Colossians 2:20-23
When I lived in New England, I was puzzled by the numerous white steepled chapels that had become coffee bistros, art galleries, and antique shops. What happened? The disease of outward religion replaced true heart religion. Heart religion is both sound doctrine and simple and pure devotion to Christ (2 Cor 11:3). In our exposition of Isaiah we saw that the human heart has a propensity for manageable externals when in religion (Is 29:13). Outward religious acts frequently conceal a wayward heart (‘whitewashed tombs’ Mt 23:27). Externals are easy to maintain, heart religion and religious affections are not. How different heart religion is from going through the motions. Spiritual deadness advances when we content ourselves with outward forms of religion, but neglect the N.T. functions (temple, school, discipleship bootcamp, family, pentagon, hospital). In apostasy, congregations are complicit with their milquetoast pastors who by the content of their preaching imply that their parishioners are spiritually healthy, when actually they were spiritually sick and ill (2 Tim 4:3-4).
Heart religion can only be maintained through the trauma of regular repentance (Ps 139:23-24). For, God’s transcendent holiness is disturbing, it shakes us up; when we dare to draw near to such penetrating light we find that there are areas of our lives which need change. Regularly practicing biblical self-confrontation in the presence of God is essential to our growth and our intimacy with the Lord. As the believer dares to draw near, he finds that God meets him with the blood-bought gifts of love, mercy, grace and adoption which God is delighted to bestow upon His own.
- “If you have died with Christ to the elementary principles of the world, why, as if you were living in the world, do you submit yourself to decrees, such as,
21 “Do not
handle, do not taste, do not touch!” Wherefore—“if you died (so as to be freed from),” (Rom 6:2; Gal 2:19). To the rudiments, decrees of the world (Col 2:8)—carnal, outward, worldly, legal ordinances. Paul had no doubt about the conversion of the Colossians: ‘you died with Christ’. These believers had died positionally in Christ and this is what the false teachers were ignorant of. True spiritual liberty (WOG) will aid sanctification while works of a ritual nature are useless, so do not subject yourselves to man-made regulations, for you have died with Christ (8, take captive, 16, defraud, 18, judge). Christ did not release believers from the Mosaic Law to become entangled again in Gnostic rules or any humanly mandated requirements. Why are you submitting to the world’s made-made religious rules as if the world were your true sphere, home, citizenship, and destiny (see Sola Scriptura)? Since, indeed you have died with Christ (a fulfilled condition), why, as if this present world were your final environment are you submitting to its human precepts, teachings, values, regulations? “Do not be carried away by varied and strange teachings; for it is good for the heart to be strengthened by grace, not by foods, through which those who were so occupied were not benefited” (
Heb 13:9
). The believer is dead to the world, like your crucified Lord, into whose death you were buried (Gal 6:14; 1 Pet 4:1-2).ⁱ Christ is ‘Source Person’—you died to the world as your source of identity, purpose, or fulfillment.
Paul condemned legalism and mysticism; in our text (vv. 20-23) he condemns asceticism. An ascetic practices rigorous self-denial and even self-mortification of the body in order to become ‘more spiritual’. Ascetic practices were popular during the Middle Ages: wearing hair shirts next to the skin, sleeping on hard beds, whipping oneself, not speaking for days (maybe years), going without food or sleep, etc.
Asceticism arises out of guilt (mgt. efforts). But Christ has taken away all the guilt of believers by His death (Col. 2:13–14). Since believers died with Christ to the basic principles of this world, they are not obligated to obey the world’s accepted ideas about spirituality and religion. True spirituality is living by the power of the Spirit in union with Christ by whom we died to sin. “For we know that our old self was crucified with Him so that the body of sin might be rendered powerless” (Rom. 6:6).ⁱⁱ
- “Do not handle, do not taste, do not touch!”
22
(which all refer to things destined to perish with use)—in accordance with the commandments and teachings of men? In verse 21 we find a series of ‘do not’s’. This was part of the false teachers (‘spoilers’) approach to sanctification; they had made-up rules to be obeyed as a way of salvation. It had to do with a ritualistic and regulated lifestyle similar to monastic orders today. People may be religious, but if they have no light on the doctrine of justification by faith only, then they have ‘a name that [they] are alive, but are dead’ (Rev 3:1).
