You can probably tell from the last couple devotions that I have been reading in Colossians, specifically that first wonderful chapter. There are three verses (vs21-23) that contain three of the most amazing truths found in Scripture. Verse 21-22a speaks of our separation and reconciliation, verse 22b gives us the result of that reconciliation and verse 23 provides a warning. I want to look at what those verses mean for us over the next couple days.
Colossians 1:21: “This includes you who were once far away from God. You were his enemies, separated from him by your evil thoughts and actions. Yet now he has reconciled you to himself through the death of Christ in his physical body.
Once we were alienated. We were banished from the presence of God. We were estranged. We were habitual enemies of God because of our sin. God was holy; we were not. Ezekiel 18:4 reminds us of that: “Behold, all souls are Mine…. The soul who sins shall die.”
Doesn’t come much plainer than that. The soul who sins shall die. Before we came to Christ, we may have been good people or evil people according to the world’s viewpoint, but to a Holy God, we deserved nothing less than death. Each of us had broken the first and greatest commandment to love, “the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind.”
No one was able to keep that commandment, even if we did well with others. And breaking one law, just one, makes us a lawbreaker under judgment. “Yet now” the most amazing transformation; God has reconciled us through Christ’s death.
I don’t want justice. Justice demands my death as a lawbreaker, and my condemnation and eternal alienation from God. I need a Holy God to be merciful to me, a sinner. I need a Holy God to make the way for me. I need a Holy God to enable me to come into His presence. I need His mercy and His grace.