June 6, 2010: Speaking at Last – Michael Hidalgo

Paul has gone through the entire letter telling the people in the Colossian Church how to live. In our world today, if faced with philosophical arguments, like the ones facing the Colossian believers, I suspect we would want to know how to respond … verbally. We often frame things in a very logical way … and attempt to assemble our words, thoughts, and evidence in a convincing way. However, all this does in the end is win and argument, rarely does it change minds.

Paul’s admonition is to be wise, redeem time, be full of grace, to allow the words to taste good … so that the Colossian believers would “know how to answer everyone.” It seems that they were to speak when they were asked. Some believe the assumption was that they were living such different lives that people would start asking. Their life was to speak … their word were to explain it. Perhaps this is why Paul says, “Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders …” first – because the way we act speaks louder than anything.