Colossians 1:19

A learned man reads it: For all fulness pleased to dwell in him. Others: He liked, or approved, that all fulness should dwell in him, bringing instances for that construction of the word it pleased. For it pleased the Father; it is true the word Father is not in the Greek text, nor in the oriental versions, but is well understood and supplied from the context, Colossians 1:12, where the apostle gives thanks to the Father, and then describes his dear Son in the following verses, and here in this adds a cogent reason why he should be the Head of his church, since the Son of his love, (in whom he is well pleased, Matthew 3:17), is he alone in whom he likes to dwell with all fulness or all fulness, doth will to abide. That in him should all fulness; here is another all, and a fulness added to that all; an all for parts, a fulness for degrees; a transcendency in all, above all. It is of the Father's good pleasure that Christ, not here considered simply, as the Son of God, but respectively, as Head of his church, and Mediator, should be the subject of this all fulness, which is not directly that of his body mystical, Ephesians 1:23. But:

1. Originally, the fulness of the Godhead, whereby he hath an all-sufficiency of perfections for his mediatory office upon the mystical union, which none other hath or can have, Colossians 2:9 1 Thessalonians 1:14: of which more distinctly in the next chapter.

2. Derivatively, a fulness of the Spirit and habitual grace, Luke 1:80, with 1 Thessalonians 1:16,33 1 Thessalonians 3:34; holiness, wisdom, power, perfectly to finish his work, 1 Thessalonians 17:4, 1 Thessalonians 19:30, and other excellencies for the reconciling (as it follows) and actual influencing of his body, Psalms 130:7,8 Mt 28:18 1 Thessalonians 5:20 Romans 1:4 1 Corinthians 5:4; with 2 Corinthians 12:9 Ephesians 1:20 Hebrews 7:25,26 Re 5:6,12. Dwell; and this all fulness doth not only lodge in him for a time, but resideth and abideth in him; it is not in him as the Divine glory was awhile in the tabernacle of Moses, and the temple of Solomon, but dwells constantly in him, not as a private person, but a universal principle; as Head of the body, (as well as reconciler), to fill up the emptiness of man with the abundant grace that perpetually resideth in him.