Avoiding Substitutes and Embracing the Fullness of Christ.

So good to see all your beautiful faces. We are continuing in our series through Colossians today. Today's message is a bit of a part two, so if you missed last week, I encourage you to go to Spotify. You can find it on our website as well. Look up the message from last week as it will kind of make sense of today.

We are going to be reading in Colossians chapter 2. If you have your Bibles, you can turn there. Now it will be on the screen. But today we're talking about what it looks like for us to be rooted in Christ and to have life to the full.

A.W. Tozer said that the most important thing about you is what you believe about God. What you believe about God is the most important thing about you. And this is true for anyone, whether they even acknowledge the existence of who God is. That's because whether we realize it or not, what we believe about God shapes every other part of our lives. It gives the place that we're rooted in. That's where everything flows.

Paul is writing this letter to people that he has never met, and he is going to be appealing for them and begging them to be so cautious about how they believe, what they believe about God, who they believe Jesus to be. I believe that in the same way Paul was writing this to the church in Colossae, he's writing this to them because he's saying, I want you to be free from the faulty beliefs. I want you to be free from every lie and every false narrative that is leaving your life unsatisfied. I believe that God wants to set us free today.

I believe that in the same way that he was talking to the church, he's talking to us today and he's saying the reasons that you're not feeling satisfied, the reasons that you feel like you're going and you're going and you're still stressed and you're overwhelmed and you're filled with panic and anxiety is because maybe, just maybe, it has to do with who you believe Jesus to be. I want you to know who Jesus is so you can be free from those things and you can live into the power of the resurrection.

Understanding False Beliefs

Let's pick up in chapter two. This is Paul writing again to the church.

I want you to know how much I am struggling for you and for those at Laodicea and for all who have not met me personally. My purpose is that they may be encouraged in heart and united in love so that they may have the full riches of complete understanding in order that they may know the mystery of God, namely Christ, in whom are hidden all treasures of wisdom and knowledge. I tell you this so that no one may deceive you by fine sounding arguments. For though I am absent from you in body, I am present with you in spirit and delight to see how orderly you are and how firm your faith in Christ is.

Colossians 2:1-5

Verse six says:

So then just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live in him, rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught and overflowing with thankfulness. See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the basic principles of the world rather than on Christ. For in Christ, all the fullness of the deity lives in bodily form.

Colossians 2:6-9

This is where it just keeps getting better and better. And you have been given fullness in Christ.

For in Christ, all the fullness of the deity lives in bodily form and you have been given fullness in Christ, who is the head over every power and authority. In him you were also circumcised in the putting off of the sinful nature. Do not with a circumcision done by the human hands of men, but with the circumcision done by Christ, having been buried with him in baptism and raised with him through your faith in the power of God, who raised him from the dead.

Colossians 2:9-12

When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave all of our sins, having canceled the written code with its regulations that was against us and that stood opposed to us. He took it away, nailing it to the cross and having disarmed the powers and the authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.

What is Paul doing here? He is kind of in this prayer mode. He's contending for them. He's saying, I'm struggling for you, those are the church in Laodicea, all that I have not met personally. So he's reminding us again that these are people that he does not know.

Paul was the person in Acts we read about whose life was persecuting Christians, and then he encounters Jesus. He radically transforms his life. Now he's preaching the gospel and he is being persecuted for preaching the gospel. So he's laying down everything for the sake of the gospel. He's writing from prison. This church that has never met him, they're getting this letter from this guy who's in prison somewhere. And he's saying, listen to me, listen to these words.

He keeps emphasizing like who Christ is and the idea of mysteries and treasure and knowledge. Why is that? Well, the goal is that he wants them to know this, that they have access to the fullness, all the riches, all the glory, complete understanding, this mystery, this thing that they're looking for. He wants them to know you have it, you found it. This is so important for us because it's rooted in this idea of Gnosticism.

