A common saying that has become well-known is, “Truth is
stranger than fiction.” When one begins to study what has really
happened in history he discovers that reality if just as amazing and
interesting as anything that could be invented. For example, I read
the story of a drifter in Australia who saw an ad in a year old
American newspaper he found in the desert. His name was Tom
Ellis, and the ad was about a correspondence course in electricity.
He had no money, but he wrote explaining his situation and interest.
His need appealed to the chief engineer of the school, who was
Fenton L. Howard. He taught Tom Ellis through the mail for
several years without any payments.
Seventeen years later during World War II Fenton Howard
was a navel electrician aboard a U. S. ship in the Pacific. A
generator blew apart and he was critically injured. An SOS was
sent out and answered by an Australian ship whose electrician
installed a motor so the American ship could limp home. It did just
that in time to save the life of Fenton Howard. The amazing fact in
the story is that the Australian electrician was none other than Tom
Ellis, whom Fenton Howard had taught across thousands of miles.
The payment was long in coming, but when it came, it came with
interest, for the student saved the life of the teacher.
You can call such an experience luck, chance or coincidence,
and you could not be disproved, for there are things that happen in
life that are not God’s intention, and they are beyond man to
foresee. A flip of the coin could be predicted if all the factors were
known before hand, but since they are not, and since they very with
every flip, it is considered a matter of chance. God does not
determine which it will be, and man cannot determine which it will
be, and so we call it chance. Jesus did not hesitate to use the word.
He said in Luke 10:31, “And by chance there came down a certain
priest...” He means that it just happened that he came by just as the
man who was beaten was laying there. The providence of God was
to be seen in the Good Samaritan who showed compassion, but not
in the priest who just happened by.
This brings us to our text. Paul is praying for divine direction.
He is asking God to providentially work in his life so as to bring him
back to the Thessalonians. This clearly implies that not all that
happens is God’s providence, for what is the need for praying for
specific divine direction if all that life brings us is his pre-determined
direction anyway. It puts prayer on a very high level to see that it
can actually help determine the future course of life and history. To
believe this, however, is to come into apparent conflict with the
scientific world view. For the scientist all effects have a cause, and
these causes can be verified, and so there is no room for God to
break into the chain of cause and effect to alter what is to be. In
other words, the scientific world view is determinism.
Many theologians have this same pattern of thinking. They
have such a rigid concept of predestination that God’s hands are
tied. A more adequate concept is brought out in Karl Heim’s book
Transformation Of The Scientific World View. He pictures God’s
relationship to history like newspaper press. Once the type is set in
presses all that comes out on the printed copies is completely
predetermined. But anytime he wishes the editor can stop the
presses and insert new type, and this changes the material on
subsequent copies. Christians agree with the scientific world view
that every effect has a cause, but they just recognize that the greatest
of those causes is the will of God. When He acts providentially in
history, He does not intervene in the sense that He makes shambles
of the law of cause and effect. He simply becomes a stronger cause
to alter what natural causes would have produced had He not
intervened. Providence breaks no laws any more than an airplane
does when it overcomes the law of gravity by a greater cause.
Paul is simply praying that God will providentially work in the
future so as to assure His seeing them again face to face. We want to
examine the basis on which Paul makes this request for divine
direction.
I. PAUL’S PETITION.
The word here is stronger than just prayer. It is supplication.
There is a fervency in his petition that matches the great gratitude
which he had. The significant factor, however, is the qualitative
nature of Paul’s request. He did not seek divine direction for any
self-centered purpose. It was totally for the sake of service, and in
order that he might perfect their faith. We cannot pray too
earnestly, but we can pray too selfishly. A. W. Tozer felt that too
much prayer is “A heavenly method of achieving earthly success.”
He felt there were many so-called Christian projects afloat in the
world calling on the saints to pray and give that were nothing more
than schemes to relieve men of earning an honest living. He said,
“Selfishness is never so exquisitely selfish as when it is on its knees.”
We find none of this in Paul. His prayer was always, “Lord
give me that I may give.” Prayer to him was a power for service and
not a power to gain service. Paul was never satisfied short of
perfection. He never reached it, but he kept pressing on. He
couldn’t thank God enough for the faith of the Thessalonians that
caused them to stand fast in tribulation and temptation. Standing
fast did not mean standing still for Paul. It was marvelous what
they did, but Paul did not see life through rose colored glasses. Just
because they made a great showing did not mean they were mature
in the faith yet. He recognized they had much to learn, and it was
his goal to see that they learned it.
