Living Under the Supremacy of Christ

What are you passionate about? The people and things you are passionate about make a difference in how you live, how you schedule your time, what kind of activities you will get involved in.

There are some people in our lives each of us should be passionate about. I would hope you are passionate about your spouse if you are married and about your children. When you are passionate about the people you love the most, you will talk about them and you will schedule time for them and for the activities they enjoy. I know that if you want to get me started talking all you have to do is ask about Christine or our daughter, Nancy, and our son-in-law, Dave.

Then there are the organizations that we get involved with or the sports teams we enjoy rooting for that we are often passionate about. People will put a lot of time and effort into an organization whose mission they care passionately about. We root feverishly for teams that have captured our hearts. Here it is the Packers or the Badgers in football or basketball or, for some, hockey. While I share those passions with people in this area, I part company when it comes to baseball — I am a Chicago Cubs fan. If you want to know why, just ask!

My greatest passion, though, exceeds even my family and certainly organizations or sports teams. You see, without a doubt, my greatest passion is Jesus Christ. I hope he is yours too. When I taught preaching students how to preach, I wanted them to learn to preach him with passion.

We will consider our passion for Christ in a series of sermons from Colossians beginning April 11 and extending through May. In a variety of ways, Colossians calls for we who are believers to make Christ the passion of our lives, not just in what we believe, but also in how we live.

There are three key verses in Colossians, each of which calls for us to make Jesus the passion, the center, of our lives.

(1) Paul begins Colossians by describing the nature of Christ. He says Christ is who he is “so that in everything he might have the supremacy” (Colossians 1:18). He is to be the passion of our lives.

(2) In chapter 2, Paul discusses the believer’s position in Christ: “So, then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live in him” (2:6).

(3) When he gets to chapter 3, Paul calls for us to live a Christ-like life: “set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God” (3:1).

My theme for my messages in Colossians will be “Living Under the Supremacy of Christ.” The book tells us why we should make Christ supreme and how we should then live. This calls for great passion, living for the one who has created and redeemed us. I hope you will develop your passion for Christ.