< Colossians 2 >

1 I want you to know in how great a struggle I am engaged for you and for Christ’s people at Laodicea, and for all who have not yet seen me;
For I would have you know in how severe a struggle I am engaged on behalf of you and the brethren in Laodicea and of all who have not known me personally,
2 in the hope that they, being bound to one another by love, and keeping in view the full blessedness of a firm conviction, may be encouraged to strive for a perfect knowledge of God’s hidden truth,
in order that their hearts may be cheered, they themselves being welded together in love and enjoying all the advantages of a reasonable certainty, till at last they attain the full knowledge of God's truth, which is Christ Himself.
3 even Christ himself, in whom all treasures of wisdom and knowledge lie hidden.
In Him all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are stored up, hidden from view.
4 I say this to prevent anyone from deceiving you by plausible arguments.
I say this to prevent your being misled by any one's plausible sophistry.
5 It is true that I am not with you in person, but I am with you in spirit, and am glad to see the good order and the unbroken front resulting from your faith in Christ.
For although, as you say, I am absent from you in body, yet in spirit I am present with you and am delighted to witness your good discipline and the solid front presented by your faith in Christ.
6 Since, therefore, you have received Jesus, the Christ, as your Lord, live your lives in union with him –
As therefore you have received the Christ, even Jesus our Lord, live and act in vital union with Him;
7 rooted in him, building up your characters through union with him, growing stronger through your faith, as you were taught, overflowing with faith and thanksgiving.
having the roots of your being firmly planted in Him, and continually building yourselves up in Him, and always being increasingly confirmed in the faith as you were taught it, and abounding in it with thanksgiving.
8 Take care that there is not someone who will carry you away by his ‘philosophy’ – a hollow sham! – following, as it does, mere human traditions, and dealing with puerile questions of this world, and not with Christ.
Take care lest there be some one who leads you away as prisoners by means of his philosophy and idle fancies, following human traditions and the world's crude notions instead of following Christ.
9 For in Christ the Godhead in all its fulness dwells incarnate;
For it is in Christ that the fulness of God's nature dwells embodied, and in Him you are made complete,
10 and, by your union with him, you also are filled with it. He is the head of all archangels and powers of heaven.
and He is the Lord of all princes and rulers.
11 By your union with him you received a circumcision that was not performed by human hands, when you threw off the tyranny of the earthly body, and received the circumcision of the Christ.
In Him also you were circumcised with a circumcision not performed by hand, when you threw off your sinful nature in true Christian circumcision;
12 For in baptism you were buried with Christ; and in baptism you were also raised to life with him, through your faith in the omnipotence of God, who raised him from the dead.
having been buried with Him in your baptism, in which you were also raised with Him through faith produced within you by God who raised Him from among the dead.
13 And to you, who once were dead, by reason of your sins and your uncircumcised nature – to you God gave life in giving life to Christ! He pardoned all our sins!
And to you--dead as you once were in your transgressions and in the uncircumcision of your natural state--He has nevertheless given Life with Himself, having forgiven us all our transgressions.
14 He canceled the bond which stood against us – the bond that consisted of ordinances – and which was directly hostile to us! He has taken it out of our way by nailing it to the cross!
The bond, with its requirements, which was in force against us and was hostile to us, He cancelled, and cleared it out of the way, nailing it to His Cross.
15 He rid himself of all the powers of evil, and held them up to open contempt, when he celebrated his triumph over them on the cross!
And the hostile princes and rulers He shook off from Himself, and boldly displayed them as His conquests, when by the Cross He triumphed over them.
16 Do not, then, allow anyone to take you to task on questions of eating or drinking, or in the matter of annual or monthly or weekly festivals.
Therefore suffer no one to sit in judgement on you as to eating or drinking or with regard to a festival, a new moon or a sabbath.
17 These things are only the shadow of what is to come; the substance is in the Christ.
These were a shadow of things that were soon to come, but the substance belongs to Christ.
18 Do not let anyone defraud you of the reality by affecting delight in so-called ‘humility’ and angel-worship. Such a person busies themselves with their visions, and without reason are rendered conceited by their merely human intellect.
Let no one defraud you of your prize, priding himself on his humility and on his worship of the angels, and taking his stand on the visions he has seen, and idly puffed up with his unspiritual thoughts.
19 They fail to maintain union with the head, to whom it is due that the whole body, nourished and knit together by the contact and connexion of every part, grows with a divine growth.
Such a one does not keep his hold upon Christ, the Head, from whom the Body, in all its parts nourished and strengthened by its points of contact and its connections, grows with a divine growth.
20 Since, with Christ, you became dead to the puerile teaching of this world, why do you submit, as if you still belonged to the world,
If you have died with Christ and have escaped from the world's rudimentary notions, why, as though your life still belonged to the world, do you submit to such precepts as
21 to such ordinances as ‘Do not handle, or taste, or touch’?
"Do not handle this;" "Do not taste that;" "Do not touch that other thing" --
22 For all the things referred to in them cease to exist when used. You are following mere human directions and instructions.
referring to things which are all intended to be used up and perish--in obedience to mere human injunctions and teachings?
23 Such prohibitions appear reasonable where there is a desire for self-imposed service, and so-called ‘humility,’ and harsh treatment of the body, but are of no real value against the indulgence of our earthly nature.
These rules have indeed an appearance of wisdom where self-imposed worship exists, and an affectation of humility and an ascetic severity. But not one of them is of any value in combating the indulgence of our lower natures.

< Colossians 2 >