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Life is what you are alive to. Mention cars and many teenage boys come alive. Mention boyfriends and all the teenage girls come alive. Mention money and the stock market and a lot of people come alive. Life indeed is what you are alive to. That is certainly true in the Christian life. When you come to the Lord Jesus Christ, your life takes on a new perspective and it gains a new center. Paul put it this way in Philippians 1:21, “For me to live is Christ and to die is gain.” Life, for the believer, is Jesus Christ. You come alive in the Lord Jesus Christ and life…

Colossians is the blueprint that tells us how we can put our lives together. It also gives us God’s plan for getting this good news to lost people. It is tragic, but true, that most people live their entire life and never really know what life is all about. They live 70 or so years, eat tons of food, wear large numbers of clothing, drive all kinds of cars, and travel to a multitude of places. They live and they die and never really know how what their life could have been and what they truly missed over the years. There was a man who lived all of his life…

As we begin this chapter, please carefully read the words: “Let no man therefore judge you (condemn you or look down on you) in meat, or in drink, or in respect of a holy day, or of the new moon, or of the Sabbath days: Which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Christ” (Colossians 2:16-17). We are not called to live life in the shadows. A shadow is a dim outline of some object or some reality. Really, a shadow is a promise and a preview. A shadow is a promise that something or someone is coming. It is also a preview because the…

Will Christ be the center of your celebration this Christmas season? Are you living for the things that Christ died for? The Christian needs to remember that our joy is because of Jesus, our songs because of our Savior, our love because of our Lord, our inheritance is because of His incarnation, and our blessings a result of His birth. The central figure throughout the Scriptures is the conquering Christ. In the Old Testament era, through the Passover, the people looked forward to redemption. In the New Testament era, during the Christmas season, we look backward to the Incarnation. In the Book of Isaiah, the centrality of the conquering Christ is vividly seen for us. It…

The Apostle Paul was a masterful writer, under the anointing of the Holy Spirit. In his writings, he describes how we have now entered into a transition from the Sufficiency of Christ to the deficiency of cults. In Colossians 2:3, we read, “In whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.” Then, in verse 4, we read, “And this I say, lest any man should beguile you with enticing words.” He is moving from Sufficiency to deficiency. The best way for us to be prepared and not deceived by that which is false is to be very well grounded in that which is true. The same Jesus Christ…

    Dear Visionary Leader, Merry Christmas! When I was 15 years old, my Father had a plant nursery business called, Davis Brothers’ Nursery in Mobile, Alabama. Our nursery had more than 30,000 hanging baskets in greenhouses and thousands of potted plants outside. During my high school years and early college years, when I was not in class, I worked long hours there. On a particular Saturday, our team of about 15 to 20 workers, were potting plants outside and putting the pots on a large cart, that would be pulled by a tractor out to a vast open field and unloaded in a neat row. I was given the…

Many years ago, a leader said to me, “When we preach we add, but when we teach, we multiply.” I never forgot this important lesson. Sooner or later, if we are planning to speak beyond the grave, we must move from addition to multiplication. The lesson of multiplication. On another occasion, when I was preparing for another long airline trip, a close pastor friend said, “You can either spend the money or spend the man. But, when the man is spent, it is over.” He was not trying to teach me regarding the stewardship of money, but the management of a healthy self. The lesson of management. Nearly forty years…

If I could tell you a secret which would explain how you could be everything you ought to be and everything you want to be, would you be interested? The Apostle Paul is writing here about the Christian life and how it works in our lives. He is writing about the sufficiency of the Lord Jesus Christ and the ministry that God had given to him. Right in the middle this exposition on the sufficiency of Christ, Paul says, “I have a mystery for you. I have a secret for you.” In Colossians 1:26-27, he uses the word, “mystery” twice. Usually, when we think about mystery, we think in terms…

The book of Colossians has as its purpose to set forth the absolute sufficiency of the Lord Jesus Christ. In the first chapter, Paul has set before us the sufficiency of Christ. In the second chapter, he takes all other substitutes for the Lord Jesus Christ and compares them to what we have in Him.  Some years ago, there was a farmer in Madison, Wisconsin, who had built a maze on 400 acres of his cornfield. It was rather sophisticated affair. They used satellites in order to help design the maze and a variety of other technological innovations. They had towers so that when people go through the maze and…

I always enjoy Mother’s Day because it becomes another opportunity to express appreciation and gratitude to our wonderful, precious mothers. I guess my favorite Mother’s Day joke of all time is about the wealthy man who couldn’t see his mother on Mother’s Day and he decided to do something very special for her. He heard about this talking bird that could whistle “Amazing Grace” and quote the 23rd Psalm. Even though it cost $30,000, he bought it and sent it to his mother. Several days later he called and asked, “Mother, how did you like that bird I sent you?” She said, “Oh, it was delicious, son.” When you read…