Well, if you turn your Bibles
to 1 Thessalonians, one of the things that's been intriguing
about this book which the scholars claim to be the first of the
New Testament letters. That may or may not be the case.
At the end of the day it's written by God that we actually have
a history of a church, a church being formed. And the church,
when this letter is written, there is not a mention anywhere
in these letters of a pastor in this church. And so there
was this group of believers in what is now modern day Salonika
in Greece. Paul turned up Having been afflicted
in Philippi, probably arrived there with the wounds on his
body from his beatings there, and he arrives in Thessalonica
in no time at all. There is a commotion in town
as the Gospel comes. It stirs and stirs the hearts
of people. And as we saw on Sunday from
Luke's Gospel, the Holy Spirit when he comes and when he brings
the gospel and actually reveals the thoughts of the hearts of
people. And Paul was rejoicing as he
came to Thessalonica and rejoicing that he had the opportunity to
preach the gospel there, and some of them believed and consorted
and associated and joined in fellowship with Paul and Silas. Of the devout Greeks, a great
multitude, and of the chief women, not a few. The Jews, which believe
not, moved with envy, took under them certain lewd fellows. They went to find evil men in
the marketplace, it says. And they joined them and they
gathered the company of these evil men and they set the whole
city in uproar. And Paul had to leave just after
that two short weeks there. And he moved on and ended up
in Athens and then back in Corinth. and he was keen to find out what
has happened to this group of believers in this town. They
don't have an apostle, they don't have a pastor. What is going
on? And in chapter 3, He writes back to them, and he
writes back almost immediately having received the news from
Timothy. He writes back in chapter 3,
verse 1, he says, When we could no longer fair bear, we thought
it good to be left at Athens alone, and sent Timothy, our
brother and minister of God and our fellow labourer in the Gospel
of Christ, to establish you and to comfort you concerning your
faith, that no man should be moved by these afflictions. For you yourselves know that
we are appointed thereunto. For truly, for verily, when we
were with you, we told you before that we should suffer tribulation
even as it came to pass, as you know. For this cause, when I
could no longer forbear, I sent to know your faith, lest by some
means the tempter have tempted you, and our labour be in vain. But now, when Timotheus came
from you unto us and brought us good tidings of your faith
and charity, your faith and love, and that you have a good remembrance
of us always, desiring greatly to see us as we also to see you. Therefore, brethren, we were
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 increase and abound in love toward one 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. So Paul, here we have an insight
into the emotional life of an apostle, a minister after God's
own heart, a minister provided by God, a servant of the souls
of these people, a servant of the glory of God. And we have
in these verses from Verse 7, 8, 9 and 10 we have Paul telling
us these things, that he's comforted. Telling us that in verse 8, that
now we live. Verse 9, now he's thankful. He's saying, how much, how can
we thank God enough for you? And verse 9, further on, he's
rejoicing. For all the joy wherewith we
rejoice for your sake before our God. And this brings him
in verse 10 to be a man who now prays. And so I just wanted to look,
I just wanted to look at those four effects, five, aren't they? There are four, five effects
in Paul's life. Comforted, he lives, he's thankful,
he's joyful, and he's prayerful. And as a Christian, Isn't that
something that should be in our hearts, that we would be a comfort
to our fellow believers, that we'd find life, we'd find real
life in seeing the faithfulness of others, that we would be thankful. Other people would be thankful
to God for us, that we would be people who cause other people
to rejoice. and we'd be people who in thankfulness
and rejoicing bend their knees before God in joy and thankfulness
and gratitude to God. Paul writes in verse 5, is sent
to know your faith, lest by some means the tempter have tempted
you, and our labour be in vain. He knew the enemies of the people
of God. He knew the subtleties of the
enemies of the people of God. He knew something of what these
Thessalonians were going to have to put up with. He was one of
them himself, wasn't he? He knows. how a Jew, how a zealous
Jew is going to attack believers. He knows the subtlety of Satan,
both in bringing open opposition and bringing deception, to turn
them away, to take their eyes off the Lord Jesus that He proclaimed
to them and turn their eyes ever so subtly away. They can tell
Him, you can have Jesus plus something. If you have Jesus
plus anything, you don't have Jesus. How did he explain it
in 2 Corinthians 11-3? He fears. He was concerned. He had the care of the churches.
