Right along with what Brother Dave talked about this morning we're going to look at some of those things we're going to look at what we need to be focused on as believers. All right so in some of these false teachings that were brought up was the need for observing Old Testament laws and commandments okay works righteousness There was a philosophical emphasis on a special knowledge or a higher knowledge than what ordinary folk could have. And that perfection was a tribute to this philosophical elite, what was going on during that time. There was also, Paul also talked about worship of angels as mediators to God. And the biggest thing that we all need to key around was that these false teachings were denying the deity of Jesus Christ. And if we can't get past that, then we don't need to talk about anything else. Because our hope lies in Jesus alone. If Jesus is not God, then we are pitiful. To take the divinity out of Jesus is to take the hope from our souls. OK, we have no hope and we are to be pitied among all people. If Jesus is not God, if Jesus and his work on the cross was not sufficient for our salvation, if it was not sufficient for forgiveness of sin, for that redemption, that restoration, then we have no hope if his work was not enough. So that's kind of the occasion why Paul was writing to the church here. And there's a couple of things that he wanted to show the deity and the supremacy of Christ, number one, above all things. And he wanted to lead believers into a spiritual maturity. And I love, Dave, you brought up the Psalms 23 this morning. And he gave us a challenge. He says, you know, is there a way for us to measure our spiritual maturity? And he gave us a challenge for this next year to to do that. OK, looking at passages, looking at the passage in Psalms 23, the pastures, the serenity, the tranquility of the waters, God being our shepherd, all right, providing comfort and protection to us. so spiritual maturity and also he wanted to inform the church of his state of affairs and he was asking for prayers on his behalf all right so as we as we get into Colossians chapter 1 here Paul's he had some petitions here the first one was Paul's people petitioners petition to the church the second thing we're going to look at this morning is Paul's prayer petition and how Paul had been praying for his church And the third thing is going to be directed to us kind of as a challenge is for Paul's practical petition. That goes for the church at Colossae, but also for all believers today, and that includes us as believers in the New Testament church. In verses 3 through 8, and we'll read our text here in just a moment, I want to give you some background that leads up into this. Verses 3 through 8, Paul states that the Colossians demonstrated faith and love. All right and that's important. Brother Dave talked this morning about faith, trust, and thanksgiving. Okay, so we're going to talk this morning about faith, love, our hope in Christ, and thanksgiving. All right, so it's really neat how listening to the Sunday school lesson is going right along with what God would have us to learn in Colossians this morning. All right, so the Colossians demonstrated faith and love. Faith in Jesus Christ and love for the saints. And we know that this faith and this love comes from the hope that is stored up for us in heaven. The hope of Jesus Christ is man's only hope. That is where our hope lies. That is where our hope lies. That hope is given to us by the gospel, by the Bible that we have laying in our laps, God's word. It was inspired, all scriptures inspired, in 2 Timothy 3.16. It is profitable for our doctrine, for our instruction, for our correction, so that it would lead us into all spiritual maturity, to be perfect or complete, have that spiritual completeness that God so desires for us. And Paul also stated in these few verses that all over the world the gospel is being preached and it is bearing fruit and is growing. We are a living organism. This is not an organization. It is not static. It is dynamic. It is growing. If we are a living organism, we should be bearing fruit. And when we bear fruit, that increases that spiritual growth. Our spiritual maturity increases. So let's get into our key verses for this morning. If you'll follow along with me, Colossians chapter 1, 9, 10, 11, and 12. It says, For this cause we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to praise for you. and to desire that you be filled with the knowledge of his will and all wisdom and spiritual understanding, that you might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God, strengthened with all might according to his glorious power, unto all patience and longsuffering with joyfulness, giving thanks unto the father which hath made us meet to be partakers of this inheritance of the saints in light for this calls Paul starts off this he says for this calls what causes we talking about the calls that we previously mentioned that the Colossian church their faith in Jesus and their love for the saints their faith was being put into practice And Paul's saying that I am praying for you. He says, for this cause, since the day we heard of it, do not cease to pray for you. So Paul is always lifting up this group of believers to God because they are being shown faithful. Because of their faith in Jesus and because of their love for the saints. And it's important to know the background during this day. There was a rise of false teachings. Gnostics were beginning to come on the scene. It's