The Cosmic Christ Text: Colossians 1:15-23
Introduction: The Center of All Things
We live in an age of disintegration. Men are frantically trying to make sense of the world, but they are like someone trying to assemble a thousand-piece puzzle without the picture on the box lid. They have all the pieces, history, science, art, morality, but they have no integrating principle. The result is chaos, fragmentation, and ultimately, meaninglessness. Everything flies apart. Our modern world is a testament to this folly; it is a world that has rejected its center, and as a result, the center cannot hold. Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.
The Apostle Paul, writing to the church at Colossae, confronts a similar problem. The Colossian believers were being tempted by a syncretistic heresy, a philosophical and religious goulash that tried to mix in a little bit of Jesus with a lot of pagan speculation, angel worship, and ascetic regulations. This teaching diminished Christ, making Him one important spiritual being among many. It was an attempt to fit Jesus into their system, rather than recognizing that He is the system. He is the box lid. He is the coherence of all reality.
In response, Paul does not simply correct a few minor doctrinal errors. He unleashes one of the most majestic, Christ-drenched passages in all of Scripture. This is not a polite theological treatise; it is a thunderclap. Paul takes all the pieces of the puzzle, the entire cosmos, visible and invisible, from the highest angel to the smallest atom, and he shows us how they all fit together in one man: the Lord Jesus Christ. This passage is the great Christological hymn of the New Testament. It is the Christian theory of everything. If you want to understand the world, if you want to understand your own life, if you want to understand salvation, you must begin here. You must see that Christ is not a part of the story. He is the point of the story.
The Text
Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For in Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities, all things have been created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together. And He is the head of the body, the church; Who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that He Himself will come to have first place in everything. For in Him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through Him to reconcile all things to Himself, having made peace through the blood of His cross, through Him, whether things on earth or things in heaven. And although you were formerly alienated and enemies in mind and in evil deeds, but now He reconciled you in the body of His flesh through death, in order to present you before Him holy and blameless and beyond reproach, if indeed you continue in the faith firmly grounded and steadfast, and not moved away from the hope of the gospel, which you have heard, which was proclaimed in all creation under heaven, and of which I, Paul, was made a minister.
(Colossians 1:15-23 LSB)
Christ the Creator (vv. 15-17)
Paul begins this magnificent section by defining who the Son is in relation to God the Father and to the created order.
"Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation." (Colossians 1:15)
First, He is the image of the invisible God. God the Father is pure spirit; He is invisible, dwelling in unapproachable light. No man has seen God at any time. So how do we know this invisible God? We look at Jesus. Jesus is the perfect representation, the exact likeness, the visible manifestation of the invisible God. He is not a blurry photograph; He is the Father's portrait. As Jesus Himself told Philip, "Whoever has seen me has seen the Father" (John 14:9). This is a direct assertion of His deity. No mere creature could ever be the image of the invisible God.
Second, He is the "firstborn of all creation." This phrase has been a battleground for centuries. Arians, and their modern-day descendants like the Jehovah's Witnesses, pounce on this verse to argue that Jesus was the first and greatest created being. But this is to completely misunderstand the term and to ignore the immediate context. The word for firstborn, prototokos, does not primarily mean first in time, but first in rank, the preeminent one, the heir. In the Old Testament, the firstborn son was the principal heir who received the double portion and held the place of authority in the family (see Psalm 89:27, where David, the youngest son, is called "firstborn"). Paul is not saying Jesus is the first creature off the assembly line. He is saying Jesus is the Lord and inheritor of all creation. The very next verse proves this beyond all doubt.
"For in Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities, all things have been created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together." (Colossians 1:16-17)
Notice the "For." Verse 16 explains verse 15. Why is He the firstborn, the heir of creation? Because He is the Creator. Paul leaves no wiggle room. "All things" were created in Him, through Him, and for Him. He is the agent of creation ("through Him"), the location of creation ("in Him"), and the goal of creation ("for Him"). If something exists, it was made by Christ and for Christ. This includes everything you can see, the mountains and the oceans, and everything you can't, the angelic beings described as thrones, dominions, rulers, and authorities. Christ is not a creature; He is the uncreated Creator of every single thing that is not God. As John tells us, "without him was not any thing made that was made" (John 1:3).
Then Paul adds in verse 17 that He is "before all things," meaning He is pre-existent and eternal. And not only did He create everything, but "in Him all things hold together." The word here is sunesteken, from which we get our word "sustain." Christ is the cosmic glue. He is the principle of coherence that keeps the universe from flying apart into chaos. Every law of physics, every orbit of every planet, every beat of your heart is sustained by the continuous, active power of the Lord Jesus Christ. Apart from Christ, nothing makes sense, nothing coheres, nothing hangs together. He is the reason there is a universe and not a multiverse, a cosmos and not a chaos.
