The Power of God

Colossians 1:1-2

COL-090

Hebrews 4:12: "For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and the intentions of the heart."

2 Timothy 3:16-17: "All scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work."

Philippians 2:12-16: "So then, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure. Do all things without grumbling or disputing; that you may prove yourselves to be blameless and innocent, children of God above reproach in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you appear as lights in the world, holding fast the word of life, so that in the day of Christ I may have cause to glory because I did not run in vain nor toil in vain."

Please open the living and active word of God to Colossians 1:9-14. Our subject is "Prayer for the Colossians," number 24.

The Mind of God vs. the Mind of Satan

Decisions that are made with these two controlling minds, God's or Satan's, the only two minds in the universe, have enormous temporal and eternal consequences. Nowhere is this consequence between these two minds more significant than in a matter of one's personal salvation through Jesus Christ by faith alone. And if there is anything which is under attack by Satan today, it's what the Gospel is all about. If there is any place where the word of God is being attacked, it is on the exclusiveness of salvation as a gift from God based on the provision of Jesus Christ alone received entirely by an act of trust in that Savior. Nowhere is the consequence of these two minds more evident because this is where the battle is now raging.

Recently, this was forcibly brought home to me as I had occasion to recall an incident from my youth at Austin High School in the city of Chicago. Austin was the second largest high school in the city of Chicago, and it was a very dramatic looking building with hundreds and hundreds of students. I played first chair baritone in the concert band of Austin High school of over 90 players. And it was all boys. In those days, you had an all-boys band and you had an all-girls band.

The director of our concert band at Austin High was a veteran of World War I who used to regale us with the problems of going through the trenches, carrying his instrument and all of paraphernalia as a bandsman. His name was Captain Gish. He was a rather imposing looking figure. This is the Austin High School Concert band, and I am sitting right there in the baritone section. I became the concert band student conductor and developed a very close rapport with Captain Gish.

It was my job to walk in during rehearsals and warm up the band, get things set up for the Captain to step up and start rehearsing the organization. In fact, he entrusted me with the job of being the director of the school's ROTC Military Band, the Reserve Officer Training Corps Military Band, which is used at football games and at specialist school concerts. In fact, he even gave me a key to the band room so that I could come in and out going about the business of running the military band. He gave me a voucher so that I could go down to Brook Mays in downtown Chicago and buy all the music I wanted for the military band to play on the occasions when we were part of the concert.

In this band, sitting right next to me here, I had a good friend. He played second chair baritone, and he was a good player. His name was James Bishop. He was part also of the military band that was my responsibility. And there were times when I would never see Captain Gish for days on end and every day we had to go through the practice. This guy with the baton you may recognize in his better days. But it was a lot of fun leading the military band and it was a lot of fun being at the football game and doing all that stuff that people do on the field in formations and so on.

A little closer look at my friend James Bishop, he used to play third chair baritone. Then he beat out the second chair guy and was shooting for first, but he never had a chance. The yearbook, this is I, this is Bishop. In the book it tells you something about these people and I thought it was kind of illustrative as I look back at that old annual. Everyone gets a nickname. Mine was Johnny for some reason, and James was called Bishop. I don't really remember why. And it tells all the kinds of stuff that you were into in one thing or another in the school activities. And then it would require, we had to fill out a little form that said, please state your life's ambition for inclusion in the school annual. Now this is near senior year and all that. So mine, I thought I felt it was appropriate, said "to do the right, as God gives me the power to see the right," a little play on a statement made by Abraham Lincoln. James Bishop in response to that question, his ambition, is "what's associated with Vassar?" Vassar, as you know, is a very prominent exclusive women's college in the East. So James's orientation was a little different there.

In our description, James was described by the people who put this together as "musical, satirical and romantic." And I was described as "merry, musical, and mischievous." Fortunately they weren't trying to illiterate G's, or I'd have to have been gay or something else here, which really would've messed up the annual from then on. But fortunately they used an appropriate word there. So we got away with that.

Well, I had somehow found a man at the time who had a ministry of mailing gospel tracts. If you'd write to him, send a form in, he would send them to you free on the basis that you would distribute these tracts. So, I would send in for a quantity of certain selected gospel tracts and he would send them back to me and I would take these tracts to Austin High School, and I'd walk down the halls dropping them through the slots of the lockers, the student's lockers where they kept their books.

