Colossians 2: Remembering the Victory of the Cross

Introduction

"When you go through a hard time, what do you remember first?" Malcolm Duncan, pastor of Kensington Temple, continues his "Living Well" series in the letter to the Colossians with a simple call: remember the victory of the cross.

The text is Colossians 2:13-15. Paul states that God made us alive together with Christ, that he erased the record of charges that stood against us by nailing it to the cross, and that he stripped the rulers and authorities of their power, triumphing over them by the cross.

The thread of the series is picked up here: the flourishing life is not found by adding Jesus to everything else. It is found by recognizing that Jesus is fully God, that we are complete in him, and that every rival power, "not some, all," has been defeated by his cross. The pastor draws three reasons from it, then answers questions from the congregation.

Message Outline

1. What You Remember Shapes Your Life

• Memory is powerful. A song takes you back to a place, a smell to a childhood home. The scent of an old aftershave reminds the pastor of two members of his family who have since died, "as if I were standing right beside them."
• In the middle of a move, he stops over old photo albums and relives a whole season of his life. What happened years ago can shape the way we see ourselves today.
• "If you only remember your failures, you will live very cautiously. If you only remember your wounds, you will live on the defensive." Whoever remembers only what was said about them will spend their life trying to prove it wrong, and whoever remembers only their losses will be afraid to hope.
• That is why Scripture calls us again and again to remember: who God is, what he has done, his promises and his faithfulness. But above all, the New Testament calls us to remember Jesus, his death, his resurrection and what he accomplished at the cross.
• Paul does not describe the cross as a merely tragic death, a beautiful example or a religious symbol. He describes it as the moment when something decisive happened: what looked like Jesus' defeat was his victory. "God wins through apparent weakness."

2. The Cross Settles Your Past

• Many carry an invisible file: things they wish they had done or not done, words they regret, choices they would undo if they could.
• The pastor tells how, a few days before the unexpected death of his older brother, his brother shouted hurtful words at him during a heated argument. He did not answer, and never spoke to him again. For a long time he lived with that regret and with unanswered questions: could he have stepped in more during the grief his brother was going through?
• Sometimes others also keep a record against us: "You've done it before, you're doing it again." And we silently conclude: "That's what I'll always be."
• Paul speaks of "the record of charges that stood against us": an accounting term, a written debt, sealed, impossible to repay. Grace does not mean saying that evil does not matter. It costs, because sin had to be dealt with.
• God did not put this document away in a drawer to take it out again later. The debt was not postponed: it was paid by Jesus. "You don't have to build your identity on your worst day."
• The pastor quotes Micah 7:19, where God casts our sins into the depths of the sea. Corrie ten Boom added that God threw them into the sea of his forgetfulness and put up a sign: "No fishing." Because we keep going back to fish.
• Forgiveness does not erase the consequences and does not remove the need for repair, honesty, apologies or change. But "the cross is bigger than my guilt, God's mercy is bigger than my shame."
• He distinguishes conviction from condemnation. Conviction is the voice of the Spirit: "Come back to me." Condemnation says: "This is all you will ever be. Stay away from God." The first leads to God, the second pushes you to hide. "If you hide because of your guilt, that is not God."

3. Your Life Is Held by Grace, Not by Perfect Decisions

• The pastor speaks to young adults in their twenties and thirties, caught in the comparisons of social media, where people post their meals and trips, rarely their failures or fears.
• Where to work, where to study, who to live with, who to trust, have I already missed my chance? The cross is a reminder that our lives do not depend on our ability to make every decision perfectly. They are held by grace.
• He believes that some ways of teaching about God's plan can do harm. Early in his Christian life, he was taught that he had to find God's one and only design, or else miss it. He thinks instead that God sometimes places several good options in front of us, and that he meets us in the one we choose.
• "If you get it wrong, your life is not over." Pray, think it through, seek advice, then decide. If God does not forbid it in his Word, do not be afraid to trust him in your everyday choices. It is not your past that has the last word, it is the victory of the cross.

4. The Powers Have Been Disarmed

• The problem is not only the guilt within us. There are also powers around us: spiritual, political, cultural, and patterns of thought that hold us captive. They promise life and produce death.
• The pastor names them: comparison, which says your life only counts if it looks better than someone else's; consumption, which sells you a new identity; achievement, which makes you earn your identity through a degree or a position; appearance, which turns the body into a product to display instead of a temple to honor.
• He adds outrage, which confuses anger with courage; isolation, which persuades you that no one will understand you; cynicism, "so insidious," which tells you that you are naive to trust Jesus; and fear, which tells you that obeying God is too risky.
• These voices speak loudly and act as if they were in control. Paul says they are not. The Roman Empire, the religious authorities, the mocking crowd and even the tomb thought they had the last word. They were wrong.
• God confronts the violence of the world not by becoming more violent, but through the self-giving love of Jesus. Jesus absorbs hatred without becoming hateful. At the resurrection, God declares that forgiveness is stronger than accusation, hope stronger than despair, life stronger than death.
• "We do not fight for victory as if the outcome of God's kingdom were uncertain. We stand in victory, because God's victory is certain."

