Colossians: Substance or Shadows
Pastor Fletcher preaches from Colossians 2:16-23. Discussion points: Emphasizing the elements of Christianity can pull our focus away from Christ, the ceremonial laws of the Old Testament all pointed forward to Christ and the new kingdom, we can value our spiritual practices and experiences without overemphasizing and worshipping them.
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Scripture reader: [Colossians 2:16-23] Therefore, let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink, or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath. These are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ. Let no one disqualify you, insisting on asceticism and worship of angels, going on in detail about visions, puffed up without reason by his sensuous mind and not holding fast to the head, from whom the whole body, nourished and knit together through its joints and ligaments, grows with a growth that is from God.
If with Christ you died to the elemental spirits of the world, why, as if you were still alive in the world, do you submit to regulations, do not handle, do not taste, do not touch, referring to things that all perish as they are used, according to human precepts and teachings. These indeed have an appearance of wisdom in promoting self-made religion and asceticism and severity to the body, but they are of no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh.
This is the word of the Lord.
Preacher: Have you all ever heard the Aesop's fable of the dog and its shadow? I don't know that you have. I, I learned it this week. Aesop was a, Greek storyteller from about 500 years before the time of Christ. And his stories were not Christian whatsoever, but oftentimes have wonderful little morals. And, and this one, the story of the dog and its reflection, it tells. The story of a dog who has a large bone in his mouth and is going to enjoy that bone. And as he walks along, he finds a reflecting pool and he walks up to the reflecting pool and sees his shadow, that of another dog with a even larger bone. Unbeknownst to him, seeing only his reflection, he drops the bone to grab the larger bone and loses what he has into the water.
The moral of the story is really simple. Beware lest you lose the substance by grasping at the shadow. Beware lest you lose the substance by grasping at the shadow. I feel like that main point. From that little fable is the main point that Paul is telling us today in Colossians chapter 2. We're going through the Bible, right now we're in the, in the book of Colossians. We're just going kind of verse by verse as we work our way through this book of the Bible. I love teaching books of the Bible verse by verse because I don't get to control what we're talking about on Sunday. You know, last week we're talking about a topic. And then this week the topic's very different. But it's just as relevant and just as good, because the Bible is relevant and good as we work through it.
And so today we come to this idea that beware. Lest you lose the substance while grasping for the shadows. Paul's addressing this issue in the church in Colossae. In fact, this might be the, the primary issue of the Church of Colossae, is that they have these false teachers that are in the church. And these false teachers are teaching a variety of different things. But one thing that you don't actually, it's actually pretty profound. They're not denying anything that is true. They're not denying the virgin birth. They're not denying the, the death of Jesus. They're not denying the divinity of Christ. They're not denying the resurrection of Christ or the ascension of Christ, or the fact that he's going to return. They're not denying any of the things that we just read in the Apostles Creed.
Instead, what they're doing is they are adding to it. You see, you can be just as wrong. You can be just as much of a false teacher by adding to the gospel as you can by subtracting from the gospel. And so what they're saying is that it's not merely good enough for you to follow Jesus and to worship him, but you actually need to reach a higher level of spirituality. And that higher level of spirituality is found through spiritual practices or spiritual experiences. They're saying that the key to life. The key to the spiritual life that we all desire is through spiritual practices or experiences.
And look, there is nothing wrong with spiritual practices or experiences. But as we go through this, you'll see that I'm a very big advocate for both of those. But when you substitute the shadow for the substance, you lose everything. And that is the main idea that Paul wants us to see, is that when you emphasize the shadow over the substance, you actually lose the gospel.
Let me give you an illustration. This comes from Eugene Peterson, and I love Eugene Peterson. He was a pastor in Maryland for many years. He's, he's, he was from Montana. Has just a totally different way of being a pastor. Most of you probably only know the name Eugene Peterson because he wrote The Message, which I don't know about your tradition. The tradition that I came in, liked to, that I was brought up in, liked to pooh poo on The Message a good bit, because it's not a real translation. But as long as you don't read it, as long, it never claims to be. As long as you don't say this is a translation. And instead, this is a paraphrase of one man. It doesn't have all, you know, the Bible is translated by like hundreds of people. Whenever we have a real translation. Lots of work have, has gone into every word. They've considered every textual variant. Not The Message. The Message is just one man trying to bring the Bible to life, and I love it for that reason. And if you can just read it with that in mind, you'd love it.
