Well, let's turn to God's Word then. Colossians 3 is our sermon text, preaching through this epistle from Paul and Timothy to the church in Colossae in the mid-50s AD. And I mentioned last week that the first part of chapter 3, or kind of the first part there, the one right before, the one we're reading today, is kind of the negative. Put off these things as believers. But today we're going to look at more of the positives. And last week I only got to verse 10, so we're going to pick up at verse 11 and go through 13 of Colossians 3. 11 through 13 of Colossians 3. And do listen, do pay attention, because this is God's Word. Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free, but Christ is all and in all. Put on then as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness and patience, bearing with one another, and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other. As the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive." That's how far we'll read and look at in this part of God's Word. How do you think about yourselves? I mean, how do you, as a human being, think about yourself? That's a pretty big and important question, isn't it? And how you answer that question is going to affect all the parts of your life. How you think about yourself affects all of life. So, for example, if you think very highly of yourself, if you think you're the smartest, strongest, godliest, best person, we know that's pride. And if you think too much of and too much about yourself, and it's always all about you, it's going to affect your life. Other people are going to be annoyed with you, and you're going to have too high of thoughts about yourself. It's going to affect everything if you're proud. But on the opposite hand, if you think you're, you know, the opposite of smart and strong and godly, if you think you're worthless and a stupid loser, it's also very self-focused, because it's still all about you, and it also is going to affect your life. It's going to make you gloomy and negative and sometimes a downer to other people. And I could give many more examples. I just want you to think about that. How you think about yourself affects all parts of life. And when it comes to this, how you think about yourself, I would say, and I would argue pretty strongly, that the best answer to how you think about yourself in a good way, in a healthy way, is found in the Christian faith. The healthiest and most satisfying way for you to think about yourself is found in Christ, in Him. Like Paul has been teaching us, in Him we have new life, in Him we have security, in Him we have the forgiveness of sins and the promise of glory. So if you want to think about yourself in a healthy and good way, you think about yourself in Christ. And so, that's what Paul has been talking about a little bit earlier. In chapter 3, verse 1, he says, set your minds on heavenly things. Christ, who is in heaven. And so, if you think about yourself first, you're going to get it all wrong. But if you think about Christ first, it will start to fall into place. And then you'll think about others in a proper way as well. And so, that's what kind of those things we're going to talk about as we look at these verses this morning in Colossians 3, verses 11 through 13. Here's the main thought. In Christ, you are an undivided people who are distinguished, and you have directions on how to live. That's kind of the main thought we're going to look at today from these verses. In Christ, if you're a believer, in Christ, you are an undivided people, that's the first point, and you are distinguished, that's the second point, and you have directions. on how to live. That's the third point. So let's look at this text and these points that Paul is making in order. First of all, in verse 11, it's, you are an undivided people. You are a unified people. Let's read verse 11. Here, there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, and so on. We'll get to those. But I think when you look at this, the first question you might have, we're just picking up in the middle of a thought, Where is here in verse 11? Here there is not Jew or Greek. Well, it goes back to the earlier emphasis that Paul is making for Christians. It's in Christ. or with Christ, in his body, there is no distinction between Jew and Greek, barbarian and Scythian. And it goes to this right before in verse 10, you have put on the new self, if you're a Christian, you've put on the new self and you're being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator. And then you could say, where there is neither Jew nor Greek and so on. So if you're in Christ, if you're being renewed into His image, there's no distinction between Jew and Greek, slave and free, male and female, rich or poor, older or younger, barbarian, Scythian, and the list goes on and on. And that's the point that Paul is making in verse 11. You're a unified people in Christ. We don't make distinctions in Christ's body based on ethnicity, or income level, or age, or social status, or skin color, or other worldly divisions. We don't do that in Christ. And Paul gives us a few examples. We can walk through these just briefly in verse 11. He says there's no distinction between Jew and Greek, between uncircumcised or circumcised, in other words. Now, it would be back then, you know, in the first century, they were still wrestling with this, a Jew and a non-Jew, or a Greek. It's the Jews and non-Jews, essentially. Now, we know this so far removed, we know from Ephesians 2, that when Christ died on the cross, he broke down that wall of division, and he made two people, Jew and non-Jew, into one, one body, one church, one people of God. We know that. But in Paul's day in Colossae and other places, they were still wrestling with that reality. And Paul is saying here, because of Jesus and in Jesus, we don't make this distinction or division between Jew and non-Jew, circumcised and non-circumcised. It doesn't matter in Christ whether