Nailed! The law in Colossians

R. K. MCGREGOR WRIGHT

Preamble

Behind the letter to the Colossians, there was a serious Gnostic-type of legalistic and mythical teaching. It was called “the Colossian Heresy” by such scholars as J. B. Lightfoot, and it seems to have had features similar to legalisms that believers face today. Angel-worship, food regulations, and the keeping of Jewish holy days and festivals from the old (Mosaic) covenant were being imposed on Christians by these false teachers. Paul appeals to the work of the cross to explain why those observances are not relevant for us under the new covenant today. By the middle of the second century, these ideas Paul opposed had evolved into the full-blown sects called Gnosticism, but Paul already had to combat their beginnings in his own day.

IN THE SAME INSTANT THAT JESUS DIED AS MY SUBSTITUTE, THE NEW COVENANT WAS ALSO SUBSTITUTED FOR THE OLD, WHOLLY REPLACING IT AS THE BELIEVERS’ RULE OF LIFE

The first seven verses of the chapter state the preeminence of Christ over all merely human philosophies and life-styles. The Christian life is to be lived on the very same principle on which it was entered, by faith in Christ alone (v. 6). We received him by faith, and we must “walk in him” (live our lives) likewise by faith, by trusting the One whom we know has spoken truth to us. It is Christ who is the Source of all wisdom and knowledge. The Incarnate Logos Himself is the final exegesis (exegesato, Jn 1:18) of all God’s truth because, in the words of a well-known statement of the Incarnation, the complete fullness of Deity dwells in Jesus “bodily” (v. 9a).

Paul is now going to expound the Source of the eternal life we have received, which is emphatically not the law, but “Christ, who is our life” (3:4). There are very good reasons for this perspective, as Paul will now tell us. Open your Bible and follow along through the comments.

Verse 10: …and in Him you have been made complete, and He is the head over all rule and authority;

Jesus is himself the fullness of the Godhead, and we, too, receive our fullness of spiritual life from Him. He is the true source of “all rule and authority.” The term kephale (KJV head) here means “source”, not “boss,” as its use in verse 19 shows clearly enough. Gnostic demons and archons have no authority with Jesus, and they cannot provide a true revelation from God.

Verse 11: and in Him you were also circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, in the removal of the body of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ;

All “in Christ” have been circumcised with the divine and supernatural circumcision of the heart Jeremiah predicted for all those who are in the new covenant, having come to “know the Lord” (Jeremiah 31:33-34). This “Christian circumcision” is “without hands,” a phrase borrowed from Daniel 2:45 where it describes the coming kingdom of Christ. Paul stated in Colossians 1:13 that believers have already been translated into God’s kingdom, and in this verse we learn how: by regeneration—the new birth. This new birth ends the rule and reign of “the body of flesh,” or the body of sin, which is described and condemned by the old covenant Law (v. 14).

Verse 12: having been buried with Him in baptism, in which you were also raised up with Him through faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead.

This transition from the old to the new covenant was symbolized visibly by our water-baptism, which Peter says presupposes we are believers with a cleansed conscience (1 Pet 3:21). Baptism combines the significance of three components of our transfer into the new covenant: God’s judgment, our testimony to our new faith, and our cleansing from the corruption of sin. Just as circumcision in Israel pointed forward to believers’ hearts being circumcised and cleansed from sin by acceptance of Christ’s eventual death and resurrection, so on this side of the cross, baptism looks back to what God has done for the individual in Jesus’ sacrifice and resurrection. The visible act of baptism also depicts our being raised spiritually with Christ and points forward also to our final bodily resurrection. Just as God raised Christ from the dead, so also He raises us to a newness of life “by faith”, or trust, in the work that God has done in saving us. Our salvation is just as much a miracle of God’s sovereignty as Jesus’ own resurrection was.

