Part 2 of Colossians series on substance and shadows.
When I speak of culture in this article, I am drawing from the original Latin meaning of ‘cultura’—rooted in cultivating, nurturing, and bringing forth what is truly wholesome and good. In this sense, culture is not a superficial identity or a passing trend; it is the deep, intentional cultivation of a way of life that aligns with what is good, true, and grounded in Christ’s kingdom.
After I released my first article on Colossians and the importance of substance over shadows I had a wonderful person ask a great question:
One question I’d love to ask: how can we practically discern when a spiritual practice is still pointing us to Christ versus when it has started to replace Him?
That’s an incredibly important question, and it’s one that deserves a real, substantial answer, not just a quick platitude. It’s the question of whether your faith is built on solid ground or just shifting shadows.
I want to answer this by delving into what Paul then establishes as the basis of substantive living in Christ, and therefore how we keep him central. I hope this does justice to the question asked—which I am humbled to answer. I will touch on the first article to refamiliarize us, then expand further.
To get to the heart of it, we need to look at what the Bible itself says about shadows and substance. In Colossians chapter 2, verse 17, it says that these things (referring to the rituals, festivals, and rules mentioned earlier in the chapter) ‘are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ.’ This verse is key because it tells us that these external practices are just shadows, outlines of something real, but not the real thing. The true substance is found in Christ alone.
So, how do you know if your faith is substantial and not shadowy? It comes down to where you are placing your ultimate devotion and how you are living out your faith.
We’ve been talking about Colossians chapter 3, verses 1 through 3, and they speak directly to this:
‘If then you have been raised with Christ…’ (Colossians 3:1a).
- This is the absolute bedrock. It’s not a suggestion or a ‘maybe.’ The Greek word for ‘raised’ here is incredibly powerful. It’s in a tense that means it’s a completed, objective fact. It’s something that has already happened to you by God’s action. Think of it like this: you don’t try to be raised; you are raised. This is the substance of your faith, given to you, not something you have to earn or perform. It’s the ultimate ‘hard-won conviction’ that was won for you. If you’re in Christ, this is your starting point, your new reality.
Then, because of that reality, he gives a command: ‘…seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.’ (Colossians 3:1b).
- This ‘seek’ is where your agency comes in. The Greek word here is a present, active command. It means to continually, actively, and deliberately pursue, investigate, desire, and strive for these ‘things above.’ This isn’t passive waiting; it’s an ongoing, conscious choice, a daily ‘either/or.’ It’s you, as a unique individual, choosing to orient your entire life towards this new reality you’ve been given. It’s the opposite of being swept along by the crowd or living superficially. You are making your faith a deliberate priority.
And then, he tells you how to do that seeking: ‘Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth.’ (Colossians 3:2).
- This is about conscious engagement. It’s not just about feeling good; rather willfully directing your thoughts, your intellect, your focus. It’s about training your ‘brain,’ as we’ve talked about, to keenly focus on eternal truths rather than the fleeting, often distracting, ‘things on earth’ that can create those ‘shadows’ of superficiality. This is where the ‘renewal in knowledge’ truly begins.
Finally, he reminds you of the profound truth that underpins it all: ‘For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.’ (Colossians 3:3).
- This verse directly addresses the ‘shadows.’ If your life is hidden with Christ in God, it means your true identity, your deepest reality, is not visible to the world. It’s not dependent on external validation, performance, or what any crowd thinks. It’s secure, internal, and untouchable by earthly circumstances. This is the ultimate protection against a ‘shadowy’ faith—because the substance of who you are is not accessible to the very things that create shadows.
- This hiddenness does not mean secretive, but rather what is hidden with Christ becomes visible in how you live. Not as performance, but as expression. The unseen reality gives shape to the seen life. What seems subtle is in fact loud.
So, how do you know if your faith is authentic and substantial, and not based on shadows?
It’s when you are actively seeking the things above because you know they are the substance, not just the shadows. It’s when Christ, who holds everything together, is your ultimate focus.