Captain Gish and my friends, including James Bishop, knew that I did this. On one occasion, a few of us were in the band room, we were standing around Captain Gish's desk chatting with him. And James Bishop was part of the group when he saw some tracts sticking out of my shirt pocket. And he reached over and grabbed the tracts and then waved them around with ridicule to all these guys standing there saying, "Here, here, here's a way. Take a tract and go to Heaven." And he just carried on making a big joke of these gospel tracts. "Take a tract and go to Heaven." Well, Captain Gish didn't think this was funny and he told Bishop to knock it off and to give the tracts back to me, which he did.

Now, my treatment of the tract and the message of the Gospel on it was the mind of God. While James Bishop's treatment was the mind of Satan. Here you see was an enormous, big difference of viewpoint.

We graduated from High School and James Bishop and I parted, parted company to pursue our futures now. One year later, Pearl Harbor took place and World War II began and Bishop and I ended up in different military services still without any contact with one another. Sometime later through a mutual friend, I heard that James Bishop had been killed in combat. And as soon as I heard it, I thought of that incident in the Austin High School band room and the ridiculing of the gospel tracts, the ticket to Heaven.

If before his death, somehow James Bishop was able to think God's divine viewpoint (possibly through the tract that he had read), if he had been able to think God's viewpoint, then I will see him again in Heaven. If he did not, then I will never see him again. If by the Grace of God, perhaps from the memory of that tract message, which I know he read, he was later given the mind of God to believe the Gospel and to be saved, then I will see him again in Heaven.

Is it really important? Is it really important to possess the mind of God? You betcha' it is. You see before you, probably two distinctively different eternal destinies, not of any merit of the individuals but only the merit of Christ accepted or rejected. It makes a difference to have the mind of God because it means eternal life with God. To not to have it means to have eternal death with Satan. It means eternal rewards for Christian service or a loss of rewards for a wasted life of opportunities which have been ignored, whether you have the mind of God or not.

Bearing Fruit and Increasing in the Knowledge of God

Then Paul goes on says, what pleases God is that the Colossian saints bear the fruit of divine good works and that they constantly increase in the "epignosis" full knowledge of doctrine. That is, doctrine in which they have been instructed in Church (And they didn't sit there as you may perhaps choose to sit here this morning and hear a principle of doctrine taught, and in the back of your mind you have mental reservations, 'I don't know if that's true. That sounds kind of kooky to me. I don't know other people; my friends don't think that way.' And immediately you have a bit of information that is totally useless to you.) But when you say 'Yes, that's the word of God, Amen,' that bit of information suddenly becomes permanently stored within your human spirit and you develop immediately a little more focus and orientation on the mind of God.

This is the objective reality of the supreme need for full knowledge of doctrine in one's life in contrast to the subjective emotionalism that gives one a kick but leaves one devoid of the mind of Christ. That's the difference. Some people come to Church, they can't hang in with a Church like this. And they will seldom come back unless God makes a tremendous impact on them because they're here for kicks: for emotionalism, for ha-has, and for fun and for great inspiration. None of that is here. Nobody's playing to make you a fool in your emotions. But people say, "Sock it to me, so I know I've been to Church." Well, not in this Church. Here we tell you what is the mind of God. We tell that to you on the basis of the doctrines of the word of God. And if you can rise to it, you'll amount to something in life. If not, you're going to be just a drag and a drudge like everybody else as if he had never known Christ, just like any unbeliever.

But it is your potential to recognize that emotionalism is Satan's playhouse. That is how he brings a human being down to the lowest levels, including Christians. If you cannot be objective, how many times do I hear Christians saying, oh, here's something that has just been such a blessing to me? And at the heart of that something, it's a corrupt operation. It's had a corrupt beginning. It has a deadly twist to it. But because it's a play on emotions, this Christian just felt good and thought he had something, not realizing that he'd been played for a fool. There are always deluded Christians who are telling us that they're being helped spiritually from a spiritually contaminated source that looks good on the surface.

Beware Wolves in Sheep's Clothing

How about Matthew 7:15-20. Matthew 7:15-20, you will notice, comes right after the significant awesome statement of Jesus Christ in Matthew 7:13-14 where he says, "Enter by the narrow gate; for the gate is wide, and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and many are those who enter by it." Most of the human race finds the gateway to the road to Hell. But verse 14 says, "For the gate is small, and the way is narrow that leads to life, and few are those who find it." Those who are on the broad road to Hell are there because they're operating on a subjective frame of reference. Emotionalism is their frame of reference.

