Colossians 1:19

‘For it was the good pleasure of the Father that in him should all the fullness dwell.'

Once more the good pleasure of God comes into account. All things happen according to His good pleasure. And it was His good pleasure that ‘all the fullness' should permanently dwell in Him. The meaning of ‘fullness' here would seem to be the entire attributes of the Godhead. In Him there was nothing lacking of the fullness of God (compare Ephesians 3:19).

‘Of the Father.' This is not in the Greek text and is to be read in from Ephesians 3:12. We could alternatively read in ‘of the Godhead' or ‘of the invisible God' (from Ephesians 3:15). The Greek could also be translated ‘for in Him all the fullness was pleased to permanently dwell', but the significance is the same, for ‘the fullness' personified could only refer to God..

Many ancient religions interposed between God and man many intermediaries through whom unworthy, insignificant man, who could not approach God directly, must in one way or another seek to approach the holy, all-powerful God, but Paul sweeps all such aside. Man is ever tempted to a false humility by seeking intermediaries between himself and God (witness the cult of Mary and of the saints), but Paul stresses that ‘there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus' (1 Timothy 2:5). None other is needed and to seek such is an insult to Him and what He has done. And He could be that because in Him God and man was combined. He was both God and man.

‘The good pleasure.' The verb is elsewhere only used of God's good pleasure.

‘To dwell.' This is the aorist infinitive. To take up dwelling once for all. And the verb itself suggests permanent dwelling.

‘The fullness.' (the pleroma). The word is used of patches ‘filling up' a tear in clothing (Matthew 9:16; Mark 2:21), the fullness is not the patch but represents the completeness of the whole once it is patched; of baskets being ‘filled up' (Mark 8:20), and thus the whole basketful; of the future ‘fullness' of Israel when they have full and complete enjoyment of what they have lost (Romans 11:12); of ‘the fullness' of the Gentiles referring to the complete number of those who respond to Christ (Romans 11:25); of love as the ‘fulfilment' of the Law, referring to it as fulfilling it and completing it (Romans 13:10); of the earth and its ‘fullness', the totality of things on earth (1 Corinthians 10:26); of the fullness of the blessing of Christ, with nothing coming short of full blessing (Romans 15:29); and of the fullness of the times, when the necessary overall time is complete (Galatians 4:4; Ephesians 1:10). It thus carries the ideas of completeness and totality.

The garment is made ‘complete' by the patches; fullness represents the sum total of everything within a ‘container' (the filled baskets, the earth's fullness, the Law); it represents the completeness of a designated period (the fullness of times) and it represents that which is complete in itself (the fullness of the Jews and Gentiles and of blessing from Christ through Paul). Extra-biblically it is used of the full complement of a ship's crew ‘completing' the ship and then of the ship itself as complete.

Theologically it is used of ‘His fullness', the fullness of Christ (John 1:16), signifying the totality of what He is and has; it is used of being ‘filled unto all the fullness of God' (Ephesians 3:19) signifying the totality of the love that God would give us as a whole (or even possibly the totality of the love of God); it is used of ‘the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ' (Ephesians 3:13) as signifying the totality of what Christ is as man (or the totality of His requirements); and in Ephesians 1:23 it is used of the church as ‘the fullness of Him Who fills all in all', where it would seem to mean that the church will, like the patch, once the plan of redemption is completed, make up what is lacking in His overall supremacy, so making Him complete (the patch completes the fullness. It is not itself the fullness). Thus until that day He is (by His own choice) not totally complete until all the saved are gathered in and presented perfect before Him. (Although some see it as meaning that they receive of His fullness and thus are made complete in Him (compare Colossians 2:10)). In Colossians 2:9 we read, ‘in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily' where it signifies that in Him is the totality of what God is, and this leads on to the fact that we are made complete in Him.

So pleroma represents completeness, totality, fullness. And here in Colossians 1:19 it therefore indicates that in Him dwells permanently the complete fullness of God with nothing lacking.