Titles are a part of the old self. These are a part of what stays behind on this Earth, but have no place among us that are not of this Earth. So we must be a people without titles.
Colossians 3:11 ESV
Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free; but Christ is all, and in all.
These are not easy, because we seek to think more highly of ourselves and less of those that are different than us, or those that set their hearts and minds against us. Therefore, we place titles and names that are intended to entrap and ensnare our “enemies” as the other, because we don’t want them to have any place with us.
This, however, sets our minds on the Earth, but earlier in Colossians we are instructed to be people that set our hearts and minds on that which is above, for with Christ we have been transformed by the death of sin upon the cross.
Colossians 3:1-4 ESV
If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.
Is the glory of God shining through in your life? Is our life so obvious that people cannot help but know that we are transformed and people that are renewed. Or do we have things in our life that are less than glorified. Are we perfect? Or do we still have much work to do?
Colossians points out things that we all still have much work to do. Because we are impure, God’s wrath must be satiated, and we must be cleansed. So if we stop looking outward and pointing the finger at those around us, putting down the people that we are against, we need to look at the stuff, the junk, that weighs us down, look deep down within and cleanse the ugliness within, rather than pointing out the ugliness in the other.
Colossians 3:5-10 ESV
Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. On account of these the wrath of God is coming. In these you too once walked, when you were living in them. But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator.
We are called to shed titles, and instead let the glory of God shine through us. When we allow the scales of our own sin to fall, we no longer will need to point out how someone is different, but rather you will be able to see the fact that those we see as other, or enemy, or different as Christ’s beloved.
Elpis and Shalom 