The Struggle for Understanding

Colossians 2:1-5

As Paul transitions out of his greetings and the foundation for his letter, which we saw in chapter 1, he is now getting into the meat of the purpose of why he is writing.  All of Paul’s writings that we find in the New Testament were meant to encourage and instruct the churches with which he had a relationship.  This is why he talks about his “great struggle” on behalf of the people in the church.  This word that he uses, which we translate into “struggle,” is an athletic term.  It is a type of anxiety or nervousness that an athlete experiences right before starting a race or game.  In running, it is common to have what they call a “shakeout run” the day before the race.  It’s an easy-paced run or jog with other participants in the race to get all that nervousness out.  It seems a little silly, that to get rid of your nerves before a run, you run!  However, this letter of Paul’s is achieving the same thing.  He is concerned about the church, so he decides to write to them about his concerns! 

After Paul had introduced the idea of the mystery of God, he encourages them that they already have the information that makes it no longer a worldly mystery!  That should encourage us as well.  There are things we don’t understand about God, but for those of us who are in Christ, we have the answers!  Now, let us not confuse this with knowing everything.  Rather, what Paul is saying is that Jesus Himself is the answer.  As we grow in our relationship with God through Christ, we can attain knowledge and wisdom about anything we need to navigate in this life.  Sometimes, however, it isn’t quite the answer we expect or think we need.  But, we get the right answer nonetheless.  I will give an example:

On my most recent mission trip to Guatemala, there was an evening when a young lady suddenly started crying and couldn’t talk.  I was trying to ask her questions to find out why she was crying.  Was she in pain?  Was she sad?  Did she have a bad memory of something that happened in her past?  I couldn’t get her to tell me, so I started to pray, “Lord, show me what to do to help her!”  His response to me was something I didn’t expect, but had to accept.  He said, “I am working.”  As a human who like to solve problems, I felt like this didn’t really answer my prayer.  As I thought about it, I realized it was the answer I needed in that situation.  It wasn’t about me doing anything at all!  Instead, I had to trust God and just be there with her while she experienced what was happening.  You might be wondering, “so what happened?”  To keep a long story short: she received a vision of angels covered in bright light surrounding us and was so overwhelmed with joy that all she could do was cry and tremble!  We all thought something was wrong and meanwhile she was experiencing the pure glory of the Lord!  This is the mystery of God that He allows us to be a part of.  It is supernatural and we will not always be able to understand it in our finite minds, but He always gives us the answer we need, even if it is unexpected and maybe confusing at the time.

This is why Paul is so concerned that the Colossians will be persuaded by impressive speech and arguments.  As humans, we want to understand and control what is going on around us, even in relation to the spiritual realm.  However, we cannot always comprehend what is happening or what God is doing.  Therefore, we are prone to be convinced by logical thought and convincing arguments and therefore led astray from the innate truths of God!  Is this frustrating?  For me: absolutely!  I want to understand and comprehend it all.  I’m sure you do too.  However, if God is someone who can be fully understood in the humanly logical sense, then He wouldn’t be God.  He would be another human.  Rather, what I have come to understand about God is that He is really sovereign, that He is really loving, and that He is really good.  In moments like the story I recounted above, that has to be enough for me to trust Him and wait to find out the bigger picture.  When this all happened, we had to go to bed wondering what was going on, because it wasn’t until the next day that she was able to tell us.  She told us that the evening before, whenever I asked her a question it was like someone put a hand over her mouth whenever she tried to respond.

It was a glorious moment for her in God’s presence, and we probably would have ruined it had she been able to tell us right away what was happening.  God knew better and left us all in “the dark” while she was able to experience The Light.  As we continue to read this letter from Paul to the church, he will expound upon this idea of how to trust God’s revelation over human arguments and manmade logic.  For fun, I want to end by sharing with you a rendition of what it may have been like that night sitting around the table as she saw this vision.