what John later spoke about. And the Gnostics believed that all matter is evil. So these people, these philosophical elite that had this higher learning, they thought that they were all spiritual. There was nothing carnal or fleshly about them. And they denied that Jesus actually came in the flesh. They denied that. They claimed his body was just an illusion. That if God took on man flesh, then he would be corrupt. And as we read in 2 John, this morning, 7 through 10 in our Sunday school hour, it talked about that very same thing. Those who claim that Jesus did not actually come in the flesh. That was that heresy that he was talking about. It was what John was talking about. all right so we we have to take the background for why this was written and we have to and we have to look at what Paul is actually saying and why he is saying these things okay says faith in Christ rather he actually came he gave his life for us he died he was buried and he was resurrected all right so that faith in Christ God's son the bears deliverance for us okay and in the cause of that faith that we would live lives that bear fruit and Paul was commending this church in these passages for that says that Paul and others have continued to usher these believers into God's presence so that all right so that's key all right because now we see kind of where Paul's going here all right so that God would fill them with the knowledge of his will All right, and when we think about filling. of something here to fill out to completeness of the Bible talks a lot about perfection in our spiritual maturity but to fill out that in a completeness and whatever whatever shape God would dictate that for us as individuals that that completeness of that spiritual maturity to have a fuller or a deeper understanding of who Christ is what he did for us and as followers of him what that means for our lives And that such knowledge, he says, does not come from a fleshly mind, does not come from our human minds. It is God-given through His Spirit. We talked in the Sunday School Hour this morning again about this restoration, this renewing of our mind in the Scriptures. It's exactly what Paul's talking about here again. The Holy Spirit enlightens our spirit. as part of his part of his teaching ministry as well as God's word. But if he filled with the knowledge of his will says through all wisdom. There's some passages in James James one five James three fifteen that talks about this this practical knowledge coming from God. Practical knowledge coming from God. And we would be filled with the knowledge of His will through that wisdom and through spiritual understanding, which helps us make clear decisions about how to apply God's will in various circumstances in our life. So Paul is ushering this church ushering the Saints at Colossae into God's presence encouraging encouraging them he's asking God that he would continue to strengthen this church continue to keep them grounded in the faith not chasing after some false teaching some false heresies or heresy it's what a heresy is false teaching but chasing after these things And always to remember that Christ is divine, came in the flesh, as John described it to us, the Word became flesh, and He dwelt with us. As Brother Dave talked about this morning, these false teachers offer an appearance of wisdom. An appearance of wisdom. And it's taking these things, taking the truth and twisting it. So it sounds good, too. You know, captivated, obviously, lots of minds during this day, especially within legalistic regulations. You have to do this to be safe. You have to keep these laws to be safe. And we saw that from the beginning. The Judaizers. It was faith plus something else. Faith plus circumcision. Faith plus dietary laws. Whatever. And all these things have just snowballed in these last 2,000 years. There's nothing new today going on that hasn't happened in the past. The same false teachings are taught today as it was then. There's nothing new, guys. If you study your history, you will see that there is nothing new under the sun. There's nothing new out there. It's just a cycle. It's a reinventing of the same wheel over and over and over throughout each generation. And you know why? Because we don't know our history, and if we don't know it, we're going to repeat it. Okay, what we said this morning, all right, and that's the same thing that was happening here at the beginning here. All right, true spiritual wisdom though, the true spiritual wisdom that we gain from God is stabilizing. It is stabilizing from us. We have the Holy Spirit. We don't have to chase all these winds of doctrine. All these false teachings because God's Word stabilizes us. God calls us out from the world. He sets us anew. He gives us His Spirit. And that is stabilizing. That is comforting. But it's also liberating. Liberating to know that we don't have to do these works. There's a key word, have to. OK, you don't have to. But as a renewed, as a new creature, as a new creation, we should want to. OK, because that is our new nature. All right. When we understand how deeply God loves us and we can see that in his son. That should move us as a new creation, as a new creation in Christ. To live our lives after him in Christ's likeness. And as we read in Proverbs 1 7, Proverbs 9 10, that the beginning of wisdom, the beginning of this understanding comes from where? The fear of God. Fear of God. Fear of the Lord. Alright, so as we get through this prayer petitioning, Paul offering up these