The word Gnostic in Greek means like to know or knowledge. That's where when someone says I'm agnostic, it means I don't really know or I don't have beliefs. It comes from that word. Gnosticism is this kind of false theology that was creeping into the church at that time. Essentially they were saying, there's this kind of mystery, this other hidden wisdom and knowledge that you need. It's not that they weren't saying they didn't believe in Jesus. They believed in Jesus, but they didn't believe that Jesus completed them. They thought, there's still something more. It's easy to read about this and think, okay, that's what they struggle with then. But the more I read this, the more this text comes to life. I can't help but think, is that still the same temptation that we have as the church today? Is that although we read the gospel, although we hear these things, we still, something inside of us is like, but there's something missing other than Jesus. That is where the enemy wants us to stay. It's to keep seeking for something that we already have and to take our eyes and our attention and our focus off of Jesus, who's right in front of us saying, I'm here. Everything that you need is found in me.

With Gnosticism they were also talking about everything that was created was like evil. And so it was kind of like rid yourself of the world. They also believed that Jesus didn't come in human form or have a body. This is important for what we believe about the gospel and Jesus' body being broken and his blood being poured out. The language here is important to understand culturally.

Paul says here that he wants their hearts to be encouraged. When you think about your heart, what do you think about? Your physical heart maybe, the one that beats. Maybe your feelings, like you think you should follow your heart, like those types of things. Like it's all kind of the emotional side of you, the feeling side of you. This word heart though, in the Greek is a little bit different. This word heart, cardia, is what it would have been translated to.

At this time, culturally, the idea of heart and mind wouldn't have been separated. It wasn't like emotions and thoughts as separate things. When he's saying, I want to encourage you, he's saying, I don't want to just encourage your emotions. I don't want to just encourage the feeling side of you, but the center, right? The heart at the center, the things that keep you beating, that keep you going at the core of the whole person. He's like, this is what I'm coming to encourage.

Resisting False Substitutes

I tell you this so that no one may deceive you with fine sounding arguments. Everyone say no one. No one may deceive you with fine sounding arguments. Has anyone here fallen for any scammers in your life? Has anyone been scammed? Well, I have fallen for the scammers. I travel often and have had to renew my passport before. I fell for a passport scam.

I went to renew my passport. I was on the government website. I did everything right. And I was ready to go. Then my computer died. The next day when I opened it up, the browser wasn't there. So I Googled it again for passport, renew your passport, whatever. I click on a link. I log in as if it was the login I was on. I completed it. It looks the exact same, everything's the same. Except when I get to the end of it, I notice that now I'm getting a confirmation email from something that's not .gov, which you know is not good. Everything was the same from this scam website, except for at the very end, there was one line that was different. It was so close that I fell for it.

My brother fell for a scam from Venmo where Venmo started requesting my friend's money for groceries because I forgot my credit card at the grocery store and I needed Venmo. Now it doesn't completely make sense, but that's something that I do often where I'm always like, even last night I was with him, I was like, hey, I forgot my credit card. Like you got money. This is a thing that I do. Venmo literally created a profile with my name. It was instead of Abbie Sawczak, it was Abbie.Sawczak. It was my profile picture, everything. So he's a good brother and he sent me the money. Then he calls me and he's like, are you good? I'm like, what are you talking about? It was a scam. But it was so close to the real thing, minus the name, just that little dot in the middle. It was so close.

Paul is saying beware of these fine sounding arguments. He would have noticed if my last name on Venmo was spelled differently. He would have noticed if the picture wasn't of me, right? We don't fall for stupid arguments. We don't fall for blatant obvious lies. Paul is warning them. He's like, it's going to be fine sounding. So I want you to be so aware of what you believe in, that you know the purity of who Jesus is. So you don't fall for it. So no one takes you captive. No one can lie to you and get you to fall for these scams.

They were falling for this substitute, these fake things. What are the substitutes that we're falling for today? What are the things that are so close yet so far from who Jesus is? Because Paul is saying Jesus in his death and his resurrection completes you. Jesus in his death and in his resurrection gives you access to life abundantly, life to the full. Yet we fall for these substitutes.

The first is moral therapeutic deism. This is the belief that God exists to make you happy, to help you feel good. Everything when it comes down to Jesus is just about, okay, he came so that I can feel good and I can be happy. This reduces Christianity to a system of moral self-help and neglects the call to the cross, repentance, and sanctification. Jesus came so that we can have life and have it to the full, but that whole idea of full is not empty of suffering because Jesus' life to the full led him to the cross and led him to death so he can be resurrected.

The next is the prosperity gospel. We have this idea that as long as you do the things, you go to church every Sunday, you read your Bible, you pray, you give that maybe not just ten percent, but eleven percent tithe, like watch the Lord bless you. But we have this idea that people preach that if you just give your money to the church, God's going to bless you abundantly. If you just pray hard enough, then every good thing you've ever wanted is going to happen. This is so dangerous.

