We are once again in our Rooted series.
So last time on the Rooted series we had Prit come and talk
about being rerouted, being pruned and being renewed.
This time we're going to be talking about now being clothed
in the character of Christ. So the title for the message
today is what is the title of the message?
What is the title of the message?
I forget the title of the message.
Is that it revealing Christ in US, Revealing Christ in US.
Let's just take a moment to pray.
Heavenly Father, thank you for this time.
Thank you that we can come together and freely worship you
in spirit and in truth. Lord Father, I pray that
whatever I speak today will just be downloaded from you and it
will be a tremendous blessing to your people.
Help us, Lord, we need your help.
Jesus name, Amen. Amen.
So as I was saying last time, Pritt was speaking about how we
are to take off certain things, take off certain ways of living,
and we are to be re rooted into the right soil, which is Christ.
So this morning we're going to take it from Colossians.
We've been in the book of Colossians for, for a while now
and it's been rich, rich teaching.
I really do encourage you guys to, to go back and, and look at
the message, the messages. And so we're in Colossians
chapter 3 and we're going to start it from verse 12 going
down to verse 17. And so it reads.
Therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved,
clothed yourself with compassion, kindness, humility,
gentleness, and patience. Bear with each other and forgive
one another. If any of you has a grievance
against someone, forgive as the Lord forgave you.
And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all
together in perfect unity. Let the peace of Christ rule in
your heart, since as members of 1 body you were called to peace
and be thankful. Let the message of Christ dwell
among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with
all wisdom through psalms, hymns, and songs from the
Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your heart.
And whatever you do, whether in Word or deed, do it all in the
name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through
Him. Amen.
So much rich stuff that is that
is in here. And I pray I'm going to be able
to cover as much as I can do. So as we can see in this in this
part of the Scripture, it talks a lot about being clothed in the
character of Christ. And one of the major things that
we must have in mind even before we do anything at all is that we
must know that we are chosen and loved by God as the Scripture
said in in verse 12. Therefore, as God's chosen
people, holy and dearly loved. Now notice something.
Notice it doesn't say. Therefore, try harder, be
better, fix up and be sharp about it.
No, it doesn't say anything like that.
You see the Scripture says here, therefore, as God's chosen
people, chosen holy, dearly loved people.
See, this is the amazing thing about the Kingdom of God.
You know, in the world everything, you have to
basically earn it. You have to earn your place.
You have to look for the approval of others.
But that's the difference between the Kingdom of God here.
The in the Kingdom we don't put on the character of Christ to
earn God's love. We put it on because we are
already loved. I mean, think about it, before
Jesus did anything, when he was baptized in the waters and the
Holy Spirit came like a dove on him.
And then there was a voice saying, This is my beloved son,
in whom I am well pleased. And he and he received that
before he did anything at all, before he did any work, before
he performed any miracle, before he said anything he got from
heaven that he is dearly loved and God is pleased with him.
And sometimes it's hard for us, especially in this, in the
culture that we live in, where you're trying to earn and work
for your position and your place in life.
And even in regards to like relationships, you know,
sometimes you get that saying of what do you bring to the table,
you know? And so it's this kind of certain
works mentality. But the beautiful thing is that
with gods, you don't get that you don't have to work for his
affections. He has already smothered you
with it. And that's an amazing thing to
know before you do anything at all.
So what we see is that identity comes before instruction.
Identity comes before instruction.
And so it's very important that we, we, we start from this
position in life. Amen.
So #2 this is where we start to clothe ourselves in Christ like
character. And so, as the scripture says,
after that it says clothe yourselves with compassion,
kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience.
See, clothing is important. Amen.
Everybody here is clothed. Every single one of us
intentionally chose what we were going to wear today.
Might have had a couple of outfits there.
I want to listen, put this one away.
And so we clothe ourselves intentionally in what we want to
wear, you know, and different clothes suit different
environments. You know, you might have a, a
specific kind of uniform that you work, you have for work or
when you have special occasions when you want to go to a
wedding. You might, you know, if you're a
guy, you might wear a suit or, and a lady's lovely flowing
dress, whatever you want to wear, you know.
But as I said, different clothes for different environments, you
know, we, we don't, we don't wear a three piece suit to the
gym. And you might not wear your gym
clothes to, to work unless you work in the gym.
But but you get what I'm saying. Yeah.
So clothes communicate identity. And so Paul is saying to
believers who have already taken off the old self and it's old
ways and have now intentionally put on the character of Christ
on a daily basis. See, the Christian life isn't
just about what God removes from us.
It's also about how he perfectly dresses us.
And so now we're going to look at the the list of things that
Paul talks about here. So starting off with compassion.
Now I want to look at this in terms of the the the meaning of
the word in the original language, which is the Greek
here. And forgive me if I butcher this
Greek word, but the word there for compassion is is splaconum.
