As I mentioned in the introduction last week, I have had a desire for some time to really dig into the book of Colossians. And this year I’m one of several teachers who will be taking our women’s ministry through this powerful little epistle. So I thought I would share some of the truths we are learning with you all, as well.

Colossians is all about Jesus. It calls us to worship Him, understand who He is, and live in light of that truth. It’s both theological and practical. And it contains one of the most quoted and most taught portions of Scripture, especially when it comes to Christ.

Studying the book of Colossians will help us answer some very important questions. For starters, what does it mean when we say that Jesus is preeminent? That He is sufficient? And how should we live in light of who He is? So, I hope you will come back each week and grow with me through Paul’s letter to our first-century brothers and sisters.

Today we’re going to look at how He is preeminent and sufficient. And what it means that we should preach the gospel to ourselves.

At the end of this discussion, you’ll find links to my other posts from the past week or so.

The Preeminent Christ & Why It’s Important

Colossians 1.15-20

Last Week

Last week I introduced this study with a little background. Then we looked verses 1-14 beginning with the salutation and why even those first two verses are important. We also talked about Paul’s reason for writing his letter to the Colossians, his concerns, and how he was praying for them. His prayer is especially important because it illustrates the importance of spiritual growth and gives us a template for praying for ourselves, our families, and those in our circle of influence. If you missed it, here is the link: Introduction to Colossians. Now let’s look at his sufficiency and preeminence.

The Preeminent Christ

We’re going to pick up in verse 15 and next week go back to verses 9-14 and talk more about those verses and what the Preeminent Christ does in and through us.

First, what does the word preeminent mean?

One definition says, “having paramount rank, dignity or importance.” And Noah Webster’s 1828 Dictionary includes these definitions, “Superior in excellence; distinguished for something commendable or honorable. Surpassing others.” It lists goodness and power among those things.

So, we might say this passage speaks of the superior excellence of Christ and how He is commendable, honorable, and distinguished above all others in goodness and power.

But we’re going to see that even that definition falls short of who the Preeminent Christ is and what it all means to us. So, let’s look at Verses 15-20.

A Hymn of Praise to the Preeminent Christ

These verses are different in style and format from the rest of the chapter. They seem to be set apart from the verses before and after. Some commentators call this section a poem or a hymn. It seems Paul used the language he did to capture our attention and to drive home the points he was making.

One way this section is set apart from the verses before and after is by the use of certain pronouns. If you look back at verses 13 and 14, the emphasis is on “we” or “us.”

¹³He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, ¹⁴in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

And in verses 21-23, the emphasis in on the pronoun “you.”

²¹And you, who once were alienated ,,, ²²… in order to present you holy and blameless … ²³if indeed you continue in the faith, … not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard, …

But here in 15-20, the emphasis in on “he” or “him.” He uses the phrase “he is” four times, five if you count “so he might be” in verse 18. And he says, “in him, through him, to him, or by him” 7 times. The “he” or “him” being Jesus.

If you are following along in your bible, uou might take a minute and underline or highlight all those pronouns.

God is the central character in all of Scripture. Everything in both the Old Testament and the New point to Christ. But this particular passage is one of the most quoted and most taught perhaps because it contains such a concentrated list of many truths about Jesus Christ.

The Image of the Invisible God

Let’s look at verse 15:

¹⁵He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.

He is the “image of the invisible God.” Verse 19 says, “For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell.” Unlike us who were made in His image as created beings, He is the divine image of God.

Hebrews 1.3 says, “He is the express image of His person.” He is God, the second person of the Trinity. He said of Himself in John 14.9, “Whoever has seen me has seen the Father.”

All God’s attributes and perfections are seen and lived out in the life of Christ.

The Firstborn of All Creation

Verse 15 goes on to say, “He is the firstborn of all creation.” This does not mean Jesus was a created being. It had to do with ranking, with rights of inheritance. He is the heir of everything.

Hebrews 1.1-3:

1 God, after He spoke long ago to the fathers in the prophets in many portions and in many ways, ²in these last days has spoken to us in His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through whom He also made the world.

And in Psalm 89.27 God is talking:

I will also make him My firstborn,
The highest of the kings of the earth.

He’s not a created being. He was before all things.

Creator & Sustainer

In fact, He is the Creator of all things.

Verse 16-17:

¹⁶For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. ¹⁷And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.

John 1.1-3 says:

1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. ²He was in the beginning with God. ³All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made.

He created all things and as verse 17 tells us, “by Him all things are held together.” Hebrews 1.3 says, “… he upholds the universe by the word of his power.” He didn’t just create the world; He is the sustainer of it.

The Head of the Body, the Church

Verse 18:

¹⁸And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent.

