Col 1 & 2 oops posted Eph 1 rather than Col 1 yesterday!

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Scripture selections are taken from the Rock Church Daily Bread Reading schedule for each month. “Lena’s Journalin’” are Lena’s comments on the specific passages from her Daily Journal.

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Apology: Yesterday I posted an incorrect DB reference. So I’ll post yesterday and today together. Col 1 & 2 52 verses….
Colossians 1:1-29
Greetings from Paul
1This letter is from Paul, chosen by God to be an apostle of Christ Jesus, and from our brother Timothy.
2It is written to God's holy people in the city of Colosse, who are faithful brothers and sisters F1 in Christ. May God our Father give you grace and peace.
Paul's Thanksgiving and Prayer
3We always pray for you, and we give thanks to God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, 4for we have heard that you trust in Christ Jesus and that you love all of God's people. 5You do this because you are looking forward to the joys of heaven—as you have been ever since you first heard the truth of the Good News. 6This same Good News that came to you is going out all over the world. It is changing lives everywhere, just as it changed yours that very first day you heard and understood the truth about God's great kindness to sinners.
7Epaphras, our much loved co-worker, was the one who brought you the Good News. He is Christ's faithful servant, and he is helping us in your place. F2 8He is the one who told us about the great love for others that the Holy Spirit has given you.
9So we have continued praying for you ever since we first heard about you.
We ask God to give you a complete understanding of what he wants to do in your lives,
and we ask him to make you wise with spiritual wisdom.
10Then the way you live will always honor and please the Lord,
and you will continually do good, kind things for others.
All the while, you will learn to know God better and better.
11We also pray that you will be strengthened with his glorious power
so that you will have all the patience and endurance you need.
May you be filled with joy,
12always thanking the Father, who has enabled you to share the inheritance that belongs to God's holy people, who live in the light.
13For he has rescued us from the one who rules in the kingdom of darkness, and he has brought us into the Kingdom of his dear Son.
14God has purchased our freedom with his blood F3 and has forgiven all our sins.
Christ Is Supreme
15Christ is the visible image of the invisible God. He existed before God made anything at all and is supreme over all creation. F4 16Christ is the one through whom God created everything in heaven and earth. He made the things we can see and the things we can't see—kings, kingdoms, rulers, and authorities. Everything has been created through him and for him. 17He existed before everything else began, and he holds all creation together.
18Christ is the head of the church, which is his body. He is the first of all who will rise from the dead, F5 so he is first in everything. 19For God in all his fullness was pleased to live in Christ, 20and by him God reconciled everything to himself. He made peace with everything in heaven and on earth by means of his blood on the cross.
21This includes you who were once so far away from God.
You were his enemies,
separated from him by your evil thoughts and actions,
22yet now he has brought you back as his friends.
He has done this through his death on the cross in his own human body.
As a result, he has brought you into the very presence of God, and you are holy and blameless as you stand before him without a single fault.
23But you must continue to believe this truth and stand in it firmly. Don't drift away from the assurance you received when you heard the Good News. The Good News has been preached all over the world, and I, Paul, have been appointed by God to proclaim it.
Paul's Work for the Church
24I am glad when I suffer for you in my body, for I am completing what remains of Christ's sufferings for his body, the church. 25God has given me the responsibility of serving his church by proclaiming his message in all its fullness to you Gentiles. 26This message was kept secret for centuries and generations past, but now it has been revealed to his own holy people. 27For it has pleased God to tell his people that the riches and glory of Christ are for you Gentiles, too. For this is the secret: Christ lives in you, and this is your assurance that you will share in his glory.
28So everywhere we go, we tell everyone about Christ. We warn them and teach them with all the wisdom God has given us, for we want to present them to God, perfect F6 in their relationship to Christ. 29I work very hard at this, as I depend on Christ's mighty power that works within me.
FOOTNOTES:F1: Greek faithful brothers. F2: Greek he is ministering on your behalf; other manuscripts read he is ministering on our behalf. F3: Some manuscripts do not include with his blood. F4: Greek He is the firstborn of all creation. F5: Greek He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead. F6: Or mature.