In Col 2:16, “meat, drink” are instances of the “ordinances” (Col 2:20) in the words of their imposers. There is an ascending climax of superstitious prohibitions: The first Greek word ‘handle’ means close contact and retention: the latter, ‘touch’ means momentary contact. Do not handle, taste, or touch; the three refer primarily to meats. These are examples of human religious rules which did not bring true righteousness. Humans have always had an ascetic, legalistic tendency (Is 29:13; Mt 15:10–12; Mk 7:19; Rom 14:17, 21). But it is a hollow religion of self-effort, self-glory and self-sufficiency (vv. 22–23). (EX. Eve, nor touch it. . . might lead to eating it.)
The Gnostics argued that the body was hostile to the spirit, for the material was essentially evil. The Gnostic error (Platonic) was that the spirit is good, the body and
matter are evil, contaminated. Thus, salvation is freedom from the body. So, if the body is evil, then treating the body with disrespect (or of no consequence) will appear to be spiritual. Neglect of the body looks like the person is on a higher spiritual plain (appears religious and wise) (EX. my experience in India, ‘holy men’, sadhu, or yogi).
Gnosticism’s errors about the body held the false idea that the body does not matter; for it is a spiritual detriment and liability (ppt. slide; the body cannot make you sin, etc.). Some turned to asceticism to weaken the body. Others gave in to licentiousness, dismissing what the “evil” body did as morally irrelevant. But, the Scriptures are clear—the body-soul binary means that the members of one’s body express the soul’s loyalties, who your master really is (very dangerous error that God only cares about the heart = modern day Gnosticism) (Rom 6:11-13).
No! The deeds of the body do greatly affect the soul (Eph 4:17ff.). But Paul has shown that God entered the material world and in a real human body won us salvation. As we enter Colossians 3 next Lord’s day, we will see immediately that Paul shows that the way we live in our body does make an eternal difference. True spirituality is living an obedient human life, here, in union with Christ.ⁱⁱⁱ Through Christ, God redeems the use of the body so that it is a vital resource in the service of others.
What of Paul’s Colossian hearers? If elements of self-made religion have a grip on you, it’s a symptom of a woefully low estimate of Christ (union and completeness). Spiritual dullness is revealed by one’s affinity for false spiritualities (hermit crab). Legalism absolutizes relative things (eat, drink, clothing, note pants issue in Africa). Antinomianism relativizes absolute things (do not commit fornication, etc.).
The bottom line issue our text is alluding to is this: what does it take to conquer sin? Sin is not only something a man did: it is something that takes possession of him, something the man is, something that turns him into an open enemy of the God. It brings outward penalties: ‘whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.’ But far more appalling than these were its inward results. It torments the conscience: ‘O wretched man that I am!’ ‘Their worm shall not die’. It brings the will into abject slavery, ‘everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin’ (we teach the WOG at HP, man’s will is not free but is in a bondage only God can break). Sin destroys fellowship with God: and without Christ, men are ‘alienated,’ ‘without God in the world.’ Sin hardens the heart, and blinds the judgment, and warps the moral sense: ‘God gave them over to a reprobate mind.’ It destroys life itself: ‘the wages of sin is death.’ Such is the Bible’s estimate of sin’s overwhelming gravity.ⁱᵛ How foolish to imagine that sin can be conquered and overcome by religious rituals, by avoiding certain foods, or by lighting a candle, or by burning incense, or by reciting certain phrases. Faulty diagnosis of the seriousness of sin leads people to an insufficient remedy for sin (legalism, etc.)
Countless church-goers have only a God concept, and not a saving knowledge of God in Christ. They have never been struck with the Scriptural truth that God dwells in pure, burning holiness, in unapproachable light, thus, our sins committed against His infinite majesty must be punished. And because they have only a God concept, they do not grasp the immensity of the payment needed to be able to stand accepted before a holy God (man cannot atone for his sins, or contribute to an atonement). This lack of a saving knowledge of God is revealed in how they deal with conscience.
