24 Jan First things first: Changing your clothes

Colossians 3:1-17

If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. 3 For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. 4 When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.

5 Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. 6 On account of these the wrath of God is coming. 7 In these you too once walked, when you were living in them. 8 But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. 9 Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices 10 and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator. 11 Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free; but Christ is all, and in all.

Let’s pray.

Let me start by telling this story. There were two people who were trying to enter the entertainment industry in Las Vegas, and they wanted to do circus because one of the guys is really good with animals. In order to stand out from the other circuses, they decided to get exotic animals, one of the most popular animals they got is the white lions and tigers. For a few years, they trained the lion, they were good and when the time came for live performance, they pulled off the incredible tricks with these animals. They were well known for that and all their shows were sold out every time. They did shows after shows, until one day. As part of the act, the guy held his microphone to a seven year old white tiger, named Montecore and told him to say “hello” to the audience. Montecore responded by biting the guy’s sleeve. He swatted the tiger and barked “release!”. Suffering from dizziness, he tripped and fell onto his back, and Montecore moved to stand over him. Montecore bit into his neck and dragged him offstage. Spoiler alert, the guy survived. And people are very surprised by this, they are surprised that a tiger can bite – it is in their nature as a predator to bite.

I feel like most of the time as Christians, this is our attitude towards sins. We think that we can toy with them, play with them, we try to tame them and we will never get bitten. For example, for those who like to gossip, how often do we think that we can survive a gossip session thinking that we’re just gonna sit there silently and we end up talking bad about someone? Or do we think that it is okay to have a sleepover with our girlfriend or boyfriend because we are immune to the sexual tension? Or we think that it is okay to cheat our company by increasing our expense claim by $5 and end up doing more? We know that we shouldn’t be doing all these things yet somehow we think that we can handle sin, we are strong enough people to tame sins. John Piper says that “When it comes to killing my sin, I don’t wait for the miracle, I act the miracle”. Meaning that when it comes to sin, we don’t play around with sin hoping that God will intervene, but we need to act upon it. We need to be active in saying no to sins.

We are all guilty. When we prepare this message, both Josh and I are very convicted. When we look at ourselves, we know the truth and what we should do, but we are no better. We love to dwell in our clothes. That’s the language that Paul uses in this passage today to describe our self. Old clothes and new clothes. But as we ponder on this passage, we see that our hope is not in our ability to put off our old clothes, oh yes the bible says that we need to do that but we do not base our hope on that, but we base our hope in Christ. That’s our prayer today, as we understand who we are in Christ and what Christ has done, we will gladly change our clothes, we put off our old clothes and put on our new ones.  So three things from today’s passage: new identity, putting off & putting on.

1. New identity

If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. 3 For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. 4 When Christ who is your life appears, then you  also will appear with him in glory.

I love how Paul starts the passage not with you need to do this now but instead he starts with the why. If we are in Christ, we have not only died with Christ, but we have also been raised with Christ and our lives are hidden in Christ. That means this, for those who are in Christ, our lives are no longer our own because Christ has purchased us when He bled on the cross so that you and I can stand righteous in front of God. We now have a new identity. We were once called sinners, but now if we are in Christ, we are called saints. And the good news is this new identity is not conditional on our performance. How freeing it is to know that even we fail, this remains true: that we have died and been raised with Christ. So now our identity is not what we do, which family we come from, how much money we make or whether we are single or married, but our identity is Christ. But this doesn’t stop here. Knowing our new identity in Christ will change  the way we see our lives, ourselves and others and at the end it will change the way we act.

For those who are in a relationship, I think you can all agree that something changes before the relationship and after. You wouldn’t continue to act like a single person after being in a relationship, would you? Being in a relationship changes the way you see your life, your partners and others. And the weird or beautiful thing about being in a relationship is somehow their preferences affect yours. Once you didn’t like rap music, but then you find yourself listening to Drake. Once you don’t like going out, but you find yourself wanting to go on adventures with your partner and the list goes on. What we see here is not doing things out of obligation, but out of love. It is the same with our relationship with God, but on a much bigger and deeper scale. We were once His enemies, but now are called His own. We once didn’t even know or want Him, but now we find our identity in Him. Now we have a relationship with God that we do not have before. And just like any other relationships, now God’s preferences are ours and we don’t do this out of obligations, but out of love and joy.

