2 Thessalonians 1 - Commendation in Conflict - 7/10/16
Turn with me to the book of 2 Thessalonians, chapter 1. Two weeks ago, we looked at 1 Thessalonians, and we saw an introduction to the church there. As you remember, Thessalonica is a town in Greece, one of the biggest cities in the whole Greek nation. Paul came to town, preached in the Jewish synagogue, and many Jews and Gentiles believed. A church was started at Thessalonica, but rowdy Jews stirred up a riot, and Paul had to leave quickly. As he travels down to Athens, Paul writes them a letter to encourage them to continue on in their newfound faith.
In his first letter to them, Paul praises these new Christians, because they had a faith that was growing, showing, and echoing.
• In chapter 1, Paul expresses his thankfulness for these new believers: they responded right away by putting their faith into action.
• In chapter 2, Paul talks about his ministry when he came to Thessalonica. Paul declares that he had pure motives when he was with them. We see his depth of care for them personally. We see the emotional highs and lows involved in relationships.
• In chapter 3, Paul reminds them to keep the right perspective - not to be shocked at trials, but to expect them. He reminds them to have a passionate joy about the things God is doing; not to focus on the trials, but to focus on the way God brings us through the trials. And he reminds them, and us, to pray! When God works, and to see Him continue to work, we need to pray.
Normally in Paul’s letters the first few chapters have to do with doctrine, the last half deals with duty. He starts by telling what is true, and then he ends by saying “So what?” - because of what we know to be true, how does that affect our lives? And the book of 1 Thessalonians is no different. In the first half, he begins by talking about them, about his ministry to them, and about the trials both Paul and the Thessalonians faced.
• In chapter 4, and Paul talks about how we live. He begins with a call to holy living. In light of what is true, that the Thessalonians are growing in their faith and enduring trials faithfully, Paul calls them to continue to live lives that are pleasing to God. Then in the end of chapter 4, Paul goes on to talk about the Lord’s return. Paul corrects two wrong ideas for the Thessalonian believers.
What happens to the dead? What happens to Christians when they die? Do they miss out on something spiritually if they aren’t living when Jesus returns? The answer: Don’t worry, we get to be with Jesus forever. We don’t miss out on anything.
• In chapter 5 we find another question about the Lord’s return.
What happens to those who are still living when the Lord returns? Do we have to face God’s wrath?
There is a terrible day of judgment coming, the day of the Lord, the day when God brings His wrath and judgment to the earth. But we don’t need to worry, because as Christians we won’t face the wrath of God. Jesus IS coming soon - and when He comes, we want to be ready. That is a whirlwind overview of 1 Thessalonians.
But shortly after Paul had written them the letter of 1 Thessalonians, he felt a need to write them a second letter, the letter of 2 Thessalonians. Paul wants to straighten out a few misunderstandings that the church had. Here in 2 Thessalonians we have three chapters, and three key ideas.
• In chapter 1, Paul gives Commendation: he writes in Praise for their Perseverance
• In chapter 2, Paul gives Comfort: he writes about the Reality of Christ’s Return
• In chapter 3, Paul gives Correction: he writes about the need to Work while we Wait
Today, we want to look at chapter 1. Read 1 Thessalonians 1 - Pray
You remember that while we normally sign our letters at the end, in the first century they signed their names at the start. So here is Paul, Silas, and Timothy writing to the believers at Thessalonica - baby Christians who turned from worshiping idols and turned to following Christ. And the first focus of their letter is
* Praise - Paul starts out giving them motivation. We all have heard the saying “prayer changes things” - but let’s realize that “praise” also changes things. Praise is a great motivator. And praise reinforces our desire to do what we know is right. Paul is writing to these brothers and sisters undergoing great persecution, and what does he do? He thanks God for them! He focuses on giving praise to God. But that was nothing new for Paul. Remember in Acts 16, when Paul is taken by the crowd in Philippi - he is beaten with many stripes, put in prison, has his feet chained in stocks, and what does Paul do? He sings praises to God!
The temptation that Satan brings us when we face difficult circumstances in life is like Job’s wife - she says “Curse God and die!” There are many times that we just want to throw ourselves a pity party. We complain about the trouble we are facing; we blame God and declare that He doesn’t care about us. We become obsessed with trying to get out from under the circumstances. But what does God want us to do? PRAISE!
Think about this - if every time you stubbed your toe or hit your thumb with a hammer you yelled out “Praise the Lord” - I really believe Satan would start trying to find another way to attack you. Because the last thing Satan wants is to see God get the praise. So back to the Thessalonians - why is Paul praising?