The conscience of a person rightly tells him that he is not what he ought to be. But, a natural man excuses himself, letting himself off the hook. Scripture tells us what we owe God in obedience and reverence we have failed to provide. The unsaved religious man does many things to quiet his conscience. He attempts to speak peace to his own conscience by bribing his conscience (“I am a helpful person, a caring person, nice to my friends, faithful in religion”). Because of this spiritual epidemic of self-righteousness, the question every faithful pastor must ask his hearers is this: “Has the blood of Christ been applied to your conscience? Have you ever by faith laid your hands on the forehead of the Lamb of God and transferred the guilt of all your sins, and the guilt of what you are in your own person (your innate depravity), have you ever laid all of that vileness upon the suffering Substitute (that He might bear it up to His cross)?”
It is not possible for you to love God’s holiness and justice unless the blood of God’s Lamb is painted upon the doorposts of your heart. Countless church-goers have never trusted in the shed blood of Christ alone. Their rebellion, self-righteousness have never been dug up by the roots by the work of the Spirit. Therefore, they refuse the Savior’s blood because they do not wish to serve under the Lordship of the One who shed His own blood. That inner resistance to Christ is evidence of their self-will and love of personal autonomy; and it is proof that they are still controlled by original sin. How disastrous it is that they do not want deliverance from sin—IF, salvation costs them their self-directed life. It is tragic beyond words that they would throw away their precious eternal soul in order to retain a little imagined independence from God.
How different things are where the Holy Spirit has true believer gladly comes under the Lordship of Christ and finds delight in being ruled by His Word. But, the false believer has chosen a manageable form of religion that lets him keep his self-life. What a contrast this is from the true believer who has put all of his hope in God the Father’s estimate of His Son’s blood. The genuine Christian understands that Christ did not die to ‘make salvation possible’—no, He died for a people whom He would indubitably save. The true Christian knows that saving grace is not a combined effort between God and the sinner. For, God’s eternal plan was to give a chosen people to His Son by means of His Son’s free offer of Himself upon Calvary’s cross. “All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will certainly not cast out” (Jn 6:37).
In light of this, one of the greatest contrasts imaginable is the gospel confronting manmade schemes of salvation/sanctification. For, how a person responds to this question: how shall the sinful deeds of the flesh be subdued?—reveals their functional ‘gospel’—what they actually believe. (slide on penance. Is it possible to make personal atonement for sin? See piercing, cutting, self-flagellation, etc.).
- (which all refer to things destined to perish with use)—in accordance with the commandments and teachings of men? Which—things, namely, the three things handled, touched, and tasted. are to perish (by their very nature are constituted for perishing (‘destruction by corruption’).” Referring to Col 2:20-21. All these “ordinances” are according to human, not divine, injunctions: teachings/systems.”
- “These are matters which have, to be sure, the appearance of wisdom in self-made religion and self-abasement and severe treatment of the body,
but are of no value
against fleshly indulgence.” Asceticism is a man-made system of rules (often taken out of context from God’s Law) based on human commands and teachings. Living by such regulations or self-made religion has a certain appearance of wisdom (Col 1:9; 2:3, 4:5), but it has absolutely no value in restraining sensual indulgence.ᵛ
Why has manmade religion always grown explosively? First of all, it is natural to us because our religious instincts are 180 degrees opposite what the Bible teaches. The gospel stands radically opposite of all natural religion, for the message of Christ tells us that only a mighty act of God intervening in our life can deliver us from our sin. But, man is forever optimistic that he can connect with the divine, win favor from God, and repair himself by means of religion. Will-worship, or arbitrarily invented worship: devised by man’s own will, rushes into the vacuum left by an absence of Biblical truth.
Setting aside God’s will for man’s own will may appear self-abasing, but really it is the pride of man; self-willed “humility” (“lowliness of mind”). It rejects the dignity of direct communion with Christ (worshipping of angels, false mediators). Neglecting of the body—This asceticism seems to have rested on the Platonic theory that matter is the source of evil. So, in that view, not paying any “honor” which is due to the body, severe treatment of it, degrading the body supposedly would help prevent the person from satisfying of the flesh. Problem: while seeming to deny self and the body, ascetics are really glorying in self. Tradition puffs up; it clogs the heavenly perceptions. Self-imposed ordinances gratify self-righteousness, though seeming to mortify it.ᵛⁱ
CONCLUSION: “Let No One Enslave You!” (Col 2:20–23).
