So tonight, we are going to continue our series in Colossians 3. And specifically, we are looking at the continuing in the second of four commands that we see here that kind of wrap up this section on putting on the new man that starts back in verse 10. So let's read verse 16. It says, 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. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for this time in your word. We thank you for all that you do for us. We pray that you would help us to be edified this evening as we go through this command to let Christ's word dwell in us richly. and to understand its meaning and how it applies to our lives. In Jesus' name, amen. All right, so we continue through our series and we're looking at this second of the four commands that we see here, which are really to control our expression of our new life as a believer. First of all, in verse 15, the first command was that we were to let the peace of God rule in our hearts. The peace of God is to be the umpire or the arbitrator or the ruler in our hearts. And then in verse 16, there is the word of Christ that is to dwell. And we called that, we entitled this message to be controlled by the word of God. So we're to let the peace of God rule in our hearts. We're to let the word of Christ dwell in us richly. And that's really the point of verse 16, be controlled by the word of God. Let the word of God control you. And the last time we were together, we looked at three points from this passage. The first point that we looked at was the command. We saw that this is a command by God, and it is something that we must recognize as imperative. And so it's something that we have to take serious because it's a command from God. And so we must ensure that we are obeying this command. And we have to take that seriously. The second point is the content. The content. What is it that we are to let dwell? Well, it's the Word of Christ. And so the Word of Christ is the content. That is the thing that is to dwell in us richly. It's the Word of Christ. It's God's Word. And then the third point we said was it's continuation. And that is in the sense of the word dwell. It's to dwell in us. It's to reside in us. It's to make itself at home in our life. And it's to remain there. It's to take up residence. It's to make itself at home in our life. And it's to do it in a rich, abundant manner. That's where the idea of richly comes in. So we're to let the word of Christ dwell in us richly. So we see the command, the content, the continuation. This is a present tense imperative. So Christ's Word is to continue in an ongoing way to dwell. It's not just a one-time thing, but it's an ongoing way of life for the believer, where his Word saturates your life, where his Word takes up every part of you, and it rules every thought and every word and every attitude and every action. And we do this in an ongoing way. This becomes who we are. As a believer, believers are people who let the word of Christ dwell in them richly. A person who's filled up with God's word and then allows the word of God to control them. Very similar to what we see in Ephesians chapter five, where we're filled with the spirit and the result is that the Holy Spirit controls us. And then, the next point that we're going to get into tonight, another C, is the consequences. What are the consequences of letting the Word of Christ dwell in us richly? I see two consequences that come out of a life that is controlled by the Word of God. And those two consequences are ministry and worship. We see ministry in the teaching and admonishing, and we see worship in the verse, and that is the singing. Now, the fact that these are consequences means that they come out of something, they result from something. Making that something really a really a prerequisite or a requirement And so before you can effectively do these things that we will speak about tonight First you must understand that you cannot effectively do them unless you are first controlled by the Word of God Someone who is not controlled by the Word of God is not going to be able to effectively minister to others and is not going to be able to effectively worship God So first, you must understand that you cannot not effectively do these things if you are not controlled by the Word of God. The one is dependent upon the other. And again, I want to point out that the context here is in the church. This is the context of the church. The you is plural here. Let the Word of Christ dwell in you. That's plural, that's all of us. We are all to be letting the Word of Christ dwell in us richly. And what that will result in, the consequence, will be ministry and worship. So as well, we all, as a church, ought to allow the Word of God to control each and every one of us, so that we can then effectively do the things that we will see here in this verse. But before we look at those consequences, I want to look at a little bit of a contention, another C, a contention. So what is this contention that I speak of? Well, there is quite the divergence among different scholars and preachers and commentators about how the clauses in this verse break down and break up. Grammatically, and I think I did and I do think it's that it is actually difficult to decide How to how to connect each clause in the verse, but I hopefully can explain that to you So so this there's this contention. What do I mean by the contention? Well, let me explain to you What I'm gonna do is just kind of break down the verse and the clauses and what the contention is and Does the phrase, here's the first point of contention in the verse, does the phrase, in all wisdom, does that go with the phrase, let the word of Christ dwell in you richly? Or does it go with the following phrase, teaching and admonishing? So in other words, does the clause, in all wisdom, go with, let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, in all wisdom? Or is it, 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 and your hearts to the Lord. So that's contention number one. Contention number two. Does the phrase teaching and admonishing one another, is that separate from the phrase in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, or do they go together? In other words, does the phrase teaching and admonishing one another, does that go together with in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, or is that a separate clause from in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs? In other words, here's the two different schools of thought. One school of thought says that the Word of Christ dwells in you richly, in all wisdom, and then that results in teaching and admonishing one another in Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. And then there's another school of thought that says that the Word of Christ dwells in you richly, And then in all wisdom, we teach and admonish one another. And then in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, we sing with grace in the hearts to the Lord. So in essence, you have So there's some placement of some prepositional phrases that we have to kind of figure out where they go. And we have to understand this verse in the context here, also in the context of the Book of Colossians, but also in the context of the whole scripture. So the contention, now the contention resolved. I'm going to tell you what I think, and then I'm going to tell you why I think it. It seems to me, after a lot of reading, I studied a lot for this, I read a lot for this, because it was kind of a, like, how does this, because there's really two schools of thought, and there's a lot of people that say one way, and there's a lot of people that say another. It seems to me that after reading and studying, the best way to understand this verse, and I'll get into why, is first to connect, in all wisdom, to the teaching and admonishing one another. And then, to have in Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, that part of the verse be separated from the teaching and admonishing. and having in Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs connected with singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. So what we would have is then, let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly. That's the command. Let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly. Richly, an adverb that goes with that first clause. Then you have a second clause. In all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another, And then you have a third clause that is, in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. Now, let me explain to you why I think that this is the best way to break down this verse. First, it seems that the adverb ritually is an emphatic qualifier. In other words, it gives an emphatic qualification of the word dwell in, let dwell. In other words, it tells us the manner in which The Word of Christ is to dwell in us. It's to dwell in us richly. It's there for emphasis. It's an emphatic qualifier, which to me would terminate that clause or phrase. Let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly. Second, The prepositional phrase, in all wisdom, and none of these in and of themselves is like the nail in the coffin. I'm taking this all as a whole, looking at it all as a whole, so not one of these single points is really, you can't take it by itself, you have to look at all of this as a whole. So second, in all wisdom seems to naturally fit better with teaching and admonishing than it does with letting the word of Christ dwell in you richly. In other words, if someone is going to be teaching and admonishing, what are they going to need in order to do that? Well, they're going to need wisdom. They're going to need all wisdom. And we're going to talk a little bit later about what that is. And so it seems to me that that fits better with teaching admonishing than it does with the first phrase, let the word of Christ dwell in you richly. Third, and this to me was really helpful in deciding one way or the other. Again, it's not the only thing, but it definitely helps. This way of understanding this verse fits with a previous pattern that Paul uses in the book of Colossians in chapter 1 verse 28. So if you look over to Colossians chapter 1 and verse 28, Paul says this, warning every man, so the word warning there, it's the same word for admonish, and teaching every man, same word for teach, in all wisdom. Notice there, Paul has in all wisdom, and he is using it in the same sense there, where we have teaching and admonishing in all wisdom. And so, this fits the pattern where Paul states that the goal of his ministry was that he may present every man perfect, complete in Christ. And his means for accomplishing that goal was to preach Christ, while also warning and admonishing, or teaching, every man in all wisdom. Fourth, the passage itself then has a more symmetrical balance when you have the prepositional phrase at the beginning of each clause with the participle then following. So in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another, and