• Their Faith is Flourishing - There saw this same thing back in 1 Thessalonians 1 - they had a faith that put itself into practice, it worked, and they became a model to everyone in Greece, and their testimony was known throughout the world! Now here again in 2 Thessalonians, Paul says your faith is growing more and more. The term used here is really “super-growing”. It is growing abundantly fast.
I love the old tv show - Gomer Pyle USMC. In one episode Gomer is growing watermelons, and he has these little plants in a garden that the colonel has given him permission to have. Sargeant Carter wants to play a prank on Gomer, so he puts a whole grown watermelon out in the patch at night, and the next morning Gomer comes out to find a huge watermelon. Now THAT’S supergrowing!
The Thessalonians didn’t just grow a little bit. Sometimes we are content just to have one devotional thought that warms our hearts. Not the Thessalonians. They grew by leaps and bounds! So HOW did they grow their faith so much? Through suffering! If we’re talking about biblical “knowledge” growing, we get that through study. But in talking about “faith” growing, that comes about through placing out faith in situations were that faith is tested.
Let’s realize that even in the most difficult circumstances in life, our faith can grow. Sadly, there are many Christians whose faith is “stagnant.” They haven’t exercised their faith in a long time. Ritual, yes, every Sunday! But faith, sadly no.
No doubt the Thessalonican believers did not consider themselves to be very spiritual as they suffered, but Paul detected what God was doing among them. Often we look for the “glory” days of living on the “mountain” - but the strength of our character and the greater witness for Christ is shown in how we respond when we are in the “valley.” Anyone can rejoice and praise God when they are having a “mountaintop” experience - but it is much harder to be faithful in praising God when you struggle going through times of suffering and persecution.
Faith, like a muscle, must be exercised to grow stronger. Tribulation and persecution are God’s ways to strengthen our faith. When we come to Hebrews 11, we see the great “heroes” of the faith. We wish we could be great men and women of faith like them. But one thing we often overlook is that all the great men and women of faith in Hebrews 11 suffered in one way or another, or faced tremendous obstacles, so that their faith could grow. Paul had prayed for the believers in Thessalonica, that their faith might be perfected (1 Thes. 3:10); and now he thanked God for answered prayer. But their faith is growing because they are exercising their faith as they persevere through great suffering and persecution.
In verse 4, Paul commends them for their perseverance. Where does perseverance come from? Suffering! Paul used several words to describe their situation: persecutions, which means “attacks from without”; tribulations, which literally means “pressures” that result from the trials; and trouble, which means “to be pressed into a narrow place.” No matter how we look at it, the Thessalonian Christians were not having an easy time.
Normally when faced with a problem our first response is to say, “God, please take this away.” After all, that’s what Paul did, even Jesus prayed that way. But when God chooses to leave us to face the problem, we need to change the way we look at the problem. It can either be a stumbling-block or a stepping-stone. Don’t just look to escape the problem; look for God’s grace to carry you through. Struggle, problems, adversity, testing -- these make us stronger. God promises He will never give us more than we can bear.
Think about an athlete in training. They run miles and miles; do thousands of situps and pushups; lift heavy, heavy weights - why? to be stronger, faster, to be their best. There are many who say “that’s too hard” and never work out. They’d rather sit in front of the TV with a pop in one hand and a bag of chips in the other.
We have a nation of “couch potato” Christians, who don’t want any adversity. But when we avoid adversity, we miss out on one of the greatest blessing God could bring us. In Romans 5, Paul says that suffering produces perseverance. When we go through suffering, we learn never to give up.
God permits trials that He might build character into our lives. He can grow a mushroom overnight, but it takes many years—and many storms—to build a mighty oak.
Then in that same chapter Paul says perseverance produces character. The term character is the idea of being “approved” by God. And that is the idea of the spiritual maturity that had come to these new Christians. They had experienced a “super growth” of their faith. So Paul is praising God because
• Their Faith is Flourishing - he is also praising God because
• Their Love is Abounding - in verse 3 he says, and the love every one of you has for each other is increasing. As they faced suffering, it not only brought them closer to God and grew their faith, it also brought them closer to one another and grew their love. In 1 Th 3:12 Paul prays, May the Lord make your love increase and overflow for each other and for everyone else, just as ours does for you. When he says “for each other” he is referring to other Christians. So when he says “for everyone else” he is referring to the unsaved. These are the very ones who were persecuting the Thessalonians. Paul prays for their love to grow even for those who afflicted them. And here we see that God answered that prayer of Paul’s, because their love was abounding.