Verse 13: When you were dead in your transgressions and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He made you alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our transgressions,

Baptism represents something else, too; we start out “dead in transgressions and sins,” (as Paul has already said in Ephesians 2:1), and must be “made alive,” (regenerated), a blessing also found “in Him”. This blessing results in complete forgiveness, not just of past sins, but of “all our transgressions,” all our large and petty failures, now and in the future, to meet the standard of God’s own righteousness. The phrase “buried with him in baptism” is probably an allusion to Christ’s own baptism, which was a public testimony announcing his Messiahship to Israel (John 1:31). Our baptism is likewise a public testimony to our belonging to Him and announces our discipleship. Moreover, Jesus called his death a “baptism” in Matthew 20:22-23. Further, Jesus’ own resurrection life is the real source of our regenerate life. Both Jesus’ resurrection and our regeneration are equally God’s work, not ours, and when we obey the promptings of the Spirit Who regenerates us, good works follow to manifest our faith (Eph 2:10). The faith which alone saves is never alone, as James makes clear in 2:14, and Paul in Galatians 5:6.

Verse 14: having canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, which was hostile to us; and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross.

Our forgiveness is based on the fact that the handwriting of the law which condemned us (“which was hostile to us”), God himself removed from the equation, nailing it to the cross. This removal of the law—the entire Mosaic law including the Decalogue—literally occurred as a public testimony to the passing of the old covenant, when Jesus the Incarnate Torah took his perfect obedience to the cross and was nailed there in the very same body in which resided “the fullness of the Godhead bodily” (verse 9). Thus the dying of Jesus terminated the old law completely, and his resurrection proclaimed a new day under the new covenant. In the same instant that Jesus died as my substitute (see Matthew 20:28), the new covenant was also substituted for the old, wholly replacing it as the believers’ rule of life. Further, just as the old covenant was replaced by the new, so when we are born again, Christ’s resurrection life replaces our old life which God has set aside as worthless.

Just as the old covenant could never sanctify the sinner, so our fleshly body of sin cannot generate a justifying righteousness, “for no flesh shall be justified (declared righteous) by the law.” Jesus’ own “active and passive obedience” literally is the white robe of righteousness in which He clothes us when we are regenerated. Without this robe of Jesus’ own obedience covering us, nobody could be saved, because even after we are born again, we do not achieve moral perfection in this life. The law’s job was merely to identify (Romans 2:20) and to increase sin (Romans 5:20) and to point toward the dying Messiah (as in Isaiah 53). Now, on this side of the cross, our debt is cancelled—a debt that an eternity in hell could never pay. As Isaiah says, (Isaiah 53:11), “He shall see the travail of his soul and will be satisfied.”

FOOD LAWS AND SABBATHS WERE MERE SHADOWS OF THE REAL THINGS TO COME, AND WE NOW HAVE THE REAL THINGS. JESUS HIMSELF IS THE SUBSTANCE OF THOSE SHADOWS.

The Old Testament text is still the inerrant word of God under the new covenant. The Old Testament law, typology, and promises still point to Christ, as they always did. In fact, they are the means by which we know that Jesus is the promised Messiah. Under the new covenant, however, we preach the Torah as embodied in Jesus, and His righteousness is imputed to us in our justification. The law has been abolished as a requirement of obedience. “Cast out the bondwoman and her son” (Galatians 4:30) does not mean, “Give her a separate bedroom and keep her on; she’ll be useful for defending ourselves against the antinomians.” Rather, it means the old covenant has no place in the new covenant household of God.

Verse 15: When He had disarmed the rulers and authorities, He made a public display of them, having triumphed over them through Him.

The fulfillment of the long-promised redeeming atonement in space-time history by Jesus’ death vindicated God’s sovereignty in the salvation of believers. Against all the machinations of the devil and his minions, in the most public way possible, God defeated the powers of evil by the death of his Son. The cross didn’t kill Jesus, for He was not on it long enough. Rather, His death was a voluntary act; He “gave up His spirit,” having cried, “It is finished” (John 19:30).