But Eugene Peterson wrote a lot of other things. One of my heroes, just had a totally different way of being a pastor than what we are familiar with. But let me give you this illustration that he wrote. It's a little story. Imagine yourself moving into a house with a huge picture window overlooking a grand view across a wide expanse of water enclosed by a range of snowcapped mountains. Doesn't that sound nice? You have a ringside seat before wild storms and cloud formations, the entire spectrum of sun illuminated colors and the rocks and trees and wildflowers and water. You are captivated by the view. Several times a day, you interrupt your work and you stand before this window to take in the majesty and the beauty, thrilled with the botanical and meteorological fireworks.
One afternoon you notice some bird droppings on the window glass. Get a bucket of water and a towel and clean it. A couple days later, a rainstorm leaves the windows streaked, and the bucket comes out again. Another day, visitors come with a tribe of small, dirty fingered children. The moment they leave, you see all the smudge marks on the glass. They are hardly out the door before you have the bucket out. You were so proud of that window, and it's such a large window. But it's incredible how many different ways foreign objects can attach themselves to that window, obscuring the vision, distracting from the contemplative beauty. Keeping that window clean develops into an obsessive compulsive neurosis. You accumulate ladders and buckets and squeegee. You you construct a scaffolding inside and out to make it possible to get to all the difficult corners and heights. You have the cleanest window in North America. But it's now been years since you looked through it. You've become a Pharisee.
It's a beautiful story to illustrate that sometimes the means to see Christ becomes overemphasized to the point to where you're worshiping the means, and not the savior in which is pictured by those means. There's a way to overemphasize the window into the person of Jesus in such a way that you fail to look through it and you just look at the window. You can become a person who does religious practices and forgets Christ. You can become a person who pursues religious experiences and forgets Christ. You can become a person obsessed over the shadows of Christ and forget the substance of who he is.
As we go through this passage, I just want you to consider, have you ever emphasized the shadow over the substance? Point one: The shadow of religious practices versus the substance of Jesus. The shadow of religious practices versus the substance of Jesus. Verse 16, let's look at this together. Therefore, let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink. So there's this group of people in the Church of Colossae, and they're a judgy bunch, as most churches have a judgy bunch. The judgy bunch in this, yeah, I don't know where the judgy bunch sits in here. Don't look, OK? But. the judgy bunch in this church are judging people over matters of food and drink. And when he says that, it's assumed that we understand what he's talking about.
But what he's talking about is the kosher laws of the Old Testament. Matters of food and drink, what you're allowed to eat and what you're not allowed to eat. In the Old Testament, there's all kinds of laws about what you're allowed to eat and drink. That's at least what we assume that this passage is talking about. It could be other things, but this is probably the most common one that we, we might assume it to be. And so, in the Old Testament, we might know that Jewish people, they don't eat pork. They don't eat shellfish. And the reason why they don't eat these things is because the Lord gave them a set of dietary laws to set them apart as the people of God. So he said, you're not to function as everyone else does. You are not to eat these items. And so you don't eat pork, you don't eat shellfish, and we know those, but there's like a million other ones that you're not allowed to do as a Jewish person set apart as part of Israel.
But when Jesus comes, what he actually says is that it's not the food from the outside that makes someone unclean, but it's what comes from inside that makes someone unclean. And so the things that come from inside are our anger, our lust, our pride. Those things are the things that make us unclean, the things that separate us from God. And thus Jesus declared all foods to be clean.
At the same time, it says don't allow people to judge you on holy days or on holy food, the sacred food, what to eat and drink, or on holy days. Sabbath or noon moon or a festival. Or as you see there, verse, verse 6, 17, verse 16, the second half of verse 16, it says, or with regard to a festival or a new moon, or a Sabbath. And so each of these are referring to the weekly, the Sabbath, the monthly, the new moon, or the annual festivals like the Day of Atonement, or the Feast of Tabernacles, or the feast of Passover.
And each of these, Paul is saying that these sacred food and the sacred days of the Old Testament were meant to point us toward an ultimate reality that we have with Jesus. That's why he says in verse 17, these are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ. So the food laws, when we think back to the Old Testament, the food laws, a lot of a lot of times people will make the, the declaration like, oh, you believe the Bible. Why don't you keep the, the food laws? Why aren't you eating shellfish? Gotcha. And that's a really simple one, OK? Because I am a Christian, and I believe the Bible in context as it's written and it's right genre. And I believe that the Old Testament has been satisfied by the new.
