Alright, we're looking at Colossians chapter 2, 1 through 8. And, you know, I've had some conversations with people in this Bible study, and I know for some of you who've never done inductive Bible study, this is a lot. Alright, those of you who've never, you know, if you haven't been in the habit of reading the Bible, and all of a sudden you jump in asking questions, and cross-referencing, and it's a lot.

But, it's kind of like exercising, right? If you haven't exercised for a long time, your muscle hurts, and it's tiring, but in the long run, it's good for you, right? And so, getting in the habit of studying the Bible is not just important, it is essential. It is essential to your walk with God, because if you don't learn how to eat spiritual food, you will always be dependent upon somebody else to feed you.

So, if you happen to be around other people who are encouraging you, strengthening you, then you're doing okay. But, as soon as those people disappoint you, or something goes wrong, you're in the pits, right? And so, you can't live your Christian life always hitched to somebody else feeding you.

And so, this is absolutely, this is not just important, it is essential for your walk with God, right? And, obviously, Apostle Paul even mentions that about not being persuaded with persuasiveness of speech. And so, it's constantly coming in where there's a deliberate attack for you to stray in your mind, and your thinking, and your life.

So, if that's where you are, you're not walking with God, you probably don't even notice that that's happening. But, if you're even somewhat interested in trying to pursue God, you'll probably have already noticed that there is a constant pressure and attack, or even subtle, that's coming in to cause you to stray, right?

And so, again, I can't emphasize enough why this is so important, okay? And, I've also had some conversation with you guys where, you know, you've read the Bible, and maybe you've even memorized, but you've never studied the Bible in this way before. And, I'm hoping that some of you will share the same sentiment.

It is a world of difference between hearing a sermon and giving you insights that I've received, and just kind of spoon-feeding you, and coming back saying, "Oh, I'm really encouraged by that," than you searching and finding treasures for yourselves, right? So, how many of you find that? It's just a completely different insight, completely different impact.

Just raise your hand. Show other people. Okay? World of difference, right? So, if you're able to—I remember, I shared this before, but I remember the first time just in the library, just starting through Thessalonians, and the insight that I was able to gain on my own. And, all of a sudden, it really felt like I had three eyes, and one of my eyes got open.

I wasn't using it for all that time, and all of a sudden, it just—I had a completely different perspective of the world, that I was able to come to the Word of God. And, it's different hearing from somebody, "God said this," versus hearing from God directly, right? Because that's what it feels like when you gain insight from the Word of God, and God begins to speak to you directly from God's Word.

Okay? So, even though it's tedious, and it may be difficult, and you do have to do some work in order to gain things out of it, it is a world of difference in your walk with God to be able to come to the Word and find insights on your own.

Okay? So, let me pray for us, and we'll jump right in. Heavenly Father, we pray for your blessing. I know that some of us here come from a full day of work, and we may be physically tired, but we pray that your living Word would constantly recalibrate our thoughts and our spirits, that we may have an eternal perspective, that we would not live day to day in the grind, and just caught up with the rest of the world, Lord God, and allowing year to year just go by.

Help us to be purposeful. Help us, Lord God, live consistent with the faith that we profess. Help us to gain insight from your Word, that we may know who you are, and to follow you with all our hearts. In Jesus name we pray. Amen. All right. So, the first thing, if you look at the questions that I gave you, and again this is just kind of help you, guide you through some of the things that that I'll be going over, but the first thing every week, just to kind of give you some guidance, it says look for repeated words, similar words, and ideas in the immediate area to get an idea of the thought flow of the writer.

Okay? So, as you are studying this, before you ask questions, as you are reading this, that's probably the first thing that you should be doing. Right? What are words that are repeated here? What are phrases that are repeated? What are, look for words that connect ideas or conclude ideas from one thought to another.

Right? You should be circling these, highlighting these, connecting these, because it'll help you get the thought flow of the writer. You understand what I'm saying? And that's why I divided the verses in the way that I did. Right? Instead of just giving you verse by verse 1, verse 2, verse 3, verse 4, I try to break it down into the thought flow, so you can clearly see that this is his main point, this is his sub point, and then therefore he transitions into this, and this sentence leads to these thoughts.