5. The Cross Teaches You to Live Victoriously

• The pastor acknowledges that this point is often misunderstood "in our Pentecostal tribe." Living victoriously does not mean getting everything, never facing anything or always being right. It means that when trials come knocking at your door, you can stand firm and keep hope.
• The world says victory means going up: Jesus came down. Protecting yourself: Jesus gave himself. Defeating your enemies: Jesus loved his enemies. Being served: Jesus came "not to be served, but to serve."
• "What really worries me is when Pentecostals start talking like the world," with the same definitions of victory, simply dressed up in religious language.
• The flourishing life is not having the most attention, money or influence. It is a life more and more rooted in Jesus, where love grows stronger than fear and character matters more than image.
• He calls this a "cruciform" life, shaped by the cross. "It's not glamorous, but it is glorious." It sometimes feels like losing, but resurrection always grows where the life of Christ has been sown.
• "We do not just carry the cross, we are shaped by it": our relationships, our decisions, our ambitions, our money, the way we treat others. Your feelings are real but they do not tell you who you are. Your circumstances are real but they do not define God's faithfulness.

6. Questions and Answers: Family Patterns and the Sufficiency of the Cross

• First question: if our sins are erased, why do we see repeated patterns in a family line, such as alcoholism? The pastor distinguishes the penalty of sin, broken at the cross, from the presence of sin, which still has to be dealt with.
• He speaks mostly of behaviors learned from one generation to the next, more than of a "generational curse." As the first Christian in his family, he says he brought to the cross a strong family tendency toward certain addictions.
• He quotes John 3:16, John 1:29 ("Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!") and 1 John 2:2, as well as Galatians 3:13: Christ bore and broke the curse of the law.
• He takes up a formula from the Reformers: the cross is sufficient for all, and it becomes effective in those who surrender to it.
• How do you lay these things down? Not by drawing up an exhaustive list out of fear of forgetting a sin. Martin Luther, while confessing every fault, ended up panicking at the thought of having forgotten some. When God brings something to light, name it before him and deal with it. "You don't have to do the Holy Spirit's job. He knows very well how to lead us into freedom."

7. Questions and Answers: Forgiving and Following the Call Without Relying on Your Emotions

• If I have forgiven, why does the anger come back? "Forgiveness is not a feeling. It is an act of the will, a decision of the heart." Your behavior follows your decision, not your emotions.
• The pastor tells of having to forgive one person every day for nearly fifteen years, feeling like a hypocrite for a long time. He went from hatred to genuine love, without ever putting himself back in a position to be hurt or letting his family be hurt.
• When the devil whispers "you haven't forgiven," you can answer: "You are a liar. I have forgiven, and my feelings show that I still need God's grace." He also warns against treating a deep wound lightly (Jeremiah 6:14) and recommends the book Forgiveness by his friend Jim Graham.
• How can you be sure you are on the path God wants? Every decision requires some faith, and faith comes from hearing the Word. Our victory comes not from the strength of our faith but from its object: Jesus and his finished work.
• A passing unease is not a signal to leave. An unease that has settled in for months, with positive reasons (serving more, learning, glorifying Jesus), deserves to be examined. Negative reasons alone are not enough.
• The pastor shares the uncertainty caused by a move he has been expecting for two and a half years, after more than twenty moves since his marriage. You do not base a decision on the emotion of the moment, but on the conviction of following God's call. "A flourishing life and a successful life are not the same thing."

Key Takeaways

• What you remember shapes how you live: first remember what Jesus accomplished at the cross.
• The record of charges against you has been erased. The debt is paid, so you do not have to build your identity on your worst day.
• Conviction brings you back to God, condemnation pushes you to hide. Condemnation never comes from God.
• The loud powers (comparison, fear, cynicism, isolation) were disarmed at the cross.
• Christian victory takes the shape of the cross: going down, giving yourself, loving your enemies, serving.

Personal Application

1. In hard moments, what do you remember first: your failures, your wounds, what has been said about you, or the cross?
2. Which "file" from your past do you keep reopening even though you have handed it over to Jesus?
3. Does the guilt you feel right now draw you closer to God or push you to hide?
4. Which of these powers (comparison, consumption, achievement, appearance, cynicism, fear) speaks the loudest in your life today?
5. Is there someone you have decided to forgive and toward whom you need to keep acting on that decision, even when your emotions do not follow?

Verses Cited

• Colossians 2:8-15
• Micah 7:19
• Mark 10:45
• John 3:16
• John 1:29
• 1 John 2:2
• Galatians 3:13
• Jeremiah 6:14
• Romans 10:17

Frequently Asked Questions

What does "the record of charges that stood against us" mean in Colossians 2:14?

For Malcolm Duncan, Paul uses an accounting term: a written, documented, sealed debt that was impossible to repay. At the cross, God did not put this document away in a drawer or postpone the due date: the debt was paid by Jesus and the record was erased. So you do not have to build your identity on your worst day.

What is the difference between conviction and condemnation?

Conviction comes from the Spirit of God: it shows you something to settle and calls you to come back to him. Condemnation tells you: "This is all you will ever be, stay away from God." Conviction leads to God, condemnation pushes you to hide. If your guilt pushes you to hide, that is not God.

If I have forgiven, why do I still feel angry?

Malcolm Duncan explains that forgiveness is not a feeling but an act of the will, a decision of the heart. Emotions can come back without canceling that decision. Your behavior follows your decision, not your emotions. He tells of having to forgive someone every day for years before his feelings changed.