Colossians Part 1

Now, Epaphras leaves Philippi; they’re in love with him. He’s in love with them. And now in 61 A.D., Epaphras arrives in Rome, meets Paul. Paul has some vague recollection of him, and Epaphras begins to tell him about Colossae. Really? Hierapolis, too, wow. And even Laodicea, yes. And he begins to watch Epaphras. By the way, he gives Paul this gift, and he begins to watch Epaphras. This young man is a marvel; he serves and ministers to Paul and to the church there, and the church in Rome falls in love with him.

I’m telling you, brothers and sisters, this is some man. And then there’s Onesimus, the runaway slave, who moves in with Paul and begins to take care of him, serving as a marvelous servant of the Lord, ultimately becoming Onesimus. Did you get that? He finally became profitable. Now, if you go home tonight and read the book of Philemon, you’ll just laugh at that. But anyway, Epaphroditus stays with Paul. They talk and talk and talk, and Paul finally says, “I’m going to write a letter to Colossae.” Now, we’ve come full circle from 54 A.D. It is now 61 A.D., and Paul writes the letter that you’re now a steward of.

A little bit more. David, did you follow all that? More or less. I think that’s how they’re memorizing passages of scripture around here, more or less. Paul writes the letter, and then he writes them another letter, only he says, “Let Hierapolis and Laodicea read this one first.” He writes two letters. The theme of Colossians is Christ. Can you give me the next two words? Christ the head. He writes the book we call Ephesians, and that is Christ the body. The two books are really one: they’re both about the great cosmological Christ. They are the greatest Christology in the world.

Now he also writes the letter to Philemon, and he says to Tychicus, ‘Tychicus, go home.’ Now, does anybody understand that? Why? What did I mean? Tychicus goes home. Think. Think. Where’s Tychicus from? Where? Where’s Tychicus from? He’s from Ephesus, it’s where he got saved. Where’s Ephesus? Asia Minor. Where’s Colossae? Asia Minor, 90 miles from Ephesus. Tychicus, go home. Now, are you following me? And take these three letters with you. I want Epaphras to stay a little longer. Tychicus says, “Okay, Onesimus, you come on, go with me. Good luck, buddy.” And he packs, he has the three letters with him. Epaphras comes down with the fever, and he gets sick, like I’ve been sick, and he gets sicker and sicker and sicker. When Tychicus leaves, Epaphras is desperately ill.

Now that’s all in the New Testament, everything I’ve told you is in the New Testament. But you and I are the only people in the world who know this story, and that’s the absolute living truth, saints, because no one ever cared. Folks have always used this book as a Ouija board. I’m talking about the New Testament and read it just for today. This is the living, breathing story of Christian workers in churches. This is reality, this is the kind of stuff you can identify with. This is like Bernie slipping into the United States illegally. I couldn’t mention this previously in any previous messages here, but it’s okay now. Bernie is an American citizen; they can’t touch you. Praise the Lord that Bernie is an American citizen, Amen. And I have a notion; I have a notion that Bernie looked pretty good compared to some of the things some of you have done. But now you’re in the Lord and you’re in his house. And we understand these things, we can identify with him, we get some idea of what’s going on.

Okay. Now, where’s Tychicus going to go? Where’s he going? Where’s he going? Home. But how does he get there? What’s his route? He goes back through Greece, and then he’s going to Colossae, and then he’s going home to Ephesus. We assume maybe he’s just going to stay there in Colossae for a while. If he goes to Greece, where is he going to go in Greece? Philippi. And he’s going to say, “Hi, I’m glad to meet all of you folks. I’ve heard a lot about you. Paul really is grateful for the money you sent him; thank God for that. Things are really rough up there for Paul.” And tells them the whole story and says, “By the way, I don’t know if Epaphroditus is alive or dead; he was desperately ill.

Philippi sends Tychicus on his way, and then they send a messenger to Rome to find out if Epaphroditus is alive or dead. And that’s how the book of Philippians got written. You can read the book of Philippians and find out that Paul wrote to them to thank them for the gift. He sent the messenger back home to Philippi, and he said, “Not only is he well, I’m sending this letter to you by way of Epaphroditus so that he can come and tell you about my situation, and he can come there and minister among you.” Brothers and sisters, this is a story to me. It is just incomparable, and now Tychicus finally arrives in Colossae. He hands them a letter, and he says, “I got one here, I got to take over to Laodicea, but they’ll bring it back to you, and when I finish reading this one, we’ll send it to Laodicea, and you’ll get two letters.”

Where’s Philemon? Oh, you’re Philemon. Brother Philemon, I have a letter to you from Paul. You read it, and when you finish reading it, you tell me you have finished reading it, and I’ll bring Onesimus to you. He’s hiding out in the woods right now, waiting for the letter to be read. Now, that’s the story you’re going to read.

Brothers and sisters, Colossians. Is that a good story? All right. I want to see it in a drama. I want to see it in a drama. Charlie, where are you? Okay, Robert, where are you? Okay. You think you can do something with this? Okay. You have until December 1997. I am telling you that if somebody ever asks me, ‘Does anybody know the book of Colossians as well as you do?’ I’m going to say, ‘Well, there is a group of Bible scholars in Chicago who know it better than I do.’

Okay, I’m going to read a small part of this translation by Gene Edwards. It will be the first time in human history that any part of it has ever been read publicly, and I don’t know if it’s any clearer or not. I have the foggiest idea, you know what the problem is here, saints? The problem is that the whole first chapter is just three sentences. That’s its problem.

Let’s see what comes out. Paul, a sent out one, sent out by Jesus Christ, my being sent out, being a sent out one, was by the will of God and with me, brother Timothy. So, we know Timothy was in Rome, don’t we? Okay.

To the holy ones, the faithful brothers and sisters in Christ who gather in Colossae. Grace to all of you in the ecclesia Colossae, and peace to all of you from God our Father. I give thanks to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, always praying for you. I’ve been praying for you ever since I heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of your love for all the holy ones and of the faith laid up for you in heavenly places.