Letters from Paul

A taste of the study room coming with Paul — pull open whatever you'd like to sit with.

The reading — Colossians 1:1-14

¹Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus through the will of God, and Timothy our brother, ²to the saints and faithful brothers in Christ at Colossae: Grace to you and peace from God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ. ³We give thanks to God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always for you, ⁴having heard of your faith in Christ Jesus, and of the love which you have toward all the saints, ⁵because of the hope which is laid up for you in the heavens, of which you heard before in the word of the truth of the Good News, ⁶which has come to you; even as it is in all the world and is bearing fruit and growing, as it does in you also, since the day you heard and knew the grace of God in truth; ⁷even as you learned of Epaphras our beloved fellow servant, who is a faithful servant of Christ on our behalf, ⁸who also declared to us your love in the Spirit. ⁹For this cause, we also, since the day we heard this, don’t cease praying and making requests for you, that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, ¹⁰that you may walk worthily of the Lord, to please him in all respects, bearing fruit in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God; ¹¹strengthened with all power, according to the might of his glory, for all endurance and perseverance with joy; ¹²giving thanks to the Father, who made us fit to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light; ¹³who delivered us out of the power of darkness, and translated us into the Kingdom of the Son of his love; ¹⁴in whom we have our redemption, the forgiveness of our sins;

World English Bible

The words behind the words

When I wrote that I give thanks for the "hope laid up for you in heaven" (Colossians 1:5), the word for hope is no wishful thing — it is a settled expectation, a treasure already stored and kept safe, waiting. And when I prayed you would be filled with "the knowledge of his will" (Colossians 1:9), the word is not bare information but a deep, thorough knowing, the kind that reshapes how a person walks. It is knowledge that bears fruit (Colossians 1:10), not knowledge that only puffs up.

Where else you say this

I take up this same thread of a faith and love that spring from hope stored up when I remind the Thessalonians of their "work of faith and labor of love and steadfastness of hope" (1 Thessalonians 1:3). The prayer that you be filled with knowledge and walk worthily I pray again for the Ephesians (Ephesians 1:9-10, 4:1). And this rescue "from the domain of darkness" into the kingdom of the beloved Son (Colossians 1:13) is the same transfer I set before you in Romans — once slaves of sin, now alive to God (Romans 6:17-18).

The situation

I had never seen the faces of the Colossians. It was Epaphras, my fellow servant, who carried the gospel to them and then came to me with news of their faith and love (Colossians 1:7-8) — and with worry, for teachers were pressing on them a fuller "wisdom" than Christ, adding rules and visions and angel-worship. So I open not with alarm but with thanksgiving, grounding them in the gospel they first heard, before I ever turn to correct the error. And I write these words in chains, in Rome, guarded — proof that the word which is "bearing fruit and increasing" in all the world (Colossians 1:6) is not bound though I am.

The hard question

You may ask: if God has already "qualified" you and "delivered" you and "transferred" you into the kingdom (Colossians 1:12-13) — all done, all past — then why does the next breath pray that you be filled and grow and bear fruit and increase (Colossians 1:9-10)? Does he not already have you? He does. But do not flatten the one into the other. The rescue is finished; the walking is not. God grants you wholly to his Son and then bids you become, in daily life, what you already are. Look at the text: redemption stands in the past tense (Colossians 1:14), the fruit-bearing in the present. Hold both, and you will neither despair as though nothing were settled, nor idle as though nothing remained.

This is a small window into what a study room with Paul will hold — word by word, letter by letter, and the maps and journeys behind them. Get notified when it opens →

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