Gateway Chapel | Dr. Tony Merida

welcome to video chapel for the fall semester here at gateway seminary as you know the pandemic has caused us to cancel co-curricular activities like chapel at all of our campuses so instead we're offering you this video chapel experience for the fall now before we move into the chapel message for today and i introduce our speaker let me tell you two other important things first let me tell you how we decided to arrange the speakers for this fall's experience we pulled together a group of staff and faculty and asked them to consider messages from different speakers from all over the united states and to bring forward some recommendations of who they really thought the seminary community needed to hear from right now and so we put together a speaker's list and asked them to give us their best of message to share with gateway seminary so that's what you're going to be hearing this fall the best of speakers from across the united states now before we move again to the speaker let me also say thank you for helping us get off to such a good start last week with our face-to-face instruction here at gateway last week we had all kinds of scenario planning to deal with all kinds of difficulties that might arise when we started offering face-to-face instruction in the midst of the pandemic but frankly almost none of that materialized and i attribute that to your good attitude and your willingness to work together to solve these problems and figure out a way to deliver instruction face to face in all five of our locations so thank you faculty and staff and students for working together to make last week such a good experience and now we're into the semester and week by week we'll be continuing to address these issues as we continue to operate our academic program now for the speaker of the day our speaker today is dr tony morita he's the pastor and of preaching and vision at imago day church in raleigh north carolina he's the author of books like christ-centered expositor and orphanology and that second book's important because he's married to kimberly and they have five adopted children dr morita is a graduate of new orleans baptist theological seminary and has a good word for us today and i commend him to you as our speaker for this week's video chapel if you are a guest with us or new with us at a manga day we are going through the book of colossians and we're in week 3 of nine of this little series through uh this letter and today we're looking at one of the christological high points of the new testament that is a passage that is one of the premier passages in the whole new testament to talk about the person and work of jesus christ paul in very hymnic poetic language describes for us this stunning portrait of our savior and so let's pray and ask for the lord's help to understand it and apply it father we thank you for your word today we recognize that we don't live by bread alone but every word that comes from the mouth of god and we take this as your word every preposition every conjunction every pronoun everything in this text is filled with meaning and beauty and glory and so what we know not please teach us what we have not please give us and what we are not please make us for christ's sake we pray amen i don't know if you know anyone like this you can mention a particular thing to him or her and immediately it triggers a very passionate response they can go on for hours talking about whatever that thing is perhaps you have an uncle or something and you can just mention a 67 camaro and you can just sit back and listen to uncle joe go on and on about all the virtues of 67 camaro or perhaps you've been around the debate is michael jordan or was michael jordan better than lebron james and you observe passionate advocates for one or the other talking about the attributes of these great players around these parts you often hear a debate about barbecue don't you on whether texas barbecue or kansas city barbecue or memphis barbecue is better than the other and you hear them go on and on about sauces and burnt ends and all other things related to barbecue when i was in seminary i had a professor we could just mention qumran and it triggered a non-stop incessant talk about ancient scrolls uh it was always a convenient thing to do when we didn't have our homework because he could go on for 50 minutes i would just say dr cole you know didn't they find psalm 42 in cave 11. oh yes and there he would go for 45 minutes talking about qumran i was thinking about this when i was uh thinking about movies uh one of the one of the scenes that came to my mind is when uh in the movie sandlot uh the the new kid on the block his name was smalls remember him let's say it together you're killing me smalls yeah there you go i thought you were familiar with that movie uh it's the name babe ruth and everybody goes on about babe ruth he goes and finds a baseball because they didn't have one and it was signed by babe ruth and he knew nothing about baseball and he brings his dad's autographed ball out to play and they asked him where did you get that ball and he says i don't know some lady gave it to me she even signed her name on it baby ruth and they all say babe ruth and they go on and he he keeps saying i don't know who she is and they're like he's the sultan of swat he is the king of crash he is the colossus of clout he is the great bambino and small says you mean that's the same guy it's that sort of thing we come up to here in colossians chapter one paul has just described in verses 12 and 13 that the father has transferred us out