Jesus was perfectly divine in human flesh, and his life led him to pain and led him to suffering. So if that happened for Jesus, why are we believing that us following him isn't going to lead us to the cross? Life to the full is not absent of suffering. There's no prosperity gospel. The gospel is come and follow me, and it's going to lead you to death, but then it's going to lead you back to that resurrection life, and that is the hope of eternity that we have today.

For much of my life growing up, I realized I was rooted in this. Where it plays out then is when you look at other people and you're like, but God, like I see that they have the things that I want and that I long for. Their life, I'm going to judge a little bit. It doesn't really look like you, Jesus. And then I'm over here. I'm like, God, I'm laying down my life and these things aren't happening. And you realize like then this isn't really adding up.

Even wealth is such a cultural thing depending on where you're at and what that looks like. If we believe that just wealth and prosperity is a sign of God's blessing you and you're doing a good job, then how do we explain all of the rich people in this world that are using all of their goods and their money for evil and harm? How do we explain that? That's not Jesus. That's not what he's saying. He's not saying that if you have money and if you have wealth and you have riches according to the world, that means you're doing God's work and you're following him. The same way, how do you explain the people when you go and they have absolutely nothing, yet they have the joy of the Lord and they have strength and they have peace? We have to be cautious and careful to say what are these hollow substitute theologies that we're believing in, we're living in.

Jesus said, I have come so you can have life to the full and follow me, which means following me to the cross. Jesus did not stay up in heaven. Instead, he entered into our pain and our brokenness. We have that same call as followers of Jesus. It's to follow him into the brokenness. Actually, us saying yes to him is going to lead us into those places if we're truly following him.

Moral relativism disguised as truth. This is the idea that truth is subjective and personal, often framed as God has given you your own truth. It's my truth. It replaces the objective revealed truth of Christ with an inward personal spirituality. This goes back to follow your heart, do what feels good. Like God's going to honor that. Jesus had a way of life that he invites us to follow. There is one way and it's his way.

Yes, we're all made in his image. As we look around this room, we recognize we are all made in the image of God to represent different pieces of his heart. So yes, it might look different in the way that we follow Jesus. But the truth is the truth. The gospel is the gospel. That doesn't change. And we can't live just following our own desires and following what our flesh wants in that moment. Rather, we follow Jesus and where he's leading us.

Sometimes we reduce faith to rules or rituals. This is where we get in this space where we have an overemphasis on external practices, whether it's your diet or whether it is the way that you worship and your spiritual disciplines. You know, we talk about a lot as a church about spiritual practices, and they're so good. But we cannot believe that that is what saves us. We cannot believe that that is what leads us to the resurrection power of Jesus. Rather, because we have been saved and because we have been raised to walk with him in new life, we do these things so that we can grow and we can stay rooted.

All of these things, they're good because they point us to Christ. But they become bad when they take us away from Christ. With spiritual practices, we always have to be so careful about how are we reading and praying and doing all of these things. Because if they're leading us to isolation and not community, then that's not where God wants us to be. If our spiritual practices are leading us to protecting ourselves and staying away from people that are far from Jesus, then that's not where he wants us to be. Our spiritual practices should always lead us to kindness, to compassion, to being more like Jesus and nothing else.

Hyper-individualized Christianity. This is a big one. The belief that Christianity is primarily about personal experience and self-fulfillment rather than participation in Christ's body, the church. COVID really did a number on us with this, right, where it kind of got us so secluded and so isolated that we forget that yes, like we have access to amazing podcasts and speakers and teachers that you can watch and you can listen to. But nothing can replace being a part of a physical body, the church. Nothing can replace that. This is where we learn how to practice being with Jesus. This is where we have to show patience. This is where we have to show kindness, forgiveness. This is where we get to say, it's not on my strength, but Christ is your strength.

Sometimes that comes through the body of all of us having different gifts and working together. We cannot live these hyper-individual, independent lives. We need to continue to grow on our interdependence on one another as followers of Jesus.

