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
Colossians 1:3-4
We all have habits. Some good. Some not so good. Some habits are made because we put out mind to it. We want to do something well. We want to achieve a goal. We want to be able to play an instrument. Paint a picture. Drive a car.
And then there are those habits that just sort of happen. Like turning off the car key after you’ve parked. It’s just instinctive. You just do it because that’s what you’ve always seen people do. And once you started to drive, you started turning the engine off with the key just before getting out of the car.
I’ve been turning my car key off for a whole lot of years. More than 50 to be precise. That’s a whole lot of turning the key off. In summer, winter, spring, and fall. Whether it was snowing, raining, or even in the blazing hot desert, I always turned the car key off.
All of that stopped when I bought a Tesla. As odd as it is to think about, you don’t turn and remove the key with a Tesla. You never shut this car off. Why? Well, there are two reasons.
First – Because you never turn this car on. It’s always on. I know it seems wrong that an electric car should be on all the time. You’d assumed that you’d need to turn it off to save electricity. But that’s not the way it’s made. It’s designed to stay on all the time. Even when you go on a trip and leave it at the airport, the car stays on. And because you don’t turn it on, there’s no way to turn it off.
Second – Because this car doesn’t have a key. There’s no key slot in the doors, frunk, or trunk. It doesn’t even have one of those fobs where you press a button to lock and unlock the doors. While it does have a credit card looking thing that you can wave at the car, I don’t even do that anymore. All I have to do is walk up to the car with my phone and it unlocks automatically. And when I walk away, it locks itself.
I’ve owned this car for a number of years now. I’ve made countless trips and driven thousands of miles. And yet, I still reach for the key to turn the car off. In my head I “know” that there’s no reason to turn it off. But that doesn’t stop me from reaching for something that’s not there. The habit built over the years keeps me reaching for it.
It’s this kind of faith habit that Paul’s happy about in the Colossians. They started believing in Jesus a while ago. But now, they’ve actively believed in Jesus for so long that their faith has moved from a new thing that they’re not familiar with to something that they do all the time.
Jesus isn’t some new idea that’s like a lot of other new ideas floating in and out of their world. He’s moved in to stay. It’s like Jesus sat down and made his house inside them. He’s come to stay.
With the Colossians their faith started out small, but it didn’t stay small. They didn’t just sit there and let their newfound faith in Jesus just sit there like a bump on a log. Oh no. They grabbed ahold of Jesus with both hands and made him their Lord.
But what does Lord mean? We don’t use the word Lord very often. Let me first tell you what it isn’t. Being Lord is not being your boss. Your manager. The Chief of Police. The President. Prime Minister. Or any other title for the person who’s at the top of the organization. Lord means that he’s the one and only. Period. He’s got all the power and authority to make any and all decisions for our life. There’s only one.
For even if there are so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth (as indeed there are many “gods” and many “lords”), yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live.
1 Corinthians 8:5,6
If there’s multiple lords, then there are none. There’s only one or none. But he’s not some angry king that wants to bust our chops. He’s not annoyed at us, always looking for a way to trip us up and make us fall. No, he’s a loving Heavenly Father that wants nothing but the best for us. He’s the Lord who will die in our place
The Lord Jesus is someone with all the power and might but was willing to die for us on the cross. He was ready to give up all the privileges of being God and came in humility as a man. Fully God and fully man. As people, we really don’t like the idea of someone else being Lord. We want to be in charge. We want to make all the decisions. We want to pull all the string. We want all the power.
So, the question is, has belief in Jesus come inside you to the point that he has your permission to go anywhere in your life? In your closet. Under your bed. In your refrigerator? Can he rummage all around your life or are there certain places he can’t go? Having Jesus as Lord isn’t just a good thing. It’s the best thing.
Noodling Questions
How do you teach yourself new habits?
What areas of life is it easier to push Jesus out of? What areas are harder?
Why do we want to push back from the idea of someone being our Lord?