then in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. Fifth. You don't really see anywhere else in Scripture, and I looked through all of the different places that these are participles, teaching and admonishing. The verb is dwell, so we have three participles, teaching, admonishing and singing. All the other places in scripture that you see these words teaching and admonishing used, there's no context of music whatsoever. I'll just leave it at that. There's no music in the context of the teaching and admonishing. Now, that's not to say that teaching and admonishing cannot happen during music, during singing, during a special music. It's not to say that at all. In fact, teaching and admonishing probably should be occurring when we listen to music, but it's not primarily the purpose of music. Now, if we think about this, we have the word of Christ dwelling in us richly. If that is happening, if the word of Christ is dwelling in you richly, the content of our teaching and admonishing, and the content of our worship should then be the Word of Christ. That is, if the Word of Christ is dwelling in us richly, we should be teaching and admonishing one another with the Word of Christ, and then we should be singing to God the Word of Christ. But teaching and admonishing is not primarily done through singing. It's not like we have a strategy where we run around and teach and admonish one another in song. Like I walk down to Pastor Warner, and I'm going to teach him something, and so I start singing it to him. Or, you know, Brother Ross, I'm going to admonish him that he needs to stop whatever it is, and I'm going to sing that to him. That's not what I think. I don't think that that's what's being taught here. So that's number five. And then number six, and this really is more of a, well, it's closely related to our understanding of how this verse fits into the biblical view and the primary purpose and audience of music, and that is it's God. The primary purpose and the primary audience of music is to God, and we see that. In our verse here, we sing to God, not to people. And you see that here at the end of the verse, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. So our music, the primary audience is God. Now, does, when we sing in the congregation, are we all edified? Can we be edified? Yes, if it's the word of God, if we're singing scripture. Can we be taught and admonished? Can we learn? Well, certainly we can learn through music because, I mean, right now, when someone comes up and preaches the word, you wanna be taught, you wanna learn. Well, if we're singing scripture, if the scripture is being sung, then we can be taught and admonished. But it's not a strategy, in other words. It's not the primary purpose of music. So that's the contention, okay? That's the contention. That's how I'm gonna instruct you in this verse in the understanding. So let's look at the consequences. So if the word of Christ is dwelling in you richly, I see two consequences in this verse. One, and this is the only one we're gonna get to tonight, is ministry. Three words in verse 16 end in the letters ING, teaching, admonishing, and singing. These three words are all participles. They are all byproducts or side effects of the previous part of the verse, letting the Word of Christ dwell in you richly. And so each participle then is dependent upon the main verb of the verse, which is let dwell. And since each participle is a byproduct of letting the content of the Word of Christ dwell in you richly, then it would lead us to the conclusion that what would be coming out in those actions would also be the content of the Word of Christ. In other words, if the Word of Christ dwells in you richly, if the Word of Christ takes up residence in your life, if the Word of Christ saturates and permeates every area of your life, and it does this in a rich, full, abundant manner, that Word comes bubbling out. in the things that it does. It comes bubbling out in your life. Paul says that it is expressed in a church in two different ways, in ministry and in worship. And so if you are filled up with, if you are controlled by the Word of Christ, then you will teach and admonish others with his word, and you will then sing his word. So first of all, let's look at the first consequence, and that's ministry. Ministry. In all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another. Notice the manner in which the ministry of teaching and admonishing here is to take place. It is to be done how? In all wisdom. in all wisdom. Like I mentioned earlier, this is consistent with how Paul says that he and his fellow laborers sought to do their own ministry of presenting every man perfect or complete in Christ Jesus, was in all wisdom. And he implores us to do the same here. Now, what is wisdom? Well, we've said, and I don't know if this was Pastor Sutton's creation, but it's one of the things I remember about Pastor Sutton. He always defined wisdom as the proper application of truth. In other words, you have the knowledge of something, and then you understand it, and you're able to apply it in your life. You don't just have the knowledge for the sake of knowledge, but you have the knowledge so that way you know how to put it into practice. That's wisdom, properly applying truth. So it is the ability to take our knowledge that we have, specifically our knowledge of the scripture, and then to apply it in our life in different circumstances, in our spiritual life. And so this ministry