¹I want you to know how hard I’m working for you and for those who are in Laodicea and for everyone who hasn’t met me in person.

²My goal is that they will all be encouraged in their hearts and joined together in love. Then their understanding will be rich and complete, and they will know the mystery of God, which is Christ.

³All the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are hidden in him.

⁴I tell you this so that no one will mislead you with deceptive arguments.

⁵Even though I’m away from you in body, I’m with you in spirit, and I am glad to see that you’re well-disciplined and that your faith in Christ is so strong.

⁶So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, keep on living your lives in him.

⁷Put down deep roots and build yourselves up in him. Grow strong in your faith, just as you were taught, and overflow with thanksgiving.

⁸Make sure that no one makes you their prisoner through false and deceptive reasoning, through ideas that depend on human teachings and the basic spiritual powers of this world rather than on Christ.

⁹All the fullness of God is living in Christ in human form.

¹⁰Because you belong to Christ, you have been made complete. He is the ruler over every power and authority.

¹¹In Christ, you have received a circumcision that has not been done by human hands. Your circumcision has been done by Christ, and he has put away the person you used to be when wrong desires ruled over you.

¹²When you were baptized, you were buried together with Christ, and you were raised to life with him by believing in the work that God did when he raised Jesus from the dead.

¹³At one time you were dead in your sins, and your wrong desires were not circumcised. But God gave you new life together with Christ. He forgave us all our sins

¹⁴and cancelled the debt that the law said we owed. That debt counted against us and made us guilty, but God took it away and nailed it to the cross.

¹⁵Jesus disarmed the spiritual powers and authorities of this world and publicly defeated them by dying on the cross.

¹⁶So don’t let anyone judge you because of what you eat or drink or because of how you approach holy days such as special feasts and New Moons and Sabbath days.

¹⁷Those were only a shadow of the things that were coming; now the reality is found in Christ.

¹⁸Some people pretend to be humble, and they worship angels. But don’t let people like that judge you. These people tell you in great detail about the visions they’ve seen, and they’re conceited because of all the ideas they have. But their ideas are really useless, because their minds aren’t guided by the Holy Spirit.

¹⁹These people aren’t connected anymore to the head, who is Christ. God makes the whole body grow as it’s guided by the head and held together by its tendons and ligaments.

²⁰Some people still follow the basic spiritual powers of the world. But you died with Christ as far as those powers are concerned. So why do you act as if you still belonged to the world? You’re following rules such as,

²¹“Don’t handle! Don’t taste! Don’t touch!”

²²Rules like those are about things that will soon pass away. They’re based on merely human rules and teachings.

²³It’s true that these rules seem to make sense. They lead people to have a regular schedule of worship, at least to act as if they’re humble, and to be severe with their bodies. But these rules don’t do anything to stop people from giving in to their wrong desires.