Who Are We? Colossians 1
In our postmodern, well-to-do climate, subjectivism (the subject is the one determining the value of the object), relativism (there are no absolutes), and cynical individualism (the individual alone has the highest authority in their life). These questions typically center around three theological beliefs. These realities relate to:
The doctrine of humanity (biblical anthropology), such as “who we are?” and “what is our place in the world?”
The doctrine of God (biblical theology), such as “who God is?” and “what is God’s place in the world?”
The doctrine of regeneration (Biblical soteriology & Biblical hamartiology), such as “why am I the way I am?” and “is there a better way than the way I am now?”
As we listen well to our co-workers, family members, and neighbors, we may have questions about how to respond, how to remain faithful in conversation, how to boldly represent Christ well, and how to humbly shine a light of hope to those lost in darkness. We may find those around us have questions about who they are, their place in the world, who God is, what God’s place is, why we are the way we are, and if there is a better way than our own way.
Who Are We?
We begin our study with the important questions relating to who you are. We need to come under what the Word of God has to say about who we are. We need to come under and find firm truth in who we are as God speaks to us through His Word by His Spirit. Why is God’s opinion of who we are so essential, you may be asking? Because God alone is unchanging, always truthful, and has your best interest in His heart.
In contrast, every other voice and situation that gives an answer to the question “Who are you?” is changing, not always truthful, and doesn’t have your best interest at heart. Things get pretty complicated when everything around us tries to impress upon us and reinforce an identity of who we are. Who are you? It is partially a complicated question because we are constantly changing. One day we are happy; another we are sad. One day we are employed, in school, in a relationship, well known, and another day we are seeking work, out of school, lonely, and seemingly a stranger to everyone. One day, who we are is well defined, and we can be confident in that identity, but then another day happens, and everything about who we were is stripped from us. One day we were a husband or wife, and then our beloved spouse died. One day we were from our home nation, but then we moved and are strangers in a new nation. One day we were a father or mother, until we mourned the death of our child. One day we were on the rise in our company, until the company went “in another direction”. One day we were a starting contributing player on the team, but now we have trouble getting out of our seats.
Who are we? We are constantly changing, constantly subject to change, constantly being drawn into different situations, circumstances, and relationships. Who are you? If we only listen to ourselves to understand who we are, we will always have a changing understanding, a slipping and dissatisfying understanding of who we are. It is truly a paradox: to find ourselves, we cannot keep listening and looking at only ourselves, that only leads to madness, loneliness, frustration, confusion, and selfishness.
You may well recognize that to understand who you are, you need to listen to voices outside of yourself. But in turning to listen to other voices that may help define and answer the question “Who am I,” we soon learn that those other voices are often unreliable, unhelpful, and untrue. This makes answering the question “Who am I” even more complicated. The voices around us speak with only partial knowledge. Even our closest allies, friends, and family are often somewhat estranged from who we are. Sometimes, because we are always changing, and because the people around us are always changing, we find ourselves in that hilarious but often confusing and bewildering moment when we turn to each other and say, “I’ve known you for how long, and I didn’t know THAT about you?” How could we possibly trust someone who doesn’t know us to reveal to us who we really are?
The absurdity of the whole situation climbs to a mountaintop peak when we realize that groups of people assessing who people are is even more unhelpful. Whole groups of people can be deployed to define, dissect, and answer questions about who someone is, but oftentimes the more cooks there are in the kitchen, the more differences of opinion multiply. One group of people, like your classmates in school, may say who you are reducing you to one thing or another, another group of people, friends in church may say another thing, and then of course there is the great group of people that you interact with simultaneously most frequently, and yet at the same time have never met - the unnamed host of a horde of unnamed faceless people whom you interact with online. They too may say who you are in a variety of ways, but you’ll find that according to the internet, you are never quite the same person to one group as you are to another group.
This is before we even begin to consider the truly befuddling reality that not everyone who is giving an answer to your question is truthful. Everyone has an angle, everyone has a different perspective, and that’s on top of everyone having different moods and different motivations. Some people’s motivations in defining who we are come from a place that is not for our benefit. A brilliant scholarly academic professor who came to Christ later in life admitted that early in life they treated students and other faculty as tools for their work, not as fellow people with value and individually worthy purposes. This professor had to admit that they used other people to further advance their own career, research, and academic standing. In the business world, that is often called “climbing the ladder” or “networking”. After all, isn’t the key to success in the world not about “what you know”, but more about “who you know” and how you can leverage or use those “you know” to accomplish the things you desire?
