Colossians 1 — The Image of the Invisible God

Today’s Passage: Colossians 1

Paul opens this letter the way a grateful man opens a letter to friends, with thanksgiving spilling over. He has heard of the Colossians’ faith and love, and he cannot stop giving thanks or stop praying that they be filled with the knowledge of God’s will and bear fruit in every good work. Then, having named the great rescue God has worked, transferring us out of the domain of darkness and into the kingdom of His beloved Son, Paul lifts his eyes and his voice rises into one of the highest songs in all of Scripture. In a handful of verses he sets before us the whole stature of Christ. The image of the invisible God. The firstborn over all creation. The One through whom and for whom every created thing was made, the One in whom all things hold together, the head of the church, the firstborn from the dead, the One in whom all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through whose blood upon the cross all things are reconciled. When you have finished reading, you will understand why Paul is content to spend his sufferings and his whole life making this Christ known.

As you read, hold this: Christ is supreme over all creation, and in Him all things hold together.

Colossians 1:1–2 (BSB)

¹ Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother, ² To the saints and faithful brothers in Christ at Colossae: Grace and peace to you from God our Father.

Paul begins as he so often does, naming himself an apostle “by the will of God.” He did not appoint himself, and he did not earn the office. He was sent by God’s own choosing, and that quiet phrase already turns our eyes away from man and toward the will of God, where this whole letter will keep them. He names Timothy beside himself, “our brother,” and he greets the Colossians as “saints and faithful brothers in Christ.” They are set apart and they are family, and both of those things are true only because they are “in Christ,” a little phrase that will carry the weight of everything to come. Then the familiar blessing, “Grace and peace,” the free favor of God and the wholeness that follows from it, given from the Father Himself.

Colossians 1:3–8 (BSB)

³ We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, ⁴ because we have heard about your faith in Christ Jesus and your love for all the saints— ⁵ the faith and love proceeding from the hope stored up for you in heaven, of which you have already heard in the word of truth, the gospel ⁶ that has come to you. All over the world this gospel is bearing fruit and growing, just as it has been doing among you since the day you heard it and truly understood the grace of God. ⁷ You learned it from Epaphras, our beloved fellow servant, who is a faithful minister of Christ on our behalf, ⁸ and who also informed us of your love in the Spirit.

Notice what Paul gives thanks for. Not for their gifts or their numbers, but for three things that belong together and always travel as a company: faith, love, and hope. Their faith rests in Christ, their love reaches out to all the saints, and both of these, Paul says, are “proceeding from the hope stored up for you in heaven.” Hope here is not a wishful feeling but a settled treasure, already laid up and kept safe in heaven, and it is the sight of that treasure that frees a heart to trust God and to love others without fear. They came to know this hope through “the word of truth, the gospel,” and Paul cannot mention the gospel without marveling at how it grows. “All over the world this gospel is bearing fruit and growing,” he says, like a living seed that keeps spreading and yielding, and it has been doing the very same thing among the Colossians “since the day you heard it and truly understood the grace of God.” Then he honors the man who first brought it to them, Epaphras, “our beloved fellow servant” and “a faithful minister of Christ,” the one who carried the good news to Colossae and carried back to Paul the report of their “love in the Spirit.”

Colossians 1:9–14 (BSB)

⁹ For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you and asking God to fill you with the knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, ¹⁰ so that you may walk in a manner worthy of the Lord and may please Him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God, ¹¹ being strengthened with all power according to His glorious might so that you may have full endurance and patience, and joyfully ¹² giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the light. ¹³ He has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of His beloved Son, ¹⁴ in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

Having given thanks, Paul turns to prayer, and it is worth watching what he asks for. Not comfort, not ease, not even the removal of the false teaching, but “the knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.” He longs for them to know God deeply, because he understands that a life grows out of what it knows. And so the prayer opens outward into a walk: knowing God’s will, they will “walk in a manner worthy of the Lord,” bearing fruit, growing, and being “strengthened with all power according to His glorious might.” Look closely, though, at what that strength is for. Not for triumphant displays, but for “endurance and patience,” and even those wrapped in joy, “joyfully giving thanks to the Father.” The strength of God most often shows itself as a quiet, thankful staying-power under pressure.

Then Paul names the great rescue that makes all this gratitude possible, and he does it with the language of a mighty act of God. The Father “has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the light,” and He “has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of His beloved Son.” Hear the two kingdoms and the movement between them. We did not stroll out of the darkness on our own; we were rescued from it, lifted out of a domain that held us fast and carried over into another kingdom altogether, the kingdom of the Son whom the Father loves. And the passport into that kingdom is named at once: “in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.” Redemption is the ransoming of a captive, and here it is spelled out plainly so we cannot mistake it. To be redeemed is to be forgiven, our debt cancelled, our record cleared, and the whole rescue accomplished in the beloved Son. That word “beloved Son” is the doorway, and through it Paul now steps into his great song.

