Can you imagine what it must have been like to sit and talk with Jesus? We believe that Jesus was God made flesh. In other words, Jesus is God.

So if you were sitting and having a conversation with Jesus, you were sitting and having a conversation directly with God. Wow.

I’m not sure which is more difficult for me to wrap my mind around: the humanity of Christ or the Deity of Christ. Both are equally challenging, but as Paul writes to the church in Colossae, he seems to be focused on the Deity of Christ. In Colossians 1, for example, he says that Christ is the image of God:

The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.

Colossians 1:15

Jesus is the image of the invisible God. He is the physical representation of God, who is spirit. He truly represents God in the way that God was intended to be represented. In a similar way that man and woman, Adam and Eve, were created and formed so as to represent – to image – God, Jesus was the true image. The things that he did. The things that he said. The way that he lived. The holiness of God in human form. The way that he gave himself for each of us. The way that he reigns over his kingdom. Even today, even now, Jesus represents God in a human form.

But there is a very important difference between Jesus and what God intended for Adam and Eve. Adam and Eve were created. Jesus was the firstborn over all of creation, meaning he himself was the creator. Paul goes on to say that Jesus created all things. Everything. Everything was created for him.

And then, even further, Jesus is both the ruler and the redeemer over all things. The creation is his. All of it was made for him, yet at the same time, he both cares for the creation and redeems it all back to God through his blood.

So Christ isn’t just given authority. He also has authority because he is the creator. He is the one for whom all things were made.

And yet he is also the one who walked here on the earth in human form!

Paul punctuates this discussion again in the second chapter in saying that Christ is the fullness of the Deity in and of himself:

For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, and in Christ you have been brought to fullness. He is the head over every power and authority.

Colossians 2:9-10

Paul is saying that Jesus isn’t just a created person, like one of us. Yes, he is the image of the invisible God, so he is a human like us, but he is also the fullness of the Deity. In other words, he is fully God. Even though he lived, and still lives even today in bodily form, he also is fully God. He did not lose any part of being God because he took on human form, but instead he is still fully God and he continues to rule and reign as God even today.

It would have been amazing to have known Jesus as he walked the earth. It would have been illuminating. We would have known what to do. We would have been able to understand everything that God wants from us.

Right?

Well, except the disciples messed it up. The disciples abandoned Jesus. Despite Jesus having explained to them his plan, they didn’t understand.

But we do still have the words that Jesus spoke. We can hear directly from him. We can understand what God wants from us even today. We can hear directly from God by reading the words that Jesus spoke.

In fact, we probably have an even greater advantage because we can listen to him with hindsight. We can see the plan in the context of the rest of history. We can see what God is doing from creation to the life of Christ and then understand where we fit, what God wants from us, and the life that he wants us to take even today.

If we will listen to him.

If we will trust him.

There are incredible implications to the fact that Jesus is the fullness of the Deity. It means that we can listen to the words of the Deity. As we read the word of God, we can “hear” the words of God coming from Christ. Yes, the Holy Spirit lives within us and we can hear from him as well. In fact, we must! Yet, if there is any doubt, we can directly read the words of God. We can directly understand his plan. And we can directly move forward based on what he has told us to do.

The fullness of the Deity in a human form should create within us the fullness of Christ living within us, if we will fully place our faith in him and do what he has called us to do. May that be the reality within which we live today and ongoing!