So that while you are reading it, you clearly see the outline of what he's saying. Right? What's the point, what's a sub point, and what is his supporting argument? Right? So, these are things that I told you that every time if I do Bible study, prepare for sermons, I do this first, and then I go back and look for repeated words or phrases or transitional phrases, and then once I start circling these things, it's pretty clear what he's trying to get at.

Right? And then once I get the outline of his thoughts, then I can go back and start asking questions. What did he mean by that? Why did he say this? And clearly he's saying this, and it concludes over here, but if you, before you get all of that, and you jump in, and why did he mean this, you're asking a question outside the context that you don't understand yet.

You understand? Okay? So you have to understand the context before you jump in to the text. That's why we do a broad study, chapter study, and then, and then you have smaller divisions like one through eight, but even within the smaller divisions, there are paragraphs, and there's ideas. So you want to break that down before you start to get into, because it'll help you gain observations.

Okay? So what are some words that are repeated here? Just yell it out if you, if you notice, and it doesn't have to be the exact same words. Similar words. Okay? Christ, definitely. Can you point it out to us? It doesn't just have to be you. Obviously Christ is repeated.

Tell us where you see it. Okay? Verse two. Where is that? Here? Keep yelling it out. Five, six, and then eight. Okay? Hm? Okay. Good. Him. Keep going. Six says him. Where else? I thought I did it. Okay. What are you looking at? Okay. Christ himself. In whom? Okay.

Good. Anything else? In? Okay. So in transition. Okay. Oh, is that what you mean? Okay. Okay. Alright. Very good. So clearly, right, just, just looking at the highlights alone, you can say, I mean, this is, this is like, what about Christ is something else. But obviously he's talking about Christ, right?

I mean, the whole Bible is talking about Christ, but it's concentrated here. Okay. What, what else? Okay. Knowledge. Okay. Can you yell out where it is? No. Okay. Wait. Is there something else? I only have one highlight. All right. No, there's no yellow. There's no purple. What? Wait, like that?

Oh. Yeah, you guys treat me like grandpa. Okay. Okay. Where else? Okay. Where's that? Okay. Okay. Okay. Anywhere else? Okay. Good. Understanding. Okay. So you can see that, that's kind of concentrated here in the beginning. Okay. So all of these things will help us. Is there anything else? Oh.

Okay. Okay. That's, that's good insight where Paul says repeatedly, "I." Right? So what does that tell us when you see repeatedly he's saying, "I"? Something about his ministry, about his, his goal, his desire. Okay. Good. What else? Okay. Treasures of wealth. Okay. Can you tell me where they are?

Okay. Did I miss something? Is that it? Or did I miss something? Can you see? Okay. Anything else? Okay. All right. Good. I was waiting for that to come out. All right. So. Okay. Very good. In fact, we'll see the word good discipline also fits into that. Right? Even built up.

So all of these are similar ideas of being stable. Right? Being rooted. Okay. Okay. The opposite of that deception, delusion, being captive. Right? Okay. So just from the repeated words, you can already see the thought flow. Right? And so where is this division? Versus two, like one, two, and three.

Right? How would you title this? Maybe Paul's goal in ministry. And then five and six, instructions for the church. Okay. So broadly speaking, that's how it's kind of broken down. Right? All right. So let's go back and look at verse one. He starts by saying, for I want you to know.

And again, these are things that, like I said, if possible, do not look at commentaries. Right? Even if there might be great insight in the commentary, our goal in this Bible study is not for you to learn how to use the commentaries. Because if you are in the habit of going to comment to every question you have, before digging, before doing the homework, you're going to just jump and say, oh, I wonder what my study Bible says.

Or I wonder what he says. And then whatever he says becomes your theology. And then if you were asked to defend it, you can't defend it. Right? I've talked to so many people who say, I'm a cessationist, I'm a Calvinist. It's like, why? And then they'll quote somebody. It's like, I didn't ask you, like, they're not the final authority.

