Colossians 2

1For I want you to knowhow great astruggle I have for you and for those at Laodicea and for all who have not seen me face to face,2thattheir hearts may be encouraged, beingknit together in love, to reach all the riches of full assurance of understanding and the knowledge ofGods mystery, which is Christ,3in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.4I say this in orderthat no one may delude you with plausible arguments.5Forthough I am absent in body, yet I am with you in spirit, rejoicing to see yourgood order andthe firmness of your faith in Christ.

Alive in Christ

6Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him,7rooted andbuilt up in him andestablished in the faith, justas you were taught, aboundingin thanksgiving.

8See to it that no one takes you captive byphilosophy andempty deceit, according tohuman tradition, according to theelemental spiritsof the world, and not according to Christ.9Forin him the whole fullness of deity dwellsbodily,10andyou have been filled in him, who isthe head of all rule and authority.11In him alsoyou were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, byputting off the body of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ,12having been buried with him in baptism, in whichyou were also raised with him through faith inthe powerful working of God,who raised him from the dead.13And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, Godmade alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses,14bycancelingthe record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross.15He disarmed the rulers and authoritiesandput them to open shame, bytriumphing over them in him.

Let No One Disqualify You

16Therefore let no onepass judgment on youin questions of food and drink, or with regard toa festival ora new moon or a Sabbath.17These are a shadow of the things to come, butthe substance belongs to Christ.18Let no onedisqualify you,insisting on asceticism and worship of angels,going on in detail about visions,puffed up without reason byhis sensuous mind,19andnotholding fast to the Head, from whom the whole body, nourished and knit together through its joints and ligaments, grows with a growth that is from God.

20If with Christyou died to theelemental spirits of the world,why, as if you were still alive in the world, do you submit to regulations21Do not handle, Do not taste, Do not touch22(referring to things that all perish as they are used)according tohuman precepts and teachings?23These have indeed an appearance of wisdom inpromoting self-made religion and asceticism and severity to the body, but they areof no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh.