Colossians 3:3-4 For you are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.… It is hidden — I. IN ITS ORIGIN. Conversion is a hidden operation. We have read many accounts of it. We are told how certain words, thoughts, providences, were followed by certain feelings, resolutions, actions, but the change itself is beyond the cognizance of the person changed. "The wind bloweth," etc. II. IN ITS GREATEST MOMENTS. 1. That of self-dedication. When a man takes the oath of allegiance to his country, it is in the presence of others; but when he swears fealty to God, he is hidden with God. 2. That of communion with God. The soul wants something more than is supplied by public worship. 3. Those of its highest joys, as when Jesus was transfigured, He was hid from His disciples by the bright overshadowing cloud. 4. Those of its deepest sorrows, as Jesus was separated from His disciples in Gethsemane. The greatest actions have not appeared on the public stage of history: they are obscure, un-chronicled, unmonumented, but God has seen and estimated them. III. FROM THE EYE OF THE WORLD. The life of the world consists in being alive unto sin and dead. unto God. The Christian has withdrawn from and is dead to this. Hence though his life be manifest as the sun, the world cannot see him. "If our gospel be hid," etc. Nature may be hidden in two ways; at midnight by darkness, at noonday by blindness. When Christ appeared the world knew Him not; so with His disciples, It requires a Christian to understand a Christian. The world has not the key to the Christian life. IV. WITH CHRIST. 1. As our representative. The union between the believer and his Lord is a hidden one. It is the sheet anchor of spiritual life cast within the veil, and therefore hidden; but it is in the strength of that the soul can ride securely through the tempest of time. 2. As the object of our affections. Our true home is the spot towards which the heart tremblingly turns as the needle to the pole. "Where your treasure is," etc. 3. The full meaning of our present life is hidden with Christ. It is full of mystery. Think of its suffering; its relation with sin; its mortality, etc. 4. The final glory of this life is hid with Christ. "It doth not yet appear," etc. V. In God. God Himself is the hidden one. "Verily Thou art a God that hidest Thyself." "Canst thou by searching;" etc. What safety, comfort, joy, the Christian has. (F. Ferguson.) Parallel Verses KJV: For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.WEB: For you died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. |
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