The preeminence of Jesus Christ is both a fact and the key to experiencing true life. Lasting peace, joy, purpose, and meaning are found exclusively in Him.
This is a truth stressed over and over in Paul’s letter to the Colossians. And it is a truth especially highlighted in Colossians 1:24-29.
God makes His home in the Christian. He “takes up residence” in the Christian’s body and soul. He dwells within believers. Are you a believer? Then Christ is in you.
And “Christ in you” is the key to everything.
The Key to Suffering in Life (24-25)
Like other Christians, Paul was persecuted for his faith and had suffered hardships. He suffered economic hardships and relational hardships. He was ostracized, beaten, and ridiculed. He suffered physically and emotionally as a Christian and yet, he says in verse 24, “I now rejoice in my sufferings for you.”
“I now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up in my flesh what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ, for the sake of His body, which is the church.” (verse 24)
Before we talk about how Paul can rejoice in his sufferings, let’s consider the often misunderstood phrase “and fill up in my flesh what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ.”
Some have taken this phrase to mean that Paul is talking about something lacking in Christ’s suffering on our behalf. Others have used this verse to teach the unbiblical idea of penance or even punishing oneself for sin because Christ’s suffering on the cross was seen as somehow lacking.
The notion of Christ’s suffering on the cross as somehow insufficient is totally contrary to the entire teaching of the New Testament. We have previously noted that Paul’s main point in this letter is that the Christian is complete in Christ.
Christ in you is the key to everything.
This verse is not teaching that Christ’s sufferings on our behalf lacked something that we needed; something else to atone for our sin. In fact, the Greek word for suffering in verse 24 is never once used in the entire New Testament to describe Christ’s sufferings in His atonement for us.
Rather, Paul is teaching that Christians—the church—will suffer. If you are a believer, then you will suffer similar hardships to that of the apostle.
It’s much as our Lord Jesus promised in John 16:33, “In the world you will have tribulation,” you will suffer.
So this phrase, “filling up what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ” is Paul’s teaching that the suffering endured by the church—the body of Christ —continues. Christ suffered once for all time in His physical body and He is now at the right hand of the Father. The church here on earth is the meaning of the word body in this context. The church continues to suffer and endure hardships here.
Paul adds that it is this church, “of which I became a minister according to the stewardship from God which was given to me for you, to fulfill the word of God,” (verse 25)
Paul was divinely commissioned to serve as a minister. God called him to preach the gospel and to plant churches. So he suffered as a Christian minister, enduring hardships and difficulties as he went about the ministry of proclaiming the Word of God.
And yet, he says in verse 24, “I now rejoice in my sufferings.” How can he rejoice? Because Christ lives in Him: “Christ in you, the hope of glory (verse 27).” That Christ was in him was a fact he was experiencing presently and a fact that he would enjoy forever. And this is a fact that he is proclaiming to others.
Consider that Paul’s sufferings were the means God was using to bless other people with the gospel. That’s clear given what Paul is saying in verse 25.
So make the connection: If Paul’s sufferings were the means God used to bless others and bring glory to Himself—how does God intend to work through your sufferings to bless others and glorify Himself?
When you go through hardships and difficulties for Christ, would you not be encouraged knowing that your sufferings served a greater purpose? Would it not be encouraging to you if you knew that your sufferings for Christ would be the very means God was using to bring a loved one to faith in Christ?
Would you be encouraged to know that your sufferings may well lead to somebody else’s being blessed by the ministry of Jesus?
There is no suffering of yours that is wasted.
One of the keys to getting through suffering or enduring suffering is to know that God is at work through our suffering. He works to make us more holy through our suffering.
James taught a similar truth: “My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance, the ability to stand, and let endurance have it’s complete work so that you may be complete, lacking nothing.” (James 1:2-4)
Paul teaches here in Colossians 1 that another way God works through our suffering is to spread the Good News, to spread the gospel.
If you’re a Christian, one day you will be in heaven and imagine Jesus taking you around and showing you people who came to faith in Christ largely as a result of your suffering.
Christ in you, the key to suffering in life.
The Key to Meaning in Life (26-27)
“Christ in you” is the key to the very meaning of your existence. Paul describes this notion of Christ in us as a mystery:
the mystery which has been hidden from ages and from generations, but now has been revealed to His saints. (verse 26)
The word “mystery” in verse 26 is not mystery like we usually think of it. It doesn’t mean eerie, or cryptic or strange or something weird with music and smoke. It is a word that describes a thing that was once concealed but now revealed. It was there all along; you just couldn’t see it fully.
