Yeah. It's scheduled for next week. That's what we're expecting. It should be good. I'll taste and kind of check itself out. I might put this in the next slot. so so All right. Good evening. Welcome to the Wednesday evening service. Let's begin please by opening in our hymnals to page 552. 552. Let's stand together if you would please. We will be singing page 552 in our hymnals. O Jesus, I have promised to serve Thee to the end. ever near me my master and my friend I shall not fear the battle if thou art by my side nor wander from the pathway if thou wilt be my guide. Oh, let me feel thee near me. The world is ever near. I see the sights that dazzle, the tempting sounds I hear. My bows are ever near me. around me and within, but Jesus draw thou nearer and shield my soul from sin. O Jesus, thou hast promised to all who follow thee That where Thou art in glory, there shall Thy servant be. And Jesus, I have promised to serve Thee to the end. Oh give me grace to follow my master and my friend. You may be seated. Father, we thank you that we can gather and be called out, called by thy name. And Father, we know that the church was purchased by the blood of God, the blood of Christ. And what a blessing it is, Father, to enjoy the privileges that are being part of your body, your institution, to participate in your worship, to hear and, as it were, sit at Jesus' feet. Jesus is the living word, and the Bible is our word. to us, and Father, we thank you for the opportunity to sit and learn and be taught of the Word of God, to be encouraged and edified. Help us to encourage one another, to exhort one another even more. Father, provoke one another to good works, we pray. Father, we ask for those that need comfort, especially around the loss. Mrs. Singleton, Father, that you would bring comfort to family members, bring salvation, Father, the message of the gospel, which is salvation, just to bring it around one more time, allowing people to hear it, knowing that this free offer of the gospel is the offer of eternal life and the offer of peace with God. And we can have it through Jesus Christ. So we pray you would bless us tonight. Help us as we open your word. Give strength to the preacher, we pray, in Jesus' name, amen. All right, welcome to our services, this midweek service. Just to keep you informed, and I sent an email out, but in case you didn't get that, Mrs. Singleton, Sister Jerry, went home to be with the Lord Monday evening, Monday evening at her home. uh... surrounded by her church family and really was her church family that was with her through the final days and can't say enough about church family that so many things to scramble to her aid uh... to comfort sit by her uh... even just sending messages through the phone, different things like that. All that our church did, really rallying around her at that time. There was some beautiful singing. There was scripture being read throughout the day. We thank the Lord for that. We know that it's difficult for us, but for her, it's glory. She's in glory. She's seeing the Lord of glory. And we're thankful for that. We're thankful for the assurance that comes with salvation. We're thankful for all she did. for all these years, whether it was housing people, whether it was being an encouragement, discipling, so many things to be thankful for for her life. I don't have any firm announcements to give you. I'm meeting with the funeral director tomorrow. So once we have that meeting, I should be able to get out some more details as far as the date of the services. I fully expect that they will be here. So just wait for that information to come out. As soon as I know, I'll send something out. It's probably going to be a weekday. We'll close the school for that day, just some of the logistics of it, and we'll have a day to celebrate her life and to preach and worship the Lord. So that's what's coming up as far as that goes. If you have any questions, you can ask me, but that's the big thing that happened this last week. Looking forward, tomorrow is Ladies Fellowship, so I encourage you to attend, ladies, at 7 p.m. And Men's Prayer is Saturday. That's an easy one to forget. It's easy to forget when it's the first day, but it's also easy to forget once we've now been in October a few days that it is on the 7th, Saturday, 7 a.m., Men's Prayer time. Monday's a holiday. And those are the main announcements that I have for folks. One other thing to mention, on October 15th, that Sunday, Dan Armacost will be here. And so we've made arrangements, they're gonna be staying in the missionary apartment for a couple days. They'll be with us in the Sunday morning service. He'll give his presentation in Sunday school hour. preach Sunday a.m. and we'd like to have a potluck so this was not this Sunday but a week from Sunday we would like to have a potluck after Sunday morning service so just keep that in mind spread the word make a note potluck not this Sunday but a week from Sunday we'll have potluck in early afternoon service on that day The Armicost will not be in the afternoon service, but they'll be with us in the morning service. And then we'll just, after the potluck, come in and have our afternoon service, and that will be our day of worship on October the 15th. So keep that in mind. It's a blessing. It's glad that they're coming. Be a chance for me to get to know him a little bit. I passed him on campus there, but really hadn't spent much time with him. Some of you know him much better. But we're thankful to host them and that they can stay here on the property. So that's coming up in a week and a half. All right, that's all the announcements I have this evening. Tonight, Brother Kelso is going to be bringing us the message. All right, you can open your Bibles to Colossians chapter three. Colossians three, we are gonna start into a new group of verses, which starts in verse 15, goes down to verse 17, really a continuation of this putting on the new man. And what we're gonna be moving into here is some imperatives. four imperatives, four commands that we're going to see in verses 15 through 17 that are kind of really like the final cap to this putting on of the new man. It's the final piece of the new man that kind of goes over top of all of the garments, all of the clothing that has been put on, and really puts a cap on this section regarding putting on the new man. So let's look at verse, Let's back up, let's just read start in verse 12, we'll read down to verse 17. The Bible says Colossians 3 verse 12, put on therefore as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, long-suffering, forbearing