Final Greetings

Hey, hey, good morning, good morning, good morning. Welcome to Coffee and Devotions. This is where every day you and I, we get together, we get into God's Word, we have a little bit of coffee and we grow in our love for the Lord together. And this year, 2022, Lord willing, we'll make it from the book of Acts to the book of 2 Thessalonians. I'm so glad to be with you this morning. Why don't we have some coffee, we'll pray, and we'll get into the Lord's Word. Let's pray.
What a blessing it is. What a joy it is to come to Your Word. Lord, we thank you for the work of your Holy Spirit in our hearts, in our lives, in changing the world. God, we pray that as we read your word that you would watch over us and that you would teach us in Jesus' name. Amen. All right, we are at Colossians chapter 4, Colossians chapter 4, and we're at verses 7 through 18, Colossians chapter 4, verses 7 through 18. Let's read God's word together now.
Tychicus, my beloved brother, faithful minister, and fellow servant in the Lord, will tell you all the news about me. I am sending him to you for this very purpose, that he may know your circumstances and comfort your hearts. With Onesimus, a faithful and beloved brother, who is one of you, they will make known to you all things which are happening here. Aristarchus, my fellow prisoner, greets you, with Mark, the cousin of Barnabas, about whom you received instructions.
If he comes to you, welcome him. And Jesus, who is called Justice. These are my only fellow workers for the kingdom of God who are of the circumcision. They have proved to be a comfort to me. Epaphras, who is one of you, a bondservant of Christ, greets you, always laboring fervently for you in prayers. that you may stand perfect and complete in all the will of God.
For I bear him witness that he has a great zeal for you and those who are in Laodicea and those in Heriopolis. Luke, the beloved physician, and Demas greet you. Greet the brethren who are in Laodicea and Nymphos and the church that is in his house. Now, when this epistle is read among you, see that it is read also in the church of the Laodiceans, and that you likewise read the epistle from Laodicea. And say to Archippus, take heed to the ministry which you have received in the Lord, that you may fulfill it. This salutation by my own hand, Paul, Remember my chains. Grace be with you. Amen.
Well, we need to ask ourselves, A, what's this about? B, what's the best verse to summarize this? And C, what are we called to do in response to these words, right? So A, what's Paul getting at here? What is this about? Why did the Holy Spirit put this in the scriptures? Or this is a letter from Apostle Paul to the church in Colossae, and there's a series of different people who they know about, who they've met, and who he's sending to them.
And so he goes through this and he talks about, Tychicus, a beloved brother, faithful minister, and fellow servant in the Lord, will tell you all the news about me. He says, I'm sending him to you. I'm sending him to you and he's going to give you all the info. He's going to give you all the 411. He's going to let you know all about what's going on with me. I'm sending him to you for this very purpose, that he may make known, that he may know your circumstances and comfort your heart.
So he's not just bringing news about Paul, but he also wants to learn about what's going on at Colossae. So he's able to take word back. But he's also going there as a minister, as a servant, and he's going there to comfort them. And so this man is going as a pastor to go care for them, to be a visiting minister. But then you have in verse nine, an interesting person. He also says that along with Tychicus, he's also sending with him Onesimus, a faithful and beloved brother. Now Onesimus is interesting. Onesimus is actually from Colossae. But Onesimus is the major part of a book of the Bible. The book of Philemon.
He's the slave. of Philemon and he's apparently with Paul as he's most likely in Rome in chains. And so he's writing to him and telling him about Onesimus and he's saying he's one of your own and I'm sending him back to you. He's a faithful and beloved brother. They will make known to you all things which are happening here. And so here's a couple of the different people who he's sending to them and he knows that Tichycus is going to come back to him, but Onesimus is most likely going to be staying there because he needs to be reconciled with Philemon.
Well, verse 10 says, Aristarchus, my fellow prisoner, greets you. So he's got a fellow prisoner with him, and so he greets him. Aristarchus is a man who's a missionary companion of Paul, and so he wants to greet the church. Colossae also. And then we have someone interesting as well in verse 10, with Mark the cousin of Barnabas, about whom you received instructions. If he comes to you, welcome him.
Well now, this is the first time we've run into Mark in a long time. We saw him back in the book of Acts, at the very beginning of the year, when Mark was Barnabas's cousin, and he goes along on the first missionary journey, but halfway through it, he doesn't go, and then when the second missionary journey's about to come forward, Barnabas wants to take along Mark, and Paul says no, and it's such a sharp dispute between them that they actually end up having to go their own ways, go a different direction from each other. Well, now it seems like Mark and Paul are reconciled, and he sees that he is actually of ministerial value. He hasn't turned his back on the kingdom. And so he says, if he comes to you, welcome him.