I usually think of my experience in looking for something in the refrigerator. I’m making nachos so I’ve got the chips and the cheese and I open the fridge door and I’m looking for the jalapeño peppers and I know we’ve got some, but I don’t see them. And I look and look and look, but I can’t see them. My wife comes over and immediately points them out. They were there all along, I just couldn’t see them.
In a way, that’s a bit like Paul’s use of the term mystery here. He is describing something God has done, but it is something that could not be fully seen until God revealed it later, revealing it “to His saints,” to believers. He adds:
To them God willed to make known what are the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles: which is—(and now here it is; the thing nobody could see until God revealed it)—Christ in you, the hope of glory. (verse 27)
The mystery, the thing nobody could have anticipated, was that GOD WOULD LIVE IN US WHO BELIEVE! “Christ in you, the hope of glory.”
This is the key to real meaning in life. Christ lives in the believer and guarantees the believer’s future in heaven. Christ in you—the hope of glory. Remember that New Testament hope is a fact, an assurance, a guarantee. You could just as well say, “Christ in you; the fact of your future existence; the hope, the guarantee of your future forever in heaven.
Why are you living? You live physically for maybe 80 or 90 years. If that’s all you’ve got, what good is that?
Your life is a vapor, here today, and gone in a moment (James 4:14). If all you are living for is this life, you’re wasting your life. If you are crossing your fingers and hoping there’s some kind of life after death and your’e just kind of taking your chances, you are wasting your life. The glorious good news of the Gospel is “Christ in you, the hope of glory!”
There is no news greater when a Christian loved one dies than to know that Christian is now in heaven. We can say, “Praise God for Jesus, the hope of glory!” Our loved one is in heaven. Are you headed there?
But the gospel is not just about the hereafter, but about the here now. Living in the here now is shaped by the truth of the hereafter.
Christ died for you that He might live in you.
Christians live their lives in the truth that God lives within them and empowers them for every work He calls us to do.
Have you ever sensed that God was working in you and through you as you shared the gospel with someone? As you talked to someone about Jesus? As you prayed, as you read the Word? You feel like: “Man, I sense the presence of God!” Yes, you do. Christ in you, the hope of glory.
As Jesus said in Matthew 10:20, “it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father who speaks in you.”
Christ in you, the key to everything. The key to suffering in life and the key to meaning in life. One more:
The Key to Growing in Life (28-29)
Every true Christian is growing. Paul writes:
Him we preach, warning every man and teaching every man in all wisdom, that we may present every man perfect (or complete) in Christ Jesus. (verse 28)
To this end I also labor, striving according to His working which works in me mightily. (verse 29)
For Paul it was not enough that the Colossians had accepted Jesus Christ as their personal Lord and Savior. That was not enough. That was just the beginning of their experience. He reminds Christians that there is so much more to learn.
The ultimate goal of ministry is “to present every man perfect (complete) in Christ Jesus.” That includes “warning” and “teaching,” and doing this “in all wisdom.”
Coming to faith in Christ is just the beginning. We go on growing in all wisdom. God intends to grow us all, and to make us look more and more like Jesus with each passing day.
One reason you attend worship services and small group studies is to consider the “warning” and the “teaching” of the Word “in all wisdom” that you may grow into completion.
Paul describes Christian growth as hard work: “to this end I also labor, striving according to His working which works in me mightily.” (verse 29)
That word “striving” is the word from which we get “to agonize.” It’s the picture of an athlete running, or fighting, and everything in him tells him to quit. But he digs down deeper and says, “I’m not going to stop! I’m gonna push through.”
It’s much like Romans 8:18: “For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.”
Just like Paul we must strive forward as we grow. Don’t stop. Push through. Don’t get comfortable in your Christianity and just rejoice in the victories. Keep pushing. Keep sharing the Gospel, keep growing, keep running.
And don’t stop in the face of your failures. Push through past failures.
Feel like you have failed the Lord recently? Who doesn’t?! Battling sin and temptation? Who doesn’t?! Push through. Dig down deep and keep moving.
Remember the key: Christ in you, the hope of glory!
What About You?
- Specifically how will remembering “Christ in you, the hope of glory” encourage you this week?
- Can you think of an example of how your suffering may be the means to a spiritual blessing?
- If you are not a Christian, then the opposite fact is true: “Christ is not in you” and there is no hope of glory. Turn to Him today and ask for His help to live the life He has called you to live.
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