Message 17 - 1thessalonians Chapter 5:22 – Abstain From Every Form Of Evil Series

MESSAGE 17 - 1THESSALONIANS CHAPTER 5:22 – ABSTAIN FROM EVERY FORM OF EVIL

THE INTRODUCTION

{{1Thessalonians 5 v 22 “Abstain from every form of evil.”}}

The KJV is “Abstain from all appearances of evil.” NIV is “Reject every kind of evil.” NASB and ESV is “Abstain from every form of evil.” The Holman version says, “Stay away from every form of evil.”

This is not an easy message, and it is a difficult passage to speak on I think. I might go a bit slower because it contains items to concentrate on. Now at the outset, we need to be clear here on one thing. The KJV translation is wrong. It says “all appearances of evil”. To preserve oneself from all appearance of evil is not within the power of man. There are two words for “evil” in Greek – and the one used here, signifies “harmful or mischievous” (so designating “the Evil One”).

“Abstain from every evil sight” (or show of evil), from all that is evil in the outward show of things about you. F.B. Meyer, the great Greek scholar, has said, “the sense must also be of an abstinence from that which is ACTUALLY evil.” There is a difference between appearance of evil, and the form of evil itself. A godly Christian should be able to recognise forms of eviI, but I think ungrounded Christians may confuse being evil with what seems to be evil – and for that matter, so do most of us. It is not easy separating appearance from form when speaking of this subject.

NOW INTRODUCING THE MATTER OF LUST INTO THIS STUDY

{{1John 2:15 “Do not love the world, nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 1John 2:16 All that is in the world, the LUST of the flesh and the LUST of the eyes and the boastful PRIDE of life, is not from the Father, but is from the world.”}} Those verses gather up all points of failed human nature in sin. The third one, pride, is what dominates ambitious man, the importance of who you are, and the desire to control and ride over others. The word closely associates with arrogance, superiority and belittling others. It means having an exalted opinion of yourself, of your achievements and of your position, and becoming smug about all that. It is THE sin that causes conflict then divisions and much hurt to others. We see this pride in all walks of life, especially in Parliaments, very much so in question time. It is this pride that keeps a person quarantined from God. It creates a no-go zone around the person and keeps the salvation of God remote.

The first two lusts are related (the eyes, the flesh) and both tick the box for appearance of evil, that form of evil that appears to you, or you become aware of it. It is the eyes that see and desire. It is the flesh that hankers after sin and craves for satisfaction. You can trace the damage right through scripture, of the lust of the eyes and the flesh when that lust conceives. It began with Eve who saw the fruit that it was a delight to the eyes and good for food. Her hankering after it caused her to submit to the devil’s clever reasons and she took it in her hands, and fell into sin.

For her, it began with appearance – there was nothing wrong with the appearance of the fruit, but it became the form of evil for the prompting to do wrong. It was the devil’s appeal to appearance, that was the problem. He took the innocence of appearance and built a lust into it. Eve could have walked away from that lust but she did not. She let it hatch, to conceive and to develop. The devil promised good, but gave evil. The crucial point though, was the form of evil she did not abstain from, which was the departure from the spoken word of God. Appearance, lust – they must be put in their place decisively. Do not let action arise from them.

We did a series on Lot before (they are on Sermon Central) but he looked around and spied Sodom. His first reaction should have been that Sodom must be rejected because the people were godless, but appeal was too strong for him and he succumbed to that form of evil. When Abram gave him the choice of land, his already dulled senses and conscience were defeated. The appearance and form of Sodom’s evil was known to him, but it was too strong for him and he succumbed. Then he chose Sodom and just escaped with his life, but wifeless. It was a simple enough decision he should have made because Sodom was known by reputation and practice, but something in Lot was hankering after the exploits of Sodom. He may not have been a participant in the evil of the Sodomites, but the appeal of evil grew to take him into that place for a defeated and perilous life. Paul said to abstain, and in Lot’s case abstain should have meant going the other way, but he did not.