Letters from Paul

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

The reading — Colossians 2:16-23

¹⁶Let no one therefore judge you in eating, or in drinking, or with respect to a feast day or a new moon or a Sabbath day, ¹⁷which are a shadow of the things to come; but the body is Christ’s. ¹⁸Let no one rob you of your prize by a voluntary humility and worshiping of the angels, dwelling in the things which he has not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind, ¹⁹and not holding firmly to the Head, from whom all the body, being supplied and knit together through the joints and ligaments, grows with God’s growth. ²⁰If you died with Christ from the elements of the world, why, as though living in the world, do you subject yourselves to ordinances, ²¹“Don’t handle, nor taste, nor touch” ²²(all of which perish with use), according to the precepts and doctrines of men? ²³Which things indeed appear like wisdom in self-imposed worship, and humility, and severity to the body; but aren’t of any value against the indulgence of the flesh.

World English Bible

The words behind the words

When I wrote "let no one pass judgment on you" and "let no one disqualify you" (Colossians 2:16, 18), the words I chose are sharp ones. That second word is drawn from the games — it means to be cheated of a prize by a crooked umpire, robbed of what is already yours. And "a shadow of the things to come" (Colossians 2:17) — a shadow is real, cast by a real body, but you do not embrace the shadow when the body itself has come. The body is Christ. So too "self-made religion" (Colossians 2:23) is, in the original, worship one invents for oneself — a piety that has chosen its own object and calls it humility.

Where else you say this

I fought this same battle for the Galatians, who were being drawn back under days and months and seasons and years (Galatians 4:9-10). I reasoned it through for the Romans, that one man esteems one day above another while another esteems every day alike, and each must not despise the other (Romans 14:5-6). And I told Timothy plainly that these commands to abstain come from those who forbid what God created to be received with thanksgiving (1 Timothy 4:1-4).

The situation

Something had crept into Colossae — teachers pressing the believers to keep festivals and new moons and sabbaths, to abstain and afflict themselves, to attend to visions and the worship of angels. It wore the dress of humility and severity, and it looked wise. But it added rules to Christ, as though he were not enough, and it puffed up the very flesh it claimed to master. I was not among them — Epaphras had carried me their trouble — and I wrote from where I sit now, in chains, to hold up before them the fullness that is theirs in Christ alone.

The hard question

You may ask: if these regulations concern real things — the body, appetite, reverence — why does Paul say they are of no value? Are discipline and self-denial worthless, then? No. Read again what I actually wrote: they are "of no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh" (Colossians 2:23). The problem is not that they demand too much but that they cannot deliver — they touch, taste, and handle, yet leave the heart untouched and swollen with pride. You have died with Christ and been raised with him (Colossians 2:20, 3:1); therefore the way to holiness is not backward into shadows but upward, seeking the things above, where he is. Rules cannot do what union with a living Lord does.

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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