This often gets tricky when we start elevating the non-essentials. Sometimes, in our desire to be devout, we can accidentally make the ‘shadows’ – like specific rituals, traditions, or even how we ‘perform’ our faith in a group – seem like the most important things. We can start focusing so much on the outline of faith that we forget the essence and substance of Christ as Lord, who is the superlative of our devotion.
When your faith is substantial, even if you’re restricted in the ‘performative’ aspects – like if you can’t do a certain ritual, or if you’re in a crowd that disagrees with you – you can still hold onto the reality of your belief. Because your faith isn’t dependent on the external performance or the crowd’s approval; it’s rooted in the substance that is Christ Himself, who is before all things and in whom all things hold together.
And here’s another layer to that substance: it’s not just about a future hope; it’s about a present reality.
The ‘new creation’ that Christ brings isn’t something we just wait for. Because you have been raised with Christ (the Aorist fact), you are already living in that new reality, here and now. The future hope is embedded in your present existence. This means your ‘seeking’ and ‘setting your mind’ on things above isn’t escapism; it’s authentic living. It requires embodying the reality of God’s kingdom in the here and now, with the full, ultimate future firmly in view. You don’t lose yourself in the future; you live from the future that is already breaking into your present.
Your task now is to dig into these verses further, to see how this ‘seeking’ plays out in the rest of the chapter and the letter. Ask yourself: What does it look like to ‘seek’ and ‘set your mind’ on things above in your daily life? How does this ‘hidden life’ protect you from the shadows of performance? How does living in this ‘new creation’ reality shape your present actions? The answers will reveal the solid ground of your faith.”
Now, looking at living the concrete embody existence:
Understanding the ‘substance’ of Christ and the ‘shadows’ that can distract us. We’ve seen that you have been raised (a completed fact), and therefore you are commanded to continually seek (an active, ongoing choice).
This is where the concept of agency becomes absolutely central as we choose to respond to the grace that has already achieved so much for us. When we talk about ‘agency,’ we’re talking about our capacity to act independently, to make our own free choices, and to be the author of our own actions rather than just reacting to external forces or passively following a crowd.
That Greek word for ‘seek’ (zēteō) we explored earlier? It’s absolutely bursting with this meaning. It encompasses the entire spectrum of agency that makes up our existence. It’s not just a mental exercise or a vague hope; it’s a sincere act of will that involves:
- Our minds: Consciously directing our thoughts (“set your minds on things above”).
- Our desires: Cultivating a deep longing for what is eternal.
- Our choices: Deliberately orienting our actions towards Christ.
- Our striving: Actively pursuing and investigating these ‘things above.’
Crucially, this agency isn’t about trying to earn your raised status; that has already been achieved for you by God. Instead, your agency is about actively inhabiting that new reality. You are not creating something new, but rather something unique. You are making manifest in your daily life what is already true about you in Christ. It’s the active appropriation of a profound gift.
This is the path to becoming what I call a ‘Kingdom of God that cultivates Christian embodiment.’ Not a ‘human cultural Christian’ who simply adopts external religious customs or conforms to societal expectations that might bear a Christian label. No, this is about something far deeper. We need to rediscover the rich meaning of culture in its original meaning. We are citizens of a Kingdom, and therefore participants in a culture that moves from shadows into the reality found in Christ.
To understand this, let’s look at the very root of the word ‘culture.’ It comes from the Latin cultura, meaning ’tilling,’ ‘agriculture,’ and ‘development.’ It’s tied to the idea of cultivating – nurturing something into being. This isn’t about group identity or simply following religious rituals and rules. Rather, it is taking what is truly worth collecting into oneself and then tilling it, nurturing it, and developing it until it becomes substantial, bringing about well-being and goodness.
So, when we speak of a ‘Kingdom of God culture,’ we’re talking about a cultivating and nurturing way of life. This means intentionally tending to the seeds of Christ’s Kingdom within us, allowing them to grow into something substantial. It implies an embeddedness – a deep, internal understanding of what it truly means to live a good way of life, not just an external performance.
