J. L. Terveen Colossians 2
14
giving grace, a picture which again Paul grounds thoroughly in his christological
touchstone of union with Christ. He casts the fundamental structure for this metaphor in
a classic Pauline contrast between "then/once" and "now" (
; 1:21-22),
48
between their pre-Christian status and their current Christian existence.
Pauls contrast begins with a description of the Colossian believers former state
as
.
49
The following phrases clearly indicate the figurative sense of "deadness"
here, spiritual death.
50
The two causal datives establish the grounds of their former
condition of spiritual death. First, they acted out their rebellion against God through
"trespasses,"
51
deliberately violating the laws of God and setting themselves in hostility
against him. Further, Pauls description of them as "uncircumcised in your flesh,"
recalling for a moment the circumcision terminology of 2:11, is likely used as a symbol
of their spiritual status as pagans ostensibly Gentile unbelievers outside the covenant of
God and alienated from him (Eph. 2:11-12).
52
So in both deed and standing, the Gentile
Christians of Colossae had once been spiritually dead, hostile to God and separated
utterly from his life and grace. Paul bluntly sets out their former spiritual condition to
draw attention to the stunningly gracious quickening power of God, to which he now
turns.
With the finite aorist verb
Paul turns to the "now" of the
Colossian believers spiritual status, a condition based on their past experience of Gods
life-giving grace. A virtual synonym for
, the unusual
draws on a typical contemporary Jewish concept for God as one "who gives life to the
dead."
54
The prepositional
phrase directly attached to
stresses the
prefix and emphatically draws attention once again to the