Colossians 2:13-17 - Out of the Shadows into the Sunlight

Today, Sunday June 6 Out of the Shadows into the Sunlight Colossians 2:13-17 And you, being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He has made alive together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses, having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us. And He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. Having disarmed principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it. So let no one judge you in food or in drink, or regarding a festival or a new moon or sabbaths, which are a shadow of things to come, but the substance is of Christ. The false teachers in the church at Colossae had mixed oriental mysticism with Greek philosophy and also with Jewish legalism. The flesh loves to be religious, so long as that religion does not have a cross to crucify the flesh. The Colossian believers were involved in Jewish legalism, the rituals, diets, holy days and so on. That’s why Paul wrote, “You are going out of the sunlight into the shadows. You are forsaking the reality of Christ’s body, for the symbols!” When I look around the world today, we see the same thing in most of so called Christianity. Jesus is still there in crucifixes, statues, rituals, ceremonies and religious services. Jesus has become the symbol while the flesh is satisfied with the works of religion. Christianity has become a religion that promotes and teaches Jesus plus the sacraments, the rituals, the ceremonies, and whatever else that might appeal to the flesh. The vain Greek philosophies of the world have an appeal to the intellectual mind while the religious rituals of diets, holy days and ceremonies have an appeal to the flesh. It is hard for us to conceive that we can be forgiven for all of our sins and trespasses by simply believing by faith in a cross where a man died two thousand years ago.  So we need to “add” our part to be saved. Please don’t fall for this deception and lie from the devil. Your forgiveness of sins is based totally on what Jesus did for us on the Cross. Jesus canceled the debt that we owed, our breaking of the laws of God, our trespasses, and the punishment for them, by nailing them to His cross when He took our place and our punishment and satisfied the wrath of God against us with His own death. That’s why we can be forgiven!!!!! Today, what are you depending on to save you! Christ is the reality everything else is only the shadow. Please come out of the shadows into the Sunlight of His love, His grace, His mercy and His forgiveness! God bless!