Filling Your Spiritual Tank

                                       Colossians 1: 1-14

 

 

          I drove my last car for a long time, thirteen years. I drove it so long we became friends, at least as much as man and machine can do that. Ladies, as you know, it’s more than a little sometimes. Over time, I became acquainted with the nuances of my car and, of course, it became well used and developed some ways to talk to me. One in particular was the fuel pump. In an older Suburban, it’s a good idea to always keep at least a quarter tank of gas. My mechanic told me that if you let the fuel regularly go below that level, it seems to wear out the fuel pump. I accidently tested that theory a couple times. The mechanic was right. My car reminded me the hard way. It didn’t like running on fumes and it taught me to honor that.

          It’s pretty predictable how a car is going to act if the fuel pump is not working. No pump, no circulation. No circulation, no move. The car may as well be out of gas. It doesn’t matter what your agenda is for the day. The method of transportation you chose is now offline. Take a walk, hail a cab, but don’t count on your ordinary method to get here and there on the road without being nice to your fuel pump. In this case, that means always carrying keeping a bigger reserve in the tank. If you want to depend on it, you have to feed it!

          The apostle Paul didn’t start the church in Colossae, but he was well aware of it.  The church plant credit went to Epaphras, whom Paul referred to as a beloved fellow servant. Paul wrote to the Colossian church from prison in an effort to encourage the church and to engage them in the process of becoming unified in their celebration of Christ. From the beginning of the letter, Paul launches immediately into those issues of how to fill the spiritual tanks of the Christians in Colossae.

          First, Paul talks about faith, love and hope, familiar earmarks of Christianity and for Paul. He uses these terms together in 1 Corinthians 13, Romans 5, Galatians 5 and 1 Thessalonians 1. Here, the terms love and faith seem to stem from hope. Faith in Christ and love for one another are a result of “the hope laid up for you in heaven.”  That hope is in the here and now; the fulfillment of that hope lies in that which is promised and yet to come.

Hope is sort of like a full tank of gas. You know you can get there from here because you are equipped. You are ready for the trip because you have reliable transportation—the transportation of hope, the realistic expectation of that which will happen. And Paul says that hope is “laid up for you in heaven.” It’s like a heavenly layaway plan. This kind of hope is in no danger of being lost or taken away. It is held in heaven, away from all those things of earth which might damage it.

Many of us have been through gas shortages. Gas prices spiraled up. Supply seemed to go down, though we were never sure of what manipulations were really going on. Many of us learned to conserve, to consolidate our trips, to make our trips count, in order to get through the crises. But how many of you actually thought about giving up your car? How many of you sought alternative methods to get to and fro? I’m guessing that answer is none or next to none. Why didn’t you? Because you deem your car to be your mode of transportation. This is the way you navigate distance in life. Giving up your car was not an option. Right?

Well, if giving up your car is not on the table, then you must feed it. You must feed it fuel and water and fluids for it to continue to perform. Why would anyone think that maintenance of the Christian life would be any different? If you want it to work for you, then you have to feed and nourish it. You have to look after it if you want it to look after you.

It is the last chapter of John’s gospel. John, the beloved disciple, is describing the last things Jesus said that last day on the Galilean shore. Jesus asks Peter three times, “do you love me?” Three times when Peter answered yes, Jesus replied: “Feed my sheep.” Feed my sheep. It was a divine directive from Jesus to a disciple to put gas in the tanks of believers, to not let them run out, but to fill and refill until he comes again.

          How? How do we Christians keep our spiritual fuel tanks full? We need to be fed and refueled regularly. Paul gives the Colossians some good ideas for their time, and I can see just as much need and just as much relevance in our time as did the Colossian church. In verses 9-12, Paul prays a prayer of intercession for these Christians, and in doing so, he outlines steps of faith to be taken.

First, we need knowledge of God’s will. The Colossians had the Old Testament scriptures. They had the teaching of Paul and Epaphras. They had letters and stories of Jesus in circulation. And they had what Paul calls spiritual wisdom and understanding, that knowledge which comes through the heart when we listen and come into communion with the Holy Spirit. They had that knowledge that comes from God through Jesus on the wings of the Holy Spirit: heart-knowledge.

Next, and stemming from that spirituality, we can walk in a manner worthy of the Lord. We can adopt lifestyles that incorporate Christian values into who we are and what we do. No matter the circumstance, we are to practice honesty, loyalty, generosity, kindness and love as we go about our lives. They, our lives, are interwoven with the Holy Spirit and the witness and practice of the gospel.

Third, our behavior will cause us to bear fruit through our good works. We don’t have to try much on this point. If we have the heart-knowledge that Paul talks about and if we put it into practice by walking the walk, it follows that we will bear fruit. When Paul talks about bearing fruit, he’s talking about not just thinking good thoughts, but also doing good things.

Last, Paul tells us to increase in the knowledge of God. Again, there is logic to this.  We don’t have a bunch of rules to memorize.  We let God into our hearts.  We act out what we believe. We do things to show our obedience to God and his message for us. And in that obedient behavior, we grow in faith. We increase in the knowledge of God.

Paul ends his prayer by asking God for power to exercise patience, to claim endurance, and to do both with joy. Joy. Paul talks about power and patience and endurance, earmarks of testing and trials, and yet he calls upon us to do all this with joy, thanking God for the privilege to do it. And you know what. Paul is right. We should do all these things. We should ask for all this help. And we should thank God, for what he offers is nothing short of redemption, redemption from a life destined to end badly. But by the grace of God, we have lives to live gassed up, ready for the long haul, primed for an eternal destiny.

How do we fill that spiritual tank? Believe in your heart, walk the walk, do good for God’s sake, and increase in your ability and desire to do all these things.  Do these things in faith and love and they will take you farther than you ever believed you could go!