Rev. Dr. Les Martin

The Feast of St. Matthew 2025
Rev. Dr. Les Martin
Matthew 9:9-13

I desire mercy, and not sacrifice. -Matthew  9:13 (ESV)

In the Name of the Living God: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Today, we celebrate the Feast of Saint Matthew, Apostle and Evangelist. His name in Hebrew means “gift of Yahweh.” He was a tax collector in the town of  Capernaum, and his work was levying taxes on the fishermen like Peter. As we heard in our Gospel reading today, Jesus calls him as a disciple, and later appointed as one of the 12 apostles (10:3). The early church identified the first book of the NT as “the Gospel according to Matthew.”

Matthew, Mark and Luke all place the call of Matthew after the healing of the paralytic and Jesus’ pronouncement of his right to forgive sins (Mt 9:1–8), and before the dinner for “tax collectors and sinners” (vv 10–13).  This location for his call clearly identifies Matthew as one of the sinners (v 13) to whom Jesus offers forgiveness.  Matthew’s response to Jesus is obedient, decisive, and sacrificial- Luke 5:28 tells us that he got up, left everything he was and had behind, to follow Jesus.

In all three lists of the 12 apostles (Mt 10:2–4; Mk 3:16–19; Lk 6:14–16), Matthew appears; but Matthew alone speaks of “Matthew the tax collector.” Besides distinguishing this Matthew from others, “tax collector”- Matthew’s deliberate self-designation- would also recall the life out of which Jesus had called him.

But what exactly was the kind of life was Matthew called away from?  I know none of us much like the IRS today, but it was something more than just that in NT times. The Romans collected a variety of taxes. Their own officers undertook some of this work, but also delegated it to private individuals, Jews and others, who were required to return to the authorities an agreed sum. Seeking to augment their wages out of real economic need or sometimes just greed, they often collected far more than they were required to pay- painful, exorbitant amounts-  and became a hated group. The Jews among them were particularly despised, as being not just unjust but also collators with Empire. Such men were regarded as sinners and were often linked in the phrase “tax collectors and sinners”. This is the Matthew we meet at the beginning of our story today.

If that’s how we meet him, I think it’s only fair to ask “why?” How does a man who becomes an apostle, evangelist, and author of one of our gospels-  a man who reportedly took the faith first to his own Jewish people and then all the way to Persia- how does he start out in one of the most despised and morally compromised occupations he could’ve had?

The first possibility has everything to do with living life in an unjust system. Any of you who have spent any amount of time in the developing world would understand this immediately. In Nigeria, for instance,  most lower level government functionaries do not earn enough to live on, provided they are even paid. I was often stopped by the police, the army, and customs officials in the hopes that they could extract a sum of money from the white man. Many of them, I believe, were not particularly wicked people. They were just doing what they could with their position to try and survive. It was ethically wrong, annoying, and often provoked me to anger, but at another level, I get it. When you live in a system that is corrupt and does not provide for you, you do what you need to to provide for yourself. This is a possibility for why Matthew finds himself where he is, just a guy trying to get by when all the odds are stacked against him. Honestly, I think most of us would prefer to think of one of the apostles and evangelists this way- a basically good guy trying to live his life, but making some poor choices- but there is another possibility.

That possibility is this: whether as a result of the unjust system of Roman occupation, or because of the fallibility and sinfulness of the human heart, Matthew could have simply been evil.  Not super-villain evil, I’m not suggesting that, but rather the banal, wretched, petty evil that is no less spiritually destructive, but doesn’t necessarily make the headlines. In second, Timothy, chapter 3, verses two through five, Paul reminds us what people will inevitably become in the wake of the tragedy in Eden.  He writes:

…people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy,  heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having the appearance of godliness, but denying its power. (ESV)

We know this. ’Twas ever thus, and the story of our cultural, moral, and political decay affirm it as an ongoing reality.

So it could be one, or it could be the other. Actually, it could also be some mix of both. We just don’t know. What we do know is that both descriptions apply to us as well. We are people of limits- those imposed on us by unjust systems, be they our culture, our faith, tradition, or our family of origin. By age, mental and physical illness, addiction, and just plain random chance in a fallen world.  So often, I think our banal little sins are a product of the lives we have found ourselves in, of our inability to live beyond the limits that were imposed on us.  We are just trying to get by.  At the same time, we know that the truth is this: 

We have followed too much the devices and desires of our own hearts…We have left undone those things which we ought to have done, and we have done those things which we ought not to have done; and…there is no health in us. (Confession of Sin, Daily Morning Prayer, BCP 2019)

Beloved, the sad fact is that not all our sin is a result of circumstances. In our brokenness, the reality is we also create and cooperate with the sin in our lives.  In Romans 7:15, Paul cries out in real frustration about these limitations in our fallen hearts- his and ours.  He writes:  “For I don’t understand what I am doing. For I do not do what I want – instead, I do what I hate.” (NET). In verse 24, his agony comes to head as he says: “Wretched man that I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?” (NET) But by 8:1-2, we hear the solution as he proclaims:  “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the life-giving Spirit in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and death.”  We may indeed be people of limits, both imposed upon us and freely chosen, but the good news is this: Jesus Christ offers us something different. To Matthew, to Paul, to you and me this very day.

It’s useful to note a couple of things about Jesus’ encounter with Matthew in the Gospel today, both to get a sense of how our Lord works with us, and to get encouragement as we struggle against all our limitations. If your life is anything like mine right now, you need such a reminder and such encouragement.

My first observation is this: note that Jesus calls a tax collector, not an “ex-tax collector.”  The love of Christ always comes to us as we are- not as we might hope to be, or even as he wants us to be. He goes to Matthew’s house, the text says, and has dinner there. Jesus meets Matthew- and us- in the shambles of the life we are living right now, not some other one- lives of exhaustion, of illness, of compromise and sin. Transformation has to start somewhere, and it always starts with the broken sinner, right in the midst of his broken, sinful life-  not with someone who has moved on from that. Let’s face it, if we could move on from that, we wouldn’t need Jesus at all.

We should also note that the call is just to follow Jesus, nothing else. In our disappointment and anger, we may focus too much on tearing down unjust systems, on “rage against the machine.” But the world is ever with us, we can’t win that battle. Further, when focusing too much on the wrongs we perceive around us, there’s always the temptation that the victim will become the victimizer. Our focus needs to be on the one we follow, not on the utter unfairness of it all.

In our despair, we may be attempted to give up on ourselves, to feel that our more personal failings and our poor choices will never change. Again, this is the victim becoming the victimizer, only now we choose to victimize ourselves. Again, the call is clear to focus on Jesus who both delivers and transforms us, not on how pathetic we think we may be. 

As we follow the one who desires mercy, not sacrifice, we are invited to do the same. To be merciful to those people, institutions and situations that oppress us. They will know we are Christians by our love, after all. And to show mercy to ourselves, even when we are at our most broken and unlovable. We receive mercy free of charge, with no demand for sacrifice, and as we remain rooted in Christ, we find that we can become people like that, too, by his grace.

In his 1994 song, “Things We Leave Behind,” Christian musician Michael Card sings of St Matthew in the following way:

Matthew was mindful of taking the tax, pressing the people to pay. Hearing the call, he responded in faith, followed the Light and the Way.

That’s the lesson Matthew would teach us today, I think. Whatever brokenness and sin we find ourselves in, Jesus invites us to follow him into a life that is beyond all our limitations. Trusting him, following him, moving deeper into his heart of mercy, tax-collectors become apostles, and you and I will slowly but certainly walk in all such good works, as he has prepared for us, as well.  Come, follow him.

Rev. Doug Floyd

Exaltation of the Cross 2025
Rev. Doug Floyd
Isaiah 45:21-25, Psalm 98, Philippians 2:5–11, John 12:31-36a

Today we celebrate Holy Cross Day or the Exaltation of the Cross. Historically, this feast commemorated the story of Constantine’s mother, St. Helena, when she discovered the cross where Jesus was crucified. According to the legend, a temple to Venus has been eracted over the tomb of Jesus. Helena ordered the temple to be torn down and excavated. She found three crosses. She brought a sick woman to the place of the crosses. She had the woman touch the first cross and nothing happened. Then the second cross. Once again, nothing happened. Finally, the third cross was brought to the sickly woman. When she touched it, she was instantly healed. Helena lifted up the cross as the True Cross of Jesus.

One thing we can say for certain is that the cross is central to our faith. As Rowan Williams writes, “There is no pre-cross Christianity.”[1] And yet, for the early Christians, the cross was shameful. Last lent, I did a presentation on the “Art of the Crucifixion,” and we discovered that there are very few images of the cross in the early church. It was seen a form of execution for the very lowest of society. “Romans almost never imposed crucifixion upon their citizens,” writes Robin Jenson, “but rather inflicted it on individuals considered to be undeserving of more humane forms of capital punishment (thieves, slaves, or traitors).”[2]

This fits perfectly with Paul’s description in our second lesson today, He writes, “Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.”[3] Jesus Christ is humiliated as a slave, as a criminal, as the very lowest of the social order.

Jesus had warned the Pharisees of a coming judgment. Those on the inside would suddenly find themselves on the outside: cast into outer darkness. When Jesus is crucified, He becomes the outsider. He descends into darkness, the accursed, the cast aside, the desolate, the forgotten. He enters the judgment that he warned the Pharisees about. He has come to enter our judgment as well.

Though the early church embraced the Good News of Jesus, they avoided creating images of this cross. In the middle of the second century, we already begin seeing artwork by Christians in the catacombs. We see images of Jonah, of the three young men in the fire and even Jesus as a shepherd but no images of the cross.

In the early second century, Justin Martyr writes, “For they charge our madness to consist in this, that we give to a crucified man second place after the unchangeable and eternal God, begetter of all things, for they do not know the mystery involved in this, to which we ask you to give heed as we expound it to you.”[4]

Archeologists have found a piece of graffiti about the cross dated to 200 AD. It is a picture of a man on a cross with the head of an ass. The inscription reads, “Alexamenos worships (his) god.” This graffiti is making fun of people who would worship a man hung on a cross.

“Among all the kinds of deaths there was none worse than that death,” writes St. Augustine. “Indeed, when very severe pains torment one, it is called excruciation, from the word crux (cross). For those crucified, hanging on the wood, fastened to the wood by nails in the feet and hands, were slain by a long drawn out death. For to be crucified was not to be killed by being struck down; but one was alive on the cross for a long time, not because a longer life was chosen, but because the death itself was being protracted so that the pain would not be ended too quickly. He wanted to die for us. We say too little: he deigned to be crucified, having become obedient even to the death of the cross.”[5]

Worshipping a man as God who had been crucified was unthinkable to Jews and Gentiles. And yet, the Spirit worked through this story to open hearts and establish faith communities. People all across the empire turned to this crucified man as Savior. Eventually Constantine legalized Christianity and his mother embraced the faith. The Gospel traveled throughout the world through Christian Roman Soldiers, converted pagan tribes, and Christian missionaries.

