I want us to focus on verse 24 and Paul’s “filling up that which is lacking in Christ’s afflictions.” How could anything be lacking in Christ’s afflictions? Was not his suffering and death for us utterly all-sufficient? So what does he mean in verse 24 and how does it apply to us?
To see verse 24 properly let’s look at it in connection with the rest of the verses. Starting at verse 29 let’s go backward and sum up what Paul is saying in this paragraph.
Verse 29: Paul says that there is a purpose for which he labors. And the striving, the agonizing, of this labor is not merely his own energy. It is the power of Christ mightily working in him.
Verse 28 describes the purpose that Paul labors for, namely, to present everyone that he reaches “complete in Christ.” And he does this by proclaiming Christ, admonishing everyone, and teaching everyone. This is Paul’s ceaseless labor which Christ energizes.
Verse 26–27 defines more explicitly what Paul proclaims and teaches. It’s called a “mystery” in verse 26, not because it can’t be understood, but because it has been hidden for ages and has now been revealed to the saints. Then verse 27 describes the riches of the glory of this mystery. It is “Christ in you [Gentiles], the hope of glory.” What was not revealed fully in past ages was that the Jewish Messiah—the Christ—would actually reach out to non-Jewish nations and indwell non-Jewish people—that he would actually live in them and give them the promise of Abraham, the hope of glory in the kingdom of God with all the saints.
But now the mystery is being revealed and Paul is proclaiming Christ and teaching everywhere that the indwelling of the Messiah and the hope of the glory of God belong to all who trust Christ and really hope in the glory of God (1:4, 23).
Verse 25 simply says that this proclamation of Christ is the fulfilling of a stewardship that God has given to Paul to spread God’s Word. He is a servant of the church and a steward of God. His charge is to take the Word of God to the nations, offer them the hope of glory, and call them to faith. And so he is a minister of the church by gathering God’s chosen ones from among the nations, and by teaching and admonishing them so that they can be presented complete in Christ.
Verse 24 says that this ministry of extending the mystery of Christ and the hope of glory to the nations, and then admonishing and teaching them involves suffering. “Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I do my share on behalf of his body (which is the church) in filling up that which is lacking in Christ’s afflictions.”
*What Does “Fill Up What Is Lacking” Mean? *
Now what does this mean that when Paul suffers for the church—extending the hope of glory to more and more people, and teaching them about the mystery of Christ, and suffering in doing this—he is “filling up what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions”? How can any man fill up what is surely as full as any suffering could be?
*The Context Suggests the Meaning *
I think the context that we just looked at suggests that Paul’s sufferings fill up Christ’s not by adding anything to their worth, but by extending them to the people they were meant to bless. What is lacking in the afflictions of Christ is not that they are deficient in worth or merit, as though they could not sufficiently cover the sins of all who believe. What is lacking is that the infinite value of Christ’s afflictions are not known in the world. They are still a mystery (hidden) to most peoples. And God’s intention is that the mystery be revealed, extended to all the Gentiles. So the afflictions are lacking in the sense that they are not seen and known among the nations. They must be carried by ministers of the Word. And those ministers of the Word fill up what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ by extending them to others.
*Similar Words in Philippians 2:30 *
There is a strong confirmation of this in the use of similar words in Philippians 2:30. There was a man named Epaphroditus in the church at Philippi. When the church there gathered support for Paul (perhaps money or supplies or books), they decided to send them to Paul in Rome by the hand of Epaphroditus. In his travels with this supply Epaphroditus almost loses his life. Verse 27 says he was sick to the point of death, but God spared him.
Then in verse 29 Paul tells the church in Philippi to honor Epaphroditus when he comes back, and he gives his reason in verse 30 which has words very similar to Colossians 1:24. “Because he came close to death for the work of Christ, risking his life to complete * what was deficient * in your service to me.” Now in the original the phrase “completing what was deficient” in your service to me is almost the same as “filling up what is lacking” in Christ’s afflictions in Colossians 1:24.
