloriously in Rev. 5: 6-12:

And between the throne and the four living creatures and among the elders I saw a Lamb standing, as though it had been slain, with seven horns and with seven eyes, which are the seven spirits of God sent out into all the earth. And he went and took the scroll from the right hand of him who was seated on the throne. And when he had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, each holding a harp, and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints. And they sang a new song, saying,

“Worthy are you to take the scroll

and to open its seals,

for you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God

from every tribe and language and people and nation,

and you have made them a kingdom and priests to our God,

and they shall reign on the earth.”

Then I looked, and I heard around the throne and the living creatures and the elders the voice of many angels, numbering myriads of myriads and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice, “Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!” (ESV)

Praise be to Jesus who was worthy, who was slain, and who is making us a kingdom of priests for the just worship of the Father. How eager we should all be to be there at the fulfillment of this vision, when we will all say “To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever!”, falling down and worshipping (5:13, ESV)

Let us no longer sleep like children, but be awakened to the grace of God and the responsibility which attends it. Let us be obedient to renounce ourselves and to accept our destiny as a priesthood of believers. Let us be moved by compassion and not convenience. Let us fear God and not men. Let us not compromise our worship of God, who is worthy of all praise.