“Dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh” (Col. 2:13) is not the most pleasant way to describe someone’s past. This, however, is precisely the diagnosis that Paul gave the believers in Colossae. The Colossians had been sinners against God, deserving His just punishment; and they—like the Ephesians—had been “strangers to the covenants of promise” (Eph. 2:12) in which the Jewish people found hope. In other words, the Colossians needed forgiveness but had no obvious expectation of receiving it. They were as good as dead and in need of a radical intervention.
And yet “you,” Paul adds, “God made alive” (Col. 2:13). The intervention came—not from human beings but from God Himself, who stepped in to correct the problem. The Colossians were not saved by finding religion. They weren’t saved by a new philosophy. They were not saved even by good works. God saved them, forgiving their sins and bringing them to life spiritually.
How did God do this? As Paul goes on, he explains what God has done in three pictures.
The Slate Wiped Clean
Paul begins with the picture of a slate wiped clean, a canceled record of debt—in the words of the King James Bible, “blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us”:
You, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. (Col. 2:13–14)
In Paul’s day, people wrote on papyrus or vellum, and the ink they used was not permanent. It could be wiped away. It was possible to take a sponge and wipe a record clean.
God has a law that is expressed in His Word and reflected on the human conscience—even on the consciences of those who never heard the law (Rom. 2:14–16). Every human, except for Christ, has disobeyed the law and accrued a vast debt of guilt. A day is coming when God will settle the accounts.
But, Paul says to the Colossians, our debt of sin is like an IOU that God takes and tears up. Christ has paid the debt, settled the account, and disposed of the record. And this is what happens for all who believe in Christ and put themselves in His hands. We have no power to clear the debt ourselves, but He will do it for those who come to Him in faith.
The Record Nailed to the Cross
Paul’s second picture recalls the notice that was nailed to the cross when Jesus died, declaring that the reason for His execution was that He was “The King of the Jews”: “This he set aside, nailing it to the cross” (Col. 2:14). In God’s providence, that placard proclaimed that He was dying in the place of the people and for them—and not for Jewish sinners only but for all sinners (Eph. 2:14–16).
Our debt of sin is like an IOU that God takes and tears up.
As Paul says elsewhere, “For our sake God made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Cor. 5:21). The believer’s debt is eradicated because on the cross, Jesus Christ paid the debt. He suffered the punishment for our sins, and He allowed us to have all the credit of His own righteousness.
The hymn writer put this eloquently in “It Is Well with My Soul”:
My sin—oh the bliss of this glorious thought!—
My sin, not in part but the whole,
Is nailed to the cross, and I bear it no more.1
The cross, far from being a place of despair and defeat, has become a place of joy and triumph for those who believe. It is there that Jesus took sin on His own shoulders and made it possible for us to receive life and forgiveness through faith.
The Triumph over the Enemy
Finally, Paul offers the picture of victory: “He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in him” (Col. 2:15).
Jesus triumphed in the cross. He dealt with the forces of evil arrayed against Him and against God’s people. Satan is an accuser who wants men and women to die in their sins. At the cross, however, he has been struck down. He is not yet annihilated, but he is certainly and irrevocably defeated and humiliated.
The cross, far from being a place of despair and defeat, has become a place of joy and triumph for those who believe.
A Roman triumph was a parade in honor of a victorious general. The general would lead a procession displaying the trophies of his victory, not least of all his vanquished foes, stripped and chained. The people would look on and say, “There’s nothing to fear from those soldiers anymore—not after what our general has done to them.”
That is the picture Paul employs. Christ has won the victory; the forces of evil have been, are being, and will be put to shame. Therefore, the Christian can say,
When Satan tempts me to despair
And tells me of the guilt within,
Upward I look and see Him there
Who made an end of all my sin.2
When we place our faith in Christ, the devil may still lash out at the conscience and accuse us, making us doubt our standing with God. We can say, “My Lord Jesus has wiped the record clean. You cannot accuse me. Christ has paid my debt, He has born my sin, and He has defeated you.” Because for the believer, sins are forgiven, the slate is wiped clean, that old stack of debt has been nailed to the cross, and the enemy has been disarmed.
This is good news! And it is good news for those who will come to Christ in faith, rejecting sin and putting their destiny in His hands. Anyone—male or female, young or old, Jew or gentile—may come to Him and say, “Dear God, thank You for sending Your Son to do for me what I could never do for myself. I admit that I am sinful. I believe that Jesus died in my place. I come with empty hands and a needy heart, and I ask You to transform my life and make me the person You intend for me to be.”
This article was adapted from the sermon “Triumphant Forgiveness” by Alistair Begg.