With such a swirling, churning, always shifting reality, other people cannot be a true, lasting source of defining who we are. If we rely on other individuals or other groups to answer and define who we are, we will find ourselves in a never-ending revolving door of self-understanding that is continually redefined by every moment and every relationship and every interaction we have in the world.
Never knowing who you are, by the way, is a way the world preys upon the souls of people. The world puts forward the idea of “try it before you buy it” and “how will you know if this is who you are unless you give it a shot”? In contrast, God’s Word says that the fool learns from their own experience, while the wise learn from instruction and observation. The world invites us to be fools in answering the question of who we are. We love to answer the question of who we are based on our own moods, ever-shifting preferences, or the voices of others around us that are equally ever-shifting.
Who Does God Say We Are?
We need to come to know who we are from a perspective that doesn’t change, is also truthful, and has our own best interests at heart. We need to come to know who we are in reality, not just in hypotheticals. We need to come to know our identity, who we really are, beyond the surface, beyond moods, beyond even our changing life circumstances and life-changing moments. We need to come to know who we are from a source that can speak with authority to the reality of who we are.
God’s Word says that God knew us from before the foundations of the world were laid (Ephesians 1:4); that means God has known you the longest. God’s Word says that only God can see the heart (1 Samuel 16:7); that means God knows you the deepest. God’s Word says that the Lord knows what we do and think (Psalm 94:11, Ezekiel 11:5, Isaiah 66:18); that means God
And this is where we come to the book of Colossians. This is God’s Word for us. God’s Word comes to us with unchanging consistency, absolute truth, and with a motive of our eternal best interest.
Who Does God Say We Are?
In Colossians 1, we hear about who we are in 3 ways. We are people; you are a person who needs to be rescued, reconciled, and given revelation. This is who you are. You are someone in need of rescue. You are someone in need of reconciliation. You are someone in need of revelation.
Colossians, as a book, was written to believers (1:2), inspired by the Holy Spirit (1:1), and by the Apostle Paul and Timothy (1:1). They wrote it to Christians in the town of Colossae. This was a group of Christian’s that first became Christians as they heard the gospel taught and proclaimed by Epaphras (1:7). Paul writes to them, reminding them who they are, and reminding them who they were. He writes to them about who they are now, as a result of God’s grace, a people who have been rescued (1:13-14), have been reconciled (1:21-22), and have received God’s revealing of the mystery of life, which is Christ (1:26-27).
This shows us that the Bible says we have one of two identities. We either have an identity apart from Christ, or we have our identity rooted and united to Christ. You as a person, either have been rescued by Christ, or you need to be rescued. That is who you are. You as a person, either are reconciled to God, or you are in need of reconciliation with God. You as a person, either have received the revelation of God about the mystery of life that is Christ, or you are ignorant and confused about your true life’s purpose.
When the Bible says we need to be rescued, it is not being dramatic or hyperbolic, nor is it exaggerating our circumstances. For those whose identities are not in Christ, there is a real need for rescue. The need for rescue is a need for rescue from, as Colossians 1:13 puts it, “the dominion of darkness”. When we are in the dark, there is much that we cannot do, much that we cannot see, much fear that lurks, and much uncertainty. For those whose identity is in anything besides Christ, that person is dominated by the dark. The person dominated by the dark loves the darkness and is enslaved to the ways of the darkness.
I know a person whose identity was not in Christ; this person knew of Jesus, but rejected Jesus. This person’s life was marked by continual repeated episodes of uncertain searching for purpose, searching for satisfaction, and searching for anything resembling life. At first, when I knew this person, they found purpose in the groups they were a part of. But that eventually didn’t satisfy. Groups split up, friends move away, and causes that start with great vigor fade into memory. This person then sought identity in their sexuality, trying to be the most manly person he could be. And then eventually tried to be the most womanly woman he could mutilate and turn himself into. This person had rejected the light that would have guided them through every question and every circumstance. This person needed rescue from the confusion, from the dissatisfaction, from the loneliness, and from the darkness. No matter what this person did, in counseling, in using various therapeutic drugs, in making friends or joining social groups, seemingly nothing could rescue this person from the dominion of darkness.
I knew a couple who outwardly enjoyed each other very much because of their very robust intimate life. They were not married; they were both in college, and they both lived with their parents still. They were not especially hard workers, nor did they make efforts to sacrifice for each other. They often bragged and talked about their obsessive physical enjoyment, but that obsession led to a great many problems in their relationship, and in their relationships with others. Their relationship wasn’t rooted in truth, or beauty, or love. Their relationship was devoid of God in their lives, as both of them had rejected Christ throughout their lives. The one thing they had going for them was the one thing they shared in common: a slavish obsession with physical pleasure. This obsession killed their motivation to eat healthy, pursue meaningful employment, or even become a couple living together. Instead, they lived very much in a parasitic manner, taking the gains and generosity of others, while selfishly only indulging themselves at every opportunity possible. These were people whom many would be jealous of, yet as our spiritual eyes begin to open, we recognize that this couple wasn’t happy, wasn’t holy, wasn’t loving, and wasn’t in any way in a good place. They were enslaved in darkness. They were under the dominion, the domination, of dark desires that kept them in chains to the desires of physical pleasure.