that we have is to be done how? It's to be done in all wisdom. That is that it is to be done with practical discernment. being able to understand biblical principles, the teachings of scripture, and the principles that are there in scripture, and then putting them into practice in our life. But this can't be done in a Christian's life unless they are first, what? Filled up with the word of Christ, and allowing the word of Christ to dwell richly in our lives. There are many people, and I could dare say many Christians, who suffer from having a lot of knowledge but little wisdom. They can fill up their minds with so much knowledge and so many facts, and they could get 100% on all the Bible tests and Bible quizzes, and they'd win all the trivia questions and the Trivial Pursuit game or whatever, as it relates to the Bible categories. but they lack in wisdom because they don't know how to take those truths that they know and put them into practice in their life. They're really educated fools. They've amassed so much knowledge in their life, but they don't know anything practical to do with what they know. But the Lord doesn't want us to just gain a bunch of knowledge of his word. He does want that, and if you're gonna have wisdom, you're gonna need to gain knowledge But he wants us to be able to apply it to our life, put it into practice. Like know God's word, know what it says. Read it, think about it, meditate upon it. But then do it, put it into practice. But he doesn't want it to just be in our own life. He wants us to be able to help other people put his word into practice as well. Because we are part of his body, and we are to help one another walk with him. We're to be doing it ourselves first. But then we're to be helping one another do the same thing. And that really is the main point of the Great Commission, one of the main points of the Great Commission, right? Teaching them to observe all things. Teaching, same word, them to observe, to do. Not to just know, but to do. We are to help one another walk in obedience to the Lord's commands. That's one of our responsibilities as believers. And so we are to apply the knowledge that we have gained from the Word of Christ richly dwelling within us to our own lives, and in our own practice, but we're also to apply it to others. Help one another to walk in a manner worthy of our calling of Him. Now, I want you to notice the word, all. Let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom. The word, all, is the Greek word, passe, and it refers to the completeness or totality of a thing. So this word really indicates that this wisdom is, it's not partial wisdom. It's full, complete, absolute wisdom in the sense that it is free from imperfection. Where does wisdom ultimately come from? Wisdom comes from God. And so this is really divine wisdom. Now obviously our wisdom isn't perfect, but the wisdom that God gives us is perfect. And so when it says in James that if any man lacked wisdom, let him ask of God, and God will give to that man, and upbraideth not, and will give liberally, God gives you wisdom to be able to apply truth in specific situations. And He gives you this full, complete, thorough wisdom that you need in order to understand and put into practice the things that He teaches in Scripture. Now you say, well, it wasn't enough wisdom. Well, it was, because it came from God. It's a full, complete, perfect wisdom. And where does this come from? Well, this wisdom is gained by reading God's word, by hearing it taught and preached, by meditating on his word. And it really is the desire that we should have in our life is something we should be seeking for, it's something we should be praying for. And in Colossians 1, it was something that Paul specifically prayed for, for the Colossian believers, that they would be filled with the knowledge of his will and all wisdom and spiritual understanding. And so it was Paul's desire that the Colossian believers were to be filled with wisdom, and they would be controlled by it. Therefore this absolute complete wisdom is the means by which we are to conduct this ministry With one another with the ultimate goal of helping each other be perfected in Christ Jesus now that takes us to what we see here and that is really a two-fold ministry in the verse one is a positive pot You see a positive side of the ministry and then there's the second side which is the the negative aspect two aspects and that's the teaching and admonishing. And notice, both are important. Can't leave one out. You must teach and you must admonish. Teaching is the positive aspect of ministry, and it really is the easier of the two. Teaching is something that is, it just naturally is easier for someone to do. The admonishment side of it, we'll get to that in a minute, but that isn't necessarily one of the easiest things to do. But it's part of this. It's part of this ministry that we're to be involved in as believers as we allow Christ's word to dwell in us. The word teach is a word that means to give instruction or to impart positive truth. It's an easy word to understand, to give instruction, to impart truth. So as believers, we are to be teaching, that is, instructing one another in what the word of God says. and then what God expects from us in it. That's the application part. And this is really the consistent pattern of Paul's ministry, even as you see how Paul writes these letters to the different churches, these different epistles. How does Paul almost always start in the first few chapters of an