People are still turning to the crucified one as Savior of the world. Only four years ago, the English historian Tom Holland published “Dominion” where he discusses the inexplicable mystery that the church formed by worshipping a man who was executed in the most shameful manner of the empire. He sees this radical shift as the beginning of a new world that altered all of Western society.

Gradually the images followed. Images of Christ on the cross appeared in the 4th century, but his eyes were open, which indicated he was resurrected. It was not until the 10th and 11th century that images and sculptures appeared with Christ suffering on the cross. Today, it would be difficult to imagine a church without some image of the cross. Our faith is not primarily symbolized by an empty tomb but by a cross. The humiliation of Jesus is the exaltation of humans.

So far, I’ve been focusing upon the external aspect of the work of the cross, and how it’s shame would eventually become its glory. But the deeper story is the transformation of the heart and the hope of all creation. On this day when we celebrate Christ’s redeeming grace in the work of the cross, we must pause to reflect upon God’s grace revealed in the cross.

We need to go back and reflect on the creation story. We start with Paul’s statement in Roman’s 8:20-21, “For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God.”[6]

In Genesis 1-2, we see God creating a world that reveals His goodness. It is good and in light of creating humans, it is very good. The Lord is intimately involved for creating and sustaining every aspect of His world. The Gospel of John reveals that “All things were made through him that is Jesus the Word, and without him was not any thing made that was made.”[7] “Then John says, In him was life, and the life was the light of men.”[8] Humans were made to bear the very life and light of God. Some church fathers like St Maximos believed that Adam and Eve were translucent to this light. They shined out with the glory of God. It would seem from these early passages in Genesis and later passages like Romans 8, humans played a distinctive role is serving and ruling this creation in and through the love of God. (Moses)

Sadly, we come to Genesis 3-4. Humans turn away from God and suffer a broken communion with God and one another. By the time we get to Genesis 4, human blood is shed on the ground. Now creation is suffering directly under violence and sin and humanity. The ground is crying out for vengeance.

In his wonderful book, On the Incarnation, Athanasius emphasizes that all things were created from nothing and dependent on God for existence. To turn from God, separates humans from the very source of their existence. He writes,

[W] hen humans despised and overturned the comprehension of God, devising and contriving evil for themselves, as was said in the first work, then they received the previously threatened condemnation of death, and thereafter no longer remained as they had been created, but were corrupted as they had contrived; and, seizing them, death reigned. For the transgression of the commandment returned them to the natural state, so that, just as they, not being, came to be, so also they might rightly endure in time the corruption unto non-being.[9]

In this state of separation, humans were moving to non-being and eventually non-existence. The sin of turning away from God is the sin of all humanity and is called idolatry. Gradually, humans lose their humanity and become beasts: killing, betraying, exploiting, enslaving, and on and on. As we have seen in our own country and throughout the world. Athanasius helped me to see that sin unravels humans and ultimately all creation. In the words of Isaiah, “it is coming undone.” We physically destroy one another and the earth. We emotionally, relationally, spiritually corrupt the creation.

Jesus descends into the lowest point of this unraveling. In the age of the Roman empire, the lowest point was crucifixion, the cross. Christ assumes every aspect of human corruption in mind, heart, and body. In his death on the cross, he dies a criminal, though innocent. He is crushed, humiliated, and descends to the very lowest corruption of humans. Because Christ is fully man and fully God, he can unite to a corrupt humanity while united to an incorrupt Heavenly Father. Thus, in His resurrection, humanity is raised from the dead and up into communion with Father, Son, and Spirit.

Our union with Christ changes everything for us and for all creation. Even now, His redeeming grace is rippling out to every aspect of creation that has been subjected to futility. We long and groan and strain forward to the day when all God’s people will enter the redeemed and all creation will be raised up into His glory. In Christ, we are priests, we are God’s instruments of reconciliation. And yet, we are weak, and we grow weary. Paul writes in Romans 8

For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.

Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.[10]

This is why we continue to celebrate our faith through the image of the cross. In the cross, we see the paradox of humiliation and exaltation, of death and resurrection, and sin and redemption.

Almighty God, whose most dear Son went not up to joy but first he suffered pain, and entered not into glory before he was crucified: mercifully grant that we, walking in the way of the cross, may find it none other than the way of life and peace; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who is alive and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen

[1] Rowan Williams, God with Us: The Meaning of the Cross and Resurrection—Then and Now (London: SPCK, 2017), 21.

[2] Robin Jensen, The Cross: History, Art, and Controversy (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2023), 8.

[3] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Php 2:5–8.

[4] St. Justin Martyr, St. Justin Martyr: The First and Second Apologies, ed. Walter J. Burghardt et al., trans. Leslie William Barnard, vol. 56, Ancient Christian Writers (New York; Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1997), 31.

[5] Augustine of Hippo, Tractates on the Gospel of John 28–54, ed. Thomas P. Halton, trans. John W. Rettig, vol. 88, The Fathers of the Church (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 1993), 85.

[6] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Ro 8:20–21.

[7] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Jn 1:3.

[8] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Jn 1:4.

[9] St Athanasius the Great of Alexandria, On the Incarnation: Translation, ed. and trans. John Behr, vol. 44a, Popular Patristics Series (Yonkers, NY: St Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 2011), 59.

[10] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Ro 8:22–28.

Rev. Dr. Les Martin

Pentecost+13 2025
Rev. Dr. Les Martin
Deuteronomy 30:15–20, Psalm 1, Philemon, Luke 14:25-33

O Lord God, grant your people grace to withstand the temptations of the world, the flesh, and the devil, and with pure hearts and minds to follow you – From the Collect of the Day

In the Name of the Living God: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

I stood before you on August 3rd to inform you that the doctors had determined I had a bad heart. Briefly, I am happy to tell you today that the procedure I had some 17 days ago now seems to have been a success. I’m grateful to God for a new lease on life.

In that same announcement, I also alluded to the fact that I have a bad heart in other ways- spiritual ways. Truth is, we all do. Today in Deuteronomy 30 verse 15. God tells the people of Israel about their options, moving forward. He says that he has set before them life and good, evil and death. In verse 19, he pleads with them to “choose life.” In truth, that’s not just their choice, it’s my choice, it’s the daily choice of all of us, really. Problem is, we have bad hearts. Verses 17 and 18 of the same passage read as follows:

But if your heart turns away, and you will not hear, but are drawn away to worship other gods and serve them, I declare to you today, that you shall surely perish. (Dt 30:18-18, ESV)

We know from the history of Israel, that their hearts did indeed turn away, again and again, and they did indeed perish in their idolatry, again and again. So do we.

Proverbs 14:12 says the following “There is a way that seems right to a person, but its end is the way to death.” (CSB) That, friends, is both the heart of the matter, and what’s the matter with our hearts.  You see, we don’t have to be particularly actively evil or wicked people to wind up in a mess. Rather, it’s simply the case that what seems naturally right and good to us leads to death. This is because our hearts are not neutral territory. Absent the truth of Christ and the work of the Holy Spirit, they are deceived- fatally so. Our Collect this morning reminds us  that they are constantly subjected to “the temptations of the world, the flesh, and the devil.”  Throughout history, the church has said that the work of Christian living is to renounce- to decide that we will no longer give allegiance to- those temptations, to that way that seems so right to us but actually deals us destruction.

The world, the flesh and the devil.  These are the “three foes of man” – as they were called in the medieval Church.  They are constantly seducing our hearts, enticing us to go off in a way that seems appealing at first glance, but actually only reaps a harvest of painful consequences.  Let’s consider them in reverse order.

The devil is at the heart of the problem with our hearts. Back in Genesis 3:4-5 he offers us the original lie, the original temptation that humanity swallows hook, line, and sinker. Regarding eating the forbidden fruit in the Garden of Eden, he whispers:

Surely you will not die, for God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will open and you will be like God (NET)

You will be like God. Yours will be the kingdom the power and the glory. Everything you desire is within your grasp, and it is your right. If it feels good, do it. If you can conceive it, you can achieve it. Have it your way. Building our lives on this lie is indeed the way of evil. Believing this lie, we no longer love God above all things and our neighbors as ourselves. We are God, and our neighbors- like Onesimus in our Epistle today- are our slaves, to be used for our pleasure and cast off when they don’t meet our needs.  Self-idolatry, self-worship- it’s so subtle, so common place. We place ourselves at the center of our universe so easily.

The desires of the flesh are always the next logical next step. Having declared ourselves masters of our own universe, the question is: What do I want? What am I hungry for? What do I desire? Rather than being satisfied with the daily bread provided for us, we begin to listen to the internal voices of our cravings. This may cause us to look backward to either the cucumbers and leeks of Egypt, or just the freedom of youth. Cravings may also be more fantasy-based, imagining a life of physical pleasure, unlimited financial resources, or some form of fame, esteem or even physical appearance that would make us feel better about ourselves. Whatever our particular desire is somewhat irrelevant. What’s universal among broken humanity is the unfolding process: we first declare ourselves God, and then we seek to satisfy our cravings.

Enter the world.  The culture waters we all swim in-those of decadent, end-stage consumer captialism-provide for our cravings, either with real things and people, or with the illusions of virtual life and digital intimacy.  Like the people in Pixar’s 2008 film WALL-E, it is easy for us to grow fat, indolent, and lazy as we fill ourselves with all the stuff our society says will make us happy.

“If your heart turns away… I declare to you today, that you shall surely perish.”  They did, we do, obsessed with self-worship, consumed by our wants, buried under our mountains of things.

As I mentioned earlier, our baptismal life in Christ necessitates the renunciation of these three foes of mankind.  If, as the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous states, “Selfishness – self-centeredness… is the root of our troubles,” (Big Book, p 62) then the answer to renouncing “the devil and all the spiritual forces of wickedness that rebel against God” (BCP 2019 Baptismal liturgy) lies in what Christ commends in verse 26 of our Gospel reading today:  we simply must choose God first, above even self.  For John Calvin, self-denial is the way Jesus offers us freedom from what he terms the “deadly pestilence of love of strife and love of self.” Denial of self- turning instead to God and our neighbor as the focus of our attention- is the escape from selfishness. Self-denial is the gift Christ gives us that enables us to dedicate ourselves to God and to seek the things which “are of the Lord’s will.”  This is not to ignore a healthy self-identity, mind you, nor overlook legitimate self-care.  It is, however, the work of “right-sizing” ourselves- recognizing that the Lord is God and we are not. Like that old saying says: it’s not about thinking less of yourself, it’s about thinking of yourself less.

What of “the sinful desires of the flesh that draw you from the love of God?” (BCP 2019 Baptismal liturgy) Jesus teaches in verse 27 that we must bear our cross. In Galatians 2:20, the Apostle Paul writes:

My old self has been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. So I live in this earthly body by trusting in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. (NLT)

We always need to remember that as fallen humans we have our wants and our needs confused.  We do not really know what is good for us, only what we desire. When we can come to trust in the Son of God and in his provision of what is truly necessary- for our daily bread- it becomes easier, if not exactly easy, to crucify our internal cravings for immediate and never-ending pleasure and soothing.