of the dominion of darkness and placed us in the son of his love and it's just the mention just the thought of jesus and his redemption that triggers this passionate exposition of this christ christ is this and christ is that christ is this and christ is that and we're all sort of like smalls here at the end saying i mean this is the same guy yes this is not the great bambino this is someone infinitely more glorious the lord jesus christ now remember the theme of colossians we're calling it christ is enough about the sufficiency of jesus this fits right in with this overarching theme of the letter because it's the supremacy of christ that assures you of the sufficiency of christ right when you understand who jesus is then you can believe he's enough but if you don't have a big enough vision of christ if his your christ is puny then you might not think he's enough but it's the supremacy of jesus that assures us of the sufficiency of jesus now practically what this text ought to do i think in the spirit of the text itself is simply inspire praise all right the some argue whether or not this was an early hymn that is verses 15 to 20 and paul uh adopted it perhaps tweaked it a bit uh paul's fully capable of having written it himself we do have other passages that that seem to be early creeds or early hymns and uh are inspired texts now for us um regardless of of the the the human origin of it it's been preserved for us and it is clearly in poetic hymnic form and i think that's something to keep in mind whenever you're looking at a text that is saying something lofty about the character of jesus trying to articulate his glory it's almost like language is inadequate and so the the way you express that which is uh you know impossible to express in language often is in poetry it's in music it's in it's in hymnology right and that's the sort of thing you get you have here in colossians um language is inadequate it made me think of shai lin i've got to put at least one hip hop song in per servant don't i when he he writes one of his owns imagine and i can't explain the half of it our brains can't even fathom it and language is inadequate to characterize the lord on the throne with spiritual eyes his story is shown from him and through him and to him as everything surely to god be the glory alone that's what we're looking at here it's just a powerful passage about the the majesty of jesus so we could spend we're spending nine weeks on the letter of colossians we could spend nine weeks on this text but we're not going to do that nor nine hours and so an effort to get you out of here uh in a reasonable amount of time i'm just going to outline this passage for us with five c's five c's you're welcome so we're going to see here christ's clarity christ's creation christ control christ church and christ cross now the first three fall under one big section in the text verses 15 to 17 christ as creator the first three that is his clarity his creation is control and then the second two fall under that uh sort of the you might a heading of redemption or new creation that is his church and his cross so we're going to look at it uh with that in mind and from the feel of that i hope you get a sense of where the text moves right it starts with the highest of highs from the lofty heights of the pre-existent son of god who created and sustains everything and it descends all the way to the cross and so we see here the cosmic christ and the crucified christ all of which should inspire praise all right so here's the clarity piece verse 15 he is the image of the invisible god the firstborn of all creation notice this pronoun he it pops up over and over it's again it's like this triggered response he is this he is that you see it again down in verse 17. he's before all things verse 18 he's the head of the body verse 18 also he is the beginning and so on paul here is is sort of moving like an unstoppable machine talking about the the being of jesus christ and the first thing he says is that he is the image this is the greek word icon where we get the word icon from that that is he is thank you uh he is the visible aspect accurately representing that which is invisible meaning that jesus perfectly reveals the nature of god you remember when paul says over in 2 corinthians 4 we have the light of the knowledge of the glory of god in the face of jesus christ we see him we see our god verse 19 of the same chapter we're looking at in him all the fullness of god was pleased to dwell the same is said in chapter 2 verse 9 in him all the fullness of deity dwelt bodily recall the conversation of philip when he says to jesus in john 14 show us the father and that will be enough and jesus says he who has seen me has seen the father philippians 2 another great christ him though he was in the very nature god very form of god he did not count equality with god a thing to be grasped but emptied himself taking the form of a servant being born in the likeness of men you want to know what the invisible god looks like you look to jesus jesus brings clarity to the question what is god like we look at jesus we don't believe in some god of our imagination some vague god we believe in the god of revelation god has revealed himself in jesus we see god as creator and redeemer calvin says in christ god shows his righteousness goodness wisdom power in short his entire self this is our savior now we know humans we've already talked about this some this morning are made in the imago day in the image of god but jesus you see is the only one that has satisfactory likeness to god he is the perfect image