And then we get in verse 11, Jesus, who is called Justice. That's the only mention we have of this guy, but he's greeting them. And he says, these are my only fellow workers for the kingdom of God who are of the circumcision. These are the only guys who are Jews, who are going about the work of sharing the gospel, going around the Roman empire and sharing the good news of Jesus Christ. And so he says, this is it. This is all he's got left.
And they all say that they're greeting him. They have proved to be a comfort to me. These guys who have gathered around Paul are a comfort to him. They're his support group. They're his prayer buddies. They're his small group and accountability and ministry partners, right? These are the guys that are getting him through the stuff.
And then he says in verse 12, Epaphras, who is one of you, we had come into contact with Epaphras before in chapter one. And so now we've come back to Epaphras and he says, Epaphras, who is one of you, a bondservant of Christ, greet you always laboring fervently for you in prayers that you may stand perfect and complete at the will of God. Notice how Epaphras is laboring. How is he working?
He's praying for the saints. He's caring for the people in prayer. Remember it was in Acts chapter six that there was a dangerous point in the church in which the apostles could have been distracted from the preaching of the word and the ministry of prayer.
And here Epaphras is praying for them, fervently, desiring that they would be cared for. And so he wants them to be perfect and complete, able to stand in all the will of God. And then he says in verse 13 about Epaphras, for I bear him witness that he has great zeal for you and for those in Laodicea and those in Heriopolis.
These are three cities that are kind of triplet cities, right? They're not too far apart from each other. Colossae was first, it was most important, and then Laodicea picked up prominence, and then there were Roman soldiers who ended up in Heriopolis.
Oh, I hear little feet. Oh, can you come here? I'm recording Coffee and Devotion. Do you want to say hi? Do you want to say hi? No? So, Debra and Nathan are singing. Okay, can you tell them I said that they need to stop singing? Sometimes they sing with me. Oh, okay. All right. I love you. Thank you. Okay, you can shut my door, thank you.
So he wraps that part up with Epaphras. And then he gets into someone else we know also. Luke, the beloved physician. He says that he's also with him and he's praying for them, he's caring for them. But then we come to someone else. Someone else that would later be a disappointment to Paul. And Demas greets you. Demas would later, Leave Paul. Oh They won't stop singing.
How about you sit here with us until the end of coffee and devotions. I sound good Okay, and so Demas would eventually leave Demas would eventually forsake and be as Paul would later say essentially pulled away by this world and wouldn't go and and go to Thessalonica and He says, greet the brethren who are in Laodicea and Nymphos and the church that is in his house.
Now, when this epistle is read among you, right? Epistle is just an old New Testament Greek word for letter. When this letter is read among you, see that it is read also in the church of the Laodiceans. And that you likewise, oh, shh, we're talking, okay? that you likewise read the epistle from Laodicea. So what is he saying here? He's saying, I wrote a letter to your sister city in Laodicea. And so when they get that letter, they're gonna read it and you need to take their letter and read it in your church. And this letter here that we have, Colossians, you need to take it over to Laodicea and you need to read it to them.
And say to Archippus, take heed, take heed to the ministry which you have received in the Lord that you may fulfill it. It seems like Archippus is the pastor in Laodicea. And so he wants the people in Colossae when they get this letter to tell him to take heed to the ministry that they received from the Lord. This was the service that God had given to Archippus to carry out for his service.
And so this salutation by my own hand, Paul, remember my chains, grace be with you. Amen. I think this is getting at this heart of fellowship. I remember talking to a man just not too long ago who talked about how, you know, he really didn't need other Christians. It was just him and his Bible. That seems totally foreign. to the end of the letters of Colossians, to Romans, to Ephesians. It seems like all over the place these letters have so many names and people listed in them because people need other Christians. And so both good and, like Demas, sometimes not ending so well.
Oh, are you getting tired? And so we need to ask ourselves, how do we fervently pray for other Christians? What minister do you need to encourage in the work that he's doing? Let's go ahead and pray. Father, we thank you so much for this day, and we thank you for Jesus Christ. We thank you for our brothers and sisters in the faith. We thank you that we aren't the only church, that there are other congregations, and that we can encourage one another, that we can encourage the ministers in other churches. Father, we thank you that you are the one who knows about those faithful servants, even those who meet in the house churches, and that Your Spirit is with them. God, we pray that Your grace would be with us. In Jesus' name, amen. Well, may the grace of Jesus Christ be with you, and I'll see you tomorrow. Bye. You wanna say bye?
Thanks for listening to this week's message from God's Word for You, a ministry of Sharon R.P. Church in rural southeast Iowa. We pray that the message would be used by God to transform your faith and your life this week. If you'd like to get more information about us, feel free to go to the website, SharonRPC.org. We'd love to invite you to worship with us. Our worship time is 10 a.m. every Sunday at 25204 160th Avenue. Morning Sun, Iowa, 52640. May God richly bless you this week.