Unless otherwise marked, Scriptures are taken from the HOLY BIBLE,
NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984
International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Bible Publishers.

Colossians 1:9-12
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 and understanding. And we pray this in ordxer that you may live a live
worthy of the Lord and 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 in the saints in the kingdom of light.

As we grow in the knowledge of God our lives will change, we will more
closely conform to the image of Jesus, our head. It is God's plan and purpose
that we produce fruit, that we participate in the work of God, and that we do
so in EVERY good work He has to be done. He desires that the Body of Christ,
which He has delivered from the authority of sin and death and brought into
His kingdom in His son, should have a full share in the kingdom, that we all be
Jesus to the world. He wants the Body to become indistinguishable from the head.
And has promised His glorious might will strengthen us to accomplish that goal.
All that is lacking is for us to become aware of it, and by faith partake of it.

Colossians 1:13-20
For He has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the
kingdom of the Son He loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of
sins. He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.
For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and
invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were
created by him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold
together. And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and
the firstborn form among the dead, so that in all things he might have the
supremacy. For God was pleased to have all His fullness dwell in him, and
through him to reconcile to Himself all things, whether things on earth, or
things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.

Jesus, the first to be born again, has supremacy over all of us, who were actually
born again in him, by virtue of his being the first. All that we habve from God comes
through Jesus and is in reality ours because it is his. But it is very important to
realize that it was given him with the express intent that we would have it.
Infact we are in God's Kingdom because we are in the kingdom of His son.
When we procaimed Jesus to be our Lord we entered his kingdom, we then had our ability to participate as God's authorities on earth and over the creatures on it
restored.
This is the proclamation of the herald angels at Jesus' birth. They announced
that on earth there would be peace and goodwill toward man from God and those in
His kingdom. We were seperated and at emnity toward God in our sin, but in
Christ Jesus, our head, we are reconnected and have renewed spiritual life and
purpose.

Colossians 1:25-28
I have become its (the body/church) servant by the commission God gave me to
present to you the Word of God in its fullness -- the mystery that has been kept
hidden for ages and generations, but is now disclosed to the saints. To them God
has chosen to make known among the gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery,
which is Christ in you the hope of glory. We proclaim him, admonishing and
teaching everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone perfect in
Christ.

In ages past men weren't allowed to grasp the love, mercy, and grace of God
in its ultimate manifestation. But we have been granted to know its fullness.
Spicifically that God desires to restore us to total maturity and perfection as
His children, ambassadors, and servants in the earth.

Colossians 2:9+10
For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, and you have
been given fullness in Christ, who is the head over every power and authority.

Jesus, as a resurrected man has been filled with all the fullness of God, and
we are promised fullness also in him. We are not God, but we are His temple,
and as the Body of Christ we can be partakers of God's divine presence in the
person of the Holy Spirit. Jesus had the Spirit without measure (John 3:34) when
he walked on the earth as a man in total harmony with God, and we are offered
the same level of fullness in him today.

Colossians 3:10+11
...and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the
image of its Creator. Here there is no Greek or Jew, circumcised or
uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all.

We are called to take the "mantle" of Christ, just as Elisha did from Elijah,
and to put on the "new self" which we are called to be in Jesus Christ. God
desires that we allow Him to make all that we are to be Christ, and that it be
so in all of us. This occurs through a process of renewal, when your and I were
born again, we were born a new spirit by and of God's Spirit. Our soul (which
is our thinking, desiring, and the "life" we live) is still the old "self". We
still have a fleshly body. But through the knowledge of God we are renewed into
the image of our Creator -- Christ. Even the usage of the terms "Head" and body
clearly indicate that we are the same creature, having the same nature. You can
examine your self, the genetic code (DNA) found in the cels that make up your
head is exactly the same as the DNA that makes up the cels of your finger,
foot, liver, heart etc... The basic foundational nature of "you" is shared by
each part of you. So it is with Christ. We are spirit of his Spirit, and are
called, by that Spirit, to be conformed in every area of our living to His
image, or if you will, His basic nature, His DNA. Our body is still fleshly,
but we are promised that His Spirit will give life to it (ROM 8:11).

This is why Jesus said that we would do the works that he did, and greater.
Because he was going back to the Father (JOHN 14:12). It is extreemly important
to recognize that apart form Jesus we can do nothing, but bless the Living God
we aren't apart from him. And we are called to total fellowship with him and
the Father. God wants to spend 24 hours a day living in you and living through
you to reach and touch a dying world with the light of His Glory and His
kingdom. Will you make a commitment to Him to seek Him and His will with all
your heart, to partake of His measureless promises, and enter into a non-stop
relationship with Him?

Dan Sharpe 6/17/94.

If you haven't yet accepted God's gift, Jesus Christ as your Savior, and Proclaimed him as your Lord, I encourage you to pray this prayer aloud: