Colossians 3:14 (KJV)
And above all these things put on charity, which is the bond of perfectness.
Barnes writes (forgive the length of this quote), “The bond of all perfection; the thing which will unite all other things, and make them complete; compare the parallel place in Ephesians 4:3. The idea seems to be that love will bind all the other graces fast together, and render the whole system complete. Without love, though there might be other graces and virtues, there would be a want of harmony and compactness in our Christian graces, and this was necessary to unite and complete the whole. There is great beauty in the expression, and it contains most important truth. If it were possible to conceive that the other graces could exist among a Christian people, yet there would be a sad incompleteness, a painful want of harmony and union, if love were not the reigning principle. Nor faith, nor zeal, nor prophecy, nor the power of speaking with the tongue of angels, would answer the purpose.”
I refer you to the International Standard Bible Encyclopedia for its definition of the word charity. ISBE says the word agape was probably used by Paul for the purpose of expressing the relationship of Christians in community—the local church.
Colossians says of this charity that it is “the bond of perfectness.” It is the thing that unites everything else in the gifts and graces of the Christian life. Without it, everything else becomes meaningless.
Most of us would think of this as belonging to the Christian as an individual, but the Bible is a book of community. Christians exist together. The thing that makes everything else in the local church work is our charity—our unique love one for another.
And this is the very thing I think we too often ignore and miss. It is the thing the devil has stolen from us through the idea of the invisible church. We do not cultivate and guard charity in the church as we ought. The result is a church filled with individualists. They might all claim to have love for mankind, love for the faith, and love for Christ, yet they often lack the kind of love for their church that brings unity, maturity, and complete “perfection” into it.
It is charity—fervent love for our church—that we need above all else.
#BondOfPerfectness #BiblicalCharity #LoveBuildsTheChurch #LocalChurchTruth #ChristianUnity
The One Thing Your Church Needs Above Everything Else: Is This the Missing Piece in Many Churches Today?
What do you think—has charity been overlooked in today’s churches?
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