Paul mentions that when we are in Christ, if we have died and been raised with Christ, this is what we need to do now: we need to seek the things that are above, set our minds on the things that are above, not on things of the earth. Do we need to abandon our life on earth and just focus on the heavenly things? I don’t think that’s what Paul had in mind when he wrote this letter to the Colossians, rather we don’t see the things of the earth as the ultimate good. But we seek the ultimate goods that are above, where Christ is. We are to seek the One who dwells in heaven. In other words, what Paul wants us to seek is Christ himself. The word ‘seek’ does not have a passive voice to it. It is an active word, there is action required from our part. Yes, we have died and been raised with Jesus despite our performance, so now we are to actively seek Him and His characters. And this is not a one time thing, it does not happen only when we first come to know Christ. The word ‘seek’ is in the present imperative, an ongoing effort. If I can translate it, Paul is saying keep on seeking, keep on setting our minds, keep pursuing Him, keep chasing after Christ, keep treasuring Him.  We need to do this daily. Life has its way to distract us and drift us away, but Paul is reminding us that we need to keep on seeking Christ.

If we look at ourselves today, how often do we seek and set our minds and hearts on the things that are above?  With all the daily noise we go through with looking after the baby or the kids, aiming for that promotion, studying for HDs, or planning this year’s achievements, have we lost our focus and calibration to what we are called to do?  Our problem is that although we know our new identity in Christ, our response to this knowledge is a passive one.  We have continued living our lives as usual.  So how should we respond?

2. Putting Off

5 Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. 6 On account of these the wrath of God is coming. 7 In these you too once walked, when you were living in them. 8 But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. 9 Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices 10 and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator. 11 Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free; but Christ is all, and in all.

When we want to change our clothes, the first thing that we need to do is put off our old ones so that we can wear the new ones. Have you seen someone who doesn’t put off their old clothes before putting on the new ones? If you did, you would probably call that person crazy. And it is the same here. Paul is saying that the first thing you need to do is to put off your old clothes, you need to put to death your sins. Paul doesn’t say for those who are strong, you are okay, you can try to tame them. Paul is very clear that we are not to play with our sins, but we are to put to death or kill them. In the words of John Owen, kill it, or it will be killing you. If we do not intentionally kill these sins, they will enslave us. Paul knows this and here is the warning for us in verse 6 that the wrath of God is coming to those who practice earthly desires.

There are 2 lists of sins that Paul mentions in verse 5 and verse 8. We are not going into depth with these, but we will just briefly see the contrast between these two. In verse 5 Paul mentions ‘sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire and covetousness, which is idolatry’. These are the sins of the heart and provide us with evil intentions. This list moves from action to the motives. In verse 8 ‘anger, wrath, malice, slander and obscene talk’. This one has to do with wicked hate and these are chosen carefully by Paul because they can harm or destroy relationships and it moves from motives to action. By no means these are extensive lists of sins, but in general, there are two types of sins – the sins that we commit to ourselves and to others. In both circumstances, those sins can be thoughts or desires only, but they can also be translated to actions. So killing our sins is not limited to behaviour modification, but it goes deep to the root, which is our heart.

Maybe some of us think “nope, that’s not me. I am a good Christian. I don’t do the things that were listed by Paul” But if we are being honest with ourselves, everyone struggles with this, no one is immune. Growing up in Sunday school, usually on new year, the teacher would say, ‘Who wants to be better this year? Let’s write one sin that we struggle with the most and try not to do it again this year.’ And every single year, I always wrote anger ha! But you know what, by the first week of January, I have failed. I tried again next year, and it’s the same. Trying harder or self will does not work and I hope I am not alone in this place. The key to put off our old clothes is to look at Jesus. When we see what Jesus has done and how much we have forgiven, it is only natural for us to put away our old clothes. Matt Chandler says until we see Jesus as lovely, we won’t be serious about our sins. As we behold Christ and His beauty, we put to death what is earthly in us – this happens continuously and simultaneously.

If I can put what Paul says into my own words, it goes like this: as we look at Christ, we realise that our old clothes do not fit anymore, they are out of season, dirty and we need to put those off, we discard our old life and its destructive way of living because we have been given a brand new set of clothes suitable for God’s family that enable us to be “renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator”.  With our new identity in Christ, we can have the confidence that our old way of life no longer defines who we are.  We are given the spiritual eyes to see the truth, seek more of Christ and to pursue his holiness.  As we do this, our lives are being renewed day by day into God’s image and his character. There is encouragement in 2 Corinthians 4:16 “¹⁶ So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day”.  Church, if you can see the beautiful clothes that have been given to you, why would you go and try to put on your old shabby clothes again?

Now there may be many of us today that feel as though we’re not good enough or may have been affected by something that was done in the past as the perpetrator or the victim.  Well let me tell you this.  The Gospel does not discriminate.  There is no distinction or attribute that sets God’s children apart from each other.  It is written “¹¹ Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free”.  It is “here” in Christ’s family, made up of the brothers and sisters you are sitting next to, that earthly barriers that intend to differentiate and separate us have been dismantled and made irrelevant.  For “Christ is all, and in all”, meaning that Christ is in his people and it is Christ that unites his people together despite the differences.  It is not about your status, achievements or how good you are compared to the person next to you, but that in Christ, his righteousness is our righteousness.   We can see Christ wherever we look and not let the prejudices of our old lives distort the new life in which we now live together.      

