Seeking What’s Above
Seeking What Is Above: A Call to Die to Self and Live in Christ
There is a phrase that carries more weight than we often give it credit for: "That is a big if." In Colossians 3:1, the apostle Paul opens with exactly that kind of statement. The verse describes how those who have been raised with Christ ought to seek the things which are above, where Christ sits at the right hand of God. It sounds simple enough. But everything hinges on that opening word: if.
If you have been risen with Christ, here is what your life ought to look like.
That conditional statement is not meant to produce anxiety about salvation. Rather, it is meant to produce clarity about direction. Think of it like the foundational logic of computer programming. When you write an if-then statement into a computer, the machine responds the same way every single time. There are no exceptions, no moods, no bad days. The input determines the output without fail. In the same way, the Christian life has a clear if-then logic built into it. If you have been born again, if you have trusted Christ as your Savior, then there is a corresponding reality that follows. Your life is now hidden with Christ in God, and the things above are where your attention, affection, and energy belong.
The problem, of course, is that we live in a world that is very good at pulling our gaze downward.
The Battle for Your Affection
Colossians 3:2 puts it plainly, calling believers to set their affections on things above and not on the things of the earth. First John 2:15 reinforces this, warning that love for the world and love for the Father cannot occupy the same heart at the same time. Everything that belongs to this world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life, is temporary. It will pass away. And yet these are the very things that compete daily for the throne of our hearts.
This is not simply a warning about obviously sinful things. Inordinate affection, as Paul calls it in Colossians 3:5, means any affection that exceeds what is proper. That can include hobbies, food, fashion, entertainment, and a thousand other things that are not inherently wicked but can quietly crowd out Christ. When any created thing occupies more of our thoughts, our conversations, and our energy than the Creator, something has gone wrong. The affection has become disordered.
Hebrews 12:1-2 gives us the remedy. It calls us to lay aside every weight and the sin that so easily besets us, and to run with patience the race set before us. The key is in what follows: looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. He is the one who, for the joy set before him, endured the cross and despised the shame. He saw past the suffering, past the betrayal, past the false trial, all the way to the joy beyond. That is the vision we are called to share.
Mortify the Flesh
One of the most striking words in this passage is found in Colossians 3:5: mortify. It means to kill. To exterminate. It is not a gentle word, and it was not meant to be. The flesh is persistent. It is attracted to what it ought not to have. It does not respond to half-measures or occasional treatments. It requires consistent, daily, deliberate action.
Jesus himself addressed this in Matthew 5:30, speaking of cutting off hands and feet and plucking out eyes if they cause us to sin. The point is not a call to literal self-mutilation. The point is that we have not yet begun to take sin seriously enough. Hebrews 12:4 asks a sobering question, noting that we have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood in our striving against sin. The battle against the flesh is meant to be that serious, that costly, that intentional.
And yet here is the remarkable truth: Christ has already won that battle. He sweat, as it were, great drops of blood in the garden of Gethsemane. He knows what it is to be pressed to the absolute limit by temptation and to emerge without sin. He is the high priest who was tempted in all points as we are, yet without sin, as Hebrews 4:15 tells us. So when we go to him and say we cannot get victory, his answer is both tender and triumphant. You cannot, and you do not have to, because I already have.
Put Off the Old, Put On the New
Colossians 3:9-10 calls us to put off the old man with his deeds and put on the new man, who is renewed in knowledge after the image of the one who created him. The old man has many faces. He looks different from person to person, shaped by individual appetites and histories and preferences. But the new man has only one face, and it belongs to Christ.
This is why Colossians 3:11 can say that Christ is all and in all. When the old is stripped away, what remains is not a better version of ourselves. What remains is Christ.
Second Corinthians 5:14 tells us that the love of Christ is what constrains us in all of this. It is not a checklist of religious activities that transforms us. It is not rule-keeping or reputation management. It is love. The love of Christ compels us because we understand that one died for all, and therefore all died, and those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died and rose again.
A Vision Worth Having
Psalm 17:15 captures the ultimate hope of all of this: beholding the face of God in righteousness, and being satisfied when we awake in his likeness. Not satisfied by streets of gold or reunions or earthly pleasures carried into eternity. Satisfied by him. His face. His presence. His likeness.
That is the vision worth seeking. That is the affection worth setting. That is the life worth living.
If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above.
