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Our salvation consists in the fact that Christ, in His death, blotted out all accusation against us! When He, Christ, nailed our sin on the cross, He ‘spoiled’ principalities and powers, He disarmed the powers and authorities – and made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross, v15! Christ triumphed over all the powers of Satan and all the powers of evil that are against us and attack us! When Christ died on the cross, He did not only forgive our sin, but He broke the power the devil had against us. The NIV translation sums up this triumph in a military sense: Christ on the cross, disarmed the powers and authorities! He disarmed the devil! That’s what the Ukrainians are trying to do with the Russians – to smash all their arms and ammunition depots, all their weapons and tanks and armaments and to disarm the enemy! And when they’re disarmed, they can’t fight! Christ has done for us what the Ukrainians are doing – disarming the enemy!

“As you have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him.” Walk in Him! To fulfil our Christian experience and calling, it’s not just a matter of the moment we receive Christ, which is the beginning of our salvation, but it’s the ‘going on’! Walking in fellowship with Christ. This is a daily walk! Not something that happens when you go to church on a Sunday, a prayer meeting or a Bible study. This is a daily experience of fellowship with Christ. I can see the depth of what Paul is saying here, that although he’s not present in the flesh with the believers in Laodicea and others whom he has never met personally, yet the link in the Holy Spirit, in the fellowship of love, makes him one with them! Just as, in our relationship with Christ – whom we have never seen in the flesh – it is our love and our unity in love in Him and with one another, that enables us to receive Christ’s blessings.

The treasures of God are hidden in Christ. ONLY when we understand the person of Christ, can we begin to fully understand what the blessings of God are. The blessings of God come to us not from the Father alone, but through Christ. This is the importance of Jesus Christ to us! Yes, the Scripture tells us to ask God the Father for our needs, but Jesus said this: Whatsoever you ask God the Father IN MY NAME, I – Jesus – will do it. John 14:13,14. It is He who has the ability, the right to mediate and pass on the blessings of God to us. Although God is our Father, we still come in the Name of His Son in order to receive the blessing.

'Christ in you, the hope of glory!' Writing to the Colossians, Paul is saying that Christ living in us is the living demonstration and proof of what is to come! CHRIST IN US! We have, within our new born-again bodies, the living evidence of ALL the Power, ALL the Glory of the Gospel – it is INCREDIBLE what God has done! Paul concludes here, v28ff, “This is what we preach, warning every man, teaching every man – that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus.” When we get into the Kingdom of God at the time of Christ’s Second Coming, He will present us before the Father – and He will say, “Father, this is the evidence of My Work”!!! Do you realise?!! On the day of our bodily Resurrection, we come before the Father; Jesus will be there, and He’ll say, “Father, this man, this woman, this person – the life that they lived, who and what they are – is the evidence of My Work!!!” We are the living demonstration of Christ’s Work in us. 

We started this year at full speed. I left for Ukraine on Tuesday January 3rd. The only way is to fly to Poland, then go by car across the Polish and Ukrainian borders, then into Lviv. The first day was spent being shown how, for hundreds of years, Ukraine has had an independent identity from Russia, and has every reason to fight to be free from Russian intervention and control. In this New Year we are expecting to do more than in previous years – which means we need your support more than ever! To fulfil all that God has put in my heart this year, we will need your prayer support – and almost double our financial income.

Christ is the Head, the Beginning, the Firstborn from the dead – yes, the First One to rise from the dead. And in Him, we are also born again and rise from the dead. But Christ is the first, that in ALL things He might have the pre-eminence. He’s the FIRST! The Elder Brother of us all. And in Colossians 1v19, Paul says, it pleased the Father that in Him all fullness should dwell. It pleases the Father that His Son should have the pre-eminence in the Church. 

