'Who now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up that which is

behind of the afflictions of Christ in my flesh for His body's sake,

which is the Church' (Col. 1:24).

Protestant interpreters generally have rightly felt that anything that

touched the completeness of the Sacrifice of Christ must be wrong, and to

make Paul say that he supplemented that glorious Work would be horrible in

the extreme.  Many Romanist commentators have found in this passage a basis

for their teaching concerning the merits of the saints and the doctrine of

indulgences.  Yet many Protestant commentators have failed to give this

passage its full weight, putting out their hand, as it were, to stay the Ark

of God.

In the first case, let us observe that the apostle uses

the word 'afflictions' thlipsis, which word is never used

to speak of the vicarious Offering of Christ.  Christ's suffering was

something far deeper than affliction.

The verb 'to fill up' used by Paul here is antanapleroo, and differs

from anapleroo and prosanapleroo which are also used by him in his epistles.

Pleroo means 'to fill' and so 'to complete' as a net (Matt. 13:48).  The word

is used in the next verse to the one under consideration in Colossians 'to

complete the Word of God' (Col. 1:25).  Anapleroo, 'to fill up', ana being

the preposition 'up', 'to fill up a measure' (1 Thess. 2:16), or 'to fill the

place of something missing' (1 Cor. 16:17).

Prosanapleroo, not only adds ana but pros 'toward' to the verb pleroo,

and is translated 'supply', 2 Corinthians 9:12 and 11:9.  In both passages

the word 'want' is in the context, and Cremer says 'It differs from

antanapleroo in that it expresses not the supply, but the removal of the

want, and differs from anapleroo in that it describes the manner in which the

want is met, so that the element of supply falls into the background'.  This

leads us to the word used in Colossians 1:24.

Anti is a preposition which denotes 'corresponding to', a 'return for

something else', 'I fill up on my part'.  The presence of 'anti' signifies

that the supply comes from an opposite quarter to the deficiency.  In this

sentence one is mentioned in connection with the supply, another in

connection with a deficiency, the anti describing the antithesis of these

personal agents.  While the sufferings of Christ were for ever finished so

far as the atonement was concerned, they will never finish until the last

redeemed believer is gathered home.  We may speak of Christ's sufferings as

sacrificial and complete, or ministerial and growing.  Peter refers to this

aspect where he says:

'Forasmuch then as Christ hath suffered for us in the flesh, arm

yourselves likewise with the same mind' (1 Pet. 4:1).

'Rejoice, inasmuch as ye are partakers of Christ's sufferings' (1 Pet.

Lightfoot paraphrases the passage in Colossians, writing upon the

presence of 'now' in verse 24, saying:

'The thought underlying nun seems to be this.  If ever I have been

disposed to repine at my lot, if ever I have felt my cross almost too

heavy to bear, yet now -- now, when I contemplate the lavish wealth of