Robert H. Hitchcock
Sugar Land, Texas
February 12, 1998
OUR COMPLETENESS IN CHRIST
Col 2:10
10 And ye are complete in him, which is the head of all principality and power:
Complete= lacks nothing. Not in-complete. No where else to look. No where else to go. No one else to ask. Nothing left un-done. Nothing more to do. Nothing missing. Nothing hidden. Nothing un-known.
Rom 10:9-10
9 That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.
10 For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.
Salvation=wholeness. If you have a whole pie, not a piece is missing ( and no one has snitched the crust.) In Christ, in the new birth spirit, the believer is made whole, he is made complete. Before the new birth, a person is definitely in-complete. They have no spirit, no connection with God. They have no righteousness, no sanctification, no ability to operate spiritual power, no power of attorney, no redemption, no spiritual love to give. They have no eternal life abiding within them.
I'd have to say that that would be considered in-complete, wouldn't you? You could have 10 Ph.D's piled up with 10 bank accounts to go with them; you could be President of 10 corporations with power over 10's of millions, and you would still be in-complete. Nothing in the physical realm would ever be able to make you complete either.
In what manner has God made us complete?
Rom 3:22-24
22 Even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe: for there is no difference:
23 For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God;
24 Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus:
Righteousness!!!! That's what every natural man is missing!! All have sinned. All come short of the glory of God (that's really no secret, now, is it?) First things first in our completeness. God has made us righteous in Christ! We can stand before the Father without any sense of sin, guilt, condemnation or inferiority. WOW! That's a good start. We are justified freely by His grace. WOW! That's a wonderful step to completeness. Christ Jesus has redeemed us, paid for us. WOW! That's got to be considered a giant step on the road to complete wholeness!
What else is in the complete package?
Rom 8:1-4
1 There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.
2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death.
3 For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh:
4 That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.
Now isn't THAT terrific?! No condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus- the born again ones. Condemnation was all we ever had before the new birth. Enmity with God. Enmity with ourselves. Constantly feeling the inferiority of our own inadequacies. Why? Because the flesh was and is weak. It is im-perfect and in-complete. Without the spirit of God, man does not have it " going on!" (The new expression for having it together.)
Christ Jesus, by his completeness and his accomplishments, which left nothing un-done, has made us free from the law. All right!! The law is too hard to do. As a matter of fact, no one was ever able to do the whole law, thus no one was ever complete by the law! So Christ Jesus took care of the law by fulfilling the law on our behalf, thus making us free from the law forever.
There's still more to our completeness in Christ.
Rom 8:16-19
16 The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God:
17 And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together.
18 For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.
19 For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God.
The believers are the children of God. Elohim. Jehovah. The one true God. Children!! That's a truth, not a figure of speech. And children are heirs, heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ. Don't you see how complete that must really be? How totally finished the work of Christ is? How fully accepted you and I are by God? How full of power and love we must be?
All of our completeness has not yet come to pass. There is a future point in time coming that will reveal the rest of what Christ has accomplished for us. There will be a new body; a new heaven and earth. That will be the genuine "New World Order" won't it?!
Eph 1:2-6
2 Grace be to you, and peace, from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ:
4 According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love:
5 Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will,
6 To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved.
You know....being blessed with all spiritual blessings has got to be complete. I don't think you can get more than ALL of something can you? If it's ALL, then there's nothing left out. There's nothing left to receive. We have been blessed with all spiritual blessings in Christ. That's completely, completely, absolutely complete.
There's more.
We have been chosen and we are holy and without blame before God. That's icing on the cake, yes? Holy and without blame before God. In love predestinated as His children. That's riches.
And to top it all off- God has made us accepted. No more striving. No more attempts. No more wonderings and wanderings. We are accepted by Him. That is complete, wouldn't you say?
Rom 8:28-39
28 And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.
29 For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren.
30 Moreover whom he did predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called, them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified.
31 What shall we then say to these things? If God be for us, who can be against us?
32 He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?
33 Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifieth.
34 Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us.
35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?
36 As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.
37 Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.
38 For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come,
39 Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Our completeness in Christ is just too big to measure it all. All things working together for good. Predestinated. Called. Justified. Glorified. God is for us, who can be against us? Who condemns us? No one. Who shall separate us from the love of God? Nothing.
Our completeness in Christ is so complete that it is written in Colossians with a rare 4th conjugation of the word "complete", and it literally means: " completely, completely, absolutely complete." Needless to say, the born again ones have received it all from their Father. We now fellowship with Him and each other in that completeness, looking forward to the day when Christ returns and the full redemption of the body is finished.