PART 2 – Putting On

Put On the New Self

Thank you Stace! Now let’s look at the second half of the verses for tonight.

12 Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, 13 bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. 14 And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. 15 And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful. 16 Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. 17 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.

What a beautiful set of verses! You can feel Paul’s tone has changed to a positive one. After telling us that we have put off or put away our old lives like old dirty clothing, Paul now directs us to what we should be “putting on”.  In verse 12 he says “¹² Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience”.  Most often than not, when we read this verse we’d breeze over it and go “Finally! Paul’s finally talking about the good stuff!”.  But if you consider the words that Paul uses to describe the Christian “God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved”, don’t they sound familiar? These were the respected titles given to Israel in the Old Testament.  Deuteronomy 6:6-7 records “⁶ “For you are a people holy to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession, out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth. ⁷ It was not because you were more in number than any other people that the Lord set his love on you and chose you, for you were the fewest of all peoples”.  God says that He chose Israel not because of what Israel has done or can do for Him, but it is because of who God is.  He is love and in his sovereignty he chose them.  Like Israel, we are also bestowed these three honourable titles, “chosen, holy and beloved” not because of our goodness or that we were great in any way but only because of God’s grace and his love for you and me.  We have zero contribution in this and the only thing we need to do is to just put it on. It’s to live a life knowing that you are called “chosen, holy and beloved” by the God of the universe!

Imagine being in an Avengers movie and you are given a suit by no other than Iron Man himself.  This suit gives you superpowers and when you wear it, it feels awesome! You can do things you never thought you could do before and everyone either knows or questions if you’re an Avenger.  Just like this the new set clothes we are given and “put on” as a believer “compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience”, allow us to be more Christlike in what we do.  We can be “compassionate” when we are in the midst of sorrow, grief or need.   We can be “kind” to those who are ungrateful and are inhospitable to us.  We can be “humble” in situations that tempt us to demand recognition.  We can be “meek” or “gentle” in our actions to others.  We can be “patient” in situations that are uncomfortable and may result in our humiliation.  But unlike Iron Man, when we fail Jesus doesn’t say “If you’re nothing without this suit, then you shouldn’t have it” for it is because we are nothing that we are given these new clothes to put on.  Without Jesus, we’ll never be compassionate, kind, humble, gentle or patient or be genuine in our doing of them.         

But what good are these characteristics if we have separated ourselves from others? If you’re part of RSI, you’ll know from our weekly reading of Matthew 28 that Christians are called to go into the world.  We have to actively be involved in the lives of other people.  But not only in the world, Christians are also to be active participants in a community with other Christians, their brothers and sisters.  Verse 13 says “¹³ bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive”.  The church is a messy place and requires us to even be more compassionate, kind and gentle.  It will test us to persevere in patience and humility.  If I make up just 1 sinner, then the church is home to many sinners, the broken, the flawed and imperfect.  That is why Paul not only tells us to “bear with one another” but also “forgiving each other”.  It’s one thing to be able to bear with someone’s flaws or imperfections, but forgiving someone? This requires effort and sacrifice on our part.  Paul reminds us that “as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive”.  Church, we deserved to be eternally punished for our sins, but the fact that we can be here today, to know and seek more of Christ, is because we have been forgiven by Christ. It was Christ who took that first step to forgive us.  If we know this, why would we not forgive those who have wronged us? Do you have a complaint against another brother or sister tonight?  Forgive them not because you have to, but look to the cross and know that you have been forgiven. Perhaps you have yet to be a part of a community? Make an effort to join an MC today.

Now it’s awesome if we know how to conduct ourselves from the verses that we just read.  But if we are compassionate, kind, humble, meek, patient, bearing and forgiving each other without love, it doesn’t mean anything.  For “¹⁴ …above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony”.  But this love isn’t a shallow love that the world knows today but rather a love that is unconditional.  A love that has no strings attached.  With Valentines’ Day coming up, we find it easier to love someone when we receive a gift or are spoiled in some way.  But how do we genuinely love others even in the times where our love is not returned?  It is by being reminded of God’s love for you and the price that was paid so you can put on these new clothes.  Since there is nothing we could offer to save ourselves, that price had to be the perfect life of His son, Jesus and it was paid in full at the cross.  When we know what Jesus has done for us, we can’t help but to love others regardless whether they love us back or not.  If I can sum up what Paul is saying here it is that we ought to love each other and live sacrificially just as Jesus has done it for us.  If we are in Christ, we need to care for others.  He does not mend only our broken relationship with God, but will transform how we relate to each other.  Like a complete set of clothes, it is love that brings all these characteristics together in harmony.

