Colossians 3:1-4 (ESV)

[1] If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. [2] Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. [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.

When he says to set our minds on things above, what does that mean? It does not mean, set your thoughts on ethereal, spiritual things versus earthly things like work, commitment, marriage and family, etc. This is not the Greek philosophy that says physical things are evil and spiritual things are good. Paul defines his terms in the next verses. He defines earthly things as, “sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry” (Col 3:5). These things are to be put to death.

These are expressions of the brokenness that resulted from Adam’s sin, but they are not what define the believer. He goes on to write, “In these you too once walked, when you were living in them” (Col 3:7). We are no longer living in them. As believers we are now living in Christ. As such, behavior from that previous life is inappropriate. Our past behavior does not define us. Our identity is found in Christ, with whom we have been raised to new life.

What does Christ’s life look like? “Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive” (Col 3:12-13). Why? Because that is who we are now in Christ. That is our new identity. As believers in Jesus Christ we are not only forgiven of our sins, we are given an entirely new identity.

As believers it is now love that ought to bind us together, peace that ought to rule in our hearts, and the Word of God that ought to dwell in us richly, “teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God” (Col 3:16). These things ought to be true of us, not because it will keep God happy with us, or conversely that it will keep God from being angry with us, but because this is who we are.

As believers in Jesus Christ our identity is no longer found in our earthly passions, our former way of life, nor our sinful habits that we sometimes find so hard to break. Our identity is now found in Christ. To set our minds on things above is not to be thinking about gold paved streets, and wondering how to play the harp. It is to set our minds on the very life of Christ in whom we find our life.

Today, let us practice setting our minds on the character of Christ, for that is who we are. When the Apostle wrote, “forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead” (Php 3:13), I think this is what he meant. When the writer of Hebrews wrote, “looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith” (Heb 12:2). I think this is what he meant. It is time that we, as believers in Jesus Christ, stop fixating on what we did wrong, and what we do wrong, and begin to fix our eyes on Jesus, set our minds on our identity in Christ, and actually believe that we have a new identity, for we “have been raised with Christ” (Col 3:1).