epistle? It's very theological, it's very doctrinal. And then what's in the end? Practice, right? You have doctrine, you have practice. And so Paul even presents his letters this way. Both are important. We teach, but we also apply. Biblical teaching is normally preventative in measure. In other words, when you teach, you're teaching someone so that they know a truth in order to prevent them from doing something that they shouldn't, or to prevent them from not doing something that they should be doing. In other words, it is the regular communication of truth to help a person avoid sinful behavior. That's teaching. And it is often truth given without a specific situation in mind. but it is more inclusive of all the different situations that one may encounter. When a pastor or a teacher or a preacher, a Sunday school teacher gets up and teaches or preaches, he may know particular struggles, but he's not necessarily preaching at that particular struggle at the moment that he's teaching or preaching, and it's communicated more generally so that everybody in the church can be helped. Teaching and preaching are by nature given to help us avoid the pitfalls of life and to prepare us to think, to speak, and to act biblically during the trials of life. So teaching is preventative. So with that in mind, the word of God then is supposed to be studied, explained, dissected, and discussed regularly among the members of the church. And it really, when we think about this, how do we put this into practice, this teaching, A lot of times after the church service, you will find the men standing out in the huddle talking about what was preached, talking about something that they got out of the message, or how the message worked in their life, or how they understood it, or maybe they didn't understand something, and now they understand it better. Every different man's or every different lady's In other words, when we do that, in those moments where we're standing there talking, and it doesn't even have to be in the circle, the huddle, it can be anywhere. It could be before the service, it could be after the service. I know Brother Ross, if any of you know Brother Ross, he's gonna ask you at some point, what have you been reading in your Bible lately? Or he's going to ask you, what? I'm just going to throw this out there. So get ready. Do you have any New Year's resolutions? He's going to ask you why he's he's practicing this verse. He's trying to be helpful. He's teaching. He's admonishing. OK, so the point is, this should be something that's always happening. It's the word of God should be discussed regularly among us. And guess what, kids? You want to be a member of the church? If you're a member of this body, this is also your responsibility to partake in. You are to be a part of this ministry of teaching and admonishing one another. Say, well, I can't teach my dad or I can't teach my mom. You can maybe teach one of the other children. You can talk to them about what you've been reading in scripture and how you can apply it in your life. And so think about it from that perspective. So teach, teach. This is the preventative measure. It's to prevent us from sinning. But then there's the aside of admonishing. Admonishment is the negative aspect of ministry. This is the one that nobody likes to do, or very few people like to do. Admonishing is also the responsibility of every believer, just like teaching is. And it means to give correction or to give a warning. To give a correction or give a warning. The word here, and, connects the two words teaching and admonishing, tells us that admonition is included in the life of a person who's controlled by the word of God. And so this word admonish has a couple different layers of meaning. It means to instruct each other's behaviors and beliefs, but it's also a warning and a rebuke. So not only were the Colossians supposed to study and explain and dissect and discuss God's Word regularly, but they were also supposed to help each other live it out. And if someone wasn't living it out, they were to warn them or they were to rebuke them or admonish them. And so biblical admonition is similar to teaching in that it is the communication of truth, but it is not preemptive or preventative, necessarily. It is more corrective. So if many of you have worked or do work in the public world, and if you go up at all into supervision and management, I'm sure you will know that there is training and things like that that are preventative in nature, and then there are those things that are corrective in nature. I will give you an example from my field of work. Preventative. If you drive fast in the rain to catch the speeder, you will crash. Okay, that's preventative, that's teaching. Okay, you say, do CHP officers crash in the rain? Yes. Yes, they do. Okay, that's preventative. Now, that new guy goes out, and he's been taught, and he's been told by probably five or six different people throughout his training, don't drive fast in the rain, because you will crash. And he gets off on his own. And he drives fast in the rain to make that stop on that guy that's speeding. And he spins out and crashes into the center divide. OK. Did he take heed to the teaching? No. What's coming next? Correction, correction, right? There's gonna be some admonishment, and there's probably gonna be some paper. He's probably gonna get written up, okay? Now, I don't know what it is in the security world. Maybe it's, don't sleep on the job, because if you do, someone might break in and