Verse 16: Therefore no one is to act as your judge in regard to food or drink or in respect to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath day—

THEREFORE. This important copulative must not be glossed over. The whole point of the passing from the old to the new covenant by means of Jesus’ taking the Torah to the cross in His flesh is about to be revealed! Therefore, nobody may judge the Christian for not obeying the details of the Mosaic law. The law has been “put out of the way” by God Himself. Even the Sabbath is abolished—all of them! (sabbatÿn, Sabbaths plural).

Verse 17: things which are a mere shadow of what is to come; but the substance belongs to Christ.

Food laws and Sabbaths were mere shadows of the real things to come, and we now have the real things. Jesus Himself is the substance of those shadows. Further, the Body of Christ is the present reality, since we no longer have Jesus bodily with us (2 Corinthians 5:16). Instead, His resurrection life is lived out through the Church as the Body of Christ, through which He acts now in the world. His body encompasses both Gentiles and Jews (whom the Mosaic food laws were meant to separate), and His body also enjoys the perpetual Sabbath-rest promised for God’s people who believe (Hebrews 4:7, 9-10).

Verse 18: Let no one keep defrauding you of your prize by delighting in self-abasement and the worship of the angels, taking his stand on visions he has seen, inflated without cause by his fleshly mind,

Don’t let anyone trick you (seduce you) into schemes of sanctification by law-keeping. The “mystery religions” of those days had all sorts of occult techniques of approaching the unseen world through legalism, asceticism, the worship of angels, and occult speculations here condemned. Observers of those mystery religions pompously imagined that through those things they could enter the unseen world! The “mind of the flesh” contains no glimmer of the true Light, which finally entered the world with Jesus (John 1:8-13).

Verse 19: and not holding fast to the head, from whom the entire body, being supplied and held together by the joints and ligaments, grows with a growth which is from God.

The “Colossian heretics” did not “grasp the Source” of their spiritual growth. Instead of spiritual growth being accelerated by occult techniques or special knowledge and observances, the Source of growth is the risen Christ, the Head (Source) from which the body is fed and nourished. All the body’s parts (each Christian) receive gifts from God (1 Corinthians 12:7 and following) with which to serve the body as a whole. Thus, the growth of the body in grace is “of God.” The work of sanctification is not just for the purpose of individual growth but is also for the health of the whole body.

Verses 20-22: 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, “Do not handle, do not taste, do not touch!” (which all refer to things destined to perish with use)—in accordance with the commandments and teachings of men?

The Greek word for “rudiments” (stoicheia) is deliberately ambiguous. It commonly meant not only the “elements” of nature, but also the axioms or basic structural principles of a philosophy of life. Similarly, this word applied to the law as a pattern of living. Christ frees us from the erroneous philosophies of the world (verse 8), with their false and enslaving presuppositions, the stoicheia (basic principles or axioms) of the Greek philosophers. Likewise, we are freed from the earth-bound principles of the law. This is remarkably negative language for a Jew! It shows how strongly Paul felt about the complete passing of the old covenant, and how personally he knew the seductive power of legalism in any form. As a highly-committed Pharisee, he had trod that tiresome path himself and wanted to save the Colossian believers from going that way.

The verse also contains a warning against dependence on “the traditions of men”, a subject which became a big issue between Rome and the Reformers in the Reformation era. Romanist salvationism has been highly legalistic since the early Middle Ages. In that system, the believer is required to “merit the merits of Christ” through the sacraments and by obedience to the hierarchy from the Pope down. When Jesus died as our representative and substitute, however, we died also in Him to the law. Why then, should we submit to traditionalist legalisms? This question cannot be answered affirmatively from the Bible; in fact, we shouldn’t submit to them.

Verse 23: 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.

Following these “teachings of men” provides an outward show of wisdom and humility, of “self-made religion” (NASB) and abuse of our bodies by ascetic practices. Paul, however, is explicitly clear about these things: they have no value and cannot protect us against fleshly indulgence. In fact, they may be demonic (1 Tim 4:1-5).

