Well, last week we looked at
Paul responding to the news that he received from Timothy. And
now he talks about how he was, in verse 7 of chapter 3, he talked
about how he was comforted over you in all of our affliction
and distress by your faith. For now we live if you stand
fast in the Lord. For what thanks can we render
to God again for you for all the joy wherewith we joy for
your sakes before our God, night and day praying exceedingly that
we might see your face and might perfect that which is lacking
in your faith. Now God himself and our Father
and our Lord Jesus Christ direct our way unto you, and the Lord
make you to increase and abound in love toward one another and
toward all men, even as we do toward you, to the end that 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. The letter to Thessalonians reflects
again the work of grace in the heart of Paul, that Jewish idolater
turned into a servant of the Lord. And three times in this
letter we have witnessed, we bear witness thanks to the blessed
Holy Spirit of Paul at prayer. It begins with a prayer, doesn't
it? We give thanks, verse 2 of chapter 1. We give thanks to
God always for you all, making mention of you in our prayers,
remembering without ceasing your work of faith and your labour
of love and patience of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ, in
the sight of God and our Father. And he finishes the letter, if
you turn over to chapter 5, he finishes the letter not just
by praying, but by calling upon them to pray for him. He says
in verse 16 of chapter 5, he says, Rejoice evermore, pray
without ceasing. In everything give thanks, for
this is the will of Christ Jesus concerning you. And he says,
Quench not the spirit despised, not prophesying, prove all things,
hold fast to that which is good, abstain from all appearance of
evil. And then he comes to prayer and
he says, And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly, and
I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved
blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. And then
he has this great description of our great God, faithful, faithful. Just love the fact that God is
faithful. Faithful is he that calleth you,
who also will do it. In verse 25 he says, Brethren,
pray for us. So he begins with prayer, ends
with prayer, and in the middle, in these verses we have before
us, in verse 11 down to 13, we have Paul at prayer yet again. No sooner has he mentioned prayer,
in verse 10 he's talking about his own praying, night and day
praying exceedingly that we might see your face and might perfect
that which is lacking in your faith. And immediately having
mentioned prayer, he goes to prayer and we have this witness.
He shows them, his heart before God. It's fascinating how often
in 1 Thessalonians Paul is speaking to them as a person who is in
the very presence of God. God is his witness. He says in
this ministry, in verse 4 of chapter 2, we are allowed of
God to be put in trust with the Gospel. And so we speak, not
as pleasing men but God. So even when he's speaking, he's
speaking with the consummate awareness of the presence of
God. In the next verse he says, he
doesn't use flattering words and he doesn't use anything as
a cloak for covetousness and he says, God is my witness. And he didn't seek glory from
them, glory from others. God is their witness. And he says to them in verse
10, it's that same chapter, he says, you are witnesses and God
also of how holy and blameless we were before you. He lives his life in the presence
of God. And I was talking to, I think
it might have been Norm the other day, that one of the, on last
Sunday after the service, that we, sometimes our problem is
our sort of time and space constraints and almost our sort of geography. And so often we are inclined
to think that heaven is somewhere out there at the other end of
the universe. What happens if it's incredibly
close to us? God says it's here, isn't it?