Those who find, by the grace of God, that little small gate and that little narrow road, the gate is Jesus Christ. He is the gate into the sheep fold. The way is Jesus Christ. He is the narrow road. There is no other name under heaven whereby we must be saved except the name Christ Jesus. Jesus says, "No man cometh unto the Father but by Me." [John 14:6] It's a very exclusive road. Entrance is by Christ and the journey is on the basis of what He has already accomplished on the cross. That is the way, and few people are able to act objectively to listen to the word of God and to recognize the authority of scripture and that here is a book that's been challenged and attacked for centuries and nobody's ever found anything wrong with it or any error in it. It has to be obviously the word of God, let alone how it confirms that authority by the multiplicity (25% of the whole book is prophecies that were fulfilled at a distant time in total detail that nobody could have guessed at.). It had to be a message from God.

Now having said that, He then goes on in Matthew 7:15-20 and points out how foolish Christians without the mind of God are, what they will believe, what they will swallow. "Beware of the false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves." The sheep represents religious activity. Here's a religious leader. He's dressed so that he looks like a person of God. But what he is, is a wolf in sheep's clothing. And these people who believe this kind of a false prophet are those who are on the broad road to eternal death.

Now these people have to be identified. They may act very nice on the outside. They may be very personable, and they may be very helpful and very kind, but they're a contaminated source. Because of what? Because of what they believe, they're doctrines.

Matthew 7:16-20 says, "You will know them by their fruits. Grapes are not gathered from thorn bushes, nor figs from thistles, are they? [17] "Even so, every good tree bears good fruit; but the bad tree bears bad fruit. [18] "A good tree cannot produce bad fruit, nor can a bad tree produce good fruit. [19] "Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. [20] "So then, you will know them by their fruits." And since he began this segment in verse 15 about bewaring of false prophets, he is referring to what they teach. Don't make the mistake here that this fruit means how they act. No. Anybody can act nice. Hell is Hades, the way station, the holding pen, for what will be put in the Lake of Fire in time. That Hades place is full of people who looked good, full of people who acted very nicely, full of people who are very moral.

No, He's not talking about conduct here. He's talking about their teachings: "You will know them by their doctrine." And if there's a contaminated source, then you must be beware of that organization. It has a contaminated poison that will get you in time.

I hope you've had the capacity, the discipline, and the wisdom to read carefully that booklet that I sent you through the mail that followed up our last Sunday night's, tremendous service on this attempt to equate Catholicism with Christianity and that Catholics are going to Heaven on the basis of their salvation plan. Now, when I send you the next one shortly on the deity of Christ, don't get mad at me because some of your favorite organizations and some of your favorite preachers are named in the booklet as they were in the one you received this week.

One of our parents in the academy was substituting in the office and she heard Mr. Shane and Mr. Getchel and I were talking about the Sunday evening service and about the activity of the deception that is being propagated by the evangelicals and Catholics together accord. And for a moment, I thought I heard her inclining her ear over. (Secretaries do that all the time, so I never know when they're really listening or if that's just the way they sit.) But I came back in, and sure enough, she said, "I was interested in hearing what you're talking about. We've had the same problem at our church." And she goes to one of the Bible churches in the suburbs. And she asked me if I knew about this booklet, "the one I sent you?" And I said, "Yes, I sent it to every one of our members." She said, "Well, that was written by my pastor." She goes to that Church, and she asked if I was acquainted with the second one and I said, "Yes. And my congregation's going to get that shortly." She said, "You have no idea the abuse our pastor has taken from the great powers of evangelicalism in the metroplex when they got hold of that booklet where he named names and quoted specifics of what these people are saying, what they're implying, what they're doing." But she said, "He's right and we are all supportive of him. And the result is that people will flee from us because they want to go to what is emotionally comfortable for them." See, that is subjectivism instead of objectively saying, "Let's read what the booklet says. Did these people say this? Is this compatible with scripture." And like good Bereans of old, we make our decision on that basis.

So it is clear from this passage of scripture that contaminated sources are not going to bring you the truth of the word of God. And Paul therefore knows that if these people in Colossae do not keep adding and strengthening that human spirit reservoir of doctrine, they're going to be exposed to all kinds of false teachers that carry on great pretenses. They're in the religious world and they make a big impact. And of course, before John died the last apostle, even in Paul's day, one of the greatest heresies already was taking place in the Christian Church, the heresy of Gnosticism (which comes from that Greek word "gnósis."). These guys with "gnósis," they say, we've got the real "epignósis," and they paraded themselves as those who had the superior insights of God. And Paul is saying, don't let this happen. Keep your kids informed. Keep telling your children. Don't teach your children like a bunch of little bumpkins. Treat them like those who are capable of adult knowledge of the word of God, and you share with them, and you instruct them, and you see that they're here to hear the word of God so that they are not contaminated by "rah rah Christianity."