And then finally, spiritual bypassing. Using spiritual practices to avoid dealing with the real pain, the hard things, the suffering. The gospel is not about spiritual bypassing either. It's not about just praying away all these things and just saying, well, I prayed and that's it. But it is acknowledging the pain and joy in Jesus, in the suffering, and continuing to walk from that place.

The last one is mixing Christian teachings and other religious philosophical systems without any discernment. This is what's happening. There was a mix of all these things going on where people were coming on with these fine sounding appeals. They're saying like, all paths lead to God. Your faith is just one of many truths and all of these different things. Paul is coming up against this and saying, no, we have to go back to the purity of the gospel. He's saying Jesus. In Jesus is found all the mysteries and the knowledge, everything that you're longing for.

Sometimes you might have a moment where you're like, okay, well, I'm going to just practice this individualized way of life and it might feel good for a moment. But the second that things start to go wrong, the second that things start to shake, you realize you have no roots. You realize that there's nothing there to help you stand firm if you are not connected to the source, which is Christ. The word head, the authority, that source, that is Christ. A hose is only good if it's connected to water. Otherwise, it's going to do nothing. We have to be connected to the source in order for the Holy Spirit to flow through us.

Staying Rooted

Paul is urging them to stay rooted.

So then just as you have received Christ as Lord, continue to live in him, rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith you were taught and overflowing with thankfulness. See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy which depends on human tradition and basic principles of this world rather than on Christ.

Colossians 2:6-8

How do we stay rooted? Good roots need good soil and good water. Good roots are intertwined with others. Good roots can build stronger roots when they experience some of the stress of the wind that it brings. You have to be connected to the source. You have to have good soil, soil that is watered, soil that you are constantly pulling out any weeds and any lies and anything that's creeping in. You have to have good soil.

Some of the strongest roots, when the wind and the storms come, they're held together when they're actually intertwined with other roots. This points back to why we can't live this individualized faith. We have to be a body together because there's going to be days where you're going to wake up and you're going to be like, God, I don't know how to endure anymore. And you're going to need someone that you can reach out to and say, will you pray for me? Will you read scripture over me? Will you point me back to the truth? Will you help me stay rooted today? There's going to be times where friends are calling on you and you're like, I'm ready to go. I'm going to help you stay rooted. We have to be intertwined. We're stronger when we're intertwined.

Good roots that experience wind and storm build stronger roots underneath the surface. There was a study done in Arizona in the nineties. Basically they tried to build the perfect environment for trees to grow in. They built this greenhouse and they tried to protect it from the wind, from the storms, from all of these things. What they got was really tall trees. But what happened was the second they exposed them to anything, because the whole time they were growing, they weren't exposed, they completely collapsed.

Although from the outside they look tall and they look strong, they had no roots. Because they never, as they grew, were able to have the strength to resist the small things. When they were tall, it all just shattered down. There is something for us in life. We can get so caught up in thinking that if I just protect myself, if I just avoid all pain, if I avoid all suffering, then I'm going to be strong. But really, it's the stress of the wind sometimes that God uses to strengthen us and to deepen our roots.

I don't know who needs to be reminded of that today with maybe even what you're walking through. God wants to strengthen you through the things that you are walking through. That pain, like Paul when he's saying, I'm rejoicing in this suffering that I'm doing for you. We can see Christ right in the middle of it, working and strengthening us. With Christ, suffering makes us stronger.

As a church, we have these shared practices that we call our rule of life. This really is for us to say, okay, this idea of rule comes from the Latin word trellis. It's saying, how do we create this trellis, spiritual practices that we're going to be committed to. Praying, reading our Bibles every day, fasting, being in community, giving of our time and our resources. How do we follow the practices of Jesus so that we can continue to have this trellis so that every time God's speaking and moving and every seed planted is growing strong? That's what our rule of life is.

We can start with our spiritual practices of saying like, where are we cultivating good soil? Where are we allowing seeds to be planted? What do we have set up to help the seeds grow? Because Paul is emphasizing over and over again where he's saying, people are going to come and try to take you captive with these hollow and deceptive philosophies. So he's like, be on guard, be on guard, be ready.

Spiritual practices can often though lead you into isolation. He's saying, be ready, like don't let it do that. Don't let it lead you into isolation, but into community. Don't let it take you away from the people who need Jesus. But yet practice these things to become more like Jesus.

