Full Assurance in Christ Alone

Having declared Christ to be preeminent in everything and all the fullness of God dwelling in him, Paul makes known how much he is suffering for the sake of Christ and the church. He does this, not for his own glory, but so that believers may be encouraged, mature in Christ and have "all the riches of full assurance of understanding and knowledge... which is Christ" so they might be protected from the deception of worldly arguments and reason. Paul knows that only Christ can bring all this to fruition, and so he labours and toils in his gospel proclamation. Pray that we too might know all the riches of full assurance in Christ Jesus and so be lifted out of any sense of complacency and delivered from any form of deception.