Strengthened By the Power of God

Then in verse 11 he says, 'to do this is not easy.' Now it takes some kind of a special capacity to do this. We're talking about a divine empowerment. Here's the nature of the power - "strengthened." The word looks like this. It's the Greek word dunamoó (doo-nam-o'-o), D U N A M O O. This word very simply means "to be made strong when you're weak." Here the reference is to some powerful spiritual empowerment that enables you to live a life that's worthy of Jesus Christ.

Please don't make the foolish mistake that it takes the grace and the power of the Holy Spirit to get you saved. It does. It takes His calling, it takes His enablement, it takes His conviction, and it takes all that Christ has done to get you saved. God has to do it all, but then you think that all you need to do is listen to inspirational sermons, all you need to do is be psychologized with some so-called Christian psychology, and you're going to make it in your life. No, it is God who must mature you. It is God who must carry through. It is God who must enable you to know how to function as a Christian. Now, how do you do that? You have to have the mind of God.

So this power that God provides is part of that 'making it in life successfully,' and it comes from the word of God. This is in the present tense, which means that this is a constant provision. God is just waiting to empower you as you wouldn't believe, so that you don't have to be a stupid little fink in life like all the other people around you. And it's in the middle voice, which means that this will be for your great personal benefit, this power of God.

A spiritual principle is stated here. The same word is used in Hebrews 11:34, in this way. Hebrews 11:34, "Quenched the power of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, from weakness were made strong". There it is: "from weakness were made strong." From what kind of weakness? Spiritual weakness. They quenched the power of fire. They escaped the edge of the sword. From weakness they were made strong. They became mighty at war, and they put foreign armies to flight. Now, here's an external expression in a powerful way of the power of God working in you spiritually.

That's why I say that if you're going to be in a military service and you're going to possibly face combat situation, you want to be well versed in doctrine. You want to be steeped with a full human spirit of doctrine because doctrine in the human spirit gives you external protection on the field of combat. That's demonstrated again and again in the word of God. And you will come through and others will fall around you.

So Paul says, strengthened, "with," indicates the means of this empowerment, "all" indicating the highest degree, the sky's the limit with God the Holy Spirit, no limitations, and powered with "all power." And here's a related word. This is the word dunamis (doo'-nam-is), D U N A M I S. This is a word for power that refers to a force in some situation before it is turned loose. This is inherent power which gives you the ability to make something happen.

Do you notice that there's a relationship between this word dunamis and an English word that it produced, dynamite. Dynamite is a stick with potential explosive power. It's not dangerous while in hand until it has a cap put on it, a primer put into it, and set off. Then you release what's in that dynamite. Dynamite is unstable. You do have to be careful how you carry it.

In the explosive packs we had in World War II, we used a thing called TNT - Trinitrotoluene and it was much more stable. You could be carrying a pack and have a bullet, or a piece of shrapnel hit the pack and it would not explode. Dynamite would have very potentially exploded.

But in any case, the point of this word is that it has great power. It's sitting there ready to be turned loose. That is what God gives you. When doctrine becomes your life, you have great enormous Spiritual power. When you have great enormous Spiritual power, you will be invigorated mentally. You'll be invigorated physically. And you will be made successful in your profession, in your work, in everything you do. You'll have the mind of God. The idea here is that the Christian has been invigorated by God with all vigor just waiting to be turned loose.

This is the means by which we achieve a conduct worthy of the Lord. The power potential is nothing less than the almighty power of God. This power is the result of the full knowledge of doctrine in the believers' human spirit, which produces in him the mind of God. God's people perish, the scripture says, Hosea 4:6, "from the lack of the 'full' knowledge" of doctrine in the believers' human spirit. God's people perish from lack of the knowledge of doctrine that some PT [pastor-teacher] should have been explaining to them in the Church service but never did. And therefore, they cannot meet the mind of Satan with the mind of doctrine as Jesus did in his wilderness temptation. Jesus in his humanity, nocked the devil off his pins, zip. How? By quoting scripture. By quoting a doctrinal principle. So being strengthened here with a supreme power of potential power in God's service. This is the Christians' Spiritual fire power in the angelic warfare, strengthened with all potential power.

God's power is all. It is not given in proportion to our need, but in proportion to His omnipotence, no limit. And it takes the power of God to save a lost sinner and it takes the power of God to develop a spiritually mature Christian who is able to serve God. The Grace of God is required for both. It takes his Grace to save us. It takes his Grace to make us mature. But he gives us the means to do that.