The world, it seems to me, wants to give us that pleasure, those wants- on credit.  We buy now, pay later.  Thing is, what we buy neither lasts nor satisfies- the point is the acquisition that never ends:  there is always some new thing, some new dream that we are encouraged to go after. And the costs- the consequences of this way of living- are so very high.  Addiction, broken homes, damaged and discarded relationships, a life of stress driven by the anxiety to either get ahead or just pay off our financial debt, a life of illness driven by quick-fix consumption of unhealthy foods, substances, and ideas. Hence our baptismal liturgy calls us to “renounce the empty promises and deadly deceits of this world that corrupt and destroy the creatures of God.” (BCP 2019 Baptismal liturgy).   The things of this fast-food, single-use, disposable life do indeed corrupt and destroy us.  Jesus, in verse 27, urges us to “count the cost” of the kind of lifestyle we are building.  To have the discipline to walk closely with him in the life he has given us to live, as opposed to grasping for some kind of fantasy lifestyle that was never meant to be ours, despite what the world suggests.

Some thoughts about this life of renunciation.  First, it is not so much about doing something different- although it entails that- as it is about seeing something different.  Its about seeing how much peace there is in not trying to be God anymore.  Its about understanding that the commandments of the Lord really are the best way to live- that they provide freedom to live, not restriction of life.  It is about seeing that this altar, this font, these relationships, our spouses, families, friends and work are the place in which God is making us holy and transforming us into his likeness.  In the givenness of our lives is where we find grace.  We don’t have to search for it anywhere else.  In fact, such a search may well lead us only to the dead-end consequences that are always the result of rebellious self-seeking.  Just to see this- to confess these truths- is to allow God to begin the re-fashioning of our bad hearts into hearts that delight in him.  And as our hearts learn to delight in him, our mind will be renewed, and our lives will follow suit.

Secondly, remember that we won’t always get it right.  We will still quite often err, siding with the world, the flesh, and the devil.  When we do- when we have wandered far in a land that is waste, with the consequences of the choices we have made weighing us down- then we have come to the place of hope.  Remember this:  discipleship is not the Gospel.  And the Gospel is this:  that when we were still far off, Christ loved us, died for us, and brought us home.  There is always forgiveness for the repentant heart.  The way of renunciation, the way of discipleship is fruit that grows out of our rooted relationship in Christ, not the other way around.  We can always find mercy and forgiveness in Jesus, even when we have been too much with the world, the flesh, the devil.

This past week, I began cardiac rehab three days a week.  You know- the diet, the treadmill and the weights.  Why?  Because the fact is this:  the doctors have fixed my heart, have given me a new life.  But what I do with that life is up to me.  Effort is required to make sure I use it to the fullest, and in the best way possible.  In his mercy, Jesus has given us all new life through his shed blood and the waters of Baptism.  What we do with it is up to us.  The life of renouncing the world, the flesh, and the devil, of giving allegiance to Christ and him alone- that is our spiritual cardiac rehabilitation.  It enables us to live the kind of lives that the children we are are invited to live.  The very best way of living there is. May God give us the desire to pursue it.

Rev. Doug Floyd

Pentecost +12 – Ever Growing Community of Christ
Rev. Doug Floyd
Colossians 4:2-6

Today marks the end of our summer long reflections on Colossians. This week I reread all the sermons on our website, and then I reread the book of Colossians. One theme that surfaced again and again is our rootedness in Christ. This made me think of a little book I read with some friends in college, The Green Letters by Myles Stanford. This book was one of a several books that introduced me to a life shaped by God’s abundant grace as revealed in Christ.

Here some 40 years later I am still learning about this life of grace. I still love reading with God’s people and learning from God’s people. We are bound together in Christ and through Christ we are bound to saints across the ages. This is a treasure.

We have talked about how the community of Colossae was ordinary, even insignificant, and yet they were loved by God. When they heard the gospel, the Spirit opened the door of their hearts, and they received this good news. They were raised up into the great communion of love.

While Paul is addressing the personal and individual faith of each member of the community, we must not forget that he is addressing the whole fellowship. At the end of chapter 4, he encourages them to pass this letter on to the church at Laodicea, and to read the letter that he wrote to the church at Laodicea. While these letters may address specific concerns of each community, they are intended for the body of Christ across space and time. So, we hear these words addressed to us today.

Even as Paul focuses our attention upon the redeeming and glorifying work of Jesus Christ among us, he emphasizes the unspeakable glory of Christ Jesus who is the image of the invisible God. The Good News that was hidden for ages has been revealed. It is Jesus Christ, the firstborn of all creation.

“For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.” [1]

“He has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present [us] holy and blameless and above reproach before him.”[2] As ordinary and even insignificant people, we have been reconciled to God. Our hope is hidden beyond the veil of this life before the very throne of God. We live in and through the reality of this sacred communion of love as revealed in Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Our relation to one another is shaped in Christ. Our relation to the culture is shaped in Christ. We have tasted the sweet love of God, and we will never be the same again.

Even as we set our minds on things above, we turn our hearts out to a culture in need of the good news of Jesus Christ. We do this in prayer, thanksgiving, and wise hospitality toward those outside the faith.

 “Continue steadfastly in prayer, being watchful in it with thanksgiving.”[3] Here is an exhortation to pray, watch, and give thanks. This is certainly applicable to each of us in our daily lives, but it also speaks to the community. The letter is being read aloud when the community gathers. In this community, outsiders have been welcomed. Love has been poured out in fellowship, in the peace, and in the supper of the Lamb.

As often as the community gathers, we are invited to lift up our voices in prayer. To be watchful. To give thanks. “Prayers of the people” offers some guidance to our prayers, but we can lift individual voices as well. I appreciate when some people cry out for specific individuals and for situations our world. Consider how Sherry has encouraged us to pray for specific places of persecution like Nigeria. As the covenant community, we offer priestly prayers for a world in need. Even as we pray, we are called to be watchful in thanksgiving.

There is one sense in which we are always watching for the coming of the Lord. There is another sense in which we are watching for those who would seduce us from the truth. In 1 Peter 5:8, we read “Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.”

We respond to these attacks with humble hearts, trusting God’s provision. In our culture, these attacks may also look more like social pressure, but in many cultures, Christians face tne threat of physical, emotional, and legal violence. The people of God remain vigilant and humble themselves under the mighty hand of God. At the same, we are watching to see what God is doing in our community and in the region at large. How is God calling us to serve.

Consider Geoff’s exhortation to help provide food for the hungry. We pour out our lives in prayer even as we pour out our resources to the community in need. I exhort each of you to keep watchful and when you sense a great need to share it with our whole community, so that we can pray and serve together.

Next Paul asks for prayer. He writes, “At the same time, pray also for us, that God may open to us a door for the word, to declare the mystery of Christ, on account of which I am in prison— that I may make it clear, which is how I ought to speak. [4] Paul opens this letter praying for the Colossians and now he asks them to pray for him. The Colossians and the folks at St. Brendan’s are fellow servants with Paul.

He is writing from prison and is asking them to pray for an open door. Is this so that he might escape? In Acts 5, the Apostles are arrested and put in prison. An angel of the Lord lets them out, and they begin preaching again the next day. I don’t think Paul is asking to be let out. He wants an open door for the Gospel.

In Acts 4, the church prays to preach boldly with the good news of Jesus Christ. Like the Apostles in Jerusalem, Paul is asking his fellow believers to pray that the Gospel might have an open door. From prison Paul can address soldiers and write letters. Consider the soldiers who hear. Some of these soldiers will eventually bring the Gospel to the uttermost reaches of the empire.

Every week, we pray “For all those who proclaim the Gospel at home and abroad; and for all who teach and disciple others.” We want to the Gospel to go forth through open doors to the hearts of the people. Not so that the “Christian team” will grow stronger but so that insignificant, beat down, and discouraged people in slave to sin will be reconciled to God.

Now the whole church is encouraged to walk out their calling in the community beyond the church, to walk in wisdom toward outsiders, making the best use of the time. “Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person.”[5]

We go forth as children of light who shine out like stars in the universe. We bring words of hope, hands of healing, gracious hospitality. When I eight or nine, my sister and I joined my parents and their youth group out on the street in New Jersey, handing out tracts. We were “witnessing.” I have no doubt God used our small service. Even in college, I took to the streets with a handful of tracts. As it turns out, I ended up talking to one or two people all afternoon. It seems I’ve always been a teacher even when I tried to be an evangelist.

Though God can and will use this service, I think this outreach can take all sorts of shapes. It might be as simple as talking with the checkout clerk at the grocery store. We all have different gifts, and hospitality can take different shapes in our lives.

In the past, I held movie nights and house concerts for sinners and saints alike. I was trying to find ways to open our lives and love to those around us. I had a friend who set up a dream both at the Flea Market. “Dreams for two cents.” People always walked up and talked with him.

One way that our community might reach beyond ourselves to a world in need is through prayer. Kelly and I went to a conference once when a man in our group shared how he used to buy gas from the same market every week. The clerk was a goth girl. He would talk to her when he paid. Then he asked his house church to start praying for her. Eventually, he told her about the group. She came. Eventually she embraced Jesus and later became a missionary.

That sounds like an open door, like watchfulness, prayer, thanksgiving.

Each week we gather as priests before God and worship, pray, receive the blessing of Christ, and go out with the Good News on our lips and in our feet. May the Lord have mercy upon us and teach each of us how we might be instruments of gracious hospitality and holy reconciliation in a world desperate for the love of God.

[1] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Col 1:16–20.

[2] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Col 1:22.

[3] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Col 4:2.

[4] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Col 4:3–4.

[5] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Col 4:5–6.

Dr. Christopher Graham

Pentecost+11 2025 – Bearing Fruit
Dr. Christiopher Graham
Colossians 3:18-4:1

In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

How are we to be shaped this morning by the 142 words, the nine verses that Sherry read from Colossians chapter 3 verses 19 to 4:1 for us. More specifically, how are we to be shaped by those six verbs: submit, love, provoke not, obey, work heartily, treat justly and fairly.

When I told my friend and colleague that I was preaching on this passage, a man who I respect very much for his homiletical skill, which is just a fancy way to say he gives really good sermons. When I told him that this was my pass passage, he chuckled.

Then he said, “You’ve just got to steer into it.” If you’ve ever taken a driver’s instruction course, then you remember these words as the instructions you give to someone when they find themselves in a potentially life-threatening skid. Having lived in Vermont for five years, I can attest to the fact that the words work, but you can’t overthink them, you can’t think too hard why it actually works.

You just have to trust the advice, because it’ll keep you on the road. And I believe that my colleague’s advice is wise for us this morning if we want to be shaped by just these words this morning. Of course, it feels more intuitive when you’re in a skid to steer out of the skid.

It seems easier in the same way to take and avoid the words that we have before us this morning to avoid Paul’s words. In fact, maybe some folks actually read what Father Doug sent out and aren’t here this morning because they’re avoiding these words. I don’t know.

I’ll let Father Doug ask them. In fact, there are well worn strategies that preachers, teachers, and readers use to avoid hearing just these words. I want to share three of those strategies this morning so that you know that I am committed to not using these strategies.

