First Thessalonians, we've been
studying through a few different books of the Bible that recently
we got sidetracked from. We had started in four or five
different books going through them, and we got to the end of
2 Corinthians and focused on that and finished that, and then
we got to the end of Hebrews and focused on that and finished
that book. And one of them was 1 Thessalonians,
and I wanna come back to it this morning. When we started this
book, we saw how the Apostle Paul came to the Thessalonians. We saw the story of how the gospel
came. He came and he preached the gospel. And some in the city of Thessalonica
gladly received the message. They gladly received the gospel.
Most rejected it. Most of the city rejected the
gospel. They rejected the message of
Christ. And rioting broke out. They got some lewd men of the
baser sort to go into people's houses and drag them out. They were trying to find Paul,
Silas, and Timothy. the ones who brought this message
into the city, and they wanted them dead. So they had to flee
from Thessalonica to spare their lives. But there was a congregation
of believers there. The gospel, and that's what I
am so thankful for, the message of the gospel never goes out
in vain. Never. It accomplishes one thing
or the other. It's either to salvation or condemnation. But it didn't go out in vain.
And a group of people laid hold of that message, and laid hold
of the truth, laid hold of Christ, in spite of what was going on
around them. And Paul, he had to flee all the way to Athens,
Greece. He went to Berea, and they followed
him to Berea, and they started the same stuff there, and then
he had to go all the way to Athens, Greece. And while he was there
thinking on all of this, the Thessalonians, praying for them,
he wrote them this letter. He said, I'm gonna send them,
if I can't be there in person, I'll send them a letter. He wrote
it to encourage them, to teach them, to ground them more so
in the gospel. And if you will look at chapter
one, 1 Thessalonians chapter one, he began the letter by saying,
Paul and Silas and Timothy. Paul and Silvanus and Timotheus.
Unto the church of the Thessalonians, which is in God the Father and
in the Lord Jesus Christ. That's who I'm writing to. All
those who are in God the Father and in the Lord Jesus Christ.
He said, grace be to you. and peace from God our Father
and the Lord Jesus Christ, we give thanks to God always for
you all, making mention of you in our prayers, remembering without
ceasing your work of faith and labor of love and patience of
hope in our Lord Jesus Christ in the sight of God and our Father,
knowing, brethren beloved, your election of God. God chose you. And he said, we know your election,
verse five, for our gospel came not unto you in word only, but
also in power, and in the Holy Ghost, and in much assurance,
as you know what manner of men we were among you for your sake.
And you became followers of us and of the Lord, having received
the word in much affliction. There was much affliction surrounding
the preaching of the gospel. But he said, you received it
with joy of the Holy Ghost, so that you were examples to all
that believe in Macedonia and Achaia, for from you sounded
out the word of the Lord, not only in Macedonia and Achaia,
but also in every place your faith to God were to spread abroad,
so that we need not to speak anything, for they themselves
show of us what manner of entering in we had unto you, and how you
turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God." This
message came in And it proved that you were some of God's people
because you believed it. And you laid hold of it. And
you started witnessing it to everybody around you. And you
turn from your idols, which is usually number one, self, greatest
idol we have. You turn from your idols to the
true and living God. Verse 10, to wait for his son
from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, even Jesus, which delivered
us from the wrath to come. So Paul started by giving thanks
to God. He said, that's where I start.
I thank God. I thank God for choosing to save
All of you, all of you who are in Christ and doing such a great
work in you. And then he said in chapter two,
verse nine, you remember brethren, our labor and travail for laboring
night and day because we would not be chargeable unto any of
you, we preached unto you the gospel of God. We preached Christ
crucified to you. That's all we would preach. We
did not want to be chargeable unto any of you. We preached
Christ crucified. In verse 19, he said, for what
is our hope or joy or crown of rejoicing are not even you in
the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at his coming. He said,
that is our whole goal and desire. And it is. It's not about fame. It's not about money. It's not
about Authority, it's not about anything. I just want to see
you standing in the presence of Jesus Christ when He comes
back. That's it. That's it. Our only
motivation is seeing you with Christ. That's it. In chapter
3, verse 3, He wanted to encourage them that no man should be moved
by these afflictions. He said, you're going to be persecuted
and afflicted for believing this message. People close to you
will not believe it with you. But he said, don't be moved by
these afflictions, for yourselves know that we are appointed thereunto. We're appointed unto these things. We're appointed to all things,
even afflictions. But he's telling them God is
our protector. God is keeping us and he will
keep us, so remain steadfast. Remain steadfast in the truth.
