Saturday 18 August 2018

Psalm: Psalm 119:113-128

Background

Usually, when in a church setting someone says they have something to say ‘in love’, it means one way or another there is a rebuke coming. At best, it is truly given and received in love. At worst, this phrase is used to cover other less-righteous agendas, or a lack of full understanding.

In today’s passage Paul completes the introduction to his letter to the church at Colossae. He was about the admonish them severely for a variety of heresies that have been reported to him by their pastor, Epaphras. And here he was at pains to show he truly loved them: ‘Though I am absent in body, yet I am with you in spirit, and I rejoice to see your morale and the firmness of your faith in Christ’ (v. 5).

Paul did not just say he loves the church: words are cheap. He linked his own well-being to theirs. If they were well, he was well. He recognised and congratulated their rootedness and building up in Christ (verse 7). He wrote with conspicuous respect, noting that their foundation was secure even if he needed to correct their way of life. Indeed it was because their foundation was secure that he felt able to correct their way of life.

The overarching theme of the letter to the Colossians is the sovereignty of Christ. Christ is never an ‘actor’ or even a combatant in creation, but its creator: Christ is the beginning and the end, and writ all through all things. This should be in our minds, Paul implied, whenever we fall into a mindset that anything might be outside the sovereignty of Christ.

To Ponder

• What makes it easier for you to hear constructive criticism?
• How can you offer others constructive criticism?
• Where do you go for wisdom when you feel pulled in different directions by “plausible arguments” (v. 4)?