Your life is hidden with Christ in God

August 10, 2025
Scripture: Colossians 3:3–5 (ESV)
3 For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.
4 When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.
5 Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry.

Last week, I spoke about how religious activities themselves are not the essence of the Christian life, but rather spiritual fellowship with the Lord is what truly matters. This does not mean that religious activities are useless or unnecessary. The problem is when religious activities themselves are equated with the Christian life.

Now, the life of a Christian is a daily battle — a battle against our sinful nature, a battle of faith in the midst of difficult circumstances, and a battle against spiritual enemies. Yet, even in such circumstances, Christians rejoice. That is because we have hope.
Today, let us think together about the hope that the Bible teaches.

Verse 3
For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.

When the Bible speaks of "death," it can be confusing, so let me summarize:
Before salvation → Spiritually dead in relation to God (Ephesians 2:1)
At the moment of salvation → The old self dies with Christ (Romans 6:6; Colossians 3:3)
After salvation → Raised with Christ to live in new life (Colossians 3:1–4)
Being dead before salvation means being spiritually dead — having no spiritual life and living only with physical life. When Adam sinned, this spiritual life died. In other words, our relationship with God was cut off, and we could not have spiritual fellowship with Him.
Next, at the moment of salvation, we died — this refers to death to our sinful nature. This is a declaration and a change of position. God justifies us because we are born again. However, this death does not mean that the sinful nature disappears. It marks the beginning of the battle against sin.
The sinful nature within us does not grow weaker. Sin is a force that resists the desire to do what is right, like friction — the more you move forward, the more the resistance increases. If you do not try to obey God, sin remains quiet. But the moment you try to obey God’s Word, the power of sin rises up to stop you.

Yet God has given us a way to fight this sin — the new life.
This new life is spiritual life, born within us at the moment of salvation, and it is a life without sin. The Holy Spirit works in this new life.
The Holy Spirit convicts us of sin and gives us power to fight it.
If you now recognize as sin what you once did without hesitation, it is because you have this new life. The desire to forsake sin, to love Jesus, and to obey His Word is proof that this new life has been given to you.
In short, Christians live with both a new life and a sinful nature that is declared dead but still actively at work.
The battle with sin is fierce, and no one can completely overcome it in this life.

Paul has in mind baptism here. The meaning of baptism is to express with our bodies that just as Christ died on the cross, we have died to our old self, and just as Christ was raised, we are raised to live as a new self.
But there is a problem — even after baptism, even after experiencing the work of the Holy Spirit, even after being set on fire in a church revival meeting, the sinful nature is not gone. When the excitement fades, nothing seems to have changed — sometimes the cooling is even harder because the heat was once so high.

One church elder confessed, “I have lived the Christian life for decades, but the sins that come to my mind are the same as before.” Was he a lazy believer? No. As an elder, he was considered devout and served far more than others. He was simply being honest.

So, we live in hope.
The latter half of verse 3 says:
Your life is hidden with Christ in God.
This life refers to the new life — the life completely free from sin. That life has not yet been given to us in its fullness.
“Hidden” can also be expressed as “kept” or “guarded.” The new life — the new existence — is kept safe until the appointed time. This will be realized at the return of Christ.

Verse 4
When Christ, who is our life, is revealed, then you also will be revealed with Him in glory.

This is what is often referred to as Regeneration → Sanctification → Glorification.
Glorification is when we will be completely freed from sin and given a life of perfect righteousness.
Right now, we are living in the process of Sanctification.
The process of sanctification is a battle against sin.
What is required of us in this age is to live in a way that is worthy of God’s people.

In verse 5, Paul writes very concretely about sanctification:
“Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry.” (Colossians 3:5 ESV)
Simply put, he is saying: Stop idolatry.
An idol is anything you worship as “god” besides the one true God.
In modern terms, it means living under the control of, and in obedience to, something other than God.
For modern people, idols are less about other religions and more about living according to the evil desires that arise from within.

“Covetousness” in Greek is πλεονεξία (pleonexía)
πλείων (pleion) = “more”
ἔχω (echo) = “to have”
→ “The desire to have more” = insatiable desire, greed.
Here Paul points to two types of idolatry:

Things the Bible strictly forbids
Pornography, gambling, illegal drugs, fortune-telling, witchcraft, adultery, homosexual acts, premarital sex.
Good gifts from God that can become greed
Food, sex, work, property, money, rest, entertainment, relationships, technology.

The Bible speaks very strongly about these: “Put them to death.”

“Put to death” — original word and grammar
Greek: νεκρώσατε (nekrosate)
Root: νεκρόω (nekroō) = “to kill,” “to render dead”
Grammar: Aorist imperative, 2nd person plural
→ A strong command for a decisive, once-for-all action — “completely, decisively.”
This “putting to death” means breaking off old behavioral patterns so that you can walk in new ways.

Recent brain science has shown that when we repeat an action, the brain creates a neural pathway.
Once a pathway is formed, the command to act flows through it automatically—without going through conscious thought and decision-making.
When the Bible says “put to death,” it is essentially saying: Cut off that pathway.
To cut it off, you must stop the behavior for a certain period.
Then, to prevent it from being rebuilt, you must establish a new habit that forms an alternative pathway.

For example, a person with alcohol addiction has developed a pathway that says, “Drinking makes me happy.”
Normally, before drinking, a person weighs pros and cons and decides — “I have something to do today, so I won’t drink,” or “I can’t afford it this month, so I’ll skip it.”
But someone with that pathway doesn’t reach that decision point — the brain automatically commands: “Drink now,” and the body obeys.
Sin works in the same way.
When we habitually commit a sin, a pathway is formed.
In certain situations, the brain is already commanding the behavior before we consciously choose.
Greed is, in one sense, when such a pathway is firmly established.
The brain, thinking “This is a frequently used behavior, let’s automate it,” bypasses the prefrontal cortex (where we consciously deliberate) and reacts automatically.
The beauty of God’s creation is that such a pathway can be weakened if we stop using it.
At the same time, new, healthy pathways can be formed by repeatedly practicing godly behaviors.
In neuroscience, substitution is known to be effective — it’s faster to replace a bad habit with a good one than to simply stop the bad one.

Biblically speaking:
Sanctification is the process in which the old “pathways” of sinful habits and thoughts are replaced by new “pathways” of obedience to God’s Word.
This means the key is in our moment-by-moment thoughts and actions:
Will I choose sin, or rely on the Holy Spirit?
Will I obey God’s Word, or follow the pattern of the world?
If sexual immorality, evil desire, or greed arises and we follow it, we will repeat it and be ruled by it.
But if we cut it off and build godly pathways through the Word and the Spirit, we will be transformed.

Sin always stirs up evil thoughts and actions within us.
It destroys relationships and ruins the good life God intends.
If we are Christians, we must, by the help of the Holy Spirit, decisively reject the various temptations to sin that arise within us.
The brain will pattern our lives according to the actions we continually choose.
God desires that we live a blessed life free from the grip of sin.
For that, we must, through the Spirit’s work, keep building godly habits.

Closing Prayer
Lord Jesus,
Thank You that my life is hidden with You in God. Thank You for giving me new life by Your death and resurrection.
I confess that my sinful nature still resists Your will. Please help me, by the Holy Spirit, to put to death the old patterns and to build new habits of obedience to Your Word.
When temptation comes, remind me that I am dead to sin and alive to God. Strengthen my desire for Your glory and my love for others. Shape my heart and actions into Your likeness, until the day You appear and I am revealed with You in glory.
In Jesus’ name, Amen.