Calvin saw in Paul’s attitude the importance of Christian
teaching. He wrote, “From this it is clear how much we must devote
ourselves to teaching. For teachers were not ordained only that in
one day or in one month they should bring men to the faith of
Christ, but that they should bring to completion the faith that has
just begun.” This does not mean that we cannot be fully committed
until we know all things. Someone said that when Columbus started
out he did not know where he was going. When he arrived he did
not know where he was. When he returned he did not know where
he had been, but all the same he discovered America. We can know
and experience fellowship with God in spite of a lack of knowledge,
but as we gain more and more of that knowledge, we increase our
capacity for service to others.
God is an unlimited source of power, but we can only draw on
that source in accord with our capacity. The fact that a 40 watt bulb
does not give adequate light to read by is not due to lack in the
source of the power, but in the instrument that puts that power into
service. A 100 watt bulb does not add to the source, but merely
increases the capacity to draw on the source for greater power of
service. This is why Christians should have a hunger to know the
Word so as to perfect their faith, and that they might thereby
increase their capacity to be used of God in service to others. If this
is not our desire, as it was Paul’s, on what basis can we ask God for
His providential guidance?
In verse 12 we see Paul’s prayer for them, and this should be
the prayer of every believer for himself. To increase and abound in
love toward fellow believers, and toward all men, is one of our
highest goals. Here we find an application of our little chorus deep
and wide. Love in the Christian is to be both intensive and
extensive. It is to grow more and more and over flow until it is the
basic factor in our relationships to believers. It is not to end there,
for the church is not to become a mutual admiration society which
gets wrapped up in itself and forgets the reason for its existence,
which is to reach a lost world with the love of God.
II. THE MEANS OF DIVINE DIRECTION.
In verse 11 Paul is not asking for a miracle, but for God’s
guidance in a providential way. When a miracle takes place no one
can say, “What luck.” It is so definitely an act of God that no
mistake can be made. No cause but a supernatural cause could
possibly produce a miracle. Providence, on the other hand, is very
much within the possibility of being caused by natural law. There is
nothing impossible about the story of the teacher being saved by the
student that we wrote of at the beginning. There is nothing
impossible at all about the multitude of events that so coincide as to
produce amazing benefits for God’s children. To show the
distinction consider the story of Exodus. If God had foreseen that
natural causes would at a specific time result in a dry path across
the Red Sea, and therefore worked in the life of Moses and the
people to get them there at just the time that such would happen,
that would be providence and not miracle. If, however, there were
no natural causes to produce such an effect, then it is a miracle.
There is nothing necessarily spectacular about providence.
One man was telling of the remarkable providence that preserved
him when his horse stumbled. Another man said, “I have a more
remarkable providence than that. My horse never stumbled at all.”
There is a tendency to only think of God’s guidance and providence
when there is a close call, but it is far more abundant in preserving
us from having any close calls in the first place. Paul is not asking
for anything spectacular to happen. He just wants God to work
things out so Satan does not hinder him from getting to them. It
took 5 years before did get back, but he was patient with the
providence of God. He didn’t expect God to pick him up and carry
him there. He was content to leave it in the hands of God to work
out the time schedule.
III. THE GOAL OF DIVINE DIRECTION.
What ultimate purpose was behind Paul’s desire for divine
guidance? It was that when Christ comes again that they might be
mature in Christ with hearts established in holiness. The whole
attitude of the New Testament is that we are to be aiming toward
perfection in the light of Christ coming. This is the purpose behind
all of the exhortation to watch. We are to be watching and keeping
awake, and preparing for that day by growth in holiness. This is the
end of all providence. God’s whole purpose in acting in our lives is
that we might be conformed to the image of His Son.
When Christ comes again with all His holy ones, we want to be
prepared to join that holy company. The saints here are not angels,
as some would say, for this word is never used by itself anywhere in
the New Testament to refer to angels. This is a reference to the
redeemed that will return with Christ. The significance of this is
that it makes perfectly clear that the coming for and with the saints
is all one event. This has been the historic pre-millennial view
throughout history. The significance of it for our lives is that it
ought to compel us to pray with Paul in all earnestness that we
might be used for service, and prepared for the second coming by
the providential guidance of God. Such a goal is not within our
capacity to reach apart from divine direction.