So Paul sees their faith flourishing, their love abounding, and what is the result? He gives thanks! Look at the first part of verse 3 - We ought always to thank God for you, brothers, and rightly so. Let’s realize that it is RIGHT to give God thanks for the way He is helping us to grow. This is an area where most of us probably fail miserably. We can find it easy to thank God for “things” - thanks for the raise, thanks for the bonus, thanks for healing Grandma’s broken leg. But it can be much harder to thank God for “character qualities.” Yet as we take time to consider the way God is growing us, this should be something we do. We should thank God for the character, the spiritual maturity He is building in our lives.
So Paul wants to encourage these Thessalonian believers, and he starts with praise for their spiritual growth. But the second thing we see in this chapter, Paul tries to encourage these believers facing great persecution by helping the to have the right. . .
* Perspective! There is something in our human nature that longs for “justice” to be done. You can watch a movie with a mean villain, and if he gets away with abusing others, you want to scream at the screen for someone to kill him, take him out! Somebody needs to do something!
In the same way, even though these Christians know that God is with them in the persecution, their hearts are crying out for God to make things right. And that’s where Paul steps in and reminds them that God WILL set everything right. One day! For these Thessalonian Christians who have faced such great suffering, Paul reminds them that God will bring relief. Look down at verse 6: God is just: He will pay back trouble to those who trouble you and give relief to you who are troubled, and to us as well. The word here “relief” is the idea of releasing a bowstring. Think of an archer out deer hunting. He sees the deer, and holds the bow taught - the string under pressure, waiting to let the arrow fly - but once he does, the string is no longer under any pressure. There will be a day when these Christians will no longer be under the pressure of suffering and persecution. So Paul encourages them to live in hope. But on a far deeper level, God will bring justice. He will PAY BACK trouble to those who troubled them.
And we’re not just talking about trouble in this life, but we’re talking “eternal damnation.” Look down in verse 9 - They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord and from the majesty of his power on the day he comes to be glorified in his holy people and to be marvelled at among all those who have believed.
There are some who say “we are all going to make it to heaven - we are just on different paths there.” But the scripture is clear: Those who refuse the gospel, the “good news” of salvation in Jesus are damned. In verse 8 it says they will be “punished.” Verse 9 - that punishment is “everlasting destruction.” And the worst part of all - they are shut out, deprived of any access to God.
A Christian doctor had tried to witness to a very moral woman who belonged to a church that denied the need for salvation and the reality of future judgment. “God loves me too much to condemn me,” the patient would reply. “I cannot believe that God would make such a place as a lake of fire.” The woman became ill and the diagnosis was cancer. An operation was necessary. “I wonder if I really should operate,” the doctor said to her in her hospital room. “I really love you too much to cut into you and give you pain.” “Doctor,” said the patient, “if you really loved me, you would do everything possible to save me. How can you permit this awful thing to remain in my body?” It was easy then for him to explain that what cancer is to the body, sin is to the world; and both must be dealt with radically and completely. Just as a physician cannot love health without hating disease and dealing with it, so God cannot love righteousness without hating sin and judging it.
ONE DAY, God will set everything right and bring the justice that our hearts cry out for! So Paul shares praise, perspective, and thirdly, he turns to
• Prayer - In light of all that is going on in their lives, Paul affirms to the Thessalonian believers that he is constantly praying for them. And he mentions three specific things he is praying for them. First, he is praying about
- their worth - verse 11 - With this in mind, we constantly pray for you, that our God may count you worthy of his calling. Paul is NOT saying that he was praying they would be worthy of saving - for none of us are. Neither is he saying that our works provide our salvation - for that is not possible either. Rather, what he is saying is that he wanted to see that they “passed the test.” He is praying that their response to all the suffering and persecution they were under would show that their faith was genuine and sincere. Their actions, their response, would show what was in their heart, and would show the depth of their character, it would show their worth. Secondly he prays for
- their walk - this is in the second half of verse 11 - and that by his power he may fulfil every good purpose of yours and every act prompted by your faith. Character shows itself through our conduct. We live out our faith by the actions we do. Paul points out that their faith prompts their actions. A heart of faith builds good purposes which prompt right action. So Paul is praying for their walk as well to be blameless. And then third, Paul prays for
- their witness - in verse 12 he says, We pray this so that the name of our Lord Jesus may be glorified in you, and you in him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ. As we show our worth, we pass the test, and we put our faith into action, bringing about a consistent walk, this becomes a witness for all to see. We bring glory to God by our actions. Jesus says in Matthew 5:16 - In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven. May this be true of us as well.
So, to recap, let’s seek to praise God for what He is doing in building our character: let’s abound in love and flourish in faith; let’s remember that one day God will set everything right; and until that day, let’s pray daily that God would establish our worth, our walk, and our witness. Let’s pray right now.
