Colossians 1:19 

What is the big deal about Jesus? He has attracted a combination of devotion and opposition like no other person in the history of the world.

He lived 20 centuries ago, but every single second, millions of people are studying what He said. His birth divides B.C. (Before Christ) from A.D. (Anno Domini, or, the year of our Lord). Every time you write out the date, you are acknowledging the birth of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. He started with a handful of disciples—today, 31%[RH1]   of the world’s population names the name of Christ Jesus.

Only Jesus Reveals the Father

“For it pleased the Father that in Him all the fullness should dwell” (Colossians 1:19). Jesus is “the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation” (Colossians 1:15).

There is no way we could come to or understand God by reason, religion or ritual. We have to know God by revelation. Somebody has to take us by the hand and introduce us to God, and Jesus alone does this. (See Matthew 1:27.) You can know about God, but you cannot know Him, and have intimate fellowship with Him, except through Jesus Christ, the Son of God.

The word image in Colossians 1:15 comes from the Greek icon. It means “an identical and exact replica.” All of God is in Christ. “For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily” (Colossians 2:9). Jesus is both God and man. (Read John 1.)

Colossians 1:15 also says Christ is “the firstborn over all creation.” Firstborn here means the chief, the highest of the high. Christ never had a beginning. (See John 1:1.) He is the great I AM. (See Exodus 3:14; John 8:58.) God said of Jesus, “I will make him My firstborn, the highest of the kings of the earth." (Psalm 89:27; see whole chapter.)

Only Jesus Rules the Universe

“For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible” (Colossians 1:16a). The baby in Matthew 1 is the mighty God of Genesis 1.

Christ is the power of creation, and its preserver. “He is before all things, and in Him all things consist” (Colossians 1:17). Billions of stars in the Universe, planets orbiting, cells with nuclei and neutrons and protons, and everything else—what keeps all of that together? By Jesus, all things consist. If He were to take His hand off it, it would all come apart.

Eastern religion teaches that history is circular—you can come back again if you don’t get it right the first time. The Bible teaches that history is linear, that we are headed toward a climax: the kingdoms of this world will become the kingdoms of our Lord and His Christ, and He shall reign forever. (See Revelation 11:15.) 

Only Jesus Reconciles the Lost

“For it pleased the Father that in Him all the fullness should dwell, and by Him to reconcile all things to Himself, by Him, whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross” (Colossians 1:19-20).

If you had one word to describe God, it would be Holy. Your sin will either be pardoned in Christ or punished in Hell, but it will never be overlooked.

So God, the mighty maker, died for man, the creature. It is Christ’s deity that makes His death meaningful. Man’s estate was lost by a man, and it had to be regained by a man. Christ came down to our side of the chasm and put on absolute manhood, and by His blood, He made peace between God and man.