Conclusion

The law tells us what sin is, that it is “exceedingly sinful” (Romans 7:13), and that it is repugnant in God’s sight. That’s the bad news. The law also pointed to Christ, leading like those slaves who led children to school in the Greek world (the paidogogoi of Gal 3:24). Today it continues to stand as the witness of Christ, identifying Him as the only One who completely fulfilled all its righteous requirements.

Now, however, we live under a very different covenant, and this new covenant is “not like” the old (Heb 8:9), which could be “broken” by the sinners with which it was made. This new covenant is based on “two unchangeable things,” God’s oath and God’s promise only, and He will never break His word, as Jesus said in John 10:35. Paul confirms this fact in 2 Timothy 2:13, for “He cannot contradict himself.” Jesus Himself guarantees the new covenant. That’s the good news of the Gospel.

In their determination to show how the law is still “relevant” to the believer, the Puritans of the 15-1600s often preached a “third use of the law” which reestablished it as the rule of life for the Christian. This preaching was a disastrous move and led to the theory today called theonomy which brings all of life once more under the curse of the law. Either Jesus took this curse upon himself, or it still rests on every believer, and nobody is saved. But no theonomist could have written the highly negative evaluation of the Mosaic law we find in Hebrews 8:13 and 7:18; “When he said ‘a new covenant’ he has made the first obsolete. But whatever is becoming obsolete and growing old, is ready to disappear.” And “there is a setting aside of the former commandment because of its weakness and uselessness, for the Law made nothing perfect….”

Attentive readers will draw their own conclusions. †

Commentary Sources

1. Bruce, F. F. Colossians, “Philemon and Ephesians” (in Eerdman’s New International Commentary on the New Testament, 1984). Good modern commentary by the most famous evangelical commentator in the mid-20th century. Very high quality and easy to understand.
2. Clark, Gordon H. Colossians (1979, reprinted currently by Trinity Foundation). Very clear and helpful shorter exposition by a great Christian philosopher and Greek teacher.
3. Davenant, John. An Exposition of the Epistle to the Colossians (Latin 1627, ET 1831, reprinted 1979). A superb example of a Puritan Bishop’s exposition from a Reformed Anglican pulpit. Very helpful.
4. Gill, John. “Colossians” in his six-volume Exposition of the whole Bible (1700s, often reprinted). Gill was a Calvinistic Baptist, and a moderate Covenantalist, the only man in history to preach through every verse of the Bible and publish it as a commentary.
5. Lightfoot, John B. Colossians and Philemon (1879, and often reprinted). A classic commentary on the Greek text of these two letters by one of the great Anglican teaching Bishops of Durham. Contains a good account of the “Colossian heresy” in an introductory essay. Very helpful even if you can’t read much Greek or Latin.
6. Vaughn, Curtis. “Colossians” (in Volume 11 of Zondervan’s Expositor’s Bible Commentary, 1978). Another shorter commentary in a larger set on the whole Bible. This conservative set is excellent for ready-reference, as it covers the whole Bible in twelve volumes.
7. Readers are also directed to the fullest and most accurate account from the 1800s of the doctrine of Atonement in the New Testament, the superb study by Thomas Crawford, The Scripture Doctrine of The Atonement. My copy is the fifth edition of 1888, but it has been reprinted since. It is effectively a commentary on every verse dealing with the nature of Christ’s atoning death. Unusually helpful. The best book on the NT terminology for the Atonement is Leon Morris’ The Apostolic Preaching Of The Cross (Eerdmans, Third Edn., 1965).
8. Aquila and Priscilla Study Center. (423) 434-2188. E-mail: rkwjc@chater.net
   
   

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M. K. McGregor Wright is an Australian born in 1940. After teaching in high schools in Adelaide, he left to study in England. He came to America in 1970 to do a ThM at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Apologetics. There he met his wife Julia from Tennessee. While involved in a ministry to International Students in Denver, he completed a PhD in historical theology. He has published No Place For Sovereignty (IVP, 1996). At present he writes and operates a Bible-teaching ministry in East Tennessee called Aquila and Priscilla Study Center. You may contact him at rkwjc@charter.net.