“Therefore as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, 7. Rooted and built up in Him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving.”
In this text, Paul lays out for the Colossians, and for us, the reality of our relationship with Christ. First, we receive Christ. The Greek word here can also be translated “taken.” We have taken Christ into our lives by faith in Him. Jesus knocked and we opened the door to Him. (See Revelation 3:20) When we received Jesus into our lives He did not make us religious, but He made us His. The Christian experience is a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. Then we are to “walk in Him.” This means that this personal relationship with Christ should make a difference in our lives. Second, we are “rooted and built up in Him and established in the faith.” The Greek word for “rooted” means that we are firmly planted in Christ. We need to put our roots down deep in Christ. He has made this possible by giving us the Holy Spirit to lead and guide us into His truth. We need to put our roots down in the scriptures. A Christian who does not read and study scripture will not grow in Christ. (If you are a new Christian, you need to read and study the four gospels and get thoroughly acquainted with Jesus.) We need to put our roots down in prayer. Christians need to set aside a time to pray. We can pray any time during the day, but we need a time of concentrated prayer, where we not only speak to the Lord, but we let Him speak to our hearts. We need to put our roots down in Christ’s church. I don’t mean that we are to just “go to church,” but we are to be the church in our daily lives. The relationship that we have with Christ is an eternal reality. When we accept Christ as our Savior, He becomes one with us, meaning that we have a personal relationship with Him. We can say with Paul: “I am not ashamed: for I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that day.” (2nd Timothy 1:12) The reality is that we have received Christ into our lives, we are rooted, firmly fixed, in Him; therefore, we live each day for Him. This doesn’t mean that we strut around being one with Jesus, but that we live lives that let His light shine. I repeat: Jesus does not make us religious; rather He lives within us to change and use us to shine for Him each day. Let’s let our lights shine for Jesus in this troubled world and let the world know that He is alive by the way we live. May others see Jesus in us in our daily lives! Bro. Joe
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AuthorDr. Joe Beauchamp is the author of this blog and website. Categories
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