Colossians 1:15–17 (BSB)

¹⁵ The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. ¹⁶ For in Him all things were created, things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities. All things were created through Him and for Him. ¹⁷ He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.

Read these three verses slowly, for they may be the summit of the whole letter. Paul begins with the Son’s relation to God, “the image (εἰκών) eikōn, pronounced ay-KOHN. Strong's G1504, image, likeness, visible representation. When Paul says the Son is “the image of the invisible God,” he reaches for a word that means far more than a likeness or a copy. An eikōn is a visible representation that carries the very reality of what it shows. The word gives us our English “icon,” but we must not think of a faint picture. Paul means that the invisible God, whom no eye has seen, has made Himself seen in the Son. To look at Christ is to look at God made visible, not a lesser reflection of Him but His exact representation. Paul uses the same word again in 2 Corinthians 4:4, calling Christ “the image of God,” and the letter to the Hebrews says the same thing another way, naming the Son “the exact representation of His nature” (Hebrews 1:3). This is the hinge of the whole hymn. The One who forgives our sins, who was born in a stable and died on a cross, is nothing less than the invisible God made visible. Everything Paul goes on to say about creation and reconciliation stands upon this one astonishing claim. of the invisible God,” and then to creation, “the firstborn (πρωτότοκος) prōtotokos, pronounced pro-TOT-oh-kos. Strong's G4416, firstborn, the one holding first rank and honor. Paul calls the Son “the firstborn over all creation,” and this is a phrase we must hold with great care, for it has been misread by those who imagine it means the Son was the first created being. The text itself forbids that reading. In the very next breath Paul says that “in Him all things were created,” and a moment later “He is before all things.” The Creator of everything cannot Himself be a creature. What then does “firstborn” mean? In the Scriptures the firstborn was the heir, the son who held the place of supreme rank and honor and inheritance. God even calls the whole nation of Israel “My firstborn son” (Exodus 4:22), and David, the youngest child of Jesse, is appointed God’s “firstborn, the highest of the kings of the earth” (Psalm 89:27), neither of them first in time, both first in standing. So prōtotokos here is a title of supremacy, not of origin. The Son is the heir of all creation and its Lord, preeminent over everything that was made because everything was made through Him and for Him. Paul will sound the word once more in verse 18, “the firstborn from among the dead,” and there it carries the same weight of preeminence, now over the new creation as well as the old. over all creation,” and having planted that title he immediately guards it against every misunderstanding. Why is the Son supreme over all creation? “For in Him all things were created.” Everything that exists came to be through Him, and Paul sweeps his hand across the entire universe to leave nothing out: “things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities.” Whatever powers the Colossians were being tempted to fear or to worship, seen or unseen, high or low, every one of them is a creature that the Son Himself made. And He made them not only “through Him,” as the agent of creation, but “for Him,” as the goal of it. All things exist for the Son, to serve His glory and His purpose. Then verse 17 sets the crown upon it in two short clauses. “He is before all things,” existing before anything was made, and “in Him all things hold together.” This is a truth to steady the soul. The universe does not simply run on its own laws like a machine wound up and left alone; it is held, moment by moment, in the hands of the Son. Every atom, every orbit, every breath is sustained by Him. He is not only the One through whom the world began but the One in whom it continues to stand.

Colossians 1:18–20 (BSB)

¹⁸ And He is the head of the body, the church; He is the beginning and firstborn from among the dead, so that in all things He may have preeminence. ¹⁹ For God was pleased to have all His fullness dwell in Him, ²⁰ and through Him to reconcile to Himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through the blood of His cross.

Now the song turns from the wide universe to the people God is gathering, and it loses none of its height. The same Christ who is Lord over all creation “is the head of the body, the church.” He is not merely its founder or its example but its living head, the source of its life and the one who directs it, as a head governs and animates a body. And He holds another firstness as well: He is “the beginning and firstborn from among the dead.” When Paul says “firstborn” a second time, he means it as he meant it before, the supreme and preeminent one, but now over a new territory. Christ is the first to rise from death into unending life, the head of a new creation as He is head of the old, and He rose “so that in all things He may have preeminence.” That little phrase gathers up the whole hymn. In creation and in resurrection, over the cosmos and over the church, over things visible and invisible, the Son is to have first place in everything. There is no realm where He is second.

