When this church finally decided to build our new worship center back in 1996 all my pastor friends told me to pack my bags. One of my former seminary teachers suggested that I update my resume. You see, building projects have a reputation for tearing churches apart. And through the years a general pattern has emerged, that by the time the building is actually built, the teaching pastor’s either too exhausted to go on or the congregation is sick of him. So the pastor either ends up resigning or being fired.
Now fortunately none of that happened--and though our building campaign and construction was tiring and challenging--it was also a time of great blessing. But I’ve often wondered why it is that putting up a building so often causes the church to fall apart. You see, the building is just the outward shell. The real church is the people, and the facilities are just our place to meet, the tent that keeps us dry when it rains, warm when it’s cold, and cool when it’s hot.
Because the real church is the people, not the building, the Bible doesn’t really say much about building programs. But the Bible does command followers of Jesus Christ to build the church. For instance, the Bible calls the church--the community of God’s people--God’s building (1 Cor 3:9). First Corinthians 14:12 contains a command to all followers of Jesus Christ to strive to build up the church. My job description as a pastor in Ephesians 4:12 is to equip church members to serve in ministry so that the church might be built up. So building a church is a biblical concept, but this kind of building has very little to do with bricks, drywall or carpeting. Instead, building the church has to do with the community of people.
We’ve been in the midst of a series through the New Testament books of 1 and 2 Thessalonians called LIVING CONFIDENTLY IN UNCERTAIN TIMES. With we’ve been talking about how the Bible anchors our confidence, not in computers or a strong economy, but in a relationship with Jesus Christ. Because Christ has opened the way for us to know God and because our future is secure through Christ, we can be confident no matter what the future holds…even today, 42 days before y2k. Today as we finish 1 Thessalonians and get reading to start 2 Thessalonians next week, we’re going to look at how to build a confident church. We’re going to talk about five bricks that are each absolutely necessary to build a confident church.
1. Our Leadership (1 Thess 5:12-13).
The first brick is CONFIDENCE IN OUR LEADERSHIP. We see this in vv. 12-13.
Here Paul’s talking to the entire congregation--all the members--about their attitude toward the leadership. In some ways the Thessalonian church isn’t much different than churches are today. Here we find a group of people in v. 12 who "work hard," those men and women who sacrifice their energy, their time, and their money to make the church’s ministry happen. The word for "work" Paul uses here has the idea of manual labor, of toil and sweat (Louw and Nida 42.47; Stott 119). As we’ll see in a few minutes, there was also a group of people who weren’t doing anything. So the church in Thessalonica was probably like most churches in our culture today: 20% of the people were doing 80% of the work. Those who were working hard were probably feeling under appreciated, and the rest of the congregation was taking them for granted.
Paul further defines this group of people--the workers--as those who were "over" the Thessalonians. They were spiritual leaders in the church, those who admonished the Thessalonians and taught them about God. This has led some people to identify this group as the church’s pastors or elders (Stott 119).
Paul doesn’t say to crown your pastors and elders as kings, but to "respect" them. The word "respect" in v. 12 actually means to "know" someone so well that you appreciate their true worth (Morris 165). So Paul is talking about a relational kind of respect here, which is consistent with v. 13 where he says to do this "in love."
But personally I think these verses are talking about a wider group than just the pastors and elders. To describe who this passage is describing let’s envision our church as a number of concentric circles (Warren, Purpose Driven Church). The biggest circle represents the unchurched in our community, those men and women who don’t yet have a transforming relationship with Jesus Christ. This obviously represents who we’re trying to reach with God’s love. The next circle is the crowd, which represents the people who are in a worship service on any given Sunday. This is a mixed group of Christians, seekers, skeptics, perhaps a few shoppers who thought they were going to Albertsons and turned the wrong way. The next circle is the congregation, which represents those who’ve taken the step of church membership. These are people who’ve decided to make this their church home, they’ve gone through our Meet LBF seminar, shared their profession of faith in Jesus, and made a membership commitment to our church family. The next circle is the committed, which describes those who are committed to the spiritual disciplines necessary for spiritual growth. We go over these spiritual disciplines in our "Discovering Spiritual Maturity" 201 seminar. Finally there’s the core, which represents those in our church who serve in ministry with people. We offer our "Discovering My Ministry" 301 seminar to assist people in this process.
