​The Hidden Christmas
Introduction & Chapter One
November 27, 2016
Our first meeting together on the first day of Advent started out on a hopeful note. Timothy Keller is a pastor who dedicates this book to his grandchildren. It gives us the sense of a wise father passing down the gospel to the next generation. This is an approach that invites us to hear what is taught and thoughtfully engage the teachings. Keller’s tone in the book has a smile (at times a smirk when the world acts out in unbecoming manners) because Christmas is a time for joy. It’s a joy because of the incarnation of God in the earth. Joy to the world indeed!
Although Keller’s approach is not casted in the light of Advent, we who are journeying during this time are mindful of the ancient church tradition that inaugurates our church calendar. Keller’s joy though is easy to mistake as incidental happiness that any of us can have if we can get in the Christmas spirit! This appears to where the battle lines are drawn for our study. Christmas is most holy for Christian observance yet, a secular festival of lights. Keller does not take the banal method of criticizing consumerism at Christmas (in some sense for this to remain a secular festival it will ever hold onto the transactional nature of gift giving). No, Keller deals with the issue of sentimentality. It’s this prevailing mood that does no good. The problem of sentimentality is its lack of truthfulness and unrealistic ways of living in this world. The Christian response is one that sees the battle as a clash of light and darkness. It’s not one that is between persons and peoples but in all of our hearts.
To be a Christian is recognize by admitting the truth that I am blind and that Jesus alone can heal us. This is the human condition and none of us are exempt from being malaise with this disease. We want to say as Christians we are in the light (and we are because of Christ’s light) but we still struggle and fight with disordered desires and decrepit ways of being human as a people. Yes we are people called out of darkness into God’s glorious light but this does not mean our battle is over, if anything, it intensifies. It is this admittance of Sin’s power that engenders self-centredness and shows how persistent spiritual blindness can be that gives the Christian a heartfelt sense of joy. You see, we live as Christians, by the hope of God’s light shining upon us and penetrating the stoniest heart to manifest the light within that it may shine through. Our blindness as a Christian would be to say we have no struggle. Listen to Jesus in the Gospel of John:
“For judgment I came into this world, that those who do not see may see, and those who see may become blind.” (9:39)
Now listen to the offence this created in the ears of the Pharisees (some of whom made Jesus their opponent):
“Are we also blind?” (9:40)
Jesus’ reply is telling:
“If you were blind, you would have no guilt; but now that you say, ‘We see,’ your guilt remains.” (9:41)
What this exchange means for us as Christians during this time of Advent hopes is this…we are in the dark in desperate need of light. This is not something the new convert simply learns and then goes on his/her merry way, rather, it is the chance to now live as disciples who recognize the profound bankruptcy of our thought life, humanity and spiritual reception of God’s life. We live by the miracle of God’s grace. We don’t have anything that makes it easier or better as we journey into Christ. No! We bear a cross in the hopes of imitating the Master who is our Lord, Jesus Christ.
Advent is a time to come to terms with our incipient nature to not relate to God with who we are on a regular basis. It is a time to discover as the light shines on you, our unpreparedness for the coming of the King. What hope do we have other than that the baby will be born and by otherworldly intervention we will hear and believe! Such is the hope of a Christian community of brothers and sisters who do not deny they are beginning to see but neither denies there is this recurring blindness. Blindness toward what you may ask? Blindness that says we are not blind and is thereby ignorant of our unloving stony hearts in need of a Spirit transformation. We need Jesus Christ more than we think or know. Are you ready to join us this Advent for the weeks ahead? Shalom.

