There's a large temptation sometimes
to take our Christian faith and to make it abstract. What do I mean by that? I mean
it's very easy to make Christianity a theoretical platform of academics. where we can talk about it and
learn about it and study it and teach it in such a way that it's
sterile, like teaching first aid or brain surgery. We can learn that, but when we
engage in our lives in those disciplines, it's different than
just knowing it. The Christian life is not something
to be known only. The Christian life, as James
would say, do not just be hearers of the word, but be also doers
of the word. And that's a dangerous place
in an American culture. It's a dangerous thing because
we can take that very easily to mean that we are indeed the
ones who not only believe of our own free will and come to
the right conclusions when it comes to God and have the right
answers and yet and then boast in our wisdom. But it's also
a chance or an opportunity for us to then boast in the sufficiency
of our works. Oh, see, well, I do the word
of God. Well, so did the rich young ruler did the word of God. And yet he was condemned. He
left despairingly rejected, dejected rather. Scripture teaches us
that salvation is all of God, it's all of grace, and it's by
faith alone that we are found justified before the Lord. And
when we teach the gospel to the world, we've come to a place,
many of you understand, that we've been taught incorrectly
what faith is. We've been taught that faith
is what we do in response to what we hear. that belief is
the actions of our minds and the actions of our mouths and
the actions of our feet. Now, I'm not going to say that
faithful people actually don't follow in the footsteps of Christ,
but it is not in those things that we trust. Nothing is more amazing to me
than when I actually have someone come with their words and reject,
not I cannot see or I will not believe or I just don't get it
or I just don't see how, but to say that the gospel of Jesus
Christ is demonic. That is when sometimes we're
shaken to our soul to realize that, friends, we are not fighting
an earthly battle. We're not fighting a battle of
wits. We're not fighting a battle of
the mind in the sense we are, but we're not fighting a battle
of the minds like who's smarter than who. The Bible says that
God uses the nothings of the world, the stupid things of the
world, the unwise of the world to confound the wise, to destroy
the strong, to make nothing of the things that are. Yeah, we're in a war. And this
war is often misunderstood because we live in a world in which individualism
rules. And we believe that our faith
is individualistic, that our beliefs are individualistic,
that what we do as a church or a congregation is about how we
can engage and what we can receive and what we can do and how I'm
being obedient and all of these things. And friends, that is
so far from the truth. I mean, even pastors fall prey
to that. We're not immune to such temptation
to put ourselves at the center of our own worlds. Oh, what must
I do to get my church to hear the truth? How can I get these
people to follow the way of the Word? I don't know. When you start doing it, I guess,
they might get it. And then in turn, sometimes we
esteem each other wrongly. We come to the place where we
look at each other and we go, oh, if I could just have that
life, or if I could just be that holy, if I could just have that
understanding. I remember feeling that way toward mentors of mine
in my twenties, who could just like stand in front of tens of
thousands of people and just quote scripture out of the air.
And it's like, he understood it, not just knew it, and could
teach it. No Bible in front of him. I mean, he had it, Didn't have
to look up every verse because he knew it. I'm like, man, if
I could just know all of that, then I would be an effective
minister of the gospel. Oh, if I could just understand
every jot and tittle of my systematic theology, then I would be a better
minister of the gospel. Oh, so let me pursue this. Let
me pursue that. Let me pursue academics. Let
me pursue it all. Let me get all the knowledge
and all the understanding. And then God took my mind from
me. Just like that. He took it. He took it. I couldn't
tell real from fake what had happened to me yesterday in a
dream or a daydream or the dream the night before versus what
happened in my very own living room. I could not tell you what
was real and what was not. The Lord was gracious. Friends,
we're in a battle. And the Word of God, as I say
every single week, is the only hope we have in the battle. I have 200 plus hours of academic
credentials in counseling. I have over 150 to 160 hours
of theological studies and more than that in applied theology
and other types of learning. You know what good it does you?
Nothing. I'm not standing here belittling
learning. We learn. But friends, even that
is a work. And the Scripture says to study,
to show thyself approved. We are to learn the Word of God.
The Scripture teaches that the battle most of the time in the
Christian life is in the mind. And that we are to renew the
mind. What is it? What is renewing
the mind? Feasting upon the Bread of Life,
who is Jesus Christ. That's renewing the mind. Putting
in the words of Christ, which gave eternal life to begin with
in Romans 10, 17. That faith comes by hearing,
and hearing by the Word of Christ. When we sit in the mirror of
our souls every day and we look and we ponder, how shall I be
right before God? God has given us mercy and grace
through Jesus Christ and there is no other way under heaven
for us to be right before God except that which Christ has
done and accomplished on our behalf. Christ has lived holy
before God as a human being, therefore His life is worthy. to be called the righteousness
of God. And then Christ willingly gave His life up to be condemned
in our place so that He took our judgment on Himself. Friends,
that is what the gospel is. That is good news. That every
effort of our being and every fiber of our soul, every molecule
of our DNA could not muster one nanomillimeter of of righteousness,
if we obey God every second of life, we would not be righteous
before Him. But Christ is righteous, and
if His righteousness is not counted in our stay, we are condemned,
and rightly so. And these letters, these New
Testament letters, oh, I have loved to hate them so much. So
many times you look and you think, I don't like it. But it is true. I don't understand it, Lord,
give me wisdom. All the while I know what it's
trying to say, I'm just trying to twist it so it makes better
sense to the way I want it to read. And these New Testament
letters, above all things, display the work of God in the lives
of His people. Did you hear that? Yes, there's
doctrinal things, there's things that are taught. That's what
doctrine means, teaching. There's theological things, that means
there's an exposure, a revelation of who God is, that's theology.
