Colossians 1:1-14: Paul’s Prayer for Our Need

What this episode covers

Download the bulletin below: 20260802_final Transcript 20260802Download Rev. John Pennylegion – August 2, 2026 Good morning. Welcome to Christ the King. If we haven’t met, my name is Penny, and I’m the senior pastor here, and it is good to be with you. If you are a guest or a visitor, welcome. We’re glad that you would join us this morning, and you are joining us in the first Sunday of a new series in the Book of Colossians. So we’re in the New Testament Book of Colossians, so if you have a Bible, you can turn there to Colossians 1. If you don’t have a Bible, there are Bibles in the chairs in front of you, and you can find our passage on page 981, or you can follow along on the screens, because we’ll have the passage there as well. But since this is the first week in a new series, it’s good for us to take just a moment and to orient ourselves to this book of the Bible. I’m sure some of you have read it before, maybe you’re familiar with it, maybe you’ve studied it. Others of us, maybe this is the first time we’ve opened up to this portion of God’s Word, and so it’s important for us to know a little bit about it. And so what we need to know is that this was written by the Apostle Paul, and he’s writing to a church that he’s never actually met. So this is a little bit unique, because oftentimes when Paul is writing a letter, he’s writing to maybe a fellow laborer like Timothy or Titus, or he’s writing to a church that he helped plant or start, that he’s familiar with, like 1st or 2nd Corinthians, or Ephesians, or Philippians. But here with Colossians, Paul’s never been there. He hasn’t interacted with these people, he doesn’t know their faces, he’s only heard their names through his fellow worker, fellow laborer, Epaphras. You see, this church was planted by Epaphras, and over the years, somewhere along the way, we’re not sure when, but Epaphras has been talking to Paul, and been sharing with Paul about this church, about how it’s growing, how it’s facing various challenges, what’s occurring within the life of the church. And so Paul’s writing to them. He’s writing to them from prison, and we’re not sure which of his imprisonments he’s writing from, right? There’s a number of them, you can read about them in Acts, but historically and traditionally, we have thought that he’s probably writing from his time in prison in Rome. And so what this means is this is one of his later letters. And he’s writing to them because there are these philosophies and ideas that have started to seep into the church, that are devaluing the importance and significance of Jesus. And instead, these philosophies and ideas are emphasizing a need for heavenly wisdom, or secret knowledge. In fact, it’s kind of like what would later come to be known as Gnosticism. It’s not Gnosticism yet, because that doesn’t appear until many, many years after Paul is dead, but it’s kind of like a proto-Gnosticism, where the people are encouraged to move on beyond the things of this world, physicality, and the things that we experience, and what we need to achieve is some sort of heavenly, or secret, or enlightened knowledge. That’s what’s seeping into the church, and Paul’s writing to them to encourage them and to tell them that what their greatest need is, above anything else, is Jesus. In fact, so much so that some theologians have referred to Colossians as the most Christ-focused of the New Testament letters. Now, that might be a little bit of hyperbole, because all the New Testament letters point to Christ, right? But we get the point. Paul is presenting to them and to us that what we need, more than anything else, is Christ. Okay, that’s a little bit of background. I’m sure as we go through this series over the next few months, there’ll be other bits of background, but that’s probably sufficient for now. So, let’s go ahead and dive into our passage, and we’ll read Colossians 1, beginning in verse 1. “Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will

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