When he lists all those afflictions of his in 2 Corinthians, he actually
finishes the list by saying, but on top of all this, I have
the care of all the churches. Real love brings care and concern
for people's souls. And he says, to the Corinthians,
but I fear less by any means as the serpent beguiled Eve through
his subtlety, through his cunning. So your minds should be corrupted
from the simpleness, the simplicity, the singleness that is in Christ. The Gospel is a simple message. It's a simple message declaring
who the Lord Jesus is, declaring how he reveals all of the extraordinary
character of God. He is the image of the invisible
God, the fullness of the deity dwells in him. And the Gospel
is a declaration of who he is and what he has done. So he said
to the Corinthians, he just went there with two things he needed
to know. Two things are on his mind continually in all of his
preaching and he never changed from the beginning to the end.
Jesus Christ and Him crucified. That's all he needed to know.
That's all he had to proclaim. A simple message. A singular
message. And he says, that he was concerned
for them, this tempter, the same tempter that came to the Lord
Jesus. What brashness there is in Satan. He came to the Lord Jesus in
his moment of weakness. You can read about it in Matthew
chapter 4, and he tempted him, didn't he? And he says those
extraordinary words to him, and he tempts God's children in similar
ways throughout time, doesn't he? If he was good enough to
deceive Eve in the garden, he's good enough and wise enough and
smart enough to deceive us to save people today. The Lord Jesus
was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness and when the tempter
came to Him, that same Word, that same Being that Paul is
now concerned about for these Thessalonians. And the tempter,
what does he say to the Lord Jesus? He says, if you are the
Son of God. Did he know he was the Son of
God? Of course he knew he was the son of God. He said, and
really in Greek it means, if and you are the son of God, command
these stones to be made bread. He tempted the Lord Jesus and
how did the Lord Jesus respond to him? Three times he tempted
him, three times the Lord Jesus says, it is written. Paul is writing to these Thessalonian
believers, I have only the Old Testament. I don't have a word
of New Testament scriptures at this time. And they had all of
the Gospel in the Old Testament, and they had all of the Gospel
through the preaching of Paul. And you could read in first,
we read again and looked at it several times in Chapter 1 of
how that Gospel came, it came with power, it came from God. And Paul says to these Thessalonians,
knowing brethren, beloved, your election of God, But now, having
been sent away from the knot of his own will, through the
power and the purposes of God, and being hindered by Satan to
come back to them, he sends his brethren, his fellow workers,
and they come back, and in verse 6 it says, now when Timothy came
from you to us and brought us good tidings, that word is gospel. good tidings, he brought good
news to them. He brought good news of their
faith and their love. And he also brought good news
of the fact that these people still had a fond remembrance
of Paul. Not only did they have a fond
remembrance of him, they were greatly desiring to see him. There was a reciprocating mutual
affection Love, real genuine love, is created by God in the
hearts of His people. And it's mutual love, isn't it?
He wanted to go and see the Romans, to be mutually encouraged. He
wanted them, he wanted to go to a place where he saw that
the Gospel had taken root, and he was going to be encouraged
by them, and they were going to be encouraged by him. See,
Paul really loved these people. He loved them so much that he
brought the Gospel to them. Real love brings the Gospel to
people. Real love has a great desire
for people to know who the Lord Jesus is, to be joined with Him,
to be one with Him, to be cared for by Him. He knows that they
are elect and therefore He sends and gets this news back and he
says, now we're comforted. Now, brethren, we are comforted. We are encouraged over you. Paul went on in afflictions,
didn't he? His afflictions hadn't stopped
when he left Thessalonica. His afflictions followed him
around. Wherever he went, wherever the
Gospel comes, it brings affliction. But in his afflictions, his thoughts
and his anxious thoughts and his cares turns to them, turns
to those other people. He's afflicted, but he's thinking
beyond his afflictions, he's thinking of them. The genuine
gospel, in our bulletin from a couple of weeks ago, the genuine
gospel will always appear like an insult on the taste of the
public. Wherever it comes, if it is not
received, it awakens disgust and provokes abhorrence. nor
can it be otherwise, for its principal design is to mortify
the pride of man, to put to death the pride of man, and to display
the glory of grace, to throw all human excellence down to
the dust, and to elevate even to the thrones of glory the needy
and the wretched, to show that everything which exalts itself
against The knowledge of Christ is an abomination in the sight
of God, and that he who is despised by men and abhorred by the nations
is Jehovah's eternal delight. The ancient gospel is an unceremonious
