Rooted and Built in Christ (Colossians 2:6–7)

Therefore, as you’ve received Christ, Jesus the Lord, so walk in him rooted and built up in him and established in the faith just as you were taught abounding and thanksgiving.
– Colossians 2:6–7

Oh, there’s so much in these couple of verses… Especially coming on the heels of what we see at the end of Colossians 1… This glorious mystery of Christ in us.

Colossians 2:6–7 Teaches Us We Are United with Christ

So then verse 6 says, therefore, in light of all that’s been said in Colossians up to this point… As you received Christ Jesus as the Lord of your life, so now walk in him. So the language at the end of Colossians 1 is Christ is in you. Now the language is you walk in him. It’s this doctrine that we see all over the Bible of union with Christ.

Think about all the different times in the New Testament where we read that Jesus is with us. Think about Matthew 28:20. I will be with you always to the end of the age. And then we are with Jesus. Romans talks about how if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. So he is with us, we are with him. And then Colossians 1, Christ is in you. Now here, you are in Christ.

So this doctrine of our lives totally united with Jesus. And that’s what I love about the language at the beginning of verse 7 here in Colossians 2. We are rooted and built up in him. You have a root in Christ, we’re rooted in Jesus. You have a strong foundation. This is your identity. This is who you are. You’re rooted and built up in Christ by nature. The fact that you are in Jesus and Jesus is in you and you are with Jesus and Jesus is with you… You’re being built up in him.

Colossians 2:6–7 Teaches that Being United in Christ Produces a Fruitful Christian Life

And so the practical application here, the command in Colossians 2:6 is so walk in him. In other words, live in this reality all day long. Let this reality transform everything you do, everything you think, everything you desire, everything you say, every decision you make, every interaction you have, do all of it in him, him in you with him, him with you. And then it’s so interesting at the end of verse seven, after talking about being rooted and built up in Christ, established in the faith just as you were taught, Paul writes, “Walk in him abounding in thanksgiving.”

So make that connection. To walk in Christ means to abound in thanksgiving. And based on that phrase, I just want to encourage you today to abound in thanksgiving, just give thanksgiving all day long to God, to Jesus and know that as you do, this is essential to experiencing what it means to walk in him, to be rooted and built up in him.

It means to abound in thanksgiving. In the words of 1 Thessalonians, to give thanks in all circumstances, all day long, abound in it. So let’s pray accordingly. God, we praise you for this reality. We praise you that we’ve received Christ, Jesus the Lord, we praise you. Jesus is the Lord of our lives. We praise you for a union with you. We praise you that we are rooted and built up in you.

This Verse Encourages Us to Draw Near to God

God, I pray over every Christian right now listening to this right now, every person who is in Christ, Christ in them, that they would know in a fresh way in this moment, the wonder of their identity in you, their union with you. Lord, I pray that if anybody’s listening to this who’s exploring Christianity or is not in Christ right now, God, I pray that you would draw them into union with Christ, you would draw them into faith in Jesus who loves them and has given his life on a cross to pay the price for their sins so they might have life in him forever.

God, I pray for that miracle, that new birth to happen, new life to happen even now as someone’s listening to this. And God, I pray for all those who are in you that you would help us to walk in you today. And everything we do, you would help us to live out of the overflow of this incredible breathtaking union with Jesus. May your every interaction today with friends, family members, coworkers, total strangers, be the overflow of union with Christ. May your every thought and every desire, every single thing we do alone may be the overflow of the union with you and every word we say, every decision we make, everything we do, God, we pray that it will all be the overflow of a union with you.

Prayer for the Dombki Baloch People

And even as we pray this oh God, we pray that you’d help us to live today for the sake of people who don’t have this union with you. Help us to lead others to union with you around us today. We pray for people who can’t experience union with you because they’ve never even heard about you in the world.

God, please, we pray for the Dombki Baloch people of Pakistan today for 129,000 of them, no known followers of Jesus among them, God for the Dombki Baloch, please God cause the name and the truth and the love of Jesus to be made known among them that they might be in him, that they might receive Christ, Jesus the Lord. Please God, raise up Christians in Pakistan from outside Pakistan, laborers to take the gospel to the Dombki Baloch people.

Prayer of Thanksgiving

And God, as we pray all of this, we pray that you would help us to abound in thanksgiving today. We have so much to be thankful for. In fact, that’s how I want us to close. Instead of me just saying amen and that being the end, I want to encourage us as this short podcast episode comes to a close, just to spend some time and prayers of thanksgiving at the end of this podcast, and you just let that run in your life.

Just think of all the things you have to be thankful for, all the circumstances, even hard ones that the Bible causes to abound in thanksgiving in the middle of. So just spend some time in thanksgiving. God, we pray that you’d help us to abound in thanksgiving, even right now in Jesus’ name, according to your Word in Colossians 2:6–7. I’m not even going to say amen. Just abound in thanksgiving in prayer right now.