one another and forgiving one another. If any man have a quarrel against any, even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye. And above all these things, put on charity, which is the bond of perfectness. And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to the which also ye are called in one body, and be ye thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. And whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank you for this time that we can meet together as a church and hear your word taught and preached. We ask that you be honored and glorified. in our time together in the word, in Jesus' name, amen. As we have gone through this section on putting on the new man, we have seen that there is this idea of putting off the old garments of the flesh, the old garments of sin that takes place at salvation, at the moment of salvation. But after salvation, there is a putting on of the new garments. which are characterized by all of these graces that we have looked at in verses 12 through 14. So this new man has put on his new garments of compassion, and kindness, and humility, and meekness, and long-suffering, and forbearance, and forgiveness, and he has put on over top of that, to kind of tie it all together, a belt of love, charity. And we looked at that the last time that we were here in Colossians 3, was love. But here, Paul tells us that the new man is not quite ready to walk out the door just yet, for there are still a few more commands that are given in this section that are kind of like a robe or a covering that covers over the rest of these garments, an outermost garment that is going to go over top of all of it. Now, these are all imperatives, which are commands that are given here, which you could really say makes them priorities. These are priorities, something that one is to focus on or something that one is to give a great deal of time to. And we can tell that these are priorities because of the amount of time that Paul spends on each one of these. You notice that each one of these really has its own verse. You know, we look back at verse 12, we've kind of got a list, and he just briefly mentions these graces. Here, we're going to spend a verse on each one. I think most people, including myself, can have a tendency to fill their lives up with things that leave little room for the things that actually should be the most important. the ones that should be the priorities. Christians can do this by filling their lives with things. They can do it by filling their lives with activities that effectively pushes God aside or pushes God to the outskirts. We should not fill our lives with all of these other things that replace Jesus. See, Jesus is preeminent, and that's to bring in the theme here. He is preeminent, He is first place, He is sufficient, and He is the one who is to bring us satisfaction. Rather than all these other temporal things that we can fill our minds and lives with, we should push those aside and bring God to the center. of our lives. Our new lives in Christ then ought to be characterized by a full commitment and a full devotion to Jesus Christ. Paul then has commanded us to put off the grave clothes of the old life and to put on grace clothes, the new way of living. Now in our text today, in verse 15, He gives, starting in verse 15, he gives us four commands, four imperatives, which are to control the expression of that new life. First of all, in verse 15, there is the peace of God, which is to rule. Second, in verse 16, there is the word of Christ, which is to dwell. Third, in verse 17, there is the name of the Lord Jesus, which is to be glorified. And then fourth, all of this ends with thankfulness. The new self Paul described is very similar to what we see in Galatians with the fruit of the spirit, which he mentions later in his letter to the Galatians, related to the qualities of our new Christian self and a part of the fruit of the spirit is peace. Peace. The Christian life ought to be one which demonstrates peacefulness. It's part of the fruit of the Spirit, and we see it here in our passage. If Jesus Christ is your Lord and he's your Savior, then you know, you know, you have fellowship with the Prince of Peace. And you should know and have then the peace of God, which in the context here will then be lived out in peacefulness with one another. So the context of the passage here is getting along with each other. And it results in a relationship with one another that is peaceful. In our last sermon on Colossians, we ended with love. And now Paul is really focusing in on the church and unity in the church, and he ended with love. So it's really no surprise now that Paul moves to peace, because what comes out of love for one another is peaceful relationships. So it's love, it's peace, and these really are the clearest, you could say, manifestations of unity. If you want to look at a church and say, well, that church is unified, love and peace are the truest and clearest manifestations of that unity. That's true in a friendship. It's true in a family. It's true in any kind of relationship. It's true in a church. And that's really Paul's focus is peace with one another in the church. Now imagine your family, your friendships, or your church without love and peace. I mean, it would be messy. It wouldn't be something that you would look forward to being at. Now, in this world today, the word peace is a very popular word. You hear it all the time. I think it's one of those words that you could almost say it's like a woke word, like peace. If you're not saying it and talking about, like you really desire to have peace, then you're some kind of warmonger. You think of Trump, like he's this guy that just, ah, just no peace whatsoever. And that's just casted down, like people hate that. The problem is that the world's concept and the world's idea of peace is really a fake peace. It's a false peace. It's not true peace. But they're in a constant pursuit of it. They're in constant desire to have it. Now, we could say that it's a good desire to have. Yeah, I want to have peace. But it seems as though that the world has been unable to find it. They're unable to find peace. And that is, in fact, very true. Turmoil is in the world. Turmoil is near us. It's around us. It's beyond us. It's all over the place. And it really dominates the fallen world. There is an absence of personal peace in individual lives. There's an absence of family peace in family relationships. There's an absence of local peace, national peace, international peace. There's all this striving. There's all this contending. There's