Christ the Redeemer (vv. 18-20)
Having established Christ's supremacy over the first creation, Paul now turns to His supremacy over the new creation, the church.
"And He is the head of the body, the church; Who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that He Himself will come to have first place in everything." (Colossians 1:18)
Just as He is the sovereign over the cosmos, He is the head, the source of life and authority, for His body, the church. The church is not a social club or a human institution; it is a living organism, and Christ is its head. All of our life, our direction, and our purpose flows from Him.
Paul then uses two more crucial titles. He is the "beginning," the arche. This means more than just the start of a timeline. It means He is the origin, the source, the ruling principle of the new creation. And He is the "firstborn from the dead." Here again, firstborn means preeminent. He is the pioneer of the resurrection. His resurrection was not just a resuscitation; it was the beginning of the new creation breaking into the old. He is the first to rise from the dead, never to die again, and He has blazed a trail that all who are in Him will follow. The purpose of all this, His supremacy in creation and His headship in redemption, is so that "in everything He might be preeminent." There is no area of life, no sphere of existence, where Christ does not claim absolute lordship.
"For in Him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through Him to reconcile all things to Himself, having made peace through the blood of His cross, through Him, whether things on earth or things in heaven." (Colossians 1:19-20)
Why is He preeminent? Because it pleased the Father that in Him "all the fullness of God" should dwell. This is another sledgehammer blow to any attempt to diminish Christ. Not a portion of God, not an emanation from God, but the totality of the divine essence dwells bodily in Jesus Christ. He is not one-third of God; He is fully God.
And the purpose of this incarnate fullness was reconciliation. Sin had ruptured the cosmos. It alienated man from God, man from man, and man from creation. The universe was at war with its creator. The cross was God's D-Day invasion to end that war. Through the "blood of His cross," God made peace. He acted to "reconcile all things to Himself." This is a cosmic reconciliation. It is not just about saving individual souls, though it certainly includes that. It is about restoring the entire created order, things on earth and things in heaven, to their proper relationship with their Creator. The death of Christ on the cross was an event of cosmic significance, the effects of which reverberate through the heavens and the earth.
The Personal Application (vv. 21-23)
Paul now takes this glorious, cosmic truth and brings it right down to the personal experience of the Colossian believers.
"And although you were formerly alienated and enemies in mind and in evil deeds, but now He reconciled you in the body of His flesh through death, in order to present you before Him holy and blameless and beyond reproach" (Colossians 1:21-22)
This is where the rubber meets the road. Before Christ, "you," he says, were not just mistaken or misguided. You were "alienated" and "enemies." This was not a passive state; you were enemies in your mind, actively hostile to God, and this hostility was demonstrated by your wicked works. Your rebellion was not just an unfortunate slip-up; it was your nature.
But God did not leave you there. He took the initiative. "Now He reconciled you." How? "In the body of His flesh through death." The cosmic reconciliation of verse 20 is applied to you personally through the historical, physical death of Jesus. God became a man so that He could die as a man to reconcile men to God. And what is the goal of this reconciliation? It is "to present you before Him holy and blameless and beyond reproach." The goal is not just forgiveness; it is transformation. He saves you from your sin in order to present you, on the last day, as a perfect and spotless bride before the Father.
But this glorious reality comes with a condition, a responsibility.
"if indeed you continue in the faith firmly grounded and steadfast, and not moved away from the hope of the gospel, which you have heard..." (Colossians 1:23)
This is not a statement of doubt, but a call to perseverance. True faith is a faith that continues. It is not a one-time decision but an ongoing reality. We are to be "firmly grounded and steadfast." The picture is of a building with a solid foundation, able to withstand the storms of false teaching and the pressures of the world. The false teachers at Colossae were trying to move them away from the simple, powerful hope of the gospel, the gospel that Paul preached. This is the great danger for every generation of Christians: to be lured away from the all-sufficiency of Christ by something that seems more spiritual, more intellectual, or more exciting. But there is nothing more. Christ is all.
Paul concludes by reminding them of the scope of this gospel. It was "proclaimed in all creation under heaven," and he, Paul, was its minister. This is not some local cult or tribal religion. The gospel of the cosmic Christ is for the entire cosmos. It is the only true story, and it is our glorious task to live in it and to proclaim it until He who is the beginning becomes the end, and He is finally and forever all in all.