This passage is describing this core, those men and women in our congregation who are "working hard" to make ministry happen. These are our elders and pastors--of course--but it’s also our care pastors, our children’s ministry leaders, our ministry directors, and so forth. When these leaders labor in ministry and when members know them well enough to appreciate what they do, there’s peaceful harmony in the church.
Effective leadership and effective following translates into harmonious relationships. Ineffective leadership or disrespectful following translates into friction, tension, and conflict.
So how can we build confident leadership? We build a confident church by nurturing respectful relationships with our spiritual leaders.
The Bible is very clear that churches have a responsibility to cultivate positive relationships with their leadership. Other places in the Bible address the responsibility of leaders to lead with integrity, to be gentle, to instruct with clear biblical truth, and so forth. But here the emphasis is on the responsibility of followers. Nurturing respectful relationships with leaders requires work; it doesn’t happen effortlessly. Like most significant relationships in our lives, this relationship doesn’t just naturally stay strong. It requires lots of forgiveness, patience, clear communication, and most of all Christlike love.
Far too often we’ve allowed our culture’s anti-authority attitude to seep into the church, and we view leaders with distrust, failing to appreciate the hard work they do to make sure ministry is taking place. In fact, this is why every year we have a special appreciation banquet for this group of people in June, to obey this command to recognize and respect the work they do.So the first brick to build a confident church is nurturing these respectful relationships with our spiritual leaders.
2. Our Ministry (1 Thess 5:14-15).
The second brick to build with is CONFIDENCE IN OUR MINISTRY. That’s what we find in vv. 14-15.
Once again, Paul uses the collective term "brothers" to show us that he’s addressing the entire congregation. The entire congregation is to "warn the idle." The word "warn" here means "to admonish" and it usually refers to cautioning people about destructive and immoral behavior. Now not everyone needs "admonishing," so Paul describes the group who needs this as the "idle." This word "idle" was originally a military word that described someone who was out of formation or who abandoned their post, what we would call AWOL (Frame 197). Our English word "slacker" probably captures the idea of this Greek word best. The "idle" are the "won’t do’s" of the church, the people who refuse to get involved, those who expect things to be just right for them, but who haven’t yet personally contributed to building up the church. Admonishing slackers means challenging them to get back to their post.
The entire congregation is also to be involved in encouraging the timid. The word for "encourage" here means "to console" or "show tenderness" (Louw and Nida 25.153; Morris 169). This word was often used to describe giving comfort in the face of a tragedy or death (Wanamaker 197). And the people who most need this tender comfort are the timid. If the slackers are the "won’t do" people of the church, the timid are the "want to" people. These are the people who want to serve in ministry, who want to make a difference, but their lives are characterized by such brokenness or they have such a low opinion of themselves that they just can’t seem to take the next step. These are the discouraged and broken hearted, the troubled and depressed. They need tender consolation from the entire congregation.
The entire church is also told to help the weak. The word "help" here means to prop something up that’s about to collapse, to support (Bruce 133). Now the word "weak" here is probably referring to spiritual weakness. So if the idle are the "won’t do’s" and the "timid" are the "want to’s", the weak are the "can’t do’s" of the church. These are the men and women who simply aren’t spiritually strong enough to function the way God wants them to, so we’re told to prop them up, to lend support so they don’t fall.
We tend to figure the pastors will take care of the "won’t do’s," the Stephen’s ministers will take care of the "want to’s" and the care group leaders will take care of the "can’t do’s." But what Paul says here is that ministering to these people is the responsibility of the entire church, each one of us.
Then Paul says to be patient with everyone, because he knows that we tend to become very impatient with "won’t do," "want to," and "can’t do" kinds of people. In v. 15 Paul reiterates the teachings of Jesus about non-retaliation, that no matter what evil is done against us, the follower of Jesus never has an excuse to respond to evil with evil. The "eye for an eye" philosophy makes pretty good legislation, but it’s a terrible way to try to live your life if you’re a follower of Jesus Christ. A spirit of retaliation can destroy a church, splintering the members into various factions, motivating people to have secret meetings, file lawsuits, and in some rare cases resort to violence. The follower of Jesus is to always seek the good, not echo the evil.
