Were you not raised with Christ? Then aspire to the realms above, where Christ is, seated at God's right hand, and fix your thoughts on that higher realm, not on this earthly life. You died; and now your life lies hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, is revealed, then you too will be revealed with him in glory.
This is a description of what it means to be baptized - the early church baptized at sunrise on Easter. We are no longer our own, but "hidden in Christ" we are to live with the light of Christ shining forth through us. As St. Paul says, it isn't he who does what he does, but Christ in him.
Yet, this Christian triumphalism and realized eschatology is tempered, as always, by the reality that "when Christ is revealed, then you too will be revealed with him". In other words, this is not the final reality, nor is it a complete reality. It is that toward which we move, the reality, the context in which we are to understand our lives. We are no longer our own, but servants of God, hidden in Christ to be revealed to all at the end of all things. We live, in a phrase often used but never quite grasped fully, "between the times" (there was a famous German theological journal entitled Zwischen den Zeiten).
What the author of Colossians is writing about here (as the Pauline authorship of the epistle is under dispute, and I do not feel qualified to judge, I leave the question of authorship open) is what became known, in Wesleyan terminology, as sanctification, or as John Wesley called it, "Christian perfection". As we live out our baptism, "working out our salvation in fear and trembling" as Paul said, we continue to shed our propensity towards selfish, self-centered living, the exploitation of others, and the rebellion against God's love that is a part of our make-up. The perfection here is not a perfection of action, but rather the final removal of sinful intent and selfish desire from our conduct with others. It is, to use the phrase most accurately, "perfection in love". Wesley no more believed himself having achieved this final state than he believed the Second Coming had occurred; he did, however, insist that it was a living possibility, and one towards which we should strive. "Entire sanctification" is the phrase most often used to denote this particular state of spiritual enlightenment.
What began on that very first Easter is an on-going project in which more and more people are caught up in the freely offered life hidden in God through Christ. We no longer have to live in fear, or arrogance, or rebellion, but can live moving forward to the day when we are revealed with Christ. It's a journey with many interesting twists and turns, but as we surrender our rebellious ways, we may actually find more and more peace along the way.