of god and later we're taught in colossians chapter 3 verse 10 one of the things that god is doing in his people is he's conforming them more and more to the image of his son and so we see here that christ's clarity inspires praise praise god god has revealed himself to us shown us himself in the savior secondly notice here christ's creation second part of verse 15 and verse 16 paul says first of all that jesus is the firstborn over all creation firstborn of creation now firstborn of course doesn't mean jesus was created and so remember that we have uh there are several reasons for that in this text itself in fact the very next verse says by him all things were created therefore he was not created uh the whole passage is supporting the pre-existence of jesus if you remember john 1 when john says in the beginning was the word and the words with god in the word was god and i said this text shows us that jesus always was wasn't right he's there was never a point in which he did not exist so what does firstborn mean well firstborn actually has two different meanings it can mean priority in regard to time that is first or it can mean supreme in ranking right so when it comes to creation it is true he's first in time he's he was there before creation he had no beginning um but i think the latter uh uh the latter uh definition is what paul has in mind here that jesus is supreme in rank he is the first ranked over all creation he's supreme over creation which is actually how the niv translates it to help us where they translate it not firstborn of creation but firstborn over creation and that's the idea here perhaps the best cross reference is psalm 89 verse 27 god speaking about david when he says i will make him the firstborn and then he clarifies what that means the highest of the kings on earth so firstborn is a title of supremacy it's paul's way of distinguishing christ from every created thing he is over creation he's greater than creation jesus christ outranks everything in creation he outranks anything you like in creation he's more important than anything you like in creation he is greater than wealth he is greater than sex he is greater than power he is greater than sports he's greater than pumpkin spice lattes doughnuts chicken wings anything else that we might enjoy can we just chill with the pumpkins you know that's a whole other sermon i know i know people have a bleeding heart and they you know they they think the pumpkin doesn't get enough time and attention but anyway i digress jesus is greater that's the point there are many things in creation to enjoy after all he has created them for us to enjoy them but not worship them it is good and right for us to enjoy autumn weather and to praise him for that and for all the other good things that you might enjoy in this life of friendship and relationships and sports and camp fires and flannel shirts and beard oil and whatever your thing is right but nothing is more supreme and more important than jesus christ why because he's first rank over creation he is supreme over it and then notice in verse 16 something else about the creation it says here why he's supreme over creation he created all things including things in heaven and on earth visible and invisible and then he goes on about these thrones dominions rulers and authorities now let's think about this for a moment notice a couple of things one jesus majesty is seen believe it or not in these prepositions you're praising christ through the prepositions in this verse right those prepositions are these words by through and for creation was created by him right jesus is the source the origin of creation it was created through him that is jesus is the mediating agent through whom it was came into unlike what they believed in colossae that there were other intermediaries and other you know beings that created things he's saying no it all came to being only through jesus and notice the end or the goal of creation in that preposition for it exists for him all things were created by him through him and for him we also see his majesty in that little word all all things mentioned twice in verse 16 at the first part of it and the second part if there is a made thing he made it all things came into their existence by him through him and for him and notice the majesty of jesus creation by his saying that he created things in heaven and on earth visible and invisible and then thrones dominions rulers and authorities now i think these invisible powers these thrones authorities and dominions are referring to evil uh authorities and rulers and so on and i get that just from the very next chapter in chapter 2 when paul uses these words he's using them in an evil sense right in chapter 2 verse 8 he says don't be taken captive by these elemental spirits of the world and then more convincingly even is verse 15 of chapter 2 jesus disarmed the rulers and authorities by putting them to open shame by triumphing over them in him that is on the cross jesus uh triumphed over the darkness over the evil and so put it back here in the colossians one now he's saying that jesus created these things and he's sovereign over these forces these hosts now paul doesn't get into all the philosophical questions about why did he create them and how did they fall et cetera et cetera his point here is just jesus is supreme over all dark forces therefore you don't have to be afraid of them and that was an important word in colossae in the pagan world in which there were this belief in darkness and you know some dark force and everything people living in great fear understanding