you're a Jew or a Gentile, because in Christ, all people are equally important and equally significant. Your ethnicity doesn't matter. And Paul says the same things in Galatians 6. It doesn't matter if you're circumcised or not circumcised. All that matters is you're a new creation. So there's no distinction in the church. Now the next one in verse 11, we talked about Greek Jew, circumcised, uncircumcised. Barbarian and Scythian. Now we may have heard of barbarian and we use it maybe for a slang word. But back then a barbarian would be like a foreigner. Probably somebody who speaks a different language and has different customs and has come into the church. Somebody different than us. Or barbarian could mean like a lower class, uneducated person. Commentaries kind of go both ways. So that's a barbarian. And Scythian, Scythian was a group of people back then from modern-day southern Ukraine. It wasn't called Ukraine back then, but if you think in terms of area, the Scythians were people from modern-day southern Ukraine. And a lot of people viewed Scythians as even lower than barbarians, uncivilized pagans. is how some people talked of Scythians. In fact, a lot of Jews back then hated the Scythians. Josephus, a Jewish historian, said, Scythians are not much different than wild animals. But Paul says, in Christ, it doesn't matter if you're a foreigner or a native, if you're upper class or lower class, if you're from far away or from near. We don't have these distinctions in the church. And the next one is slave and free. We kind of know that. Now, slavery back in Paul's day was not like the evil practice of slavery we know of, that evil practice of human property. But slavery back then was still not great. If you were a slave back then, you were a human laborer, and you didn't have many rights. You just had to work, and you couldn't go about freely like you would want. And free, we know what free means. You're not a slave. You're free to go about as you want. You're free to own land and you have more rights. But Paul says in the church, in Christ, it doesn't matter whether you're a slave or whether you're free. We don't have those divisions. We don't have those distinctions in the church because Christ is what matters. And so Paul's point is quite clear here, I think. There is no distinction, no differentiation between people groups in the church. There's no hierarchy or order of importance or status. And Paul hammers home the same thing in Galatians 3. You are all one in Christ. There is no Jew, no Greek, nor male, nor female, nor slave, nor free. You're all one in Jesus. In the body of Christ, there's no division or distinction. Because ethnicity, and background, and income level, and gender, and nationality, and skin colors, those divisions and distinctions disappear in Christ. We don't section off the church based on those things, because we're all one in Christ. Now, if you're a Christian, of course, you're still male or female. You don't lose your gender. Or you're still from Asia or South America if you're a Christian. You don't lose your nationality. The point Paul is making here is that those things don't matter so much in the church, in Christ. They don't make you less important or more important. In Christ's body, everything is not about race, gender, or income. It's about Christ. And that's what Paul ends on in this verse 11. But Christ is all and in all. The New Living Translation puts it well. Christ is all that matters, and He lives in all of us. So we're all one, unified, equally important. And so that's what Paul is hitting home. And it goes back to Christ's supremacy in chapter 1. Christ is head of all. And it goes back to Paul's explanation of how Christ gives us new life and security in Him. And it's fundamentally true for all Christians, no matter what your background, ethnicity, age, or income level is. That's what matters, is being alive in Christ. So I think we can understand the point here. And we don't know if the church back then was making distinctions and divisions and Paul was kind of correcting them, or if Paul was maybe saying this just to prevent it, because it happens sometimes when people start to distinguish between ethnicities or income level or gender. He would say, don't go back to those worldly divisions that you used to probably think like, stay unified in Christ. Other people might think that rich people are more important than poor people, but not in the church. Other people might distinguish or separate based on ethnicity, but not in the Church. If you're in Christ, that's what matters. Those other things are far less important. Now, when we think about this topic, we all know that the Church has not always practiced this truth. Have we? I think sometimes in church history we know that Christians have actually separated or segregated sinfully. And if you think about it, it even happened in New Testament times. Remember when Peter refused to eat with Gentiles and he kind of went back to that Jew-Gentile distinction and Paul had to rebuke him? Peter was playing favorites. Or remember in James, James had to tell some Christians, stop showing favoritism to the rich. Don't give a rich person the best seat in worship. That's sinful. And it happens throughout history. We know what happened in the American church, sinful racism, where whites would not allow blacks to worship with them. It's terrible. It's disobeying a fundamental teaching of Scripture when you divide based on ethnicity, race, gender, color, and so on. And it happens in other countries too. Now, we can't change the past, but we can lament it, and we can learn from the past, and we can resolve as Christians to do better. Resolve to live out the implications of verse 11 and remember that all Christians are one in Christ, equally important. Resolve to live out the implications and not show favoritism or discrimination. We can say it together as Christians. We will remember that all Christians are one in Christ, equally