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English translations of the Bible often have inserted bias and Colossians 2:16-23 is no different. I’m not claiming translators are misleading us, but all interpretations are making decisions based upon information beyond the words themselves. My goal today, is to allow the historical and textual contexts to inform the translation instead of the context of our modern belief.

¹⁶ So then let no one judge you regarding food and drink, or as to a festival or a new moon celebration or a Sabbath. ¹⁷ These are a foreshadow of what is to come, but the physical reality (sōma) belongs to Christ.¹⁸ Let no one disqualify you, insisting on subjecting you (tapeinophrosune) and religion (threskeia) of angels, entering into the mysteries that he has seen, puffed up with no result because of the way of thinking of his flesh, ¹⁹ and not holding fast to the Head, from whom the whole body, by the ligaments and bindings, being provided for and united, grows the growing of God.

This Greek transliteration will sound very different than most English versions. This allows us to see the mind of interpreters who are striving to place it within the modern mind. However, my goal is to first see the mind of Paul from his cultural context to find the best way to contextualize. It’s this extra step that causes my teachings to differ from most teachers, yet it seems obvious, Paul wasn’t writing to a modern church.

Paul is in a Roman prison because of his Gospel to the gentiles. He’s traveled the region and his message has been met with enough resistance that he has been jailed. Paul’s gospel, just as John the Baptist’s and Jesus’ gospel, is subversive to institutional power. That piece is often missing. Religious and political power don’t welcome a sect of people who remain unaffiliated and ruled by a power greater than their institutions. Just like today, their syncretistic culture was accustomed to people embracing the cultural drift by participation in the pluralistic religiosity of the day. The Church in Colossae would have really stood out by their non-participation. Their cosmology had been completely reworked by their Christology.

Paul’s message to Colossae is to resist the cultural, political, and religious pressure to conform. This is a message we would do well to heed today. The modern Christian religion has been coopted by both sides of the political isle and syncretized with contemporary ideologies. Paul’s reminding them that the Church is the physical embodiment Christ and as such, they aren’t participating in pagan New Moon Festivals, rules about eating and drinking that would stifle their freedom in Christ, they aren’t embracing the Sabbath, they aren’t subjected to the religion of Angles (unlike our Enochian obsessed scroll-sphere culture). Paul’s message is that the aggregate of all the polytheistic culture is a form of pride that is holistically deceived in their conclusions about reality. Paul agonizes in prayer that this group of believers will remember that they are the embodiment of Christ, and as such are the means by which Christ continues in perpetuity in the world.

The Christian religion didn’t exist. What did exist was Christ being lived out in the lives of people. If you wanted to know anything about Jesus, all anyone would have to do, is meet these people and that was the same as meeting Christ. We would never say that about our churches today. Today, the closest we get to meeting Jesus in the flesh is a song, a prayer, or a cracker.

Paul’s message applies to us today. The business of the Christian religion has become syncretistic with fee for service transactions, end of life threats, and earth evacuation strategies, instead of earth redemption efforts. The church has adopted partisan politics, and become wealthy by evading taxes. Consider how Colossae wouldn’t likely be accepted by any denominational church today.

²⁰ If you died with Christ from the elemental powers over the world, why, those living by the standards of this world system, do obey rules²¹ “Do not handle, Do not taste, Do not touch” ²² (that are all bound to ruin by use)—according to the commandments and teachings of men? ²³ These have indeed an appearance of wisdom in self-imposed religion and subjection and severe control of the body, but they are of no value against the indulgence of the flesh.

Paul’s message cannot be clearer. Do NOT submit to religion. Do NOT submit to rules and regulations that people establish as means of demonstrating that you are on board with the ethos/pathos of religious endeavors. The Christian community is to be free from all of this. In Christ, who leads all comers from the inside, there is no uniformity…only unity and diversity together.

Consider how different our modern Christian experience is. Christianity has become an institutionalized religion with thousands of denominations, each wielding control and robbing its people of freedom. Each transacting money in exchange for the promise of getting to God when we die. While our modern religion tells us that our sins can be forgiven, Paul tells us that our sins ARE forgiven. While our religion looks more and more like our politics, Paul tells us our faith is the embodiment of Christ in and as our life. While religion tries to scare us with where we will go when we die, Paul reminds us that we are already in Christ and religion is therefore superfluous.

It’s no wonder the religious establishment over the centuries has turned the Colossian letter into a warning about Gnosticism which wouldn’t exist for 100 years. Paul’s words are square on the nose of anyone who would seeks to profit and promote a religiosity, with rituals, festivals, sabbaths and worthless endeavors. There can be no pursuit of God when God exists within us all. The discovery of God is the void of all pursuits and the stillness of being. There can be no spiritual life that is distinct or detached from living the life we have.

The Colossian church stood apart from the world because it was the least religious group around.