And why should all this fullness gather in one Person? “For God was pleased to have all His fullness dwell in Him.” The entire fullness of God, the whole undiminished reality of deity, was pleased to make its dwelling in the Son. He is not a partial revelation of God but the complete one. And out of that fullness flows the greatest work of all: “through Him to reconcile to Himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven.” The One through whom all things were made is the One through whom all things are brought back into peace. But mark how this reconciliation is accomplished, for Paul will not let it float away into abstraction. It is “by making peace through the blood of His cross.” The cosmic Christ of this soaring hymn is the crucified Christ. The One who holds the galaxies together made peace by being broken, and the blood shed on a Roman cross is the price and the means of a reconciliation as wide as heaven and earth. There is no higher majesty in Scripture, and it is shown to us in a Savior who bled.

Colossians 1:21–23 (BSB)

²¹ Once you were alienated from God and were hostile in your minds, engaging in evil deeds. ²² But now He has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body through death to present you holy, unblemished, and blameless in His presence— ²³ if indeed you continue in your faith, established and firm, not moved from the hope of the gospel you heard, which has been proclaimed to every creature under heaven, and of which I, Paul, have become a servant.

Having sung of a reconciliation as vast as heaven and earth, Paul now brings it home to the reader’s own heart, and he does it with two words that turn on the hinge of the gospel: “Once” and “But now.” Once, he says, “you were alienated from God and were hostile in your minds, engaging in evil deeds.” This is an honest picture of what we were, not merely distant from God but at odds with Him, our very minds set against Him and our deeds proving it. There is no flattery here and no despair either, only the truth that must be seen before grace can be treasured. And then the great reversal: “But now He has reconciled you.” The same peace that verse 20 stretched across the universe is now placed into the reader’s own life. And notice again how it was done, “by Christ’s physical body through death,” the actual body of Jesus given over to death, so that the reconciliation is no idea but an event, purchased in flesh and blood. Notice too what it was for: “to present you holy, unblemished, and blameless in His presence.” The end of the whole rescue is that we would one day stand before God without a single stain, faultless in His sight, and it is Christ who will present us so.

Then Paul adds a word that is not a threat but an anchor: “if indeed you continue in your faith, established and firm, not moved from the hope of the gospel you heard.” He is not teaching that we hold ourselves saved by our own strength, but that a true and living faith is one that continues, rooted and settled, not shifted away from the hope of the gospel. The mark of the genuine is that it endures. And that gospel, he reminds them, is no local rumor but a message “proclaimed to every creature under heaven,” the same word bearing fruit across the whole world of which he spoke in verse 6, and of it Paul himself, the great apostle, is content to be only “a servant.”

Colossians 1:24–29 (BSB)

²⁴ Now I rejoice in my sufferings for you, and I fill up in my flesh what is lacking in regard to Christ’s afflictions for the sake of His body, which is the church. ²⁵ I became its servant by the commission God gave me to fully proclaim to you the word of God, ²⁶ the mystery that was hidden for ages and generations but is now revealed to His saints. ²⁷ To them God has chosen to make known among the Gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. ²⁸ We proclaim Him, admonishing and teaching everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone perfect in Christ. ²⁹ To this end I also labor, striving with all His energy working powerfully within me.

Paul closes the chapter by speaking of his own life, and what he says is remarkable: he “rejoices” in his sufferings. A man in prison, bearing hardship for the sake of people he has never met, does not merely endure it but rejoices in it, “for the sake of His body, which is the church.” When Paul says he fills up in his flesh “what is lacking in regard to Christ’s afflictions,” he does not mean that Christ’s saving work on the cross was somehow incomplete, for the whole hymn has just declared that work full and final. He means rather that Christ’s people, His body, still have sufferings to bear as the gospel goes out into the world, and Paul gladly takes his own share of them so that others may be reached. His hardship is a servant’s hardship, spent for the church.

And what is the treasure he suffers to make known? Here Paul names it, “the mystery that was hidden for ages and generations but is now revealed to His saints.” A mystery in the Scriptures is not a riddle we must solve but a secret God has now made plain, and the secret is more wonderful than anyone had guessed. God has chosen “to make known among the Gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery,” and Paul states it in five words that a person could carry for a lifetime: “Christ in you, the hope of glory.” The cosmic Christ of verses 15 through 20, the image of the invisible God in whom all fullness dwells, comes to live within ordinary believers, and His presence within is the very ground of our hope that we will one day share His glory. This is why Paul proclaims Him, “admonishing and teaching everyone with all wisdom,” with a single goal always before him, “so that we may present everyone perfect in Christ.” And he does not do it in his own strength. He labors and strives, yes, but “with all His energy working powerfully within me.” Even the apostle’s tireless work is finally the power of Christ at work in him, the same Christ who holds all things together now holding and moving one faithful servant’s life.