Copyright Statement: Holy Bible, The New Living Translation

Colossians 2:1-23
1I want you to know how much I have agonized for you and for the church at Laodicea, and for many other friends who have never known me personally. 2My goal is that they will be encouraged and knit together by strong ties of love. I want them to have full confidence because they have complete understanding of God's secret plan, which is Christ himself. 3In him lie hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.
4I am telling you this so that no one will be able to deceive you with persuasive arguments. 5For though I am far away from you, my heart is with you. And I am very happy because you are living as you should and because of your strong faith in Christ.
Freedom from Rules and New Life in Christ
6And now, just as you accepted Christ Jesus as your Lord, you must continue to live in obedience to him. 7Let your roots grow down into him and draw up nourishment from him, so you will grow in faith, strong and vigorous in the truth you were taught. Let your lives overflow with thanksgiving for all he has done.
8Don't let anyone lead you astray with empty philosophy and high-sounding nonsense that come from human thinking and from the evil powers of this world, F7 and not from Christ. 9For in Christ the fullness of God lives in a human body, F8 10and you are complete through your union with Christ. He is the Lord over every ruler and authority in the universe.
11When you came to Christ, you were "circumcised," but not by a physical procedure. It was a spiritual procedure—the cutting away of your sinful nature. 12For you were buried with Christ when you were baptized. And with him you were raised to a new life because you trusted the mighty power of God, who raised Christ from the dead.
13You were dead because of your sins and because your sinful nature was not yet cut away. Then God made you alive with Christ. He forgave all our sins. 14He canceled the record that contained the charges against us. He took it and destroyed it by nailing it to Christ's cross. 15In this way, God disarmed the evil rulers and authorities. He shamed them publicly by his victory over them on the cross of Christ.
16So don't let anyone condemn you for what you eat or drink, or for not celebrating certain holy days or new-moon ceremonies or Sabbaths. 17For these rules were only shadows of the real thing, Christ himself. 18Don't let anyone condemn you by insisting on self-denial. And don't let anyone say you must worship angels, even though they say they have had visions about this. These people claim to be so humble, but their sinful minds have made them proud. 19But they are not connected to Christ, the head of the body. For we are joined together in his body by his strong sinews, and we grow only as we get our nourishment and strength from God.
20You have died with Christ, and he has set you free from the evil powers of this world. So why do you keep on following rules of the world, such as, 21"Don't handle, don't eat, don't touch." 22Such rules are mere human teaching about things that are gone as soon as we use them. 23These rules may seem wise because they require strong devotion, humility, and severe bodily discipline. But they have no effect when it comes to conquering a person's evil thoughts and desires.
FOOTNOTES:F7: Or from the basic principles of this world; also in 2:20. F8: Greek in him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily.

Copyright Statement: Holy Bible, The New Living Translation


~ Lena’s Journalin’~
It seems that the thoughts and intents of the heart are more important than outward actions, and that outward actions reflect the thoughts and intents of the heart. I’m not speaking of a “put on” or a mask I’m speaking of day in day out living. Attitudes, responses or reactions, thoughts we meditate on, words we allow to come out of our mouths, like complaints or thanksgiving.
God wants to bring the first and most important changes to the inward man. He wants to go deep inside of us and change us into His image inwardly first with the fruits of the new life being the outward vision of loveliness. Only through a life deeply rooted and dedicated to Christ and to the word can one be changed so deeply, so inwardly.
New Day, New Life, new me, new you – In Christ!


Daily Meditation/Recital/Question
Isaiah 58:12 (New Living Translation)
12 Your children will rebuild the deserted ruins of your cities. Then you will be known as the people who rebuild their walls and cities.