And so when we look at these food laws, what are they trying to get at? They're trying to help you to understand what it means to be clean before God. They were all about holiness. Every meal was asking the question, how can sinful people live in fellowship with a holy God? And the answer is not bacon. The reason, the way that people can live in fellowship with a holy God. It's because of what Christ has done for them. He cleanses them from sin and welcomes them to God's table.
At the same time, the sacred days for God's way of rehearsing the gospel before the gospel arrived. They were a shadow of the substance that we have in Christ. So these holy days, they were rehearsing this message of the gospel, every Sabbath said that one day we will have ultimate rest. Every Passover said that one day there will be a true lamb who dies for his people. Every feast of Tabernacle says one day there will be a God who dwells among us. Every single day of atonement says one day there will be an atoning sacrifice that pays for all of our sin. They're all shadows of the substance that we have in Christ. And for us to overemphasize the shadow to the point where we forget the substance is to lose the gospel. Why would you trade in the bone for the reflection?
Now, I recognize in this room, there's probably very few of us who are tempted to obey the food laws of the Old Testament. There are very few of us who are having a really difficult time emphasizing our Sabbath. Maybe our Sabbath. But very few of us definitely not emphasizing the Feast of Tabernacles. But I think that the same temptations lie in new forms for us today as believers. Some of us feel as though our standing with God is measured by how disciplined we've been throughout the week. About how well we've read our Bible, how well we've done our religious practices for the week.
And on the most basic level, many of us believe our standing with God is dependent upon our attendance at a church on Sunday. When he's saying Don't get me wrong, I think attendance. I think religious practice, very good. OK. But what he's saying is don't let anyone pass judgment. That that's not what makes you right before God. That is only Jesus.
When I was in college, I worked at a bookstore. And I remember the first day the bookstore opened, it was like a college textbook store. And it was the opening day, not just of the year, but of the store. So it was the first time the store had opened, and the owner came in and it was all of our first day. And she was like, I went to church, it was Sunday. And she said, "I went to church this morning cause I knew if I didn't go to church, everything would just go wrong today." And I wanted so badly to say, "Hey, I don't think that's how it works." But I used one of those rare moments where I held my tongue. I've, I've got about 5 of those. It's a.
Right now, there's a huge resurgence of what we call the spiritual practices. And it's led by this pastor on the West Coast. Many of you know of him, John Mark Comer. If you've read any of his books, I've read almost every single one of his books. I'm a big John Mark Comer fan. I really like John Mark Comer. But I do think that there's a danger in practice in this overemphasis of the spiritual practices. And we have to be careful because sometimes we can overemphasize the shadow and we can lose the substance.
I never appreciated this passage more than during the Christmas fiasco of 2022. In 2022, a, special thing happened. Christmas fell on a Sunday. And I don't know how many of you are still with us back in 2022, 4 years ago. A few of you in the room. Well, that year, we dec we decided it really wasn't much of a decision. A lot of our church travels around the holidays. There aren't very many people around and. And so it wasn't a big decision. We just decided not to have church on Sunday morning, not to have our worship gathering. We worshiped with all the other city on the hill churches on Christmas Eve, Saturday night. And then we just said, hey, we're gonna celebrate in our homes on Christmas morning. And so, we made that decision.
I have a friend who works for probably one of the biggest Christian blog, websites in the world called the Gospel Coalition. I don't know if you've ever heard of that one, but it's a, it's a big one. And he's an editor there and he's actually the guy that officiated my wedding. And, he asked me if I would write a blog on why we're not having a Christmas morning service. I said, sure, why not? That's an honor. Why wouldn't I?
What I didn't know is that because I'm not on social media and I live fairly isolated up in New England, is that the, the, the sharks were swarming at this time, that there were, there was a whole movement going on online that was saying, if you attend a church that cancels their Christmas morning services, you should leave. That any church, exactly. If any church doesn't have a Christmas morning service, not only is that a bad thing, but that's a bad church, and those are bad pastors. So there's a huge movement going on.
