“We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all God’s people— the faith and love that spring from the hope stored up for you in heaven and about which you have already heard in the true message of the gospel that has come to you. In the same way, the gospel is bearing fruit and growing throughout the whole world—just as it has been doing among you since the day you heard it and truly understood God’s grace. You learned it from Epaphras, our dear fellow servant, who is a faithful minister of Christ on our behalf, and who also told us of your love in the Spirit.”

Introduction

Are any of us glad that we woke up this morning? What are possible reasons for this? What do we hope tomorrow might bring? Do we have any basis for having such hopes? Do these bases affect the way in which we live today?

Paul’s Language for God

The first thing we note in this passage is that it starts with a reference to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. The greeting ended with a reference to God our Father. Both phrases appear only once in Colossians. This does not mean they are insignificant. Rather, their position at the beginning of the letter indicate they are very important. Paul is being very intentional. When he blesses the Colossians in the greeting he does so based on the fact that God is Father to the church. When he prays, he does so with a clear indication that all prayer is mediated through Jesus. We have access to God only because of Jesus, because God is the Father of Jesus.

The Christian Trio

In this passage Paul reports to the Colossians the reasons for which he thanks God for them. Paul has never been to Colossae. However, he has heard reports of the church there from Epaphras. Paul links three things about the Colossian church: faith, love, and hope. The same three appear in 1 Corinthians. These are related chronologically as follows.

A Belief About the Past

Faith concerns a belief. Here Paul says that it is a belief in Jesus. Not a belief that he was born, lived, and died. Not even a belief that he was raised. Rather, the belief that these all were acts of God done for the salvation of the world and in particular for us. That is, unless we appropriate the historical events for ourselves they remain mere historical events. When we appropriate them for ourselves they become God’s acts to bring about our salvation. So faith is concerned with God’s dealings in the past.

A Way of Life for the Present

Love concerns our attitude toward God, other Christians, and the world. Here Paul commends the Colossians Christians for the love they have for all Christians. Love is truly present when we love our brothers and sisters in Christ. We cannot claim to have God’s love and at the same time not love other Christians. It is uncertain how Paul, who had never been to Colossae, evaluated this love. Quite likely it was their willingness to permit Epaphras, the founder of the church in Colossae, to minister in the surrounding areas of Hierapolis and Laodicea. Love for other Christians, therefore, is concerned with the present, with how we are and live today.

An Expectation for the Future

Hope, however, concerns what we expect, what we look forward to. Paul says that the love the Colossians have for Christians is based on the hope that is reserved for them in the heavens. A short note is needed here. Heaven, by itself, does not refer to a future place. Rather, it is short-hand for the place where God lives. Even today there is a heaven. Christians hope to live in the new heavens and the new earth when God recreates all things. They will live with God. This is the great hope that we have.

So how do faith, love, and hope relate to each other? We could stick with chronology and say, “We believe that something happened in the past that enables us to expect wonderful things in the future because of which we live as though we were in that future today.”

Bearing Fruit and Growing

Or we could use the image of a tree. Faith is the seed from which the fruit of love grow. Hope would be the nutrients that fuel this growth. This leads us to v. 6. The point Paul is making is that the gospel cannot but bear fruit. The gospel is a seed provided with all the necessary nutrients. And such a seed will always bear fruit. This is a consistent teaching in the bible. The Old Testament prophets regularly likened Israel to a tree or a vineyard. Jesus used such agricultural imagery all the time. And here we see Paul does the same. According to scripture, the fruit of love produced by Christians reveals the true nature of the seed of faith and of the nutrient of hope that they have.

The church is supposed to be a tree bearing the fruit of love. No fruit of love means that something is wrong with the seed. The seed is not the true seed of the Christian faith if there is no love. If the fruit is small or few, this is because the tree lacks nutrients. So if the love in the church is restrained, this is because the church lacks hope.

Now, Paul places two ideas together. He says that the gospel is bearing fruit and growing. Sticking with the analogy of the tree, the fruit itself contains the seed for the next harvest. That is, the love that Christians have for each other is itself an empowerment by God for the numerical growth of the church.

Questions

• Do any of you have any other analogies that would help us understand the relationship between faith, love, and hope?
• How do the various elements of life in a church contribute to one or more of these three aspects?
• How has studying this passage changed your view of God and how he deals with us?
• How will your week be different now that we have studied this passage?