colossians-3:4,-colossians-3:7-nasb

Expository Notes of Dr. Thomas Constable - Colossians 3:4

"Sometimes we say of a man, ’Music is his life-Sport is his life-He lives for his work.’ Such a man finds life and all that life means in music, in sport, in work, as the case may be. For the Christian, Christ is his life. Jesus Christ dominates his thought and fills his life." [Note: Barclay, p. 179. Cf. Philippians 1:21.] "Whenever" indicates that a revelation of Christ in the future is certain, but its time is unknown. The Greek word phaneroo ("revealed") stresses the open display of Christ... read more

John Dummelow

John Dummelow's Commentary on the Bible - Colossians 3:1-25

The Christian’s Risen Life and the Duties it entails1-4. Resurrection with Christ and the heavenly life.Paraphrase] ’(1) Seeing then that at your conversion you shared not Christ’s death only, but His resurrection, go on to participate in His heavenly life, in that heaven where He is, and where He sits at God’s right hand. (2) Let your whole thought be set on heavenly, not on earthly things. (3) For you died with Christ, and your life in union with Him is a hidden life in God. (4) It is not... read more

Charles John Ellicott

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers - Colossians 3:1-4

III.(1-4) As the partaking of the death of Christ taught the negative lesson of death to the Law, so the partaking of His resurrection teaches the positive lesson of the spiritual life. We observe that this celebrated passage occupies a place at the close of the doctrinal portion of the Epistle, exactly corresponding to the even greater passage on the unity of the Church in God in the Epistle to the Ephesians (Ephesians 4:1-16). It is unlike that passage, because, summing up the main teaching... read more

Charles John Ellicott

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers - Colossians 3:4

(4) When Christ . . . shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory.—This describes the last stage of the spiritual life—the glorification with Christ in heaven, manifesting what now is hidden, and perfecting what exists only in germ. (Comp. 1 John 3:1-2, “Now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when He shall appear, we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is.”) This same conclusion ends the corresponding passage in... read more

William Nicoll

Expositor's Dictionary of Texts - Colossians 3:1-25

On the Heights Colossians 3:1 What are the things that are above? Does the Apostle mean the things that belong to the future life? Well, they do belong to the future life, and it is well for us to think of that life, and to think that we shall live in it, and that these things are the things that are current coin there. But he means the present life, for he exhorts us to seek these things, and to have them now, the things that abide, of which death cannot rob us, the things which belong to... read more

William Nicoll

Expositor's Bible Commentary - Colossians 3:1-4

Chapter 3 THE PRESENT CHRISTIAN LIFE A RISEN LIFE Colossians 3:1-4 (R.V.)We have now done with controversy. We hear no more about heretical teachers. The Apostle has cut his way through the tangled thickets of error, and has said his say as to the positive truths with which he would hew them down. For the remainder of the letter, we have principally plain practical exhortations, and a number of interesting personal details.The paragraph which we have now to consider is the transition from the... read more

Arno Clemens Gaebelein

Arno Gaebelein's Annotated Bible - Colossians 3:1-25

III. THE PRACTICAL RESULTS: LIVING AS RISEN WITH CHRIST (3-4) CHAPTER 3 1. The life hid with Christ in God (Colossians 3:1-4 ) 2. The contrast: The old man and the new man (Colossians 3:5-11 ) 3. Manifesting Christ (Colossians 3:12-17 ) 4. Relationships (Colossians 3:18-25 ; Colossians 4:1 ) Colossians 3:1-4 Risen with Christ; such is the believer’s position. “Ye are dead and your life is hid with Christ in God.” These are the great truths of Christianity: The believer dead with Christ;... read more

L.M. Grant

L. M. Grant's Commentary on the Bible - Colossians 3:1-25

CHANGING THE OLD FOR THE NEW (vs.1-11) We have seen some practical exhortations mingled with the doctrine of this epistle. Now this chapter begins what is mainly practical instruction based on the truth before declared. Just as before there are glimpses of practical lines mingled with the doctrine, so here, when practice is considered, there are also glimpses of the doctrine shining through. The believer has both died and risen with Christ. Here he is looked at, not as seated in the... read more

James Gray

James Gray's Concise Bible Commentary - Colossians 3:1-25

THE HORTATORY PART The Christian being “dead with Christ,” is dead “from the rudiments of the world”; in other words, worldly methods of obtaining “perfection” are something with which he has nothing to do. Why then should he act to the contrary, “after the commandments and doctrines of men” (Colossians 2:20 ; Colossians 2:22 )? Why should he ascribe salvation or any part of it, to things which “perish with the using”? Why should he come under a law which says “touch not, taste not,... read more

Joseph Parker

The People's Bible by Joseph Parker - Colossians 3:1-25

The Hidden Life Colossians 3:0 The Apostle is always practical. He was never so eloquent, in the noblest sense of that term, as in the Epistle to the Colossians, and the Epistle to the Ephesians. These two Epistles, which ought to be read one after the other, seem to show Paul in his amplest power, wisdom, and religious joy. He always had a short way back from the highest ecstasy to the most simple practical exhortation. He had wonderful command of voice: when he was so vehement that the whole... read more