Colossians 3:1-4 “Alive In Christ”
“Alive In Christ” is a sermon preached from Colossians 3:1-4, by Michael Beatty, pastor of Covenant Baptist Church in New Berlin, Wisconsin – a confessional Reformed Baptist church subscribing to the 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith.
Scripture Reading and Prayer
I invite you to turn in your Bibles with me to Colossians chapter 3.
Colossians chapter 3, the first four verses—Lord willing—this morning.
So, Colossians chapter 3, first four verses. Hear the Word of the Lord:
If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.
Thus far the reading of God’s Word. Please join me as we ask His blessing upon it.
Father, we ask this morning that You would once more cause us to hear the voice of Christ in the Scriptures. We ask, Lord, that You would accomplish this by the work of the Holy Spirit in each of our hearts. We pray, Lord, that You would meet us in the various places from which we have come this morning.
We know that some have come who have yet to make profession of faith. We ask that You would cause this to be the day of salvation for them. For those who come weighed down either by sin or persecution, we ask that You would comfort them, Lord—that You would cause them again to receive the balm of the gospel. And for those who have come with a proud heart, we ask that You would be pleased again to bring them under conviction, that they might confess these things and see afresh their need for Christ in the Word and the greatness of the salvation He has wrought in His name.
We know You are able to do all these things, knowing that Your Word never returns void. And so we boldly ask that You would work these things in our midst. In Christ’s name we pray. Amen.
The Hinge of Colossians
This morning we find ourselves in Colossians chapter 3, a sort of hinge passage for the rest of the book. If you think of it in terms of a door: from the beginning we’ve come through and seen the various truths about the gospel. In chapters 1 and 2 we’ve heard about our need for Christ and His great work. We’ve also heard that we must fight against those who would steal that from us.
Now the letter turns to what that means as we live unto Christ in our present life, knowing what He has worked in us by His Spirit. That’s why this passage forms the hinge.
If you look with me in verse 5—which we’ll consider next week—you see, “Put to death therefore what is earthly in you.”
In verse 12: “Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts…”
In verse 18: “Wives, submit to your husbands.”
In verse 19: “Husbands, love your wives.”
In verse 20: “Children, obey your parents.”
And so on. We’re quickly moving into very eminently practical things.
But as we go there, it’s important that we bear in mind what has come before—namely, the good news of what Christ has done.
Alive in Christ
We now hear that we are alive in Christ. If you notice in verse 3: “Your life is hidden with Christ in God.” And verse 4: “Christ who is your life appears.”
I think Paul is building on an image that we could helpfully think about by reconsidering the flood narrative for a brief moment.
If you remember the flood narrative, it goes something like this: Noah and his family were brought safely through the flood after spending many years building the ark according to the construction plans God gave him. They went into the ark, and God closed the door behind them.
The waters rose, the world that then was was destroyed, the waters receded, and they came out upon a new earth, so to speak.
When they went in, there are really three things I want to highlight in that story:
- They entered into the ark from the old world.
In other words, all their loved ones, their friends, everything they knew was in the old world. They entered into the ark, the door was closed, and those things were left behind. - The judgment waters came, and all life outside the ark was wiped out.
That world was gone. Life was only inside the ark. - When the ark came to rest on dry ground, they came out into a brand-new world.
Everything they had known was gone—the people, the things they had built. Noah wasn’t a young man when he went into the ark, but all of that was gone, and he was starting anew.
There was something that occurred in that exchange: they went from the old world into the ark and onto the new. Their life was hidden in the ark during the time they were within it.
From the Flood to Baptism
The reason I want to bring this up is because, likewise, Christians are brought through the waters of baptism.
We go into the water from the old world, and we come forth a new creation. We have been buried with Christ, raised in newness of life, reborn in Christ.
We’ve died—as Paul told us last week in chapter 2, verse 20—“with Christ to the elementary principles of this world.” Those things no longer have any bearing upon us, though they have an appearance of godliness for those who are perishing. They look appealing, but they have no application to us, because we have been buried with Him in baptism and raised to newness of life.
So in short, we might say: the Christian is now a new creation in Christ.
This morning in Colossians 3:1–4 we’ll see that our life is now located in Christ Jesus. And because of this, we work in the present life until Christ returns.
To put it in terms of the flood narrative again:
- We are located in the ark.
- We’ve left our old life behind.
- We are now in Christ.
- But we’ve not yet entered into the new heavens and the new earth.
