4 having heard of your faith in Christ Jesus, and of the love that `is' to all the saints,
Because of this I also, having heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus, and the love to all the saints,
unceasingly remembering of you the work of the faith, and the labour of the love, and the endurance of the hope, of our Lord Jesus Christ, in the presence of our God and Father,
hearing of thy love and faith that thou hast unto the Lord Jesus and toward all the saints,
and not only in his presence, but also in the comfort with which he was comforted over you, declaring to us your longing desire, your lamentation, your zeal for me, so that the more I did rejoice,
And now Timotheus having come unto us from you, and having declared good news to us of your faith and love, and that ye have a good remembrance of us always, desiring much to see us, as we also `to see' you,
And concerning the brotherly love, ye have no need of `my' writing to you, for ye yourselves are God-taught to love one another, for ye do it also to all the brethren who `are' in all Macedonia; and we call upon you, brethren, to abound still more,
for God is not unrighteous to forget your work, and the labour of the love, that ye shewed to His name, having ministered to the saints and ministering;
who through him do believe in God, who did raise out of the dead, and glory to him did give, so that your faith and hope may be in God. Your souls having purified in the obedience of the truth through the Spirit to brotherly love unfeigned, out of a pure heart one another love ye earnestly, being begotten again, not out of seed corruptible, but incorruptible, through a word of God -- living and remaining -- to the age;
and this is His command, that we may believe in the name of His Son Jesus Christ, and may love one another, even as He did give command to us,
and we -- we have known and believed the love, that God hath in us; God is love, and he who is remaining in the love, in God he doth remain, and God in him.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Colossians 1
Commentary on Colossians 1 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 1
We have here,
Col 1:1-2
Col 1:3-8
Here he proceeds to the body of the epistle, and begins with thanksgiving to God for what he had heard concerning them, though he had no personal acquaintance with them, and knew their state and character only by the reports of others.
Col 1:9-11
The apostle proceeds in these verses to pray for them. He heard that they were good, and he prayed that they might be better. He was constant in this prayer: We do not cease to pray for you. It may be he could hear of them but seldom, but he constantly prayed for them.-And desire that you may be filled with the knowledge, etc. Observe what it is that he begs of God for them,
Col 1:12-29
Here is a summary of the doctrine of the gospel concerning the great work of our redemption by Christ. It comes in here not as the matter of a sermon, but as the matter of a thanksgiving; for our salvation by Christ furnishes us with abundant matter of thanksgiving in every view of it: Giving thanks unto the Father, v. 12. He does not discourse of the work of redemption in the natural order of it; for then he would speak of the purchase of it first, and afterwards of the application of it. But here he inverts the order, because, in our sense and feeling of it, the application goes before the purchase. We first find the benefits of redemption in our hearts, and then are led by those streams to the original and fountain-head. The order and connection of the apostle's discourse may be considered in the following manner:-