This gives us a picture of what the church ought to be like, a body that can come together, in peace.  “¹⁵ And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful”.  The key that makes this harmonious relationship possible is Christ.  For if we have Christ in our hearts and as the centre of this church, it doesn’t matter what grievances or differences we have, we can be confident that we will be at peace with each other and can be thankful.  Like Stacey said earlier, there is no more barrier or distinction in God’s family.  But how do we have Christ as the centre of our hearts and this church? How do we see God’s grace to be thankful?

It is by dwelling in nothing else but the “word of Christ”. “¹⁶ Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God.  ¹⁷ 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”.  It is to have this “word of Christ” as the foundation of all the things we do.  This church is to be a place where this ‘word’ is in abundance and the basis of its instruction and discipline (Edrick spoke about this last week).  It is to understand that our dwelling in this ‘word’ overflows into singing and thanksgiving.  What is this “word of Christ”? It is in what you are holding in your hands right now.  It is the message of the Gospel.  The Good News.  It is to know what Christ has done for us, in that He lived a perfect life and reaped destruction, so that you and I who lived a life of sin destined for destruction could now live.  Jesus not only gave us his clean clothes to put on but took with him our old, dirty, sinful clothes and wore them at the cross.  Church, this is why we can seek the things that are above and can be compassionate, kind, humble, meek, patient, forgiving and loving even when it is hard to do so for we now wear his clothes of righteousness.  This is what enables us to put our differences aside and to live in peace. This is why we as a church in RSI preach and declare from this pulpit the Gospel every single week as this is what propels us to live out our new lives.  But what we also need to understand is that this isn’t the sole responsibility of the pastors or preachers of this church nor is this limited to just something to do on Sunday.  You are the church.  In having and letting the word of Christ dwell in you, each and every person in this church is called to “teach and admonish one another in all wisdom”.  So don’t neglect God’s Word.  For the Gospel shapes how we interact with each other and our attitudes to whatever we do be it from working, studying, parenting to the conversations we have with one another at the gym, in the car or at Maccas after MC on Tuesday night.  So meditate on the Word, ponder upon it, pray about it, talk about it and let it dwell in you and in your communities.

Yes, whilst the new way of living sounds hard to do and the old way of living seems so much easier, we can have the confidence that we are not alone on this journey.  That is why Paul can say “whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus”, why? because it is only Jesus that can empower us to live as our new self to its calling.  It is knowing that Jesus could still love and forgive even in the last moments of his life.  It is knowing that he is the chosen, holy and beloved one.  Jesus is our guarantee that He not only came, lived, and died, but He also lived again and now He is above “seated at the right hand of God”, meaning Jesus is victorious, is now ruling and has authority over the entire universe.  That he is in control of what happens in our lives.  From all this we can have a good hope in that our lives belong and is tied to him, and “when Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory”.  This is the Good News.

As we have this new mindset and live out our new lives with its identity built upon Christ, our outlook and perspective on our daily life changes for it is longer about “me, myself and I”, but rather seeing the beauty of Christ through what he has done.  It’s by no mistake or coincidence that Paul ends verses 15, 16 and 17 consecutively with a specific reference to giving thanks.  When we give thanks to someone, we are expressing a gratitude that is not conditional on the circumstances we are going through.  We begin to be thankful in situations that are not only favourable to us but also in situations that don’t go as planned.  It is because of Christ that we see God’s abounding grace in all the areas of our lives and are able to give “thanks to God the Father through him”, something we could not do in our old self.  Our hearts have been transformed to one that is of gratitude and thanksgiving.  So in your daily life, no matter what you’re going through, despite your circumstances, give thanks. 

Church, there you have it.  Paul is telling us how and why we can as Christians live as a new self in a corrupt and sinful world today.  In the tension of the “already” “not yet” period of time.  In that having died with Christ we already belong to a future period of glory that has not yet come but is coming soon.  A life that is secured in Christ and having the confidence that one day there will be no more tears but full joy.  If you are not yet a Christian, this is what you’re missing out on.  It is in this that we believers have been given a new identity, a new self with a new mind and heart.  We are no longer destined for God’s wrath but to a life that is in fellowship with Christ for eternity.  If anything 2021 is as uncertain as 2020, but the passage we read tonight is telling us to take heart and know that despite your shortcomings and flaws, you are God’s children and are enabled to live a life that is reflective of Christ.  It is why we can live with hope in a world where there is no hope.  The end is guaranteed, but until that day comes, we need to keep on seeking, keep pursuing, keep chasing after Christ and His being. And we know it will be worth it at the end because there is nothing that can be compared to the joy awaiting us.

Discussion questions

1. What are the right Christian attitudes toward sin? Why?
2. Why do we need to put off our old clothes and how do we do it?
3. What does it mean to put on our new clothes? Give some personal examples of putting off and putting on.
4. Explain the limitation of self-will in dealing with sins in our lives.
5.  Read Colossians 3:1-4. How does this truth empower us to live out our new identities?