thing. It pays no respect. to the academic
because of his profound learning, nor to the moralist on account
of his upright conduct. It has not the least regard to
the courtier because of his pompous honours, nor to the devotee because
of his zeal or his righteousness. No potent prince, an abject slave,
the wise philosopher, nor the ignorant rustic, the virtuous
lady and the infamous, stand on the same level in its comprehensive
sight. Its business is with the worthless
and the miserable, whomsoever they be. If these be relieved,
its end is gained. If these be made happy, its author
is glorified, whatever may become of the rest. Towards these it
constantly wears the most friendly aspect and rejoices to do them
good. But the self-sufficient of every
rank are treated by it with the utmost reserve and beheld with
steady contempt. The hungry it fills with all
good things, but the rich it sends away empty. No wonder the natural man cannot
abide the things of God. They are foolishness to him,
but the Lord's children The Lord's children are people who are brought
to the faith. It's fascinating in this first
Thessalonian letter that Paul speaks of your faith more than
in any other letter in the New Testament. In verse 2, just in
this one chapter, Timothy was sent to comfort you concerning
your faith. Verse 5, I sent to know your
faith. It's a noun. And now, in verse 6, he's brought
good news and good tidings of your faith. And he's comforted
in all of our afflictions and distress by your faith. Here he is, afflicted. He's hindered
by Satan. He's having more troubles in
Athens and more troubles in Corinth. The Jews are stirring up the
city of Corinth. They mocked him in Athens and
they opposed and they blasphemed him. He's afflicted. He knows that these people he's
left behind are going to continue to be afflicted, but they've
actually comforted him because he's heard good news of their
faith, by your faith. We know that faith is the grace
gift of God. Your faith is a gift that God
gives isn't it? When God gives, there's only
a gift if it's received isn't it? God doesn't put something
on the table and expect men to pick it up. He actually gives
a gift and when he gives a gift the recipient receives the gift. It says your faith toward God. Your faith. Faith is a gift. God is the giver. But faith is
a noun in the scriptures so often and in the King James Version
we find that it's described as your faith and when it's described
as your faith and the faith, it's actually talking about that
body of knowledge. that body which declares who
the Lord Jesus is and what He does. And then people who respond
by the grace of God to that are called believers. They are the
faithful ones. You see, Paul describes himself
as one who has, at the end of his life, he has kept the faith. Jude is about to write about
the common things but he picks up his pen and he starts and
he immediately wants to warn them and he wants them to stand
fast to contend for the faith which was once delivered to the
saints. In Titus, he says, greet them
that love us in the faith. And Timothy is described as my
own son in the faith. It's the faith of Jesus. It's the faith that's revealed
in who the faithful one is. He who is faithful and true. It's a declaration of who he
is again and what he does. And what is comforting Paul and
what is encouraging Paul and what Paul sees as good news is
that these believers have heard the Gospel from Him. They heard
a pure, unadulterated Gospel, and months and months later,
under much affliction and without His care, He finds that that
Gospel, that faith, that body of truth that He brought to these
people. You can read about it in Romans
1 and 1 Corinthians 15, and throughout the Scriptures, Ephesians 1,
It describes God and the way God reveals His character in
the saving of His people through a substitute, through the Lord
Jesus Christ. He writes, to these people and
he reminds them to read his letter again and in his letter he begins
by describing God, God the Father, God the Father of all of his
children, God the Father of the Lord Jesus Christ and he talks
about this church, he writes to this church and he says it's
a church that's in God the Father and in the Lord Jesus Christ. It's a church that's in relationship,
that's in communion with God. And he talks to them about this
work of faith, this love and the hope in the sight of God
and our Father, the believers are children of God. And then
he says in verse 4, he says, knowing brethren beloved, There
is a mutual love amongst the brethren of God. Knowing, brethren,
beloved, your election of God, Paul, like the Lord Jesus, didn't
shy away from talking about election and predestination and the absolute
sovereignty of God. And whenever the Lord Jesus met
with opposition, all he did was expound it more fully and more
completely. And he talks about our Gospel,
this Gospel of God it's described, and it's called The Gospel in
Chapter 2, verse 4. And this Gospel is a powerful
Gospel, it's the power of God unto salvation. And it came to
these people, and it came not just in word but in power and
in the Holy Spirit, and it came in much assurance. And what that
means is that there was a body of truth that they believed. They believed what Paul said.
