Biblion Bible Commentary
Read the introduction to Colossians · About this commentary
Presenting Everyone Complete
Colossians 1:28-29
28 We proclaim him, admonishing every man and teaching every man in all wisdom, that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus; · WEB
Three times in one verse Paul says every man — and the goal he names is the word the teachers were selling.
Whom we proclaim, admonishing every man and teaching every man in all wisdom, that we may present every man complete in Christ.
The repetition is not accidental and it is not style. Three times in a single sentence, in a letter answering people who divided Christians into the advanced and the ordinary. Whatever tiering was being taught at Colossae, Paul's ministry has one category.
The two verbs cover both directions: admonishing is corrective, teaching is constructive, and both are done in all wisdom — again the teachers' own word, claimed for ordinary instruction.
And the goal is the sharpest choice in the verse: to present every man complete. The word means mature, finished, brought to its intended end, and it is precisely what an initiation system exists to offer a few. Paul says it is the aim for all of them, and that it is in Christ rather than beyond him.
Verse 29 admits the cost. For this I also labor, striving according to his working which works in me mightily. The verb behind striving is the athlete's word for contending to exhaustion — and the energy expended is credited to someone else.
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