Every pastor has had this experience. It doesn't have to be the husband in a marriage, but let's just say that it's the husband. The man comes to the pastor's study clutching the report from the physician's office: high blood pressure, overweight, danger of heart disease. The physician has ordered the man to lose weight and to stop smoking. Sitting in the pastor's office, the man swears he is going to take better care of himself. He's said it before, but this time he really means it. He wants to be around for his wife and to watch his kids grow up. The pastor prays with him and wishes him luck. A few days, weeks, or months later, the wife comes in. She is beside herself, angry and hurt. Despite her best efforts, she can't get her husband to stop smoking, to exercise, or to cut back on the calories. "What else can I do?" she pleads.

Is the husband just a hypocrite? Was he full of hot air when he sat in the pastor's office promising he would take better care of himself? Perhaps that is too harsh a judgment. We often feel pulled in two directions. We can't always live up to our own expectations. We are weaker than we want to be. The husband in the pastor's office wants to live, but old habits die hard. It's hard to change. Even with the best of motivation and the best of intentions, our worst selves clutch onto us, refusing to let go.

We can get our heads around the notion of one person trying to quit a bad habit, trying to become a stronger, healthier person. The book of Colossians won't let us stop with just that, however. For the author of Colossians, our attempts to become better people have to fit into the big picture. Colossians is a big picture kind of book. College students sometimes joke about having been assigned a research topic on "You, the Universe, and Other Related Subjects." That's what Colossians tries to do. Our passage this day begins with the word, "so." In order to understand what comes after the "so," we have to look at what comes before the "so."

Before the "so," Colossians writes of the creation of the universe. We have read the creation stories in Genesis, of course. In the first story, God creates with just a word (Genesis 1:1-5). In the second, God brings water to thirsty ground (Genesis 2:5-6). The book of Proverbs adds the idea of God using Wisdom as an instrument to create the world. With Wisdom itself speaking in first person, Proverbs teaches, "The Lord created me at the beginning of his work, the first of his acts of long ago. Ages ago I was set up, at the first, before the beginning of the earth" (Proverbs 8:22-23). Colossians picks up on the idea and interprets Christ as the instrument of creation, "He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation; for in him all things in heaven and on earth were created..." (1:15-16).

Having established that Christ was the instrument of creation, Colossians goes on to say that Christ is also the means of reconciliation, "and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross" (1:20). We are reconciled to God; we are reconciled to each other. That is profound enough. The way Colossians sees it, everything in creation is reconciled to what it should be.

These are both profound ideas. If Christ is the instrument of creation, then the universe has meaning and purpose. It is inherently good, even if it seems that nothing makes sense. If God has reconciled everything in Christ, then all of the conflict we see around us and even within us will eventually pass away. God's good creation will live in harmony. Neither of these ideas is self-evident. Only the eyes of faith can see the inherent goodness of creation. Only Christian hope can affirm that all of the conflict of the world will be healed in God's time, in God's way.

God will achieve this reconciliation through the cross and resurrection. The cross and resurrection change the whole universe. All of the parts that were in conflict now come together. That's the universe part of what Colossians teaches. After that part, we come in. We participate in Jesus' death and resurrection through our baptism (2:12, 20). In baptism we die to the old self, and we are raised to a new self. I know all of this has sounded complicated, but it really is a nutshell version of what comes before the "so" that begins chapter 3. Christ is the instrument of creation; Christ's death and resurrection reconcile all things; we participate in Christ's reconciling work through our baptism, by which we die to the old self.

Before we go on to talk about what comes after the "so," we have to stop to say something that will sound funny. Some things are true, even though we have to make them true. Does that sound like I don't know what I'm talking about? When we talk about God's ways, when we talk about Christ, we have to admit that some things are true even though we have to make them true. Here's an example. We often affirm in the Christian faith that Christ's church is one. In God's eyes we are one. Nevertheless, we have to make it true that we are one with each other. We have to work together and worship together to make ourselves one, even though we affirm in the faith that we are one.

