In the sermon by Steve Hopkins titled 'The Supremacy of Christ (part two) - Reconciled,' the focus is on the continuation of a verse-by-verse study of Colossians, emphasizing the supremacy of Christ and the notion of reconciliation. The Apostle Paul warns the church in Colossae about false teachings that suggest the need for 'Christ plus' other doctrines, such as angel worship, dietary regulations, and more. These teachings undermine the sufficiency of the gospel, which states that Christ alone is sufficient for salvation. The sermon highlights that Christ is supreme over all creation, the church, and the work of redemption. Christ's death and resurrection are central to reconciling believers to God, transforming them from being alienated and enemies to being holy and blameless. The speaker emphasizes the completeness of reconciliation through Christ, warning against the allure of additional requirements for salvation. Understanding Christ's identity and work is crucial for maintaining faith and not being led astray by false doctrines.

Good afternoon again. We'll be continuing in our verse by verse study of the book of Colossians. Hopefully return to Romans next week as we go back and forth between these two letters of the Apostle Paul. If you would, turn with me in your Bibles to the first chapter of Colossians, chapter one. We're actually going to be reviewing 15 through 20 and looking at verses 21 through 22 today, but we're gonna be reading together Colossians chapter one at verses 19 through 23.

If you would stand with me for the reading of the word of the Lord, follow along with me as I read the infallible, inerrant, all-sufficient Word of God. For it pleased the Father that in Him all the fullness should dwell, and by Him to reconcile all things to himself, by him whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of his cross. And you who once were alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works and wicked works, yet now he has reconciled in the body of his flesh through death to present you holy and blameless and above reproach in His sight. If indeed you continue in the faith, grounded and steadfast, and are not moved away from the hope of the gospel, which you heard, which was preached to every creature under heaven, of which I, Paul, became a minister." Let's pray. Our Father, wonderful, glorious Father in heaven.

Our hearts are filled, O God, with praise and with thanksgiving once again. As we enter Your presence and consider the boundless stores of grace that are ours in Christ Jesus our Lord. O Lord, how the name of Jesus calms our troubled minds, soothes our deepest sorrows, heals our every wound, and drives away our fears. Oh Lord, now as we open your holy word, we humbly ask that the Spirit might be given once again to open our understanding and to minister to every soul under this roof today and to fill each heart with joy and believing and to set Christ before us in all his beauty and majesty and glory, for we do ask it in his most precious and holy name. Amen.

Let's be seated. In the days when The Apostle Paul walked on the earth. The church at Colossi was under attack. When we think of churches being under attack, well, we think of physical attack. We hear of churches almost every week in our world today being attacked by Islamists.

We hear about them in attacking churches in Nigeria and in Mozambique and Syria and many other nations in the world, and the attacks on these churches grieve us. The church at Colossi was also a church under attack, not by gangsters or Muslim hordes wielding guns and bombs, but by false teachers, wielding a false doctrine. False teachers who, armed with doctrines of external religion, made war on the sufficiency of the gospel and on the person and the work of our Lord Jesus Christ. And what was the sum of all their heresies? What was the sum of all their heresies?

You need Christ plus. You need Christ plus. Christ plus these other things. Christ plus angel worship, which you'll get to in chapter two. Christ plus dietary regulations, Christ plus laws, Christ plus this school of thought or that school of thought or philosophy, Christ plus this system of piety If you want to be spiritually full, but Christ plus anything always equals nothing.

All we need is Christ. So the apostle intercedes for the believers at Colossi. He prays for them and he exhorts them to continue in the faith of Christ that they had received, setting before them a clear vision of Christ, the preeminent Christ, the Christ who is supreme over all creation and over the new creation, the church, and the Christ who is supreme in the work of redemption. This Christ is their all-sufficient Savior who has redeemed them with His own blood and forgiven them all their sins. Paul was saying this and is saying this, if you understand who Christ is, you won't fall for these things.

If you understand who Christ is, you won't fall for these things. If you understand who Christ is, you won't be led astray by the Christ plus teachers. And we have them in our world today. If you understand who Christ is, you won't be deceived by those who are saying you need Christ plus anything else. In our last session, the apostle set the preeminent Christ before the church of Colossi.

Christ is supreme over creation. Christ is supreme over the new creation, His church. Christ is supreme in the work of redemption. There are no exceptions to the supremacy of Christ. Christ is the visible image of the invisible God.

In the incarnation of Christ, the invisible God was made visible. He is the radiance of the glory of God. He is the exact imprint of His nature. He is the firstborn. Christ is the firstborn over all creation.

He is the Lord of all creation. He is supreme over all. He is in a category all His own. For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are in earth, visible and invisible. The Apostle Paul doesn't leave the false teachers any wiggle room in Colossae and any room for doubt for those who are receiving this message of the truth of the gospel in Colossae.

Christ is the creator of all things that can be seen as well as the creator of all things that cannot be seen. Whether they be thrones or dominions or principalities or powers, all things were created by Him and all things were created for Him, whether they be things in the material realm or in the spiritual realm, whether they're earthly thrones or dominions or spiritual entities or angels or powers, Christ is not among them, Christ created them. Christ is supreme over them all because Christ created them all. All things were created by Him and for Him. Everything was created for the glory of Christ and He is before all things.