These two verses describe our ministry, our second brick, and here we find a second way to build a confident church. We build a confident church by getting personally involved in people’s lives.
Now I admit that getting involved in people’s lives, diving into ministry, is risky. Human relationships are always risky; they aren’t predictable or always manageable. This is why our tendency is to play it cool, to keep our distance, but when we do that we rob the church of our involvement in ministry. When we hold back from ministry we become the slackers Paul is describing here. Now a lot of people are afraid of that word "ministry." Ministry is simply serving God’s purposes in other people’s lives. Ministry is admonishing people when they’re AWOL, tenderly comforting the timid, supporting the weak. Ministry is patiently seeking God’s purposes with the won’t do, want to, and can’t do people. When our ministry is weak, it’s because too many people are watching from the sidelines, afraid to dive in. But we build with the brick of a confident ministry when we get personally involved in people’s lives.
3. Our Devotion (1 Thess 5:16-18).
Now the third brick is the brick of DEVOTION. That’s what we find in vv. 16-18. What these three commands all have in common is that they’re all God focused. Something else to mention is that all three are in the plural, which means Paul is addressing the entire congregation, not just solitary individuals. All three of these commands are described as God’s will for us.
We build a confident church by enthusiastically embracing God’s will in our circumstances.
A joyful resolve despite our circumstances, a praying spirit that constantly seeks God, and a thankful attitude in the midst of all of life’s circumstances makes us people of devotion. This kind of enthusiastic embrace of God’s purpose for our lives builds a strong sense of community.
4. Our Direction (1 Thess 5:19-22).
The fourth brick I want to talk about is confidence in OUR DIRECTION. We find this in vv. 19-22. The command in v. 19 is to not quench the Holy Spirit. The Spirit of God is pictured as a fire, and some in the congregation were tempted to spray the fire hose on what God’s Spirit was doing. So Paul commands us not to douse the Spirit’s fire, to not become so organized and structured that the work of God’s Spirit is quenched.
The specific way the Thessalonians were quenching God’s Spirit was by disregarding prophecy. Now prophecy in the New Testament is when the Holy Spirit gives a person supernatural insight into God’s will (Frame 206, Fee 60). The prophet in the New Testament didn’t so much foretell the future as much as he or she had supernatural insight into the present and what God wanted to do. Now this spiritual gift was extremely important when the New Testament wasn’t yet completed, because they had a greater need for supernatural guidance. Since we have the completed 27 books New Testament, we have much more to draw from in terms of guidance, but God still works in prophecy sometimes to give us specific guidance.
Just a quick example: A few months ago during first service, the worship time went long. I’d planned on giving an invitation to receive Christ that morning, but because of time I’d decided to not give the invitation. As I slipped out the back to get ready, someone in the church stopped me. She said, "I’ve never had this happen before, but I really feel like God is telling me that you need to go ahead with what you’d already planned on doing." I took that as God’s guidance to still give the invitation, and that’s what I did, even though we went late that morning. I think this is the way prophecy works, not in apocalyptic visions and "thus saith the Lord" pronouncements, but in ordinary circumstances as ordinary people discern God’s will.
But this command to not disregard prophecy is quickly followed by verses 21 and 22, to test prophecies You see, not everything spoken in God’s name is true and sometimes when God does speak we get the message wrong. The word "test" means to sift through something, to learn its genuineness, to closely examine something to determine if its real or not (Louw and Nida 27.45). As we sift through prophetic claims, when we find something real and genuine we hold on to it, but when we find something that’s not real, we separate ourselves from it.
So how can we build confidence in our direction? We build a confident church by biblically discerning God’s guidance.
Paul doesn’t tell us how to sift through prophecy here, but we know from the rest of scripture that our sieve for sifting these claims is the Bible. Let’s face it, to be a confident church we need to know where we’re going. It’s the task of our elder board to discern God’s direction, to sense God’s guidance. Things like setting our budget, making decisions about staff, building a baptismal, buying more property, and so forth are first and foremost spiritual issues about what God wants to do. Yet we’re not infallible, we sometimes don’t hear from God clearly or we get the timing wrong, so we need others who are sensing God’s direction to share that direction with us. Then we can sift and sort through it, to more accurately hear God’s voice. Biblical discernment results in a sense of vision, a sense of knowing what’s next for our congregation.So biblical discernment is vital for our direction.