Our life is hidden. Our life is not yet revealed for what it will be.
Three Points of Consideration
I want to think about this passage under three points:
- Life in Christ
- Work in Christ
- Revealed in Christ
So, life, work, and revealed as we move forward.
Life in Christ
Since Christ is our life, we are dead to the elementary principles of this world. Having been raised with Him, we will be revealed with Him in glory.
Three aspects of Christ’s work bear on our new life in Him:
1. We Are Dead to Our Old Life
We are dead to our old life.
That doesn’t mean something radical like we no longer have our parents. We just read the fifth commandment. We still have our brothers and sisters, our working relationships, our earthly ties.
But in the final analysis, our life as it once was is dead. We are moving to something new. There is something fundamentally new about our life, even while there remains a tension—because we still live in those relationships, working in and around them to the glory of God.
Still, in God’s eyes, our former life is dead.
That’s important because:
- We are dead to living in sin (as we heard in 2:20 and as we’ll hear in 3:5–11).
- We are dead to the elementary principles of self-made religion.
In other words, like Noah and his family, we are now on the other side of the waters. We cannot return to our former life.
That’s really what we say when we enter into the waters of baptism, isn’t it? We’ve been lowered with Christ, raised in newness of life.
It would be shocking for us to live otherwise—if we tried to go back, because Christ has so worked in us.
That’s what Jeremiah 32 says, isn’t it? He will not turn from us, and our hearts cannot turn from Him. Our life is bound up in Christ; we’re on the other side of the water.
That’s why Paul highlighted this in 2:12: “Having been buried with Him in baptism, in which you were also raised with Him through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised Him from the dead.”
That’s what we see in baptism: dead to our old life, raised to something new. We cannot return.
So our life in Christ is distinct. It is not “Jesus plus” something else. It’s not Christ plus earthly wisdom. It’s only Christ. Our life is Christ.
To add anything to Him means you haven’t understood that your life is found in Him alone.
2. We Were Raised with Christ
The second aspect of Christ’s work that bears on our new life is this: we were raised with Him.
If you’d like to look again at Colossians 2:12—or simply recall it—we’ve been “raised with Him through faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead.”
Thus we are now alive in Christ, and our life is now where Christ is.
That’s what Paul says here in 3:3: “You have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.”
And in 3:4: “When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory.”
So our life is now where Christ is, which means that in this present world we are pilgrims and aliens.
By that I mean our citizenship is no longer here.
- We’re aliens—not like the strange comic figures from Saturday morning cartoons, but aliens in the sense that we don’t belong here.
- The customs are different, the morality is different, the hope is different.
- We live with a growing sense that we simply don’t fit.
And we’re pilgrims—we’re looking for a city not made with hands.
That’s ultimately what Paul is pressing on: our life is where Christ is.
Think of the process every summer with a caterpillar. It eats and grows, then enters a cocoon, and later emerges as a butterfly. While hidden in the cocoon, it’s not yet revealed to the watching world what it will become.
Likewise, our life now is hidden in spiritual things. It has not yet been revealed in glory. We are in that middle state—waiting for the day the Lord returns or calls us home.
Until then, we live in the tension. But regardless, Christ is our life.
He is also the one to whom we are being conformed.
3. We Will Be Revealed with Christ in Glory
The third aspect of Christ’s work that applies to us is this: we will be revealed with Christ in glory.
Just as the caterpillar goes in as an ugly worm and comes out a beautiful butterfly, so too there is a transformation. It’s the same creature, yet it has been gloriously changed.
Paul reminds us here: we have died, and when Christ appears, we will be revealed with Him in glory (3:4).
In other words, the revelation of Christ vindicates His work in us.
Think of Noah again. As his family built the ark, their neighbors must have thought they were strange. A massive structure, years of labor, and very few workers. They entered the ark, the door closed, and the water didn’t come right away. It took time.
But when the floodwaters came, when they emerged onto dry land, what God promised was vindicated. His work was shown to be true.
And so it is for us. We’ve been buried with Him in baptism, we live now as pilgrims and aliens, but we’re not yet at the point where faith has become sight.
We long for it. We feel the tension. But we wait until Christ comes.
At His appearing, these things will reach their fullest effect.
What Does It Mean When He Appears?
Two things:
First, look with me at Philippians 3:21—or recall, since we studied it a while ago.
“Who will transform our lowly body to be like His glorious body, by the power that enables Him even to subject all things to Himself.”