He says His presence is here with us. No doubt there is, I
don't know the geography of heaven, all we can do is trust what God
says about it and it's a remarkable place and a remarkable gathering
of the saints and a remarkable exhibition of the glory of God
witnessed by His people. But to think that it's really
far away, really far away, is actually wrong, isn't it? It's
here. It's close. And it seems from
revelation that the saints around the throne are saying, how long,
O Lord, how long, how long? And they may be bearing witness
to us. We know that the angels are here. And the reason I said those things
is that Paul, when he's praying, it's just a natural outworking,
isn't it, of the reality of the presence of God, isn't it? God
is a witness. And prayer is just something
that all believers do. All believers. are children of
God. All believers have God as their
father. All believers have Christ Jesus
as their husband. All believers have the Holy Spirit. dwelling in them. Christ in you,
the hope of glory. And so out of that relationship,
prayer is just something that flows naturally, doesn't it? So Paul can say that he's praying
exceedingly, and he's praying exceedingly in verse 10, he's
praying exceedingly night and day. That doesn't mean that he
does nothing but pray. It just means that his thoughts
are turned Godward all the time. He thinks about and sees the
circumstances around him and what he sees drives him to talk
to God about it. When he thinks of the Thessalonians
as he does again and again seeing he's living in their country
and he's hearing news of what happens to them and he's knowing
that he's undergoing persecution and the same people who persecuted
him there in Thessalonica and drove him out of that town travelled
with As soon as they heard that the Gospel was being preached
in the next town down the road, they go down there and they stir
up the people there in Berea and Paul has to leave and he
knows that these people would go back to this young church
in Thessalonica and they would do the same things as they did
to him. And here is this young group of believers and to Paul
they are very dear in his heart and he takes their situation
and his desire to them to God in prayer. I don't talk much
about prayer. The Bible gives us lots of instruction
and there are, as in books like the Psalms, there are just magnificent
prayers of the people of God. But I think like many who have
walked with the Lord, We find that we are embarrassed by our
prayer life and sometimes it's depressing to read biographies
of people who seem to have done nothing but pray all the time
and yet we find ourselves caught up in so many things and sometimes
when we go to prayer we find our thoughts immediately taken
to all sorts of other things and we find it, as much as it
is a remarkable joy at times, sometimes it's just extraordinary
how our flesh gets in the way of it. And no doubt religion
has confused things. Religion tells us that prayer
involves these aspects, doesn't it, of confession and faith and
intercession and request and praise, but real true prayer
is much, much more than all of these. People can say their prayers. Paul said his prayers. For probably
30 odd years he prayed day in and day out, and he prayed probably
magnificent theologically correct prayers. And yet when Ananias
is sent to go and minister and bring comfort to Paul in his
blindness, And in his lostness, God says, behold, look, he prays. Now he's praying. Now he prays for the first time. The Lord warns us, doesn't He,
again and again in the Sermon on the Mount and in many, many
other examples about people who make a public show of praying. It's right and proper that we
pray in church and we acknowledge our dependence upon God and we
acknowledge His presence and we acknowledge His character
and we pray for His blessing upon us. But the Pharisee went
up to the temple, didn't he? Proud. He went up to the temple
proud, and it's fascinating what the Holy Spirit says about the
Pharisee. The Pharisee stood and prayed
thus with himself. Prayed with himself. He even wanted God and men to
praise him for paying his taxes. He paid a tithe. It was his duty
to pay the tithe. He doesn't need any special praise
for tithing. It's a tax. So true prayer is
much more than just rituals performed. It's much more than just asking
and receiving. It's much more than just, as
some people cast it, as just filling in this blank cheque
that's sent from heaven. It's believing, isn't it? It
is just the outworking of a believing, submissive heart, worshipping
God and seeking His will. Prayer is an act, not so much
of the body, but of the spirit, isn't it? Real prayer is a heart
cry to God, and that's why the prayers that are the Psalms are
sometimes shocking in their honesty, shocking in what they reveal
about the struggles that people are having in their hearts. As
they look at the prosperity of the wicked, as they look at the
trials around them, they're just honest. They're just laying their
case out before God and being honest. It is an activity, isn't
it? But it's much more than that.
And it comes from a spirit of faith and it comes as a result
of a confidence built by relationship. It comes as a confidence in acknowledging
the character of God, and especially as the character of God is revealed
in the Lord Jesus Christ. And it brings always thankfulness
and submission. as the spirit in us and what
we know bears witness to the reality of God's sovereign grace
in the lives of believers and sovereign grace in our own lives
individually. So let's look at these A few
verses, as briefly as the Lord will allow, and just look and
see some of those elements that I've been speaking about. In
verse 11 he says, now, and immediately he goes to God, doesn't he? Now
God himself, and then he calls him and describes him as our
Father. We get to call Him our Father,
exactly as the Lord Jesus Christ calls Him, Abba, Father. We call
Him Abba, Father. He's our Father, or literally
it means the Father of us, the Father of us believers. And so it's a description of
an intimate bond, a family relationship, a belonging. And the Lord Jesus says we are
to go into our closet, aren't we? We pray. And you enter into
your closet and you shut the door and you pray to the Father. He sees. The Father who sees
everything. The Father who rewards His children. The Father who knows what you
need before you ask Him. And the Lord Jesus encouraged
us to continue in prayer, isn't he? Ask and keep asking. Ask and keep looking to the Lord. He makes sure that we know that
we have access to that Father. Now God Himself our Father and
the Lord of us, Jesus Christ. It's a description of course
of the deity of the Lord Jesus and the equality of the Lord
Jesus. with the Father. We pray to God
the Father, we come to Him and we have perfect access and boldness
and we have a welcome. We have a welcome into the arms
of the Father because we are taken there by His dear and beloved
Son into the very holy of holies in Heaven. And Paul's request,
isn't it? God himself and our Father direct
our way, make straight our way unto you. Paul acknowledges that
his steps to them, even as he steps to them from a cross in
Turkey to go across to Greece, those steps were ordered by God,
particularly and especially, and his steps to them in Thessalonica
were ordered by God, and his steps Away from them we're ordered
by the Lord. I love how Proverbs 16 verse
9 says, in our heart, in our mind, we plan our path. We plan where we'll go and then
God determines our footfall, the Hebrew. Where your foot lands,
God determines. He determined it before the foundation
of the world. He determines it all the time
and He determines it with a purpose. And man in his pride and his
wisdom says, I will do this and I will do that and I will go
there. James warns us, doesn't he? You say, today or tomorrow
we'll go into such and such a city and continue there for a year
and buy and sell and get gain, whereas you know not what will
be tomorrow. And what is your life? It is
even a vapour. appears for a little while and
it vanishes away. Then you ought to say, if the
Lord will, we shall live and do this and do that. Paul wants
to acknowledge the character of God and the character of man
before these Thessalonians and before his God. He wants them
to know that He's acknowledging that God is absolutely sovereign
in all things. He alone is sovereign. He alone
knows all. He alone is wise in directing
the feet of all His creatures. And He is particularly and especially
wise for all of creation is centred upon the Lord Jesus Christ and
His Church and God's activities in achieving His purposes for
their good. He's the author and he is the
bestower of all grace, and it's grace that works powerfully. in all the lives of these believers.
And he is wanting, he's asking God to direct him back to them. See Paul's heart's desire before
man and before God is the same, isn't it? He wants to be with
them. He wants to have the fellowship
of believers. He knows that these believers,
if they're going to stand fast, if this little church is going
to stand fast, they need fellowship. They need fellowship with God.
They need fellowship with God's servants, like Paul. They need
fellowship with God's children. They need their brothers and
sisters. They're not designed to be independent. He starts by saying that God
is our Father, the Christian people are a family, and as a
family we need each other. We cannot survive on our own.
The whole idea in Ephesians 6 is you put on the whole armour of
God and the pronouns are plural pronouns. You as a church, wherever
you gather you put on that armour. And the thought in the Roman
armies or any of the armies of those days of someone being like
a Rambo, an Arnold Schwarzenegger or whatever, going out there
and carrying a whole weaponry around and being a lone soldier
and doing all these mighty, was just absolutely completely foreign
to them. If they didn't fight together,
they didn't stand. And Paul says in verse 8, he
says, we live, now I live, because you're standing fast, you're
standing as a raid together, supporting each other. In verse
12, he goes on to say, and the Lord make you increase. It may, of course, mean, may
the Lord make you increase in numbers, but generally Paul,
like all of God's servants throughout time, they long for others to
be in the church and they're never worried about numbers.
It would be lovely if this building couldn't contain the believers
in Nauru. It would be lovely if even the
building next door wasn't big enough to contain them all. But
if the Lord's with his people, what does it matter? The first
question I'm asked when I talk about churches is, how many do
you have? How many are there? How many? We can't number them.
We can't number them. How many angels are here? We
can't number them. God is here. God is here. We don't need anymore. He's encouraging,
isn't he? He's encouraging these believers
and he's praying to the Lord that they'll grow, as Peter says,
in the grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. They'd
grow. They'd grow in faith. They'd grow in hope. They'd grow
in holiness. They'd grow in humility. They'd
grow in knowledge. They grow in spiritual joy and
they grow in strength. That the trials that they've
gone through would be there to strengthen them and to toughen
them and to cause them to look out for each other and to care
for each other. It's very interesting that he says, he'd make you increase
and then he says, and abound. And it's the same, almost exactly
the same Greek verbs. He's saying, I want you to superabound. I'm praying that God would cause
you to superabound in love for one another. In love for one another. He acknowledges
that God alone, just turn down in your page to verse 9 of chapter
4. He says, But as touching brotherly
love, you need not that I write unto you, for you yourselves
are taught of God to love one another. Genuine, real Christian
love is something that God teaches and something that God brings
into the lives of His people. Love one another. In the midst
of these trials, in the midst of these afflictions, you just
love one another. Love bears all things. 1 Corinthians 3.7. It believes all things, it hopes
all things, and it endures all things. And I don't have time
to talk about it tonight now, but Christian love is just not
wimpish, pathetic pity. Christian love is love in the
truth. And the greatest love that we
can bring to someone, even to our brothers and sisters, is
to remind them of the Gospel. I need reminding of the greatness
and the glory and the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ.
