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, 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. 15 When He had disarmed the rulers and authorities, He made a public display of them, having triumphed over them through Him. Colossians 2:13-15
There is the thought in the advertising world that the public endlessly seeks something in or from which they can “have it all.” But Oprah in all of her wisdom has warned us “you can have it all, but just not all at once.” Well, Oprah is dead wrong. We can have it all at once because Jesus “paid it all, and all to him I owe.”
These verses, because of Paul’s style of hammering home a point, outline four truths about how we’ve been “made alive together with Him.” They’re all in the past tense.
- Having forgiven us of all our transgressions.
- Having cancelled our certificate of debt.
- Having nailed it to the cross.
- Having triumphed over them (the rulers and authorities).
Therefore, based on these truths, we were dead, but he has made us alive. We were burdened down with debt, but he’s “taken it out of the way” and “nailed it to the cross” with finality. And no one can take away all that has been granted to us, that is, “having it all,” for all those who would appear to possess the power to do so have been disarmed (apekduo, disrobed) and disgraced. Seeing this…
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—17 things which are a mere shadow of what is to come; but the substance belongs to Christ. Colossians 2:16-17
To someone who would say to us, “you can have it all,” in our transgressions and in our flesh we’d have to exclaim “get real!” But here’s what’s exciting, when Paul says “the substance belongs to Christ,” the word he uses, substance, or soma in the Greek, is translated here “reality.”
I have a longtime African American friend who always says “for real” when presented with some fact. Yes, we can have it all. Yes, for real!
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