Sermons Notes

Colossians 1:1-12                                  Put Your Mind in Your Prayers

Kowloon International Baptist Church                         Kowloon Tong

Harry Lucenay, Pastor                                                     5 March 2006

This study can help us better understand who we are in Christ

1. Look for God's gift and stand with Him.

Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother. To the holy and faithful brothers in Christ at Colosse: Grace and peace to you from God our Father.       (Colossians 1:1-12)

Paul wrote the Christians in Colosse to encourage them as they faced opposition coming from the Gnostics who valued knowledge above everything, loved rules and regulations, and saw matter as evil and spirit as good. Paul felt God had sent him out (apostle) in the name of Jesus. He knew commission was not of his doing but of God's design and he was following the will of God. Acts 9 records his blinding encounter on the Damascus Road in which God called into question Paul's previous understanding of the Divine as well as Paul's actions. 

People who live in Christ partake of all Jesus Christ has done, all He was and will be.

 If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!     (Corinthians 5:17)                                                           

2. Look for God's good and tell Him thanks.

We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you,because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all the saints the faith and love that spring from the hope that is stored up for you in heaven and that you have already heard about in the word of truth, the gospel that has come to you. All over the world this gospel is bearing fruit and growing, just as it has been doing among you since the day you heard it and understood God's grace in all its truth.          (Colossians 1:3-6)

Notice Paul's emphasis on faith, love and hope. When we found our lives on Jesus Christ we can bear fruit as we grow in Christ.

Love your neighbor as you love yourself.         (Mark 12:30)

 2. Look for God's guidance and follow Him.

For this reason, since the day we heard about you we have not stopped praying for you and asking God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all spiritual wisdom & understanding. And we pray this in order that you may live a life worthy of the Lord & may please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God,being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience, and joyfully
giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the kingdom of light.   

(Colossians 1:9-12)

 The search for the knowledge of God's will is not a search for the accumulation of new truths, but the integration of the self-revelation of God into our lives. God's will is not to be separated from God's Word.

If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously.        (James 1:5)

 
The discovery of God's will forms the basis for living a life that honors God and pleases Him.Apart from me you can do nothing.    (John 15:5)

Christians will face difficulties in life's circumstances and with people. However, God gives the strength to patiently endure difficulties

The translation used unless otherwise noted is the New International Version.