Christ is the Lord eternal, the Word that was with God and the Word that is God, as John said. The eternal Son of the Father without beginning and without end, the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end, one with the Father and the Holy Spirit, God the Son, from all eternity and to all eternity. And by Him all things consist. By Him everything is held together. Christ is holding it all together.

Christ brought everything into existence that exists, and Christ is keeping all that exists in existence. And he's the head of the body, by the way, Paul goes on, the church. This Christ is our head. He is the head of the church. There is nothing higher than the head on the body.

Christ is supreme over the new creation, the church, the savior of the body, your redeemer, who alone has supremacy in redemption, authority and headship over the church and in whom and through whom the body receives all that it needs and being nourished by Him and knit together in Him grows with the growth that comes from God. Hold to Christ, he's telling them. Hold to Christ, the head of the church, who is the beginning, he goes on, the beginning of the church, the church's origin and the source of life, the firstborn from the dead, the first to rise from the dead, never to die again, and the guarantor of the resurrection that all who are in Him will enjoy, that in all things He, Christ, might have the preeminence. Christ's resurrection from the dead demonstrated His supremacy over all creation, that He is the Lord of the universe, That in all things Christ might have the preeminence, for it pleased, he goes on, the Father, that in Him, in Christ Jesus, all the fullness should dwell. All the fullness of deity, All the fullness of God in His body and bodily form, all the divine powers, all the attributes of God, all the fullness of God, all the glory and majesty of God dwells in Christ Jesus, the God man, the Lord of the universe and the Lord of His church are all-sufficient Savior in whom we have redemption through His blood, even the forgiveness of sins.

Paul leaves no wiggle room here for the Christ plus crowd. And having made peace through the blood of his cross, we are assured that the entire created order will eventually be restored. That's what's coming. That's what's coming. Whether they be things in heaven or things on the earth, all things will ultimately be brought to submit to the preeminent Christ, our Christ, the head of the church.

This is our Savior, Jesus, the King of the universe. And Paul says to the Colossians, and what he says to the Colossians, he says to us, do not be drawn away from Him. Let him not be diminished in your thinking and in your understanding. This is the Christ, he said to the Colossians, who was preached to you by Apaphras when the word of the truth of the gospel was preached to you in truth. Do not be tempted to move away from Him by the Christ plus teachers that have come in among you.

This is the preeminent Christ, Lord of all. All you need is Him. All you need is Him. All you need is Jesus Christ. And as we pick up at verse 21, Paul says, now consider, now consider brothers and sisters, in light of all of this, understanding this, understanding who Christ is, consider what you once were and what you are now because of Him.

Again what the apostle Paul says to the believers at Colossi, he says to you, to every believer in this meeting house today and every believer in all the world. We've all seen on the Internet, they used to be on television, you've seen them on the Internet, these before and after advertisements, right? This was me before, and this was me after, whatever the person did, you know. Well, this is the Apostles' before and after picture of the Christian. He says, once this was you, but now this is you.

You were once alienated, you were once estranged from God, you were once separated from God, but now, now you are reconciled to Him. You once stood in this relationship to God, but now you stand in this relationship to Him. You were once God's enemy, but now you're His friend. And unlike the before and after ads that we see on the internet, it's not because of something we did, but because of something Christ did. Verse 21, and you who once were alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now, now He has reconciled in the body of His flesh through death.

Every person on earth has a relationship with God. Okay, so we hear preachers, I heard it all growing up, you know, you need to have a relationship with God. You have a relationship with, you know, come into a relationship with God. And we all understand what preachers are getting to when they say you need to have a relationship with God. The fact of the matter is that everyone has a relationship with God.

The question is what is your relationship with God? What is your relationship with God? Everyone stands in one of two relationships with God. They are either alienated and estranged from God or they are reconciled to God. And brothers and sisters, Paul says, in the state in which you were born, this once was you, me, every one of us.

This was us. This was our relationship with God. We were once enemies of God in our minds. You were once an enemy of God in your mind. At war with God in your thinking, manifested in your behavior, or manifested by your behavior and my behavior.

We all came into the world that way. We were at war with God and our thinking manifested by our wicked behavior, our works. This was every one of us in the state of nature in which we were born. By nature, we are estranged from God. To be estranged from God is to be at variance with Him.

By nature, in the state in which we were born, we didn't love God. We didn't fear God. In the state of nature, we weren't loyal to God. By nature, we like to keep our distance from God. We don't like His laws, And we don't want him to rule us.

By nature we are at enmity with him. Romans 8, 7 says the carnal mind is enmity against God. What is enmity? Webster, enmity is the quality of being an enemy. Enmity is the opposite of friendship.

At the fall of man, man lost his relationship with God, his fellowship with God, but bless God, Christ came. Christ came into the world and took flesh and became a man to bring reconciliation and restore fellowship and harmony with God. Praise the Lord. We who were once alienated, estranged from God and enemies in our minds by expressed by our wicked works, Yet now has he reconciled in the body of his flesh through death by the sacrifice of Christ in his literal, real, physical body. Paul says in the body of his flesh, because some of the false teachers at Colossi that had entered in were apparently Gnostics who said that Jesus was just an emanation.