Embracing the Fullness

The last thing I want to talk about today is this idea of embracing the fullness. And this is what can be sometimes the most hard for us as followers of Jesus. Jesus says, I have come that they may have life and have it to the full. And that's John 10:10. But before that, he says the thief comes to kill, steal, and destroy. But I have come so you can have life and have it to the full.

Jesus starts with these words again of saying the thief is coming, be on guard. He's giving us this picture again to be on guard. Paul, when he's talking about in verse 24 at the end of leading into two, he's saying:

I rejoice in what was suffered for you and I fill up in my flesh what is still lacking in regard to Christ's afflictions for the sake of his body, which is the church.

Colossians 1:24

Paul is talking about something crazy here where he's like, I'm rejoicing in suffering. We're talking about like the joy of the Lord is my strength. And he's like, I'm suffering. I'm in prison and I'm rejoicing. This is wild. He's like, this is good. I find joy.

I don't think he was practicing spiritual bypassing here. I think this is legit because he recognized something. He wasn't anchored in the idea that this was his forever, but he was anchored in the cross and in eternity. He had the hope of the future. So he knew this is temporary. And so I'm going to use every moment that I have for the glory of God. He embraced fullness, which meant full participation with Christ.

The mission of Christ continues with his people. The mission of Christ continues with each and every one of us today. When we say yes to following Jesus, we are saying yes to the cross. We are saying yes to his mission. We get to fulfill that. This is good news. There's power in this. And there's joy and there's suffering in that as we see in the cross.

October is the month that seven years ago we started the church. The night before, I called my mom and I was like, mom, I feel like I'm in labor. I feel like I'm giving birth because I knew that once this thing starts, it's going to keep going. And I'm probably going to have to stay here and raise this thing. I said that because at that time in my life, a bunch of my friends were having babies and telling me about the glory and the horrors of being in labor and having babies.

Everyone talks about the suffering, and it's the worst. And then it's also like, but it's the best. And women keep doing it and it keeps happening. It's this joy and suffering. A lot of times we'll be like, yeah, I don't even remember the pain. Some are like, I remember, but still worth it when I get to see that little baby. There's these two things that are happening at once, this joy and this suffering.

I have felt that these past seven years of pastoring this church. There's been moments where I'm like, this is the best thing ever. And then there's moments that I'm like, I feel like I am in prison. God, what is happening? That's just honesty. It's not all glamorous, right? It's not all fun and joy filled all the time. But full participation with Christ is both. It's embracing the fullness. It's embracing both. It's allowing ourselves space to say, even in the suffering, God, I'm going to see your presence.

It's not saying that following Christ means an absence of pain and suffering. But it means that we get to be connected to the source in the midst of it all. This is good news for us today. Life to the full is not a straight line to comfort, but it's the integration of God's presence and staying connected and rooted in the midst.

In chapter one, when Paul's saying, I strenuously contend with all the energy Christ so powerfully works in me, he's reminding us today that we don't have to do this alone. It's the power of Christ. It's the same power that raised Christ from the dead that works in you today. Are you hearing this church? The same power of Christ that raised Christ from the dead is alive in you. God wants to use that to flow through you. It's his energy. It's not ours. It's him that keeps us connected, not our own efforts. It's him that speaks when we open up the word.

N.T. Wright says it beautifully like this where he says, Paul's aim is not that they escape the world, but that they be rooted in Christ within the world. That is what we're after. Not that we're going to escape the world, not that we're going to escape the pain, we're going to escape the suffering, but we're going to stay rooted in Christ as we enter into the dark places, just like Jesus did, to bring the light. As we step into the brokenness to bring the healing that Jesus brought, because we are rooted in eternity. We are rooted in the hope of future glory, not the temporary and what's right in front of us and not these fine sounding arguments.

Often I think that we fear pain and suffering because we might think that this is just a consequence or a punishment for what we've done. We might fear pain and suffering when we think that it's something that we may never escape, and that this is it. That I'm never going to get over this anxiety. I'm never going to be healed from this. I'm never going to find the thing that I'm longing for. We fear pain and suffering when we think that we don't have what it takes to endure.

But what if we saw suffering as a way that we get to fully participate in God with his mission? What if we saw suffering as temporary and we live knowing like this is not my home and this is not forever? What if we lived as if the power and the energy of Christ was going to give us the strength to endure? What if we lived like that?

Resurrection Life

Let me keep reading in verse 9.

