And he is before all things, and by him all things consist.
Paul wrote this letter to a community of Christians in the city of Colossae, located in what is now western Turkey, around 60 AD. Some in this community were being influenced by ideas that reduced Jesus to just one spiritual power among many, downplaying who he truly was. Paul's response was to write one of the most expansive, sweeping descriptions of Jesus found anywhere in Scripture. This verse is part of that passage. "He is before all things" means Jesus existed before the universe was created — before time, before matter, before anything at all. "In him all things hold together" is a staggering claim: the coherence, continuity, and stability of all created reality is somehow sustained by and through Jesus. Paul is not describing a moral example or a spiritual teacher. He is describing the force that keeps the universe from flying apart.
Jesus, the idea that you hold everything together is almost too large for my mind to hold. But some things in my life feel like they are coming undone right now, and I need to believe it. Hold what I cannot. Amen.
Physicists have spent decades probing one of quantum mechanics' strangest unsolved puzzles: they can map what particles do, but the deeper question — why matter coheres at all, why reality holds its shape from one moment to the next — remains, at some level, mysterious. Paul, writing two thousand years before quantum mechanics existed, planted a theological flag directly in that mystery: it holds together in Jesus. Think about what feels like it's coming loose in your life right now. A relationship unraveling at the seams. A sense of purpose you can't locate anymore. A version of yourself you thought you understood. Paul's claim here is not that Jesus will reassemble it on your preferred timeline. It's something more foundational than that. The same one who keeps atoms from dissolving, who sustains the tilt of the earth, who holds galaxies in their courses — that one is holding you. Not observing from a distance. Holding. If you feel scattered or on the edge of unraveling, this verse dares you to consider: the force that holds the cosmos together has you too.
Paul wrote this to people minimizing Jesus — treating him as one spiritual option among many. What are the modern equivalents of that kind of thinking, and have you ever found yourself somewhere close to it?
'In him all things hold together' is a sweeping claim about the nature of reality itself, not just a spiritual comfort — what would it mean for how you understand the world if this is actually true?
If Jesus truly sustains all things, what does that mean for how you pray about situations that feel completely beyond anyone's ability to fix or control?
How does a view of Jesus as the one who holds all creation together change how you treat people who don't share your faith — people who, in this framework, are also being held by him?
What in your life feels like it is unraveling right now, and what would it look like — specifically and practically, not just abstractly — to trust that you are held in this season?
In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
Genesis 1:1
For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. Amen.
Romans 11:36
Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created.
Revelation 4:11
All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.
John 1:3
But to us there is but one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we in him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we by him.
1 Corinthians 8:6
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
John 1:1
For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring.
Acts 17:28
Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high;
Hebrews 1:3
And He Himself existed and is before all things, and in Him all things hold together. [His is the controlling, cohesive force of the universe.]
AMP
And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.
ESV
He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.
NASB
He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.
NIV
And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist.
NKJV
He existed before anything else, and he holds all creation together.
NLT
He was there before any of it came into existence and holds it all together right up to this moment.
MSG