who jesus is casts out fear and it still does doesn't it you see knowing christ is not just something to sign off on on a doctrinal statement knowing who christ is should impact your emotions it should settle you down there is nothing in the world more powerful than this christ this is our christ he's supreme and sovereign over all things so we flee to him we trust in him we serve through him we go through the valley of the shadow of death knowing he is with us this is our christ paul says he is the one who brings clarity to what god is like he is the creator of everything thirdly notice christ control verse 17. the text reminds us here by this conjunction and i love this little conjunction because it's almost like paul is saying and there's more and there's more you see it again in verse 18. and it's actually there in the greek text even though some of the translators take it out i don't like that but we'll leave that for another nerdy paper and is saying you need to catch this too he says there's another thing he is before all things and in him all things hold together so creation wasn't created by some sort of hands-off god who just lets it run by itself this jesus who is before all things being sovereign and supreme over all things holds it all together he is the divine glue he is that which helps everything cohere and hold together christ sustains right now the whole universe from big things to little things one writer says he is the operating principle controlling existence another said he's the principle of cohesion i love how bishop mule put it he put he said jesus keeps the cosmos from becoming chaos and that's what we read about in hebrews 1 3 he's the radiance of the glory of god the exact imprint of his nature and he upholds the universe by the word of his power he sustains all things clinton arnold writes not only does christ keep the world from falling apart as a result of earthquakes floods plagues cosmic disturbances he maintains a check on the awful workings of the demonic powers what difference does this make to know that christ sustains the cosmos only everything right in ancient paganism no one knew if their god or goddess was in control or if another god or goddess was stronger they ascribed great human features often to these goddesses you remember in the old testament elijah was mocking some of the false prophets asking if their god had went to the restroom or if he went on a vacation right no one knew if that's your god who's holding it all together chaos could happen at any moment well today the modern person says yeah we don't believe in that old paganism stuff we don't believe in all the gods and goddesses stuff no what we have today is secularism which wants an answer for the universe and how it's sustained that's devoid of god and right here it is tucked away in this old book of colossians in him all things hold together jesus christ sustains the cosmos moment by moment this doesn't mean that there aren't disasters earthquakes tsunamis but why are they so limited why doesn't everything fly off into nothingness because in him all things hold together and therefore life is not meaningless and the world is not chaos and if jesus christ my friends can sustain the cosmos he can sustain us in our trials in our despair i love the old gatsby hymn immortal honors rest on jesus's head my god my portion and my living bread in him i live upon him cast my care he saves from death destruction and despair because he sustains all things he can sustain us in our despair the christ who sustains the cosmos can sustain you in your chaos we don't have a puny little christ the supremacy of jesus christ assures us of the sufficiency of jesus christ this jesus is enough i remember early on in our marriage i think it was the first year of our marriage came home for dinner really hungry and kimberly laid out of what was you know delightful looking spinach salad and immediately i went on a quest in the kitchen to see what was going with the spinach salad where is the protein and to my dismay i found nothing there to support the salad and i was just saying babe this is not enough you know it's early on or mayor we may need some marital counseling um my appetite and yours are obviously not the same uh i can't live on bird seed and water i i've got to have some this is not enough we we never say that about jesus christ we never look at this christ and say this is not enough and i've learned never to say that about my wife's dinner either maybe she's communicating a message to me right now we see here christ christ control fourthly christ church we move into the kind of this next section of of the uh of the passage where paul moving moving from the cosmic creation sustaining that's lofty stuff isn't it rulers authorities visible invisible to real earthy stuff now to this christ who came to earth and died and rose and established a church so notice verse 18 he is the head of the body the church he's the head that is he's the lord over it also probably conveyed in this idea is he gives life to it right he's the leader the chief the sovereign over the church over the people of god and it's his body that's that reminds us that there is a great mysterious intimate union between christ and his people head body communicates that intimacy right that union also communicates here that the church is a living organism that's joined together and that the body is the means by which christ carries out his mission on earth christ is the head over the church and verse 18 b tells us one of the reasons why he is the head of the church he is the beginning the firstborn from the dead actually can be translated if you take this relative pronoun as because because he is the firstborn from the dead the reason christ is the head of the church is because he is the resurrected lord he is the beginning the firstborn from the dead now here's that word again firstborn remember it back in verse 15. and if you already forgot what i said i remind you that it can be precedence in time or it can mean supremacy and rank and this time i actually think it means precedent in time he was the first to rise from the dead never to die again and what paul is saying here is that what is true of christ is true of his people because christ rose from the dead so will you because he has conquered death so will you so verse 17 tells us in our despair christ can sustain us verse 18 tells us in our death christ can raise us he is the firstborn from the dead some people translate that firstborn often as trailblazer that's a good idea of it a pioneer michael green in his book the empty cross gives a helpful analogy i think he writes that in the middle ages there was a debate about whether or not it was possible to have a sea route to india and no one could seem to get around uh africa in fact they renamed uh the the tippo that that cape uh the cape of storms because so many people kept dying trying to get to this land of spices but one particular uh pioneer explorer from portuguese vasco de gama made it he's the first european to reach india by sea and after he reached india by sea others followed it was impossible to deny that it was that that it could uh could be done because he did it and in a greater way in a more important way green says it's sort of like that with christ as the firstborn from the dead he's the first in sequence and more will follow we look at death and we say is there any way through death is there any way you can go from death to life and the answer is yes because jesus took the voyage into darkness and he came out in resurrection power and he takes your hand and he takes my hand and he says i'll take you through the valley of the shadow of death and i can lead you out this is our savior this is why he's the head of the body because he is the firstborn from the dead that in everything he might be preeminent that is everything he said up to this point and beyond jesus is first place he's he's preeminent he is supreme now we go lower still in verse 19 as we think about christ's cross the fifth aspect here of christ he mentions first the deity of jesus i've already alluded to that that in christ all the fullness of god was pleased to dwell but here's the marvel of it that this fully divine son of god came to die on the cross and through him to reconcile to himself all things whether on earth or in heaven making peace by the blood of the cross the blood of the cross that's where this text ends it starts with the lofty vision of jesus and it ends with a bloody mangled savior and there are two aspects of reconciliation the first one i just read cosmic reconciliation the second i'll look at just a moment personal reconciliation cosmic verse 20 notice here that it says through jesus that he will reconcile to himself all things well that goes back to what we just looked at in creation he created all things and he will restore all things in this fallen creation and how is he going to do that through the cross the crosswork of jesus christ has a cosmic purpose jesus is not just redeeming spiritual disembodied people floating around nowhere but he's coming to redeem and restore the cosmos why why does it need to be redeemed well remember romans 8 the whole creation is groaning it's it's in futility it needs to be set right is not as it should be and it will be set right it will be restored to its proper order and that's why we sing at christmas i can't wait for christmas no more let sins and sorrows grow nor thorns infest the ground he comes to make his blessings flow where far as the curse is found and where is it found over the whole earth what is jesus going to restore the whole earth he's going to he's going to restore it all and even this happened through the blood of the cross that was happening on that particular occasion that's how it would happen listen to david garland great scholar he says the death of an obscure jew on a seemingly god-forsaken hill in a backwater of the roman empire attracted no notice from the historians of the era but it was the event that reconciles heaven and earth the world may be corrupted disordered and ravaged by sin but god still loves it and god intends for it to fulfill its destiny in christ sin has defaced christ's work and creation but he came to undo its consequences and bring concord in a universe out of harmony with god how did he make peace how will shalom be realized through his cross but now notice there's not only the cosmic dimension there's a personal dimension verse 21 and i love how this sentence begins and you remember what we've been reading he is and he is and he is and he is and now it is and you you see how personal this section is now paul has just said here's the greatness of jesus christ and it would be great to feel distant from this christ right to feel distant from the one who sustains the cosmos i mean he seems to be kind of busy that seems to be rather important but now you see this involves you you who were once alienated and hostile in mind doing evil deeds this is the past right alienated as we're separated from god in our sin hostile in mind so we're sinful in our thinking we do evil deeds this is our past but notice the present but