Embodiment: Living from What Is Real
Now, let’s take that a step further into the idea of embodiment. Because true cultivation, this deep internal nurturing, inevitably leads to an embodied faith. It’s the embodying of what you know to be true, and the faith, hope, and ideas that are energized from or bounce from that knowing, that reality.
And this is crucial for escaping those “shadows.” Our faith isn’t based on some vague, supernatural, disconnected reality. No, it’s rooted in something profoundly concrete: a historical person. So then, if the substance of faith is embodied in Christ in history, then it cannot remain abstract in us—it must take form in how we live.
Our faith is concrete because it is centered on a person—not an idea—the man of history who stands at the center of history itself. And if we claim to be Christian, then he is also the beginning and the end of history for us.
And here is the central point I have wanted to get to us too: this is the ultimate counter to a shadowy faith, because the substance isn’t an abstract concept; it’s a living, breathing, historical reality that demands a response, an embodiment, in our own lives. It’s an embodiment that comes not with an energy of emptiness or wistfulness, but with the energy of life, a determination, a willfulness, and an incorporated cultivating of life as we’ve discussed.
So, we’ve explored the idea of an embodied faith, a faith that is not just believed but lived out in every aspect of our being. This leads to a way of living that becomes truly holistic in its implications, as we come to know Jesus Christ as our Lord.
This means more than acknowledging Christ; it means every part of who we are is shaped by Him. You have been raised with Christ—and therefore you must seek. Not passively, but with active agency. We engage, we wrestle, we strive to grow into the mature individuals we are meant to be, so as to be our best in Him – in the One we see as central, and also in Jesus Christ, the Kingdom of God, and His righteousness.
What does it mean to ‘seek first’ here? The word ‘first’ implies priority, not just sequence. It means we are to prioritize what we lean into most strongly. And ‘Kingdom’ is always about focus: all kingdoms have a king, and the king is the source from which the kingdom flows. Finally, ‘righteousness’ means to live justly and rightly, with a love for well-being, a love for a good life, a love for a life that reflects the culture that Christ has called us into.
So, this isn’t merely Paul’s idea; it’s a deeply biblical concept, woven throughout Scripture.
Here are several questions for you to expand on:
1. Putting Off — The Break from Shadows
Paul calls us to “put off” the old way of life as we step into the new.
Looking at verses 5–11, what is the core substance of what must be put to death or laid aside?
What attitudes, actions, and patterns of thinking belong to the old self that Paul insists cannot be carried forward?
2. Putting On — The Formation of Substance
Having put off the old, Paul then calls us to “put on” a new way of being.
In verses 12–17, what are the essential virtues and dispositions that define this new life?
What does it practically look like to embody these qualities—not as performance, but as the outworking of a life rooted in Christ?
3. The Forming Tool — Word, Worship, and Mutual Formation
Verse 16 introduces a vital means of cultivating this life:
“Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly…”
What does this look like in practice?
How do teaching, admonishing, and shared worship (psalms, hymns, spiritual songs) actively form both the individual and the community into something more substantial?
4. The Ordinary as Sacred — Faith in Word and Deed
Verse 17 brings this vision into the fabric of everyday life:
“Whatever you do, in word or deed…”
What does it mean that even the smallest actions and attitudes are not neutral, but part of this embodied faith?
How does this challenge the divide between the “spiritual” and the “ordinary,” calling us to live consciously in the name of Christ in all things?
5. The Foundation and the Bridge — “Christ is All, and in All”
Verse 11 stands as both foundation and fuel: “Christ is all, and in all.”
What does this mean personally—how does it shape your identity, your “you-ness,” beyond external labels or performances?
And how does this truth function as the bridge between “putting off” and “putting on,” enabling you to live this reality out in everything you do?
In what way does Christ being “all, and in all” free you to embody substance rather than fall back into shadows?
In the end, the question is simple: is what is hidden with Christ becoming visible in how you live? Because faith is not proven in what we claim—but in what our lives quietly reveal.
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