So Paul is dealing with all these various false teachings. The Gnostic say that the body is bad, the spirit is good. Jesus didn't have a body or he couldn't be good. You know, that sort of reasoning. No, Christ had to become a man, Paul says.

In order to affect our reconciliation, to bring reconciliation, in order to mediate between God and man, Christ had to become a man. Christ had to have a body like ours, yet without sin, in order to redeem a fallen man and women and reconcile us to God and God to us when he did it at the cross. Paul says, look at what God did for you. This is your before and after picture. This is you before, and this is you now.

This is you before. You were once alienated, estranged from God, enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now He has reconciled you to God in the body of His flesh through death. Paul writes in Romans chapter 5 and verse 10, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son while we were still His enemies. When we were His active enemies in the midst of our rebellion against God, he reconciled us by the cross of His Son, having made peace through the blood of His cross. Sproal.

Reconciliation means bringing people together in peace. Christ made peace for us with God by the blood of His cross, through His sacrifice for us on the cross. Estrangement is the one inescapable ingredient for reconciliation. It's a scroll here. For without it, no reconciliation is needed.

We're all estranged from God in the state of nature in which we were born. In the Colossian epistle, we read that Christ comes to bring reconciliation. The cross brings us into a restored fellowship in harmony with God." In Christ, we are fully reconciled to God. It wouldn't be good news if we weren't fully reconciled, right? Well, mostly reconciled to God.

No, through Christ, in Christ, we are fully reconciled to God. It's not a partial thing. It's full reconciliation, full restoration of fellowship and harmony with God. In Christ, God made His enemies His friends. He made we who were once his enemies his friends, you who were once alienated, estranged from God and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now he has reconciled in the body of his flesh through death.

The price of our reconciliation was born by Christ in death. He bore the cost of bringing us into God's family. He bore the cost of bringing us into the family of God. But oh the cost, oh the cost. Only the death of Christ could satisfy God's justice and reconcile us to Him.

Jesus had to die bearing your sin and my sin. Jesus had to die bearing your sin and my sin and deal with the justice of God for us. It took the suffering of divine vengeance against our sin and the death of God's beloved Son to make reconciliation. There was no other way. Was no other way.

Think of it, there in eternity past, before the creation of the world, in the council of the Holy Trinity before time, before all time, the eternal Son, the eternal Son with angels bowing before Him and unveiling their sight because of His glory, agrees with the Father He agrees with the Father, in perfect agreement, to come to earth, to leave heaven's glory, heaven's glory to come to earth and to take flesh, to enter creation, to unite himself with humanity, to die, To suffer and die in the place of His enemies, in our place, so that we could be restored to perfect fellowship and harmony with Him. And oh, the love, love so amazing, so divine. John Newton, which of all our friends to save us could or would have shed their blood, but our Jesus died to save us, but our Jesus died to have us reconciled in Him to God. This is boundless love indeed. Jesus is a friend in need.

As we close, Christ is supreme in the work of our redemption. You don't need Christ plus circumcision, which we'll see soon in chapter two. He'll be saying to the Colossians as we go forward. You don't need Christ plus a set of man-made rules. You don't need Christ plus angelic mediation or the higher knowledge, supposed higher knowledge of the Gnostics.

You don't need a Christ plus the Jewish feast. You don't need Christ plus a set of dietary rules. You don't need Christ plus asceticism, the rigorous denial of bodily comforts. Christ plus anything equals nothing. All you need is Christ and all you need is in Him.

You cannot add anything to who He is or what He has done for you. Praise God. Like the Colossians, you were alienated from God before the truth of the word of the gospel came to you and by God's grace penetrated your hearts and mind. Like the Colossians, you were estranged from God, cut off, separated from Him in your mind by wicked works, and so was I. And like the believers at Colossi, yet Now, like them, those who have put their trust in Him, He has reconciled to God in the body of His flesh through death.

Why? The goal? To present you holy and unblameable and unreprobable in His sight. To present you holy and unblameable and unreprobable in His sight. Once estranged, now reconciled.

Praise God. Once estranged, now reconciled. We are no longer estranged from God who are united to Christ by faith, no longer enemies. He calls us His friends. My God is reconciled in our hymnal, His pardoning voice I hear, He owns me for His child, I can no longer fear.

With confidence I now draw nigh, with confidence I now draw nigh, and Father, Abba, Father, cry." Let's pray. Oh, wonderful Father, we thank You God for the reconciliation that we have with You in Christ, through Christ, and what He has done for us. We thank You Father that We thank You, Father, that You made us friends who were Your enemies. We praise and thank You, Father, for such grace and mercy that You gave Your only begotten, that He came for us, that He came for us, that He came for us. Thank you, Father, that Jesus came for us and suffered and died for rebellious creatures like us, to reconcile us to heaven and to bring us into the family of God.

O receive our praise with favor, receive our praise with favor, for we ask it in Jesus Holy and Blessed name. Amen.