5. Our Prospects (1 Thess 5:23-28).
This brings us to our final brick, which is confidence in OUR PROSPECTS FOR THE FUTURE. That’s what we see in vv. 23-28.
Speaking of discerning God’s direction leads Paul to break into a prayer (Wanamaker 206). Paul prays for their sanctification, that is, that they might be made into holy and Christlike people. This sanctifying process impacts every dimension of who we are--our spirit, our soul, as well as our physical bodies. Sanctification--being made holy--is pictured here as a process that God is performing in our lives. Sanctification isn’t something we’re doing--as if we had the power or the resources to sanctify ourselves, but it’s fundamentally a work of God.
That doesn’t mean we’re passive in the process, but it does mean that we can’t make ourselves holy. Here we find a note of assurance, that just as God has called Christians to faith in Jesus Christ, so also God will faithfully complete his work of making us holy. If you’re a follower of Jesus Christ here today, God has called you--your faith in Jesus is evidence of that call. If you’ve been called, then you can be sure that God will accomplish his work of making you holy through and through--spirit, soul and body. We can depend on that promise, that God is faithful, reliable, and trustworthy to do whatever needs to be done in our lives to make us holy.
This is followed by Paul’s final greetings, a request to pray for him, to greet each other warmly, and to publicly read this letter since it’s part of scripture.
Here we find though how to have confidence in our prospects. We build a confident church by trusting in God’s faithfulness for our spiritual progress.
If it depended on us--our faithfulness, our dependability, our resolve--we’d never make it. Let’s face it, C. S. Lewis was right to call humans "half hearted creatures" who’s passions aren’t nearly passionate enough. We get excited and motivated in spurts, but between those spurts are long periods of apathy. So if our progress in the spiritual life depended on us our prospects wouldn’t be very good.But since our progress depends on God’s faithfulness--evidenced in the fact that we already believe in Jesus--then our prospects are great. Just as surely that Jesus Christ will one day come again, so also we can be sure that we’ll be ready because God is faithfully sanctifying us through and through.
Five bricks to build a confident church. The bricks of leadership, ministry, devotion, direction, and prospects. Historically this congregation has usually been strong in these areas. We’ve had times where we’ve struggled, but by in large the last 28 years have been characterized by confidence in each of these areas. But yesterday’s strength is no guarantee for today’s strength. Now that our building is built and we’re well on our way to paying it off, it would be tempting for us to confuse this facility with the real church. More and more we’re tempted to speak of the church in terms of drywall, parking, and carpet.
But the church is the people, not the building. So as we face our future as a congregation, my prayer is that God would help us nurture respectful relationships between leaders and members, that God would help each of us get personally involved in people’s lives, enthusiastically embrace God’s will, biblically discern God’s guidance, and trust in God’s faithfulness for our growth.
Sources
Best, Ernest. A Commentary on the First and Second Epistles to the Thessalonians. Harper’s New Testament Commentaries. Hendrickson, 1986.Bruce, F. F. 1 and 2 Thessalonians. Word Biblical Commentary 45. Waco: Word Books, 1982.
Fee. Gordon. God’s Empowering Presence: The Holy Spirit in the Letters of Paul. Peabody: Hendrickson, 1994.
Frame, G. E. A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Epistles of St. Paul to the Thessalonians. ICC; Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1988.
Hiebert, D. Edmond. 1 and 2 Thessalonians. Winona Lake: BMH Books, 1992.
Holmes, Michael W. 1 and 2 Thessalonians. The NIV Application Commentary. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1998.
Keener, Craig. The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament. Intervarsity Press, 1993.
Morris, Leon. The First and Second Epistles to the Thessalonians. NICNT. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1991.
Stott, John R. W. The Message of 1 and 2 Thessalonians. The Bible Speaks Today. Downers Grove: InterVarsity, 1991.
Wanamaker, Charles A. The Epistles To the Thessalonians: A Commentary on the Greek Text. New International Greek Testament Commentary. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1990.