Because I don’t think they’re helpful in letting us be formed by just these 142 words in 9 verses. First, I will avoid the temptation to take us to another of Paul’s letters. There are times when it’s entirely appropriate to go to other books and letters of Paul to help us understand a given passage.

Father Doug did this several weeks ago when looking at in Colossians, the brief verse that deals with us as the body of Christ. And in Colossians, it just gets a verse. But in 1 Corinthians and Ephesians, it gets an extended treatment, and so Father, Doug helpfully took us there to help us better understand it in Colossians.

So there are times when it’s appropriate, but not this morning, because typically, we would go to other letters this morning to avoid these words, submit, love, provoke not, obey, work heartily, treat justly and fairly. We would go to other passages in Paul’s letters where he applies these words to everybody, or he applies them to both sides equally, but not here. Here he gives these specific words to specific people, wives, husbands, fathers, bond servants, or slaves, if you will, masters.

To turn into these words this morning means that we acknowledge that he has a word for us this morning with these words. I don’t know what was going on Colossae, that he just gave these words so directly without any sort of fluff to or explanation. And I don’t know why He gives these words to us this morning, but he does.

And we need to hear these words as a means to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord pleasing him in all respects. The second approach I will not take this morning is to describe what it means. For wives, husbands children’s fathers, slaves, and masters, to do these actions.

But Christopher, isn’t that actually paying attention to the words? No. That is Christopher, drawing from a very constrained perspective with a lot of biases, giving you a description and pretending that it’s universal.

And then I, if I were in your position, know what I would do, I would take my description, compare it with the other descriptions you’ve heard from other teachers and preachers. Find the one that is the most palatable to me, and then give myself to that description. And if we did that, we would be aiming at the wrong thing.

We’re not to aim at that description, or any description. We are to aim at these words and what Paul has to say to us in the book of Colossians. Finally, I will not steer out of the curve by trying to contrast the historical context of Paul with our context today.

And then to find some sort of universal principle that we can take from Paul’s words and then apply them in any given situation today. It’s a handy trick. But it’s not allowing us to hear just these words.

The fact is, I don’t know why. In God’s ordering of time, the apostles, Paul, even our Lord Himself, did not take as His first course of action, for example, to dismantle institutions like slavery. I don’t know.

But I do know that if I pretend somehow to take the principle to take the words that are given to slaves and masters and Colossians to extract some sort of principle, and then to say, well, it’s just like you submitting to your boss or me submitting to my boss, I know that this is to do injustice to Paul’s words. It’s quite possible that no one who hears my sermon this morning is in a relationship that is described as the Slave Master Bond relationship. But to principlize this so that it applies to me and my boss is to avoid the reality that there are an estimated 28 million people to date who are still in slavery.

And if they heard these words, that would mean something very profound to them. So we’re not going to take that route. Instead, we’re going to steer into the words and realize this that even as we live in the reality that Paul spoke about in the previous chapter, you remember these words from last week.

Here, there is not Greek and Jew circumcised, uncircumcised, barbarian, Scyithian, slave, free, but Christ is all and in all. Even as we live in that reality, Paul recognizes that we bear fruit even in our most intimate and even fraught relationships. Because you and I are now connected to Christ, your earthly reality changes in light of that.

We are not taken out of the messiness of life And in fact, what our passage this morning shows us is that we remain, even in the messiest of relationships and our most intimate relationships, even in these, we can walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing him, bearing fruit in every good. And so, in fact, that’s a great place to start, turning into the skid, turning into these words, is to recognize that we are in the fruit section of the letter. Of course, Reverend Burnett, Father Clint last week launched us well into this section last week.

And we would do well to remember that the description we have here, the words that we have here flow out of the words that we heard last week. There is then, a logical and literary connection between the verbs submit, love, provoke, not, obey, work heartily, treat justly and fairly, fairly, with the adjectives and nouns we heard last week, holy, beloved, compassionate, kindness, humility, meekness, patience, love, peace, and thankful. That our verbs this week are tied and should be consonant with the fruit of the verbs last week, bearing with one another, forgiving each other, teaching, and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns, and spiritual songs.

There is continuity, only because we have to divide it up somewhere for the sake of preaching, do we separation of a week between those words and these words? I do wish, though, that maybe we could have gotten a running head start into, you know, the words for today instead of just starting with submit. But that’s above my pay grade, as they say.

It would be good to remember when we encounter these words today that the very nature of fruit is to be attractive and appealing. And why? For the nourishment of those who are consuming and for the propagation of the plant.

Paul doesn’t choose his metaphors lightly. He chooses them knowing what they mean, and he knows that even the fruit of these words should be attractive and appealing. And so here’s just a question for us, as we grapple with these words in our relationships, are we bearing fruit in our relationship with each other, even our most intimate, even our most fraught relationships, in such a way that they nourish and multiply.

Are we submitting in such a way that our spouse is encouraged and in turn finds ways to submit to those in authority over them? Are we loving in ways that our spouses are built up, for example, and in turn loving others? But as we have seen time and heard time and time again through this series, perhaps maybe every sermon in this series, the fruit is not the fruit without roots.

These actions are merely actions unless they are connected to the one who is the root. Remember, Paul has said earlier in this letter, this, therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in Thanksgiving. And Paul does not let us forget, even in this section of the letter that our fruit, our actions, are a result of our connection, our communion with Christ.

Again, as Reverend Burnett pointed out last week, the words that this section, if then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above where Christ is seated at the right hand of the Father, Set that your mind on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. Here it is, for you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. And even in our passage this morning, Paul reminds us that our ultimate orientation, even in our earthly relationships, is toward Christ.

Wives, be subject to your husbands as is fitting in the Lord. Children be obedient to your parents in all things for this is well pleasing to the Lord. Bond servants, with sincerity of heart, fearing the Lord.

Whatever you do, do your work heartily as for the Lord. It is Christ, the Lord whom you serve, and to masters, you, too, have a master in heaven. At our most fundamental level, our relationship, our relationships, are governed by the reality that we are all in Christ, and we orient ourselves to and from Christ.

If we do not recognize that, if we do not focus on that, then our actions, even these actions, do not nourish and give life and multiply. They become merely transactional. I love you only as you submit to me, I submit to you, only as you love me, I obey you, only as far as you don’t exasperate me, I will not exasperate you, only in as much as you obey me.

As a child of the 70s, the 1970s, that is. I can testify to the fact that it is possible to so focus on the family that you can miss the one who gives life to the family. Without Christ as the root, without connection to the root, submission becomes merely passivity.

Love, even the most extreme forms of love, giving one’s body to be burned, giving one’s possessions to the poor, even all of that becomes noisy gongs and clanging cymbals. I promise that’s my only reference to another non-Colossian letter. “Obedience is learning simply how to kiss up, suck up for self-preservation.

Treating justly and fairly becomes meeting standards that are mandated by some regulatory body. Which leads me to my third and final point, and that is, so how are we to stay connected to the roots? The one who gives life for these actions.

Well, Paul has already told us that in the letter. The church is that which allows the fruit to draw from the roots. To make this point early in the letter, he switches quickly from the language of fruit and roots to head and body.

You’ll remember, this is what he said in chapter 2, verse 19, that from Christ, as the head of the body, the whole body nourished and knit together through its joints and ligaments grows with a growth that is from God. In fact, Paul uses this language to at that point to warn against associating and becoming dependent upon those who are not a part of the body. Because they offer a connection that does not bring nourishments and growth.

And in looking at the verse just preceding our passage, you remember, it says this and whatever you do in word or deed, do everything, in the name of the Lord Jesus giving thanks to God the Father through Him. Again, last week, Reverend Burnett ended his sermon saying this, “The result of Christ’s peace ruling in our hearts is that we might be Thanksgivers or people who live a Eucharistic life. If we live this kind of life, the gospel message about Jesus will then live in us and provide a song in our hearts that we can use to teach each other.

And we will need to be taught by each other every single day. What does it mean that we gather from the roots through the church? I think that Father Clint’s message last week and his quote here, his conclusion, point us in two directions.

First, we learn from each other. We learn from each other. We are willing to help and to be helped, to help each other discern if our actions are truly nourishing and fruitful and in concert with that which is our Lord, to help determine whether our actions are like a green apple Jolly Rancher, which are wonderful in flavor, that offer little nourishment, or really a Granny Smith.

Whether our actions are like a banana flavored Laffy taffy. Why? Or bananas.

We learn from and help each other discern what is and what is not fruit in our lives. And by the way, let me just say that this goes in two directions. It may be that there are things in our lives that are really more like the Laffy taffy and that we need to be called out on and spoken to about, it doesn’t feel like this is fruit.

And there are things that maybe be happening in our lives, I can attest, which we’ve never experienced before, and we need someone to tell us, “No, no, no, that’s fruit. That’s good. You need to you need to cultivate that.

The second way that Father Clint’s words last week point us to how we stay connected with the plant and therefore to the roots is in referencing the Eucharistic life. And in this, he pointed us to a way that the church keeps us connected to the root or to the head. Our interaction with each other in the liturgy and on the Lord’s Day, our service to and before God.

You see, when we hear God’s Word from our brothers and sisters, from the Old Testament and New Testament, when we hear those words read aloud, we can hear them and respond to them. We can hear Sherry this morning say those words from Isaiah and the words from Salvation, and we can be reminded that even when some of our earthly relationships fail, there is a God who is a just God, who is our refuge. And we can respond and take comfort in that.

We can hear others in the confession, even as we join with them, to confess that we have not submitted or loved, or obeyed, or worked heartily, that we have provoked or exasperated. When we come together, we can hear Father Doug and Father Les offer the words of absolution and comfort, and we are recipients of the Masters mercy. Grace and comfort, When Jeff, Stephanie, or Gail, say the words, Christ’s blood shed for you, we have communion with our Lord. who submitted to the Father’s will, so that he could love us to the end. who, taking the form of a servant, did not come to be served, but to serve.

We have communion with that, Lord. When you take my hand and say, “Pace, you manifest Christ peace in my fraught, complicated, dizzying world. Each time we gather, that is, we place ourselves in a position where we may be filled with the knowledge of his will, in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.

So as to walk in a manner worthy of a Lord, fully pleasing to him, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God, we find ourselves in a place being strengthened with all power, according to His glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy, and giving thanks to the Father who is qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints of light.

Rev. Dr. Clint Burnett

Pentecost+10 2025
Rev. Dr. Clint Burnett
Colossians 3:1-17

Good morning, grace and peace to you this beautiful morning. I bring you greetings from your sister parish in Knoxville, Old North Abbey, and we pray that you are well, and we trust that God and His faithfulness is moving you.

Christ is moving among you, sanctifying you and using you for His good purpose in beautiful, Maryville, Tennessee. Years ago, to prepare for my application to graduate schools, for my doctorate, I had to undertake a standardized test known as the graduate Record Examination or GRE for short, which is a prerequisite for admission to many American graduate programs. Maybe you have had to suffer through the GRE.