For in Christ all the fullness of the deity lives in bodily form and again this is for us today you have been given in fullness in Christ, who is the head, he is the source over every power and every authority. In him you were also circumcised in the putting of the sinful nature, not with the circumcision done by the hands of men, but with the circumcision done by Christ. Having been buried with him in baptism and raised to walk with him through your faith in the power of God who raised him from the dead.

Colossians 2:9-12

This is our hope. This is our hope today. Christ came. He gave the fullness of himself and that fullness is alive in us. We are raised to walk with him in new life. But what happens first before we're raised? We die. We die. This is the invitation of Christ where he says come and follow me and he says come and die. Why aren't we amen-ing and clapping for that? Because that's not normally what we think of as good news. When it's like come and give everything like Christ did on the cross and come and lay down your life for the sake of the gospel and for the sake of other people to know the hope of glory that lives in Jesus. And we're like, I want that hope and glory, but the come and die part? I don't know about that.

But when we live like Christ completes us, and when we live rooted in the resurrection power, we know that death actually does not have the final word, but death leads to resurrected life.

I brought some flowers from my home. They're only a week old. I get them fresh from the farmer's market across the street from my house. It closed today. It was my last day and it was really sweet. The people at the farm stand that I go to literally every single Sunday morning and get my fresh flowers. I bought out so many of their flowers because I just wanted one last time. He carried the whole crate to my car with me and he's like, bye, Abbie. We'll see you next season. I was like, bye. It was amazing. I was like, I love farmer's markets. I love flowers.

A couple of years ago, we were at fall day away. My mom was here and we were walking through the zinnia fields at Schuster Farm. There's a zinnia in here somewhere. All of a sudden, I was like, mom, what are you doing? And she's putting something in my pocket. She's like, look, they're just laying here. And I was like, what are you doing, mom? It's all the dead zinnias.

They're beautiful and there's so many. She's like, these things are expensive. I was like, mom, okay, whatever. Just like, no, just plant them, just plant them. Well, I didn't plant them. I should have listened to her. She took like just a few that were laying out there in the fields that people can't. They were dead and they looked terrible. She takes a few and she plants them. I'm looking at this. I'm like, mom, this thing is dead. And she's like, it's full of seeds. It's full of seeds. She saw something that I couldn't see. She saw potential for something that was dead to be planted and then multiplied and brought to new life.

When you come back the next year, she's like, do you like my zinnias? I'm like, where did you get all these? She's like, those things I stuffed in your pockets. Behind her is all of these zinnias. And my cute little niece is there. I'm holding some of them. She has a field of zinnias and all these flowers and all these sunflowers and all these things because she took what was dead and she planted it. She let it be buried and raised to not only new life, but multiplied.

When we say yes to following Jesus, we are taking all that was, all the brokenness, all of our past, all of our worries, all of our fear, all of our pain, all of our identity, and we're saying, I'm here to die. I'm here to be crucified with Christ. And as I am buried, I know that even though it may seem dark for a moment, even though I can't always see what's on the other side, that it is being raised to new life. And more than that, it is being multiplied.

This is the hope of the gospel. It's that when we're sitting here and we're like, this is it, God, I can't endure anymore. I'm in so much pain, he's saying, but there's new life coming. Just keep dying. Because what Paul continues to say in the gospel is Jesus is like, come and follow me. And he's like, die and be raised to walk. And then Paul gets real serious. He's like, you take up your cross daily.

I'm like, more than what? I have to be crucified daily? You mean like that one time that I did something good for you, God, and I said, forgive me for my sins, wasn't enough? Now we are complaining to Christ, okay? So we're not getting off from that.

Paul's in prison writing. He could have been here and he could have said, that's it. My ministry is over. I'm done. But instead he kept planting. He kept that soil in the darkness when he couldn't see. When am I getting out of prison? When is this going to leave? He planted it. He stayed rooted and connected to Christ and allowed that new life to come and be multiplied.

Church, what does it look like for us to be people that we don't fear death? We don't fear embracing the fullness and participating in the fullness of the gospel, but we willingly say, I want to be rid of any of that false philosophy, those hollow lies that I think are leading me to you, God, but they're not. That we no longer are willing to be fulfilled by anything or connected to anything but Christ as our source.

