Imaginations are essential to life. It is our imaginations that give us our options, imaginations that dictate what decisions we make, and imaginations that give us the tools to enact those decisions.
I can make a decision to open up a 401k. It is within my imagination to come up with the idea and find the tools to do it. The average person in Somalia would probably not think of opening up a 401k. It would never occur to them to do that. First, that country does not have the resources for the average person to substantially save towards retirement. Second, retirement means something entirely different to Somalians. And finally, they have a different tax code that would make the term 401k entirely irrelevant. Entirely different imaginations guide how the average American thinks about retirement compared to the average Somalian.
Our trip to Los Angeles opened our eyes up to the radically different imaginations that people in the United States have from one another and how our imagination needs to be planted in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Let’s turn to Colossians 1:9-14 to hear what Paul has to say about imaginations.
9 And so, from the day we heard, we have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, 10 so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God. 11 May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy, 12 giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light. 13 He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, 14 in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins (ESV).
We’re going to focus on verses 13-14 this morning, but I wanted to give you a little bit of context. Immediately after this section, there is a wonderful poem about how everything was created through Jesus and for Jesus, who is the Lord of the entire universe. This all really sets the tone for the rest of Colossians, but verses 13-14 summarize so well what Paul is trying to say throughout the rest of the letter.
The first thing Paul wants to say here is that you have been delivered from the domain of darkness. Another translation might be control of darkness or authority of darkness.
Imagine darkness is a place, perhaps a country. You are a part of that country, a citizen of that country. No matter where you go within that country, no matter where you work, vacation, live, you are in that country. All decisions you make are guided by what is available to you in that country, what is imaginable by citizens in that country, and what is feasible with the tools of that country. There is no escaping it. That is where you live. You live in that domain.
It’s kind of like the song, “Blue.”
Yo listen up, heres a story
About a little guy that lives in a blue world
And all day and all night
And everything he sees is just blue
Like him inside and outside
Blue his house with a blue little window
And a blue Corvette
And everything is blue for him
And himself and everybody around
'Cause he ain't got nobody to listen
If everything is blue, you can’t even imagine red. If everything is darkness - you can’t even imagine what it means to be faithful to the gospel. This is why Paul says in 1 Cor 1, that the cross is utter foolishness to the world.
The world can only imagine blue when the Gospel is bright red. The world can only imagine darkness and slavery when the Gospel is life and freedom.
Paul writes that we have been rescued from this country, this place, this domain of darkness. We don’t live in a blue world anymore.
There are two ways that we can take this. The first is cosmologically. We said earlier that Colossians shows how Jesus is the Lord of the entire universe. When he comes back, Scripture tells us that every knee will bow and every tongue confess. God is going to make all things new. This corrupt world will be transformed and renewed as God makes a new heavens and a new earth where the sun is not needed because the Son is our light. This is great news for the world. Eventually the domain of darkness will be no more.
But this also must be taken on a personal level. We don’t have to wait until all things are made new for us to live into the kingdom of the Son. Paul tells us that we have already been rescued. We are no longer slaves to sin. We don’t have to sin in thought, word, and, deed anymore. We have been rescued from that.
But it doesn’t end there. When we were at the L.A. Mission, myself and four of the guys had the pleasure of working alongside several of the residents. The L.A. Mission works with homeless people and addicts to provide wholeness and healing. They unashamedly proclaim the Gospel with those in their program and those they encounter on the streets. We heard several stories of folks who had been in prison and, upon release, went back to the same old habits.
If the Gospel ended there, we would be in the same boat. It would be like we were released from prison, and then left at the front door with no resources, no plan, no map of where to go and what to do. We would be like these folks that we talked to who popped out of prison and then ended up right where they started - in desperation and hopelessness, drunk, and living on the streets.
Thankfully, the stories we heard didn’t end. Even as our justice system failed them, Jesus Christ didn’t. Paul tells us that as we have been rescued from the domain of darkness, we have been transferred to the kingdom of the Son. We were in that domain, that kingdom. Now we are in this domain, this kingdom, the one of the Son, the one in the light.
The stories we heard at the Gospel mission ended in redemption, in a renewed imagination, ended in freedom for serving God.
Paul tells us we have been rescued for a purpose - that is, for following Jesus, for living “lives that are worthy of the Lord and pleasing to him in every way” (v. 10).
Just like when God rescued Israel from slavery under Pharaoh, he rescued them so that they would be a light to the nations. God has done the same thing for us. We are rescued for a purpose.
Charles Wesley in his famous hymn “And Can It Be” gets it.
“Thine eyes diffused a quickening ray; I woke, the dungeon flamed with light; my chains fell off, my heart was free; I rose, went forth, and followed Thee.”
We are freed from the prison of darkness and have the extraordinary privilege to follow him instead.
We’ve been talking about imaginations because I believe that that is what Paul is worried about in a lot of his letters. When we are transferred to the kingdom of God, we see things in red, in the light. Our decisions change. Our options change. Our hopes and dreams change. Our goals change. Our families change. Everything changes. We no longer think about things the same because our very way of processing life changes.
We are no longer controlled by the story of addiction, by the American Dream, by the lie that money equals happiness, by seeking power over others. We are controlled by the story that led Jesus to the cross.
Everything changes as we live into the kingdom of God. As we are transferred into the kingdom of the Son. Everything.
