Stand Firm In The Lord!

September 15, 2019 Sermon - CATM - Stand Firm in the Lord

We are fearfully and wonderfully made. Most of our bodies functions are automatic. Digestive, circulatory, breathing. And even when you’re scared, your brain takes over your response.

When you’re scared, your amygdala sends a distress signal, the hypothalamus activates the sympathetic nervous system by sending signals through the autonomic nerves to the adrenal glands.

These glands respond by pumping the hormone epinephrine (also known as adrenaline) into the bloodstream.

This gives you the ‘fight or flight’ impulse - when confronting a threat, should you fight it, can you fight it, or should you run away?

- how should you best use your body’s energy? It’s amazing. We are fearfully and wonderfully made.

But…what makes you confident, what makes you confident when you might otherwise be fearful? What enables you to face your fears and not hide tale and run away when you might want to?

We are nearing the end of our series on the letters to the Thessalonians. You may have noticed that both letters contain indications that the Christians in Thessalonica were living with significant fear.

They were fearful because of the hostility of the culture around them to what they represented - something new, something strange albeit wonderful.

They were fearful of the Jewish leaders who were aggressive toward the church who they saw as a potential threat to their own shakey status as a monotheistic faith in that polytheistic pagan culture.

And they were fearful because some among them were spreading misinformation.

They were saying that the day of the Lord, the day of Christ’s return had happened.

Back in the day before cell phones and Facebook, the joke among Christians, when you couldn’t contact anyone you knew at a particular time,

was that the rapture must have happened and, oh well, ya got left behind.

That was a joke, mostly. But!...If someone told you that the Lord had already returned, but you’re still here...how would you feel.

That wouldn’t be particularly good news. And it wouldn’t make any sense as a follower of Jesus. It would just be confusing.

The Thessalonian church was waaaaay before phones of any nature, so what they felt, when people starting saying that the Lord had already returned, was fear.

So the letter to the Thessalonians contains all kinds of encouragement designed to calm their fears.

These are some of the words of encouragement in the letter to the Thessalonians.

[Readers: Read the passages below without reading the verse number. Read it as though you are speaking directly to the people around you.]

Reader 1

1 Thess 1:4 For we know, brothers and sisters loved by God, that he has chosen you,

Reader 2

1 Thess 1:6 You became imitators of us and of the Lord, for you welcomed the message in the midst of severe suffering with the joy given by the Holy Spirit. 7 And so you became a model to all the believers in Macedonia and Achaia. 8 The Lord’s message rang out from you not only in Macedonia and Achaia—your faith in God has become known everywhere.

Reader 3

1:9 you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, 10 and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead—Jesus, who rescues us from the coming wrath.

Reader 4

1 Thess 2:19 For what is our hope, our joy, or the crown in which we will glory in the presence of our Lord Jesus when he comes? Is it not you? 20 Indeed, you are our glory and joy.

Reader 1

1 Thess 3:6 But Timothy has just now come to us from you and has brought good news about your faith and love.

Reader 2

1 Thess 3:7 Therefore, brothers and sisters, in all our distress and persecution we were encouraged about you because of your faith. 8 For now we really live, since you are standing firm in the Lord. 9 How can we thank God enough for you in return for all the joy we have in the presence of our God because of you?

Reader 3

1 Thess 4:9 Now about your love for one another we do not need to write to you, for you yourselves have been taught by God to love each other.

Reader 4

1 Thess 5:5 You are all children of the light and children of the day. We do not belong to the night or to the darkness.

Reader 1

2 Thes 1:4 Therefore, among God’s churches we boast about your perseverance and faith in all the persecutions and trials you are enduring.

Reader 2

5 All this is evidence that God’s judgment is right, and as a result you will be counted worthy of the kingdom of God, for which you are suffering.