Daily Bible Reading 15th July 2025 // Colossians 3:1-4
1 If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. 3 For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. 4 When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.
Let me say two things by way of rider to what was said yesterday. First of all, Paul is not repudiating living as a human being on earth. To have a fleshly/carnal mindset is quite different from living in a human fleshly body. Our bodies, fallen though they be, are part of God's good creation and are to be mastered, not despised. What Paul is rejecting, rather, is the mind set on the flesh. He rejects the orientation, the direction of our lives towards the old fleshly order of existence to which we, as Christians, no longer belong. We are to be heavenly minded, not earthly minded. The second thing to say is that there is a 'not yet' to all that Paul is speaking of. The apostle has spoken of our death and resurrection and ascension 'in Christ' as having already been accomplished once and for all, and that is true, marvellously and liberatingly true. And yet, at the same time, paradoxically, it is 'not yet' true. There is still a future consummation to be looked to and lived for (v 4). We are redeemed, gloriously redeemed, but it is only at the Parousia, when Christ returns in glory that we will know full and final redemption. In the interim, empowered by the Spirit of the risen and exalted Christ, we battle to seek and to set our minds on things above. We battle to put to death the mind of the flesh and to purify ourselves as He is pure. Yet we battle with the joy and assurance that our heavenly life will be fully manifest in all of its glory when Christ who embodies it appears. Then we who share His life now will share His glory. That which is secretly present in us now will, on that glad day, be revealed in all of its splendour and light.