We’re going to be thinking today about how to be a gospel church; how to live lives that are appropriate for people who are waiting for Christ to return to take us to be with him forever. In the previous section of this letter we were reminded that even if we don’t know exactly when Jesus will return, he is coming and that coming will be without warning, suddenly like a storm that blows up in summer and takes us by surprise; or like labor pains for a pregnant woman. So how are we to live so we’re ready for Christ’s return?
Well, it seems to me that there are 2 extremes of behaviour for Christians who are living in the last days, in the days between Jesus’ ascension and his return. The first is to make the mistake that some of these people were making. That’s to think that the last day is coming any minute and to just sit around idly waiting, or perhaps having one last fling, doing all those things we’d always put off doing. It’s the sort of thing someone who’s diagnosed with a terminal illness might do. The news suddenly changes their priorities. So they decide to spend more time with their family, or to go on that overseas trip they’ve always planned but never done. There was a guy in the news a couple of years ago who was suing his doctors because he’d been told he only had 6 months to live; so he’d gone off and spent every cent he had enjoying life while he could and then he’d discovered they’d made a mistake, there was nothing wrong with him. Or perhaps they set out to heal broken relationships. All because they know their time is short. Well that’s how some of those living in Thessalonica were behaving. So one of Paul’s instructions is to admonish the idlers, to tell them to get back to work.
But the other extreme is one that’s more likely to happen today. That’s to begin to think that it’s been so long that it’s never going to happen. I mean, after 2000 years of waiting it’s easy to simply forget that Jesus’ return is getting closer every day. Then the temptation is to begin to blend in with life around us; to take on the behaviour patterns of the culture in which we’re immersed; to forget that we’re a people set apart for God, sanctified by Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross.
You might like to think about your own life. Is the way you live different from those around you who don’t love God? Think of your non-Christian friends and neighbours? How does your life differ from theirs? Are you living, as we saw earlier in this letter, with the imminent return of Jesus as the motivating factor in your life? Or is that an irrelevance to you? Are you motivated by the love of God and by the expectation of Jesus’ return to take us to be with him in eternity?
Well, let’s look at the sort of behaviour that Paul encourages us to adopt if that is our perspective.
Leaders
First he talks about the way we relate to our leaders. He says "respect those who labor among you, and have charge of you in the Lord and admonish you; 13esteem them very highly in love because of their work." Now notice that there are three elements to the role of leader or pastor that make this important.
First, leaders are those who labor among you. It’s not easy to be a leader in the church. It actually takes hard work. Whether or not you’re an ordained leader, you’re the one who’s responsible for promoting the health and growth of the congregation. You’re the one where the buck stops. You’re the one who hears all the complaints and criticisms. If you’re the vicar you get into trouble no matter what happens. If you’re a lay leader you get into trouble for letting the vicar cause whatever it was that happened.
In fact I’m not sure how many people realise just how stressful it can be to be the minister in a parish, even a small one like ours. Peter Drucker, well known as a management guru, when asked to comment on the most stressful jobs in America, listed being the President of the United States as number one. That’s fair enough. And being a police officer I think was number 2. But do you know what the number three was? It was being the pastor of a church. So Paul is right in encouraging us to respect those who work hard among us.
Secondly your leaders are those who are over you in the Lord. This doesn’t mean some sort of authoritarian leadership. Christian leaders are first and foremost servant leaders. Our model is Jesus Christ who lowered himself and became a servant for our sake. But nevertheless, God does place leaders in the church to guide, to teach, to show the way. As we saw back in chs2&3 the leader is like a parent, set in place to act as guardian over his or her family, to model discipleship to the church.
Thirdly, they’re put there to "admonish you." That is, leaders in the church are there to warn against bad behaviour and its consequences, to reprove and maybe even discipline those how have done something wrong and to establish a culture of godly behaviour in the church.
Now it seems to me that you’re likely to see 2 or 3 different ways that people in the church treat their leaders. Some put them on a pedestal, almost worshipping the ground they walk on. For these people the vicar, or the pastor, can do no wrong. I was in a church once where there was quite a guru mentality about the minister. People came from far and wide to hear him preach. If he said something it was accepted without question by most of those people. And it was an unhealthy atmosphere.
But then there are those people who think the church would be better off without a minister at all. I know one place where the minister spent an enormous amount of energy deflecting the pressure of a few members of the congregation who thought they could do a better job of running the church than he could, which, of course, they couldn’t.
In the middle somewhere are those people who respect their leaders as those who work hard among them; who understand that they’re there because God has put them there and that their role is to establish Godliness in the church. That’s the way I hope you might treat your leaders here at St Thomas’.
Our Peers
Next Paul talks about how we’re to behave in relation to our peers. They’re to admonish the idlers, encourage the faint hearted, help the weak, be patient with all of them. It’s interesting that those who had given up work because they were waiting for the return of Christ are included with the weak and faint hearted. Paul clearly sees the three groups as equally in need of encouragement. These are the weaker brothers and sisters who need extra care and consideration. It’s easy enough for someone who’s confident in their faith to look down on those who are more timid, those who have doubts, perhaps. But Paul says we’re to treat them with patience. It may be that they’re still growing in their faith and haven’t yet reached the levels of maturity that they need to handle their present circumstances.