Like, I didn't ask you what John McCarthy thinks. I didn't ask you what some study Bible says. Like, how did you come to that conclusion? So a lot of people can't defend the doctrines that they're so strong on. How can you be so strong on a doctrine that you can't defend?

Other than dropping names or some books that you read. Right? You have to be able to defend it. So if you don't get in the habit of studying the Word of God, your doctrines will always be dependent upon who influenced you the most. So if you're in college and you happen to be a part of a Bible study that has certain doctrines, everything they believe, you're regurgitated.

They're not your convictions. They're convictions of people that you respected. Right? Until they become your convictions, you're not going to be able to defend it. So when somebody else comes along that you respect, that starts to contradict the doctrines that you profess, you're going to get confused. You don't know what to believe.

And then you become open to all kinds of attack. Right? And so again, you have to get in the habit of looking at the scripture and finding where you found your convictions. And you can't do that unless you're in the Word of God yourself. So the word for "no" here, again, this is not something that you would know unless you know the background.

This is one of those things that are very, very key in interpretation. Because there are different words for "no." Right? And I've mentioned it so many times in sermons and Bible study. There is a two basic understandings, "Oida" and what's the other word? "Gnosko." Right? "Oida" is just learning from perception, studying.

Right? The word here is "Oida." When he says here, "knowledge of God," guess what that is? "Gnosko." Right? So his goal in for you to "Oida" is what? So that you may have "Gnosko." Okay? So just by knowing the two different words, even though in English is the same word, you know that everything he's saying here, like I want you to perceive and understand how much I labor for you, how much I suffered so that you may be united in mind.

And he says all of this for what purpose? Where does he take us to? So that you may have a true knowledge of God's mystery, that you may personally know. Right? So he's not, again, as we said over and over again, our goal of the study, whether it's Hebrews, Revelation, or Leviticus, or Colossians, is not simply so you can say, "I, Oida." Right?

That I know what it says. I can tell you and give you the answer. The goal of every "Oida" in Bible study is to get you to "Gnosko." Have a personal knowledge of God. Right? So again, this is not something that you would know just in English, but again, as you continue to do interpretation, that's one of the first questions that you will ask.

Is this "Oida" or is this "Gnosko?" Because that will make a big difference in how you understand this text. Okay? So he starts by saying, "How great a struggle I have for you, behalf of you and Laodicea." Only one question came in today, and that is, "Why does he mention Laodicea with Colossians?" It's because Colossae is right under Laodicea.

Colossae could have easily been one of the seven letters of the Asia Minor churches in Book of Revelation, because it literally is right underneath. The very next city is Colossae. If you remember, remember Asia Minor, that whole area, Church of Smyrna, Philadelphia, Laodicea, like all those churches right there, they're all in Asia Minor.

If you remember, Asia Minor was a place where the Holy Spirit tells Paul not to go. And then he has a vision, and he ends up going into Macedonia because of a vision to come over. During that period, there was heavy persecution that was going on in Asia Minor.

Right? So if you remember, there's very significant things that are happening in this place, because one, persecution is happening where the Holy Spirit tells him to avoid it for a period. Right? Later on, Church of Ephesus is also in that area, where Paul spends the most number of time, or amount of time, in planting a church.

And so Paul had a deep personal connection to this area. The whole Book of Galatians, right, is also written. And then he writes Galatians because there was a very urgent matter of the Judaizers having a deep impact. So the false teachers were having a huge impact in this area.

So if you look at a lot of Paul's attention, much of it goes to that area. And even the seven churches are located right in that area. You understand what I'm saying? Okay. So those churches in Asia Minor, there's a concentration of activity that's taking place right in that area.

Right? So Paul is writing this church to Colossae, but his concern is not just Colossae, because the influence is way, way beyond Colossae. The other churches are being affected by what he's concerned about here. Okay? One of the first questions I asked in this is, "How great a struggle I have for..." Why was it important that the Colossians and the others knew that Paul was struggling from that?

