4 When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory.
4 When Christ who is your
4 When Christ (your real life, remember) shows up again on this earth, you'll show up, too - the real you, the glorious you. Meanwhile, be content with obscurity, like Christ.
4 When Christ who is our life appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory.
4 And when Christ, who is your life, is revealed to the whole world, you will share in all his glory.
40 since God had planned something better for us so that only together with us would they be made perfect.
40 God having provided
40 since God had provided something better for us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect.
40 God had a better plan for us: that their faith and our faith would come together to make one completed whole, their lives of faith not complete apart from ours.
40 God having provided something better for us, that they should not be made perfect apart from us.
40 For God had something better in mind for us, so that they would not reach perfection without us.
(Read Hebrews 11:39-40)
The world considers that the righteous are not worthy to live in the world, and God declares the world is not worthy of them. Though the righteous and the worldlings widely differ in their judgment, they agree in this, it is not fit that good men should have their rest in this world. Therefore God receives them out of it. The apostle tells the Hebrews, that God had provided some better things for them, therefore they might be sure that he expected as good things from them. As our advantages, with the better things God has provided for us, are so much beyond theirs, so should our obedience of faith, patience of hope, and labour of love, be greater. And unless we get true faith as these believers had, they will rise up to condemn us at the last day. Let us then pray continually for the increase of our faith, that we may follow these bright examples, and be, with them, at length made perfect in holiness and happiness, and shine like the sun in the kingdom of our Father for evermore.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on Colossians 3:4
Commentary on Colossians 3:1-4
(Read Colossians 3:1-4)
As Christians are freed from the ceremonial law, they must walk the more closely with God in gospel obedience. As heaven and earth are contrary one to the other, both cannot be followed together; and affection to the one will weaken and abate affection to the other. Those that are born again are dead to sin, because its dominion is broken, its power gradually subdued by the operation of grace, and it shall at length be extinguished by the perfection of glory. To be dead, then, means this, that those who have the Holy Spirit, mortifying within them the lusts of the flesh, are able to despise earthly things, and to desire those that are heavenly. Christ is, at present, one whom we have not seen; but our comfort is, that our life is safe with him. The streams of this living water flow into the soul by the influences of the Holy Spirit, through faith. Christ lives in the believer by his Spirit, and the believer lives to him in all he does. At the second coming of Christ, there will be a general assembling of all the redeemed; and those whose life is now hid with Christ, shall then appear with him in his glory. Do we look for such happiness, and should we not set our affections upon that world, and live above this?