So I write this blog. I'm winsome, I'm pastoral, I'm helpful, as always. And we, we hit publish, and I'm not on social media, but it doesn't take long. I, I'm glad I'm not on social media because I can only imagine what's on social media about this, because it doesn't take long before the counter blogs start rolling. All the other writers that think that I'm a heretic are writing what we're saying. And then I hear about a radio program in California about bad Pastor Fletcher, who is leading his church poorly. And then I hear, even more on this YouTube video where that's called, it's still up today, if you want to see it. It has all of 120 views, not to throw any shade. I think more people read my blog though. but it's called Fletcher, Pastor Fletcher Lang Cancels Christmas. I might, you might as well just throw me in a Grinch outfit, OK, guys. We, started receiving emails, to the church elders calling for my removal. It really became quite a fiasco.
And to which I respond. Let no one pass judgment upon you with regard to a festival, or a new moon, or a Sabbath. These are a shadow of the things to come. But the substance belongs to Christ. So you can disagree with that decision, and even if you're here this morning, you disagree with that decision, that's totally OK. I'm not sure I completely agree with our decision all the time. But It's just a Sabbath. And we're not going to let someone pass judgment upon us. In regard to these shadows that point toward the substance that we have in Christ. So even if you disagree, we're still a gospel believing church, we're still your brothers and sisters. And at some point you're making it more about tribe than you are about the good news of what Jesus has done for us.
The second point of this passage is the shadow of religious experiences versus the substance of Jesus. So maybe this, this is the same group of false teachers. Maybe it's a totally different group of false teachers. But Paul continues to say, let no one disqualify you insisting on asceticism and worship of angels, going on in detail about visions. And so I had to work, I had to look up this word. It's like, I kind of know what asceticism means, but like, if you ask me to define it, I wouldn't be able to. And so I looked it up. Here's the definition for you. Asceticism is a lifestyle characterized by the voluntary renunciation of material possessions, physical pleasures, and worldly indulgences in favor of strict self-discipline.
And so what the ascetics would do is that they would fast to an extreme level. And that they would practice spiritual practices or different things to get to the point to where they could start having visions. Where they could have these intense spiritual experiences. And when it says the ascetics, and then it says the worship of angels.
Now there's two different ways that we could translate this idea of the worship of angels. We could take it kind of on face value the way that it sounds, which it says the worship of angels. It sounds like we are worshiping the angels. So it sounds like there might be a group of people in this church in Colossae, who aren't just worshiping Jesus, but they're worshiping angels in addition to Jesus.
And or it could be taken as the worship that angels have, the worship of angels. And so maybe there's a group of people who are saying, guys, you can experience the glory of the Lord as it is described in Isaiah 6, where the angels are enraptured in the presence of God. You can experience the same kind of worship that the angels experience. Doesn't that sound nice? Of course it sounds nice, but they have become obsessed with this idea that you can experience this euphoric level of worship. It hit an obsession level where the worship of God became the worship of just worship.
Basically there's a group who are more about religious experiences than they are actually knowing and following Jesus. They're so obsessed with the shadow of Christ, this experience, that they've missed the substance of Christ, that they've missed seeing Christ and what where he is often found in the mundane and the ordinary. As you're washing your dishes on a Tuesday evening, Christ can be found in that moment as well.
And look, I love a good religious experience. I was saved during a good religious experience. I first met Jesus as all my friends around me were crying. I was crying, we were all crying. Oh. It was like a very emotional moment. I've had experiences I shared with you all an experience last week, I believe. That was an intense religious experience for me in many ways. I've had religious experiences in this room, where I've been worshiping the Lord, and I just felt the comforting hand of God upon me. I'm all for a religious experience, but I'm not for a religious experience for a religious experience's sake. I'm not here to pursue a religious experience. I'm here to pursue Jesus. And if that comes with a religious experience, so be it.
I have gone. I, I've been following Jesus for 26 years now. And of my 26 years, I've had lots of great times in worship, filled with tears and joy. But there have been stretches of years where I have not had an intense religious experience like this. And that's OK. Because the point is the substance, not the shadow. The experiences point us to who Christ is. They are the means. To the ends Not the ends themselves. Verse 19 puts this really well. And says and not. Holding fast. Oh, hold on. Let's go back to 18 real quick. I didn't read the second half of that. Verse 18 says, let no one disqualify you, disqualify you. Insisting on asceticism and the worship of angels. Going on in detail about visions, puffed up without reason by his sensuous mind. Do you see how he describes these people who are obsessed with religious experience for religious experiences sake? He says that they're puffed up. That he's literally saying they're full of hot air. That they're full of themselves by their sensuous mind.