This is just a, you know, just a thought that I had. Like, why do you think Paul starts out by saying, "I want you to know how much I'm struggling for you." Is it just because he's trying to introduce themselves? It's like, "Yay, you know, like this is what I'm doing for you.

You better appreciate me when I get there." Right? "Get some good food ready, because you don't know how much I struggle for you." Why is it important that they understand how much he's struggling for them? Okay, to encourage them that they're important. Right? Again, you have to understand that Apostle Paul wasn't an ordinary missionary.

He was the apostle appointed for the Gentiles. Right? So when the Apostle Paul is writing this letter, he's not just your uncle or some guy that they respect. This is the appointed apostle to them. Right? So for him to say, "You don't know how much I'm struggling for you." I mean, that's like almost saying, "God is bringing you to my attention.

You're important to God." Right? In Apostle Paul, specific revelation is coming through Apostle Paul, where he's getting the mystery that was hidden for a period, and he's revealing it to them. So the fact that Paul is struggling to get to them, again, it's a reminder to them. He's not talking about how much I love you.

Right? Of course, that is written in here, but it's a reminder to them so that they may be what? Encouraged. Right? The Apostle Paul knows you. Right? And he's praying for you, and he's struggling and risking his life to get this message to you. So be encouraged. God has not forgotten you.

He's not simply speaking on his behalf. He's speaking on behalf of Christ. Right? When he says, "I'm personally see me in front of that their hearts may be encouraged." What do you think was the source of their encouragement? This is where we get into trouble, because we want to encourage people.

Like Apostle Paul says, his goal is to encourage them. So we want to encourage you. Right? So if encouragement is the goal, how do I encourage you? God loves you just the way you are. There's nothing you can do for God to love you any more than the way he loves you now.

There's nothing you can do where God's going to be disappointed in you. You're salvaged, you're secure. Right? Now, none of this is wrong, but we have to understand when he says, "I'm coming, I'm suffering, so that you may be encouraged." What was the content of his encouragement? Right? Well, he spells it out.

Right? That you may have the attaining to the all the wealth that comes from the full assurance of understanding. In other words, all of it. He's not just talking about the things that you like. He's talking about your encouragement comes from the whole truth. Right? And nothing but the truth.

So the encouragement isn't just, "God loves you, has a wonderful plan for your life," but the whole encouragement is the gospel itself. All of it. That you may come to a true knowledge of God's mystery, that is Christ himself, in whom are hidden the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.

Right? So we have to be careful that we don't make encouragement our goal. Encouragement is the byproduct of truth. Okay? Encouragement is not the end goal. It's just something that we get when we pursue the truth. Right? And if you also notice, he said, "The encouraged having been knit together in love and attaining to all the wealth that comes from him, the full assurance of understanding." So all of these things are things that we pursue together.

So truth and practice of love and being encouraged, they're all tied together. Right? You don't have pursuit of truth and unity as two separate things. You can't have one without the other. You can't have a heart that's filled with bitterness and disunited and says, "But when it comes to truth, I'm right." Because your ability to understand the truth is directly linked to the condition of your heart.

Right? Even justification, it says, "They suppress the truth because they prefer the darkness rather than the light." So they reject the truth. Do you think that doesn't happen as Christians? If you reject the truth in one arena of your life, do you think that doesn't affect your ability to understand the heart of God?

What is intended? Yeah, of course it does. Right? So that's why when the scripture says, "Before you bring a gift to the altar, if you know that somebody has something against you, go and deal with that first." Right? "Forgive my debts as I have forgiven my debtors." Right? And so that's why every time we have communion, he says to examine.

"He who eats and drinks without acknowledging the body of Christ eats and drinks judgment upon himself." So every time we have communion, it forces us to examine. Is my relationship with God separate from my relationship with one another? They're together. Right? You can't be right with God if you're wrong with your brothers and sisters.

