COLOSSIANS 3 TEACHES A JESUS OF FAITH AND HAS NO INTEREST IN A HISTORICAL JESUS

 
Like 2 Corinthians, Colossians 3 – a letter allegedly by Paul but recognised by scholars as a forgery - teaches the following, “You have been brought back to true life, that is life with God, with Christ. Your new existence as a reborn person is as different as Jesus’ life is now that he has been raised from the dead, so you must look for the things of Heaven where Christ is seated at God’s right hand. Think on these heavenly things and not things that are on earth because your life on earth is dead and you have a new heavenly life now. The life you have now is hidden with Christ in God and in spite of that when Christ is revealed – and he is your life – you too will be revealed in all your glory with him as well.”
 
This says that Christ somehow is the Church that is a community of people who have been resurrected spiritually. They have been resurrected with him. “You have been brought back to true life … with Christ.” “He is your life”.
 
Experience was what mattered not reason in this theology. The pagan mystery religions did the same thing. You could become the god. If experience said so it was true even if contradictions happened.
 
Christians are to be concerned only with how Jesus has been changed and resurrected and how they have been changed and forget everything else and especially earthly things. The early Church had no interest in a Jesus life story.
 
Let us explore this.
 
Paul’s forger says we must forget our old lives. This seems to mean our old sins but it means more than that for why say we must forget earth things if you mean sins? He lays into the sins later because they are not just what he means. Evidences for Jesus, stories of his life, if they exist are to be forgotten for all that is of earth has to be left behind and only Heaven matters now for you are a citizen of Heaven and delivered from the earth. This implies certainty of going to Heaven after you die and more importantly that living like a heavenly person who is only interested in serving God and not in anything else is the way for you now. You don’t seek to preserve stories about Jesus if they exist you just get on with living the gospel. If we are to forget about the earthly Jesus if there was one we can be confident that the gospels are unreliable for the church was under no obligation to care about accuracy or the stories. If the stories were preserved then they cannot be trusted because the resurrection implied that Jesus forbade this. Paul’s impersonator says that our life is hidden with Christ in God but will be revealed when Christ is. We know by experience that we have been spiritually saved and resurrected but there will be no evidence for this until Christ appears. So we can’t know from proving his miracles or his resurrection. That means this Jesus never had a known life story.
 
Colossians gives no indication of knowing that Jesus lived and died on a cross through historical data. The thought is that since Christians experience a resurrection from the death of sin to a new life free from vice and salvation in life that Jesus rose. From that it was concluded that he must have died for sinners.