Here's how this idea of something being true even though we have to make it true works out in this passage. The passage says that we are dead to our old selves. Verse 3 of our passage says, "For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God." That's the part that's true. The part we have to make true is in verse 5, where it says, "Put to death, therefore, whatever in you is earthly." We have died to the old self, but we have to put it to death. Baptism enacts what is true in God's eyes: We have died to the old self. We have to make true what is true in God's eyes. We have to put to death whatever in us is earthly.

The passage has two lists of what to put to death. The first list, in verse 5, concerns our sexual urges. Sex is one of God's most precious gifts. Sex between a husband and wife should be tender and loving. Sex creates a bond, even down to the chemical level of our bodies. Sex sustains love. Throughout much of American society we have taken God's good gift of sex and distorted it, corrupted it. We have divorced sex from love, we have cheapened it. We have turned sex into recreation, simply another way to relieve boredom. In our distortion of sex, we have robbed even very young girls of their innocence. Our sexual drives are inherently good, part of God's good creation, but they must be treated with discipline. Sex without love leads to hurt and anger, not to the joy and fulfillment that sex is intended to provide. We in the church model for the world the joy of sex inside a relationship of true love. We model the building of a relationship with all of its complications. We model self-discipline and restraint. Self-discipline and restraint are not prudish or self-righteous, but the means by which we enable sex to become the blessing that it was intended to be.

The second list of things to put to death concerns our moods: anger, wrath, bad attitudes (v. 8). Anger can be a necessary part of life. We are angry at injustice, at exploitation, at mistreatment of others. Anger can also be a destructive force. Our anger often comes from the bad things that have happened to us. Anger can be hard to control. Bad tempers often defy our best attempts to tame them. Our anger breaks through the cages we try to put it in and takes over. We say or do things before we realize what has happened. Nevertheless, we must learn to control our tempers. Anger can ruin marriages and friendships. A parent's anger can leave a child with emotional scars for life. Our bad tempers often go back many years to some damage done to us a long time ago. Sometimes we need help understanding our tempers. Scheduling time with a counselor can be the greatest gift some people can give to their families.

Many of the things that can hurt us — our lust, anger, self-destructive ways — can be hard to overcome. That is why this passage talks the way it does. It tells us to put the old self to death. Using the language of murder gets our attention. Our old habits can be like the creature in a science fiction movie that refuses to die. That is why we should use every weapon in our arsenal to kill the parts of us that hold back our spiritual growth. Prayer, Bible study, counseling, willpower are all part of becoming the self God calls us to be.

When Colossians tells us to put to death the old self, it is not telling us we are worthless. It is telling us that we can become new selves, new people, better, happier, stronger, healthier people. We have to put away the old self so that the new self can grow. This passage tells us in verse 1 to seek the things that are above, but it doesn't tell us what those are until verse 12. Verse 12 draws on the other image that the passage uses. One part of the passage tells us to kill the old self. The other part of the passage tells us to strip off the old self, like taking off old, worn out clothes (v. 9). We put on the new clothes of compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience. Colossians goes on to tell us to show love and to let peace reign in our hearts (vv. 14-15). The reason to strip off the old clothes of lust and anger is to make room for things like compassion. That is the new self God can create us to be. We should not despair if we have been unable to build this kind of self, full of kindness and compassion. We may have to make small steps to become more loving and more peaceful, but God can get us there. God can work in us, making us into a self we never imagined.

God is reconciling all things in Christ. We are invited to come along. With good aim, we can kill the parts of ourselves that hurt us and others. We can grow a self full of compassion, love, and peace. Verse 4 of this passage has a curious comment. It says that in the resurrection when Christ is fully revealed we, too, will be revealed. Which self will it be? When Christ is revealed will our old self, angry and self-indulgent be revealed, or will it be the peaceful, loving self? Let us begin now to build the self we want to be revealed in the resurrection. Amen.