And, and then he continues verse 19 and says, and not holding fast to the head, from whom the whole body nourished and knit together through its joints and ligaments, grows with the growth that is from God. So just notice where the nourishment comes from. The nourishment doesn't come from the spiritual practices or experiences. It comes from the head of the church, which is Christ. Spiritual practices and experiences are great, as long as they're pointing you to Christ. But there is a way that we can live obsessing about those things and missing the main thing, which is Jesus, where our nourishment comes from.
And so as we close today, you might be asking yourself, OK. So don't practice on spirit, don't focus on spiritual practices. Don't focus on spiritual experiences. What do I focus on? Like how do I do this? Because those seem like the two natural ways for us to draw closer to Christ. And the answer is just that, that you hold fast to Christ. And it comes through a window. So, the spiritual practices, the spiritual experiences are oftentimes the window. But I'm just telling you to, to keep your sight through the window. And so I'm not saying stop doing either of those things. They're both good. Just keep looking through it and looking to Christ, that we use the spiritual practices to cling to Jesus.
When you open your Bible, you're not just checking a religious box, you're listening for the voice of your savior. And when you come into a worship gathering, your goal isn't merely an experience. The goal is Jesus, to know Him, to follow him, to obey Him, to trust him, to be confronted by him, to be comforted by him, to walk with him. It's a, it's a fine threading the needle on this one, but I think this is really clearly what the passage is teaching. And I think it's a word for us today.
And so as we close, I just want to lead us through a time of prayer. And if you would join me in praying, you can bow your heads and, and close your eyes. I just want to give you a little bit of time to ponder these things.
Consider for a moment, where have I been tempted to cling to the shadow rather than the substance? Or maybe you just need to confess that you have clung to the shadow and not the substance. Maybe you've become discouraged because of your spiritual practices haven't been what you wanted them to be. And so you feel disapproved before God. You need to hear the words of Christ again. They're saying that you're loved based upon what he has done, not what you have done. Maybe you've chased spiritual experiences, believing the next emotional high would finally make you feel close to God. And you just need to hear the voice of the Lord again. Saying Beloved, I'm near you always. Maybe you've simply been distracted and drifted from Christ Himself. Confess these things so that we may return to a heart of worship.
You're gonna give us an opportunity to confess together. If you would join me as we read this corporate prayer. The underlined portions are for you to speak along with me. Lord Jesus, we confess that we often cling to the shadows. We have trusted in our performance more than your grace. We've measured our spiritual lives by our disciplines, our consistency, and our accomplishments. Forgive us for finding our confidence in ourselves rather than in you. We have chased experiences, emotions, and spiritual highs. Forgive us for seeking your gifts more than your presence. We have looked at the window and forgotten the view. We have grasped at shadows and neglected the substance. Lord Jesus, teach us to hold fast to you. More than the practices we want you. More than the experiences we want you. Church, your hope is not in your religious performance, your hope is not in your spiritual experiences. Your hope is in Christ, who lived for you, died for you, rose for you, and even now holds you fast.
In just a moment, we're going to practice the sacred meal. And as we talk about shadows that point to substance, we have a very good one right here. Where we have the communion meal, being the shadow of who Christ is. That on the night that he was betrayed, Jesus instituted this meal, and he said, my body broken for you. Do this in remembrance of me. And then he took a cup and he said, my blood shed for you. And as we take the cup and the bread, this morning we're reminded of what Christ has done. They are the shadow, but he is the substance. And so if you're a believer here with us this morning, we encourage you to come and receive this so you can be pointed back to Christ, as he is with us in a real tangible way. And so if you would, if you're able, if I could encourage you to stand as we prepare our hearts to receive this meal.
Father, we pray that as we receive this, this meal from you this morning that You would remind us of the substance of who Christ is. That we would hold fast to the view, the glory of God. That we would not become obsessed about how to get there, but that we would just have our eyes set on the destination. And that we would follow you each step. And so God, I pray for anyone here who needs to confess, who needs to give up their own human ways of pursuing you, in lieu of actually experiencing. And so God, we pray that as we receive this communion meal that we would be reminded of your truth and your grace. In Christ's name we pray, Amen.