all of this strife that is going on in the world around us, yet we've been seeking for peace for years and years and years. The Durants in writing their history said that by their calculations in the last 3,500 years, there has been less than 300 years that could be called peaceful in the world. On a national level, here in our country, we live in a very troubled society, and we all, I mean, we live in the middle of it. We live in the center of it. Maybe something you didn't know is that over, in the United States, over two million people are housed in prisons across the country, over two million. That is the highest incarceration rate in the world. And we're America, we're America. We're supposed to have all the, you know, we're supposed to have all the money and all of the wealth and all of the, we have everything in this country, but we don't have peace. And so people are always constantly striving for peace. They want this peace, and so they look to all of these other things to try to get peace. But it doesn't bring peace. We're now facing, it seems, street riots on a routine basis, people murdering people, execution-type killings, threats of terrorism in the neighborhood. Some people, they live in their neighborhoods, they're afraid just to walk outside their home. Family disintegration is a pandemic. Talk about a pandemic. Families are just being ripped apart. Children born illegitimately without a married mother and a father. Divorce is everywhere. And in places where families don't have divorce, where that doesn't take place, homes and marriages are still full of conflict and hostility towards one another. The very bottom of that list is personal peace. There's very little of it. So this is a very troubled world. Even at the level of human hearts, a lot of people talk about peace, but they don't have it. They're trying to find peace, peace in the cities, peace in the communities, peace in their families, peace in the world, peace all around us, peace in relationships. There's always people trying to come up with peace pacts, truces, in order to eliminate and to just get rid of all the conflict that there is out there. People want that. People, unsaved people want peace. They want it. They want peace in their lives. They want some kind of tranquility in their lives. They want peace inside of them. They want peace in their most intimate relationships that they possess and their families. They want their family to be able to be free from stress and fear and anxiety and depression and despair and conflict. They want all of that to go away. Everybody seeks that. And so what do they do? They seek this peace through programs, through diversion, through alcohol, through drugs, through recreation, through entertainment, through music. All of these things, they're trying to find peace and calm, but they don't find it. On a broader scale, there are those who tell us that peace will only come in a community, in a city where there's some kind of social or economic change. And that's how they're gonna fix all of these external things. People have been saying that since the beginning of human history. It's been ongoing for years and years, all the way back to the beginning. But peace is still elusive. There is none. There is a reason for this. There is a reason that they can't find peace, and it is this. Among those who do not know God in the world, the Bible says there is no peace for the wicked. There is no peace. But as believers, We have peace with God. And we can have the peace of God. So let's look at our verse here, verse 15. It's going to be the only one we get to tonight. Colossians 3.15 says this, and let the peace of God rule in your hearts. To the witch also ye are called in one body, and be ye thankful. So first of all, I want to talk about this peace. What is the peace of God? What is the peace of God? Before our conversion, or before we were saved, the Bible teaches us that we were unconverted, we were unsaved, we were unregenerate. And at that moment, in that time, we were at enmity with God. We were at war with God. We were His enemy. We were fighting against God. Now, you may not be aware of that, but that's what the Bible says. That's the truth. The Bible says that the unsaved person, the unregenerate person, is at war with God. And we've already seen that in Colossians chapter one. If you go back to Colossians one and verse 21, it says this, and you that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works yet now have he reconciled. How did He do it? Back in verse 20, He made peace through the blood of His cross. So how were we reconciled and brought into peace with God? It was through the cross of Jesus Christ. But before that, we were His enemies. We were fighting against Him. We were going our own way. The Bible says in Isaiah chapter 48 and verse 22, that there is no peace, saith the Lord, for the wicked. So you can see that there is this enmity, there's this hostility, there's this fighting against God that's taking place in the life of every single unbeliever. And because in that state you are fighting against God, there is no peace in the heart. Because they're not at peace with God. Now God created all of us. He created the entire world. He created every person. to know Him and to have fellowship with Him. God wants us to know Him. God wants us to have peace with Him. God wants us to have fellowship with Him. That is the very purpose of our existence, is to know God, to enjoy God, and really to offer up praise and worship and honor and glory to Him. That's the purpose of our existence. So if you don't know God, then you are not fulfilling the purpose for which you are created. If you're here tonight and you haven't received Christ, then you are not fulfilling the purpose for which you were created. And you have no peace. And you will never have peace without making peace with God. Until then, you will be restless and there will be this void that can only be filled with Jesus Christ himself. So the unbeliever does not have peace with God. But, on the contrary, at conversion, the Bible says, at that moment, at that instant, you were saved by putting your faith in Jesus Christ, by trusting in Him, by believing in Him, by receiving Him, which really are all synonyms for believing in Jesus. And what happened? What happened? When you trusted, relied on, believed on, received, you were born again. And at that moment, that you were born again, you were saved. And the Bible says that you have peace with God. That's what it says in Romans chapter 5 and verse 1. Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. So peace with God can never, never comes apart from grace, from Jesus Christ. So grace removes this barrier that's between us before we're saved and makes peace between man and God. So when the unbeliever, the unsaved person responds to the gospel, responds to grace by faith, the result is peace with God. That's what happens at the moment when the unbeliever becomes a believer. They have peace with God. So I think it is important, then, that we spend a little time to distinguish the difference between the peace of God and peace with God. It's very similar, but there's a difference. Peace with God comes at the moment of salvation. And it is our permanent possession when we believe on the Lord Jesus Christ for salvation. You have, you could call it, positional peace with God. You are at peace with God. You are no longer his enemy. You are no longer fighting against him. You are reconciled to God and you have peace with Him. That's what happens at the moment of salvation. And that's really why Ephesians 6, chapter 15 calls the gospel, the gospel of peace. Because the gospel brings peace between the sinner and God. That's what the gospel does. That's what happens in our justification. When God declares you just, He imputes the righteousness of Christ to you and you're declared righteous. Therefore, you can be at peace with God. You're justified by faith in Christ and by the work that he did on the cross. Therefore, you have peace with him. You have peace with God. Every Christian, every believer has peace with God. Every single one. But the peace of God is conditional upon a believer being in a good relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ, as we abide in Christ and we trust his word, we depend on his guidance, we die to ourself, and we really are obedient to him, then we can have the peace of God. So we have peace with God, which happens positionally the moment we're saved, but then the peace of God is something, and that's really what's in this verse, it's the peace of God, That's something that happens on a day-to-day basis, where you can have it one day and not have it the next. You'll never lose peace with God, but you can lose the peace of God. Peace with God is never removed from the man or woman who has trusted in the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. But once we are saved by grace through faith, the inner perfect peace of God which rules our hearts and mind is dependent upon us maintaining a right relationship with God. So if we aren't maintaining the right relationship with God, we're not going to have the peace of God in our life. This is achieved through humble and reverent prayer and praise and grateful thanksgiving, which we see here in the context, and a submissive heart that has faith in what? Faith in God's Word and trust that God's going to do what He says He will do, that God will keep His Word in all things. And therefore, that person is then obedient because he has faith. He's trusting that God's Word is true. I know what it says. I'm going to put it into practice. And as a person puts it into practice and submits to him and submits to his word, submitting to his will for their life, they can have peace, the peace of God. Peace with God is an eternal birthright. It's an unchangeable privilege of all true believers. But the peace of God depends on choices that you make day in and day out. no matter what's going on, whether it's in the ups or the downs of life. You see, people can, I read the email that Pastor Stagger sent out regarding Mrs. Singleton passing, and he used the word peacefully in the email. Even in a moment of, really, what you could say the worst moment for someone on earth, their death, a believer can have peace. Even in the most, the lowest moment, you can have peace. But I dare say that not all believers have peace in their final moments. All unbelievers, they for sure have no peace, but I could say that there's probably believers that have no peace as well. Why? Because they've made decisions in their life that really they regret and that they weren't submitting to his word. They weren't obedient. They didn't trust him like they should. Peace with God, you could say then, is an objective peace. It's objective. It doesn't come from within ourselves. It's not something you can work for or obtain. It's something we are freely given from God at the moment of salvation. It is a gift from God. It is a gift given by Jesus when he saves a repentant sinner. Now go to John chapter 14, and I think this is really an interesting verse regarding peace. This is Jesus here in John 14 and verse 27. He says this, peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you. Not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid." So here, what do we see? We see Jesus distinguishing between the peace that He gives and the peace that the world gives. So there's a kind of peace, a fake peace that the world can give. But it's not really true peace because only true peace can come from God. Only true peace comes from Him. When we know that Jesus paid the penalty for our sins on the cross and we repent and trust in him, he is faithful to forgive our sins. He's faithful to save us. The Bible tells us that. Jesus then took the wrath of God on him. He made our wrath his wrath, and he made peace with God for us. That's what Jesus did on the cross. And what does he do in our salvation? He gives us, he offers us that peace. So this peace, the peace with God, it's a fact, not a feeling. It's free. It's forever. It can never be destroyed. It can never be eliminated. It can never be diminished. It is a secure peace with the almighty God of creation because of Jesus' finished work on the cross. And every believer has that peace, peace with God. The peace of God, however, you could say is more of a subjective peace. We have that peace when we experience the peace that comes through trusting in God and obeying his word. You could say that this peace is also a gift. because it is given to us by God freely and generously. And this piece is the piece that you could say, I don't want to say that it's not primarily a feeling, but it can produce in us a feeling of wellness and security and competence and tranquility and satisfaction, but it is something that we must actively pursue. And I think you can think of Scripture, seek peace and pursue it. There has to be an active pursuit of this peace of God. God has given us the Holy Spirit, who is also called the Comforter. And one of his many jobs is to impart peace, the peace of God, to us. We are also promised from God's word that Jesus's grace