Christ owns us body and soul, and He will conform us to Himself—even bodily.
Second, consider 1 Corinthians 15:50–58:
“I tell you this, brothers: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality. When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written: ‘Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?’ The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.”
Paul is saying that all the problems we face with our earthly bodies—our sin, our frailty, our death—will be made new. Christ will renew us and conform us to His likeness.
So we can go into the grave knowing that when we awake and see Christ, we will receive a new body, and we will know what it means to say, “O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?”
It’s almost like a sports metaphor—the taunting chant after your team scores a touchdown. Death has nothing left. It cannot stop us, because our life is hidden with Christ.
Christ is our life.
Turning Back to Colossians 3
That’s the great hope we have: our life is in Christ. And we must remember that, as those now alive in Him, we have died to our old lives.
So we no longer give ourselves to sin. We no longer give ourselves to self-made religion. That life is gone—we cannot go back.
Even as Noah may have longed to go back to parts of his old life, or as the Israelites longed for the leeks of Egypt, they couldn’t go back. It was gone. They were in the new world.
So it is with us, if we are found in Christ this morning. We have been raised to newness of life in Him.
And importantly: Christ is our life.
Because of this, no one can separate us from His love.
Jesus said in John 11, speaking to the sisters of Lazarus after his death:
“I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?”
Our life is in Christ. No one can separate us from His love. We will never die.
As Scripture says elsewhere: He is the God of the living.
So we look to Him, because our life is hidden in Him. And we must believe this if we are going to do the things God has called us to do by His Spirit.
Do you believe that Christ is your life? Do you believe your life is hidden with Him, and that when He comes in glory you will be revealed with Him likewise?
That is our hope.
The Ark as a Picture of Faith
Noah and his family believed they would survive the flood in the ark God provided.
How do we know? They built it. They entered it. The door closed. They gathered food and animals. They did what God commanded. They waited, and in the end, they were vindicated.
So too, if we believe our life is hidden in Christ, then we can do what Paul commands in these verses.
That brings us to the second main point: work in Christ.
Work in Christ
Since Christ is the life of His people, He now works in us.
Paul, having highlighted the life we now live in the Son, shows how this bears upon our earthly life in two particular areas:
- Seek the things that are above (v. 1).
- Set your minds on things that are above (v. 2).
Seek and think.
Christ, who is our life, empowers us by His Spirit to glorify and enjoy Him by seeking where He is and thinking about those things.
This bears on our lives now, because Christ is our life and He works in us.
Seek the Things Above
The first imperative Paul gives us here is to seek the things that are above.
We ask: what are those things?
The first and most obvious answer: God’s will.
Jesus told Peter in Matthew 16:23: “Get behind me, Satan! You are a hindrance to me. For you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man.”
So seeking the things above means seeking God’s interests, not our own.
It means we are dead to our old lives and reoriented toward Christ.
Another way to say this: we now seek spiritual goods over material goods.
Spiritual Goods over Material Goods
For example, everyone here has given up a day you could have used to work, make money, or pursue countless earthly activities. Our culture even calls Sunday “Sunday Funday.”
But instead, you’ve chosen to gather for worship. That’s seeking the spiritual over the material.
This reorientation affects everything:
- What kind of job we take.
- Where we live.
- How we order our family life.
- What we do with our time.
Paul will highlight these tensions more fully in 3:5–17, which we’ll take up in the coming weeks. But the principle is clear already: spiritual goods take priority over material goods.
Spiritual Works over Carnal Works
Not only do we seek spiritual goods over material goods, but also spiritual works over carnal works.
By this I mean: we may perform the same outward act, but for entirely different reasons.
For example, we might shovel our neighbor’s driveway in winter. A carnal reason would be so others think well of us, or so we feel like “a good neighbor.”
But the spiritual reason is this: we do it unto Christ.
The work itself may look the same, but the motivation is entirely different.
This is what Paul expands on later in 3:12–17—those actions that belong to the new life in Christ.
Both the seeking of spiritual goods and the doing of spiritual works highlight the inward reality of the Christian life: a heart oriented toward Christ.
Life in the Everyday
Here’s the challenge: so much of our life is consumed with ordinary necessities.
We get up, make breakfast, buy groceries, maintain homes, go to work. These material routines occupy much of our time.
But in all these decisions—large or small—we ask: does this make sense, given that I belong to Christ?
- Does this fit with the reality that my life is hidden with Him?
- Does this reflect that He owns me, body and soul?
