<p>2:17 <i>They were a shadow of the things to come, but the real object is Christ</i>- Bible students have long recognized a 'prophetic perfect' tense in Hebrew, whereby the future is spoken of as having already happened. This not only reflects the utter certainty of God's words coming true, it also reflects God's way of looking at issues without time, in the sense that God is beyond time. Thus when He told Abraham that He <em>had made him&nbsp;(</em>not 'will make you') a great nation, this reflected the way that God already saw Abraham as a father of many. Things which don't yet exist for us do <em>actually</em> exist for God (Rom. 4:17). The Law was a <em>shadow</em> of Christ (Col. 2:17) even when Christ didn't physically exist. Yet a shadow implies the real existence of the object. The Law reflected God's knowledge of the Lord Jesus; to Him, the Lord did in that sense pre-exist, although we know that literally He didn't. Likewise Levi was seen by God as paying tithes whilst he was still as it were within Abraham's body (Heb. 7:9,10), and the dead believers are likened to spectators in a stadium, cheering us on as we race the race of this life (Heb. 12:1).</p><p>Paul&rsquo;s statement that God has made public display for ridicule (<em>edeigmatisen en parr&ecirc;sia</em>) of the &ldquo;rulers and authorities&rdquo; is alluding to a phrase which occurs in the Jewish writings about the supposed Satanic rulers of this present world. But Paul says that God displays them for what they are and thereby holds them up to ridicule (Col. 2:17), rather like Elijah mocking the non-existence of Baal. In Col 2:8,20 and Gal 4:3, 8&ndash;10, Paul says that believers are no longer subject to the &ldquo;elements of the cosmos&rdquo; (<em>ta stoicheia tou kosmou</em>) &ndash; again, a term the Jews used to describe supposed sinful Angels ruling the cosmos. He&rsquo;s deconstructing these ideas rather than supporting them.</p>