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Christ Centered Relationships Colossians 3:18-4:1 |
June 4, 2006 Pastor Tom Marcum |
I’ve had a number of unusual and unexpected conversations in 30 plus years of ministry in the church. One of the most memorable took place over 20 years ago when I was the Youth Pastor in a mega-church and was newly engaged to Stirling. The conversation unfolded like this.
I had just concluded a training event with my volunteer youth leaders and one by one they began to filter out of the room. After a few minutes the only ones remaining were me and Kathy, one of my female leaders. She and her husband Dave, a very successful businessman, were very active in our church family.
As I was packing up all of my materials, Kathy and I were chatting casually when the conversation took a sudden and completely unexpected turn when, Kathy propositioned me. And she did so in terms clear enough that there was no possible way to have misunderstood her intent.
Now, I know that you’ll be stunned to learn that this doesn’t happen to me very often, but it doesn’t. “Thank You, Lord.” And I was stunned. But once my heart started beating again I said to her, with clarity equal to hers, “I don’t know how this has happened, but you’ve clearly jumped to some false assumptions about the nature of our relationship.”
To which she calmly said, “Actually, we’ve never defined the nature of our relationship.”
Which prompted me to say, “What in the world are you talking about? You’re married to Dave. I’m engaged to Stirling. The nature of our relationship is abundantly clear.”
And she said, “Actually, that’s not true. My relationship to Dave is clear. Your relationship to Stirling is clear. But we’re still free to define the nature of our relationship any way we want to.”
And at that point I decided to define the nature of our relationship by sprinting from the premises, heading straight to Stirling’s condo and saying, “You’re not going to believe what just happened to me.”
Now, as you can imagine, I spent a fair amount of time analyzing that conversation in the days that followed…as did Stirling…and one of the things I came to realize was that Kathy and I were profoundly different in this respect:
--In my mind, my relationship with my spouse, by definition, informs and guides all of my other relationships.
--In Kathy’s mind, her relationship to her husband was wholly unrelated to her other relationships.
And while I was initially stunned by her ability to so thoroughly compartmentalize an aspect of her life as important as her marriage, I’ve since realized that we humans are masters of compartmentalization and our mastery doesn’t automatically end when we become Christians. The truth of the matter is that there are a whole bunch of us Christians who have mastered the art of compartmentalizing our Christian faith, restricting it from influencing other aspects of our lives.
At the beginning of this year we began a journey through the book of Colossians, Paul’s wonderfully instructive letter written to the young church in Colosse. This morning, following a bit of a detour that began at Easter, I want to continue that journey which I’ve entitled, “Remember Who(se) You Are.”
And as we rejoin the journey at Colossians 3:18, this issue of compartmentalization is on Paul’s mind. And Paul’s basic message to us here is that rather than striving to confine our relationship with Jesus to a neat little compartment completely removed from the rest of our relationships, our goal as Christians is to intentionally invite the influence of Jesus into all of our relationships. As we have welcomed the presence of Jesus into our lives we also want to welcome the presence of Jesus into our relationships. Which means that our goal as Christians is to transform all of our relationships into CHRIST CENTERED RELATIONSHIPS.
Now, does that mean that we only form relationships with other Christians? Absolutely not. What it means is that we recognize that every relationship in our life provides us an opportunity to reflect the presence and character of Christ. And our desire…indeed, our commitment…is to do just that. So, our daily prayer sounds something like this, “Lord Jesus, even as you are at the center of my life I want you also, to be at the center of all of my relationships.”
And as we come, now, to our text, Paul is going to speak to three of those key relationships…the husband/wife relationship; the parent/child relationship and the slave/master or as we might apply it, today, the employee/employer relationship and his goal is to teach us what we can do to keep Christ at the center of those relationships. To make sure that Christ’s presence is revealed in the ways that we engage in each of those relationships.
Let’s begin with Colossians 3:18-19 where Paul’s focus is the Christ-centered marriage relationship. He writes,
“Wives, submit to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord. Husbands, love your wives and do not be harsh with them.”
I think it is safe to say that, in our culture these days you would be hard pressed to find a biblical injunction that is more controversial than this idea of wives submitting to their husbands. Consequently, I’m just going to skip these verses altogether and drop down to verse 20. Just kidding.
But why is this idea of submission so controversial? I’m convinced that it’s largely because of widespread misunderstanding about the biblical notion of submission.
--If submission means obedience, any wife would bristle. But it doesn’t mean that. The scriptures repeatedly tell children to obey their parents, but they never tell the wife to obey her husband.
--If submission means that the wife is in some way inferior to her husband, any wife would bristle. But it doesn’t mean that. Earlier in this chapter and again in his letter to the Galatians, Paul makes it clear that Christ has no regard whatsoever for distinctions like ethnicity, culture and gender. In Christ, we are all equals.