important and essential in the church. So we will not make divisions or distinctions here or in my Christian life. Not now, not here, not ever. And on the positive side, too, there's been many examples of unity in the Christian church. Of course, there's been some black spots, dark spots, but there's also been some good examples in Christian history, how verse 11 is working out beautifully, where people are unified in Christ and not divided. I read a book by a black historian, and he noted quite a few examples of how in American history, white Christians were helping black Christians escape the terror of slavery. working together. And in my own experience, when I went to seminary, there were guys from Japan and South Africa and Malawi and China, and we all truly loved each other and we got along very well. And you can probably think of examples too, where in the body of Christ, these divisions don't matter and everyone gets along together well in love and peace. And so, based on Paul's words and experience, my own experience and probably yours, the best and most extensive remedy for racism and other sinful isms in the Church is the Gospel. And may God help us absorb that truth of Christ being all and in all. He's all that matters. No divisions. You're a unified people. Now the second thing that Paul says about you, how to think about yourselves, is, and this is in verse 12, you are a distinguished people. So you're a unified people in Christ, and in Christ you're also a distinguished people altogether. First of all, verse 11 says you're God's chosen ones or God's elect. Maybe you've read Ephesians 2 before. God has elected his people to salvation in Christ before the foundation of the world. Ephesians teaches that God chose you out of his own love and sovereign will, and he didn't elect you for salvation based on your income level, or your intelligence, or any good works that you have done. He chose you by grace. You are God's chosen people. That's an essential part of who you are as a Christian. Chosen by God. That's your identity chosen by God. But Paul also says holy. Now, sometimes holy means like morally pure. We say he's a very holy person. But here, holy is more of a covenantal meaning for it, like set apart. In the old covenant, remember, God set apart certain instruments and things for use in the temple. And that language is used for Christians. Christians are, in God's covenant, set apart for His use. Set apart by God for His use. And so once again, this is part of who you are. as a Christian, whether you're young or older, whether you're rich or poor, whether you're male or female, in Christ you are set apart by God for his special use, all together. And then the other distinction or distinguish, you're God's elect, you're God's holy. And the other one, it says beloved. So there's this triple reality of who you are as a distinguished people. You're God's elect, you're God's holy, and you're God's beloved. That means he loves you. You're loved by God. You're loved by Christ. You're loved by him so much that he gave his life to save you from sin and death and hell. You're loved. It's part of your fundamental identity as a Christian. All Christians are loved by God. The Lord loves you, He cares about you, and He's affectionate towards you. In Christ, He loves all His people the same, black or white, male or female, Canadian, South American, and so on. Loved by God. So these are wonderful distinctions, distinguished things about us as Christians, God's chosen ones, holy and beloved. And one thing for application is this is how you should think about other Christians. I mean, when you meet another Christian, these things are true of that other Christian, no matter what that other Christian has for his or her background. And when you think of other Christians this way, like Paul tells us about, it will help you avoid discriminating and showing favoritism. Do you know what I mean? So when you meet another Christian, the first thing is not how much money they make, or where they're from, or what language they speak. The first thing you think about them is, they're God's chosen ones, holy and beloved. Like me. And that will help all these sinful isms disappear. That's how you should think about other Christians. Husbands, wives, other Christian family members and friends, any believer that you meet. A distinguished people. But this is also how you should think of yourself as a Christian. First of all, you're not better than other Christians. Can't have any pride. It's not like you're more holy or more elect or more loved by God. We never want to think that. But what this also means, as you think about yourself as a Christian, is you're not worse or less important than other Christians. He equally loves you and has chosen you and has set you apart. So if you're a believer, you're a distinguished person. Important, special treasure to God. And I've mentioned this before and I've talked to you about it, some of you about it, but a lot of Christians, and I'm not saying Christians out there, but a lot of Christians we know struggle with a lot of negative thoughts about themselves or just in general. A lot of Christians struggle with like hateful self thoughts. And as I've been thinking about this and reading about it, it seems to me that this has gotten worse in the last 15 or 20 years. And I agree with the studies and the surveys and the experts that I've read who say that a big part of this negative and hateful self-thought has to do with social media, smartphone addiction, and endless doom-scrolling for hours. All the scientists and experts say that excessive phone use is a major cause of depression, anxiety, and self-hatred. I'm not going to go further into that, but it's worth thinking about. And if you struggle with these kinds of things, depression, anxiety, self-hatred, there's a high probability it is due in part to excessive smartphone use. But back on to this topic, if you do have self-hating