Splaconum. And it's an interesting word
because it also means mercy, it means pretty, it means sympathy.
But it also is where we get the English word for a spleen.
Now, if you know what a spleen does, I have to research this,
but but one of the major things that a spleen does is that it
acts as a filter. It acts as a filter for our
blood, our blood flow. And so, so it embraces
everything that comes in, whether it's the good stuff or
the bad stuff. Forgive me, I am not using any
technical terms today. I'm just going to say good
stuff, bad stuff, negative, that kind of stuff, positive.
So all the good and bad stuff flows through the spleen and
then it acts as a filter for any of the, the negative or bad
things and it allows all the good to flow through.
And you see, this is a picture of compassion.
See, Jesus himself, the scripture constantly says that
he was moved with compassion and, and he truly had to be
because in a lot of the situations we'd be surrounded by
people that that according to the the Jewish law, they should
not be around him, people that were unceremonly unclean and
people that were living in sin. But he was able to filter what
came and he was able to flow in God's goodness towards people.
And that is so important for us to be able to understand that in
this world you're going to have all types, the good and the bad.
But it is so important that we move with compassion.
We're able to filter out the, the what may seem not so
pleasant parts of life, but we're able to move in the mercy
and the grace of God. And so compassion kind of
filters everything out for everything else to come.
Kindness, kindness, that word kindness means to be employed
for good, literally means to be employed for good.
The the word humility here it means it speaks about not just
in terms of being humble, but humble in mind as well, humility
of mind. So what happens is that when we
want to give our our own opinion, when we want to just to
react to whatever people are giving back to us, humility
enables us to think before we speak and to remember that we
are speaking to people who are made in the image of God.
And gentleness with that is gentleness really is controlled
strength here. It's really the picture of
somebody that is Uber strong like I, I'm a Marvel and marvel
fan. And so I'm a Oh yes, a few
Marvel fans here. And so there's there's a a comic
where they picture everybody know who the Incredible Hulk is.
Yeah, yeah, Hulk Smash and all that stuff, you know, And so
there's this comic where you see this massive husk of a being the
Hulk here, you just look at me, my shoulders are.
And he's literally holding those kind of crystal kind of things
where, you know, they make like chips or kind of like a flower
and stuff. And he's literally got a
collection of these things. And so you see this amazing
strong person holding these delicate things.
And it's the picture of strength just being delicate, you know,
that you could say something to that person that that could
really hurt them. You might have stuff on people,
you know, if, why, if, if they the way they're talking to me
right now, you know, I could easily tell them about
themselves. But it's in those moments where
you remember, yes, you may have that strength there to do all
these types of things, but you showed delicacy to them, gentle.
And it's so important on a daily basis that we demonstrate these
things and then we have patience, which ultimately is
cheerful and hopeful endurance and consistency.
It's so important to hold on to these things.
It really helps to produce hope in our lives.
So when we are transformed by Christ's character, we embrace
our new identity in Christ, which empowers us also to be
able to love others, to be able to love the people who don't
appear to be that lovable, to be able to love our streets.
Amen. To be able to reach out to
people because as the verse 13 goes on to speak about that, we
are to bear with one another. And that's, and I love that term
bearing with one another. It's, it's, it's the idea of
when you see somebody struggling with something and they're
trying to lift it up with all their might, you stand up next
to them and hold it up. You, you are there to help them.
And then we're to forgive one another.
Oh, that's a tough one there. And above all, love.
Love is so important. See, this is where compassion we
choose. Compassion over convenience.
You see, the world will say, put yourself around people who
benefits your life. Protect yourself at all times.
Cut off difficult people immediately.
But Jesus doesn't do that, does he?
Jesus moves towards the broken people.
Jesus moves towards the people who are hurting.
Jesus moves towards the people who are angry and frustrated and
that nobody wants to go near them.
He moves towards them. He moves towards the leper.
He moves towards the woman at the well.
He moves towards Zacchaeus. He moves towards his disciples
when they fail and He demonstrates His love.
And it's so important for us also to be rooted and grounded
in forgiveness. Forgiveness is the evidence of
rootedness, as it says, forgiven as the Lord has forgiven.
You see, like I said, I know it's tough.
But forgiveness is not pretending a hurt didn't happen.
Forgiveness is not calling evil good, and forgiveness is not
even instant trust and restoration.
What forgiveness is is refusing to allow bitterness to rule your
heart. What forgiveness is, is
surrendering revenge when you want to get back at them and
you're surrendering it to the Lord and then given the people
over to God. It is tough, but the Lord is
there with us and He holds us up to be able to walk in these
things and overall the virtues, which is love.
Love is so important. It's it's like the the very bind
of a book which holds everything together.
The love is love is not just one of the virtues among many.
It is the virtue that holds everything together.
