Colossians 2:16 Commentary - Dr Peter Masters

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Colossians 2:16

Comments

We are given here by the apostle Paul a glimpse of the works of the flesh. The Judaising heretics had begun to influence the church at Colossae and to persuade them that they needed Jewish ceremonies. But this particular brand of Judaising heretics at Colossae was worse than just that, because they also mixed with their Judaism various early gnostic ideas, mystical ideas, and the apostle refers to them here in passing. They said, Christ is not enough for you; what you need is ceremonies, rites and acts, but you need much more, and more elaborate ones than even the Jews had. You need to go back to the ceremonies and you need to keep them perfectly in order to have some standing or some grace before God, and that would do away with Christ, that would detract from him. That meant you had to say, Well, he wasn’t really a Saviour, or he was only a partial Saviour because I need these things too. That was one side of the heresy. Gnosticism added that all flesh is evil, and therefore there is a constant battle between good and evil, and you must adopt certain practices and ceremonies, and a very aesthetic lifestyle, denying the flesh in order to please God.So the focus was moved from salvation in Christ to a kind of gnostic, Judaistic works religion. The apostle therefore says to the people of Colossae, Do not come under judgement from these people; do not accept their criticisms of you. Do not listen to them. ‘Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink,’ in all their different rites, ‘or in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days’, because you do not keep those things any more – that is to say, the Jewish Sabbath, with all its particular rules and regulations that were attached to it. Do not be intimidated by all that. Don’t let them make you feel bad about that, you Gentiles; you don’t have to, and you are not supposed to. Now the apostle does not even trouble to distinguish between the things that were Jewish and the things that these heretics had added on. He points out that even the core Jewish rites of old have passed.

Application

Questions

What was the purpose of the old Jewish rites and ceremonies – the old Jewish laws about eating and drinking, the great separation between clean foods and unclean foods, that was now abolished? It was given to the Jews in ancient times as part of their life and part of their worship to teach them distinctions, distinguishing between that which is holy and that which is unholy, that which is fit for God and that which is not fit for God because it is sinful and polluted. These elaborate rules were designed to teach them that holiness is necessary, a Saviour must come and purchase it for us because we have none of our own sufficient to deserve heaven and eternal life. The sacrifices taught that we are sinners and a sacrifice is going to have to be made for sin. The great sacrifice will be Christ when he comes. An animal cannot do it but it taught this: that sin must be done away with, that blood must be shed, punishment must be meted out before sin can be got rid of and we can be declared clean and innocent. But when Christ came and made that sacrifice, the old lessons that pointed forward, they were abolished, they were done away.

Outline

Purpose

Introduction

Colossians 2:16 Commentary and Bible Study