and negative thoughts, you have to remember to go back to the truth of Scripture and think of yourself as Scripture describes you. chosen by God, set apart for His use, and loved. Whatever negative self-thoughts you have, put them up against the truth of verse 12. Put them up against these three-fold wonderful distinctives of who you are, chosen, holy, and loved. And the wonderful thing about the Christian faith is these things are always true of you who are in Christ, in His body. Even when you feel like a total failure, even when you feel like a worthless loser, this is true of you. You are God's chosen, set apart, and dearly loved. So the key in this, and I've said this before, it takes a while to wrap our brains around this, the key to this is don't trust your feelings and emotions that are talking to you. Your feelings and emotions are often very, very unreliable. But Scripture's truth is always 100% reliable. No matter how you feel, no matter what your emotions are, in Christ, you're God's elect. holy and dearly loved. Satan can whisper a thousand lies to you and your own fallen mind can struggle mightily against this truth. But God's truth prevails. And fight those negative thoughts with God's truth. And so here it is, just like the gospel is the only true and best remedy for racism and divisions in the church. So the gospel is the key to a secure identity for Christians. Gospel is the key to a secure identity for Christians in Christ. You are chosen, holy, and loved. Okay, well let's go on to the last point then. So you're also a people with directions. You're a people with no divisions. You're a people who are distinct and you're a people with directions. Let's look at what Paul says in verse 12 also. Put on then, skipping ahead, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness and patience. So in light of this truth of who you are in Christ, together as a diverse body of believers, clothe yourself with these wonderful virtues. Put them on like when you display something, you know, on a logo on your shirt. Exhibit these morals. Let me briefly go through them. Compassionate hearts is affectionate compassion. It's tender love. It's letting your heart go out to other Christians in tender mercy. put on kindness as well. That's goodness. It's doing good things for other believers. If someone here is sad and in sorrow, go show them some kindness and goodness. If you see another Christian in need, go be kind to them and meet their need. Wear kindness. The next one is humility. I probably don't need to define this, but it's not arrogant thinking about yourself, that I'm better than others. But understanding the reality that I already mentioned, that in Christ you're equal to others, so don't think too much about yourself or of yourself. Be humble. And then meekness, or another term for this would be gentleness. What is it to be meek or gentle in the Christian life? Well, it's not rough and rude. It's not violent and coarse and angry. If you're wearing gentleness or meekness as clothing, you're not going to scream at people. If you're clothed with gentleness, people will be at ease around you, not always on edge, because you're a gentle person. And patience. Clothe yourself with patience. Put it on display. Be slow to anger. Don't be a hot-headed volcano. Don't get upset quickly or go into attack mode. Exercise much patience. So those are these things that Paul tells us to wear. And first little note here, we'll go on to verse 13 in a moment. But the first note here is you might notice that these things overlap with the fruit of the Spirit. I'll let you think about that yourself. Note number two is that these are opposite of the sinful earthly vices that Paul mentioned before. You can look at that yourself too. Remember Paul says, put these things off. Now he says, put these things on. And I want to make another note here that this list is specifically for Christians interacting with each other in the body of Christ diverse. So all Christians in Christ's body should practice all these virtues towards all other Christians. That's what Paul is saying here. It's not like you can pick a few of these things and exhibit them towards a few other Christians, but no, all of you as believers should wear all of these clothing pieces and exhibit them towards all other believers. And that's how we build up unity. And one more note about these things in verse 12 is these are all Christ-like virtues. So go through the list. Christ is the one who has a perfectly compassionate heart. He's the one who has perfect kindness, humility and meekness. He has the one with perfect patience towards you. And that's part of the gospel, isn't it? Who Christ is for us. And now that we're new in Jesus and being renewed into his image, like Paul says, we imitate Christ and put on these Christ-like pieces of clothing to display to others in the body of Christ. This is the new you and how you should live, in other words. Okay, well, let's go on and finish here. Verse 13, here's something else you should do towards each other. Bearing with one another, or bear with each other. It's forbearance. What does it mean to bear with someone? I mean, it's an aspect of patience, right? If you bear with someone, you're patient with them. It's putting up with each other. It's enduring with each other instead of getting angry or bitter, but tolerating each other well. Now, we use this language, right? I think I've probably said this before on the pulpit. I'd say something like, you know, if I had a cold, pretend I had a cold, I'd say, bear with me today, I have a little cold, I have a cough. That means just put up with my weakness, put up with my, you know, maybe frustrations or imperfections. And so when we bear with each other as Christians, we patiently put up with each other's flaws and failures, struggles and imperfections. In case you didn't know this, we're all quite imperfect. And all of us have different quirks. All of us have different