Christ is Not a Culture

We were blessed to hear the Word preached by Don Kim, a staff member of Trinity Baptist Church in New Haven, Connecticut this past Sunday. What follows are just my notes – by no means a full transcript; nor a commentary. If you missed being with us, enjoy and if you were there, use this to refresh your mind and spirit of what we’ve been taught.

Colossians 1:15-23

Christ is Not a Culture

Strange things were going on at Colossae. They were infiltrated by pagan thoughts and ideas. A new moon celebration, worship of angels. The Book of Colossians was written in response to Gnosticism; this idea that there was a secret saving knowledge. Our own culture, in some ways, is embracing this. Through sensations like the Da Vinci Code or even the recent (this past week if you were watching the news) supposed lost tomb of Jesus. Never mind that the scientific DNA tests prove it could not be Jesus, people still embrace the idea because people are so hungry for the deconstruction of Christianity. What Paul had taught the Colossians had lost its luster. Paul is writing to tell them that Jesus is better than you think – He’s the substance – the reality – not a fad or a culture.

Why and how is that?

1. He is not a creation of His creatures. He is beyond our logic. He is the image of the invisible. He is above all. He is the authority over creation. Who are we to dictate who God is? Francis Collins, a scientist who is known for his work on the Human Genome project wrote a book entitled The Language of God and in it makes a case for God as a scientist. We struggle with the fact that there is suffering in this world. Oftentimes, if you are sharing your faith, the first objection is why does God allow suffering? God is so far above our logic and understanding.

2. Christ is supreme. Jesus is the head of the church, not the culture of the church. Fox Faith – “Films You Can Believe In” was created to meet the culture of Christianity. Look at the tremendous success of the Chronicles of Narnia movie or The Passion of Christ. We are living in an age of pragmatism – where doing church matters. It’s empty. So often in America we are trying to sell the church as if it needed a marketing strategy. There’s an actual pitch – give us 22 minutes and we’ll give you the world – a fast-food sort of church service. Where is the shared experience in that? Where is the fellowship, the worship that is Biblically constructed? It is easy to have the appearance of the culture but that’s not what Christ desires to be. He is the head. We boast in Christ crucified, not church attendance. If Christ is supreme – if He is truly the head of the church, how do we submit to Him? → We submit to Christ in private prayer. The puritan Thomas Brooks wrote The Secret Key to Heaven: The vital importance of private prayer – (Thomas Brooks was one of the most influential people in the life of Spurgeon). A man is certainly that he is secretly. He may sweat on the stage, but be cold in the closet. Christ is the head, He doesn’t have to be the culture.

Lastly, Jesus came into the world for reconciliation, not condemnation. Christianity is so heavily associated with condemnation. The world wants to shy away from fire and brimstone. Even select portions Jonathan Edwards’ sermon Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God is included in school anthologies to perpetuate the idea that Christianity is only negative. Reading John 3:16 and following we learn that the world stands condemned but there’s a message of reconciliation. Jesus came to reconcile, not to condemn. Jesus is better than anything we could think or imagine. But there is a caveat, a condition; we must repent and surrender to His grace.

Do you know this Jesus? If you do, what will you do?

MEJ