If you're not walking right with God, your ability to discern the truth is affected. Right? It is. So if you haven't been praying, if you haven't been living a holy life and life with integrity, whether it's with your time and with your money, and then you somehow separate that from being able to discern the truth, they go hand in hand.

Because we discern the truth by our mind, we also discern the truth by our spirit. So if your spirit is not right, it also affects your ability to understand. So he says, "Encourage, knit together, that we may attain the wealth that comes from the full assurance of understanding, resulting in the knowledge of the mystery, which is Christ himself." Right?

Ultimately, it's not simply about the gospel. The gospel is Jesus. Right? Again, I mentioned that the celebration of the gospel is not celebrating the open door, but what the open door leads to. Right? The gospel isn't access to God. It's God himself. Access is just a road. Right? To celebrate that we have access to God and not actually taking the access, you miss the whole point of salvation.

The goal is Christ. Okay? He says all of this because I say this so that no one will delete you in persuasive arguments. And then he says it again later on in verse 8, "See to it that no one takes you captive." And so you could already tell, right, that this is on his mind.

There's something urgent going on in Colossae and Laodicea and Galatians and Ephesus. False teaching has penetrated into the church and he's trying to combat that. Right? And that's the reason why he's telling them to commit to the truth, to commit to one another. Right? Because as soon as your heart is filled with division, there's a crack where Satan can attack even in the way that you think, even the way that you perceive things, can be perverted by allowing that to permeate in your heart.

Right? So we'll get back to verse 4, "For even though I am absent in body, nevertheless I am with you in spirit, rejoicing to see your good discipline," and simply some of your translations will say "orderly." Right? And that's why I said this good discipline, stability, they all are similar words.

So Paul's concern here, verses 5 and 6, is instructions for the church for nothing fancy. It's not taking over the world and making sure the gospel goes and risking your life for Christ. Paul's concern for them is to remain stable because they're being attacked. Right? So there are periods in our life where we need to bear arms, basically spiritually, and be ready to run into darkness.

But the stage that they're in now is they're being provoked. Right? And just like the book of Hebrews, they're kind of starting to drift maybe because of persuasive arguments. Right? So he's saying to be orderly, to stay stable in your faith. "Therefore, as you have received Christ, so walk in him." Right?

It's not enough to just say you receive Christ. Like are you applying it in your life? What is, what does your faith look like in your life outside of Wednesday Bible study and Sunday worship? Right? "Walk in him, having been firmly rooted, being built up in him, establishing your faith." Right?

And so much of our Christian faith is about this. So much of our Christian faith is learning to be strong. Right? Being rooted in Christ is not something that happens in one time. It's something that happens because of godly habit. You know, I want to say something. I know that ever since Pastor Peter Chung came to our church, there's this revival of Bible memory.

Right? And I knew that was going to happen because he was, he had influence. You know, we were like Bible memory was like a thing in our church, mainly because of Pastor Peter Chung. Now we always, I always say, you know, I'm amazed by his memory because he's, he's, he's like, he amazes me.

Right? About how much he remembers. And so if he ever says, "Hey, in 2014 this happened." Even if I don't remember, it's like, it probably happened. Right? Because he's good. He's good at that. But as great as his memory is, the reason why he's so, so good at memorizing, and I don't mean to embarrass him, is because he devotes himself to that.

He doesn't just read it and as he gets it, it's not like that. He, every day, two, three hours a day, he's in front of, he's in front of his, his cards, he's memorizing. So he's utilizing the gift that he has, he's maximizing it. And that's why he's so good at it.

Right? It's not simply because, yes, God has given him a gift of good memory. But he wouldn't, he would, he would remember a lot of random things for no, no good purpose. Like what kind of tie I wore 15 years ago. I mean, useless information. Right? But the reason why he's good at it is because he, he really is devoted.

And that's challenging to all of us. Right? So, so much of our walk with God isn't something like, "Oh, I go to retreats or heard a great sermon, or I joined a good Bible study." So much of our walk with God and our health in our, in our walk with God is your daily routines.