saints before God. in verse ten he gets into his the practicality of all of this this is Paul's practical petition to his church that you may walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing all right a walk worthy to have this genuine knowledge of Christ is to equal a transformed character Ephesians 4.1, 1 Thessalonians 2.12. If we are a new creation, we will have this transformed character. It is in Christ's likeness. We are to strive to be equal to the Lord's standards, and be holy as He is holy, 1 Peter 1.15. Be holy as He is holy. That thought in itself is just mind-blowing. But it's only through Christ, it's only through what He did for us and our faith in Him that we can be holy as He is holy. Because that righteousness is imparted to us. The second thing was the aim of the believers and their conduct was to be pleasing in every way. To anticipate and do God's wishes in every aspect of our life. Paul said that his life ambition was to please God. When he was writing to the church at Corinth, 2 Corinthians 5-9, he said that his life ambition was to please God. And that not merely pleasing people was compatible with the gospel message. We don't please people, we just please them. In Romans he speaks to us about pleasing people in order for their edification. All right, he's talking about within the confines of the church in that particular passage. But not pleasing people, just to be people pleasers. But number one, to please God first. Number two, out of our love for others to edify them, to build them up. There's four things that Paul says will result from a God-pleasing life, and the first two are related. The first thing he says is that bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God. As we show fruit of the faith, we grow in faith. We show it, we grow. We're not going to grow if we're not practicing, if we're not putting feet to our faith. Our faith will be stagnant as we are stagnant. We will not accomplish God's will if we do not model our lives as Christ lived his. So show your faith and you'll grow in faith and we'll come to a deeper knowledge of God One of the first or one of the first but one of the early church fathers Augustine about the fourth century he said that faith is understandings step and Understanding is faith's reward Okay, so what he's talking as an understanding of God think of it like a you know a big step Big step here in order for us to to get up on this high platform We need something to help us. We need a step. So this is faith here. Faith helps us understand God. Our faith. Believing in something that we cannot see. It's hard for us to even think of and grasp that in our human minds. It just doesn't make sense apart from God. That's why all these false teachings come in. We have God's spirit. God impresses upon us what he wants us to know, when he wants us to know it. He is that faith. He is that faith. If we want to understand God more and more, to understand his will for our lives individually, to understand his will corporately for this body and for his universal church, it starts with that faith. Faith that God does exist faith that God does want a relationship with his creation and that Jesus Christ is the way to have that relationship with God in verse 11 it says or the third thing that should result from the God-pleasing life is we should be strengthened with all might verse 11 there's three words for strength here there's strengthened there's power and there's might all right and that might And the Greek means power that overcomes resistance. And that word is only used for God in the New Testament. So this power that overcomes resistance. This God-given strength produces patience. It produces long-suffering. Patience and long-suffering. This long-suffering is this endurance that we have All right, as God's chosen people being called out of this world, yet we still have to live in this world, don't we? Okay, so that is an enduring process. Every day you get out, walk outside the doors of your house, you have to show some level of endurance and patience, do we not? Because we know that this is the worst that we will ever experience, this life. Because we know that this hope that we have in the future is where God is. Our hope in Jesus Christ is glory. And this is the worst that we're going to have. This is our hell, if you can think of it that way. You compare it to heaven. As good as this life may appear to be to you, this is nothing. This is absolutely nothing compared to the glory that waits for us in heaven. Absolutely nothing. So this long-suffering, this endurance, this patience. You ever think about patience as being a sweet calmness? We think of patience as a four-letter word, don't we? That is something that we don't want to have to deal with. But patience, in the context of long-suffering, is a sweet calmness. It's a gentleness. And there's a product of this glorious might that we have. If we think about God's glory, God's glory is this manifestation of excellence. It is the outward expression of God's inner character. That is huge. If you think about God's glory of people not even being to gaze upon God without fear of death because He is so glorified, He is so holy, He is so pure that we can't look at Him. Why is He like that? Why is that expression like that? It's because God's inner character is being expressed outward. God's holiness, God's purity is being demonstrated outwardly. Well, that should teach us something, shouldn't it? That that outward expression should come from our