is sufficient, 2 Corinthians 12, 9 and 10, in all things, his grace is sufficient. This is truly a blessing, it's truly a comfort, and it's something that we must remember every single day, no matter whether it's a good day or a bad day. When we keep our minds and eyes on Christ Jesus and rightly remember who He is and what He's done for us and who we are in Him and where we've come from, then we can experience the peace, the calm, the settled confidence that we have by resting in Him. This is how we receive the peace of God. It is a choice to keep our eyes on Him, keep our eyes heavenward, which really is in Colossians 3 verse 1. setting our affections, setting our thinking, getting our minds upward. Not on all these things, not all the things that are around us in this world, but getting our minds and thinkings towards eternal things, towards heavenly things. And when we do this, we keep our hearts devoted to him and we have our minds constantly being renewed in his word. we have this settled peace. But sadly, we often allow anxiety and fear and stress and all of these things that are going on around us, the homeless and the politics and all of the things that we can look at and say, yeah, it's really bad. We can let those things just kind of fill our lives. and control us, control our thinking. And we get our minds and our eyes on the circumstances and situations around us and we let that be what's primary. And we can cause that to make our hearts, we become disheartened. We can become bitter at the world. And there is no peace in our life. Confusion grows and we can get caught up in sin and disobedience because we lack faith and we don't trust God. Ultimately, the flow of God's peace is then hindered, and then what is diminished? Our joy. We're not happy. We have no peace and no joy when we allow the circumstances to rise up above God's Word. Isaiah explained to Israel this, thou will keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee. Not on the situations around you, but on him. And Paul wrote to the Philippian church, and he warns against such worry that creates this anxiety, and says that if they are careful for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication make their requests known unto God with a thankful heart, then, then the peace of God which passeth all understanding shall keep their hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. When we remember everything that God has done and given to us and for us and give him thanks and obey him, then we freely receive the peace of God and we find rest in Jesus. But the peace of God is also relational. So there's an objective peace, a peace that comes from without at the moment of salvation. There's a subjective peace. It's this inner peace that we can have as we actively pursue obedience and submission to God and His will. But there is also the peace of God, the aspect of it being relational. In other words, What we have with God and from God should come out in our relationships with one another. The moment you are saved, you are brought into peace with God, because now you are vertically aligned with him. You're aligned with God, and so you're at peace with him. Then this brings a kind of settled calm, a settled confidence, a settled trust, a settled rest, and a security that we have in knowing that God is good and that God is in control no matter what happens. And then ultimately, with all of that, you are now able to get really horizontally, because of who you are vertically, you can horizontally relate to other people. You're now able to get along with other people because of this settled peace that you have in your soul that comes out of the settled peace that you have with God. Really this, I mean, you could say that this is really an accurate indicator of a person standing with the Lord. It's how are they at peace with other people around them. If you're struggling to be at peace with those around you, then maybe there's a problem with your relationship with God. Maybe the vertical relationship, there's a problem. See, if our vertical relationship with God is the way that it should be, then our horizontal relationships with other people will be absolutely what they should be as well. This really should be a guide as to whether or not we are resting and trusting in Christ and his love, is how do we get along with other people? How do you get along with your spouse? How do you get along, children, with one another? How do you get along with one another in the church? The spiritual man or woman who is walking in the spirit and walking in truth will know a peace in their heart which passes all understanding, even in the midst of great trials and difficulties, while the one who is out of fellowship with God, walking in the flesh, They'll have inner turmoil of the Spirit. And really, you could say they're going to have sickness in their soul because they're not walking with God. So this is peace. A couple different aspects of peace. We have the peace with God, peace of God, and then we have relational peace with one another. But notice in the verse here what it says. And let the peace of God rule in your hearts. So what we have here is a command, and this is really the first of the four commands, is to let the peace of God rule in your hearts. So how do we do that? How do we allow the peace of God to rule in our hearts? Well, first of all, this is a command. No, it's a command. And it says there to let, let the peace of God. So the idea there is we're to allow this to happen, we're to let it happen. And this is a present active imperative. So it's something that we're actively doing in an ongoing way is letting the peace of God rule in our hearts. It's a command we must obey. Therefore, it's a conscientious decision that we must make. It doesn't just happen. You have to conscientiously make the decision to let peace rule. And we really must take all the commands of God seriously. When God says to do something, it should be a priority. This is a command. Now we think of commands, we think of a lot of commands in Scripture and I think if you said we were going to do a Bible competition in here and I said, you know, give me a command. I want three commands from Scripture. This is probably not one that would come. Probably wouldn't think about this passage. You might think of one of the Ten Commandments or, you know, children obey your parents or Something like that. Those things are the ones that are really external, the external commands. This is an internal command, but it's still a command. It's still something that we have to actively be doing in