What you think about God is the most important thing about you. What you think about God is going to change the way that you live. If we believe that Jesus completes us and Jesus is everything, then it should change everything about the way that we live. I even sense today that there is this temptation for us to create this perfect environment like they did with the trees. There is a temptation for us to say, okay, I'm going to spend my whole life trying to find the perfect environment. And that goes on to, right, the perfect church, the perfect friends, the perfect relationship, the perfect marriage, the perfect kids, the perfect fill in the blank. And we spend our whole lives searching for that.

When Christ is sitting there, he's like, none of that is going to lead you to what I've already given you. You don't need those things to fulfill you. You need me. Some of us, we're living in isolation because we're trying. We're like becoming like the Gnostics and we're trying to stay away from the world. Maybe you're even like, you're so afraid that you're like, I'm just going to get rid of everything and I'm trying to stay away. Jesus is like, but will you follow me actually into those dark places and be the light?

Because we don't have to be afraid of the darkness if we're connected to the source. We don't have to fear because we've overcome. Jesus has overcome. Because when we live like that, when we live trying to create this perfect space for us, and when we live avoidant of pain and of suffering and being willing to die, when we live in this place where we are afraid of people that don't know Jesus or don't live their lives like Jesus, and we become so caught up in our spiritual practices that we're like, we want nothing to do with you, then we stay dead.

And we don't leave room for God to come and raise anything back to life until we rid ourselves of everything that is not of Jesus and we take up our cross daily and we allow him to raise those things back to life. We are a church where when people are like, you know, what does it mean New Culture Church? Create the culture of Christ. We are looking at what did Christ do? We want to practice the ways of Jesus. Spiritual formation, spiritual disciplines, pray, read your Bible, do the things. But we do this because we want to be rooted, because we know and we live from this place of being resurrected. And we don't do these things to earn that, but we do it from that place of knowing that Jesus completes us.

The last thing that I want to talk about today is that if you go back and you look at where the church of Colossae was geographically, what was happening and all of that, one of the commentaries I was reading, it was so interesting. It talked about the landscape that the church of Colossae lived in. It was a place that was prone to earthquakes. So Paul is talking to these people and Christ through Paul is talking to these people and he's saying like, don't be swayed by these hollow, these false philosophies, these things that are so close to looking like Jesus and the purity of the gospel but there's just that one little period in the midst that you're missing.

These were people that understood what it was like to be swayed. They understood what it looked like for the earthquake to come and your roots to be tested. I can't help but feel like God is saying right now, like some of us, like we feel like that. We're prone to earthquakes where we feel like things are always shaking. God is inviting you today to say, you don't have to be swayed anymore. What you believe about Jesus, it matters. It's the most important thing about you.

Maybe for some of us today, it's saying, God, would you show me what it looks like to dig a little deeper? Will you show me what practices that I need to start living in to stay rooted and connected to you so that I'm not following any hollow substitutes? Some of us, I feel like we're being swayed by the substitutes because they're good and it might even look good in a moment. Your tree might be standing real tall, but you know when that earthquake comes, you're going down, and it's probably going to be a domino effect. And you might be taking others with you.

So some of us, the invitation today is to have an honest conversation with God and say, will you show me any substitutes that I have been believing? Will you show me? And then some of us, I just feel like there's this, we got weak roots and we know it. So asking that honest conversation, I'm saying, I want to live from a place of resurrection connected to the source. So God, like, what is it? Do I need to start fasting more? Do I need to find someone and say, let's practice a rule of life. Let's have accountability. Do I need to grab one of the Daily Rhythms journal? We have a whole devotional through the book of Colossians. Start there.

And then some of us, I think the invitation today is to embrace the fullness. Maybe it's saying, God, show me where you're at in the suffering. Forgive me for just looking at my situation like it's dead. And will you show me the new life that you want to bring? Some of us, it's saying, God, would you help me? Give me the strength to hold space for both the joy and the suffering to coexist. Some of us right now, God's like, are you willing to enter in and to participate with me in the suffering? Are you willing to leave your perfectly curated, crafted environment and go to the broken, dark places of this world? And remember, we're going to be afraid of that if we're not rooted in the hope of glory and eternity with Jesus. So let's be rooted in that today.

Our so what today is being rooted in Christ leads to experiencing the fullness of Christ. So now what? Stay rooted, resist the substitutes, and embrace that fullness.