We are made in the image of God. In Genesis 1:26 God said, “Let Us make man in Our Own Image.” Of whom Christ is the firstborn. Colossians 1:16 says, “For by Him ALL things were created that are in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible…” ALL things were created by Him and FOR HIM! Everything in our vast universe – and I am aware of the new Webb telescope that is looking back years, billions of years, searching in fact for the beginning of time! But yet God, who created, is in an even more important and powerful position than that telescope! Because God can see past and present and future. He can still see the beginning of time, which He created, and beyond us, He can see the end of time! EVERYTHING was created by God, absolutely EVERYTHING.

“That you might increase in the knowledge of God, strengthened with all might according to His glorious Power, with all patience, longsuffering – (but not being miserable) – but with joyfulness, giving thanks to God who has made us partakers of the inheritance of the saints!” (Colossians 1:10-11.)   Christian, you may think of yourself sometimes as poor, but you are not. You have the richest inheritance of anybody, because you inherit everything God has given Jesus. An inheritance only comes when someone dies: Jesus died, not only to pay the price of our sin, but that we might have an inheritance – here and now – in the blessings of God. All the blessing Jesus had in His life and ministry on earth through His Father – passes to us.

I want you to have confidence in your own future. Confidence that God has got your future mapped out for you. This year I will be 91. I know that, just as my past was planned by God, so is my future - and yours! Put your trust in God! In Philippians 3:13, Paul says, forget those things which are behind, and press forward towards the mark of the prize of the high calling of God which is in Christ Jesus. This is my word to you for 2023. Forget the problems of the past, forget the glories. Forget the joys, the pain, and let’s press forward into the future with confidence in God.

Don’t let fear destroy or disturb your life. The Scripture teaches, 'Don’t cast away your confidence'. Confidence is trust. Confidence is the knowledge that God will do what He said. I want you to move into this new year with confidence that God is in control. I’m confident that this will be the best year of my life: seeing the biggest miracles, the biggest steps forward in evangelism – I am confident! Because I trust the Scripture! Hebrews 10:38-39 says, ‘The just shall live by faith, but if any man draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in Him.’ – Don’t draw back from your faith! – ‘But we are not of them that draw back into perdition, but of them that believe to the saving of the soul!’ It is our faith that carries us through to that final redemption!

I want us to have a confidence and a hope for this new year. I want to share this word with you from Hebrews 10:35, “Cast not away your confidence which has great recompense of reward.” In 2023 we are entering an unknown. I often quote at the start of a new year the Christmas message spoken by King George VI to the nation at the beginning of the last war. At the suggestion of the then Princess Elizabeth, he quoted Minnie Louise Haskins, ‘I said to the man who stood at the gate of the year: “Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown.” And he replied: “Go out into the darkness and put your hand into the Hand of God. That shall be to you better than a light, and safer than a known way.”’ If the King could say that, facing the darkest days of the War, I want to say to you, if we want a light to walk safely into this new year, put you hand into the Hand of God, because that will be better than any light and safer than any known way!

We are all so familiar with the Christmas prophecy, Isaiah 9:6, ‘Unto us a child is born, unto us a Son is given...’ But Solomon in 2 Chronicles 6:18, at the dedication of the new temple asks, ‘But will God in very deed dwell with men on the earth? Behold, heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain You…!’ Yet Jesus did come, Emmanuel, ‘God with us’ and now today even more so because Christ dwells not just with us but in us after we are ‘born again’. Our bodies should be the Temple of the Holy Spirit today!

Our hope is in heaven - not here! I want to say to Christians in Ukraine, in China, or wherever you may be, under persecution or in lack, our hope is not here - out hope is in heaven! Paul is showing the Colossians so clearly in verses 5-10, “This HOPE, preached in the Gospel of truth – despite the trouble and persecution – brings forth fruit in all the world, and in you, since the day you heard it and knew the Grace of God in truth.” The Gospel preached to the first generation Church was preached to a Church which would suffer persecution and death – and here Paul continues to the Colossians, verses 7-10, “You learned this Gospel from Epaphras, our dear fellow servant, a faithful minister of Christ – and he has told me of your love in the Spirit and, from the day we heard of this, we have not ceased to pray for you, and desire that you be filled with the knowledge of God’s Will in wisdom and spiritual understanding, that you might walk worthy of the Lord, pleasing Him, being fruitful in good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God.” Paul is saying, whatever the circumstances, however hard, walk worthy of the Lord in order to please, not yourself, not the pastor, but that you might please the Lord, and that you might be fruitful in what you do! 

