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Absent in Body, Present in Spirit

Verse1For I want you to know how much I am struggling for you and for those at Laodicea, and for all who have not met me face to face,

Verse2that they may be encouraged in heart, knit together in love, and filled with the full riches of complete understanding, so that they may know the mystery of God, namely Christ,

Verse3in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.

Verse4I say this so that no one will deceive you by smooth rhetoric.

Verse5For although I am absent from you in body, I am present with you in spirit, and I delight to see your orderly condition and firm faith in Christ.

Alive with Christ

Verse6Therefore, just as you have received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to walk in Him,

Verse7rooted and built up in Him, established in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness.

Verse8See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, which are based on human tradition and the spiritual forces of the world rather than on Christ.

Verse9For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity dwells in bodily form.

Verse10And you have been made complete in Christ, who is the head over every ruler and authority.

Verse11In Him you were also circumcised, in the putting off of your sinful nature, with the circumcision performed by Christ and not by human hands.

Verse12And having been buried with Him in baptism, you were raised with Him through your faith in the power of God, who raised Him from the dead.

Verse13When you were dead in your trespasses and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our trespasses,

Verse14having canceled the debt ascribed to us in the decrees that stood against us. He took it away, nailing it to the cross!

Verse15And having disarmed the powers and authorities, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.

Verse16Therefore let no one judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a feast, a New Moon, or a Sabbath.

Verse17These are a shadow of the things to come, but the body that casts it belongs to Christ.

Verse18Do not let anyone who delights in false humility and the worship of angels disqualify you with speculation about what he has seen. Such a person is puffed up without basis by his unspiritual mind.

Verse19He has lost connection to the head, from whom the whole body, supported and knit together by its joints and ligaments, grows as God causes it to grow.

Verse20If you have died with Christ to the spiritual forces of the world, why, as though you still belonged to the world, do you submit to its regulations:

Verse21“Do not handle, do not taste, do not touch!”?

Verse22These will all perish with use, because they are based on human commands and teachings.

Verse23Such restrictions indeed have an appearance of wisdom, with their self-prescribed worship, their false humility, and their harsh treatment of the body; but they are of no value against the indulgence of the flesh.