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I. WHAT IS MEANT BY CHRISTIANS BEING COMPLETE?

1. The word means "full, wanting nothing"; and as applied to Christians, it means that they have everything necessary for life and godliness, happiness and immortality.

2. The things needed in order to being complete.

(1) Wisdom and knowledge — meeting natural ignorance of, and conflicting theories about, God and the way of salvation.

(2) Pardon and righteousness. As sinners men cannot stand before God in judgment. They are unclean in His sight, and without forgiveness and acceptance they must perish.

(3) Holiness and purity. The heart is naturally evil, and by habit and indulgence acquires strength for evil. Unless this is cleansed there can be no meetness for heaven.

(4) Consolation and peace. Forgiveness is not enough, there must be a consciousness of it, so that the sense of shame, the deepest of our discomforts, may be banished, and the sense of reconciliation with God take its place.

(5) Support and strength in view of trials, labours, enemies.

(6) Deliverance from the power of death and the grave.

II. How CHRISTIANS BECOME COMPLETE. "In Christ." Because being God and man all fulness dwells in Him, and out of this fulness all our need is supplied.

1. "In Him are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge." By His Word He instructs, by His providence He guides, and by His Spirit He opens the mind to instruct both.

2. "He is the propitiation for our sins," and has thus brought in an everlasting righteousness, by means of which believers are accepted.

3. His grace creates the heart anew, subdues sin, and developes in holiness.

4. He brings peace to the troubled conscience and consolation to the broken heart.

5. He is the strength, defence, and support of His people.

6. He hath abolished death.

(E. Cooper, M. A.)

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KJV: And ye are complete in him, which is the head of all principality and power:

WEB: and in him you are made full, who is the head of all principality and power;