The test goal is to measure one’s reading comprehension, understanding of mathematics, writing capability, and critical thinking skills. To prepare for the exam, I purchased an exam prep book from Amazon. I read through it.

I took the practice exam, and in the end, I did not achieve the score that I needed to get into the graduate schools to which I was applying. Therefore, I bought a second exam prep book, and I did the exact same thing. Once again, to reading through cover to cover and taking the practice exam, I did not do as well as I needed.

So, I bought a third exam prep book. Now, this book was exactly like the first two, say for one critical difference. The difference was that at the beginning of the book, the author of the book informed the reader that one’s test score is related directly to one’s perspective about the exam.

Rather than seeing it as a boring, long, and laborious test, the author of the book encouraged readers to see it as an opportunity to learn and to grow and to show off one’s skills. Therefore, when I came to a short story with questions about the migratory habits of seals that tested my reading comprehension, I should not say, “man, another story about the migratory habits of seals. Rather, I should say, “Oh, boy, I get to learn about the migratory habits of seals.”

I must say, after putting this advice into practice, reading through that exam prep book, and taking the practice exam, I finally achieved the score that I needed. Thereupon, I immediately registered for the GRE, took the test, thanks be to God, scored what I needed to score to get into graduate school. What’s interesting is I reflect upon my journey through the GRE, is that, among those three books, my reading comprehension, my understanding of mathematics, my writing capability, and my critical thinking skills did not change that much.

The only thing that changed in the process of studying for the GRE was my own perspective about the test. Now I contribute my success in that test to just that. Instead of dreading it, I embrace the GRE.

I became excited about it, and I looked at it as an opportunity to learn. And a somewhat similar and much more important way, St. Paul and our passage this morning from Colossians, is trying to accomplish the same thing for us, getting us to change our perspective.

His main goal in Colossians chapter 3, verses 1 through 17 is to have readers alter their perspective from an earthly one to a heavenly one, which by God’s grace will result in holy changes in our behavior and for the glorification of God. He accomplishes this objective by doing four things in our passage.

First, St. Paul exhorts us to reorient our area of concentration. Second, God’s grace will produce in us the removal of ungodly vices. Third this will allow us to robe ourselves in heavenly virtues, and finally, number four God and the gospel will reign in us.

Let’s begin with our first observation. St. Paul exhorts us to reorient our area of concentration. The Apostle begins this by noting that because of our baptism into Christ, which he has just talked about in chapter 2, God has put us believers in the highest place of honor in the cosmos. He has raised us spiritually to heaven and seated us next to God, the Son, who is enthroned at God’s right hand.

Let me say that one more time, because of our baptism, he has raised us spiritually to heaven and seated us next to God, the Son, who is enthroned to the right hand of God the Father. Because of this divine and mystical feat, St. Paul encourages us to do two things.

We must search for the things above. The verb has the connotation of action, of actually doing something. And the Bible uses it frequently to describe, for example, in the old Greek version of the Old Testament, how the future king Saul left his father’s house to go out and search for those lost donkeys, which eventually led him to Samuel and his anointing as a king.

Therefore, we must actively seek out heavenly matters in our lives. But once we find these heavenly matters, St. Paul then encourages us to be minded of them.

This verb is one that St. Paul uses a lot, especially in the letter to the Philippians. And it’s really kind of difficult for us to translate, because it has the idea of actually thinking critically about something, and then concentrating on that very thing, and then letting this critical thought and this concentration result in a change of action in our lives.

To drive home this point, St. Paul reminds us that we have died. We have died to sin, and we have died to ourselves and our baptism and then been united with Christ.

To the point that our own lives no longer exist, we are hidden with Christ in God the Father. Now we get a clue about what heavenly things St. Paul is telling us to seek after and to be minded about in Colossians chapter 3 and verse 4, when he references Jesus’ second coming.

Therefore, he is exhorting us to concentrate, to seek out, to be mindful of the gospel story with particular attention to its end-result in goal. The second coming of Jesus, and the establishment of the fullness of God’s kingdom, here on earth, a kingdom of peace and holiness and righteousness. It’s only when we can reorient our area of concentration that, by God’s grace, we can then allow him to remove vices from our lives.

Thus, St. Paul exhorts us in Colossians chapter 3 and verse 5, to put to death, literally, to kill our earthly members, which are parts of our lives that distract us and draw us away from being minded of those heavenly matters. The apostle then provides a not exhaustive list of 11 total vices, which we are to flee from in Colossians chapter 3 verses 5 through 9 These include sexual immorality, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, greed, which he likens to idolatry.

Anger, wrath, evil, blaspheming, vulgar speech, and lying, particularly to one another. These vices only produce God’s wrath, which has started being revealed from heaven and will be completed at the second coming of Jesus. Such behavior should not be part of our lives now, even though St. Paul acknowledges that before we became Christians, we lived in these vices and lived in these sins.

And now, people who have been raised to heaven are to be co enthroned spiritually with Jesus. We whose lives are hidden with Christ in God, are called by God’s grace to put the evil that defined that old person we used to be far away from us. We’re literally to kill it.

This is not something that we do by our own power, but it’s something that God gives us the ability as Christians to do. And if we go back to chapter 2 and verse 15, we see the idea of stripping the rulers and the authorities of this age, probably evil spirits who have dominion over us, of their power over us. St.

Paul uses the same verb in our passage to talk about as stripping off our old man. We can do that because God has already taken away the power of any evil forces in the world to have influence on us if we just tap into that power. This reference to putting to death our old person brings us to our third observation in our passage.

As individuals who are now new men and women of God, spiritually co and thrown next to Jesus, we must robe ourselves accordingly. We are in the heavenly court, spiritually. Therefore, we should dress like.

As part of the new humanity of which Jesus is the first, St. Paul orients us and tells us once again, we are God’s elect, the chosen ones, God’s beloved, and saints in progress. In this new race into which we belong, there is nothing of value in the old race.

The old race is defined by death and sin and Satan. Hence, it matters not to his original audience, whether they be Jew or Greek, whether they be circumcised or uncircumcised, whether or not they are a barbarian or a Scythian, a free person or a slave. And today, in our own context, we might add whether or not someone is an American or not.

A Trump supporter or a Trump detractor, a Democrat, or a Republican, and the list of things that divide God’s people goes on and on. The reason that none of these distinctions matter for us is that as Christians, St. Paul tells us that the Messiah, Christ is all things, and that He is in all things for us.

He’s everything. He’s the only thing that matters. Therefore, at the end of the day, our new ontological existence, the very existence of our new being as Christians, trumps everything from our old lives.

Consequently, instead of focusing on the things that divide us, we must by God’s grace focus on these heavenly virtues of which St. Paul once again provides a non-exhaustive list, but this one is sevenfold. Compassion, mercy, kindness, humility, meekness, patience, and most importantly of all, he says, love, which is the bond of perfection in the church.

Along with these virtues, the apostle notes that we must put on one good work in particular, especially if we’re going to live together in the church, in the community of Christ. We must forgive one another of the sins that we commit against one another. Let’s just pause right there and reflect for just a second.

Since the earliest days of the church, the apostles recognized that God’s people, though spiritually raised and seated next to Christ in the heavenly places, we still are in our old self and sometimes we sin against one another. And instead of being surprised when a brother or sister sins against us, remember, perspective is important. We must look at it as an opportunity for us to be just like our Lord.

St. Paul says he forgave others. When we have an opportunity to forgive, we can be just a little bit more like Jesus.

And finally, this morning, if we reorient our area of concentration to heaven, which by God’s grace will produce the removal of these ungodly vices and allow us to robe ourselves in these heavenly virtues. We can then move on to our passage’s fourth observation. That is, we can let God and the gospel reign in and over us.

This occurs by allowing the peace that Christ produces. That’s what the peace of Christ here means. The peace that Christ produces in our lives to rule in our hearts is peace is not just the absence of strife.

This is not just what we have a ceasefire. This piece consists of safety, of spiritual health, of spiritual prosperity, of tranquility that only can be found in Christ and contentment, that only be found in Christ.

This is why St. Paul finishes the verse by saying, the result of Christ’s peace, ruling, in our hearts is that we might be thanksgivers, or people who live a Eucharistic life for the word here, be thankful, is the plural, adjectival, or just an adjective form of the word from which we derive Eucharist. If we live this kind of life, the gospel message about Jesus will then live in us and provide a song in our hearts that we can then use to teach each other, and we will need to be taught by each other every single day. This will result in our in our fellow Christians living that Eucharistic life, too, for the outcome of our singing is everything that we do, will be done in the name of Jesus, which gives thanks, the same word for Eucharist here, to God, through the word, that God has already done for us, through his Son, in the name of the Father, and of a Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Amen. Amen.

Rev. Doug Floyd

Pentecost +9 2025 – Christ is the center
Rev. Doug Floyd
Colossians 2:16-23

Last week, Fr. Les reminded us of the center of Colossians. In chapter 2, verse six and seven we read, Therefore, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live your lives in him, rooted and built up in him and firm in your faith just as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness. (Col. 2:6-7, NET)

Jesus is the center.

Jesus is the center of our Christian faith and life.

Jesus is the center of Scripture.

Jesus is the center of all creation.

And yet, He is often displaced. As simple as this may sound, there are all sorts of ways that He is displaced. Politics can become the center of our lives. Finances can become our center. Children can become our center. These and other areas can easily become the focus of our lives instead of Christ. We don’t have to ignore any of these areas. Instead, we must learn to think of them in light of Christ. The late theologian Ray Anderson speaks of the inner logic of the Gospel. The Gospel helps us to see how all things are ordered in relation Christ.

It is easy for churches to de-center Christ. I love all the various streams of our Christian faith and have learned much from various streams. Yet, I’ve also seen some people can so focus on one aspect of their church that Christ becomes secondary to one key trait. I love Eastern Orthodoxy and have read deeply in it. Once I ate lunch with some Orthodox friends, they asked me, “Knowing what you know, how can you not become Eastern Orthodox?” My answer wasn’t too impressive. “I never felt like I was supposed to.”

In the late 80s, I worked for a Black Pentecostal church. Many of us had the strange idea that we were the only ones doing the work of Christ in the city. Our particular form took precedence over Christ. I used to think my passion and fiery preaching would reform the Southern Baptist Convention. I had to learn the hard way not to think more highly of myself than I ought.

But Christ my Savior is worthy to receive glory and honor and power. He is moving in the lives of people and churches and schools and government in ways that I cannot begin to grasp.

I have worshipped with Christians across this community and have discovered my Savior is there, working in the lives of the people, shaping the community as a dwelling place for His glory.

Over these last few weeks, we’ve emphasized how very ordinary was the church of Colossae. It could very well be that their ordinariness is the secret sauce of their community. They know that they “once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds.”[1] But Jesus “has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present [them] holy and blameless and above reproach before him.[2] In their ordinariness, they recognize their dependence on Christ.

Jesus is the center.