- Does this point toward the glory that will be revealed when He comes?
This is very different from simply going through the motions.
And yet, in the fast pace of our world, it’s easy to fall into empty routines, never stopping to ask why.
Paul’s words cut through that: “If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is.”
That’s a total reorientation. A complete engagement of life.
Living as Those Raised
So in short, Christians conform their lives to the pursuit of spiritual goods because their life is hidden with Christ.
- Our true needs are met in Him.
- Our desires are directed by Him.
- Our actions are done for His glory.
It is a complete reorientation from what we once were, because our old life is dead and gone.
As with Noah and his family—busy about the building of the ark, preparing to pass through the judgment waters—we too are busy about those things that endure through judgment into eternity.
Set Your Minds on Things Above
Now look again at verse 2: “Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth.”
This command is closely related to “seek the things above,” but here Paul shifts the emphasis inward.
“Seek” has more to do with outward action. “Set your minds” has to do with inward thought and disposition.
And this is harder to measure. We can’t hold up a spiritual “radar gun” to detect someone’s thoughts. We might discern a little from their words or actions, but much of it is hidden.
So Paul presses us here: fix your inward life on heavenly realities.
Shaping Our Minds
So Paul tells us: dwell on things above.
That means our seeking includes both our external actions and our internal reality. Our whole person is bound up in Christ.
We are to:
- Speak about the things above.
- Act on the things above.
- Think about the things above.
Our whole life is redirected toward Christ, because our life is where He is.
An Illustration from Nebraska
Now, I’m not originally from Wisconsin—don’t hold it against me!—but I grew up in Nebraska.
This time of year, especially after what happened yesterday, the only thing most people are talking about is the Nebraska Cornhuskers.
It shapes the whole community. People bond instantly over it:
- “Did you go to the game?”
- “Who’s your favorite player?”
- “Did you go to school there?”
For better or worse, that collective fixation defines the culture during football season.
Brothers and sisters, as Christians, that should be true of us in relation to heavenly things.
When we come together, our bond should be immediate and deep, because we share the same life in Christ, we’re bound together in Him, and we’re headed for the same destination.
So our words, our thoughts, and our deeds ought to flow from that shared reality.
The Lord’s Day as a Test
That doesn’t mean we need a strange dialect or outward quirks to distinguish us—beyond what Scripture commands.
But it does mean that when we gather, our lives should be centered on Christ.
And that’s the blessing of the Lord’s Day.
All week we labor in our daily callings. We’re surrounded by the noise and demands of the world.
But on the Lord’s Day, God calls us to rest from those things, giving ourselves wholly to Him.
How do we use that day?
- Are we checking scores?
- Browsing ads?
- Distracted by worldly concerns?
Or are we delighting in the things of the Lord, because that’s where we want to be—where Christ is?
The Ark Again
Think of Noah once more.
He and his family so believed that their life was only found in the ark that they arranged everything around it—spending years building it, gathering animals, storing food.
Why? Because they believed that only in the ark would they be saved.
That was just for an earthly deliverance.
How much more, for those of us in Christ, who have been brought through the waters of baptism into a new life, should we arrange our whole existence around Him?
Baptism and the Good Conscience
Turn with me to 1 Peter 3:20–22.
Peter writes:
“Because they formerly did not obey, when God’s patience waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were brought safely through water. Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you—not as a removal of dirt from the body but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God, with angels, authorities, and powers having been subjected to Him.”
So just as Noah and his family went through the flood and were saved in the ark, we who are in Christ have been brought through—not by the water itself, but by the work of Christ.
Baptism corresponds to this. It is not merely washing dirt from the body, but an appeal to God for a good conscience through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
That’s the sign we’ve been given. That’s what our baptism points us to: our life hidden in Christ, raised with Him, seated where He is—at the right hand of the Most High.
Why This Matters
So why does this matter?
Because if our life is hidden with Christ, then we seek the things that are above.
We live now oriented toward Him, waiting upon Him.
This is why Paul ties the commands of Colossians 3:1–2 so tightly to the reality of our union with Christ.
We seek the things above. We set our minds on things above.
And we do so as those who have passed through the judgment waters in Christ, coming out alive on the other side.
Revealed in Christ: Our Hope
This brings us to the third and final point: revealed in Christ—or our hope in Christ.
We live in this strange period of time:
- Christ has already been raised and seated at the right hand of God.
- We have received the Holy Spirit and see His work among us.
- Yet we still struggle with sin and persecution.
