Show Notes
Here and there in the New Testament we are suddenly given brief glimpses of arrays of Christian people. Romans 16 provides such a snapshot, and Colossians 4:7–18 provides us with another. The men and women briefly introduced lived entire, complex, interlocked lives, of which we know almost nothing. But they are our brothers and sisters in Christ; they faced temptations, overcame challenges, discharged very different tasks, and played out their roles in diverse strata of society. The brief glimpses afforded here fire our imaginations; our fuller curiosity will be satisfied only in heaven.
A few comments may hint at some of the things that may be learned from the information Paul’s letter provides.
(1) Paul kept a team of people working with him. One of their roles was to travel back and forth between wherever Paul was and the churches for which he felt himself responsible. Combining Paul’s letters with Acts, it is often possible to plot some of their constant travels. Here, Paul sends Tychicus to the Colossians with explicit pastoral purposes (Col. 4:7–8).
(2) The “Mark” of Colossians 4:10 is almost certainly John Mark, and the author of the second Gospel. Here he is identified as a relative of Barnabas. This may account, in part, for the dispute between Barnabas and Paul as to whether Mark should be given a second chance after he withdrew from the first missionary expedition (Acts 13:5, 13; 15:37–40). Certainly by the end of Paul’s ministry, Mark had been restored in the apostle’s eyes (2 Tim. 4:11).
(3) Paul’s co-workers often included both Jews and Gentiles (Col. 4:11). It does not take much imagination to recognize the challenges and stresses, as well as the blessings and richness, that this arrangement entailed.
(4) Epaphras emerges as a formidable model. He is “always wrestling in prayer” for the Colossian believers. What he prays, above all, is that they “may stand firm in all the will of God, mature and fully assured” (Col. 4:12). How the church of Christ needs prayer warriors with similar focus today!
(5) The “Luke” mentioned in Colossians 4:14 is almost certainly the author of Luke and Acts, and a Gentile (since he is in the Gentile part of this list, Col. 4:11ff.). This makes him the only Gentile writer of a New Testament document. Demas is mentioned in the same breath, but he is probably the same one who ultimately deserts the mission and the Gospel (2 Tim. 4:10). Good beginnings do not guarantee good endings.
(6) Churches in the first century did not have their own buildings. Believers regularly met in the homes of their wealthier members. Nympha of Laodicea is one of the wealthy women of a wealthy city, and the church there met in her home (Col. 4:15).
More from Read The Bible
Some years ago I received a letter from someone who told me that he had read one of my books and was upset that I had often referred to the Lord Jesus Christ as “Jesus.” He quoted several passages about confessing Jesus as Lord (e.g., Rom. 10:9), and how such confession is the mark of having the Spirit (1 Cor. 12:3). I wrote back, explaining that when I refer to the Lord Jesus Christ as Jesus, I am not thereby denying his lordship. Rather, I am not at that point affirming it. Further, the book he had read dealt with one of the synoptic Gospels. In the Gospels, the Lord Jesus is most commonly referred to simply as “Jesus.” So since I was commenting on one of the Gospels, I tended to refer to Jesus in the same way that Scripture does. When expounding some passage from, say, Paul, I tend to use, predominantly, the forms for addressing or referring to Jesus that the apostle uses.
The passage in 2 Thessalonians 3:6–13 is unique in the New Testament. Nowhere else do we find so many lines devoted to the sin of idleness.
It has always been easy to get things wrong about the return of Jesus. Sometimes this springs from ignorance, sometimes from a distorted emphasis. Judging from 2 Thessalonians 2:1–12, such dangers have been present since the early church.
I once heard a pastor preach through 2 Thessalonians 1 under the following outline:
The last chapter of 1 Kings, 1 Kings 22, many believers find troubling. For here God himself is presented as sending out “a lying spirit” (1 Kings 22:22) who will deceive King Ahab and lead him to his destruction. Does God approve of liars?