Dr. Rodney Plunket

"Faith in the Power of God"

Colossians 2:8-15
November 22, 1998

This morning I have split the sermon in two. You may have already noticed that what the worship order refers to as the sermon leads up to the Lord’s Supper and that the invitation comes later, after the Supper. The reason is that I want to begin by focusing upon baptism from the perspective of those who have already experienced it, because it is from that perspective that Paul writes in Colossians 2. During the invitation, I want to say some things to encourage any who need to experience Christian baptism to come forward and be baptized into Jesus Christ. But first let’s hear what Paul says about baptism in Colossians 2 to people who have already experienced it.

Colossians is a book written to some first century Christians whose focus had drifted. They were no longer focused upon Christ. They were distracted by an unhealthy interest in things like angels and food laws. Paul’s primary purpose in this book is to refocus them upon Christ.

A good example of the way that Paul targets this purpose is found in Colossians 2:6-7. There he says, "As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, continue to live your lives in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving". Paul in these two verses reminds his listeners that they were taught to be rooted and built upon Jesus, and he exhorts them to keep living lives that are rooted and built upon Christ Jesus. Stay focused upon Him, he says.

When Paul gets to Colossians 2:8ff he does not change his purpose. He is still seeking to cement the faith of his readers in Christ Jesus. He tells them in Colossians 2:9 that in Jesus "the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily". In verse 10 he builds upon the fullness of Jesus by declaring that they "have been given fullness in Christ". Then in verse 11 he tells them of a circumcision which they received in Christ. It is not a physical circumcision but a spiritual one; it is a spiritual circumcision that consists "in the putting off of the sinful nature". I take Paul here to mean something much like what we saw last week in Romans 6. That is, this spiritual circumcision is the act which breaks the dominating power of sin over our lives.

Now look at verse 12. Paul connects this spiritual circumcision to a specific Christian experience. He connects it to the time when his readers were "buried with [Christ] in baptism". Last week we heard Paul in Romans 6 say, "we have been buried with [Christ] by baptism into death". Colossians 2 and Romans 6 make clear that Paul saw a vital connection between baptism and the believer being joined to the redeeming power of Christ’s burial/Christ’s death. In Colossians 2 Paul reveals that this dynamic joining to the death of Christ in baptism is the time when our sinful natures are circumcised away, are cut off and removed. Their power over us is broken.

But let’s stay focused. Paul is not writing here to enhance his readers’ view of baptism; he is writing to enhance their view of Christ. The focus is upon being "buried with Him". The focus is upon Christ, and when we talk about baptism we must stay focused upon Christ. It is because the NT Christians were connected to Jesus’ lifesaving death by baptism that we want to do the very same thing. Baptism is just a dunking without Jesus. Baptism is just a quick bath without the death of Christ. Our faith is not in baptism. We are nowhere told to put our faith there. Our faith is in Christ Jesus and in the power of His death.

Now we want to look at the second half of Colossians 2:12, but to do that we need to read the entire verse. In your worship bulletin this verse is the fourth section of our Scripture reading. Colossians 2:12 says, "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". Notice the phrase "in which". The Greek prepositional phrase back of this English rendering is problematic. You see, it could just as easily be rendered "in whom" or "in him" referring to Christ rather than to baptism. If you look back at the beginning of verse 11 you will see the English phrase "in Him" and either coming next or a bit further along you will find the word "also". The three Greek words back of "in him also" in verse 11 are the exact same three words found in verse 12 and rendered a variety of ways depending on your translation. The question is simple. Is Paul still referring specifically to baptism here, or is he assuming that his readers will notice that the construction here is identical to the construction in verse 11 and know that he is again referring to what happens in Jesus? Yes, the question is simple, but the answer is not. I do not think we can know which antecedent Paul had in mind here. But I know that in Romans 6 when Paul talks about baptism joining us to the burial of Jesus he also very quickly starts talking about being raised with Him as well. Baptism, for Paul, naturally connects to being buried and raised.

But notice the whole of the verse. What raises us? Is it the coming up out of the water? Is that what raises us? No. Listen to what Paul says raises us; he says, "you were also raised up with Him through faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead". Baptism’s only power is its ability to be an event in which faith in the power of God is expressed. When our faith is in baptism as some kind of magic rite we have turned baptism into something pagan. And if we succeed in doing that, it would not surprise me at all to learn that God prefers those who have never figured out baptism but who fully understand "faith in the working of God, who raised [Christ] from the dead". Now don’t mishear me, I believe that God wants us to be a people who practice baptism, but I also believe even more strongly that he want us to practice it with all of the focus on Christ Jesus. Sometimes we talk way too much about the water. Sometimes we talk way too much about the form. The focus in the Bible is on Christ Jesus. And that is where our focus must be as well.

I am still talking to all of the baptized believers among us. Let’s focus upon Jesus. Let’s focus upon the fountain of Christ’s blood that saves us from our sins. When we revealed our faith in Jesus by being buried with Him in baptism we were dynamically joined by God to the saving power of Christ. We were connected to the fountain of His blood of His saving blood.

We want now to partake of the Lord’s Supper. We want now to focus upon what has saved us. We want to focus upon the saving fountain provided by God through Christ Jesus. Let’s focus, sisters and brothers. Let’s focus upon the power of our Savior and Lord as we eat the bread and drink the cup. Adam will come now to lead us in a song to center us upon that saving power.

This morning we end our series of four sermons on Christian baptism. And I want to end, as I said earlier, with an invitation to be baptized.

The Greek words translated as baptize and baptism refer to dipping or immersing. That is why we immerse. Baptism in the NT is accompanied by faith in Christ Jesus, otherwise it is just like a pagan magical rite. That is why we do not baptize infants; they are not yet able to put their faith in Jesus; so it is inappropriate, we think, to baptize them.

Colossians 2 presents a beautiful picture of baptism. It says that when we are baptized we are "raised with [Christ] through faith in the power of God’ (verse 12). It is the power of God that saves us. It is the power of God that raises us with Christ, and baptism is a means that God gives us to actualize our faith in God’s saving power. And verse 11 makes clear that when we are baptized "the circumcision of Christ" removes that old sinful flesh that condemned us and kept us from fellowship with God.

If you or I go into an operating room to have some cancerous growth removed, we are going there because of our faith in a doctor or doctors. We are not cured of our life-threatening condition by going into the operating room. We are saved because of what happens while we are there.

It seems to me that the same is true of baptism. It is not the going under the water that saves us. It is the power of God in whom we put our faith that saves us.

We go to an operating room because that is where the doctor does his or her life-saving work. We go to the waters of baptism because the New Testament makes clear that it is in those waters that God’s life-saving and life-giving work is performed. But our faith is not in baptism. Our faith is in God who saves us when we are washed in the blood of the Lamb––God‘s Son, Jesus Christ.

If you have never been buried with Christ, please put your faith in the power of God. Please be willing to be washed in the blood of the Lamb. Please come now as we stand and sing.