Warning Against Things That Enslave

Let us muse from Colossians 2:.20-23 and a warning about things that enslave. Paul here speaks of aestheticism. It was something done to the outward man to try to control and show off the inward man. In the Middle Ages they would sleep on hard beds, deprive themselves of food or sleep, and whip their outward man. We as Baptist think that we can control man from the outside in. It can never be done except from the inside out. Paul tells us in verses 20-21 through the death of Christ we are made dead to all outward practices. In verse 23 we are told that such practices causes us to look spiritual but can do nothing to the conquering or controlling of the flesh. Oh how we need to live in and out of our position in Christ.