Colossians 1:1-2

Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother,

 To the saints and faithful brothers in Christ at Colossae:

Grace to you and peace from God our Father.

-Colossians 1:1-2

The beginning of this letter is pretty simple and straightforward.  The authors of this letter are Paul and Timothy.  It's being written to the believers at Colossae.  He ends this introduction with "grace" and "peace", which I think was fairly common for Paul's letters.

One thing that caught my attention about this was how Paul says "by the will of God".  He first describes himself as an apostle of Christ Jesus, which is important.  But what does that mean to be "by the will of God"?  Sure, maybe it seems silly to even think that there's much to it.  You might know what it means and think I'm ridiculous for stopping to think about it.  However, this is the word of God and every word is there for a reason.  I may not get to everything, but maybe I can take a look into at least some of the minor details.  In any case, let's get back to what this means.  I think Paul is saying that the reason he is "an apostle of Christ Jesus" is mainly or solely because of God.  The NLT puts it this way: "chosen by the will of God to be an apostle of Christ Jesus".  If you were to think about the way Paul got saved and how he was before, it's hard to make a case that Paul was heading towards following Jesus.  He was probably the one who was the furthest from doing so.

In any case, this is just the intro and that's that.  We'll see how far we get...

It's been a long time and I think this was a good practice for me to do.  We'll give it a shot and see how it goes.  Looking back, I didn't get very far in Colossians last time.  Also, it may be a bit unfair since we're going through a sermon serious for Colossians at church.  In any case... ya... next time.