They were assured that the words of Paul were the words of God. And he was reasoning with them
and he was proving that Jesus was the Christ. And it came in
much assurance of the truth. That is the faith that they held
on to. And it came in this remarkable
way, didn't it? It came, as he says in chapter
1, it says, it came with much affliction, in verse 6. He received the Word in much
affliction with joy. much affliction with joy. Affliction from this world and
joy in the Holy Spirit. And this faith, your faith, is
toward God. Your faith in God. And verse 9, this faith had a
powerful effect on them. They turned from idols to serve
the living and true God. And it's the gospel that causes
His people to wait for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from
the dead, even Jesus. And it describes what Jesus has
done. He's delivered us. rescued us from the wrath to
come." And so it's a description of a relationship with God who
is a father, a relationship with God, the Holy Spirit, who reveals
the Son. It brings affliction and it brings
joy. It describes a living God, describes
a true God, and it describes the reveal of that God, the Lord
Jesus Christ, His precious Son. And where is He now? He's in
Heaven, and He's reigning and ruling over all things now, and
He sat down, having purged His people from their sins, He sat
down at the right hand of the Magistry. He came to earth, He
died, He finished the work that the Father sent Him to do, He
was buried in a tomb, He was raised, He reigns, and He's coming
back. How did Paul describe his faith?
He described it both, didn't he? In 2nd Timothy 1, 10 he says,
I know whom I have believed. I know. It's a relationship,
a relationship of knowledge and facts about a person, a man who
is God. I know whom I have believed.
He's really believed and he said, I'm persuaded that he is able
to keep that which I have committed. Real saving faith is a commitment
as well, isn't it? It's a belief in the truth. It's
a belief in He who is the Truth, and it's a commitment. He's able. It's a commitment into the hands
of One who is able to keep that which I've committed unto Him
against that day. What have you committed unto
Him? Absolutely everything. Absolutely
everything. I commit my soul, I commit my
life, I commit everything into his hands." These people were
comforting Paul. He was afflicted and he got this
good news from afar concerning their faith, concerning their
believing, concerning their holding on to the truth that's in the
Lord Jesus. With Satan and the Jews and the
Greeks attacking them, with their own flesh opposing them, they
stood there firm. He says, this is life. This is
life for an apostle. This is life for a minister of
God, isn't it? This is what he says in verse
8, for now we live. Now we live if you stand fast. Now you live, and it really should
be rendered, now we live seeing that you stand fast. Because he's already had the
good news, hasn't he? The good news has come. It's an if. Now we live seeing that you stand
fast." He continually writes to the churches with the same
words, doesn't he? He talks to the Colossians, he
said, you're grounded and settled and be not moved away from the
hope of the Gospel. He says to the Thessalonians
in the second letter, brethren, stand fast. and hold the traditions
which you have been taught, whether by word or by our epistle, the
very letter that we're reading, First Thessalonians. Stand fast,
stand fast and hold on to what you were told by the apostles. Brethren, in Philippians 4.1,
he says, Brethren, listen to his words, Brethren, my brothers
and sisters, dearly beloved and longed for, my joy, my crown,
So, stand fast in the Lord, my dearly beloved. Stand fast. You've heard the truth of the
gospel of Jesus Christ and Him crucified. You'll call His name
Jesus. He will save His people from
their sins. He is God. He does achieve what
His purpose. And don't be moved away from
Him. Don't look to anything else other than Him. Fix your eyes
on Jesus, the author and perfecter of your faith. Galatians are
told, stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ
has made us free. And do not be entangled again
with the yoke of bondage. The Lord Jesus has delivered
us. 1 Thessalonians 1 verse 10. He wept for His Son and He raised
from the dead even Jesus which delivered us. He delivered a
particular group of people. Stand fast. Stand fast, stand
firm. That's life, to witness people
standing firm in the midst of opposition. And then he goes
on to say, for what thanks can we render to God again for you? He was thankful to God the first
time when he was sent there. He was sent there by a vision
of God, wasn't he? He was stopped from going to
places in western Turkey and he bypassed two huge cities in
Greece and he came to Thessalonica. And when he came there, the Word
of God came with power. And God raised up a group of
believers. And Paul was thankful. He says,
what thanks can we render to God again for you? How can we
thank God enough for you, is what he's saying. He's now exceedingly
thankful because they have stood fast. They are As the Lord Jesus
so graphically points out in that parable of the soil, isn't
it? Only one in four produces fruit. Some falls on a path,
some falls on stony ground and for a little while it blossoms
and looks wonderful and then the heat comes and it disappears. Others grows well and it grows
amongst thorns and the cares and the wealth and the worries
of this world and they choke it out and die and when it falls
on the good soil it yields. Paul is now experiencing the
truth of that in this yielding that he sees a hundred times,
sixty times. He gives thanks. How can we thank
God enough for you? And this is where his joy is,
this is where his comfort is, this is life for him, this is
thankfulness to him. And then he says, for all the
joy wherewith we rejoice for your sakes before our God. John, as an old man, writes that
letter, 3 John, he says, I have no greater joy than to hear that
my children walk in the truth. I have no greater joy than to
hear that my children, my children in the church, they walk in the
faith." Good news, this good fruitful news, this gospel that
came with power and they received it not as the word of men, they
received it as the word of God. It came with power and its effects,
its ongoing effects in the lives of these people brings comfort.
