“And above all these things put on charity, which is the bond of perfectness.”
My Notes
What Does Colossians 3:14 Mean?
"Above all these things put on charity, which is the bond of perfectness." After listing virtues to put on — compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, patience (verse 12) — Paul places love above them all. Love isn't one virtue among many. It's the one that holds all the others together. Without love, the other virtues are disconnected fragments. With love, they form a unified whole.
The word "bond" (syndesmos) means a ligament, a binding agent, something that ties together. Love functions in the spiritual life the way ligaments function in the body: connecting, securing, enabling coordinated movement. Without ligaments, bones are separate pieces. Without love, virtues are separate performances.
The phrase "of perfectness" (tes teleiotetos — of completeness, of maturity) means love produces wholeness. Not moral flawlessness but integrated completeness. The person who has compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience — bound together by love — is complete. Nothing is missing.
Reflection Questions
- 1.What virtues do you have that function separately rather than as an integrated whole?
- 2.How does love transform other virtues from performances into expressions of character?
- 3.What would 'completeness' — virtues bound by love — look like in your daily life?
- 4.Which virtue most needs the connective tissue of love to reach its full expression?
Devotional
Above everything else: love. Not as one more item on the virtues list. As the ligament that holds all the other virtues together. Without love, compassion is disconnected from kindness. Humility floats free from patience. The virtues exist separately. Love binds them into a functioning body.
The ligament metaphor is anatomically precise: ligaments connect bone to bone. Without them, the skeleton falls apart. Each bone is real, each is necessary, but without the connective tissue, the bones are a pile rather than a body. Love is the connective tissue of the moral life. It holds the virtues together so they function as a whole.
The 'bond of perfectness' means love produces completeness. Not perfection in the modern sense (flawlessness) but in the biblical sense (maturity, wholeness, integration). The complete person isn't the one who performs each virtue separately. It's the one whose virtues are integrated by love into a unified life.
You can have compassion without love — it's called pity. You can have kindness without love — it's called politeness. You can have humility without love — it's called low self-esteem. Each virtue, without love, becomes a lesser version of itself. Love elevates each virtue to its full expression by connecting it to all the others.
What virtues in your life are disconnected — present but unintegrated? What would happen if love bound them together into wholeness?
Commentary
Trusted original commentary from respected historical Bible scholars and theologians.
And above all these things,.... Bowels of mercies, kindness, &c.
put on charity, or brotherly love, for without this…
And above all these things - Over, or upon all these things; compare the notes at Eph 6:16. Charity - Love. Notes, 1Co…
And above all these things - Επι πασι δε τουτοις· Upon all, over all; as the outer garment envelopes all the clothing,…
The apostle proceeds to exhort to mutual love and compassion: Put on therefore bowels of mercy, Col 3:12. We must not…
above all thesethings] Or, "uponall these things." Perhaps the words convey both the supreme importanceof love, and its…
Cross References
Related passages throughout Scripture