Other groups and false teachers might try to decenter Christ. They may mean well, but they emphasize ideas and rituals and experiences that refocus the life of faith. In one way or another, humans are really good about finding ways to worship ourselves above all. Eugen Rosenstock Huessy used to emphasize that the great gift of Biblical faith is God’s “No to humanity.” No we are not God. No we are not superior because we have knowledge. No we don’t get special recognition for practicing Sabbath, for fasting, for following the rituals of Anglican worship perfectly. We are not more important because we make good money, and we are not more holy because we’ve chosen the path of poverty.

Our spiritual experiences don’t make us more celestial than our neighbors. Our disciplines of faith may enrich us but do not make us more holy than the person beside us. It is Christ alone for the glory of God alone.

In today’s reading, Paul’s explains that turning to heightened spiritual experiences through fasting, beholding and worshipping angels, and having great visions beyond the veil can puff us up and separate us from the body, “not holding 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.”[3] Imagine if your arm started growing and growing and growing. The body couldn’t support it. The arm could no longer function in conjunction with the body. If anything, this giant arm would become a disability. This is what happens when one trait or one gift is emphasized above all the gifts within the community.

This image of the body of Christ appears in other letters. In 1 Corinthians 12, Paul writes, “For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and all were made to drink of one Spirit.” [4] All the various parts of the body need one another. All the members of the body are one whole.

Even as Paul describes the body of Christ, he is helping us to see the mystery of the Triune God. One God, Three Persons: Father, Son and Spirit. When we speak of the work of the Son, we are not ignoring the Father and Spirit. For all three work together as God. Gregory Nazianzen writes,

No sooner do I conceive of the One than I am illumined by the Splendour of the Three; no sooner do I distinguish Them than I am carried back to the One. When I think of any One of the Three I think of Him as the Whole, and my eyes are filled, and the greater part of what I am thinking of escapes me. I cannot grasp the greatness of That One so as to attribute a greater greatness to the Rest. When I contemplate the Three together, I see but one torch, and cannot divide or measure out the Undivided Light.[5]

Our Triune God has welcomed us into this communion of love.

At the same, He puts us into family, the church. We say Christ and acknowledge the work of the Father sending Christ, and the movement of the Spirit going before Christ and coming after Christ. This communion of love helps us to understand how we live in a communion of love with God and one another.

Christ is the head of the church, the life of His Spirit enlivens us corporately. As Paul writes in Ephesians,

But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.[6]

He gathers us up as slaves from Egypt and breathes new life into us. We are no longer dead in sin but living children. And get this, He has “made us alive together with Christ.” Made alive together. He has raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.The inner communion of the Triune God shapes the inner communion of the people of God. We are raised together. We are seated with Him together. One Body. One People.

Now and in the ages to come, He will reveal the immeasurable riches of His grace in us together. One Body. One People. One Church. As a local expression of the church, we are bound together. When writing the Corinthians, Paul responds to some who want letters of recommendation. That would be like recommendations people write about us on LinkedIn.

Paul says in 2 Corinthians, “You yourselves are our letter of recommendation, written on our hearts, to be known and read by all.”[7] If you can hear this, we also are the letter of recommendation for Paul’s ministry. We are bound to him through the wisdom God has spoken to us in him. In that sense are evidence for the resurrection of Jesus Christ. We are a living witness of the Risen Lord and we are being changed from glory to glory.

As a local body of believers, we are bound to Christ. He is our center. In and through Christ, we are bound to one another in love. At the same time, we are bound to the communion of saints across the ages in Christ. He is the head. Christ is the center. We are not trying to find ways of getting ahead, getting more glory than others. In fact, we are look for ways to celebrate the people around us.

Thus, Paul can exhort in Philippians, “Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.”[8] Each of you are gift and Christ is revealing his glory in and through you. At the same time, He is calling you and me to honor and serve those around us.

As we refocus Christ as center, as our head, we see our world as a gift of Christ and as a revelation of His glory. Whether we participate in politics, arts, music, film, and of course our children and grandchildren, we can see all these in and through Christ.

The Celtic peoples have a long history of writing praise poems to people. They saw it as worship of the Lord. Here is part of a mid-thirteenth century poem defending praise poems;

“To praise man is to praise
the One who made him,
and man’s earthly possessions
add to God’s mighty praise.

All metre and mystery
Touch on the Lord at last,
The tide thunders ashore
In praise of the High King.[9]

Thus the 20th century Welsh poet, Bobi Jones, can write praise poems to the people around him and consider this praise of God. Here is an excerpt from his poem “The People I Have Loved.”

Come breeze’s breath, that I may praise the people I have loved so freely,
The children with children’s ignorance gift for possessing wonder,
The lads and the lasses in their heathery summer of fun and in earnest
Their beauty of believing. I know they can be nothing always but
Right. Come help me in the presence of my countless loves:
Middle-aged people who have turned the ideals of their youth
Into the trenches and fashion their lives, and old people
I have loved patriots, philanthropists, saints. Once in a while
My hearts sobs within me after them
From loved of their singing and sorrowing. When their merriment
And their grief beat over me, I knew I could do no less than sweat for a time
That the magic that made them a net might remain for always.

So let us rejoice in Christ’s redeeming grace. He has rescued us from sin and death and opened our eyes and ears to the glory of God all around us. Let us give thanks for the people here today, for our families, our parents, our children and our grandchildren. Let us rejoice in our country, our leaders, and all the ways God’s blesses us. Let us rejoice in all these people and things as reminders of the abundance of God’s love revealed in Christ.

Christ is the center. Christ the head. Christ is our all in all.

[1] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Col 1:21.

[2] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Col 1:22.

[3] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Col 2:19.

[4] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), 1 Co 12:12–13.

[5] Gregory Nazianzen, “Select Orations of Saint Gregory Nazianzen,” in S. Cyril of Jerusalem, S. Gregory Nazianzen, ed. Philip Schaff and Henry Wace, trans. Charles Gordon Browne and James Edward Swallow, vol. 7, A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, Second Series (New York: Christian Literature Company, 1894), 375.

[6] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Eph 2:4–7.

[7] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), 2 Co 3:2.

[8] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Php 2:3–4.

[9] A.M. Allchin, Praise Above All: Discovering the Welsh Tradition, University of Wales, Cardiff, 1991

Rev. Dr. Les Martin

Pentecost+8 2025
Rev. Dr. Les Martin
Colossians 2:6-15

Don’t let anyone capture you with empty philosophies and high-sounding nonsense that come from human thinking and from the spiritual powers of this world – Colossians 2:8, NLT

In the Name of the Living God: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Anglican bishop and scholar NT Wright would have us realize that we have reached the key point of Paul’s letter.  He writes:

Verses 6 and 7 sum up the centre of what Paul wants to say. Everything that’s come so far…prepares for this. Everything that’s going to come after this leads on from it.

So, let’s hear those 2 verses again:

Therefore, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live your lives in him, rooted and built up in him and firm in your faith just as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness. (Col. 2:6-7, NET)

There it is.  The main point of the letter, and of our lives in Jesus Christ.  In the past few weeks, we’ve kind of already said as much.  Last week, Fr. Doug reminded us that:

The mystery of all creation has been revealed to us. It is not a math formula. It is not the secret to wealth. It is not great power. It is Jesus. He has come to reconcile all things to God.

Jesus has come to us, been given to us.  And how are we to live as a result?  Back in our first sermon, Dr. Graham put it this way:

Our ordinary posture is one of simply hearing and receiving.  I’m sorry, that’s it.

Having received Jesus and now united to him in baptism with all our transgressions forgiven, we are to simply- as verse 6 says- live our lives in him.  Which leads us to two questions this morning: Why can’t my sermon stop here?  Why doesn’t Paul’s letter stop here?  Because we refuse to believe that’s it! If we are honest, many of us- if not all of us- really believe that it must be harder than this.  More must be required.  As Tullian Tchividjian writes in One Way Love:

We conclude that it was God’s blood, sweat, and tears that got us in, but that it’s our blood, sweat, and tears that keep us in.

More must be required. It can’t be that simple, that easy.  Our history and theology are littered with a multitude of attempts to fill in the gaps in what verses 6 and 7 say, to add to the truth, and thus be able to do what it “really takes” to be saved.  We are given “just Jesus,” and invariably turn it into “Jesus + something else that is needed.”

Now, this is not a new problem.  It was a problem in the Colossian church as well.  In verse 8, Paul warns them not to be deceived, captivated, robbed and ripped off by empty, deceitful- and yet persuasive- philosophies, folk tales, and competing spiritual traditions.

We’re not really sure what “Jesus + system” the Colossians were buying into. There is the Law with it’s moralism and works, of course, that perennial temptation, but it seems that they were flirting with more than just that.  Some have suggested Phrygian mystery religions, others Gnosticism, others that they were picking up the ascetic and spiritual practices of the Ebionites.  Maybe it was simply the Greek worldview.  We don’t really know, and in some sense, it doesn’t really matter. What matters is, they were tempted by the belief that more is required- that they needed “Jesus +,” as opposed to being rooted in the faith they were taught.

Solomon may have been wiser than any of the kings who ruled in Jerusalem before him, but that didn’t make him immune to this approach.   In our reading today, he highlights his pursuit of first wisdom and then pleasure to improve his life. Elsewhere in his story- for example in 1 Kings 11- we learn of his indulgence in idolatry and witchcraft, as he explored the false religions of his foreign wives.

It seems to me that these are the 3 common alternatives to being firm in a “Just Jesus” faith:  First, the pursuit of extra knowledge, or Gnosticism, secondly, a focus on pleasure to make our lives more palatable, or Hedonism, and lastly, occult, magical, or pagan practices, which when you get down to it, are really all techniques of control.

And so today we have Jesus + Stoicism or Marxism, or Jungian psychology.  Jesus + the American dream or recreational drugs or sexual libertinism.  Jesus + shamans, or psychedelic retreats or the Prosperity Gospel.  Even Jesus as just one of many gods.  You can add your own examples, beloved, because they are legion.  It’s not just the Colossians who add something extra to the faith they have received; it’s us too, right here in 2025.

But what does this really get us? What is the result of all these extracurricular additions to the faith?  Solomon tells us he is studying both wisdom and pleasure to try and make sense of the meaning of human life under the sun. Spelled S-U-N. Why? Because, he says, human life is “an unhappy business.” But what he finds is this: the more our wisdom about life and the human predicament increases, the more our sorrow does as well. It’s the same with pleasure- and it goes without saying that his idolatrous and occult practices lead to the same end, if not not much worse. In Chapter 2, verse 11 he writes:

Behold, all was vanity and striving after wind, and there was nothing to be gained under the sun. (Ecc. 2:11b, ESV)

Let’s clarify this a bit- while idolatry, witchcraft and all other forms of spiritual control are always a dangerous dead-end- it’s not the case that knowledge per se or rightly ordered pleasures are bad.  God has given us minds and intellects to use, and living in the 21st-century, we see the value of that. For me personally, the life of the mind is a great joy. It’s the same with pleasure. Provided it stays within appropriate limits of use, and within our moral and ethical boundaries, it’s a good thing.

