Rapid Advance Of The Gospel Series

My wife and I took part in a nine-month ministry training program called Rapid Advance. The name of the training came from this chapter and from a summary of how the Gospel moved in the book of Acts. Paul did not spend his years of ministry planting a single church and trying to perfect it. He spent his years of ministry turning the world upside down from Jerusalem to Illiricum and then he was ready to move on to Spain (see Romans 15) to continue the rapid advance of the gospel. This rapid advance ministry pattern is found in the ministry of Jesus. It is found when the Gospel spread across the world through people from every corner of the world in Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost.

Thessalonica was a wonderful testimony to a rapid advance approach to ministry. Paul mentions being there three sabbaths (Acts 17:2). There were many who were won to Christ and built up in faith in this short time before the team, Paul, Silas and Timothy moved on to Berea and started ministry there, then to Athens and then to Corinth and on and on doing pioneer work and leaving new churches and leaders in their wake to carry on the work locally and keep saturating the area with more new churches.

Paul started his ministry in the rapid advance context. The gospel spread so rapidly in Antioch that Barnabas enlisted Paul to help root the new believers there in sound discipleship and then they were on to Cyprus and Galatia starting many more new churches.

Paul would leave Thessalonica after a very short ministry there, but he always had them on his heart and prayed for them. He wrote letters and in the case of Thessalonica he poured into leaders from there long into his ministry (Acts 20:4) Now, in the case of Thessalonica he is trying to counter a rumor that had circulated that they missed the second coming of Christ. He wanted to warn them about idleness too. This was a letter from Paul, Silus and Timothy but as we reach the end of chapter three Paul is taking the primary ownership of the letter.

Church ministry Spread rapidly

As for other matters, brothers and sisters, pray for us that the message of the Lord may spread rapidly and be honored, just as it was with you. (2 Thessalonians 3:1)

Paul is asking prayer for the message of the Lord to spread rapidly. Shortly after he killed Stephen in Jerusalem for spreading the gospel he ended up scattering the church, Paul met Jesus Christ on the Damascus Road and then for the rest of his life he had dedicated himself to spreading the gospel rapidly. He is asking the Thessalonians to pray for him in this ministry. They were themselves a testimony of how the gospel was spreading rapidly. They came to Christ quickly and their faith was ringing out throughout the whole region (1 Thessalonians 1:8).

We can praise the Lord how in our day this rapid advance of the gospel is still taking place. According to the Centre for the study of global Christianity in Africa in the last fifty years the number of Christians in Africa increased from 142 million to 620 million. That is nearly a half billion new Christians in that part of the world in our lifetime. That is rapid advance. In Asia in the same time period Christians grew from 92 million to 420 million. There are many more localized stories of rapid advance of the gospel in our lifetime.

We need to be praying for the rapid advance of the gospel. We need to be sharing and training others to share the gospel abundantly. We need to disciple the new believers. We need to encourage these new believers to be part of new churches not just joining existing churches. All this is the pattern that Paul used, and the Thessalonians practiced. Now it is our time to trust the Lord for using us in rapid advance ministry.

Prayer of protection

And pray that we may be delivered from wicked and evil people, for not everyone has faith. (2 Thessalonians 3:2)

Recently a friend of mine sent me a picture of himself in the hospital. Those that opposed the gospel hired thugs who stormed into a church meeting, started beating people and stabbed this man on his arms and head. He himself is a first-generation Christian. The people doing this to my friend are part of the wicked and evil people referred to in this verse. Pray that we might be delivered from them.

There is something to remember about these evil and wicked people that Paul is asking us to pray to be delivered from. Paul himself was one of them. He was transformed and went from a persecutor to a persecuted. Don’t forget that in the rapid advance of the gospel there are countless such transformations. They are evil and wicked and so was Paul. So were all of us without Christ.