February 21
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IN HIM ALL THINGS HOLD TOGETHER
13 For He rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, 14 in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation: 16 for by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones, or dominions, or rulers, or authorities—all things have been created through Him and for Him. 17 He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together. – Colossians 1:13-17
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In these passages, Paul is giving the Colossians a picture of who Jesus is. In verse 13, he describes how we are all in a realm of obscurity and here, Paul describes that it was Jesus, who brought that light and moved us away from this domain of darkness into God’s kingdom. In verse 14, Paul focuses on the salvific power that Jesus gave us so we can be forgiven from our sins. In verse 15, Jesus was described as the actual image of the God whom no one has ever seen and also that he is the very first created among all creation.
Verse 16 is one of the most important description of who Jesus is. He is the reason for the creation of all things in heaven and on earth, both seen and unseen are and it was through Him that things were created. It is in this verse that we get a picture of the other things that were created that we don’t visibly see such as thrones, dominions, rulers and authorities. Barclay comments on verse 16 as: This is true of things in heaven and things in earth, of things seen and unseen. The Jews themselves, and even more the Gnostics, had a highly-developed system of angels. With the Gnostics that was only to be expected with their long series of intermediaries between man and God. Thrones, lordships, powers and authorities were different grades of angels having their places in different spheres of the seven heavens. Paul dismisses them all with complete indifference. He is in effect saying to the Gnostics, “You give a great place in your thinking to angels. You rate Jesus Christ merely as one of them. So far from that, he created them.” Paul lays it down that the agent of God in creation is no inferior, ignorant and hostile secondary god, but the Son himself. it is he who holds the world together. That is to say, all the laws by which this world is order and not chaos are an expression of the mind of the Son. The law of gravity and the rest, the laws by which the universe hangs together, are not only scientific laws but also divine. So, then, the Son is the beginning of creation, and the end of creation, and the power who holds creation together, the Creator and the Final Goal of the world.
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REFLECTION
• What is the sign in your life that Christ is the glue that holds all things together?