Carnival Games

Colossians 2:8-9, Colossians 1:12-14

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Our Bible passage today comes from Saint Paul’s letter to the Colossians chapter two. He’s speaking here to Christians who have learned to know of God’s grace. And then we hear verse eight.

See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deceit, which are in accord with human tradition, namely, the basic principles of the world, but not in accord with Christ. For all the fullness of God’s being dwells bodily in Christ. (Colossians 2:8-9)

Many years ago when I was in high school, a friend of mine went to a carnival and he brought quite a bit of money with him, which today would be about $200 worth. And while he was there, he got talked into doing what they call a Coke bottle tip, where you take a little hook and try to pull a Coke bottle and make it stand up straight. And the man running the carnival, the vendor, was able to keep him playing this game for such a long time that he finally got all of his money away from him. It ended up being what would today be about $200. And my friend was so mad at himself that he was duped by this individual. They claim that carnival vendors can often spot easy targets and they even change what they say to people depending on what they know about them and what they can tell about them by just looking at them. And it’s all part of the game ultimately to try to get some money away from them. And so what’s at stake is really not a lot necessarily, although in my friend’s case, it was.

But Saint Paul is discussing a game in a sense that’s with much higher stakes. In fact, the highest stakes, and that is our relationship to Christ as our Savior and by faith in him, the very hope that we have of going to heaven. Early in the letter, Saint Paul reminds us of the blessings that we have of knowing Christ. Listen, he says,

[God] has qualified you to share in the inheritance of his holy people in the kingdom of light. For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. (Colossians 1:12-14)

But now he’s warning his readers about being deceived by people telling us other philosophies and view of life. And in our culture, there are many voices out there speaking to us and calling out to us, wanting to lure us away from our faith and our Savior. And some of them will appear to appeal to our intellect, maybe trying to come up with arguments and philosophical positions that appeal to our intellect. Other voices may appeal to our sinful cravings inside of us. Some may try to tempt us away with worldly prizes and wealth. But all of these in some way, shape or form will appeal to our sinful pride.

And Paul is saying be careful and aware of the motive in the heart of the person calling out to you. Whoever comes to you with deceptive philosophies wants to ultimately rob you and steal things from you. But in order to accomplish that, they have to do something that sounds flattering or they have to say something to us that sounds like it’s going to give us something beneficial. But in the end, it ends up being deceptive and something to steal from us. The Greek word that Paul uses here is the word for being cheated, just like my friend got cheated out of all that money. It’s a word we might use in a case of fraud. It’s the only place in the New Testament where this is used. It literally means to be carried away like a spoil of war, that someone picks you up and carries you off like a spoil of war. And that’s really what Paul is warning us about.

I’m sure that my friend later warned his children about being careful of going to the carnival and to protect their money and things. The faith that God wants us to protect, which is certainly much more valuable. That takes some vigilance on our part to protect that faith. And God does that by always bringing us back to the feet of our Savior who has won our hope of heaven for us and given us the forgiveness of all of our sins. And by staying close to him in his word, there will be great blessings for us. Blessed are those who hear the Word of God and keep it. Amen.