Passage: Colossians 2:18-19
The Big Idea
The second pitfall Paul warns about is “weird spirituality”: mysticism, angel worship, secret visions and any special experience someone says you need in order to be truly spiritual. But you are complete in Jesus. You don’t need a fancy experience to prove you’re in Christ. Real spirituality holds fast to the Head.
The Second Pitfall
Paul is warning us about things that will ruin your spiritual life, and showing how we’re safe from them only when we cling to Jesus.
Last time we saw the first pitfall: legalism. “Follow these rules to become more spiritual.” That’s wrong because all those things were shadows of the real thing, and the real thing is Jesus. We don’t fall in love with shadows when the real thing is right in front of us.
The second pitfall is weird spirituality, or mysticism. Think of the New Age movement, the human potential quest, fortune-telling, spells, crystals, spirit guides, contacting angels or demons. Anything that isn’t simple faith in Jesus and His gospel.
This is different from legalism because it’s subjective. It’s an extra experience you supposedly need to have or feel to be truly spiritual.
But Paul keeps telling us: you are complete in Jesus. You don’t need anything else.
You Don’t Need a Fancy Experience
You don’t need a dramatic experience to prove you’re in Christ. Some people chase experiences, but that’s a trap.
You might never feel different. It doesn’t matter, because your salvation is based on faith, not feelings or experiences. You might never feel saved. But you are completely saved by faith in Jesus. You are complete in Him. You’ll never need anything besides His faithful love.
His promises are structures already built. You already have everything you’ll ever need through Jesus. It’s all true. It’s all real. It’s all finished. Our daily growth is simply growing in our understanding of these promises and walking in them.
The Text (Colossians 2:18-19)
Don’t let anyone disqualify you from your prize by delighting in false humility and the worship of angels, going on about visions they claim to have seen, puffed up without reason by their fleshly minds. They aren’t holding fast to the Head, from whom the whole body, nourished and held together by its joints and ligaments, grows with the growth that comes from God.
Who has the right to walk into my life and tell me I’ll miss the prize of fulfillment in Jesus unless I have a certain subjective experience? No one.
Don’t Be Cheated
There’s a reward at stake here, and if you fall into this pit, you’ll miss out on it. These false teachers can swindle you out of what’s yours. Rip you off. Hustle you with their claims.
(What do you call a Mongol leader who swindles people out of their money? Genghis Con Man.)
What’s the reward? Christ in you, the hope of glory (Colossians 1:27). The prize is a life of perfect love and unity with God. Never separated. True intimacy with God. Real love, peace and joy on a much deeper level than feelings. Truth.
Weird spirituality is always looking for that from “the universe” or other spiritual sources, but never actually finds the truth. Everyone who clings to Jesus by faith has it all in its fullness.
False Humility
We talk a lot about humility. It’s the virtue God is looking for in all people, so He can pour out His grace on them (James 4:6).
But weird spirituality has a false humility. “We’re humble, and we’re awesome at it!” “We need a spirit guide to lead us, a vision to teach us.” But not Jesus. Not His Holy Spirit. Not His Word. “We know the secrets. We’ve learned the will of the universe.”
Humility stops being humility the moment you delight in your own humility. Then it’s pride. Paul says the false teachers in Colossae were puffed up by their fleshly minds. Their “humility” was a cover for pride.
The picture seems to be someone who loves to talk on and on about his spiritual experiences, when in reality they’re coming out of his own sinful flesh.
How can you tell? Usually their flesh is clearly running the show. Sinful behavior overflows. Many who claim to be super-spiritual turn out to be deeply selfish and comfortable with sin. Just listen to what comes out of the heart. It always does (Luke 6:45).
The Worship of Angels
People used to worship angels all the time. Watch how easy it is:
“Big announcement! We’re having a real, live angel join us for church tonight! Bring your friends! Call the news!”
Now replace “angel” with “Jesus,” and hardly anyone cares. No one comes. Even though He has promised He’s right here with us (Matthew 18:20).
Angels were seen as fancy go-betweens. God is too big and important to care about you, or for you to approach directly. That sounds humble, but it’s false humility. It contradicts God’s Word, His promises, and everything Jesus came to do. Jesus made a way for us to come straight to God, with no go-between but Him (1 Timothy 2:5; Hebrews 4:16).
And demons are simply angels who fell from serving God to serve Satan. Some people seek them out too. An evil spirit isn’t going to make your life better.
