Colossians (Program #32) – Having Been Rooted In Christ To Grow with the Growth of God

In many places the New Testament presents us with the matter of growing or growth. Christians like to use this term to express in a general way their spiritual progress. But actually, the Bible is not so general in its use of the term. It’s quite specific in fact. To point out that it is not us that grow at all, but actually God who grows or increases in us. “How can God grow?” You are probably asking. Or, why does God need to grow? Well, we’ll look at these questions today on this life study of the Bible from the book of Colossians.

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Colossians (Program #31) – Identified with Christ by Being Grafted into Him

We all realize that the air we breathe is all around us. So, is it fair to say that we are in the air? Of course it is. But, there’s another aspect of the air that’s also obvious, and that is that as we breath it, it fills our lungs. So, it’s also true to say that the air is in us. Without us first being in the air, there’s no way that the air could be in us. Well, what does this all have to do with the Christian life you say? Well, the Bible says that we are in Christ. But equally worth our attention, it tells us that Christ is in us as well. Identified with Christ by being grafted into Him. That’s our topic today on this life study of the Bible from Colossians.

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Colossians (Program #30) – Objective Revelation, Subjective Ministry and Practical Experience

The Gospel of John surely is loved by nearly every believer and presents Christ as life and even the mystery of life. Yet for its marvelous revelation of Christ as both God and man and as our life, it still cannot compare with the high peak of the Christ that’s revealed in the book of Colossians.  As we consider not just this high revelation of Christ but how seeing it can help us all to be brought into the practical experience of such Christ.

The expressions used in this book of Colossians, even though it is a short book, they are unique in the whole Bible. But Paul wasn’t trying just to be different, he was really endeavoring to present to us a Christ that is higher, deeper, and richer than we’ve ever imagined.

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Colossians (Program #29) – To Live Christ

When we look at the kind of human life the Lord Jesus lived on the earth and if we take His teachings as an ethical standard for us to imitate, we will set our Christian life on a direct path that will lead us to utter frustration and failure. And worst yet, it will leave God’s heart’s desire unsatisfied because the real example of the Lord Jesus was not just that He lived the perfect life, but that He all the time practiced to live another life. This might sound strange and contrary to what you’ve known and practiced concerning the Christian life, but it, nonetheless, is the clear teaching of the Bible. We need not live a good life. We need to live Christ.

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Colossians (Program #28) – The All-Inclusive Christ Versus Culture

When the Apostle Paul was addressing the Corinthians, he first had to deal with the problem of their fleshly sin and temptations. When he wrote to the churches in Galatia, he was faced with the problem of their adding practices of Judaism to their Christian faith. But, the church in Colossae offered perhaps the greatest obstacle to his labor to bring them into a deeper experience of Christ and that was their culture and philosophy.

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Colossians (Program #27) – Conclusion

The book of Colossians is a book that gives us the highest vision and revelation of Christ. It’s a book unveiling Christ. The full revelation of Christ comes in Chapter 3 verses 10 and 11, which reveal the heart’s desire of God, the New Man, a corporate entity composed of Christ as the head and the members as His body. With all their cultural and ethnic differences blended away, so that joined with the head they become His full and unique expression. Well, we would consider such a book would have a lofty and profound conclusion to match its rich content, but rather it concludes with various greetings and short reports concerning different brothers in Christ familiar to the Colossians. It is tender but it seems to lack the impact and spirit to make it a fitting conclusion. Was this Paul’s random thought? Or, God’s marvelous wisdom?

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Psalms (Program #42) – The Consummate Praise

Over the course of his nearly 70 years of ministry, Witness Lee conducted three in depth studies of the book of Psalms. His first study took place in 1954, he came back to the book again in 1969, and his final study, this life study, that he gave near the end of his life, in 1993. Although all three studies bear similarity for certain each got progressively deeper and higher, unveiling more of God’s central line, His eternal economy. As we come to the final program in the life study of the Psalms, I thought it is appropriate to quote a short portion from his second study of the Psalms called “Christ and the Church revealed and typified in the Psalms” – more…

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Colossians (Program #26) – The Living of the Saints in the Union with Christ (2)

What kind of person is the most spiritual? or let’s say, what kind of person really expresses Christ? Well, maybe you would answer a minister, or a priest, or perhaps even a monk, someone that has gone off to live in simplicity and solitude in order to manage a Christ-like living. Well, the Bible gives no such encouragement if our hearts desire is to express Him in our human life. Quite the contrary to express Christ in human life according to Colossians takes husbands and wives and children. Just how can this be that we would be those that actually express Christ in our ordinary daily lives? We’ll look at that today on a marvelous program from Colossians.

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Psalms (Program #41) – The Expressions of the Saints Before Jehovah in Different Directions and Final Prayers of David

As we had been carefully considering the book of Psalms for these past 40 programs it has become very clear that the Psalms are difficult to categorize.  Though they are all poetic, and most often lofty in their language. The thoughts and sentiment expressed are widely varied. At times they express the most common of human concepts, at other times they touched the height of God’s divine thought and frequently they revealed Christ in type, in shadow, and in prophecy with striking details and clarity. But at the end what we find are not dramatic revelations or high points but rather the earnest and heart felt prayers of men who bored once striking characteristics and that was their nearness and closeness to God and their deep love and care for the things of God.

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Colossians (Program #25) – The Living of the Saints in the Union with Christ (1)

In any situation where you have more than one person occupying the same space, conflicts and differences are bound to occur regardless of how compatible these people might think they are. Just check with any married couple. While these conflicts are not only disruptive to a peaceful marriage life, they’re also devastating within the Body of Christ which Paul calls the New Man in Colossians and Ephesians. So what does the Bible offer as a solution to the conflicts that occur in our daily life and our Church life? Well, we’ll see in today’s life study of the Bible.

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