This morning sermon text is found in Paul's letter to the Colossians, chapter one.

I invite you to follow along in your Bibles, or if you need the Bibles in the Puyrach in front of you,

as I read Colossians chapter 1

15 through 23. He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.

For in him all things were created in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or

dominions or principalities or authorities, all things were created through him and

for him. He is before all things and in him all things

hold together. He is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the first born from the dead, that in everything he might

be preeminent. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell and through him to reconcile to himself all things

whether on earth or in heaven making peace by the blood of his cross.

And you who once were estranged and hostile in mind

doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled

in his body of flesh by his death

in order to present you holy and blameless and irreproachable before

him provided that you continue in the faith stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the Gospel which you heard,

which has been preached to every creature under heaven,

and of which I, Paul, became a minister. Sometimes we fail to eat the main dish.

Sometimes we fail to eat the main dish of the biblical meal because we choke on the

hors d'oeuvres. The meal is spread before you perhaps in your lap late at night.

Or maybe it's early in the morning when you get up and you're alone in your study.

The Bible is open before you or maybe it's on a Sunday morning like this and the message is spreading the banquet of God's word before you,

and you can catch a glimpse of it,

...