. We should approach Jesus with the same desire.

In this text Paul drives the implications of the gospel even deeper into real life, into those relationships where our selfishness and idolatry are most likely to flourish. He calls us to gospel-centered relationships in marriage, in the family, and in the workplace.

If salvation comes only through trusting what Jesus has done for us, as Paul?s been arguing, why does it matter how we live? The answer shapes everything. Union with Jesus changes who we are in God?s eyes, offering all the security we need; so we live in response to God?s favor, not to earn it.

By nature, we?re all prone to moralism?to measure ourselves before God and others by our moral performance. This tendency is the enemy of the gospel. In this section of Colossians, Paul makes his case against moralism; he argues that it?s without substance, arbitrary and powerless. The implications for us are both convicting and encouraging: we don?t get to judge others, but we don?t have to fear being judged.

Everyone has something at the center of life that explains how to be fulfilled in life and what values are worth pursuing. According to Paul, the choice is simple. You can build your life on Christ as the only sure source of purpose and hope. Or you can fall for something that seems plausible at first but ultimately won?t satisfy, what he labels ?empty deceit.? The reason Jesus satisfies where nothing else will has everything to do with the fact that he offers something nothing else can: transformation and satisfaction.

Writing to a church he?d never visited in person, Paul uses this section of his letter to explain his philosophy of ministry. Not surprisingly, it begins and ends with the gospel, with what he calls ?God?s mystery.? If modeled on Paul?s, our philosophy of ministry as a church and as individuals will be gospel-centered in content, in methods, and in goals.

Why trust in Christ for redemption rather than some other source of hope? The burden of this question is the one Paul?s hymn to Christ is meant to carry. Knowing his readers were tempted to look elsewhere for security, or at the very least supplement what the cross offers, Paul explains why Christ?s identity as both God and man makes him the perfect mediator and only fit solution to our problem.

In letters like Colossians, Paul gives us a model for how to pray for ourselves and others. His prayer for the Colossians reflects a basic tension of the Christian life: through Christ we are redeemed already, transferred from darkness into light, but in our experience we are not yet what we will be. So Paul prays a prayer of gospel-centered thanksgiving, for what God has done already, and gospel-centered supplication, that the gospel would continue its good work in us.

If God is loving and powerful, why is there evil and suffering in the world? It?s a timeless question that has kept many from faith and unsettled the confidence of many an ardent believer. It?s a question the story of Joseph addresses with remarkable complexity and nuance. On one hand, the story illustrates what we know from experience: suffering comes even to those who don?t deserve it. There?s an element of mystery that neither this story nor the rest of the Bible attempts to penetrate. But on the other hand, seen from beginning to end, the story of Joseph illustrates that God governs all things?even evil and suffering?towards the fulfillment of his promises. The point for us is that, though the details of our suffering remain mostly mysterious, the gospel offers us hope that all things serve God?s purpose to redeem us.

Typically stories about national founders?stories designed to give a nation identity and purpose?talk up moral virtues worthy of emulation and play down embarrasing flaws. Israel?s origin stories?perhaps especially stories about Jacob, Israel himself?provide a noticeable contrast to this pattern. That?s because Israel?s national identity?and now the identity of the church?rests upon a different sort of foundation, a foundation that has everything to do with the answer to two crucial questions: What can we expect from God? And what does God expect from us? These are questions the story of Jacob is meant to answer.