But I want to see this passage
all together, and I originally intended to preach these verses
13 through 20 together. And Paul says in verse 13 that
though you heard the gospel from us, that's key language there, which you heard of us right in
the middle of the verse there. but it's the word of God, which
you heard of us. And most of what I thought about,
what I hear very rarely these days, anything from someone who
pretending to be a preacher of the gospel, but it's real hard
to receive what they say is the word of God, because it's just
not, it's just not. But that's the way and the reason
that we do receive the word, though it be heard of men that
we know and trust because of their faithfulness to the gospel,
because the Lord has evidently blessed them to preach directly
from the word. When we hear them, we hear his
word, It is in truth the Word of God And Paul was very thankful to
God that they received it that way we thank God without ceasing
But that's how it happened that you received it as the Word of
God Because that's what it is in truth. I And he was thankful for that
last part of verse 13, which effectually worketh also in you
that believe. All the rest of what he's gonna
say here about them and commending them is because of that, because
the word, the Lord Jesus effectually works in his people by the word
to reveal the gospel to them. And that's effectual as Jeremiah
The word Jeremiah was given, that the rain doesn't return
under the Lord void until it accomplishes that which he sent
it for, and the word is the same way. It reveals Christ, the gospel
is Christ, and so the effectual working of the word is for you
to see and know Christ. Effectually work in them to give
them faith in him. That's that's a key verse verse
13 And so we spring from that and then he compares them in
verse 14 To the other churches in Judea who had suffered similarly
to them persecutions and he It says you were followers of them
or imitators of them. You reacted the same way they
did to the afflictions and trials that came their way by being
faithful. And so he compares them. They
remained faithful in the midst of trouble. And I want us to
give due consideration to that this morning. I pray that the
Lord will impress this upon us. Accommodation that's near and
dear to my heart That they Suffered persecutions and yet remained
Faithful Paul saw this as evidence of God's Working his word effectually
in them. You see how it's connected to
that last part of verse 13 He saw that as evidence of that
effectual working of God, not their superiority or excellence
of their flesh, but the grace of God. And I do too, and I'm
thankful as Paul was for that. When the Lord shook them up, when he gave them trials, When
we suffer, it's a must needs, 1 Peter 1. The Lord tested their faith, tested their love, but he also
gave them grace to stand fast in that storm because It's natural to us as sinners
when tested, so many are driven away, some even leaving the gospel
altogether. And this is a great blessing.
You think about the blessing of God in giving you stability
and Christ being your anchor in troubles and turmoil and confusion
and fear. Because not only do you survive
the trial, but James 1, 2, my brethren,
count it all joy when you fall into diverse temptations or trials,
knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. That's not to be read over lightly. When you fall into diverse temptations,
that word is experiments, trials, proving. And the word patience is steadfastness, so
the trial of your faith, proving. God does an experiment. Not because
he's wanting to see what the outcome is gonna be. He knows
the outcome from the start. But we're gonna find out, aren't
we? We're gonna see what happens when the Lord shakes us up. When we love the idea of forgiveness,
but then when it comes down to actually forgiving somebody,
it's... It's a whole nother story. When it's like that, we're gonna
find out, aren't we? We're gonna find out. When he gives us a great sense
of the loss that we stand to suffer at any moment, that escapes
our consciousness most of the time, the awareness, of what
great loss we could suffer at any moment and that everything
is in his hand. We'll find out, won't we? We'll
find out whether our faith is the fruit of his spirit or just something we call faith. So I thank God with Paul, seeing
not only evidence of his effectual working, and that's a wonderful
thing to see, but also that he's strengthening us in the faith.
That's what he's doing. It works steadfastness. It works in such a way that the
next storm that comes, we remember, that Christ is our anchor. We
remember to look to Him instead of me, I, mine, my misery, my suffering, the
consequences to me. We're more and more aware each
time that the Lord both brings them and clears them. And we look to him from the start,
maybe next time. I thank God for that. Now they had suffered these trials
at the hands of the Jews. And that's interesting, even
in the case, if you look into the book of Acts, where this
is recorded, Even when he says your countrymen you suffered
at the hands of your countrymen, which was the Gentiles It was
the Jews that stirred him up if you remember To persecute
this church at Thessalonica So they suffered at the hands of
the Pharisees the Sadducees chief priests the elders the religious
Jews the religious period. And the apostle reminds them
that these are the same ones who murdered the Son of God. That's who you're dealing with.
That's who has turned their ire against you.
The ones who hated the Lord and crucified him and murdered the
Son of God. So this church was in the best
of company. We're in the best of company
when we're looked on as a cult by the community, looked on as
outsiders. The one that the Lord Jesus had
mercy on, the blind man in John, he wasn't welcome in the church
of that day, so-called. They excommunicated him because
He knew who Christ was. So we're in good company too.
We're with our Lord in that. He said, don't be shocked when
they hate you. They hated me first. And to remember why. Remember
why? The religious hated and murdered
the Lord Jesus Christ is to understand this passage a lot better He's not just saying this in
passing If the Lord's pleased to teach
us will understand this passage a lot better than When we dwell
on this a little bit, that they murdered the Son of God, and
remember why. Remember why they hated the Apostle
Paul. Because of the offense of the
cross, they hated him. It was the preaching that they
couldn't stand. They charged him, don't you dare preach in
this name again. These Jews hated the Lord and
his churches for one simple reason. for who Christ is. That's it. We've had a little bit of teeth
gnashing around here now, and the reason they do is because
of who we preach. They stoned him for saying he
was God. That's still why they hate him.
and us because of him. He said, for my sake, they'll
hate you for my sake. Even back in Moses' day, they
said, they're not murmuring against you, Moses, they're murmuring
against me. You just happen to be used of me, my instrument. John 10, 33, that's where they
said, we're not stoning you for a good work, we're stoning you
because you're a man, you say you're God. Well, he still does
say he's God. He says it from this pulpit and
a few others around this world, and he still hated for it. He
does as he pleases with you, with me, with everybody else,
and most people don't like him. They hated him and they separated
themselves from him because he said that they were so depraved
and evil that they couldn't come to him for salvation unless the
Father brought them. John 644, unless God Almighty,
the Heavenly Father drew them to Christ, they're not coming.
That's not popular. That's not what they preaching.
They're preaching, make your free will decision and come on
down here and get saved. That's not what the Lord taught.
He said, you're not coming to me. You're gonna die in your
sins. because the only way a sinner
can come to me is if the Lord, that word draw there means to
drag, to draw by inward power, to lead, to impel. They hated the Lord Jesus Christ
and his people, because he teaches and we teach that a man's works,
far from being the solution to sin and enmity with God, a man's
works are sin and enmity with God. All of them. People don't want to hear that. The best of them. Your righteousnesses
are as filthy rags. You think about that. The most
disgusting things that God could come up with to put in this book
are the things that describe your best works. The Jews trusted their religious
works, their rituals, their performance of them. And it was and is their
religious works that they need to be saved from. Paul stated
it as clearly as you can in Romans 10. Listen to one through three
or one through four of Romans 10 again. Brethren, my heart's
desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they might be
saved. They are on their way to hell
as fast as they can go and they need to be saved. And here's
how it's gonna happen. Here's their problem. I bear
them record. They have a zeal of God. They're
talking about God in heaven and hell, just like the Pharisees
of our day are. They're trying to get people
saved. They're trying to make proselytes. But when they do,
they make them twofold more the child of hell than they were
before, according to the Lord Jesus. They have a zeal of God,
but not according to knowledge. zeal for God without knowing
who God is. Does that not describe religion
in our day? They're a whole lot better at
getting people fired up than we are. Because what we preach
don't fire people up except the ones that know the Lord. But they don't know who God is. for they being ignorant of God's
righteousness. You see, that's the issue. What
we need to understand is that we've got to be as holy as God
is, or he's got to put us in hell. And you don't get as holy
as God is by walking down to a man-made altar. That's not
how that works. It's a miracle of his grace that
he initiates, that he performs, and that he preserves. They being ignorant of God's
righteousness, and here's how we know they're ignorant of God's
righteousness, they're going about to establish their own
righteousness. Works, good deeds, they tithe
all these different things, but they're robbing their own parents,
he said, at the same time. They strain in a gnat and swallow
a camel. And the reason they're going
about to establish their own righteousness with their wicked
works before God that they call good works, always remember there's
two kinds of sin. There's the sin that you call
sin, and there's the sin that you
call righteousness, unless you know him. I hope he gives us the grace
to not call anything of ours righteousness, but to look to
Christ for all of our righteousness. But most of what men call good
deeds and righteousness and good works is just sin, like the stuff
that they're ashamed of. There's the sin that you're ashamed
of, and there's the sin that you're proud of. Still sin. Here's why they're going about
to establish their own righteousness. They have not submitted themselves
unto the righteousness of God for Christ. is the end, the goal,
the purpose of the law for righteousness to everyone that believeth. It
is a submission. It is a confession. That's what
we do in baptism. We confessing our sins and that
they're so great, they're so black, that it took the death
of God himself, the very blood, the son of God, Wash us clean
and now we're risen with him. That's our hope And then the sinners that we
are By and large we trust the doing of that instead of what
it pictures instead of the truth of it The religious Jews tried to kill
Paul and and the churches who preached the gospel for teaching
that Christ is the end of the law for righteousness. That's
why. The purpose of the law was to drive God's elect to Christ
for righteousness. For this church in Thessalonica
to be steadfast in the face of the trials is for them to teach
and believe on Christ in spite of the hatred and the persecution
that arose from the preaching of Christ. Thank God for that steadfastness. That's what Paul's saying. The same reason they killed the
Savior. They hate you and they'll kill
you if they can, but you've stood firm. Lord, give us that steadfastness. When others go astray from the
simplicity that is in Christ, keep us. Strengthen us in the
faith and use us to shine the simple gospel light of Christ
and dispel the confusion and the foolishness and the flat-out
lies against God that plague us all. Verse 16
in our text, it shows the intensity of the hatred of religious men.
They're not satisfied to just walk away and oppose by their
false doctrine the truth of the gospel. That would just seem like the
right thing to do. You disagree with somebody, you
go teach whatever you think is right and get on with your life. No, they're not happy with that.
They rage against Christ and his witnesses so much that they
find it necessary to shut down the voice of truth in every way
they're capable of doing it. The Catholic so-called church
throughout history has been as evil and active in that as the
religious Jews were in this day. They weren't satisfied just teaching
whatever it is they taught and letting others believe what they
believed. The Lord describes them in Matthew
23, 13, Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees,
hypocrites, actors, fakes. For you shut up the kingdom of
heaven against men. For neither go ye in yourselves, neither suffer you them that
are entering to go in. They're not satisfied with just
hating the Lord and moving on. They want everybody to hate him. The word woe, he said, woe unto you scribes
and Pharisees, you hypocrites. Not only do you have no interest
in entering the kingdom of God, you don't want anybody going
in. And you're gonna do everything you can to stop them. That word
woe corresponds with, and is echoed in our text, where he
says the wrath has come upon them to the uttermost. When the
Son of God says, woe unto you, that's wrath to the uttermost
coming your way. Verse 17. But we, brethren, being taken
from you for a short time in presence, not in heart, endeavor
to more abundantly to see your face with great I couldn't help
but think about this as I read that verse. How much time could
Paul have possibly spent with these people in Thessalonians? He's
sitting here and saying, with great desire, I've longed to
come and see you. How could he love them that much? when you know he didn't spend
that much time with them? Was Paul just being like religion
is? You know how they claim to love
everybody? You visit one of their churches, which I don't guess
I've ever done. I went to, y'all remember Pastor
Hatcher that we met here. I went to one of their services
one time, and it wasn't like this, but I was in religion before
for a long time as a young man, They'll meet you in the parking
lot and give you big old hugs and never seen you in your entire
life. Is that how Paul was being? Just
religiously lovey-dovey? I don't think so. It doesn't
sound that way, does it? Could there be genuine heartfelt
love for folks that Paul couldn't possibly have known all that
well? all these different churches
that he visited and came and went because the Lord was sending
him all over the place. And then I realized, I thought
about people that I love very dearly, that
I've hardly spent any time with at all. I bet you can think of
some too. I thought about old Kevin Thacker.
and Kimberly. I've met him twice, three times
maybe, for a day or two at a time. I love him. I'm telling you the
truth. I love him. I long to see him. I'm thinking real hard about
having him come to our conference, even though they're so far away. I miss him. I texted him the
other day and just said, I'm thinking about you, man, I miss
y'all. And it was the truth. I haven't seen him but two or
three times. Mike and Sandy Walker. He preached at our conference,
what, two years ago? You talk about precious people.
I've spent hours, not, well, days, because they stayed with
us when they were here, a few days. I can't think of finer
people in the world. How do you know how fine they
are? I don't know, but I do. I know it. That's just the truth. Some of the folks in their church, I've stayed in contact with some,
and just a blessing, I'm going to go preach in North Carolina, I guess, for
Carroll Poole and his wife, Pat, we've only met them one time.
We spent a weekend with them and didn't really, you know,
we ate together and you know how it goes. You talk about precious
people. I get it, don't you? And that
only happens now with the Lord's sheep. That only happens with
the Lord's sheep. That don't happen in this world. That's something you have to
experience. And you're not gonna get that in this world, I'm telling
you. It's just not gonna be that way. And you know, I used to
roll my eyes when somebody would say something like, well, we're
with you in spirit. I used to think, well, what are
you talking about? But then the Lord taught me what
that means, and he showed it to me in his word. Paul said, we're with you in
heart. I think I've learned a little
bit about that too. That's real, isn't it? Paul said,
we were separated from you, but not in heart. Nobody can take
you out of my heart. Part of what we're learning in
1 Corinthians 13 right now. Salvation, as we experience it
in this life, is a heart work by God. We see in the scripture that
what comes out of a person's mouth is what's in their heart. Matthew 15, 18 through 19. And that what they do in that
same passage, the evil things that men do, it comes from their
heart. And here we see in our text that
the heart even transcends space and time. I thank God for that. Thank God
for that. Verse 18. Verse 18 shows that though it
is a blessing to be with someone in heart, to have them in your
heart, it's better to be with them in heart and in presence. That's better, that's a lot better.
So Paul says, I surely want to be with
you in body as well. And notice how Paul acknowledges
the means in verse 18. You know the language in another
place when someone was forbidden to go and preach in a certain
place, it says the Holy Spirit forbade us. Here it says Satan hindered us. How did the apostles know the
difference as to whether it was the Holy Spirit or Satan doing
it? There is no difference. There's no difference. If Satan
hinders you, it's by permission of the Holy Spirit. That's just
the truth, and we know that's right. That's all through the
word of God. But he acknowledges the means
here. They all knew, and we all know
that God runs Satan. He runs him. God uses everybody
and everything to run his world. He does, always has, and always
will. The rain makes the flowers grow.
The moon controls the tides. Faith is saving faith if God
gives it to you. And Satan hindered us. We bow
to all of that. We bow to God in all of that. Now there's a sense in which
We're not afraid of Satan. But there is a sense in which
we are and should be. Talking about Satan and it made
me think of how we're warned. Be vigilant, be sober, be careful. Because you have an adversary.
You have an adversary. That seeks to devour you. Are any of y'all afraid of heights? You afraid of heights? I am. I have an unreasonable
fear of heights. You can have a big handrail that's
welded all the way from top to bottom in front of me, and I'm
still scared I'm going over. I'm going over. It can get better and worse at
times, but it's a legitimate fear. In the right circumstances,
I suspect everybody's afraid of heights. Some of you may not
be scared if there's a rail in front of you, but take the rail
away. How close to the edge are you
going to get? I'm afraid of the ocean. I love
the ocean. But I'm afraid of it. I'm afraid
of it. And am I gonna be afraid of the
ocean and stand here and tell you I'm not afraid of Satan?
That's just foolish, isn't it? That doesn't make any sense.
It's a foolish thing to say. Religion, you know, Very bold about that even the
angels are not real confident about that They commend The devil's to the Lord to rebuke
them And that's our confidence, and
that's a sure confidence but We're human We can know clear
as a bell that it's safe and still be scared. We can also know clear as a bell
that God is in complete control and Satan can't do anything without
it and still be afraid of it. Faith in Christ does not make
us immune to fear of danger. It doesn't even make us immune
to unreasonable fear of danger. We're flesh and we have fleshly
instincts. Somebody told me one time that
because I didn't like to fly, that means I didn't have any
faith. I don't have a lot of faith,
that's for sure, but I don't think it has anything to do with
fear of flying, do you? It's not even the same thing.
Faith is in Christ. I know if I go down in flames
that I'm in the Lord's hands. That don't make me not scared
of flying a little bit. Not so much anymore. But we're flesh, we have fleshly
instincts. And with regard to Satan, if
the Lord used Satan to afflict Job like he did, I don't want
any part of that. But at the same time, we know
that God is on the throne. If Satan hinders us, we know
that it was God that used him, and his good purpose was fulfilled
in it. And by God's grace and the special
grace that he's able to give when we need it, we may not fear,
we may not even fear the fiery furnace. The three Hebrew children
didn't. He's able to give us that, But that's the Lord. Simon wasn't afraid of anybody
or anything in Gethsemane, was he? There's a hundred soldiers and
he cuts off one of them's ear with a sword. That's pretty bold. But in the palace porch he was. Here's our word from the Lord
when it comes to Satan and everything else. Fear not them which kill
the body but are not able to kill the soul. But rather fear
him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. There's only one worthy of our
fear truly. And it is more reverence than
being scared But in that language, there's
an element of just being scared. Fear him that's able to throw
you in hell forever. But that's it all. The point
of all of that is it goes back to him. It's the Lord. Let him
do what seemeth him good. If I'm hindered, it doesn't matter
what the means were, not really. In these last two verses, Paul's
not making these Believers ravels of Christ as his hope and joy
of course his hope of salvation and joy in the Holy Spirit Was
Christ of course he's not It's not a comparison He's simply
rejoicing in these sheep Like the Lord does If the Lord gives you charge
over his sheep in any sense, as a parent, as a husband, as
a pastor, teacher, you're gonna feel the same way
about him that he does. That's what he said when he said,
I'll give you shepherds after my heart. So Paul's just rejoicing
in them as Christ does. If the shepherd, brings his lost
sheep home on his shoulders, rejoicing and glorying in them
and saying, come rejoice with me. I found my sheep that was
lost. It'd be a pretty sorry under
shepherd who did not feel the same way. And that's what Paul
is expressing here. By God's grace, we do feel that
way. Amen. Let's pray.