Or what you do on a day to day basis have far more effect in your walk with God than what retreat you went to and what speaker you heard, what book you read, you know, what small group or who, who's mentoring you. All of these things are helpful, but nothing will impact you as much of a, as much as a daily discipline that you value and you do on a daily basis.

Right? So Paul talking about all of this, all of these things, he says, talking about being stable, being rooted, being built up, being established. Right? And that's what we're trying to work on in our Bible studies, right? In our daily routines. See to it that no one takes you captive.

Right? Captive basically means to be carried off. Right? In fact, some of your translations, it may actually even say, take, take you hostage involuntarily. And he says, it's because he's using, just like he says in verse four, persuasive arguments. With these arguments, if they weren't persuasive, it wouldn't be tempting.

No one would be deceived. It's because it's coming through very articulate men who seem to be representing God, who seem to know the scripture, but they're twisting it. Right? So he says, the reason why they're in danger is because these arguments are persuasive. They're persuasive because they're philosophical. You know, they have the ability to deceive.

It's in accord with tradition of men. In other words, this is around us all the time, according to elementary principles of the world. So the basic principles that surround us and tempt us every single day. So these false teachings are tapping into that. Why is the health and wealth gospel so popular?

Because it's tapping into the worldly principle. Right? That if you work hard, you're going to make money. If you go to get the right job, and if you connect with the right people, and the health and wealth gospel basically is tapping into those worldly principles and saying, well, all these things may not work.

If you tap into God, you can get that. Right? So nothing has changed. Only your means to get the world has changed. And that's why it's so popular because they haven't abandoned anything. They've never picked up their cross. They've never denied themselves. They're still pursuing the world. They're just doing it in the name of Jesus.

And that's why it's popular. And that's why it says it's persuasive arguments in accord with traditions of men, in elementary principles of the world. And it's very deceptive because you don't know you're being deceived. Because you're doing it in the name of Christ. And because you're in the church, because you're reading the Bible, and you're actually praying that you automatically think you're safe.

But the only thing that has changed is the means to get what you want. You're still pursuing your own life. You're still pursuing your flesh. You're still pursuing your own glory. It's just you're hoping that God will give it to you instead of you working hard for it. Right?

And that's why that theology is so pervasive. And why it carries us away. That's why you can be in the church all your life. You call me Lord, Lord, but say your heart is far from me. Why did they call him Lord, Lord? It wasn't for me. It wasn't because you were you were wanting me to be your Lord.

It's Lord, Lord, give me something. Right? Everything that they did, they did it for themselves. They didn't do it for God. That's what Jesus meant. Right? So he said that that's why it's so pervasive. That's why we need to watch out. Right? But in the end, ultimately, his goal is to get us to Christ.

Because what's going to deliver us from these things that are so powerful in our lives? Right? Because all the wealth and wisdom and understanding is where? In Christ. That's how we keep saying over and over again to fix your eyes on Christ. Right? Because then you begin to distinguish.

Right? When you fix your eyes upon Christ, like along with that, the fruit of that, you'll be able to distinguish what is not Christ. But when your eyes are not fixed on Christ, sometimes you're very confused. Because sometimes it comes from the pulpit. Sometimes it comes from books and conferences and other Christians that you respect.

And you don't discern. Because when your eyes are not fixated on Christ, you're not able to discern the difference. Okay? So in the end, that's his main goal. To get us to be fixated on that and not to be carried away. Okay? All right. The next week's passage is in Colossians chapter 2, 9 through 15.

And discussion questions are on the bottom. Okay? Let me pray for us and then I'll have you guys get into your small groups. Heavenly Father, we pray for your blessing over this time. We pray for our small group leaders that you give them wisdom in how to lead. And I pray that in our discussions that we may be open and honest.

That we truly may be a community that is united together as one. Help us, Lord God, to know what it means to be encouraged and to be united to pursue you. That we may gain Christ and to know the riches, Lord God, that is found in him and him alone.

So for that end, we pray for your blessing. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.