he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death in order to present you here is your standing christian holy blameless above reproach before him how is that possible because i know i'm not holy i know i'm not blameless i know i'm not above reproach before him well i am in jesus christ i am as holy as jesus christ is i am as without blemish as jesus christ is i am as above reproach as jesus christ is because christ is mine i've been united with christ this is our positional identity i mean you can't get much of a darker picture in verse 21 you're alienated you're evil dude your mind is hostile and you can't get a better picture in verse 22 you're holy and blameless and above reproach the bible tells us we're far worse than we ever thought we were and we're in a better standing than we could ever dream to be in the gospel is good news past present now notice future 23. if indeed you continue in the faith stable and steadfast so real faith is persevering faith or it's not real faith real faith does persevere it's steadfast or it proves that it never was real faith a faith that withers and dies never was real faith so we have the constant exhortations in the epistles to continue in fact i said this before but chapter two verse six and seven is really the heart of the book i think as you receive christ so walk in him you see there's a consistency to the faith we begin a particular way we continue the same way so as we started by trusting in christ and relying on christ as we receive this grace now we keep walking in christ we keep trusting in christ stable and steadfast not shifting and here's what inspires that hope or that's what inspires the perseverance hope the hope of the gospel which i think is an echo of chapter one verse five the hope played up for you in heaven why is it that we keep pressing on that we remain steadfast because of hope we are a people of hope hope is laid up for us in heaven which has been proclaimed paul says in all creation which i take again to be back to verse six chapter one how the gospel is being preached in the whole world that is the gentile mission is advancing the gospel is going to the ends of the earth and he says that which i paul became a minister so isn't that astonishing after this lofty picture of jesus christ he says and you too this christ is for you and how has he come for us he came in humility he came and lived a sinful life excuse me a sinless life for sinful people he came and traded places with us taking our punishment giving us his righteousness making us holy and blameless before him in this little insignificant town in the lycus valley right paul says this cosmic christ this sovereign christ is for you too and i think it's it's it's it's wonderful how this passage ends here at the cross you see we believe that the glory of god is also seen in the old rugged cross as isaiah says jesus was so disfigured in his appearance he did not seem to be that of a man and even in that there is majesty in christ so paul shows us the cosmic christ the conquering christ the crucified christ all of it in all of these ways he is glorious and later he says we'll look at next week this christ is in you he's in you so the christ that is above you as creator the christ that is beyond you as sustainer the christ that is for you who was crucified is also the christ in you the hope of glory this is why we should live christ-centered lives amen because he should have first place in everything in our homes in our relationships in our vocation in our pleasure that he would be preeminent he would have first place there's no one like him if you have this jesus christ you have enough his supremacy assures you of his sufficiency i've always liked the story of the englishman who owned a huge estate and a visiting minister came by his estate and the owner was very proud to show him all the stuff that belonged to him and he says to the visiting minister you see that farm over there that's my farm and he looks in another direction and he says you you see that house over there you know that's my house too and he goes on and on about what he has and then the minister looks down the way and he looks at this little village and he says you see the village down there so there's a poor lady in that village she can say more than all this and the guy's like what how how what does she have and the minister said she can say christ is mine if you have jesus christ you have the riches of glory he is enough realize christian what you have realize who he is and he will be enough father we thank you for your word we'll be looking at this text for the rest of our christian lives reminding ourselves of the preeminence of jesus christ and i pray that he would have first place in our lives and all that we say and do may christ be magnified he is worthy of it worthy of praise worthy of our lives lord jesus we think about the standing we have before god now we're reminded that it happened through your perfect sinless life and your substitutionary death and now as we approach the table i pray you would give us a sense of deep and profound gratitude for what you have done for us in taking us from people who were hostile in mind doing evil deeds being alienated from god who has now been called holy without blemish we're grateful for your work on our behalf continue to bless your church even now we pray in jesus name amen

Channel: Gateway Seminary

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Rating: 5 out of 5

Keywords: chapel, tony merida, christ, colossians

Id: oMevUbGZUeE

Length: 40min 8sec (2408 seconds)

Published: Wed Sep 02 2020