weaknesses. And so fair forbearance should be on display. And we could think of it this way, God bears with me so well and patiently, and I'll bear with other Christians like that. Bear with each other. And the last one for the morning, verse 13, if someone has a complaint against someone else, forgive each other. A complaint would be like a quarrel, or an offense, or an accusation, or a grievance. Like Paul said before, don't get angry and full of rage towards someone. Instead, forgive. If someone in the church family, if another Christian offends you, what should you do? Get angry and yell? Or forgive? You know the answer now, but it's hard in real life. Paul calls you to forgive the person who offended you. Acknowledge the wrong, forgive it, and let it go. That's the new way of the new self. Not anger and vengeance, but forgiveness. Now the question would be, how do we forgive each other like this? Why do we forgive each other like this? And Paul explains it here in the end of verse 13. You want an example? As the Lord has forgiven you, so also you must forgive each other. So again, it's based on Jesus in the gospel, isn't it? It always comes back to the gospel. And Paul has mentioned forgiveness twice in this letter earlier, in chapter 1 and in chapter 2. You've been forgiven by God. And so there's a comparison in how you forgive others. Like God forgives you, so you forgive each other. It's full forgiveness. It's not like partial forgiveness or mostly forgiving. But how does God forgive you? Fully, right? And it's free forgiveness. That's how God forgives you. He doesn't make you earn your forgiveness, and He doesn't make you do something for your forgiveness. He forgives you out of freedom and love. It's not only full and frequent forgiveness, it's also, or full and free forgiveness, it's also frequent forgiveness. Not three times or nine times or ten times you forgive each other. How many times you forgive each other? What did Jesus say? 70 times 7 just means all the time. That's how God forgives you. That's how you should forgive each other. And it's probably a little tough for somebody to hear this, but I would say that Christians who generally have a hard time forgiving others have probably not fully understood the gospel yet. Right? If you generally have a hard time forgiving others and it's not your MO, you probably haven't understood the gospel of what it means that God has forgiven you in Christ. And so, once you really understand the gospel, once you really understand what it means that as the Lord has forgiven you, that opens your heart to forgive full, free, and frequent. I will not forgive you is not in the Christian's vocabulary. I will not forgive you is something a Christian should never say. Scripture says, as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. So think about this as a big picture now. Who we are in Christ, we're an undivided, distinguished people, and the Lord has given us directions in how to live with each other in the body. Not in evil, not in sexual sin, not in anger, not in the world's ways of darkness, but with new life in Christ, as God's chosen, holy, and beloved people all together, being made more into the image of Christ. And he's the reason why and the example for how we live and think about ourselves and interact with others. And speaking of putting on these virtues, I probably told this story before, but when I was doing church planning work in Washington, there was two women in the church who had a conflict. And it wasn't a huge one, but a few people did know about the conflict, and I was just hearing about it. And one morning before church, kind of like this, I was getting my notes and stuff ready, and I happened to look in the back of the pews, and these two women were talking to each other, and they were crying, and they hugged. And I could tell right before church, they literally reconciled. And that's what Paul is talking about here. Bear with one another, forgive one another, show gentleness and kindness and patience. Is there another Christian that you need to forgive? Is there someone here that you need to show kindness to? Do you need to generally in life show more compassion to other people and more patience with others? These are directions for all of you to think about. Now, one last point of application. These directions also apply to Christian friendships and marriages. They apply to in the home. Any issues and conflicts in marriage fall under these directions. How do you handle a conflict in marriage? You're going to have some. Two sinful people married are going to have conflict. How do you handle it? With how Paul teaches us in Colossians 3. And on that note, sometimes Christians can be the biggest hypocrites. In public, after church and during the week, we are kind and patient and forgiving to other people out there. But then when you get home, you turn into a devil, and all these virtues disappear, and all the clothes of these virtues come off, and there's no compassion, no gentleness, no forgiveness, no patience in the home. So yes, this text is talking to you, husbands, wives, kids, in the home as well. And it's for all of us, even outside the home. Anyway, how do you think about yourself? It is a big question, isn't it? And it's best answered in the Christian faith, in Christ. As a Christian, you can think of yourself as having new life in Christ and secure in Him. It doesn't matter if you're rich or poor, black or white, male or female, foreigner or native, Jew or non-Jew. Christ is all that matters, and He lives in all of His people. And that means you are a unified and distinguished people, chosen, holy, and loved. So rejoice in this. And this is good news. Rest in the truth of who you are in Christ. And as you grow in that understanding, it will help you live together with other Christians in love and harmony in the way that Paul directs us. So let's pray for God's help, understanding, and living out this truth. Let's pray.