And he said in verse 12, we've been praying for you that the
Lord would make you to increase and abound in love, one toward
another and toward all men. Even as we do toward you, to
the end he may establish your hearts unblameable in holiness
before God, even our Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus
Christ with all his saints. Now that is the basis for what
he is about to say now. All right, this is the basis.
And increase in love. abounding in love. All right,
this is where we pick up now. Chapter 4, verse 1 says, Furthermore then,
we beseech you, brethren, and exhort you by the Lord Jesus,
that as you have received of us how you ought to walk and
to please God, so you would abound more and more. He said, in addition
to all these things that we've already said to you, as we have
already instructed you on how you ought to walk in a way that
pleases God, our exhortation to you now is that you would
abound in that more and more. Grow in it. Put more emphasis
on it. Put more emphasis on the walk
before God that pleases Him. Verse 2, For you know what commandments
we gave you by the Lord Jesus. He said, Every commandment that
we have given you has come straight from the mouth of God Himself. Every commandment. Verse three,
for this is the will of God, even your sanctification, sanctification
means purity, that you should abstain from fornication. Fornication is a man and a woman
going to bed together outside of the marriage covenant. God
forbids it. God forbids it. He forbids it
because of what it represents. What it spiritually represents.
Man's works. That's what it represents. Spiritually,
this is what it's saying. I can have union with God without
His covenant. That's what it's saying. I don't
need His covenant. I don't need it. I don't need
the covenant of his blood. I don't need the covenant of
his righteousness. I don't have to come to God only by, I don't
have to come to that union only by him. I can make my own union.
That's what it's saying. God says, no, you can't. No, you can't. Union comes only
through my covenant. For that reason, he forbids physical
fornication. Union without a covenant. Verse
three, for this is the will of God, even your sanctification,
that you should abstain from fornication, that every one of
you should know how to possess his vessel. This body is an earthen
vessel. That's what this is. It's just
a vessel that our soul lives in and animates. I am a soul. My soul is what is moving my
arm. The doctors say it's my brain.
The brain is flesh. My soul, as soon as the soul
leaves the body, nothing left. It's just an empty vessel. He said this is the will of God.
This is how you ought to walk in a way that pleases God. Verse
four, that every one of you should know how to possess his vessel
in sanctification, in purity and honor. We ought to live,
we ought to conduct ourselves, we ought to possess our bodies
in an honorable way. Verse five. Not in the lust of
concupiscence. Lust means desire. Concupiscence
also means lust, but it's a deeper form of it. It's a lust for forbidden
things, things that God forbids. Verse five, not in the lust of
concupiscence, even as the Gentiles, which know not God, That no man
go beyond and defraud his brother in any matter. Defraud, if you
have the center reference, means oppress. That no man go beyond
and oppress his brother in any matter because that the Lord
is the avenger of all such as we also have forewarned you and
testified. For God hath not called us unto
uncleanness. That means filthiness. Filthiness
of the mind, filthiness of the heart, filthiness of the mouth,
filthiness of the body. God hath not called us to uncleanness,
but unto holiness, rightness, perfection. Verse 8, he therefore
that despiseth, that word means rejects, He therefore that rejects
these words, rejects not man, but God, who hath also given
unto us his Holy Spirit. Now hold on to that just for
a minute. He's given unto us his Holy Spirit. If God has not yet revealed himself
to us, if God has not yet revealed to
us what we are by nature. All right? If we are one of the people who
do not yet truly know what we are by nature, we will read all
of that and say, okay. That's what we'll say. All right? So that's what God requires for
sanctification. Okay. If we are not a soul who
knows what he is completely in and out by nature, we'll read
every bit of that and say, got it. If God has revealed to us what
we are by nature, if we do honestly see something of our true nature,
when we look at that, All we can be is convicted by it. The law was given to convict
us. The law was given to show us
just how far wrong we are. Just how bad we truly are. If that is how I ought to walk,
then I don't walk right. And I promise, that's how I ought
to walk. It doesn't change that. If that, though, is what it takes
to please God, then I don't please God. In my flesh, I do not please
God. Men and women in great error,
they read the true and right commandments of God. This is
how we will be in the body one day. This describes us one day. But men and women, in a great
error, they read the good, true, right commandments of God, and
then they get it in their sinful minds that they have the ability
to do what God requires. This is what God requires. And men think, okay, well, I
need to do that. God said, this is sanctification. This is purity. This is holiness. And men and
women think that if they try hard enough to do these things,
they will increase in holiness and in purity before God. Progressive sanctification. growing in purity. Well, I'm a believer now. I need
