Colossians 2:16-23
Scripture Colossians
2:16-23
16 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. 17 These
are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ. 18 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, 19 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.
20 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— 21
“Do not handle, Do not taste, Do not touch” 22 (referring to things that all perish as they are
used)—according to human precepts and teachings? 23 These have indeed 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. [1]
Devotion
Paul
starts the next section of the letter with a warning to the Colossian believers.
It seems some false teachers were trying to lead them astray. By trying to add
rules to the finished work of Christ as being necessary for their salvation.
The teachings fall into four broad categories.
First
there is asceticism. This is found in verses 16 and 21. The forbidding of
eating certain foods and drinking certain drinks was really a holdover from Judaism.
They were trying to get the Colossians follow kosher food requirements. A
Christian has been taught by the Lord that all foods are clean for them. See
Mark 7:18-19 18 And
he said to them, “Then are you also without understanding? Do you not see that
whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile him, 19 since it enters not
his heart but his stomach and is expelled?” (Thus, he declared all foods
clean.)[2]
Second
the teachers were commending the celebrations of certain days. Christ has come
to free us of the need to celebrate new moons and special feast days. We should
still hold the sabbath as holy to the Lord but the other days we are not required
to celebrate any longer. Christianity is to be a religion of relationship not a
set of rules that must be followed.
Third
the Gnostic teachers were having special “visions”. These teachers were
claiming to be more spiritual because of these visions and were encouraging the
believers in Colossae to have them as well. These visions were demonic and often
simply a reflection of what the individual having the vision wanted to see.
Finally,
the worship of angels. These teachers taught that since God was so holy humans
could not approach him directly. So, they had to pray to lesser beings and
worship them instead of God. Since Jesus came and died and was raised by God,
we know that we can be bold enough to approach God at any time and that
anything we ask in Jesus name will be done for us.
Paul’s
critique of these teachers is that they are all trying to ensnare others into religious
systems that enslave the people to them. Paul also points out the fact that
these systems are of no religious value. They are empty rites making a show of
piety but are of no value in restraining fleshly lusts. For freedom Christ has set
us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery. [3] Paul’s words apply today as
they did when he wrote them. Do not become a slave to anyone except Christ and
his body the church.
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