But not only must we be patient with those who are weak, we also need to make sure that none of us repays evil for evil. If you want to cause a problem in the church this is a sure fire formula: whenever someone does something to you, do it back to them, preferably more so. Then they can retaliate; and so the problem escalates. But that’s not the way Jesus behaved is it? Listen to how Peter expresses it in 1 Peter 2: 23When he was abused, he did not return abuse; when he suffered, he did not threaten; but he entrusted himself to the one who judges justly. 24He himself bore our sins in his body on the cross, so that, free from sins, we might live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed." So don’t repay evil for evil. Rather always seek to do good to one another and to all. It’s not enough, you see, just to refrain from retaliating. It’s much better to be proactive in doing good. Of course, doing good to someone else has a similar consequence to retaliating, only in a positive direction. Think about how you feel when someone does something good to you. I think they’re called "random acts of kindness." Something that’s un-looked for, undeserved. Simply done out of love. I don’t know about you but I respond to that sort of thing by wanting to do something good in return. And so in this case the goodness multiplies rather than the evil. (Overcome an enemy by becoming their friend.)
What’s more he throws in that phrase "and to all" again. This doing good to one another is also meant to spill over to doing good to those outside the fellowship.
So this behaviour affects not just our relationships within the church but our relationships in the world around us.
Our Worship Life
Finally he moves on from our communal life, from our relationship to our leaders and our peers, to our inner life, our relationship to God. He says "Rejoice always, 17pray without ceasing, 18give thanks in all circumstances". This is a call to worship God, "rejoice", to persevere in prayer, "pray without ceasing" and to give God the praise that’s his due "give thanks in all circumstances." In fact this is an instruction that impacts not only on our personal devotions but on our gathering together on a Sunday as well. Our gatherings should be joyful. Every service is a celebration of God’s goodness to us. Similarly our gatherings should be characterised by prayer; prayer for one another, prayer for our nation, for our leaders, for our world, prayers of thanksgiving.
Why does he tell us to pray without ceasing? It seems a silly idea really. I mean when do we get to sleep? Well I don’t think that’s quite what he meant. Rather I think he means that prayer is something we do at all sorts of times and on all sorts of occasions. It isn’t something that’s restricted to our prayer in church or our small group prayer times, or our morning or evening quiet time. Rather prayer is the thing that keeps us going throughout the day or the week, that keeps us in touch with God, if you like.
Similarly, thanksgiving is something that we give to God in every circumstance. Now remember that this was a church that was facing severe persecution. It was a poor church and their position as Christians probably made that poverty worse. Yet they were to give thanks whatever their circumstances.
I’m reminded of the words of Job in Job 2:21. When the great calamities of his life first hit him his response was this: "Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return there; the LORD gave, and the LORD has taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD." Even with the great loss he was suffering, his response was "God is good. If something terrible has happened it must be for a good reason, even if I don’t understand it." Now later he spent a lot of time complaining that God wasn’t treating him fairly, so we need to keep this in perspective, but still, he knew that God was sovereign and so his response was "blessed be the name of the LORD."
The words of v19 that follow may be connected with this: "Do not quench the Spirit." There’s nothing like ingratitude, not to mention doubt about God’s goodness to quench the Spirit’s work in our lives. Rather we should be thanking God that his Spirit is at work in us, whether or not our life is easy, whatever situation we find ourselves in. Again having an awareness of the return of Christ might help here. If we think abut the fact that Christ is about to return to take us to be with him in heaven it puts our present suffering into perspective doesn’t it?
The other way we can quench the Spirit is if we despise the words of the prophets. In other words to despise God’s word. In Paul’s context that word may have come as a word of exhortation from someone with a gift of prophecy. In our context it might be the words of a preacher, or the words of someone in your small group as you discuss a Bible passage. It might be the words of someone who has some sort of prophetic gift or ministry similar to those who prophesied in Paul’s day. In all of those cases we’re told not to despise or reject what’s heard, out of hand. Rather we’re to test what’s said to see if it truly is a word from God.
So how do we do that? Well, first and foremost we check whether it’s in accord with the Scriptures. We check whether it proclaims Christ as Lord (1 Jn 4:1-3). We check whether what it says is consistent with the gospel of God’s grace. i.e. does it free or does it create rules? And the character of the speaker may be relevant. We’re told that false prophets will be known by their fruits, by their character and behaviour. Finally the test here in this passage is that we hold fast to what is good and abstain from every form of evil. So does it urge us on to good works, to godly character? Or does it lead to something that’s inherently wrong?
Notice too, that he commands them in the strongest way possible to have this letter read to the church. This places his letter on the same level as the Old Testament Scriptures that were already read in their church meetings. To ignore this letter then, is also to quench the Spirit, since it’s the Spirit that’s inspired Paul to write it.
He finishes his letter with a blessing: "may God sanctify you and keep you sound and blameless until Christ returns;" and a promise: God is faithful and he will do it. He asks for their prayers and again encourages them to greet one another as equals, as family in fact: "Greet all the brothers and sisters with a holy kiss."
Well let me finish by reminding you of what we’ve discovered as we’ve read through this letter. The call to godly living is a tough one. If we’re going to live as though Christ will return any day, then we’re going to find the going tough at times. It’s not easy to remain faithful when Christ’s return seems so far off and when we’re surrounded by a culture that tries at every turn to undermine our resolve and to turn us aside from faithfulness. But God promises that he will give us the strength. We see it here in the promise in v24. "The one who calls you is faithful, and he will do this." We saw it at the end of ch 3 where Paul prays "May the Lord make you increase and abound in love for one another and for all, just as we abound in love for you. 13And may he so strengthen your hearts in holiness that you may be blameless before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his saints." (1 Th 3:12-13) So let me finish with the blessing he asks for them in v23. "May the God of peace himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be kept sound and blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ." Amen.
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