Is that where you find comfort? When I think of all the believers,
all the Christians that you have met and you often are caused,
especially living in a town like ours and being in the circumstances
that we've been in, in India and other places, you cast your
mind around and see the people that you have seen all of us
know, all of us know people that have stood and looked like they
are very firm in the faith and you have great hope for them
and you find yourself comforted and you find yourself thankful
for them and you find yourself joyful for them and you find
yourself like Paul praying for them and then you find them drifting
away. It should. as it does in Paul,
it should cause us always to grieve. It's never anything ever
that we rejoice over, to see people drifting away. Hebrews
2 talks about people drifting away and the imagery is that
you're a boat on a very gently flowing river and someone has
just untied the rope and has just drifted away. Some people
turn in violent opposition and serious aggressiveness. So many
others just drift away. All of us have borne witness
to that. It should cause us grieving.
But when we do see people standing firm in the faith, when we do
see people holding to those truths, we think, don't we, and we go
to our prayer closet. And you know, brothers and sisters,
surely we do, when you think of some people, your heart is
breaking and you are left pleading with God for them. pleading that
God might have mercy upon their souls. And then you have other
people, other people that you know in the Lord, and you think
of them and just a smile comes across your face. You think of
them and you smile. You just have what Paul experiences
here, don't you? You have comfort. you'll have
life, you'll have thankfulness, you'll have joy and rejoicing. And in verse 10, it brings him
to prayer, doesn't it? He prays, and our English language
doesn't allow us to convey what Paul says. He prays exceedingly
earnestly. We don't have an English word
that describes it as an adjective. And he prays night and day. exceedingly that we might see
your face and might perfect what is lacking in your faith." He
had to leave in a hurry and we know, as we read on in 1 Thessalonians,
there are issues about the second coming of the Lord Jesus which
they had concerns about. We'll look more at it next week.
But he's praying exceedingly. Just read his prayer. that he wants to see their faces,
he wants to see them face to face, that we might perfect what
is lacking in your faith. And now God himself and our Father,
and this is his prayer isn't it, and our Lord Jesus Christ
direct our way unto you. If he's going to come to them
and see them again, it's going to be by the sovereign hand of
God. And then he says, And the Lord make you increase and abound
in love toward one another and toward all men, even as we do
toward you, that he may establish your hearts unblameable in holiness
before our God. One of the most remarkable statements
in the scriptures is the statement that Peter makes at that Council
of Jerusalem when the big issue was, do these Gentiles have to
go back under the law? And Peter says, God puts no difference
between Jews and Gentiles anymore, purifying their hearts. Imagine that, brothers and sisters,
a pure heart before God. Establish your heart unblameable
in holiness." Isn't that the work of the Lord Jesus? Isn't
that what He's promised to do? To present you unblameable, unrepentable,
holy before God, even our Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus
Christ with all His saints. May God work in our hearts that
we might be people who bring comfort, who are enlivening,
who bring thankfulness, who bring joy and rejoicing, who bring
our brothers and sisters to pray to God with earnestness and delight. Let's pray.