--If submission means that the wife can never voice a differing opinion and that the husband should treat her views as intrinsically of lesser value than his own, any wife would bristle. But it doesn’t mean that. Remember, that in the expanded instructions on Christian marriage that Paul wrote to the Ephesian Christians, in the verse immediately preceding his instruction for the wife to submit to her husband, he wrote, “Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.” Folks, submission is not a one-way street. We’re called to mutual submission.
So, if submission doesn’t mean any of that what does it mean? Submission basically speaks of a willingness to accept your God given function. Submission is rooted in the recognition that, even as God does not give everyone identical gifts, He also does not give everyone identical roles. And He has assigned distinct roles to husbands and wives. God has given husbands primary responsibility for leading and protecting their families and He has given wives primary responsibility for nurturing their families. And He has also given husbands and wives specific instructions to help each of them help their mate fulfill their God given function.
--Wives who consistently resist their husbands’ every attempt to provide Godly leadership to the family make it difficult for their husbands to succeed in their God-given function. So, wives are told to submit to their husbands.
--And husbands who fail to be consistently loving toward their wives make it difficult for their wives to succeed in their God-given function. So, husbands are told to love their wives. And the standard of love that is required of husbands could not be any higher. Ephesians 5:25 says it like this, “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her…”
Now, I want to quickly offer 3 final thoughts as a summary of the biblical picture of Christian marriage.
#1 The biblical picture of Christian marriage is a picture of a loving partnership between equals.
#2 The biblical picture of Christian marriage is a picture of two partners doing everything they can to help their mate become everything that God intended them to be.
#3 The biblical picture of Christian marriage is a picture of a husband and wife working together to bring the presence and character of Jesus into their home.
And that brings us to verses 20-21 where Paul turns his focus to Christ-centered parent/child relationships. He writes,
“Children, obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord. Fathers, do not embitter your children, or they will become discouraged.”
The instruction here to children is straightforward and to the point. The primary responsibility of a child toward their parents is obedience. And the motive offered for this obedience is the knowledge that it is pleasing to the Lord. And that means, Christian youth, that one of the primary ways that you can demonstrate your love for God is by respectfully doing the things your parents tell you to do.
Now, at this point Paul turns to the fathers and says, don’t “embitter your children, or they will become discouraged.” Discouraged in what? Discouraged in their effort to obey you. Discouraged in their effort to do their God-given function. And isn’t that interesting. The common thread that runs through both the husband/wife relationship and the parent/child relationship is that everyone has a God-given function and everyone is instructed to help each other fulfill their function. In this case, children help their parents fulfill their function by being respectfully obedient and parents help their children fulfill their function by not discouraging them.
And, on that point, I like what Ray Steadman says. He says the 3 quickest ways for a father to discourage his children is to ignore them, indulge them or insult them. I would add a fourth—be inconsistent in what you expect of them. If you want to find a discouraged, disobedient child, look for a child with parents who are constantly changing their expectations of that child or parents who can’t agree on what to expect of that child or parents who don’t support each others’ expectations of that child. Folks, that is a guaranteed strategy for producing a discouraged child.
And that brings us to verses 22-4:1 where Paul turns his focus to Christ-centered work relationships. He writes,
“Slaves, obey your earthly masters in everything; and do it, not only when their eye is on you and to win their favor, but with sincerity of heart and reverence for the Lord. Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving. Anyone who does wrong will be repaid for his wrong, and there is no favoritism.
Masters, provide your slaves with what is right and fair, because you know that you also have a Master in heaven.”
Paul’s words here about “masters” and “slaves” are difficult for our modern ears because of our abhorrence of the institution of slavery. But it’s important for us to remember that Paul was writing from within the context of a 1st century Roman culture in which nearly ˝ the population was slaves. So, rather than calling for its immediate destruction, he offers a radical word of instruction to transform it from the inside out…
…by telling Christian slaves that their faithful service to their earthly masters is received by God as service to the Lord;
…and by telling Christian slave masters to be fair with their slaves, remembering that they themselves are slaves to Christ.
And while the connection is not exact, it is still useful to see three lessons here that can help us bring the presence and character of Christ into our workplaces today.
#1 Give your work 100% of your effort, 100% of the time because the way you work is a reflection on Christ, whose name you bear.
#2 Do your work in such a way that it not only pleases your boss, it also pleases your Master.
#3 Whatever your work is, do it as service to the Lord.
Folks, every relationship in our lives gives us the opportunity to reflect the presence and character of Christ.
What’s more, every relationship in our lives will be transformed as we bring into it the presence and character of Christ.
Do you want to transform your marriage? Remember who and whose you are.
Do you want to transform your family? Remember who and whose you are.
Do you want to transform your work experience? Remember who and whose you are.
Folks, inviting Jesus into our lives is only the beginning of our Christian life.
Inviting Him to transform our lives is the best of the Christian life.
© Copyright 2006 Pastor Tom Marcum