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Greeting
Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by God’s will, and Timothy our brother:
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To the saints in Christ at Colossae, who are faithful brothers and sisters. Grace to you and peace from God our Father.
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Thanksgiving
We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you,
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that has come to you. It is bearing fruit and growing all over the world, just as it has among you since the day you heard it and came to truly appreciate God’s grace.
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Prayer for Spiritual Growth
For this reason also, since the day we heard this, we haven’t stopped praying for you. We are asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding,
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so that you may walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him: bearing fruit in every good work and growing in the knowledge of God,
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being strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, so that you may have great endurance and patience, joyfully
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The Centrality of Christ
He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.
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For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him,
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I have become its servant, according to God’s commission that was given to me for you, to make the word of God fully known,
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God wanted to make known among the Gentiles the glorious wealth of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.
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We proclaim him, warning and teaching everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone mature in Christ.
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I labor for this, striving with his strength that works powerfully in me.
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I want their hearts to be encouraged and joined together in love, so that they may have all the riches of complete understanding and have the knowledge of God’s mystery—Christ.
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Christ versus the Colossian Heresy
I am saying this so that no one will deceive you with arguments that sound reasonable.
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For I may be absent in body, but I am with you in spirit, rejoicing to see how well ordered you are and the strength of your faith in Christ.
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So then, just as you have received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to walk in him,
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being rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, and overflowing with gratitude.
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For the entire fullness of God’s nature dwells bodily in Christ,
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You were also circumcised in him with a circumcision not done with hands, by putting off the body of flesh, in the circumcision of Christ,
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when you were buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead.
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And when you were dead in trespasses and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, he made you alive with him and forgave us all our trespasses.
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He erased the certificate of debt, with its obligations, that was against us and opposed to us, and has taken it away by nailing it to the cross.
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They don’t hold on to the head, from whom the whole body, nourished and held together by its ligaments and tendons, grows with growth from God.
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If you died with Christ to the elements of this world, why do you live as if you still belonged to the world? Why do you submit to regulations:
