CRITICAL AND EXPLANATORY NOTES
Colossians 1:13. Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness.—The metaphor commenced in the previous verse is carried on here. The settlement in the land flowing with milk and honey is preceded by deliverance with a high hand from the house of bondage—the land of thick darkness. And hath translated us.—The same word by which the Jewish historian describes the carrying over of the Israelites to Assyria by Tiglath-Pileser. The apostle regards the deliverance, so far as the Deliverer is concerned, as a thing accomplished. His dear Son.—The A.V. margin has become the R.V. text, “The Son of His love.” We do not again find this expression; but as there is “no darkness at all” in God, who “is love,” so His Son, into whose kingdom we come, reveals the love of the Father.
Colossians 1:14. In whom we have redemption.—A release effected in consideration of a ransom. See on the verse Ephesians 1:7. The forgiveness of our sins—lit. “the dismissal of our sins.”
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.— Colossians 1:13-14
The Great Moral Translation.
These words amplify the truth unfolded in the preceding verse, and describe the great change that must take place in order to obtain a meetness for the saintly inheritance—the translation of the soul from the powerful dominion of darkness into the glorious kingdom of the Son of God.
I. This translation involves our enfranchisement from a state of dark captivity.—“Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness” (Colossians 1:13).
1. The unrenewed are in a realm of moral darkness.—This was the condition of the Colossians and of the whole Gentile world before the times of the gospel. “Darkness covered the earth, and gross darkness the people.” Darkness denotes ignorance, moral blindness. Man is in darkness about the great mysteries of being, the mystery of sin and suffering, the deep significance of life, the distressing question of human duty, the destiny of the universe, the character and operations of God, and His relation to the race. It is possible to know much about religion, to hold religious ideas at second-hand as a group of poetic conceptions—fancy pictures from the book of Revelation, like the pictures of the poets from the book of Nature—and yet be totally in the dark as to the religious experience of those ideas. May be intellectually light, and spiritually dark. Darkness denotes danger and misery. Like a traveller in a strange country overtaken by the night, stumbling along in uncertainty and fear, until one fatal step—and he lies helpless in the rocky abyss, into the bottom of which he falls.
2. In this realm of moral darkness the unrenewed are held in captivity.—They are slaves in the land of darkness, tyrannised over by an arbitrary and capricious ruler. Slavery distorts and defaces the illustrious image in which man was originally created, darkens the understanding, paralyses the intellect, and stunts the growth of intelligence; it robs him of his self-respect, poisons his sense of rectitude and honour, blunts his sensibilities, imbrutes his entire nature, and brands him with unutterable infamy. The “power of darkness” is that tyranny which sin exercises over its captives, filling their minds with deadly errors or brutish ignorance, their consciences with terror or indifference, and dragging them onwards under its dismal yoke into all the horrors of eternal darkness. The tyrant of this gloomy realm is Satan; and his domination is founded and conducted on imposture, error, ignorance, and cruelty. He is the arch-deceiver.
3. From this realm of moral darkness God graciously liberates.—“Who hath delivered us.” For the slaves of sin there is no help but in God. It is the nature of sin to incapacitate its victim for making efforts after self-enfranchisement. He is unwilling to be free. To snap the fetters from a nation of slaves yearning for liberty is a great and noble act. Our deliverance is mightier than that. The word “deliver” in the text means to snatch or rescue from danger, even though the person seized may at first be unwilling to escape, as Lot from Sodom. God does not force the human will. The method of deliverance was devised and executed independent of our will; its personal benefits cannot be enjoyed without our will.
II. This translation places us in a condition of highest moral freedom and privilege.—
1. We are transferred, to a kingdom. “Hath translated us into the kingdom” (Colossians 1:13). Power detains captives; a kingdom fosters willing citizens. Tyranny has no law but the capricious will of a despot; a kingdom implies good government, based on universally recognised and authoritative law. “The image is presented of the wholesale transportation of a conquered people, of which the history of Oriental monarchies furnishes many examples” (Josephus, Ant., IX. xi.). They were translated from a bad to a better ruling power. So the believer is moved from the realm and power of darkness and bondage to the kingdom of light and freedom. The laws of this kingdom are prescribed by Christ, its honours and privileges granted by Him, and its future history and triumphs will ever be identified with His own transcendent glory.
2. We are placed under the rule of a beneficent and glorious King.—“The kingdom of God’s dear Son,” more accurately “the Son of His love.” As love is the essence of the Father, so is it also of the Son. The manifestation of the Son to the world is a manifestation by Him of divine love (1 John 4:9). The kingdom into which believers are translated is founded on love; its entire government is carried on under the same beneficent principle. The acts of suffering and death, by which Christ won His kingly dignity and power, were revelations of love in its most heroic and self-sacrificing forms. When we believe in Christ, we are translated from the tyranny and darkness of sin into the kingdom of which the Son of God—the Son infinitely beloved of the Father—is King. As willing subjects we share with Him the Father’s love, and are being prepared for more exalted service and sublimer experiences in the endless kingdom of the future.
III. The divine method by which the translation is effected.—It is effected by redemption.
1. The means of redemption.—“Through His blood” (Colossians 1:14). The image of a captive and enslaved people is still continued. But the metaphor is changed from the victor who rescues the captive by force of arms to the philanthropist who releases him by the payment of a ransom (Lightfoot). All men are under the condemnation of a violated law, and sink in the bondage of sin. There is no release but by paying a ransom; this is involved in the idea of redemption. The ransom-price paid for the enfranchisement of enslaved humanity was “not corruptible things, as silver and gold, but the precious blood of Christ.” The mode of redemption is to us a deep mystery; the reasons influencing the divine Mind in its adoption we cannot fathom. But the fact is plainly revealed (1 Peter 3:18; 1 Peter 2:24; Galatians 3:13). This was God’s method of translating from bondage to liberty.
2. The effect of redemption.—“Even the forgiveness of sins” (Colossians 1:14). The ransom-price is paid, and the slave is free. The first blessing of redemption is pardon. It is this the penitent soul most urgently needs; it does not exclude all other redemptive blessings, but opens and prepares the soul for their reception. Sin is the great obstacle between the soul and God; the monster sluice that shuts off the flow of divine blessing. Redemption lifts the sluice, and the stream of divine goodness pours its tide of benediction into the enraptured soul. An earthly king may forgive the felon, but he cannot give him a better disposition. God never forgives without at the same time giving a new heart. Pardon involves every other blessing—peace, purity, glory; it is the pledge and foundation for the bestowal of all we can need in time or in eternity.
3. The Author of redemption.—“In whom we have redemption” (Colossians 1:14). Christ, the Son of God’s love, by the sacrifice of Himself, accomplished our redemption; and it is only as we are in Him by faith that we actually partake of the freedom He purchased for us. His blood is not merely the ransom paid for our deliverance, but He is Himself the personal, living source of redemption. The deliverance of humanity is not simply in the work of Christ, through what He did and suffered, but in Himself.—“the strong Son of God,” the crucified, risen, and living Saviour. It is not only a rescue from condemnation and punishment, but a deliverance from the power and bondage of evil. The words “in whom we have redemption” teach much and imply more. They describe a continuous gift enjoyed, a continuous process realised by all who have been translated into the kingdom of the Saviour. In them the power of redemption is being carried on, so that they die unto sin, and live unto God, and experience a growing meetness for the inheritance of the saints in light (Spence). Christ only could be the Redeemer of men; He combined in one person the divine and human natures: He could therefore meet the demands of God and the necessities of man.
Lessons.—
1. Sin is a dark, enslaving power.
2. The kingdom of the Redeemer is one of light and freedom.
3. Moral translation by redemption is a divine work.
4. The forgiveness of sin can be obtained only by faith in the Son of God.
GERM NOTES ON THE VERSES
Colossians 1:13. From Darkness to Light.
I. Man is naturally in a state of darkness, held captive by sin and Satan.
II. A kingdom of freedom and light is provided by the intervention of the Son of God.
III. The translation from darkness to light is a divine act.
Colossians 1:14. The Great Blessing of Redemption—
I. Is the forgiveness of sins.
II. The blessing of forgiveness is through the agency of Christ.
III. Redemption is purchased at a great cost and sacrifice.—“Through His blood.”