EACH YEAR, AT the beginning of January, thousands upon thousands of people around the globe make what we call “New Year’s resolutions.” Though the tradition is often associated with the United States, it is in one form or another a global practice with a long history, traceable back to the Roman Empire or even the ancient Babylonians. It’s something of a human impulse, it seems, to see the changing of the calendar as an occasion for a fresh start, a reason to resolve to do better in some way.

Recent public opinion polls taken in the United States suggest that the most popular resolutions have to do with saving money and losing weight, eating better and exercising more. Do such resolutions actually work? They can, but nearly half of the Americans polled in one study said no, believing New Year’s resolutions to be a complete waste of time.

For our purposes here, I invite you to reflect on whatever resolutions you’ve made this year or in years past. What did you resolve to do — or not do? How long did the resolutions last? Did they help you change your habits or behavior in some permanent way?

And in practice, how many of your resolutions took the form of prohibitions? Stop spending money on things you don’t need. Quit smoking. Don’t eat junk food. Stop staring at your phone and scrolling mindlessly through webpages and social media. Quit yelling at the kids. Don’t do this, stop doing that…

Part of the problem with such resolutions is that they don’t take into account the way our minds work. You probably never think of pink elephants, but if I tell you to try really hard not to think of a pink elephant, what will happen? If you’re like many people, a pink elephant will suddenly appear in your mind’s eye. You’ll struggle to suppress the image, and it’ll keep coming back.

Something similar is true of the habits we try to change. It’s one thing to try to eliminate bad habits cold turkey by sheer force of will. But it’s another to work step by step to replace bad habits with corresponding but incompatible good ones. “Stop spending” is less effective than developing a concrete plan for saving. “Quit yelling” is less effective than learning to recognize sooner when we’re getting angry and practicing new ways of handling that anger and communicating with our kids.

And, I imagine, this is one of the reasons why Paul viewed the rule-bound religion circulating in Colossae as useless. With what was probably a bit of apostolic sarcasm, he portrayed that religion as being all about what you can’t do, what you’re not supposed to handle, taste, or even touch. Such rules, he says, are just human inventions, not divinely given wisdom; they may seem wise and pious, but they’re no help in changing our tendency to indulge our fleshly desires (Col 2:20-23).

Again, let it be said that Paul is not telling the Colossians that they can just toss morality aside and do whatever they please. What he’s contradicting is not the desire to do good or live rightly, but the mistaken belief (or possibly false teaching!) that right living is achieved by imposing harsh restrictions on our behavior. Paul wants the Colossians to live holy lives, and much of the rest of the letter is devoted to telling them how this would look in their relationships and even their households.

But before he does that, he needs to make sure they have the right perspective. The opening verses of chapter 3 will continue the theological teaching of chapter 2, and bring it to a head in a way that establishes a positive foundation for faithful living.

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IN CHAPTER 2, Paul taught the absolute superiority of Christ over all, including the spiritual forces and human traditions to which the Colossians were tempted to submit themselves for religious reasons. Death plays a central role in that argument. Before they put their faith in Jesus, the Colossians were spiritually dead. But Jesus died on their behalf, and through baptism they were united with Christ in that death — and most importantly, in the resurrection that followed.

That’s the theological starting point for chapter 3: the union, here and now, of believers in the resurrection of Christ. Paul writes:

Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory. (Col 3:1-4, NIV)

“You have been raised,” Paul says, not “One day, you will be raised.” Both, of course, are true. On the one hand, we have the promise of a glorious future. Paul teaches the Colossians to look forward to the day of Jesus’ return, the day he comes in all his royal glory; on that day, we will share in that glory. That vision is the basis of our Christian hope.

On the other hand, we are also empowered to live hopefully in the present because, in Jewish terms, the messianic age — or what Jesus referred to as the “kingdom of God” (or the “kingdom of heaven”) has already dawned in the life and ministry of Jesus himself. This isn’t just the dawning of a new year, such as comes every January. It’s a whole new era, a one-time turning point in human history.

As Christians, we are to be active participants in that kingdom. Later in the chapter, Paul will distinguish between the old self and the new self, the old human nature and its way of living and our new nature in Christ and the kind of life that demonstrates that new reality (Col 3:10-11). Again, this is not a matter of imposing new rules of behavior from the outside in, but recognizing how we have already been transformed from the inside out.

That transformation is a lifelong process. If we were already everything we were meant to be, there would be no need for Paul to give the Colossians (or us!) moral advice — which in this chapter includes everything from “Clean up your language” to “Be humble and forgiving.” But the transformation has begun, and in Christ, new life is already a present possibility.

Where do we begin? Not with the “don’ts,” but with the “dos”; not by suppressing our thoughts but by redirecting them. Let’s explore what Paul teaches about that next.