I know of another person who, because of the things she had done, things she had thought, and things she had said, was convinced God could never forgive her. She was a person without hope. She knew she was an enemy of God; she knew that she deserved punishment and judgment. She said she was absolutely certain that there was no possibility of her rescue. She knew that her evil behavior was an offense against God. To have peace with God was something that was, in her mind, not a possibility.
What can possibly deliver a person, rescue people like this? Do people like us? People like the people who the Colossians used to be? When darkness is so domineering that it motivates our being, it dictates our daily habits, our desires, and shifts from one fleeting, demanding evil darkness to another? What can reveal life’s purpose, our purpose, the reason and meaning of our existence? Are these questions about who we are forever to be unanswered, unsolvable, a mystery?
Praise God that God has provided the answer! Only God can rescue, only God can reconcile, and only God can reveal the purpose of life.
For while we were dominated by the tyranny of our sin, God sent his only son into time, into our world, to live among us, to be one of us and to die the death that our sin deserved. Through the death of Jesus on the cross, we who believe in Christ have been rescued (1:13-14). Through his body we have been reconciled to God (1:21-22). Through this revealing of God’s love, we now know our life’s purpose (1:26-28).
When God rescues, it’s a real rescue. It’s a redemption, a new life, a second chance. It is forgiveness. When God looks upon those whom he has rescued, there is no anger in his face; there is no judgement waiting. This is one of the great expressions of the blessing of God towards his rescued people - when he looks upon us, his face shines, smiles, and is turned towards us. No longer do the terrible things we thought, said, or did define our future. But instead, the righteous life of Jesus Christ is what defines our future. Apart from Christ, we used to require rescue. But being united to Christ by faith, we receive a real rescue that reconciles us to God and reveals the whole purpose of our lives.
Our identity, apart from Christ, is that we are lost. Sure, we have many other identities, some chosen, some imposed. We are parents, grandparents, spouses, single, students, teachers, employees, employers, citizens, tourists; we are golfers, bakers, knitters, hunters. Yet apart from Christ, all of those secondary identities are fleeting and without any lasting meaning. Those identities apart from Christ are, as Colossians 1 says, identities in need of rescue, in need of reconciliation, and in need of a revealing of a greater purpose. Our identity apart from Christ is so lost that our lostness covers every aspect of our personhood. Every part of our identity when we are apart from Christ is in need of rescue, reconciliation, and a revealing of purpose. Our primary identity of being apart from Christ has a domino-like effect on the rest of our lives. Our purposes all seem to be a messy confusion apart from Christ. All of our secondary identities suffer as a result of our primary identity being apart from Christ. We are, apart from Christ, truly lost in every sense of the word.
Our identity in Christ is that we have been rescued, reconciled, and have had the meaning of our lives revealed. The purpose here, as Colossians 1 says, is to become “fully mature”. The purpose in our lives as those united to Christ is to “grow up”. To “grow up” spiritually means growing up in every possible way. Life in Christ means our purposes as parents, grandparents, citizens, students, golfing, baking, hunting, are all to bring glory to God in everything that we do. Receiving a new identity through the rescue, reconciliation, and revelation of Christ gives a new purpose and lasting true meaning for every other aspect of our being. As terrible and wide-reaching as our lostness is apart from Christ, even greater is the goodness and glory, depth and width of our rescue, reconciliation, and revelation in Christ.
Apart from Christ, every aspect of who we are is lost. Through union with Christ, every aspect of who we are is rescued, reconciled, and has a revealed purpose.
Who you are, according to the Bible, really boils down to two things. You are either someone who is in need of rescue from the dominion of darkness, or you are someone who has been rescued from the dominion of darkness and brought into the kingdom of Jesus Christ. You are either someone who is in need of reconciliation with God, or you are someone who has received reconciliation from God. You are either someone who is ignorant and unaware of your life purpose, or you have received God’s revelation about His saving work in and through Jesus Christ and know now that your life is not your own, but instead your whole life is a thanksgiving offering to God.
Just as children grow up and mature into their identity, we too need to grow up and mature into our identity.
