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Colossians, part 11, What Christ Accomplished

Colossians 2:14 speaks of the “the certificate of debt… which was hostile to us.” This debt was incurred when Adam sinned. Essentially Adam mortgaged the earth. The word mortgage comes from the Old French words mort (“dead”) and gage (“pledge”). So mort-gage literally refers to a “dead pledge” in the sense that property that has been pledged (promised) to you is effectively dead until the debt is fully paid. If you fail to pay, the pledge stays “dead” permanently — meaning you do not actually get the property. Instead, the lender keeps the property.

Theologically speaking, Adam’s unpayable debt meant that he could never truly own the inheritance that God had for him. That inheritance (property) was ultimately the glorified body. Yet his debt put a lien on that property until the debt was paid, thus preventing him from receiving immortality and incorruption.

We read in Proverbs 22:7,

⁷ The rich rules over the poor, and the borrower becomes the lender’s slave.

So Christ paid off Adam’s mortgage, thus paving the way for the whole earth to be filled with the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea (Habakkuk 2:14). Christ’s death fully reversed all the damage that Adam did (Romans 5:18; 1 Corinthians 15:22).

Stripping the Mortgage Holders of Their Lien

Colossians 2:15 says,

¹⁵ When He had disarmed [apekdyomai, “stripped”] the rulers and authorities, He made a public display of them, having triumphed over them through Him.

Christ’s death on the cross paid the debt and stripped the lien holders of all legal authority to continue enslaving the debtors. Paul pictures this in terms of a Roman “triumph,” which was a public celebration parading the captured king or general whom they had defeated in battle. What appeared to be a defeat for Christ was actually a victory celebration, because He stripped the lien holders of their death certificate that was “hostile” toward creation.

The Lesson

In Colossians 2:16, 17 Paul gives us the lesson drawn from Christ’s act:

¹⁶ Therefore no one is to act as your judge in regard to food or drink or in respect to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath day— ¹⁷ things which are a mere shadow [skia, “shadow, profile, silhouette”] of what is to come; but the substance belongs to Christ.

Since Christ has defeated the ruling creditors, no human or religious system has the right to judge believers by (1) Food or drink (daily dietary laws), (2) Festivals (annual feasts), (3) new moons (monthly observances), or (4) Sabbath days (weekly observances). These four were the main concerns within Judaism. No part of the Mosaic ritual calendar can be imposed as a spiritual requirement for justification. Christ’s work was complete and independent of the ritualistic requirements of religion.

Those four things, Paul says, are shadows, mere silhouettes, of that which is real that came later through the New Covenant and its Mediator. Paul asks, “Why do you focus on the shadow instead of ‘the substance,’ that is, the One casting the shadow?”

In other words, certain changes in the law occurred when the New Covenant was instituted. Hebrews 7:12 says,

¹² For when the priesthood is changed, of necessity there takes place a change of law also.

Moral laws did not change, but insofar as the rituals were concerned, there was a change of form. Most of these changes are discussed in the book of Hebrews, the book of “better things.” Types and shadows were given by Moses to instruct the people, so that they would later recognize how these things prophesied of better things to come. Unfortunately, they became addicted to the Old Covenant religious rituals and forms of worship and failed to make the transition into the better things that God intended from the beginning.

Paul continues in Colossians 2:18, 19,

¹⁸ Let no one keep defrauding [katabrabeuō] you of your prize by delighting in self-abasement [false humility] and the worship of angels, taking his stand on visions he has seen, inflated without cause by his fleshly mind, ¹⁹ and not holding fast to the head, from whom the entire body, being supplied and held together by the joints and ligaments, grows with a growth which is from God.

The Greek verb, katabrabeuō means “to rob of a prize,” or “to disqualify (as umpire).” This athletic metaphor pictures a corrupt umpire (judge) who cheats you out of victory by disqualifying you through made-up rules. Paul warns that spiritual legalists and mystics act like corrupt judges who disqualify believers even though Christ has already won the victory.

The danger is not losing salvation but being robbed of the gold medal after achieving a decisive victory. Such unjust judges may claim that they are only following the rules, or, in the case of mystical “visions” and personal revelation, overturn the victory that Christ has won lawfully. Such attempts at spirituality, being lawless, are spurious, because they arise from a “fleshly mind,” rather than the truth of Scripture.

In other words, such lawless spirituality actually originates in the fleshly soul, the conscious mind of the old man of flesh, rather than in one’s spirit through which the Holy Spirit reveals all things. The soul thus may counterfeit the spirit, and many are led astray because they have not been taught properly the difference between soul and spirit.

In verse 19, Paul uses yet another metaphor, this time a body metaphor. He shows the difference between the head and the “joints and ligaments.” Body parts are to submit to the commands of the head, not the other way around. It is the head that holds together the body, he says, and it is the head that provides spiritual “growth which is from God.”

How to be Spiritual

Colossians 2:20-22 says,

²⁰ If you have died with Christ to the elementary principles of the world, why, as if you were living in the world, do you submit yourself to decrees, such as, ²¹ “Do not handle, do not taste, do not touch!” ²² (which all refer to things destined to perish with use)—in accordance with the commandments and teachings of men?

Old Covenant Judaism, with its focus on earthly, fleshly rituals, is comparable to Epicurean materialistic religion. Both focus on temporal things, while having a façade of spirituality that is actually based in soulish revelation. In doing so, they believe that fleshly things rule that which is spiritual and that rituals are needed to complete what Christ has fully accomplished already. Yet these “decrees” (or religious rules) are simply “the commandments and teachings of men.” They are teachings that originate in the carnal mind, the fleshly soul, which claims to be spiritual.

Colossians 2:23 concludes,

²³ These are matters which have, to be sure, the appearance of wisdom in self-made religion and self-abasement and severe treatment of the body but are of no value against fleshly indulgence.

Paul warns that mystical, rule-heavy, angel-focused spirituality may look humble and powerful, but it actually disconnects believers from Christ — the only true source of life, unity, and growth. Many have tried hard to become spiritual by “severe treatment of the body” (asceticism), some through excessive fasting, others by flagellation (whipping oneself), still others by living as hermits in a cave eating dry bread. But these things are no substitute for a genuine relationship with Christ and the knowledge of the Word.