For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. Colossians 3:3 (TPT)
With Christ – Thinking High Series – Part 4
Go to PART 1 | PART 2 | PART 3 | PART 4 | PART 5 | PART 6 | PART 7
I wonder how much Paul's friends in Colossae enjoyed reading the line, “For you died…” Imagine a friend that you respected and revered saying to you,
“Hey buddy, you’re dead! You knew that, right?”
This is a concept Paul talks about a lot. And he had mentioned it earlier in his letter to the Colossians. But still, what a concept. He wrote to his friends in Galatia and explained it like this: “I have been crucified with Christ, and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”
But I am alive. I have memories and likes and dislikes and a personality and talents and all kinds of things. Even though I believe in God, I still feel very much like me. I don’t feel like a puppet that Christ controls. I feel like me. SO, what died?
There was a version of me (to be honest, I’m still very much involved in shedding it. Daily. Constantly), that was all about me. My life was about what I could do and attain to, how high up the ladder I could climb, how many blissful experiences I could enjoy, how much success I could create, and even pulling off incredible comebacks from tragedy and heartbreak. I was the focus. And other people's affirmation of me was paramount to my sense of self. I played this never ending game of portraying confidence so that people would think I was confident, and their affirmation of me would feed my starving sense of self. I felt hollow and disconnected. And I thought the only way to fill up the gaps was to get more, be more and do more. I was primarily led by my ego. You multiply that to a global level, and it's no wonder that our world is full of trauma.
But when I met Jesus, when I woke up to the presence of God all around me and, even, within me, I began to understand that the version of myself I was living out of was a counterfeit. Or at least, I had the essence of my value around the wrong way. I had to let my ego die. Drop my pride. Offer the self that was desperate for singularity up for crucifixion. I lived for validation, rather than living IN validation.
It might not sound like such a difference, but the outworking of it brings immense transformation. It causes you to think (live – remember the Jewish interpretation of mind?) higher. Which isn’t “high and lofty” but rather deep, and true and authentic to who you have been created to be. Which you begin to find out in grace when you let the old self die (crucified with Christ) and let new life, the original and authentic life that Christ brings, spring forth. It’s more like a return and a homecoming to who I really am. It's still me, it’s still my body and my life, but it's now empowered by its original source – connected to my “heavenly” origins. I no longer live promoting myself and trying to achieve a great life. The Christ life perpetuates my being in the world. And rather than promoting myself to the world around me, I can give myself to it from a place of grace, strength, and faith. Thinking and living from a high place – a place that's not about staking my claim and territory in the world, but a place that understands that this world is an opportunity for me to shine his Glory – keeps me connected to my heavenly home.
Paul wrote. “Your old life is dead. Your new life, which is your real life—even though invisible to spectators—is with Christ in God. He is your life. When Christ (your real life, remember?) shows up again on this earth, you’ll show up, too—the real you, the glorious you.” (Col 3:3-4).
“Letting go of our cherished images of ourselves is really the way to heaven, because when you fall down to the bottom, you fall on solid ground, the Great Foundation, the bedrock of God. It looks like an abyss, but it’s actually a foundation. On that foundation, you have nothing to prove, nothing to protect: “I am who I am who I am,” and for some unbelievable reason, that’s what God has chosen to love. At that point, the one you’re in love with is both God and yourself too, and you find yourself henceforth inside of God (John 14:20)!” – Richard Rohr.
Over to you! Leave a comment below.
Go to Part 5 – In Him »
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