'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.' For the Apostle Paul, the most important thing, our highest hope, is heaven. Whatever persecution, hardship, or difficulty you may face in this life, the greatest encouragement is the hope laid up for you in heaven! Today we are again facing increasing persecution. It has been said, that in many parts of the world, Christians are the most persecuted group, but we have to face the fact that persecution can simply be a part of our faith. I want to remind you that, whatever we are going through today, our hope is not down here, OUR HOPE IS IN HEAVEN. 

“My God will supply all your need according to His glorious riches in Christ Jesus!” What a wonderful promise! My God will supply all your need! When you are committed to and support the Gospel – then stand on this promise – that when you give to the extension of the Kingdom, God will supply all your need. Wow! Paul calls this a matter of ‘giving AND receiving’, v15. When you give, stand by faith, God will take the responsibility to supply ALL your need. 

“Rejoice in the Lord always, rejoice! Let your moderation be known to all men – the Lord is coming! Be careful, anxious, for nothing! But in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God.” There is something very deep here; in the Spirit I sense is that we, as labourers in the Gospel should not be overly concerned about material issues. Instead, in everything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, we should let our requests be made known to God. After all, it is God who supplies, and we should not look to men first, but trust God. When we do, v7 is fulfilled in our lives, “The peace of God which passes all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.” You know, when we trust God, it’s an implicit trust in Him and it brings peace! 

As I was preparing my Christmas TV broadcast, I saw something different! We are all so familiar with the Christmas prophecy, Isaiah 9:6, ‘Unto us a child is born, unto us a Son is given...’ But Solomon in 2 Chron. 6:18, at the dedication of the new temple asks, ‘But will God in very deed dwell with men on the earth? Behold, heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain You…!’ Yet Jesus did come, Emmanuel, ‘God with us’ and now today even more so because Christ dwells not just with us but in us after we are ‘born again’. Our bodies should be the Temple of the Holy Spirit today!

“Therefore,” the Apostle Paul says in Philippians 4:1, “my brethren whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, STAND FAST in the Lord!” This question of ‘standing fast’ is a reminder that despite our weaknesses, we must remain true to our faith. I’ve been working in the former Soviet Union for more than 60 years, 30 under communism and 30 since the freedom. I found that, in those days under communism, under persecution, the Underground Church remained ‘purer’ than the Church in the West, because they ‘HELD FAST’ to what they had – just as Christ said to the overcoming Church in Revelation 2:25, “HOLD FAST to what you have till I come.” 

Our hope is built on the Resurrection. We need to forget the past, our new life is in Christ. Our hope is built on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness. The Apostle Paul writing to the Philippians said, "I want to know Christ. Yes, to know the power of His resurrection and participation in His sufferings, becoming like Him in His death, and so, somehow attaining to the resurrection from the dead. Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that, for which, Christ Jesus took hold of me."  

'For it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfil His good purpose. Do everything without grumbling or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, ‘children of God without fault in a warped and crooked generation.’ Then you will shine among them like stars in the sky as you hold firmly to the word of life.' Paul is saying, we have to keep ourselves blameless and harmless in the midst of the perversity and sin of the world. “Shine as lights in the world, holding forth the Word of Life, so that I may rejoice in the Day of Christ, that I have not run in vain, nor laboured in vain – though I be offered on the sacrifice of service for your faith.” Paul gave his life to preach the Gospel. Come on! The message we preach is the Word of Life! Life in Christ!