Scripture Reflections

Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink, or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath. These are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ. (Col. 2:16-17)

This morning, while reading through Colossians, these verses caught my attention. They aren’t the only place the Bible says something like this (Heb. 8:5 calls the tabernacle and its sacrifices a “shadow of the heavenly things”), but it isn’t an idea most of us pay a lot of attention to, either. The basic idea is this: God established, on earth, a copy or replica of heavenly truth, so that his people would recognize the heavenly truth when it arrived. The food laws, practice of Sabbath, tabernacle, priestly work and sacrifices—all of it pointed to something deep and real, something eternal, something TRUE. All of it pointed to Jesus Christ.

Jesus Christ is the clean food that offers life and divides those inside the covenant from those outside the covenant. He is the Sabbath, the eternal rest offered to each of us. He is the tabernacle, the place God meets with man. He is both high priest and the sacrifice for cleansing and forgiveness. All of the pieces of the old covenant were shadows, copies, types, images—things meant to train and teach and prepare, so that Christ would be received and understood when he arrived.

There are two implications to this: On the one hand, it no longer matters whether we keep kosher or follow the exact strictures of the Sabbath, because the thing to which the Law pointed has arrived—the eternally real Jesus Christ has replaced the temporal shadow. We no longer offer sacrifices, because the true sacrifice has come. We no longer approach God only in the temple, because the true meeting place between God and man has arrived in Jesus. As Paul says, “let no one pass judgment on you,” in these matters, because they are just shadows.

And yet, because they are the shadows that God established to teach us to recognize Christ, food, rest, priestly ministry, sacrifice, and holy space are far more important than we normally realize. The shadows cast by Christ are not random—they are images and reflections of his eternal truth and life. If we try to understand him without the idea of holy food, rest from work, or perfect sacrifice and priestly ministry, we will misunderstand him. Each of them reflects him; each is a shadow cast by him.

One of these seems particularly critical for us, as Americans. We know how to work, and we understand amusement and entertainment, but rest is hard for most of us. We need to learn to practice rest more, so that we will understand Jesus. No one should judge one another on how we practice Sabbath (Col. 2:16), because the old covenant is obsolete (Heb. 8:13) and the Sabbath is fulfilled in Jesus (Mt. 5:17)—he is our true rest, and he is the Lord of the Sabbath (Mk. 2:28). And yet, if we don’t practice Sabbath, we will fail to understand what it means to find rest in Jesus. It was made for us (Mk. 2:27).

I would encourage you to build into your life a time (every week!) when you choose to rest in what Jesus has accomplished. We judge ourselves on productivity, and then when we are exhausted we look for amusement and diversion, but learning to rest in Jesus is essential to receiving and understanding Jesus. What would it mean to lay down your labor, and simply enjoy the fact that God has already done all that is necessary? What would it mean to realize that you have already been given all things, in Jesus? What would it mean to practice the truth that you will be judged by God not for your productivity, but instead for your willingness to trust Jesus?

In Christ,
Steven+

Scripture Reflections

Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in Christ's afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church. (Col. 1:24)
 
This verse from our reading from Colossians on Sunday is both staggering and perplexing (at least on the surface). There are two ideas present, both of which should make our heads spin. The first is the idea that Christ’s own suffering lacks something and that Paul’s suffering is filling up that lack. The second is that Paul’s sufferings have some benefit for the church.
 
First, this statement could be said about any Christian who suffers because of following Christ—Paul isn’t unique. But how is that Christ’s suffering lacks anything? And how does our suffering in the name of Christ benefit the church?
 
The answer is that all who turn to Jesus the Messiah in faith and are baptized into him are made a part of the Messiah. We are joined to him and made one with him. That means that he has our lives in him, and we have his life in us. Given that we are joined to him, our sufferings are now his sufferings—everything we suffer he suffers with us. This truth was seared into Paul (as he was going to Damascus to persecute Christians) by Jesus, who asked, “Why are you persecuting me?” It isn’t just that Jesus takes it personally when his followers suffer; instead, he is suffering in and with them.
 