God gave us creation to enjoy. No, the problem Solomon is running into is something other than knowledge and pleasure being bad in and of themselves. See, he’s looking for all this wisdom and all this pleasure to have a greater purpose. Specifically, he’s looking for it to give meaning to existence, to provide some framework that makes sense of human life, toil and suffering.  And that’s the category error, because nothing under the sun (S-U-N) can do that.

No philosophical system, earned degree, or even conspiracy theory can offer a compelling account of why the innocent suffer. We may enjoy the fruit of our modern economy, industry and technology, but no amount of hard work, number of vacations, no 401(k), not even our vaunted medical system can address the ultimate futility of merely human life. We may eat, drink, and be merry-we may build bigger barns- but inevitably strife, suffering, sickness, and death await. In the end, it all amounts to chasing after the wind. Nothing in our lives will change this, indeed nothing in all creation. The answer we seek must come extra nos (from outside of ourselves).

As Christians, we do not live merely under the sun. (S-U-N), we also live and move and have our being under the Son, spelled (S-O-N).  Jesus Christ, the loving and personal organizing principle of creation, is that answer to our dilemma that comes extra nos. Jesus- and our life in him- is what truly delivers us from futility and chasing after the wind. That’s what Paul is trying to get the Colossians- and the people of Saint Brendan’s- to understand today.

In verses 7 and 8, he urges us to turn away from empty philosophies, human reasoning, high sounding nonsense, and esoteric systems, instead trusting in the truth we have received. 

In verses 9-13, he reminds us that no mere human ritual or works of the Law are the answer to our dilemma. It may be the case that humanity left to itself is dead in its sin, however, the solution lies not in anything we can do about it, but in what comes to us extra nos.  In baptism, our transgressions, and sinful nature are canceled through union with Christ.  The old Adam is buried, the old heart is circumcised, and we are- even now, in this life – alive with Christ.  There is simply nothing within humanity’s grasp that could possibly accomplish that.

Verses 14 and 15 speak the last word concerning spiritual entities, occult practices, and even the Law. The fact of the matter is this: when the charges against us were taken by Our Lord to the Cross, when he cried out “It is finished,” the power of these things over us was finished as well.  No condemnation, no subjection to hostile forces, no need to seek help from some other spiritual force need remain.  Their impotence and shame is our victory- we need pay them no more attention at all.

So often we muddle along in this vale of tears, living lives of futility and chasing after the wind- life under the S-U-N.  We forget all too easily that ours is a life lived under the S-O-N, united to him in baptism, rooted in his person, work, and love.

We may say “I know Christ is King, but…” and then substitute some other politics or philosophy, sucked from the fruit which our grandparents picked in the Garden. Gnosticism.  Higher knowledge than the revelation of Jesus Christ.

Or, “I know what Jesus taught, but…” and then flip over to some lesser way of seeking to bring ourselves joy.  Hedonism.  Putting pleasure in the place that belongs to life in Christ. 

Or perhaps, “I know that my sins are forgiven, my present and future are secure, but…” and then seek spiritual power and security either from our own works, or from some spirituality alien to our God and faith. Idolatry, witchcraft.  Seeking power, control, and safety somewhere other than in the blood of the Cross.

When the moment of our testing comes, whatever comes after that “but” in the sentence shows what our hearts really trust in. Whenever there is such a “but,” we are engaging in a “Jesus +” kind of life. Paul is urging us not to be captive to those “buts” and the competing ideologies they represent.  “Just Jesus,” he is urging, not “Jesus +”  We are complete through our union with Christ, who is the only authority we have or will ever need. In the words of 1 Corinthians, Christ crucified may be “a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles,” but we know and trust that he is in fact “the power of God and the wisdom of God.” (1:23-24, NET).  Or, as Brennan Manning, once put it:

Grace is enough. He is enough. Jesus is enough.

Let’s end where we started, with verses 6 and 7 again:

Therefore, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live your lives in him, rooted and built up in him and firm in your faith just as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness. (Col. 2:6-7, NET)

Rev. Doug Floyd

Pentecost +7 2025
Rev. Doug Floyd
Colossians 1:21-29

Paul is writing the Colossians about the majesty, the glory, the hope of Jesus Christ.

To speak of Christ is to burst into song. For He is the source of all beauty.

Two weeks ago, Christopher explained that he was preaching an ordinary sermon to ordinary people living in ordinary times. He went on to introduce the ordinary the town of Colossae. It is forgotten. Not excavated like many ancient towns. It is a pile of rocks.

Markus Barth points out that “there is good reason to believe that Colossae was one of the least important places to which documents that were later canonized were ever sent.”[1]  Least important places. The Gospel bears fruit in one of the Least important places.

In today’s passage, Paul writes, “And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds….”[2] Alienated. Hostile in mind. Doing evil deeds.

Alienated has the sense of the stranger, the other. In his 1916 novella, Franz Kafka writes about a man who wakes to find himself transformed into an insect. Some people think he’s a cockroach. Kafka calls him a “monstrous vermin.” The family does not want to see him. They slide his food under the doorway. When he dies, they sweep him out to the curb with other refuse. Talk about alienation. It is said that when Kafka read his stories to friends, they all laughed. Maybe in their laughter they recognized the absurd role of modern man.

Alienated. Insignificant. Hostile. Doing evil deeds. The people of Colossae could relate. They were insignificant people living in an insignificant town. They would live and die and be forgotten. They were not people of the covenant. A people far off.

And yet, Epaphras tells them about Jesus Christ. He shares the hope of the gospel, which has been proclaimed in all creation. Just as Psalm 19 declares, “The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork.[3] They could not hear this glorious song of creation. They were blind and deaf to the goodness of God and followed useless superstitions that often led into all manner of ungodliness.

And yet, Epaphras tells them about Jesus Christ. And they have ears to hear. Jesus condescends into their own insignificance. He names them. Brings them near into the covenant. Covers them with His love. Through His body broken on the cross, He redeems them, delivers them from the domain of darkness and into the kingdom of light and love. He will present them blameless before the Father.

Paul proclaims this Gospel and suffers for doing so. But this is a suffering that brings joy. Epaphras carries this Gospel that Paul proclaims to the alienated people of Colossae. The ancient mystery from before the world began has now been revealed. And it is good news.

As Paul describes this mystery which God has made known in Ephesians, “which [God] set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.”[4]

Last week, Fr. Les told us that “the cross affects all creation.” This Good News of Jesus Christ and his life, death, and resurrection is embedded into every fiber of creation. This glorious truth rings out through the whole cosmos. And yet this plan was hidden until the Father’s perfect time. The ancient Jews couldn’t see. The angels longed to peer into it. This glorious song has been revealed to the lowest of the lowly.

As G.K. Chesterton sings, “Glory to God in the lowest.” The God on High who dwells in a high and holy place has come down to the lowest. In Jesus Christ, He steps into the lives of the alienated, the stranger, the forgotten, the forsaken, the weary, the broken. He takes hold of those who have fallen through the cracks of life and into the dragon’s mouth. He grabs them out of sin and death and raises them up, up, up to glory. To joy. To beauty. To love.

As I sit with these words, I am reminded of the insignificant ones in our world. Think of the children dying of starvation in the Sudan, Nigeria, Gaza, and so many other places. Think of the victims of never-ending wars. Think of the abused. The weary. The tired. Those on the verge of giving up. Think of yourselves.

Yes, we are blessed to live in a prosperous and mostly peaceful country. And yet, we also know suffering, loss, pain.

In the grand scheme of things, we are also insignificant. We will live and die. Within a generation or two, we will be forgotten. We suffer in this life. We struggle. Feel abandoned at times. Some of us know first-hand the feeling of alienation. In fact, Kafka’s story The Metamorphosis many relate to the alienation of the main character. How many have said, “I am the only one who knows this suffering.”

Think of the supposed great people walking the earth today. Those who occupy the halls of power. They are fading even now. They will fade to dust and be forgotten. Think of the famous people throughout history. Julius Ceasar who ruled the empire of Rome. His own senators killed him. We know very little of him.

Only a few names from each era of history are remembered, and still, they are but ghosts in our imagination. Ancient Israel would see them as ghosts dwelling in the darkness of Sheol. No voice. No power. No one.

Now we long to be important. We long to be recognized. We long for glory. Some athletes call themselves “Greatest of All Time” that is G.O.A.T.. They are fading even now.

We are fading even now. We might turn to ancestors for glory. But even if we have some great and glorious ancestors, we can be sure we also have some robbers, some brigands. Most of us have descended from one or another tribal groups in Europe or elsewhere. Think of the savagery of ancient tribes. Think of the savagery of Ancient Rome. Augustine said that it was an empire founded on blood lust.

What I am trying to say is that we, like the Colossians were once alienated, hostile in mind, doing evil deeds. At times, we still feel the deep pain caused sin and death inherent in our families, our jobs, our country, and our world.

We are the forgotten ones who God has not forgotten. He has come to us in our lowly estate to reveal the mystery of Jesus Christ in us, the hope of glory. He names us, remembers us. Our significance is in Him. Jesus has raised us up in His love. We are growing from glory to glory in Christ. Our eyes and ears are opening to the song of God’s love that enlivens all things.

The mystery of all creation has been revealed to us. It is not a math formula. It is not the secret to wealth. It is not great power. It is Jesus. He has come to reconcile all things to God. Once we behold this mystery, we realize that every page of Scripture bears witness to Jesus. Every blade of grass bears witness to Jesus. He is the mystery at the heart of all things. Love pulses through all the cosmos.

The Welsh have sung of this glory since they first came to faith in Christ. Saunders Lewis sings of this glory as he looks at the pine trees by lake on a dark night. At the same time, he sees the promise of Christ in this pastoral scene. If we visualize his image of the moon rising over the valley, we see an image of the Host being raised in the Eucharist. We see an image of Christ. He writes:

The lake of the night is still in the valley,
In its windless trough;
Orion and the Dragon sleep on its leaden face,
The moon rises slowly and swims drowsily in her way.

Behold now the hour of her ascension.
Immediately you shine before her with the lance of your leap
From root to tip under her journey
Shooting to the heart of darkness like the Easter Candle under its flame:
Hush, the night stands about you in the cool chancel
And the bread of heaven crosses the earth with its blessing.[5]

Here’s one more Welsh poet. Bobi Jones sings praise of God as he sits before the fire with his family.

Hell is fire; then there’s a fire that’s Heaven
In a grate amidst the children. We draw close around it
And listen to the beating of its orange wings
Against the breeze that’s gathered the invisible
Confidential cooking of the hearth.
The fire from the sky, it broke through the rain
And alighted like a bird upon the kitchen altar.
And the mother caught it like Noah’s dove
Between her two hands and offered it becomingly.

Which of us who listen to it can help but hear
The warm melody of the kettleful of family?
In bed, between the mother and myself,
God is warm; and His place at the table’s filled.
He is the Musician we hear coming
From room to room in secret.
It is His music heats the house
Gurgling through feet and blood, to rise,
Smokeless, to our half-drunk heads.