An Ancient Teaching in Modern Clothes
Pastor Ray Stedman pointed out that false humility and the worship of angels always show up together in this kind of teaching.
In Colossae there was an early form of what would later be called Gnosticism (from the Greek word for knowledge). It taught that a ladder of spiritual beings stood between people and God, and they had to be acknowledged and appeased. Through contact with them, your secret knowledge would grow until you finally understood the “oneness” of all things.
That same idea is alive today. It promises to move you beyond self, but look closely and it’s all about self: developing your own powers, unlocking your potential, discovering that everything you need is already inside you. “The light you seek is in your own lantern.” A famous pop song once claimed that learning to love yourself is the greatest love of all. That could be the theme song of the whole movement.
What’s the danger? Paul says it plainly: it disqualifies you from the prize. And the prize is a real life with Jesus. Adopted and loved. Peace and joy. Daily fellowship with God, for real.
Visions
“Going on about visions they claim to have seen.” Paul is warning about false visions.
Many religious movements over the centuries have been built on claimed visions and secret revelations, and those in the inner circle are naturally proud of their secret knowledge. The false teachers in Colossae claimed visions and contact with angels. Remember that a third of the angels fell and became the demons who serve Satan (Revelation 12:4, 9). By bypassing the Word of God and the Spirit of God, they opened themselves up to demonic deception. Satan is a liar (John 8:44) and a deceiver (Revelation 12:9), a master at counterfeiting spiritual experiences.
The Spirit clearly warns that in later times some will abandon the faith, paying attention to deceiving spirits and teachings of demons (1 Timothy 4:1). Demons are always trying to deceive people, even in church.
Should we ever connect with them, speak with them, or worship them? No.
Even a holy angel refused worship. When John fell at an angel’s feet, the angel told him not to do it. He was only a fellow servant. Worship God (Revelation 19:10).
Holding Fast to the Head (Colossians 2:19)
That’s the real problem with all weird spirituality: it keeps us from holding fast to the Head.
You can’t embrace Jesus while you’re seeking another source of life or revelation. Jesus is our Head, our source of life. Everything we need flows from Him. You are complete in Him.
What Does a Real Spiritual Experience Look Like?
How would we know one is genuine? Look at Paul’s own story in 2 Corinthians 12:1-10.
- He doesn’t want to boast (verse 1). Not proud. Not special.
- He isn’t even sure how it happened (verses 2-3). He knew a man in Christ who was caught up to the third heaven, whether in the body or out of it, he didn’t know. God knows. No claims of special insider knowledge.
- He heard things too sacred to put into words (verse 4). Not fun details about heaven, but a weight of glory too serious and amazing to explain.
- He’ll only boast in his weaknesses (verse 5). He’ll talk about Jesus, the One who deserves all the attention. Not himself. Except to talk about how weak he is, how much he needs Jesus, and how Jesus has had to help and save him.
- He refuses to let anyone think too highly of him (verse 6). The truth is, he’s just a man. Jesus gets all the credit.
- God gave him a thorn in the flesh to keep him humble (verses 7-8). He begged the Lord three times to take it away.
- God’s answer: My grace is sufficient for you, because My power is made perfect in weakness (verse 9). So Paul gladly boasts in his weaknesses, so Christ’s power can rest on him. When he is weak, then he is strong (verse 10).
A real spiritual life trusts God even when it can’t see Him, even when it can’t feel Him, even when it hurts.
A real spiritual life brings nothing to the table but weakness and brokenness, need and distress, stress and failure. But it comes to the table anyway and communes with God through the sacrifice of Jesus.
And Jesus gives us, by grace, His very life: the Holy Spirit. A real spiritual life. And we overflow with His love, His joy, His peace, His everything.
That’s holding fast to the Head. Seeking Him. Clinging to Him. Delighting in Him.
The Headship of Christ
The church can never be right until it’s right in its relationship to Christ as Head.
Who is the Lord of the church? Who redeemed it? Who has the right to direct it? These are all-determining questions.
The church is part of Christ’s very body. Do the parts of your body rebel against your head?
Paul says that as we grow up, we won’t be tossed around like children by every wind of teaching and every clever lie. Instead, speaking the truth in love, we grow up in every way into Christ, the Head. From Him the whole body is joined and held together, and as each part does its work, the body builds itself up in love (Ephesians 4:14-16).
Grace Takeaway
You don’t need a vision, a spirit guide, a secret or a special feeling to be complete. You already are, in Jesus. Hold fast to the Head. Bring Him your weakness, and let His grace be enough.
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