Greetings fellow-wayfarer, two weeks ago (November 13, 2016) we went into groups of three for Sunday School. These are posted for your edification and to aid along in study of Paul's letter to the Colossians. Below are fifteen collections that I pray will stretch and strengthen you in your love for God. Shalom.
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1. If Colossians were a First Testament book, which one would you say and why?
2. Show five instances in the letter of Colossians of Paul being imprisoned. Describe each of those instances with citation of chapter and verse reference.
3. Paul is a new man in Christ but imprisoned. Make sense of this reality and share three paradoxes that are its necessary outcome.
4. Last week’s sermon entitled, “Misfits of Another Kingdom,” made the point in 3:18-4:1 that Christians are not primarily about telling other people what to do. Explain the way that works in family roles of wives-husbands, children-fathers, slaves-masters.
5. Unpack Colossians 2:23, “These have indeed an appearance of wisdom in promoting self-made religion and asceticism and severity to the body, but they are of no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh.” Context: Paul is speaking of human teachings and precepts (something Jesus was on about with the Pharisees) when talking about having an appearance of wisdom. What does have value to stopping the indulgence of the flesh? And why does “self-made religion”, “asceticism” and “severity to the body” not work in stopping the indulgence of the flesh? Why is this false approach used by people generation after generation? How do you understand this lingering effect?
6. Review the Sunday School from a couple weeks ago that addressed the ways we understand the head and the way Colossians does (see Col. 1:18; 2:10, 19). In sum, Christ as the head sounds a lot different than we point at the head. Account for this difference.
7. The one part of our sermon series in Colossians that did not have time allotted to go through was Col. 3:15-17. In past times of teaching these verses, the repetition of thanksgiving (3X) has been mentioned. Look at the word “let” (v.15, 16) and connect this to doing everything in the name of the Lord Jesus. Comment on what kind of outcome this can have on our ways of being Christian.
8. Colossians 3:11 reads, “Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free: but Christ is all, and in all.” This verse is reminiscent of Galatians 3:28. Why does Paul not include male and female in this list? Is this simply an oversight or gloss? Or perhaps does it contribute to the addressing of the Christian household in 3:18-4:1? Further, how do you hear Christ is all and in all?
9. Paul warns against being taken captive by philosophy and empty deceit according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of this world (2:8). Again in 2:22 he speaks of human precepts and teachings.  Why is there a need to warn against the role of human tradition, teachings and precepts? Isn’t this a built in component to being Christian that we have a human composition to that way things are share, disseminated or disclosed? Speak to this issue with understanding church practice (both within our Sunday confines and abroad).
10. Have each person offer up a portion of Paul’s prayer in 1:9-14 for one another and our church.
11. Re-summarize the role of the opening chapters of Genesis in Paul’s letter to the Colossians. Why does he make a point of starting from there?
12. Death and resurrection are the ways of God made plain in the person of our Lord Jesus Christ. Show the ways that Paul makes this the crux of the matter for our life in Christ.
13. Colossians 3:25, “For the wrongdoer will be paid back for the wrong he has done, and there is no partiality.” This verse seems to be out of place when reading the flow of 3:22-4:1. But we know the Bible is God’s Word and these lines have a point to make. Who is this line speaking of? The bondservants or masters? Or it both? Give reason(s) for your answer.
14. Read Colossians 4:7-18. This will be next week’s text that concludes our sermon series in Colossians. Get acquainted with the names and imagine being in the church at Colossae when it is being read aloud. What impressions does this ending leave with you?  
15. Benediction: now may the Father of our living Lord Jesus Christ who robes you and adorns you as our high priest in heaven cause you by the Holy Spirit to be wearing as God’s hand-picked ones, holy and much loved to be clothed with compassionate hearts to our failures, kindness to the bruised, humility to the proud in heart, meekness to the power-hungry, patience to the wandering, making room for other Christians who fault without finding fault, and tenderly forgiving others as you remember what it has been like to be forgiven by the Lord, so now forgive others and let love reign in you from the inside out and by so doing promote the glory of God in this mission of imaging the Creator Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen.  

Greetings, our last week in Sunday School (November 20, 2016) I wrote on the board various questions and musings on the letter of Colossians. Listed below are 12 questions I invite you to process and digest. Should you have any questions, feel free to let me know. Shalom!

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• Grace is vital to the proclamation of Paul’s gospel to the gentiles (see Colossians 1:2; 4:18). Show the ways Paul ministers grace in ministering to the Colossians.
• What is God’s action toward His creation? In other words, locate at least ten references to God as the subject of the verb in the entirety of the letter of Colossians.
• Why does the role of the mind come into conversation when speaking about humanity’s bondage to Sin?
• Identify the calling of the church, and the place you find yourself in all of this?
• The revelation of God’s gospel shows that God is hiding some things. Explain.
• How would it affect your understanding to learn the letter to the Laodiceans is the letter to the Ephesians?
• Paul’s language of faith shows a great level of imagination at work (eg. In 2:14 the legal demands on the cross are cancelled is referring to the inscription above Jesus’ head on the cross). Find other references in Colossians of Paul using his apostolic imagination.
• Comment upon the vertical/horizontal dimensions described in the letter. What effect does this give to the hearers?
• According to Paul in Colossians, a mature Christian community/people/church is characterized by ____________.
• Paul appears to throughout the letter to take a positive tone to the Colossian church. In this light, many scholars speak of a “Colossian Heresy” in the letter that Paul is warning Colossians Christians. Reconcile this conundrum.
• The Christian hope, as described by Paul, is shown in the letter to be what?
• Compare Paul’s letter to the Romans with Colossians, what major similarities and differences do you notice?