Without love, kindness becomes performance.
Without love, truth becomes harshness.
And without love, service becomes pride.
See, love never fails. And sometimes it's only in a
period of time when we actually realize that at the end of the
day, Love Actually was the right way.
At the end of the day, I should have walked in love.
You know, hindsight is 2020, but love never fails.
Amen #3 We are ruled by peace. In that verse 13, it said 15 in
it and it says that the that in the word that in peace rule in
our hearts. And the the word rule has the
idea of a referee or an umpire. You know, there was a massive
game that happened last night and and the the referee made
some major decisions there. Yeah.
My apologies for all the the Gunners.
My wife is looking at me funny like you.
You were not apologetic. Yes, last yesterday.
Like get in there. Sorry, let me get back into.
I need some water. What's that talking about?
Referees. Yes, referees.
Peace as well. Having peace as the final
decision in our lives. Letting peace be the umpire.
So I ask you, what is making the final call in your life?
Is it anxiety? Is it anger?
Is it comparison? Is it fear?
Could it be the culture and social media that's making the
final call? Could it be the wounds of the
past that is making the final call?
Well, the Lord is encouraging us to let peace, the peace of
Christ, be the deciding voice. Because ultimately Christ is our
peace. And the beautiful thing about
the word peace in the original language means to set at one.
It's a picture of something that is reset and made whole.
And this reflects in regards to us as a community of believers
that peace must be the major focal point of our decisions.
See, peace doesn't just mean quiet.
Peace means to face the challenge, but ultimately it
means that we come into agreement in some place.
As much as it is possible for us to walk in peace, let us walk in
peace with each other because you have to picture it like
this. Ultimately, Jesus is in the
middle, and you and whoever you have a conflict with or a
challenge with, Jesus is encouraging us to come together.
We might not see eye to eye all the time, but that doesn't mean
that we give up on each other. So a rooted church becomes a
peaceful church. Amen.
So #4 filled with the Word and
worship. Now this is where it talks
about. Let the word of Christ dwell in
you richly, richly, not occasionally, but richly.
See, it's good. It's nice to have motivational
quotes and different, different things and different positive
things that that you know are good for encouraging and
uplifting. But when the Word of God is in
you and not just information stored in your head, but when it
starts to change your perspective, to change your
opinions on life, that's when you we become saturated with the
with the word of God. Deep roots need to be saturated
in you know, when you think of a tea bag in a in a teacup and
whenever there's hot water poured onto it, whatever's in
the tea bag comes out. And that's the reality of life
that whatever is in US is going to come out.
Let it be the word of God dwelling in US richly that flows
out under pressure when when it gets heated, when it gets hot,
let the word of Christ come out. Let it be your perspective.
Let it be your opinion. When someone comes with a
challenging thought or when someone comes with their own
opinion, be bold enough to say, well, here's what I think.
Well, have you looked at it this way?
Well, I don't actually see it like that.
Maybe we should do it like this. Let it flood out.
Let the flavour flood out. For those of you who remember
the is it PG tips and all them kind of things, Yeah, let the
flavor flood out. Forgive me for the accent.
Sorry it's so important. And worship.
Oh, worship. And then it goes on to say
teaching and admonishing one another with all wisdom.
That word wisdom means clarity for direction.
Clarity for direction with all wisdom through psalms, hymns,
songs of the Spirit. This is what we did this
morning. And even as even as Claire was
praying for, praying for our, for our young people who are
going out into the world for Christ.
That is awesome. Honestly, they could be doing
anything else, but they're living out living out there
faith, Amen. And they, and just that prayer
was such an encouragement as well to them.
And so we, we do that through the Psalms, through the hymns,
through spiritual songs. See, we have to remember it's
not just about something that comes before a sermon.
Worship. Worship roots us into the truth
that God wants to communicate to us.
So as a challenge, what's going to be the soundtrack of your
week? Let the Word and let the worship
of the Lord, let the truth that is sung be your strength this
week. And finally, in everything we
do, let's do it all on to the Lord.
And see, Paul finishes off here with an amazing thing here
because when we do all things on to the Lord, he's saying
everything. It's not just our spiritual
life, but it's our everyday life.
Paul ends by removing the sacred and the circular divide.
See, Jesus is not just Lord of of church attendance, worship
songs, and Sunday mornings. He is Lord over our
conversations, over our parenting, over our
relationships, over our work ethic, over our money, over
everything, our private thoughts, our social media, and
our conflicts. He is Lord over all.
And so a rooted life is not just a Sunday life, is it?
It's an everyday surrendered life.
So as Psalm 34 verse 8 says, oh, taste and see that the Lord is
good through the fruit that we produce.
We can be those that give out that fruit so that people can
truly taste and see that God is good.
He is good. Let us show the world how good
he really is. Amen.
Let's go.
Thank you, Lord.