[Continuing in Colossians 1:11] Strengthened with all potential power according to His glorious might. The word glorious is actually the Greek word for glory. It looks like this. It's the word "doxa," (dox'-ah) D O X A. And this word applied to God refers to the character of God. When we speak about the glory of God, we're speaking about the essence of God. All of those attributes of perfection that make God, God. God is a person therefore because of His perfection, who is surrounded by a brilliant light. That's His external demonstration of His glory. Because He is so magnificent in every way above everyone else in the universe, God has a glory which no one can touch. And anybody who is in the presence of God and that glory is shining is very sobered immediately, I guarantee you. This is the power of a Holy being. Someone who has absolute righteousness and perfect justice.

Now positionally, you must understand that you yourself have this kind of glory. You have absolute righteousness in Christ. You have perfect justice because of Christ. It's all been imputed to you, to your account. And like Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration, they looked at Him, that glory was enormous in Him. It was like the glory of God without limit. But it was set aside, the doctrine of the kenosis. The doctrine of shielding that glory, putting it aside, covering it. I shouldn't say "putting it aside," He didn't lose His deity in any way, but His glory was shielded. But on that Mount of Transfiguration, Peter, James, and John suddenly lost it as Jesus let loose the internal glory that He had.

Someday, either at your death and entrance into the presence of Christ, you will physically explode externally in the glory light of God or at the rapture of the Church. The moment we leave this earth, it will be a brilliant ball of fire going up through the interstellar spaces into the throne room of God as every Christian will be exuding externally the glory of God. Positionally you have that holiness. You have absolute righteousness. You have perfect justice. Positionally, you have that glory now. But it's shielded because the sin nature keeps it encased until it's released.

The Power of God

Now we have had power up here in "dunamis," potential, the dynamite untouched. Now we come to where the fuse is lit, and the thing blows up. This is "kratos" power in the Greek language, which means "power which is blasting out, a power in action." It refers to something that makes things happen. And it is a power that comes directly from the essence of God. The power of what God Himself is.

This is described for us in Ephesians 1:19-21, "and what is the surpassing greatness of His power toward us who believe. These are in accordance with the working of the strength of His might [20] "which He brought about in Christ, when He raised Him from the dead, and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places, [21] "far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come."

What is this "kratos" power in action? It is the might of God that raised Jesus from the dead, and that then elevated Him into Heaven in a place of honor at the right hand of God the Father. This is the power that is now available to you in your daily life. It's right there inside you. It is right there waiting, as dunamis and under the proper conditions of your acting upon the will of God and upon following the word of God, the fuse is lit and "dunamis" becomes "kratos" power - the explosive power that permeates every area of your life and gives you guidance, gives you capacity, and gives you good success.

Now, this is not psychological inspirational power structure talking. This is the reality. This is objective truth. It's not thinking positively. It's the fact that God has made you a positive creature with His power.

God's Power In the Christian Life

So we may translate our passage here in Colossians by the words, "according to the manifested power in action of His glory." The majesty of God is His glory. The measure of the Christian's power and daily life is the glorious omnipotence of God, the Holy One. The might of His glory, this might indwells every believer in the person of God the Holy Spirit. It is God's glorious might which is more than adequate for anything that you and I have to face in our lives and in our needs.

This is divine power that will be provided as the need arises in life. You may count on it. But only if you are well taught in scripture. Only if you are a doctrinally oriented person. Only if you have taken that doctrine to heart with a positive enthusiasm. Only if you walk in temporal fellowship with your known sins confessed.

What you should be concerned about is not having regrets at the Judgment Seat of Christ, you see. You don't have to be worried about going to Heaven; those of you who are in Christ, you've got it made. But to squander your life when you have this kind of intense potential power with you and the means to turn it loose by the leading of the Holy Spirit. And then to come to Heaven and stand there like a poor beggar because you did not save your life for the potential of rewards that it was equipped to produce.

That would be very sad indeed. But that is not the way for us. We are to please God with fruit bearing and we are to please Him by being in Church to learn more doctrine every chance we get, increasing in the knowledge of God. And the result of this will be that we will be strengthened with every kind of potential power according to the glorious, explosive might of God, represented by the very character of God Himself, His great and wonderful essence. This divine power is not a figment of our imagination. It is the promise of God. It will work and you may count on it in your most trying situation in life. When this power is working, you're not going to make those dumb decisions that so many of you do. You're not going to turn back from the battle. You're not going to hold back. You're going to go for it with a God of all power.

Our Father, we want to thank You for this, Your Word, and for its illuminating application.

Dr. John E. Danish, 1995

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