Colossians 2:1-15

For I want you to know how greatly I am struggling  for you, for those in Laodicea,  and for all who have not seen me in person. I want their hearts to be encouraged  and joined together in love, so that they may have all the riches of complete understanding and have the knowledge of God’s mystery   #— #Christ.  , In him are hidden all the treasures of wisdom  and knowledge.  I am saying this so that no one will deceive you with arguments that sound reasonable. For I may be absent in body, but I am with you in spirit,  rejoicing to see how well ordered you are and the strength of your faith in Christ. So then, just as you have received  Christ Jesus as Lord,  continue to walk in him, being rooted and built up in him  and established in the faith, just as you were taught,  and overflowing with gratitude. Be careful that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deceit based on human tradition,  based on the elements of the world, rather than Christ.  For the entire fullness  of God’s nature dwells bodily  in Christ, and you have been filled by him, who is the head  over every ruler and authority. You were also circumcised in him with a circumcision not done with hands, by putting off the body of flesh,  in the circumcision of Christ,  when you were buried with him  in baptism, in which you were also raised with him  through faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead.  And when you were dead in trespasses and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, he made you alive with him and forgave us all our trespasses. He erased the certificate of debt, with its obligations, that was against us and opposed to us, and has taken it away by nailing it to the cross.  He disarmed the rulers and authorities and disgraced them publicly; he triumphed over them in him.