1For I want you to know how great a struggle I have for you, for those in Laodicea, and for all who have not seen me face to face.

2I want their hearts to be comforted and knit together in love, so that they may have all the riches of being fully assured in their understanding, and so that they may know the mystery of ¹²our God and Father and of Christ,

3in whom all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are hidden.

4I say this so that no one will deceive you with persuasive speech.

5For though I am absent in body, I am with you in spirit, rejoicing to see your good order and the firmness of your faith in Christ.

Fullness of Life in Christ

6Therefore, just as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, continue to walk in him,

7being rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding ¹³in it with thanksgiving.

8Be careful that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of men and the elements of the world, and not according to Christ.

9For all the fullness of God's nature dwells bodily in Christ,

10and you have been filled by him, who is the head over every ruler and authority.

11In him you were also circumcised with a circumcision not done by hands, by putting off the body ¹⁴of the sins of the flesh in the circumcision of Christ.

12Having been buried with him in baptism, you have also been raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised him from the dead.

13And ¹⁵although you were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made you alive together with Christ. He forgave ¹⁶us all our trespasses

14by blotting out the certificate of debt that stood against us with its legal demands; he took it away by nailing it to the cross.

15He stripped the rulers and authorities of their power and made a public display of them, leading a triumphal procession over them by the cross.

16Therefore let no one judge you in regard to food ¹⁷or drink, or in the matter of a feast, a New Moon celebration, or a Sabbath day.

17These are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance is Christ.

18Let no one who delights in false humility and angelic religion disqualify you. Such a person takes his stand on things he has ¹⁸not seen, being puffed up without reason by the mind of his flesh,

19while not holding fast to the head, from whom the entire body, being supported and knit together by its joints and tendons, grows with a growth that is from God.

20¹⁹If you have died with Christ to the elements of the world, why, as though you were living in the world, do you submit to regulations such as,

21“Do not handle, do not taste, do not touch”?

22Such regulations are based on the commandments and doctrines of men, and apply to things that will all decay with use.

23Although these regulations have a semblance of wisdom in self-imposed piety, false humility, and severe treatment of the body, they are of no value in restraining fleshly indulgence.