Only those who know the sunshine know the beauty
That breaks across the mat between door and cupboard.
It pierces to the marrow of all laughter patiently
Like a tune that lingers round the edges of the mind
Or a cat curling up. Our song’s purring, the love
That’s been composed so cunningly, that’s been performed
On the harpstrings of the family fires through Him.[6]

Everywhere we turn, we see glimpses of His goodness and grace. All creation bears witness to goodness of God revealed in Christ. Let us go forth this week, asking for eyes to see and ears to hear His love and beauty.

As we read Scripture, walk outside, meet people in the store, at work or even at the doctor’s office, may we realize His love is all around us. May we become minstrels, singing of the glory of God in Christ revealed all through the Bible and all through creation. As we behold glimpses of His love. We might write a poem, sing a song, prayer a prayer, and even dance a jig. We might learn to rejoice in the goodness of God.

To speak of Christ is to burst into song.

I end with a beloved prayer from the ancient Celts.

May Christ be with me, Christ before me, Christ behind me, Christ within me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me, Christ to my right, Christ to my left, Christ where I lie down, Christ where I sit, Christ where I stand, Christ in the heart of everyone who thinks of me, Christ in the mouth of everyone who speaks to me, Christ in every eye which looks on me, Christ in every ear which hears me.[7]

[1] Markus Barth, Helmut Blanke, and Astrid B. Beck, Colossians: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary, vol. 34B, Anchor Yale Bible (New Haven;  London: Yale University Press, 2008), 10.

[2] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Col 1:21.

[3] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Ps 19:1.

[4] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Eph 1:9–10.

[5] Saunders Lewis, The Pine

[6] Bobi Jones, Selected Poems, translated by Joseph Clancy, Swansea: Christopher Davis (Publishers) Ltd, 1987, p. 73.

[7] John Carey, King of Mysteries: Early Irish Religious Writings, Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2000, p. 128.

Rev. Dr. Les Martin

Pentecost +6
Rev. Dr. Les Martin
Colossians 1:15-20

I am determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. – 1 Corinthians 2:2

In the Name of the Living God: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen

Last week, Dr. Graham began our eight-week sermon series on the book of Colossians by dealing with Paul’s opening thanksgivings and prayers for the church in that city.  You may remember that, in the midst of his sermon, he called our attention to the phrase “in him”- meaning the idea of believers as abiding in Christ- that Paul uses so often both in this letter and throughout his writings.  In our passage today, Paul turns the attention of the Colossians – and of us – to Jesus:  “the him that we are in.”

Versus 15 through 20 have the flavor of a liturgical hymn or canticle that Paul has repurposed for his own use, something he does in many of his letters.  The poetic language has a powerful, cascading effect- it swirls and circles around the work and person of Jesus, inviting us to reconsider what we see when we see Jesus, to contemplate the question of just who Jesus is.  Let’s take some time to return to these six verses, as in a real sense they are our sermon today, and what I will offer you are just some insight on what these verses actually mean.  They read as follows:

15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.

16 For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him.

17 And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.

18 And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent.

19 For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell,

20 and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.  (ESV)

What we notice first is that Paul would have us understand that in Jesus we see who God is.  Not what God is like, mind you, but rather who God is. To speak of God as a Christian, first and foremost, is to speak of Jesus Christ.  This can sound elementary, but I assure you, it is not. I had a patient once- a believing and practicing Christian- who nonetheless in the middle of our conversation asked me without irony “Why do you talk about Jesus all the time? Don’t you ever talk about God?”  The truth of the matter is this: our Christology- what we believe about Jesus Christ-  is often fuzzy, even if we are believers.

We may unconsciously assume that Jesus is only the son of God, some kind of deputy or junior version of the real thing.  Indeed, the heretic Arius made much of language like we see in verse 15, where Jesus is referred to as “the firstborn of all creation” to advance his belief that the Christ was actually created being, albeit the most important one.  Let’s deal with that right at the outset: this term translated “firstborn” is not the same Greek word one would use to say “created first.” That’s a different word.  Firstborn suggests priority, or supremacy. It’s an honorific title. In America, we call the president’s wife the  “First Lady,” to bestow honor upon her. It’s not the case that anyone believes that Melania is the first woman who has ever been created. So think of it that way.

In Jesus, we see who God is. Jesus is the one who reveals God in his very person.  In the Gospel of John, this truth hits us right between the eyes again and again: John 14:9, where Jesus says if you have seen him, you have seen the Father; John 12:41, where we were told quite plainly that Isaiah saw Jesus and spoke about him; John 8:56, where the testimony is that Abraham himself saw his day and was glad.  Indeed, we can go so far as to say that in our first reading today, at the Oaks of Mamre, Jesus himself was involved in the promise of a son for Abraham.  Mysteriously, he promises his own ancestor! He is the God who Moses encountered, with whom Jacob wrestled at the river Jabbock, the one who walked in the cool of the garden with our first parents.  This can be hard to understand, because we are time-bound, we think linearly.  But while we are time bound, God is not. “As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be.”  Jesus is “the was, the is, and the is to come” as the Book of Revelation proclaims.  To be a Christian at all, to be faithful to the biblical witness, is to confess this “He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation… for God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in the Son.”

Because he is God in this way, we also confess that Jesus is the creator. Verse 18 refers to him as “the beginning,” deliberately calling to mind both the prologue of John “In the beginning was the Word… All things were created by him and apart from him not one thing was created that has been created,” (John 1:1,3, NET) and also the opening words of our Scriptures: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the Earth.” (Gen 1:1, NET).  Now, we often unconsciously attribute creation to the Father, or perhaps the Spirit, but if a mystery of the Trinity means anything to us, it must also mean this: Christ is the Creator, too.  Anglican bishop and scholar NT Wright says the following:

 Jesus Christ, says the poem boldly, is the one through whom and for whom the whole creation was made in the first place. This isn’t just a remarkable thing to say about an individual of recent history (which shows how very quickly the early Christians came to see Jesus as one who had been from all eternity the agent of the father in making the world). It is also a remarkable thing to say about the ‘natural’ world. It was his idea, his workmanship. It is beautiful, powerful and sweet because he made it like that. When the lavish and generous beauty of the world makes you catch your breath, remember that it is like that because of Jesus.

Hear also Saint Augustine:

“Before Abraham I am”; that’s what he said himself, the Gospel speaks. Listen to it, or read it. But that’s little enough, being the creator before Abraham; he’s the creator before Adam, creator before heaven and earth, before all the angels, and the whole spiritual creation, “thrones, dominions, principalities and powers,”  the creator before all things whatsoever. (Sermons 290.2)

Slain from the foundation of the world, all things were created through him- and for him.  We are the sphere in which he passionately exercises his purposes, love, and authority. Verse 17 tells us that all things are continually being held together in him: that, as Anglican priest and New Testament scholar, Michael Bird reminds us: Christ is the reason there is a cosmos instead of chaos

Now, it is one thing to joyously affirm Jesus as creator when we look at the beauty of the world, but what are we to say about the brokenness, the dysfunction, the evil we also see?  Paul does not leave us hanging with this unanswered question. In verse 20, Jesus is also confessed as the one who has authority to reconcile our wayward reality with God by means of the blood of his cross.  He himself is the reconciler, and the author of a new creation.  Katalasso is the greek word we translate as “ to reconcile all things.” What it really means is “to exchange hostility for a friendly relationship.” Because he is God, Jesus has the authority to affect this reconciliation, to give us a chance to begin again.  And it’s not just us: the object of reconciliation is not merely human beings, but all things, which gives reconciliation a cosmic scope as Paul says in 2 Corinthians 5:19: “God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself.” Bishop Wright puts it this way:

the living God has now acted to heal the world of the wickedness and corruption which have so radically infected it. And he’s done so through the same one through whom it was made in the first place. This is the point of the balance in the poem. The Jesus through whom the world was made in the first place is the same Jesus through whom the world has now been redeemed. He is the firstborn of all creation, and the firstborn from the dead.

The firstborn from the dead.  Lastly, we need to consider Paul’s confession in these verses of Jesus as the prototype for what it really means to be human.  When we look at Jesus, we don’t just see who God is, we see who we were meant to be all along.  Instead of remaining dead in our trespasses, Jesus shows us what it really means to be people who are alive “in Him.”  The church father St. Gregory of Nyssa phrases it like this:

he is also a “beginning.”… But what benefits do we derive from believing that he is the beginning? We become ourselves what we believe our beginning to be. (On Perfection.)

We become what we believe our beginning to be.  So often, we settle for second best.  Abraham and Sarah, so old as to be as good as dead, could not quite believe the promise. Sarah laughed at the idea that she would have a son. But she did.  Martha in our Gospel reading, so distracted by her work, so consumed in her hospitality, so driven by her need to do something good for Jesus, could not quite trust in the fact that Jesus had come to do something good for her- that she could simply abide in him. Jesus reminds her- and us- that, beneath all our worries and troubles, lies an invitation to relationship, to grace, and to love. In our doubts, our anxieties, our struggles and our arguments, we so often either fall back on the fatalism that says “this is just the way it is” or on our own efforts, saying “I can make this better if I just work really hard.” We define ourselves over against our “enemies,” and we are often unrelenting in our fight for our rights, our politics and our possessions.  In all of this, I would say to you that we settle for second best.  If who Jesus is means anything at all, part of his revelation to us is that we don’t have to live in despair, striving, or fearful contention.  We are invited to become fully human “in him.”

So, in it’s totality, what can we say that this passage actually means for you and me today?  Earlier, I suggested that even practicing Christians today have a fuzzy Christology.  Later, in chapter 2 of Colossians, Paul will warn the believers there not to give into “ empty, deceitful philosophy.”  Ideas, you see, have consequences- particularly when we are dealing with revealed truth.  We live today in an anti-theological age. So many Christians now see little value in doctrine, even when it’s contained in the Bible.  “ I just want a simple faith,” so many say, “I don’t care about all that stuff.” And yet we must. For if we do not believe, teach, and confess what we have received, Jesus can become an empty shell into which the spirit of the age can pour whatever perverse and alien philosophy it chooses to sell us. Honestly, I think it’s safe to say that we see that happening today, which is why this letter and especially this passage are so relevant to us.

Paul would have the Colossians- and us- know and confess the truth about Jesus, “the Him that we are in.” He is God, and there is no other.  Creation is no mere fluke, no random chance, but the canvas on which he has purposefully painted his beauty, truth, and goodness for everyone to see.  It may be broken, defaced by sin and death, but Jesus has paid the heavy price for what we have done to both it and to ourselves. The reconciliation has been accomplished. It is finished, a new creation is being born in our midst- and it starts right here in the church.  As believers, we are invited to abide in him, to bring forth the fruit of the Spirit as we are nurtured by his means of grace, and to realize the Christ isn’t done with us or with any of this just yet. We don’t have to doubt, to worry, to strive and to scheme, or to settle for a second best. He is making all things new. That’s the truth we must confidently adhere to, and lovingly share with the whole world.  What we need to understand, in the words of Lutheran pastor and professor Richard Lenski, is this:

“The cross affects all creation.”