an intentional way, allowing God's peace to rule. And not doing this then would be disobedience. It would be disobedience to God. So if you're not allowing the peace of God to rule in your heart, you are in disobedience to God. So first of all, we see this is a command. But secondly, let's look at the word rule. The word rule that Paul uses here is a word that comes from the world of athletics, from the athletic world. It is the Greek word Brabuto, and it has the understanding of acting as an arbiter or a judge. So that's the word for rule. A word we would all be familiar with today is, if you're not familiar with arbiter, if you don't know what that means, or a judge, think of a referee, or an umpire, an official. And the word carries with it the idea of one who decides what's right in each situation. It's a decision maker. It's the one, in a sense, who determines who the winner is and who's going to be the one to receive the prize. Paul uses a variation of this word back in Colossians 2, verse 18. I believe this is the only place in Scripture in Colossians 3.15 where this word is used. There's a variation of the word used back in Colossians 2. And verse 18, where he says, let no man, therefore, let me make sure I'm reading the right verse. Verse 18, let no man beguile you of your reward. So the word beguile is the same word, but it has a preposition in front of it, kata. For those of you who are familiar with Greek, it's a preposition that has the idea of against. So in that sense, it's to be deprived of or to be cheated or to be tricked of the reward in chapter 2. In the Greek games, there were judges, we would call them umpires, who would reject contestants that were not qualified. If they didn't qualify for the games, they'd be disqualified, they'd be rejected for whatever reason. Maybe they didn't meet the standard, maybe they broke a rule. That's what these umpires would do. They would reject the contestants who were not qualified, and they would disqualify those who broke the rules. So, in a sense, just like in a sporting game, you have an official, you have a referee, you have an umpire who's out there making the calls, calling balls and strikes, calling travels, calling double dribbles, calling fouls. The official really has, in a certain sense, you know, you think back over the years there's been scandals when it comes to referees, you know, throwing games or whatever. The referee really does have some sway as to the outcome of the game. And so in a sporting game, the umpire makes the calls. He makes the decisions as far as the game and how it's to be played. So we, in the same way, must allow the peace of God the peace of God, the inner peace that we have, the subjective inner peace of God, to be the decision maker in every decision we make in our life. The peace of God must be the umpire. The peace of God must be the thing that calls the shots in our life, the thing that directs our thoughts and our actions. It must be the peace of God. The word rule, when you think of rule, I think of something that's in the center. It's not like, if you're going to allow the peace of God to rule, it can't be that the peace of God rules over here in the corner, just this little corner. But all of this over here, I'm going to rule that. I'm going to be in charge of this area. This over here, I'll put God right over here in the corner. And I'll submit to him in this area over here, but in all of this, I want to be in charge. No, rule, the word rule has the idea, and you can think of the word, I think you can, there's probably some similarities in verse 16 to the word dwell. Let the word of Christ dwell in you to fill you up, to take over all areas of your life, to allow the peace of God to be the centerpiece, the center focus in all of your decision making. That's the idea here of rule. It's to be over all of our decisions. So in other words, if a decision that you're going to make is not going to, in the context here, we're talking about peace with one another, bring peace with another person, then guess what you shouldn't do? that decision. Letting the peace of God rule would mean that when so-and-so says something to you that you don't like, you don't strike out at them. You don't lash out at the person in whatever relationship it is. It could be in the home, it can be in the church, it could be in your work. Letting the peace of God rule says, wait, I have peace with God. He's giving me peace, and so I can be at peace with one another, even in the worst times, even in the worst situations. So we must think about our relationship with God when we make our decisions with one another. The peace that we have with God then ultimately needs to be what guides us and rules us in making our decisions for us. So when we go back to what we were talking about at the beginning, when we were saved, we decided, we made the decision, we chose to no longer be at war with God. That was the decision you made. So we continue in our lives on an everyday basis to honor that agreement. You think about PACs or agreements that, you know, countries make. You know, if a president makes an agreement with, I don't know, whatever country. They make an agreement, they sign a treaty. The president then has to make every decision, every decision that he makes has to keep in mind this agreement, this contract, this treaty that he signed with this foreign country. So as not to break the agreement, as not to break the promise, not to break the treaty. And as believers, we are called then to let the peace of God have the final ruling, have the final say in our decisions. Peace is to be the final arbitrator. Peace is to be the highest authority. Peace is to be that which rules our decision-making process. Third, that includes our decision-making with one another in the church. I want to point out that in verse 15, where it says, let the peace of God rule in your hearts, the word your is plural. So the focus here is not necessarily on the individual, but rather to the whole of the church. Now, if the peace of God is gonna rule in our church as a whole, in a plural way, it's gonna have to rule in an individual way in each and every one of our lives, in each member. So the individual heart of each member must be at peace if the whole congregation is to be at peace with one another. That is the peace here that Paul is mentioning. Rather than a command for personal peace, just like, just be at peace, everybody, as long as you're all individually at peace, that's all that matters. It doesn't matter if you're not, if you're getting along with one another. That's not what Paul's