Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - What is Jesus? | New Testament | Colossians 1

Episode Date: August 16, 2023

Your answer to the question "who or what is Jesus" might be the most important thing about you. So how confident are you in your answer? In today's episode, Patrickexplores Colossians 1 which includes one of the most beautiful descriptions of Jesus. Listen to find out who he is. Your support makes TMBT possible. Ten Minute Bible Talks is a crowd-funded project. Join the TMBTeam to reach more people with the Bible. Give now. Join the TMBT community in reading the entire New Testament in one year. Get your FREE reading plan here. Like this content? Make sure to leave us a rating and share it with others, so others can find it too. Use #asktmbt to connect with us, ask questions, and suggest topics. We'd love to hear from you! To learn more, visit our website and follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter@TenMinuteBibleTalks. Don't forget to subscribe to the TMBT Newsletter here. Passages: Colossians 1

Welcome to 10 minute Bible talks, where we connect the Bible to your life. In the time it takes to get to work. I'm Patrick Miller. Who is Jesus? What is Jesus? I know that sounds like a weird question, but it's totally important. And I say that because when I became a Christian, I understood some fundamental things about who Jesus was, that he was both human and God. But I somehow got the idea that the way this whole thing worked out was that he had a human

body and a divine soul. Now, I didn't know it at the time, but that's actually an ancient heresy called Nestorianism. Thankfully, God is gracious with us in our process of learning, and he showed me the error of my ways. But I've since discovered that Christians have a lot of views about God that actually misrepresent him. For example, some Christians describe God like water. Just like water comes in three different forms, liquid vapor, and solid. God can change his form as Father, son and Holy Spirit. But that's actually not true. That's a heresy called modalism. God is three persons who share in one divine substance. The father is not the spirit and the spirit is not the son, but all are one substance, one Godhead. Does your brain hurt yet? Don't worry. This isn't seminary. I'm bringing all of this

up for a reason. What you believe about God really matters. In fact, it might be the most important thing about you because what you believe about God will shape the whole of your life. If God doesn't exist, well, I guess it's Yolo or nihilism. Or if God's a distant being who isn't really engaged, well, I guess it's the same as the last one. If God's an angry judge counting up every wrongdoing ready to smite you, well, welcome to shame city. If God's a winking grandfather who laughs when you sin, welcome to self-expression station. I could keep going. What you believe about God shapes your life. But it's not just that. If you love God, you should care that you know him as he is. How would you feel if your spouse or best friend sat down with pen and paper and they wrote an essay

describing you. But then when you sat down to Reddit, you found out that they got your height wrong, your skin color wrong, your hair wrong, your eye color, your complexion, all of it wrong. And worse yet, they misrepresented your personality. They said you love all sorts of things you don't love and ignored what you actually love. How would you feel? Would you wonder if they really knew you, if they really saw you, if they really cared about you? How do you think God feels when we aren't really careful about knowing him as he is? When our eyes glaze over, when he describes himself in his word. If you sat down to write that essay about God, would he read it and feel known? Would he feel seen? Would he feel valued? One of my favorite descriptions of Jesus, who he really

is, the second person of the Trinity, the son of God. Well, it comes in the first chapter of Colossians, which is exactly where we are at in the New Testament. If you want to know him as he is, and all his glorious, wonderful unity, there are a few places better to look than this passage. I just want to read through it and offer some commentary. Colossians 115. The son is the image of the invisible God,

the firstborn over all creation. In other words, Jesus, in his human nature, is the perfect image bearer of God. Even though he's co-eternal, he eternally proceeds from the Father as the Father's son. That's the best analogy we have for their tender love and relationship. Verse 16, for in Him, Jesus, all things were created, things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities, all things have been

created through him and for him. So Jesus is the Creator. All that is in creation, whether physical or spiritual, has been made by Him, for him, and through His power. Verse 17, He is before all things, and in Him, all. all things hold together. So Jesus is eternal. He existed before time and matter and space. He's outside of time. And as God, he holds, he literally holds reality together by his divine power. Verse 18. And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning and the first born from

among the dead so that in everything he might have supremacy. So Jesus is the leader of the church. And by his resurrection, he's the first from the church to rise up from the dead. He's kind of like the first fruit that sprouts from a tree in spring. He is supreme overall. He is the ruler overall. He is powerful overall. He is sovereign overall. Verse 19 and 20. 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. So Jesus is fully divine. and through Jesus, God has reconciled himself to a world that's been broken by human sin. Jesus bore the penalty for our sin and our corruption.

By doing so, he's actually reconciled us to God, and not just us, the whole of creation too. This means that in him, all things were not only made, but all things will be made new. I know this episode might sound lofty and theological, but don't you want to know God as he really is? Don't you want to be able to sit down with pen and paper and say, God, I know you, I care about you, I see you, I value you. That's who Jesus is. He is our king. He is the one you love. Seek to know him as he is. Worship him as he is.