2 I want you to know how great a struggle I have for you and for those in Laodicea, as well as for those who have still not seen me face to face. ² My purpose is that their hearts, joined together in love, may be encouraged. May they have all the riches of the full assurance of understanding, leading to a true knowledge of the mystery of God—that is, Messiah. ³ In Him all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are hidden. ^{[a] 4} I am telling you this so that no one will deceive you with persuasive-sounding arguments. ⁵ For even though I am absent in body, yet I am with you in spirit—rejoicing to see your good order and the steadfastness of your trust in Messiah.

Living Out the Mystery

⁶ Therefore as you received Messiah Yeshua as Lord, so continue to walk in Him— ⁷ rooted and built up in Him and established in your faith just as you were taught, overflowing with thankfulness. ⁸ See that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men and the basic principles of the world rather than Messiah. ⁹ For all the fullness of Deity lives bodily in Him, ¹⁰ and in Him you have been filled to fullness. He is the head over every ruler and authority.

¹¹ In Him you were also circumcised with a circumcision done not by hand, in the stripping away of the body of the flesh through the circumcision of Messiah. ¹² You were buried along with Him in immersion, through which you also were raised with Him by trusting in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead. ¹³ When you were dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made you alive together with Him when He pardoned us all our transgressions. ¹⁴ He wiped out the handwritten record of debts with the decrees against us, which was hostile to us. He took it away by nailing it to the cross. ¹⁵ After disarming the principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in the cross.^[b]

The Danger of False Wisdom

¹⁶ Therefore, do not let anyone pass judgment on you in matters of food or drink, or in respect to a festival or new moon or Shabbat. ^{[c] 17} These are a foreshadowing of things to come, but the reality is Messiah. ^{[d] 18} Let no one disqualify you by insisting on false humility and worship of angels—going into detail about what he has seen, puffed up without cause by his fleshly mind. ¹⁹ He is not holding fast to the Head. It is from Him that the whole body, nourished and held together by its joints and tendons, grows with a godly increase. ²⁰ If you died with Messiah to the basic principles of the world, why—as though living in the world—do you subject yourselves to their rules? ²¹ “Don’t handle! Don’t taste! Don’t touch!” ²² These all lead to decay with use, based as they are on man-made commands and teachings. ^{[e] 23} Indeed, these are matters that have an appearance of wisdom in self-made religion and humility and self-denial of the body—yet none are of any value for stopping indulgence of the flesh.