steal. Okay, that's the warning. That's the instruction. Now what happens when you fall asleep on wherever, at the desk at two o'clock in the morning, and someone breaks in? Now there's admonition coming, right? And I think we all get the point. There are things that are preventative in nature, and there are things that are corrective in nature. Teaching is preventative, admonition is corrective, and we must be doing both. We must be doing both. In other words, admonition is the communication of truth that is spoken in order to help a person correct sinful behavior. A similar word that we might use is the word rebuke. And so biblically, when you rebuke someone, you bring truth where change is needed. Someone is doing wrong, they're doing sinfully. And by the way, The reason that this instruction and admonition is important is because in a church, you may have a young Christian who doesn't even know that they're sinning. They don't even know that what they're doing is wrong. And so they need someone to correct their way. They need someone to go to the Bible and say, well, this is what scripture says. You shouldn't say that, or you shouldn't do that, or you shouldn't be involved in that, because they may not know. You confront them about their sinful behavior. Why? Because you want to get at them? You want to tell that person? No, because you lovingly care about them and you want them to correct it and then to have that bring positive change in their life. And ultimately, when we teach each other and admonish one another, it should help all of us grow in our Christian lives. Notice the phrase here, one another, teaching and admonishing one another. One another here is a reflexive pronoun and it highlights a couple things. One, it highlights who is to be involved in the teaching and admonishing. It's not just Pastor Stagger and Pastor Warner. It's all of us. Everyone is to be involved. It's the whole church. We are to all be involved in the teaching and admonishing. Second, it indicates that the Christian life involves a commitment by every member of the church to each other, to one another. And this implies mutual help, mutual teaching and admonishing. We are responsible then as believers to other Christians in the church, other fellow members of the church. The reflexive pronoun is also used, I believe, to highlight the participation of the subject in the action. In other words, it emphasizes that the one receiving the instruction and the one receiving the admonition should receive it. So it's not to be just like, I'm gonna go to Brother Ross and admonish him about whatever, and I'm gonna go to Pastor Warner and teach him about whatever, and then they're just, that's it, and that's all. No, they're there to receive it. And then when I'm taught and admonished by Brother Derek or somebody else, I'm to receive the teaching. I'm to receive the instruction and admonition. Last, one another doesn't limit this ministry to just the pastor. And we've mentioned this. We are to all be involved in this. But it requires us first to be controlled by God's word, to have his word filled up inside of us so that we know what his word says and how it's to be applied in different situations, not just in our own life, but how we can help others in their own lives as well. And so it is the responsibility of every believer to teach, but also to warn. And if this is something that believers are supposed to be doing, that is something that every single believer should want for themselves as well. If Christ's word is filling you up, it is dwelling in you richly, you're gonna desire not only to teach and admonish others, but you're gonna desire to be taught and admonished yourself. Say, oh yeah, I love that. I love that when I get corrected, or when someone teaches me. But that's part of this verse, is the receiving of it. We have to receive it. This mutual instruction and this mutual admonition. Proverbs says that the one that despises reproof, Ereth, is a fool, is brutish, and it says that their end is death. So don't despise correction. Don't despise teaching and admonishment. The person who is under the continual control of God's Word, what will they be doing? They will be properly applying Scripture to themselves, and then they will help others do the same. And this is really true fellowship. This is really what unity is all about, when we all share in the truth mutually, both giving and receiving teaching and admonition. And so our goal as a church, our goal as Bethel Baptist Church, and as we apply this in our own church, needs to be that that was the same as Paul in desiring that each other is made complete in Christ. And we are to accomplish it by the same means as Paul did, by teaching and admonishing one another. Based on what? Based on the Word of Christ dwelling in us richly. And then we share that with one another and we receive it. In that way, we share with others the blessings we have received from having the word of Christ dwell in us richly. And that is ministry. So the first consequence is ministry. The second consequence, which we will get to in our next time together, is worship. And that's in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. two consequences. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly. And as you do that, teach and admonish and worship God. Let's pray. Dear Heavenly Father, we're thankful for this time in your word. We pray that you'd help us to all take to heart these things and to be able to put them into practice in our own lives.