That is a big if. But if it is true of you, everything else follows.
There is a phrase that carries more weight than we often give it credit for: "That is a big if." In Colossians 3:1, the apostle Paul opens with exactly that kind of statement. The verse describes how those who have been raised with Christ ought to seek the things which are above, where Christ sits at the right hand of God. It sounds simple enough. But everything hinges on that opening word: if.
If you have been risen with Christ, here is what your life ought to look like.
That conditional statement is not meant to produce anxiety about salvation. Rather, it is meant to produce clarity about direction. Think of it like the foundational logic of computer programming. When you write an if-then statement into a computer, the machine responds the same way every single time. There are no exceptions, no moods, no bad days. The input determines the output without fail. In the same way, the Christian life has a clear if-then logic built into it. If you have been born again, if you have trusted Christ as your Savior, then there is a corresponding reality that follows. Your life is now hidden with Christ in God, and the things above are where your attention, affection, and energy belong.
The problem, of course, is that we live in a world that is very good at pulling our gaze downward.
The Battle for Your Affection
Colossians 3:2 puts it plainly, calling believers to set their affections on things above and not on the things of the earth. First John 2:15 reinforces this, warning that love for the world and love for the Father cannot occupy the same heart at the same time. Everything that belongs to this world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life, is temporary. It will pass away. And yet these are the very things that compete daily for the throne of our hearts.
This is not simply a warning about obviously sinful things. Inordinate affection, as Paul calls it in Colossians 3:5, means any affection that exceeds what is proper. That can include hobbies, food, fashion, entertainment, and a thousand other things that are not inherently wicked but can quietly crowd out Christ. When any created thing occupies more of our thoughts, our conversations, and our energy than the Creator, something has gone wrong. The affection has become disordered.
Hebrews 12:1-2 gives us the remedy. It calls us to lay aside every weight and the sin that so easily besets us, and to run with patience the race set before us. The key is in what follows: looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. He is the one who, for the joy set before him, endured the cross and despised the shame. He saw past the suffering, past the betrayal, past the false trial, all the way to the joy beyond. That is the vision we are called to share.
Mortify the Flesh
One of the most striking words in this passage is found in Colossians 3:5: mortify. It means to kill. To exterminate. It is not a gentle word, and it was not meant to be. The flesh is persistent. It is attracted to what it ought not to have. It does not respond to half-measures or occasional treatments. It requires consistent, daily, deliberate action.
Jesus himself addressed this in Matthew 5:30, speaking of cutting off hands and feet and plucking out eyes if they cause us to sin. The point is not a call to literal self-mutilation. The point is that we have not yet begun to take sin seriously enough. Hebrews 12:4 asks a sobering question, noting that we have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood in our striving against sin. The battle against the flesh is meant to be that serious, that costly, that intentional.
And yet here is the remarkable truth: Christ has already won that battle. He sweat, as it were, great drops of blood in the garden of Gethsemane. He knows what it is to be pressed to the absolute limit by temptation and to emerge without sin. He is the high priest who was tempted in all points as we are, yet without sin, as Hebrews 4:15 tells us. So when we go to him and say we cannot get victory, his answer is both tender and triumphant. You cannot, and you do not have to, because I already have.
Put Off the Old, Put On the New
Colossians 3:9-10 calls us to put off the old man with his deeds and put on the new man, who is renewed in knowledge after the image of the one who created him. The old man has many faces. He looks different from person to person, shaped by individual appetites and histories and preferences. But the new man has only one face, and it belongs to Christ.
This is why Colossians 3:11 can say that Christ is all and in all. When the old is stripped away, what remains is not a better version of ourselves. What remains is Christ.
Second Corinthians 5:14 tells us that the love of Christ is what constrains us in all of this. It is not a checklist of religious activities that transforms us. It is not rule-keeping or reputation management. It is love. The love of Christ compels us because we understand that one died for all, and therefore all died, and those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died and rose again.
A Vision Worth Having
Psalm 17:15 captures the ultimate hope of all of this: beholding the face of God in righteousness, and being satisfied when we awake in his likeness. Not satisfied by streets of gold or reunions or earthly pleasures carried into eternity. Satisfied by him. His face. His presence. His likeness.
That is the vision worth seeking. That is the affection worth setting. That is the life worth living.
If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above.
That is a big if. But if it is true of you, everything else follows.
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