Spring has well and truly sprung!
The greenhouse door has been left open, the covers have come off the delicate plants, the buds on the trees have lost their hard cases – and people are putting away their winter clothes. Time to strip off and enjoy the Summer sunshine! (This was written well in advance so I am just hoping I am right! My mother’s birthday was on June 2nd, and I can remember snow lying in our garden in London on her birthday one year …… )
The theme for this week is Stripping off. This is not about clothing of course, but the bad habits and downright rotten actions that can plague us. In this section of Colossians Paul writes about stripping off in verse 9, and then goes on in v 12 to write ‘clothe yourselves with tenderhearted mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience.‘ There is a taking off of the old and a putting on of something new. We shall be considering the putting on at a later date, so first let’s see what needs to be taken off.
The reading on which we focus this week is Colossians 3:5-9
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So put to death the sinful, earthly things lurking within you. Have nothing to do with sexual immorality, impurity, lust, and evil desires. Don’t be greedy, for a greedy person is an idolater, worshiping the things of this world. Because of these sins, the anger of God is coming. You used to do these things when your life was still part of this world. But now is the time to get rid of anger, rage, malicious behaviour, slander, and dirty language. Don’t lie to each other, for you have stripped off your old sinful nature and all its wicked deeds.
vv 8-9. But now is the time to get rid of ANGER, rage, malicious behaviour, slander, and dirty language. Don’t lie to each other, for you have stripped off your old sinful nature and all its wicked deeds.
Anger is a settled, smouldering frame of mind regarding the circumstances, actions, and behaviour that we encounter in the world around us and which unsettle us. You might well have met, as I have, an individual that was best described as an angry person. There is a sharpness in the voice, hasty words of criticism, and even a harsh look on the face that rarely seems to soften. Such a person is hard to relate to, and you always find you need to give careful responses as you lightly tip-toe through the eggshells. If by any chance you get it wrong, either the anger will break through or you will be faced with the sulks.
Several characters in the Old Testament seem to be angry people. Nabal, the man in today’s story, is probably one of them – right down to the tension-induced stroke from which he suffered.
That is all part of a pre-Christian old nature, and Paul says ‘Strip it off.’ If that description fits you, Paul urges, strip it off. When you committed yourself to following Jesus you were born again, started a fresh life in the power of the Holy Spirit, and this kind of embittered anger has no place in it. The remedy is to pray for, and work out in practice, what Paul puts in Colossians 3:12, ‘Since God chose you to be the holy people he loves, you must clothe yourselves with tender-hearted mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience.‘ These qualities are the very opposite of anger, and the Holy Spirit will give you grace to succeed because that is His plan for your life.
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