As the head, He has the right to prescribe how we as the church should live. And just as the head of a natural body is the source of everything, in the case of Christ, all strength, all power, all wisdom, all grace, life itself, everything comes from Him. This speaks of our complete dependence on Him. It also speaks of our union with Christ.

Ephesians 1 says:

²²And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, ²³which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.

Last week I said that the occasion of Paul’s writing was a report by the church’s founder about false teachers. They were trying to infiltrate the church and convince the Colossians that they needed Jesus plus something. Paul was saying Jesus is everything. He is sufficient. He is the Preeminent Christ.

The Preeminent Christ & Christians Today

Not much has changed.

Today some would say, we need Jesus + sacraments.

Or Jesus + baptism.

Or Jesus + some other legalistic requirement.

While some of those things may not be wrong, even good, they don’t save us. Being baptized, for example, is a step of obedience but we’re not saved because we were baptized.

Faith in Jesus Christ and His finished work on the cross are all we need.

Ephesians 2.8-9:

⁸For by grace you have been saved through faith; and this is not of yourselves, it is the gift of God;⁹not a result of works, so that no one may boast.

The Beginning, Firstborn of the Dead

Verse 18, also, tells us that He is the beginning, the firstborn of the dead, the originating power. He is the source of the church and, in fact, the source of everything.

He is “the firstborn of the dead.” While He was not the first to be raised from the dead, He was the first to be raised by His own power.

Crucified with Him & Raised with Him

And because of our union with Him, we died with Him.

In Galatians 2.20 Paul said:

²⁰I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.

When Christ was crucified, it was as if we were crucified with Him. The penalty for our sin was paid in full, just as if we had been crucified ourselves.

And when He rose from the dead, we rose, too. Now the risen Christ empowers us to live for Him in a way that pleases God. Or as Paul said in Romans 6, we have been raised to walk in newness of life.

But His resurrection also guarantees our final resurrection in eternity.

1 Thessalonians 4.16-17:

16 For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. 17 Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord.

He Has Reconciled Us

Verses 18 and 19 continue:

¹⁸ … that in everything he might be preeminent. ¹⁹For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell.

God sums up this section by saying that He is preeminent and all the fullness of God dwells in Him. He is the One who is above all others, the Creator of all things, the One true God. The express image of His likeness.

Back to our definition, “Superior in excellence; distinguished, commendable, honorable, surpassing all others. That alone should lead us to worship.

But then comes verse 20:

²⁰and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.

We’re back to the gospel! The Preeminent Christ has reconciled us to Himself by the blood of His cross.

No Other Hope

Because of sin, there was no other hope for us. He was and is our only hope (Rom. 3.23, 6.23).

Romans 3.23 says:

²³for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.

Most of us tend to think we really weren’t that bad. As if Christ died for a case of spiritual sniffles. We might not have been as bad as we could have been but that was only because of God’s common grace.

And we were sinners and not just because we sinned. We were sinners by nature, selfish and prideful, not a pretty picture. Paul went on in Romans 6:

²³… the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

The wages of sin is death! Not just physical death, but spiritual and eternal death, separation from God for eternity in a place the bible calls hell.

Hell is not purgatory, in the sense that we are purged on cleansed from our sins and someday graduate to heaven. Neither are we annihilated. We will all live forever. The question is … where?

But … listen again to the last part of that verse in Romans, “the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

It’s a free gift. We can’t earn it. There is no plan B.

He lived the perfect life we never could and died, not for His own sin but for ours. And because of our union with Him, we died with Him, were raised with Him, had His righteousness credited to us, and enabled to live for Him now. That should amaze us!

Preaching the Gospel to Yourself

We should remind ourselves of all that, not so we can wallow in our sin, but to fill us with gratitude, empower us, and inspire us to live for Him. For those of us who belong to Him, He has made peace between us and God. Some have called this preaching the gospel to yourself.

If you don’t believe that describes you and you want to know more, reach out to a pastor or Christian friend. Or you can email me at donna.soulsurvival@yahoo.com. You might also read these posts.

“Do You Live with a Sense of Guilt?”

“Could You Be a Christian in Name Only?”

The Preeminent Christ Has Come Near

Almost as amazing as the gospel itself is the fact that the Preeminent Christ, the invisible God, the Creator of the universe came near to us.

Jn. 1.14 says:

¹⁴And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.

During the Exodus, after God delivered His people from their bondage in Egypt, He dwelt with them in the tabernacle in the wilderness.

Then God came near to them and to us in the person of Jesus Christ. He dwelt among us literally. The Creator of the universe took on flesh and came as a baby. He pitched His tent with us.

And now He tabernacles with us in the person of the Holy Spirit. 1 Cor. 6.19 says that we are the temple of the Holy Spirit.

How should all of this impact our day to day lives, our struggles, our concerns? We’ll talk more about that next week.