Mission Without Borders: Every Person (Colossians 1:24-29).Sunday October 25, 2026
Main idea: Because Paul’s mission was to every person, we cannot be effective as servant stewards while we harbor any prejudice.
Intro:
One of the side effects of the fall is prejudice. We fear, don’t like, are suspicious of people who are not like us.
Shakespeare used this human flaw in Romeo and Juliet a story about the destructive power of prejudice (and the high cost of defying it).
Paul, in this clause (vs. 28) uses the phrase every person three times in rapid succession.
Col 1:28-29 We proclaim Him, admonishing every man and teaching every man with all wisdom, so that we may present every man complete in Christ. 29 For this purpose also I labor, striving according to His power, which mightily works within me.
Col 3:9-11 Do not lie to one another, since you laid aside the old self with its evil practices, 10 and have put on the new self who is being renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created him — 11 a renewal in which there is no distinction between Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave and freeman, but Christ is all, and in all.
Scythians in the Greco-Roman world they were stereotyped as the most savage of the “barbarians.”
Colossians addresses false teachers who heralded cultural or philosophical elitism, which both Jew and Gentile possessed.
Proclaim, Warn, and Teach
Col 1:28 We proclaim Him, admonishing every man and teaching every man with all wisdom, so that we may present every man complete in Christ.
Proclaiming is not superficial, especially when accompanied by warning and teaching – all together it is full pastoral care.
Not to impress: the foundation of prejudice is pride.
1Co 2:1-2 And when I came to you, brethren, I did not come with superiority of speech or of wisdom, proclaiming to you the testimony of God. 2 For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified.
“Warning” (noutheteo) - warn, admonish. Setting the mind of someone in proper order, correcting him or putting him right.
1Co 4:14 I do not write these things to shame you, but to admonish you as my beloved children.
This demands love that is more than kindness. As Paul wrote, “love …rejoices with the truth.”
Warning is not fully effective without teaching. Warning away from the wrong path does not protect a heart from choosing other wrong paths. Teaching is to be intensive in the Christian community.
Col 2:6-7 Therefore as you have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, 7 having been firmly rooted and now being built up in Him and established in your faith, just as you were instructed, and overflowing with gratitude.
Established faith in the instruction from God is the only cure of prejudice.
Paul courageously fought prejudice in the infant church, which would have surely destroyed it. Christianity is the most dispersed religion in the world. It is prevalent everywhere.
Proclaiming, warning, teaching: just the job of the apostle?
Col 3:16 Let the word of Christ richly dwell within you, with all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with thankfulness in your hearts to God.
What does your fellow (family, neighbor, coworker, etc.) need to hear? How to know and how to communicate with genuine love and not pride?
“In all wisdom”
Wisdom is the ability to know how knowledge and understanding apply to all situations.
Wisdom: contextualized approach to an uncompromised message.
Eschatology: standing before Christ mature.
Every man presented mature - Paul.
Christ - Col 1:22 He has now reconciled you in His fleshly body through death, in order to present you before Him holy and blameless and beyond reproach
In Pauline usage “complete” (telios) describes a person mature in faith and in knowledge of God’s will, someone who has attained mature adulthood and is no longer misled by false doctrine.
Again: every man. God’s desire: He has humbled Himself to do so.
1Ti 2:4-6 who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. 5 For there is one God, and one mediator also between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, 6 who gave Himself as a ransom for all …
The whole sentence has been about others - every man, suffering on your behalf, for you, for the body, Christ in you.
Pastoral care of “every person” demands fervent labor (next class).
Col 1:29 For this purpose also I labor, striving according to His power, which mightily works within me.
Sounds exhausting and not to be desired. But how could God give us a life that would not fulfill the desire of His creature made in His image?
Notice the source of power and where it is from. In our next class we’ll see the simplicity of how it all works and why this strenuous labor is our ultimate joy.
Conclusion:
To engage every person with the wisdom that understands their need, to target that need with proclamation, warning, teaching in the virtue of divine love while patiently enduring (1:11) suffering from indifference, rejection, and persecution – I think we can all agree demands a divine perspective.
The tension between the pride of our old nature and the grace of the new nature is not a guaranteed victory for the believer.
Let the word of God examine you. It is no use to examine yourself from the standpoint of self.
1Co 4:4 For I am conscious of nothing against myself, yet I am not by this acquitted; but the one who examines me is the Lord.
Find and route out all prejudice. Find the need in every person and seek them.
Every man extends the range of the mission to the borderless domain of our Savior and King. |