Her name was Hope. She was in her mid 30s and had had a tough life. We had gotten to know her over the past week as she stopped by the church for a variety or reasons that past week - VBS, Community Day, Sunday Worship, and sometimes just to say hi. She wanted to thank us in a tangible way for our work so Friday morning, she brought us homemade flautas, still warm from the oven, for us to eat on our way home. Well it just so happened that we had quite a bit of food that we had brought that we didn’t use. The people of New Heights Church had provided us with more food than we could eat, so we gave it all to Hope. We were glad she was there so it would not be wasted. You could tell she was thankful but I didn’t think much of it. A few minutes later, Pastor Don pulled me aside and told me some of her story:
A while ago, she gave her life to Jesus and started attending New Heights Church. The Sunday we were there, she responded to the prompting of the Holy Spirit and had entirely surrendered her life to Jesus Christ. She didn’t have a lot of money, but really felt God wanted her to make us this gift, even if it meant she didn’t eat as well that week. The equivalent of chicken flautas for 14 people could have fed her for 3 or 4 days. Yet she desired to be faithful and made them anyway. Then we gave her 3-4 times as much in groceries as she gave us. It was as if God used us to show her God’s incredible abundance.
You see, Hope had been living within a story of scarcity. It was a story that said, take care of yourself first and if you have any left, then you can look to others. It was a story that believed there isn’t enough to go around. And when she gave herself entirely to Jesus Christ, she began living out a story that said there is abundance in Christ Jesus. I have enough and more. I am going to think of others first and give even if I don’t have enough to give. I am going to try to out give the Creator of all things. And in her first act of giving since Sunday, she received back triple what she gave. As you can expect, Pastor Don was ecstatic that we “coincidentally” had those leftover groceries. Her faithful gift is an incredible example of what happens when we live in the kingdom of the Son.
Repeat verse 13: “He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son.”
Finally, and most importantly, there is nothing we did or can do to rescue us from the domain of darkness. We don’t escape - we are rescued. Sometimes it’s easy to forget this.
When we drove up to the L.A. Mission, you should have seen the looks on our faces. I had never been to Skid Row before. I had never seen anything like this. There tents everywhere - camping tents, tents made of tarps, tents made of clothes, tents made of cardboard, tents made of towels. There are little to no white people around - a few hispanics, a few Cubans, but mostly black people. And then quite a few cops. Now the cops were reassuring to me, but any place that requires a number of cops can’t be the safest place in the world. So we pull up and our eyes are bugging out of our faces. We had never seen anything like this.
A little later in the week, we used Col 1:13-14 for our morning devotional. We talked about how if it weren’t for the grace of God, that could be us. Not only have we been born to parents who have introduced us to Jesus at an early age and steered us clear of addictive substances, but we only have Jesus to thank for being rescued from the domain of darkness. We didn’t do anything to deserve it, we just responded. And if it weren’t for the grace of God we would be just as addicted, just as hopeless, living in darkness just like the drug dealer on the street corner.
I realize that their are choices that lead to that lifestyle. I’m not saying that. What I am saying, is that if it weren’t for the grace of God, we wouldn’t know any better. We wouldn’t know that there is anything better than the next hit. We wouldn’t know any hope. We wouldn’t know any love. It is only because of what Jesus Christ did that we can have hope!
It’s all because of the faithfulness of Jesus Christ. Verse 22 tells us that he has reconciled us by means of his death. That is why we can be transferred to the kingdom of the Son.
That’s what I learned in Los Angeles.
I wish I could go on and preach through the entire book of Colossians. There’s such good stuff here. But I can’t. I’m just here to tell you what God did in my life on our trip.
It’s easy for me to look at “those people” and condemn them for the place in life where their decisions have led them. But I can’t. I know that if it weren’t for the grace of God, that would be me. And even if I wasn’t on Skid Row, I would deserve to be. If it weren’t for Jesus Christ, I would still be in the domain of darkness and would have no hope, no life.
Sometimes its easier for us to extend grace when we go on missions trip than it is when we are in Baker City. We know people’s stories here. We know their decisions. We know how they have arrived at the place they are at. But we can’t stop extending grace when we come home from a trip like this.
It should break our hearts when we see people who are still living in the domain of darkness. It should break our hearts when we see people living by the hopeless stories of this world. It should break our hearts when we see our friends following for the same old lie, when they keep on feeding the addiction, when they keeping on falling for that guy or girl who might be no good but makes them feel loved somehow, when they buy into the idea that money equals happiness. The gospel compels our hearts to break. We have done nothing to deserve what we have. Jesus Christ did everything.
And we must proclaim the Gospel to those who are still living in the domain of darkness. We must tell them that God has a rescue plan. We must invite them to participate in what God wants to do in the world and demonstrate with our lives what freedom looks like.
My prayer is that the lessons we learned in Los Angeles would not stay in Los Angeles. My prayer is that we would be changed in Baker City and we would change Baker City.
I’m going to close in prayer. I would encourage you to ask one of the participants about their trip and ask them what they learned about Jesus Christ and about themselves. Their answer may differ from what I learned.
My challenge to each of you is to focus on the things God has rescued you from, and pray that those whom we encounter today may also come to participate in God’s Great Rescue Plan. We have an incredible and free gift. May we not take that for granted, but may we share it with everybody whom we encounter.
Preached 8/17/2014 at Baker City Church of the Nazarene