The power of Christ in the life of the believer does more than merely restrain the desires of the flesh: it puts new desires within him. A new nature determines a renewed spiritual appetite. The Christian has the very nature of God within (2 Pet 1:4), and this means he has godly ambitions and desires. He does not need man-made religious laws on the outside to control his appetites because he has life on the inside! The harsh rules of the ascetics “lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence” (Col 2:23).
The answer to legalism is the full acceptance the believer has in Christ. The answer to mysticism is the living presence of spiritual union with Christ, the Head of the church. The answer to asceticism is our position in Christ in co-death, co-burial, and co-resurrection resulting in the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit. Completeness in Christ who is supreme, deconstructs every false spirituality.
We put all of this into daily practice as we fellowship with Christ through worship, the Word, fellowship, and prayer. As we yield to the indwelling Spirit, we receive the power we need for daily living. It is in our fellowship with other believers that we contribute spiritually to the growth of the body, the church, and the other members of the body contribute to us. What a wonderful way to live! Is Christ preeminent in your life—does He have the cream of your affections? Brethren, what stimulates heart religion is the majesty of Christ exhibited to our remaining misery. Are you drawing on His spiritual power, or depending on externals, on man-made “religious” substitutes?ᵛⁱⁱ ADDENDUM: Why does outward religion appear useful, but is not useful? Because of original sin, man’s heart is an idol factory, fallen man has always had a propensity to attribute spiritual power to rituals, regulation, and physical objects. The false assumption behind this is as follows: through talisman, objects, fetishes, ceremonies, rituals, regulations, superstitions, chanting, incantations, it is possible to harness, or corral, spiritual forces. But, it is at best, an exercise in futility (and at worst, trafficking in demons). (EX. mass in Girona, Spain. Luther and a dangerous ‘opera’ for the senses —doing great spiritual harm to the individual.) Don’t co-exist with error, repudiate the false, contend for the truth!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The gospel sets us free to be ministering to others, sets us free to serve (see my article on how the gospel prepares us for relationships). It takes a disciple to make a disciple. Fervency for Christ is contagious. It enflames others, it draws others to you. But, it also will cause some to keep their distance. See quotes from Edwards’ book, The Religious Affections.
How are the sinful deeds of the flesh to be subdued? This in some ways relates to a massive question addressed in the history of Western Civilization. How shall evil be restrained? How shall law and order be maintained? Shall certain criminals be publicly tortured as a terrifying deterrent to crime? Note the terror and intimidation under the Roman Empire. The Protestant Reformation was an ongoing event that took place in tandem with a growing literacy in Europe. As its citizens studied the ‘library’ of the Bible (66 books), they learned of the incarnation, of God’s rule and relation to His creatures and His creation. This affected everything from choosing good and just leaders, to shaping how young people would be raised to be honest, productive, contributing citizens (note Protestant catechisms, etc.). The knowledge of God in Christ defines every man’s duty. (EX. Holland dairy example).
Endnotes: i Jamieson, R., Fausset, A. R., & Brown, D. (1997). Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (Vol. 2, pp. 378 –379). Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc. ii Vincent, M. R. (1887). Word studies in the New Testament (Vol. 3, pp. 498–499). New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons. iii Ibid. iv Utley, R. J. (1997). Paul Bound, the Gospel Unbound: Letters from Prison (Colossians, Ephesians and Philemon, then later, Philippians) (Vol. Volume 8, p. 36). Marshall, TX: Bible Lessons International. James Stewart, A Man in Christ, pp. 106–107. v Geisler, N. L. (1985). Colossians. In J. F. Walvoord & R. B. Zuck (Eds.), The Bible Knowledge Commentary: An Exposition of the Scriptures (Vol. 2, p. 679). Wheaton, IL: Victor Books. vi Jamieson, R., Fausset, A. R., & Brown, D. (1997). Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (Vol. 2, p. 379). Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc. vii Jamieson, R., Fausset, A. R., & Brown, D. (1997). Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (Vol. 2, p.
- Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.