Week 46 Colossians 3
Paul begins chapter three by telling his readers that now that they were following the Lord one thing they needed to be doing was to seek the things above. He repeats himself in the very next verse: set your minds on things above.
To emphasize the point he also adds the converse: don’t set your mind on earthly things (and again two verses later: put to death what belongs to your earthly nature).
So the principle is that I focus my mind and my thinking on things above (and at the same time shun earthly things). It’s the kind of simple picture that I like with just two basic elements: Focal Point A & Focal Point B. Still…I’m left with the obvious follow-up question: what specific things are included in earthly things?
Fortunately Paul anticipated the question and he listed five specific instincts that my earthly nature tends to prefer:
• sexual immorality
• impurity
• lust
• evil desire
• greed.
This helps. Paul moves me from an ambiguous general principle and offers a checklist of specific practices – things I need to put to death.
Now that I believe a number of adjustments start coming into play and one of them is that I begin to reorient my thinking away from earthly things. They aren’t the norm anymore. Now I start to refocus. There are other things – better things – to get my mind attending to.
Note: quotes from Colossians 3:1-5 (CSB)