I need to be reminded again and again that as that covenant of
grace was sealed in all eternity before this world began, at that
moment God the Father looked to the Lord Jesus Christ for
every Everything he ever required of me and he's never had any
reason to change because he's pleased with his son. He's pleased
with his son. He's pleased with his son and
I'm in his family. He's pleased with all of his
family. He's pleased. Love one another. Love one another. Preach the
gospel to one another. Cover one another's sins. Bear one another's burdens. Grown by God, love that's focused
on the Lord Jesus Christ, love that's based on faith, isn't
it? But faith, circumcision has no ability, uncircumcision has
no ability, the only thing that matters according to Galatians
5.6 is faith, working through love. And here's a challenge,
isn't it? It's a challenge to the Thessalonican
Church and it's a challenge to us, isn't it? It's also love
toward all men. As I said, real love desires
the Gospel to be brought to all men. But Paul is asking these
people, he's praying that God would cause them to still have
a heart. of love even for those who persecuted
them. Stand opposed to their message. Stand opposed to their denial
of the gospel. Stand as one against them. Stand as one against the evil
that they perpetrate by denying the deity and the work of the
Lord Jesus Christ. but still have in your hearts.
Don't allow hatred and bitterness to build up in your hearts. It's
a challenging thing, isn't it, because for them it must have
been a trial as it has been for so many of us. to have to stand
against for the sake of the Gospel, for the sake of the glory of
God, for the sake of His work and His witness in the lives
of people, to stand against and stand opposed to people that
we dearly love, is real love for them, isn't it? It's real
love, isn't it? To stand for the Gospel is real
love. to give in and to compromise
is not loving their souls. We cannot love them unless we
love their eternal souls and we pray for them. We pray that
God might be merciful to them. Paul knew that God alone could
bring His heart to these people. Instead of them becoming embittered
and joined together in embitteredness, they are actually joined together
as a family of God. And so they join together in
love and that love then emanates out from them. And Paul says
it has become famous, hasn't it? They have become famous in
that region for the way the Gospel has come to them and has worked
in them. Just turn over in your Bibles
to 2 Thessalonians 1 and you'll see, it's wonderful. Paul, I don't know the time frame
between one letter and the next. Listen to what he says. He says, Grace unto you and peace,
verse 2, from God our Father and Lord Jesus Christ. In verse
3 of this second letter he says, We are bound to thank God always
for you, brethren, as it is right, as it is meet, because that your
faith groweth exceedingly and the charity, the love of every
one of you toward each other abounds. Paul prays in 1 Thessalonians
and 2 Thessalonians. He has answer. to his prayer. And it is not just that they
would abound, but they would know from God, in answer to prayer,
that Paul feels the same way about them. His love in absence
of being with them, his love toward them has grown. His love hasn't diminished by
his absence. His love has grown. And he has a purpose, doesn't
he? His prayer is not just a whim. It's a purposeful prayer, isn't
it? And he says, to the end, there is a purpose, isn't it,
that He may establish, He may support your hearts unblameable
in holiness before God, even our Father, at the coming of
our Lord Jesus Christ with all of His saints. So Paul had one
big thing in mind, didn't he? One big thing in mind for his
church is the glory of God and it's the presence of these people
before God at that great day. He's excited to hear this news. It's called good news. He's excited
to have had almost gospel good news. The gospel has taken root. And he says now that we live,
that you stand fast. And he prays that they would
establish, their hearts would be established, unblameable in
holiness before God. What a remarkable statement about
the believer's state in the Lord Jesus Christ. Unblameable in
holiness before God our Father. At the coming of our Lord Jesus
Christ with all his saints. The next chapter we will have
the opportunity to look at all that in much more detail. What a great prayer. Now God
Himself and our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ direct our
way to you, make our path straight to you. And the Lord make you
increase and abound in love, one toward another and toward
all men, even as we do toward you, to the end that He may establish
your hearts. unblameable in holiness before
God even our Father. Let's pray.