In what sense, then, was the service of the Philippians to Paul “lacking” and in what sense did Epaphroditus “fill up” what was lacking in their service? A hundred years ago a commentator, Marvin Vincent, I think gets it exactly right.
The gift to Paul was a gift of the church as a body. It was a sacrificial offering of love. What was lacking, and what would have been grateful to Paul and to the church alike, was the church’s presentation of this offering in person. This was impossible, and Paul represents Epaphroditus as supplying this lack by his affectionate and zealous ministry. (Epistle to the Philippians and to Philemon, ICC, p. 78)
*How We “Fill Up What Is Lacking” in Christ’s Afflictions **
I think that is exactly what the words mean in Colossians 1:24 as well. Christ has prepared a love offering for the world by suffering and dying for sinners. It is full and lacking in nothing—except one thing, a personal presentation by Christ himself to the nations of the world and the people of your workplace. God’s answer to this lack is to call the people of Christ (people like Paul) to present the afflictions of Christ to the world—to carry them from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth.
In doing this we “fill up what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ.” We finish what they were designed for, namely, a personal presentation to the world of people who do not know about their infinite worth.
But notice how Paul says this in verse 24: He says that it is in his sufferings and in his flesh—that is, his actual, suffering body that he does his share in filling up the afflictions of Christ. So Paul sees a very close connection between his sufferings and Christ’s afflictions. What this means, I think, is that God intends for the afflictions of Christ to be presented to the world through the afflictions of his people. God really means for the body of Christ, the church, to experience some of the suffering he experienced so that when we offer the Christ of the cross to people, they see the Christ of the cross in us. We are to make the afflictions of Christ real for people by the afflictions we experience in offering him to them, and living the life of love he lived.
“I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake . . . filling up that which is lacking in the afflictions of Christ.” Christ wills to have a personal presentation of his sufferings to the world. And the way he means to offer himself as a sufferer for the world to the world is through his people who, like him, are willing to suffer for the world. His sufferings are completed in our sufferings because in ours the world sees his, and they have their appointed effect. The suffering love of Christ for sinners is seen in the suffering love of his people for sinners.
I think what we see in Colossians 1:24 is the living out of Jesus’ words in Mark 8:35, “Whoever wishes to save his life shall lose it; and whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel’s shall save it.” The pathway of salvation is the pathway of “losing one’s life for the sake of the gospel.” The point is that taking the gospel to people (across the office or across the ocean) ordinarily requires sacrifice and suffering, a losing of life or a denying of self. This is the way Christ means for his saving sufferings to be taken to the world, through the sufferings of his people.
Paul’s Joy in This Calling
And Paul says he rejoices in that. Verse 24: “Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake.” The Calvary road is not a joyless road. It is a painful one, but it is a profoundly happy one. When we choose the fleeting pleasures of comfort and security over the sacrifices and sufferings of missions and evangelism and ministry and love, we choose against joy. We choose broken cisterns that can hold no water and reject the spring of water whose waters never fail (Isaiah 58:11).
The happiest people in the world are the people who know the mystery of Christ in them the hope of glory, satisfying their deep longings and freeing them to extend the sufferings of Christ through their own to the world.
God is calling us in this text to live for the sake of the gospel and to do that through suffering. Christ chose suffering, it didn’t just happen to him. He chose it as the way to create and perfect the church. Now he calls us to choose suffering. That is, he calls us to take up our cross and follow him on the Calvary road and deny ourselves and make sacrifices for the sake of presenting his suffering to the world and ministering to the church.
I just heard a memorable way of saying this from the Romanian pastor and mission leader Joseph Tson. He said, “Christ’s cross was for propitiation; ours is for propagation.” That is, Christ suffered to accomplish salvation; we suffer to spread salvation. And our willingness to endure hardship for the good of others is a filling up of Christ’s afflictions because it extends them to others and makes them visible. *
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Suffering for Christ and His Church is a huge lesson in life if not one of the greatest we will all face in the crucible of being humbly fashion in the likeness of our beloved Savior.