Set Apart

Set Apart

Colossians 2:11-14

            Set apart.  Chosen for some special work.  Going through some ritual that declares you are different from those around you.  Belonging to a special group.  Receiving some preparation that raises you to a status that others haven’t attained.  Being a member of an “in group”—or perhaps, an “out group.”  Something happens that defines you as having been changed from the person you were to the person you now are.  Consecrated.

            The Bible has a lot to say about set-apartness.  It begins with Adam and Eve.  They were created in God’s own image—something that was true of no other part of creation.  God met with them in Eden and spoke with them.  Adam and Eve were set apart—chosen, special.  God consecrated them for a specific work—gave them specific instructions.  “Care for my creation,” God said.  “Do not eat from this one tree.”  Adam and Eve were called out by God from the other creatures for special tasks.

            Abraham was also called out by God.  He was told to leave his homeland and travel to a foreign place where he would become the father of a great people—a great nation.  One mark of the set-apartness of this nation would be circumcision.  For the males, there would be something that made them different from all other  peoples.  They would carry in their flesh a sign of their consecration.  Abraham’s descendants would be God’s chosen people.

            Moses and the people who followed him were set apart.  Like their forefathers they carried in their flesh the mark of circumcision—the mark of set-apartness.  To this was added a history of God acting on their behalf, setting them free from captivity and leading them to the Promised Land.  This God had a name—YHWH—“I AM.”  Not “I was,” or “I will be,” or “I might be,” but “I AM.”  The great I AM called them out of Egypt to be a light to the nations.  They were to be holy as God is holy—to be different from those around them.

            Throughout the history of God’s people many others were anointed—set apart for God’s special purpose:  Aaron, Esther, Saul, David, the prophets.  Each was consecrated in some way.  Each was given a task.  Each was prepared by God to perform the work God needed to be done.

            In the New Testament we find a new way of setting people apart—baptism.  John called people to repentance and baptized them in the Jordan—setting them apart, making them different from those around them, preparing them for God’s work.  Jesus insisted that John baptize him.  When John balked, Jesus let him know that baptism was necessary to set him apart for the work God had called him to do.

            Throughout his epistles Paul speaks of set-apartness.  Sometimes, as in Colossians, he couples circumcision with baptism as contrasting signs of consecration.  For Paul, who had been circumcised “in the flesh,” the old way of setting someone apart wasn’t good enough.  For him the necessary consecration was not one of the flesh, but one of dying to the world in baptism as Jesus Christ had died to the world on the cross.  As surely as physical circumcision had made God’s people different in the Hebrew Scriptures, baptism was to change them in the New Testament.  They were to be set apart, consecrated, changed—made different.

            How has your baptism changed you?  How are you different from the person you were before the act of consecration?  Christians in Paul’s time behaved so differently from those around them that everyone knew they were set apart.  Do those around you know that you have died to the world and become alive in Christ—set apart, consecrated by God for God’s special work?