If you imagine all the Christians that have ever been and all who ever will be, and then imagine the concrete amount that all of those Christians have suffered and ever will suffer in the name of Christ, you are imagining the totality of Christ’s sufferings. When Paul says, “I am filling up what is lacking in Christ's afflictions,” he is saying that he is contributing his part to that whole. Christ’s afflictions aren’t lacking in the sense of inadequacy—the cross was sufficient for all the sins of the world. Instead, they are lacking simply in the sense that many of Christ’s sufferings occur in his followers, and some of those haven’t happened yet. Paul is saying, in effect, “Everything I am suffering in the name of Christ is part of Christ’s suffering, and boy, I am adding to the total right now, while in prison!”
 
Because no suffering strikes Christ that he doesn’t turn into a means of redemption for others (the basic pattern of the cross), all the suffering of Christ (including the parts that occur in our lives) becomes a part of his means of redeeming of the world. The end result of this is that anything we suffer because we are following Jesus (everything from giving up an hour’s sleep to pray for someone to being mocked for maintaining Christian honesty and love to being violently persecuted) is happening to Jesus in us, and all of it is used by him to bring about the reconciliation of the entire cosmos to the Father. For the Christian, there is no such thing as empty suffering—all of it occurs in Christ, and all of it is used by Christ in his glorious work.
 
In Christ,
 
Steven+

Scripture Reflections

On Sunday, Steven preached on Paul’s words in Galatians 6:2: “Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.” Today’s Evening Prayer reading, 1 Corinthians 9, shows one way Paul lived that command out.

Paul ministered without a salary, but it would have been appropriate for him to receive whatever the Corinthians offered him. After all, as he writes in verse 9, “You shall not muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain.”

In other contexts Paul was glad to receive that kind of love from the people he served. He knew it gave them joy, and it eased the burden on him. However, for a variety of reasons, Paul recognized that the Corinthian context was different. There was already envy and dissent, and it wouldn’t do to let money muddy the waters too.

Instead, Paul worked to support himself while he was in Corinth. Paul had no clear moral obligation to get a second job. It would have been his right as an apostle to receive what the Corinthians offered him in love. But Paul knew that some in the Corinthian church might leverage that generosity to accuse Paul of greed or selfishness. That conflict could have led to division and confusion within the congregation. So, instead of clinging to his rights as an apostle, Paul chose the humbler and harder route. He doubled his efforts so nothing would compromise their ability to hear the gospel. Paul didn’t just bear their burdens with nice words. For months on end, he worked overtime so he could feed himself and his flock.

We love talking about rights, and for good reason! After all, the idea of human rights is one of the beautiful inheritances our culture has received from Christian tradition. But rights are always inferior to love. They can be legislated, and their shapes and contours can be clearly defined (often, at least), but they can never reach as far as love does. Nor do they yield the same reward. We need rights because we fail to love, not because rights and love are on par with each other.

If you’re not convinced, look at Jesus. He laid down his right to sit in glory at the right hand of the Father (Phil. 2:5-10) so he could bear our burdens. Or, as John puts it in 1 John 4:19, “we love because he first loved us.” If you need an example that feels more attainable, look at the way Paul delighted in the people he served. It’s all over his letters. Humble love brings more joy than self-justification can.

God is not asking you to look for the next place you can flush your rights. And yes, we should care when our neighbors are mistreated or abused. But there are places in all of our lives when God would have us choose humility instead of self-exaltation. There will be credit taken by others, blamed thrown on us, money requested, conflicts initiated, and more. Ask God for the wisdom to know when obedience requires you to be steadfast and immovable; ask him for the discernment to know when love requires sacrificial generosity. In all things, seek to emulate the love of Jesus, who laid aside his crown so that we could be reconciled to God.

Justin+