getting at here. Paul is stressing here, rather stressing a unity or a harmony of the whole body, the whole church. A church ought to demonstrate peace and reconciliation within the body of Christ. We ought to be at peace with one another. And we know that that doesn't always happen. But when it doesn't happen, we have to back up, and we go back to the verses we've looked at before, and we fix the issues, whatever it may be. There might be forgiveness that's in order. There may be forbearance that's in order. But we have to make sure that we're at peace peacemaking church, peacekeeping church. We should be peaceful with one another. We should be unified, getting along. False teachers in the church at Colossae posed a threat to the unity and the harmony of the congregation. And Paul believed that if they demonstrated the peace of Christ, then it would keep them, the church, on the proper path. The reason for such peace is given here is that believers are called into one body. And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to the which also you're called in one body." Now, briefly, I'm going to mention that this one body is not teaching a universal church idea. There are those out there that will say that this is the proof text for universal church. It's one body. See, we're all part of one body. That's not the idea here. One is not numerical, but rather the focus is on unity, and you can see that in the context. Unity is there, and it's very obvious if you look through the verses that we've already gone to, that unity is what is in focus. And it's very similar to, if you go to Romans chapter 15 and verse 6, Verse five, now the God of patience and consolation grants you to be like-minded one toward another according to Christ Jesus. So here we see this like-mindedness, we see this idea of unity. That ye may with one mind and one mouth glorify God. So here it's very clear this isn't one, we're not talking about the whole group has to have one representative who speaks out to honor and glorify God. It's one in unity, so it's similar in that a body, a church, is one in unity through how? Through aligning itself with God. The church is where the believers at Colossae and where we realize and experience true belief and true practice that comes as a result of everyone in the church being at peace with God. Notice here that Paul excludes himself from the group here by saying ye. If this was if this was if this was some kind of thinking about a universal mystical body, Paul should have included himself in that in this verse. But he doesn't. He speaks to the Colossian church. Paul here doesn't say that, he says ye, you're there. The peace with God then is the basis for our union with Christ. We all get along, why? Why do we all get along? Would we all get along if we weren't believers? If we weren't in unity with Christ? No. I venture to say that if we were all just unbelievers, we'd have no interaction whatsoever. Why do we get along? Why do we come together? because we're all unified together because of the union that we have with Christ. We're one because of our union with Christ. The body life of the church then is a oneness. It's unity that we have with each other that we get from our oneness that we have with God. We don't come together then based on what we want. We don't come together based on our own thing. We come together based on what will keep us aligned with God. And then when we obey, and we obey God in the church. So why is a church one? Why is a church one? Well, a church is one because the church members submit, individually submit to the will of God. Each believer allows peace to rule in their own life. How? Where? Here, through the local church. Then the local church then is where we find this oneness of this unity that God wants, that God expects, that God really requires for all believers. So, application. How are you doing? How are we doing? Are you committed to peace? Are you committed to letting the peace that you have from God, are you committed to letting that peace rule in your life, in every decision that you make, all of them, and specifically in the decisions that you make with one another? Are you committed to peace? Do you want peace? Do we want peace as a church? We should. Peace includes considering others more important than yourself. And that really, when it comes down to it, when there's striving, I think we talked about, I think you talked about striving, strife a couple weeks ago in the Sunday school time. When there's contention, is there really peace? I mean, it's like the opposite of peace. Over here, you've got peace. Everyone's getting along. Everyone's having a good time. Everyone's fellowshipping. Everyone's got good attitudes. Everyone's happy and joyful. And that's what it looks like when there's striving going on, right? It's happy, joyful, you know, smiles on the face. No, it's not. It's the opposite. So strife is the opposite of peace. Contention is the opposite of peace. And where does contention? What's the root of contention? What does the Bible say? Where does it come from? What does it come out of? Only by pride. Yeah. It comes out of a proud heart. So kids, when you're out there playing around and you're fighting and bickering and arguing and slinging stuff at each other, and you're being mean to one another, you know where that comes from? A proud heart. Is that letting the peace of God rule? No. Husbands, wives, when you're going at it, that never happens, I'm sure. It comes from pride, a lack of humility. We have to make sure that in every relationship that we have, we're allowing the peace of God to rule. That takes thinking. That takes, you can't, you have to, I've said this, I tell this to Bryce all the time, and it's something I'm sure that many of you have said or heard, think before you speak. Think before you speak. You have to think about the other person before you say whatever it is you're gonna say. Why? Because they might not understand what it is that you're saying, or they might not take it the way you think they're gonna take it. So rather than just opening your mouth and saying the first thing that comes, which can really lead to the contention that we're talking about here, stop, slow down, and think about what you're gonna say. Is what I'm about to say, is it gonna bring peace to the situation, or is it gonna bring conflict? Ultimately, we have to consider others and consider them as more important than us. This commitment to peace then preserves our unity. And it is made possible because we are at peace with God. This church relationship isn't about