i'd like us to imagine that we are the recipients of paul's letter to the colossians. this requires that we familiarize ourselves with the story of the church at colossae. so as an intro, i'm sitting at pitts skimming a couple commentaries which will hopefully help us connect to the people whom paul addressed.
colossae is located in modern day turkey, populated by phrygians first, then greeks, and finally jews after antiochus III settled two thousand jews there around 200 BCE. the people of the city then were familiar with diverse cultural and religious perspectives. the church itself (and the synagogues) reflected a free mixing of these influences-- phrygian nature worship, iranian astrology, mystery cults and hellenistic speculation.
fertile land surrounded the city, and wool became colossae's regarded export. the city benefited from being placed along a southern trade-route but was overshadowed by its two neighbors-- laodecia and hierapolis. colossae in comparison could only be a considered a town, but a town that likely shared in the wealth of the region. not much else is known of colossae, since an earthquake destroyed it in 61-62, and there has been no archaeological excavation of the ruins.
the church was probably founded by a gentile believer named epaphras. paul probably has never visited the church, nor any other church in the lycus valley (such as laodecia). the dearth of information regarding the city makes it difficult to reconstruct the conduct of church members beyond generalities of living in a pluralistic town under roman rule.
in the comments today, share any parallels you see between ACF and the colossian church. what do you imagine are some of the struggles the colossians faced as believers? how do you identify with their situation? how would you encourage or advise the church in colossae?
to help us enter the life of the colossians as much as we can, we're going to plod through colossians, somewhat slowly. i'd like to challenge each of us to memorize the passage for the week. that way, the words of paul will be on our minds throughout the week, and the lingering of scripture in our thoughts will allow the Holy Spirit to speak in different ways. so, today or tomorrow memorize colossians 1:1-14-- when you're watching TV, eating breakfast or lunch, whenever you have time. then next week we'll jump into that text and share our thoughts.
5 comments:
just a question, are we doing a passage of colossians each week/day/hour?
each hour? that'd be impressive.
no, we'll just do one passage a week.
it sounds like colossae was a mixed bag of different types of people. i also got the sense that they weren't the stereotypical church--they sounded a bit more "worldly." i feel like that fits with what acf is. there is a diverse range of faith and a lot of different religious backgrounds that people bring to the table. in short, i feel like i can't ever assume anything about anyone's faith who comes to acf.
in colossians 1:10-13, paul writes to the people encouraging them to grow and mature. i thought to myself, i wonder if paul is just putting it nicely the fact that they have a lot of room for improvement. nonetheless, i also see acf as having a lot of room for growth. growing in understanding, spiritual wisdom, growing in the knowledge of God, etc.
if the colossians really were wealthy, i'm curious if paul will address how christians should live with privilege. that's something all of us at emory (and anyone else getting a college education) needs to wrestle with.
i also think about how our asian-american heritage will help us identify with the mixed bag eunice mentions. we might be able to navigate this mixed identity of being a christian in the world, not of the world, just as we, by default, merge two cultures-- that of our immigrant parents and that of our peers.
re: col 1, i don't think i was super clear. next week, we'll talk about the passage. i was just encouraging everyone to really think about the passage beforehand so that our discussion on monday will have the richness of everyone's thoughts and participation.
i noticed in verses 9-10 that Paul is praying that the Colossians receive spiritual wisdom and understanding in order to walk in a manner pleasing to God. he emphasizes that we need to have an understanding of who God is and what he's doing for us in order to live the kingdom life. that part really stood out to me.
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