THE BOOK OF COLOSSIANS

Paul's letter to the Colossians is a brief statement of the "essential elements" of the life God provides for those who seek to believe, trust, and obey Jesus as Lord of their lives.

The letter tells us how grace produces peace, how promises produce hope, and hope produces faith and love.


The letter is built around the prayer of Paul (1.9-12) for knowledge, understanding, and wisdom of four areas of a life worthy of and pleasing to the Lord.



The four areas are:
1. bearing fruit in good work;
2. growing in the knowledge of God;
3. being strengthened with all power for endurance and patience;
4. joyfully giving thanks to the Father.


He tells us what we need to know and understand about each of these areas:
The fruit and its applications--3.1-4.1
The knowledge of God--1.13-23
The strength exemplified in Paul and applied to us in 1.24-2.23
The joy exemplified in Paul--1.24-2.5; 4.7-18


The prayer for the life of this letter comes from the heart of God through the heart of Paul to and for our hearts.


It is the new life of holiness, righteousness, love, joy and peace that replaces our old life of pride, selfishness, strife, fear, etc. (3.1-14)


The door to this new life and all its grace is found in earnest devotion to praying Paul's prayer (4.2) and reading with meditation our way through this letter from God. The Holy Spirit will give us knowledge, understanding, wisdom, and power to live this life as we do so.


As Paul says in Ephesians 3.4:

In reading this, then,

you will be able to understand my insight

into the mystery of Christ....