whether you grew up here. It's not about whether you married in here. It's not about whether you moved to this area and became a church member. But rather, it's about God having made peace with each and every one of us. whether you're from Ohio, or Indiana, or Utah, or Wisconsin, Iowa, I don't wanna miss any, Alabama, Louisiana, sorry, that was actually, that was bad, Louisiana. And I don't know, I don't know if I missed any others, but wherever you're from, you come together in this church. And we are united one with another because of this peace that we have with God through the cross of Christ. And then we're called then to live this peace out with one another. And that's what really holds any church together. That's what it took to unite the Greeks and the Jews. That's what it took to unite the Romans and the barbaric Scythians back in our passage earlier on. That's what it took to unite the bond slave and the servant was the peace of God. They had nothing in common, yet they could be united together in the church. And that's what it takes for all of us to remain united. Also related to the peace of Christ, guiding us is being thankful. The verse ends with Paul saying, just a little like bookend, and be thankful. Just like almost in bypass. Just be thankful. We're going to see this idea concept again back in verse 17. So it's mentioned twice in a few verses. So there's this idea of being thankful. It's important. When you think about this idea of thankfulness and peace, the combination really does truly make sense. A lack of peace with one another generally results from self-seeking or dissatisfaction with the way that things are. Being thankful means that we realize that all things are provided in Christ. So if we are truly thankful, then there's not very much room for bitterness and resentment. So in other words, start being thankful for one another, and you will be at peace with one another, if you can be thankful for one another. But the peace of God can too often be hindered when a person's heart is lacking in their thanksgiving for one another and their praise. Each of those groups, the Greeks, the Jews, the Romans, the Scythians, the barbarians, the bond servant, the slave, the master, each one of those groups, they could have picked at each other, they could have got on each other's case, they could have fought with one another and strived with one another in church because, you know, whatever. we're not, I'm better than you, you're not as good as me, you're from this part of the world, you're the scum of the earth, you're not an LSU fan, you're an Alabama fan, or you don't like the Utes or whatever. There's all of these very, there's all kinds of things that we have that are different that could really split us apart, but we don't allow those things to drive a wedge between us. Each of those groups, like I said, could have just really gone at each other, but a grateful heart, a grateful heart that is filled with heavenly thanks and praise to God, that is a heart that is ready and prepared to have the peace of God flow into their inner being and then flow outward towards everyone else around them. And this is really a testimony of praise to our Heavenly Father. You think about people when they come into our church. Visitors, unsaved, whatever, we don't get a lot, but every now and then we get them come in. If they came in and they just saw just constant, just no unity, just absolute chaos, what a horrible testimony that is, or that would be. And I think overall we do well here in our fellowship with one another, but I believe there's always room for improvement. We can always do better, we can always be better. It is being thankful that leads to unity. As one commentator put it, God has put you together, God has put you together with others who are very different from you. God tells you to be thankful about that. Look for reasons to be thankful. Look for them in your home, look for them in your family, look for them in your friendships, look for them in this church. Try not to find the thing that irritates you and think about that. You will see those irritations, trust me. You will, they're there. I'm sure if I asked, you guys could all come up with something that I do that irritates you. They're all around us. If you look and you want to really focus on the irritations, you'll find them. It's part of dealing with fellow sinners. And you and I are both one of those. We're sinners. But fixating our thinking and our mind and our thoughts on those irritations, it's not gonna help build unity, it's gonna destroy, tear down unity. Focusing on the reasons for thanksgiving builds unity. How can you thank God for so and so today? Focus on those reasons. So may we with one accord then let the peace of God rule in our hearts. day by day, moment by moment, one step at a time, for it is to this that this body of Christ has been called. Peace. Let's pray. Dear Heavenly Father, we are thankful for your word. We thank for the teaching that we can see in your word. We know that it is your will that we know your word, that we study it, that we think about it, that we meditate on it, and that we put it into practice. Pray that you'd strengthen us as a church, strengthen us in our unity and in our love for one another, that you would help us to just fellowship and pray for and think about the things that we can be thankful for with one another so that we may allow the peace the peace that you give to rule in our own hearts and in our own lives and in this church so we can be a wonderful testimony of unity to this world around us in Jesus name Amen I like that breakdown on the peace with God, and then that helps us experience the peace of God in our lives. And as I think about that, I think about how those in the world often, when they have turmoil or stress, they say, well, I have to recenter, like do yoga. and that maybe this yoga pose, I'll recenter, I'll get peace with my body and spirit. But we need to recenter as believers, but it's in prayer. It's in the Word of God. Every day you have to recenter and remember, oh, Jesus died for me, and I have all these wonderful riches in Christ, and I'm overloaded with riches in Christ. And then we're centered, and then we're able to handle the difficulties and problems that come our way because we're already full. We're centered in on all the wonderful things we have in Christ and only great peace have they that love thy law and nothing shall offend them. So you're able to have it because you spent the time centering yourself in God's word and in prayer and I think we'll have an opportunity now to