We are waiting for the time when this tension is removed at the revelation of Jesus Christ—at His return.
And in each of the passages we’ve considered, there is a reminder that the time is short.
In 1 Peter 3, Peter quickly shifts from baptism to the suffering Christians endure.
In Colossians 3, Paul moves directly from life in Christ to putting sin to death and ordering household relationships under Christ.
Why? Because the Christian life is about persevering in this in-between time, until the day when our life is revealed with Him in glory.
How Do We Persevere?
How do we press on until that day?
By remembering:
- This present age is passing away.
- Our true life is not here, but in Christ.
- The Spirit enables us to put sin to death and live unto righteousness.
So when we face the difficult commands of Colossians 3:5–11 (putting sin to death), or the positive commands of 3:12–17 (putting on compassion, kindness, humility, and love), we do so in hope.
We know where we’re going. We know the end of the story.
Persevering Through Trials
So, what sort of motivation do we have in the short while as we wait upon Him, the author and perfecter of our faith?
A great deal.
Because we know where we’re going. We know the end of the story. Our life is already there with Him.
He has gone to prepare a place for us. As Jesus said in John 14, “If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?”
Since our life here is but a vapor, and our true life is in Christ, we can count that as our greatest reality.
We belong where He is.
Living in Light of Our Hope
That’s why, in the weeks ahead, we’ll be able to wrestle with the difficult commands of Colossians 3:
- “Put to death… what is earthly in you” (3:5–11)
- “Put on… compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience” (3:12–17)
- “Wives, submit to your husbands” (3:18)
- “Husbands, love your wives” (3:19)
- “Children, obey your parents” (3:20)
None of these come easily to sinners. We don’t want to do them perpetually, perfectly, or personally.
We’d rather someone else take on that burden for us.
But knowing our hope—that our life will be revealed with Christ—gives us strength to press on, even when the commands are hard.
The Lord’s Supper: A Visible Sign
And so Christ has given us a sign to sustain us in this present age: the Lord’s Supper.
Here in just a few moments, we will approach the table. And in the bread and cup, Christ reminds us of His death for us.
As He said: “This is my body, broken for you.”
And: “This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is shed for you.”
The bread and cup are not empty symbols. As 1 Corinthians 10 reminds us, Christ meets us in them, allowing us to participate in His body and blood.
We need that. We are weak. We cannot endure in our own strength.
But in the Supper, He assures us again that our life is hidden in Him, that His grace is sufficient, and that He is at work in us by His Spirit.
So when we come, we taste and see that the Lord is good (Psalm 34:8). We not only see His goodness, but we also receive His provision for all we need in this present age.
How to Approach the Table
So as we come, ask the Lord for help in those burdens weighing on you—whether individual struggles or corporate needs.
Because our life is found in Him, and the Supper is one of the ways He sustains that life until He brings us home.
We’ve seen that our life is now located in Christ Jesus. That encompasses everything of who we are and everything that we do. And we have a great hope that motivates us to obey what God has commanded, because we know we are headed toward the new heavens and the new earth.
As Noah and his family stepped forth from the ark into a new world, they received a testament of God’s promise. He set His bow in the clouds and said, “Never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of the flood” (Genesis 9:11–13).
But we have an even greater testament. We have the Word of the Son of God, into whom we have been baptized and raised in newness of life. And He tells us in the Supper that one day He will drink the cup anew with us in His Father’s kingdom (Matthew 26:29).
That is where we’re going. We have His promise.
So we wait, until the day we leave the ark and step into the new heavens and the new earth.
On that day, we will know by sight what we now know by faith. Until then, we trust the One who has called us and placed His name upon us.
And so let’s give thanks to the Lord now as we prepare to come to His table.
Closing Prayer
Our Father, we thank You for Your kindness toward us in the Lord Jesus Christ. We ask that You would be pleased to work in us those things that You have commanded in Your Word. For apart from You, we are unable to do them.
And yet, Lord, we pray that You would grow us in grace, that we might be strengthened, and that we might all the more reckon our life here as but a vapor, while our true life is found in Christ.
Please cause us to believe that there is truly no life apart from Him. All those outside of Christ will perish in the waters of judgment.
So we ask: strengthen the faith of Your children this day. And for those apart from You, we pray that You would be pleased to save them—even today. That they too might enter into the ark which is Christ, and pass safely through the judgment waters into the new heavens and the new earth.
In Christ’s name we pray. Amen.
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