Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassion, kindness, lowliness, meekness, and patience, forbearing one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in the one body. And be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teach and admonish one another in all wisdom, and sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs with thankfulness in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.
Colossians 3:12–17 (RSV)
'Do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus,' thus St. Paul describes our life within the Body of Christ. It sounds so simple there on the pages of the Bible. 'Do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus,' as easy as taking a breath.
Can St. Paul mean 'everything'? We read through the partial listing of what 'everything' means, and our failures begin to add up. Compassion, kindness, lowliness, meekness, and on goes St. Paul. Can he be serious?
'And above all, put on love,' tops it all. Love as Christ has loved us, love, because each life is worthy of Jesus' innocent suffering, death and resurrection.
We stand bewildered, for we know that we do not have this within us on our own. It must come from outside us. It does, day after day, the Lord seeks us out, allows us to see our sin, forgives our repentant hearts, and cloths us with His righteousness.
Our Lord does this as we learn that we can, by His grace, put on all that St. Paul has laid before us. By each sin forgiven, every godless thought forgotten, the unkind word left unspoken, or evil intent released, we become less a sinner, and we become the love that has saved us. We grow into the holiness that is our Lord.
We may never come close to the fullness of Christ while in this flesh; still, we can begin to glimpse what will be as we are dressed in the righteousness of our Lord.