to be more pure than I was. Yeah, we do. You got that right,
buddy. We are some wicked, sinful, vile
creatures, and we should not be that. But progressing in sanctification,
as God looks at us, progressing in purity before Him and holiness
before Him, There is no such thing. There is no such thing. Now, I really hope this will
be a help, and I hope this will be informative. Sanctification, meaning our pureness
before God, our holiness before God, sanctification does not
increase or decrease. Sanctification does not increase
or decrease. Holiness does not increase or
decrease. Purity does not increase or decrease. Either we are sanctified or we
are not. It's one of the two. Grace grows. He giveth more grace. Faith grows. Lord, increase our faith. Love,
which is the basis of what the Apostle Paul is writing about. This is the basis of what he's
saying. Love grows. Love grows. Sanctification does
not grow. It does not grow. It's like a
light switch that does not have a dimmer on it. Either it's on
or it's off. We could be clean and pure in
almost every commandment of the Lord. But if we find one little
spot, filthy. Filthy. I mean filthy, guilty,
unclean, unsanctified. One little spot. This is why
Paul said in Romans 8, turn with me over there to Romans 8, Romans 8 verse 8. So then they that are in the
flesh cannot please God. They that are in the flesh cannot
please God. Paul said in our text, if you
walk this way and if you conduct yourself and if you live life
in this way, you'll please God. The problem for man is he's in
the flesh. And they that are in the flesh cannot please God. God's commandment on fornication
holds true. It holds true. I pray God will
give all of us the ability to possess our bodies. Possess our bodies. in an honorable
way and never enter into physical fornication. I pray our Lord
will teach our children and keep our children and protect them
from that and the harm that comes from that. But even if he keeps
us from that, these minds and this heart right here, we're all guilty. We are all
guilty. We're all plum ruined. Completely,
completely ruined. In this flesh, we are not pleasing
to God. But look at what verse 1 says
right here in Romans 8. There is therefore now no condemnation
to them which are in Christ Jesus who walk not after the flesh
but after the spirit. In Christ we have the ability
to walk before God in the spirit and not in the flesh. We have
the ability to walk before God. Verse two says, for the law of
the spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from
the law of sin and death. What does that mean? How did
that happen? Verse three says, for what the
law could not do. What could the law not do? What
could the law not do? It could not cause me to keep
it. The law said, this is what you
have to do. But what the law could not do is cause me to keep
it. It could condemn me, but it couldn't
redeem me. Because of my sinful flesh, when
the law looked at me, its hands were tied. It looked at me and
its hands were tied. Guilty. It can't say anything
but guilty. That's all it can say. Verse
3, what the law could not do in that it was weak through the
flesh, God sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh
and for sin, if you have the center margin, for sin, says
by a sacrifice for sin, condemned sin in the flesh. that the righteousness
of the law, this is amazing, verse 4 is amazing, that the
righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not
after the flesh but after the spirit. What does that mean?
Turn to Galatians 4. Galatians 4 verse 4 says, But
when the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth His
Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that
were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons. He put Himself under our law. The law said, this is how you
ought to walk. He walked rightly. The law said, if you're going
to be sanctified, you're going to have to please God. He pleased
God. He abstained from all evil and
all sin. He possessed his vessel. Mind, heart, tongue, body, he
possessed it in purity and honor. He never desired what he did
not have. Never. He never defrauded his
brethren. He should have. Never did. Took nothing from them. Gave
all to them. He lived an entire life of absolute
spotlessness. And then he took that life, he
took the entire pleasing walk of his life and traded it with
us. Our walk became his. His walk
became ours. Right here in Galatians 4, verse
4 says, When the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth
His Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them
that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption
of sons. Now. Okay, we're not finished
just yet. Now. That's done. Okay, that's done. That is finished. That is settled
in heaven, redeemed. Redeemed. Traded. That's settled in heaven forever. For every sinner Christ did that
for, that's finished. Salvation's done. Now, verse
6 says, and because you are sons, not soon to be sons, Not trying
to be sons. Not in the process of becoming
sons. Because you're in the process
now of becoming sons. Almost sons. Not that. He said,
because you are sons. God hath sent forth the spirit
of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father. That's what Paul said at the
end of our text. God has sent his spirit to you. And he said,
this is why I'm telling you these things. It's because God has
sent his spirit to you. When it comes to what God's law
demanded of us, we know we couldn't do it. We know we couldn't do
it. But we know that Christ did.
He freely gave that accomplishment to us. Because of that, just
because of that, We now have a new motivation. Before, the
motivation was, I want to be saved. I want to go to heaven
and not hell. We now have a new motivation.
That's settled. That's settled. I cannot sanctify
myself. Christ is my sanctification.
Either I have him or I don't. It's just one or the other. Either
I have Him, either I'm in Him, or I'm not. One of the two. Because He is my sanctification. Because in Him, I stand sanctified
before God, pure before God, holy before God. That makes me
love Him. And that makes me want to be
like Him. Now, if you look right here at Galatians 3, verse 3
says, Are you so foolish, having begun in the Spirit, are you
now made perfect by the flesh? Are we going to say that we're
saved by grace and better works? Having begun in the Spirit, are
you now saved by the flesh? Saying that Christ did it all,
are we now going to go back and say that we have to, now let's
make sure we're pleasing to God? No way. I'm not trying to make myself
more pure or more pleasing in God's eyes through the deeds
of the law. Christ is my purity. But this
is what John wrote, the Apostle John. He wrote this in 2 John. He said, this is love. that we walk after His commandments. He didn't say, this is salvation. He didn't say that. He said,
this is love. This is love. Do you love Him?
This is love. Ephesians 2 says, we are His
workmanship. We're saved by grace. By grace
you save through faith, that not of yourselves, it's the gift
of God. Not of works, lest any man should boast. We are his
workmanship. Created in Christ Jesus unto
good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk
in them. Paul said in Ephesians 4, I therefore the prisoner of
the Lord beseech you that you walk worthy of the vocation wherewith
you're called. He said in Ephesians 5, you were
sometimes darkness, but now are you light in the Lord. You're
light. Walk as children of light. He said in Colossians 2, as you
have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in
him. Now let's go back and read our
text one more time. First Thessalonians. Chapter 3, verse 12 said, the
Lord make you to increase and abound in love, one toward another
and toward all men, even as we do toward you. To the end, he
may establish your hearts unblameable in holiness before God, even
our Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all
his saints. Chapter four, verse one. Furthermore,
then, we beseech you, brethren, and exhort you by the Lord Jesus
that as you have received of us how you ought to walk and
to please God so you would abound more and more. For you know what
commandments we gave you by the Lord Jesus. For this is the will
of God, even your sanctification, that you should abstain from
fornication. Don't do it. I want to tell every
young person, don't do it. Just don't do it. Verse four,
that every one of you should know how to possess his vessel
in sanctification and honor. When it comes to these bodies
right here, let's possess them. May God give us the ability to
possess them in sanctification and honor. Not abusers of ourselves,
not abusers of our bodies. If he will allow us to, let's
put away filthiness of the mouth, filthiness of the You know, that
sounds good, but then you give me about five seconds and, oh
Lord, help me, help me, help me. Verse five, not in the lust
of concupiscence. If God says it's forbidden, Lord,
help us to leave it there. Even as the Gentiles, which know
not God, that no man go beyond and defraud his brother in any
matter. Lord, let me handle things and relationships in an honorable
way. Because that the Lord is the avenger of all such, as we
also have forewarned you and testified for God has not called
us to uncleanness. Brethren, God has not called
us to uncleanness. Well, you know, free from the
law, saved by grace, go do what you want. Don't go do what you
want. I know what your heart wants. Don't go do it. God has not called us unto uncleanness,
but unto holiness. Verse 8, he therefore that despiseth
is not despising man, but God, who hath also given unto us his
Holy Spirit. May God teach those of us who
has had his sovereignty revealed to us and his substitution revealed
to us, may God teach us not to reject his law, not to reject
his commandment. I don't have to do that. Lord,
help us. David said, I love it. I love
it. Help us to love it, knowing that
we're not doing any of it for salvation. Christ saved us. Christ
saved us. That's done because of that.
May God teach us not to reject his law and commandments, but
to love them. and to strive to do them, the
apostle said, abound in them, abound in them for love's sake,
for Christ's sake. Okay, you're dismissed.