innermost thoughts, our inner love for who God is, for what Jesus did for us. And because of that building up or that overflowing of our heart, it should proceed outward. That super abundance, which we talked about in Sunday school, our cup runneth over, and because that does, that should be demonstrated outwardly. Our faith, people should be able to see that, that we are different. We are a new creation. We are a new creature in Christ. And the fourth thing that results from a God-pleasing life is thankfulness. There again, this power that lives within us today. We should have this joyful thanksgiving to God because He is so loving. so wanting his creation to be reconciled, to be redeemed, to be restored to him as the way it was in the very beginning. And this thankfulness should be a keynote in our spiritual life. It should result in following God's will and pleasing Him. You know, being thankful for what God gives us. Because we didn't have a choice where we were born, did we? We didn't have a choice into what life. God placed us where He wanted us because of His understanding, because of His knowledge, and not ours. You know, Fred and the kids are over in Kenya. Do you think there's any difference between life in Nairobi and life in Craig, Alaska? There is a great deal of difference. There's believers in both locations. You should thank God that you are here in Craig, Alaska, battling your battles here in Craig, Alaska, over those ones that are fighting in Nairobi. Just a simple thing like that. God's placement of you in your life. Because He chose you before the foundations of the world were even laid. And He has your best interest at heart. And we have to trust that. That's all we have to go on, is trust. Our faith, our trust, our hope in Jesus, Maintaining that love relationship with Him, maintaining that love relationship with people around us, with the saints, the church, and those outside of it. Being that light, being that outward expression of God's inner character. So just think that joy. You look in Galatians 5, 22, 23. It talks about the fruit of the Spirit. Okay, the fruit of the Spirit. It's not fruits. It's a singular term. So if you have the fruit of the Spirit, if you have the Holy Spirit living within you, you will show these particular traits as a new creature. One of those things is joy. Being joyful, being thankful. Thankful to God. We have a lot to be thankful for. We have a tremendous amount to be thankful for. So wrapping this up, looking at Paul's petition to his people, his church, the saints he was writing to, reading through Paul's prayer petition for these saints here, and it's the same for us today, and seeing what he wanted God to show them. we can take these words and we can put them into practice. We should we are practical people we should be taking the things that we know the things that God allows us to understand about his will his intentions for us individual as individuals and corporately as a church and we'll talk later tonight. In the worship time tonight about will carry that a step further but for now we want to look at the practicality of the gospel and how we shouldn't keep it to ourselves. We should take that love relationship that we have with God through Jesus Christ and demonstrate that outwardly. Outwardly in this assembly, outwardly in Craig, Alaska, to Alaska itself, and wherever we are, overseas, wherever that takes us, to the ends of the earth. So it was Paul's encouragement to this church because they were faithful, because they had love for each other. That was demonstrated. People talked about it. That's how Paul knew about it. So I hope this church will be a light for this community in both faith and love for each other, love for the community, to be able to reach those that don't know about Jesus. You know, when I was growing up, I thought that there's no way that in the United States of America that people don't know who Jesus Christ is. Man, I was totally wrong. The older I've gotten, the more people I've come in contact with, listening to their stories, people have no idea who the true Jesus was. They think He's a curse word, because that's how a lot of people hear it. They have no idea that He was God in the flesh that came to redeem us from a dark and satanic world. They have no idea. They have no idea of the hope that lies in that name, Jesus. They use it flippantly, but they have no idea, even in this community. I was talking to somebody the other day, and I asked them who they thought Jesus was. And they told me who they thought Jesus was. It's not the Jesus that I know. It's not the Jesus that's demonstrated in this gospel, in this Bible. You know why? Because they had been influenced by a realm of heresy. A lifetime of false teaching through a cult. They didn't know it. They had never heard the truth. It was the truth twisted. And I was so saddened by that because growing up, I thought everybody knows who Jesus is. How do you not? But they don't. They don't. They do not know who Jesus is, who the true Jesus is. So, if we can take that faith, take our trust in Him, take our hope in an eternity with God, and translate that into love, And just share with them who Jesus is. Just tell them who Jesus is to you. The one that died for you. The one that took your sins. The one that took your payments so you wouldn't have to. To have a right relationship with God. So we would experience punishment. that we would have this joyful reunion with our Creator the way He had intended it from the beginning.