Ingredients of True Spirituality.

Since you died with Christ to the basic principles of this world, why, as though you still belonged to it, do you submit to its rules: ‘Do not handle! Do not taste! Do not touch!?’ These are all destined to perish with use, because they are based on human commands and teachings. Such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom, with their self-imposed worship, their false humility and their harsh treatment of the body, but they lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence. (Colossians 2:20-23)

In the letter the Apostle Paul wrote to the church in Colossae, he addressed some of the problems that the church was encountering as a new community of Christian faith. He uses his letter to teach them what true Christian Spirituality is and to avoid the fake spirituality of legalism.

Repentance and faith, submission to Jesus as the Lord, making space to let the mind, will and emotions of Christ become an inward reality and adopting the new language of gratitude are all marks of what Paul calls true spirituality. His focus is that we are changed by God from the inside out, and that this change comes through these elements, not following rules or traditions made up by people.

One of the easiest things for us to do is to become a legalist. What I mean by legalist, is that we adopt a certain set of rules that we are able to keep (thinking it pleases God) and then we usually judge everyone else by our rules. The problem with this type of fake spirituality is that it not only makes us self-righteous and hard to live with, but it also has no power to really change us on the inside. Christ came that we might actually have a real connection with God, and that from this connection, there would be seeds planted in humanity that change us into what we are created to be, and the hope of what those seeds will one day fully become. Paul’s letter in essence is a warning not to go back to legalism; it does make people look shiny on the outside, but those who live with a legalist know it’s not what’s on the inside. He encourages them to keep their connection to Christ as their means of true spiritual growth, letting him change the inside as we become what we were meant to be, from the inside out.