Prayer: Give me the gift of understanding Christian language and of speaking clearly about your grace. Amen.
16 – And the Winner Is . . .
Colossians 2:15 — (15) He disarmed the rulers and authorities and made a public example of them, triumphing over them in it [the cross].
The message of the cross is not simply that Jesus is alive; he is also not guilty as charged by the government and by the religious authorities. Oh yes, and he is the supreme ruler of every power anywhere in this or any other galaxy. And the cross has become a symbol of all that—even if it is often debauched as jewelry. (One writer sarcastically refers to this casual attitude as “Jesus on a bracelet.”) Minimally, what was dismantled by the resurrection was the power of Rome (which finally fell in 410 CE) and the reliability of the popular religious prejudices that supported the politicians’ actions against Jesus.
But there are still powers that oppose God. While God can take care of herself, those powers are sometimes effective in trapping you in seductive webs. It has been said that the task of the church is to be able to identify the principalities and powers that attempt to govern humans. In college there is a glut of claimants to the thrones of power. Some of these claimants—science, career, technology, history—derive much of their power from the fact that they are well presented, well argued, dressed in the finery of cultural or academic or financial acceptability. Then there are also those extracurricular claimants—sports, sex, alcohol, gambling . . . and the list goes on.
But above every principle, tradition, argument, system, ideology, religion, government, principality, and power is Christ who had been attacked by a coalition of the principalities of his day only to have his “sentence” reversed by God in the resurrection. You have been truly favored by a God who not only provides you with a forgiver and redeemer but also with the final and superior power over all other claimants. In a world of many competing powers it is comforting to know that there is one truly good power and that he is the most powerful one and he invites you to find your safety in him.
Prayer: Help me to recognize the principalities and powers and not be seduced by them. Amen.
17 – Don’t Be Ashamed!
Colossians 2:16–19 — (16) Therefore do not let anyone condemn you in matters of food and drink or of observing festivals, new moons, or sabbaths. (17) These are only a shadow of what is to come, but the substance belongs to Christ. (18) Do not let anyone disqualify you, insisting on self-abasement and worship of angels, dwelling on visions, puffed up without cause by a human way of thinking, (19) and not holding fast to the head, from whom the whole body, nourished and held together by its ligaments and sinews, grows with a growth that is from God.
There is nothing as entertaining as the sight of politicians caught out in some embarrassment and scrambling for cover—or at least for a cover story. For example Watergate, Monica Lewinski, vicuna coats, Iran Contra, Teapot Dome—you never know what the source of shame and embarrassment will be, even for a United States president. Victims try to minimize the shame, opponents gleefully attempt to maximize it. In America today, however, where virtually anything goes, shame is almost never fatal to a career.
In the time of Jesus, shame was much more powerful in its effects than it is in our day. A prime example of shame was a sentence to death on a cross. Persons whom the powers that be wanted to publicly humiliate in the most horrible public exposure of physical nakedness and lack of control of bodily functions, were sentenced to crucifixion. This was a means of execution applied to a broad spectrum of people the government wanted to punish and hold up as warning examples. Jesus—as a public threat to Rome and a religious annoyance to the Jews who wanted to keep on good terms with Rome—was only one of the cross’s innumerable victims.
Among the powers of the world are religious observances that have become absolutized in our lives. If we don’t do them, shame! Shame! Paul points out that religious practices are only shadow—not the real thing. They are not what God has given you for nourishment and growth: Jesus Christ is. So don’t get hung up on stuff like what to eat or pay undue attention to; what to avoid or with whom not to associate. Those are not deal-breakers. Only what has Jesus at the core is for real. His is the creation and he has sanctified it so that you can live fully in it.
Prayer: Help me to see in the light of Christ—what is substance and what is only shadow. Amen.
18 – Dogma-Tied by the World
Colossians 2:20–23 — (20) If with Christ you died to the elemental spirits of the universe, why do you live as if you still belonged to the world? Why do you submit to regulations, (21) “Do not handle, Do not taste, Do not touch”? (22) All these regulations refer to things that perish with use; they are simply human commands and teachings. (23) These have indeed an appearance of wisdom in promoting self-imposed piety, humility, and severe treatment of the body, but they are of no value in checking self-indulgence.
What are the basic constituents of the universe? People have been asking that question for centuries, first with religious answers and then “scientifically” by observation beginning with the Greek philosopher Thales (640–546 BCE) who proposed water (!) as the basic building block of matter. As advances in instrumentation enabled closer looks at the material world, scientists developed better theories, and the answer to the “basic elements” question has changed and we now know that it is . . . well, at this writing, the scientific answer is still a work in progress.
But there is also a less scientific version of the question. It’s more like: “What is the basic driving force of human affairs?” For the answer, it seems that all you need to do is look at the misguided and selfishly used power under which Jesus was “legally” executed. How can Christians, reborn and reformed in our baptism into Christ, still think and act under the control of the basic operating principles of the “world” that killed him? Especially after Jesus’ “conviction” had been so dramatically reversed by God’s raising him from an unjust death?
Or what about this personally directed-at-you version of the question: “If with Christ you died to the elemental spirits of the universe” (or university?), how come you “submit to” (in the Greek, dogmatizesthe, or “let yourself be dictated to by the dogmas) “regulations” of the world?
Among the fundamental values or “dogmas” of the university are self-improvement, freedom, toleration, competition, concern for job preparation. Paul might dismiss them as “simply human commands and teachings” that only have the “appearance of wisdom.” You and Christ “died to the elemental spirits of the universe” and you both are free to replace them with other loftier, more important things like love, compassion, hospitality, and service of others.
Prayer: Lord give me the insight to what those elemental principals are so I can live according to your will. Amen.
19 – Witness Protection Program
Colossians 3:1–4 — (1) So if 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 is revealed, then you also will be revealed with him in glory.
Remember on the TV program Sesame Street when they were teaching the concepts of “near” and “far”? Now you know that near and far, up and down, are not all that clear. You could theoretically move toward the “edge” of the universe, but since we now know that space curves, you would ultimately find yourself back more or less where you started. Reading the up/down language of Colossians as metaphorical is better than reading it literally. Our hope is in heaven (1:5a) means, importantly, that it is not here in the world of human beings and faulty human institutions.
God has delivered you from the “dominion of darkness” to the “kingdom of his beloved son” (1:13). In today’s reading, that change is described in terms of your move from “down” on earth, among earthly things, to “up” in heaven and the things of Christ. The importance here is