Which is eternal life, by the way. John 17, 3, this is eternal
life, that you know the one true God and the Son whom He has sent.
You know Him intimately. How do we know Him intimately?
Through the words of God. Through the scripture. How many
hours of counsel I have given across my desk before I came
to understand this reality? And by an error did God teach
me the sufficiency of His Word. And I say it every week, but
beloved, I want to ask you a question today that should not bring conviction
and guilt, but should bring an admonishment and an exhortation
that you would, that means a warning and an encouragement. That's
what admonishment means, a warning, encouragement, exhortation, an
exhortation for you to read the word of God, even when everything
in your mind says it will not work. It will. It won't. God will. It's God's word speaking
to you. And here at this Thessalonian
church, it's something interesting about the New Testament church
is that every letter is written to believers. There's not one
thing written to an unbeliever in the entire New Testament.
You know that God does not write to unbelievers through his apostles. What do unbelievers hear as the
church is taught the gospel? The gospel goes out of the church.
We teach them the truth. And as Paul has written these
letters and James wrote a letter and Peter wrote two letters,
Paul wrote a letter to the Hebrews, Peter says, and second Peter,
we call that Hebrews. You can argue it if you want
to. John wrote a gospel, Dr. Luke
wrote a gospel, and he also wrote a chronicle of history of what
the first church looked like in its genesis. We see the writing of the apostle
Jude. We see the Pauline epistles to
Timothy and to Titus and to Philemon, a little tiny postcard. We see
John's letters that he wrote, and all through them there are
a lot of There's a continuity there and there is a there is
a banner which flies above all of them. And it is that the people
of God have received the word of God through the apostles for
their good and for their sanctification and for their salvation and for
the sealing of their of their faith. And all of them have struggled
either with sin, like the Corinthians or Galatians, with false doctrine
and sin and false doctrine, adding things to the gospel of Jesus
Christ. or like the church of Ephesus who just needed to be
instructed because they were so young and immature, or the
church of Thessalonica like we've been in the last year, who were
living their faith in such a way that the people around them within
40 to 50 miles were eager to hear what the apostles had to
say about the Lord because they heard the rumors and the gossip
of what kind of people the Thessalonians had become. Either way, Here we are today,
written to these individuals for our sake. Beloved, is the
Word of God working for you today? Is God's Word moving in your
mind and seated in your heart? Is the Word of God something
that you just utilize as a recipe book or is God's Word your intimate
relationship with God? See, we can't use it. like the prior. We cannot go
and say, well, I want to see what the Bible says about drinking.
I want to see what the Bible says about tattoos. I want to
see what the Bible says about disobedient children. We all
know those verses. The Bible says to obey your parents,
children of the Lord, for this is right. Timothy actually tells,
Paul actually tells Timothy that disobedient children are numbered
amongst murderers and sexual debauchery people. I loved those
verses when my children were younger. Right there along the things
is, fathers, do not exasperate your children. Do not draw them
to anger. Oh, hush, Paul. You don't know
what you're talking about. You don't know my children, Paul.
I mean, we know those. We want to find out how our wives
are supposed to submit. So we want to know what the Bible
says about that. But we don't want to see husbands love your
wife as Christ loved the church, who died on the cross. for her. And we think that means we get
our way. No, we don't get our way. We follow the way of Christ
who died. So we die. We like to go to the
Bible and say, well, just how many lies can I tell before I
go to hell? None. Because not lying won't
get you to heaven. Not sinning won't get you to
heaven. Only Christ can get you to heaven. Well, what am I supposed
to do about these unbelievers in my life? What am I supposed
to do about this? What am I supposed to do? Quit
looking to the Bible. It's good to look for those answers,
but friends, if that's our mainstay, it's like eating at the food
court for the free samples. I'll get a piece of chicken here
and I'll do that. I'll go around and get enough free samples and
not have to pay for anything. It's a perfect way of eating
for free. It's the best tasting chicken you'll ever eat, free
chicken. But it's not gonna sustain you. The free crackers and the bag
of peanuts on the flight is not going to be enough for you. I
would suggest that probably most of us put something in our bodies
before we came to service this morning and some sense of food
or some sustenance. We drank something. We at least
hopefully prayerfully brushed our teeth. We made preparations
for our day in some manner. Tomorrow, those preparations
start over. I would say that probably in
about 45 minutes, those preparations start over. Why? Because our bodies are not going
to be starved of the necessity. Why then is our soul starved
of the necessity? Why do we starve? We'd rather
go see a movie rather than be intimate with God. We'd rather
go play games rather than have an intimate relationship with
Jesus Christ. We'd rather, you know, go do this or go do that
rather than do this. Now, beloved, we're all guilty
as charged. And if we read the Bible without
any kind of margin, we'll never get up from it. We're like, okay,
we're always just gonna sit here and we just lock the doors and
never leave. And when we die of starvation, hallelujah, we're
eating the bread of life in death. But that's a poor stewardship
of our time if there's no life to live as we live in the word. But friends, in comparison, what
is there greater than intimacy with the Lord? Well, I enjoy
fellowship. Well, you know what real fellowship
stands for? The word in the Greek is koinonia.
That means all things in common. Do we have all things in common
with each other? Well, let me tell you what I don't have in
common with most of you. Much of nothing. Much of anything. What is there in common among
us? I mean, some of us like to hunt, some of us like to shoot
guns, some of us like to do kung fu, some of us like to read,
some of us like to sew, some of us like to play football and
basketball. I mean, last weekend we had like
a, I don't know, a sports extravaganza over there and Ruby decided to
play full tackle with a golf cart. So, I mean, you know, a
lot of things were happening. But not everybody participated
because not everybody has that in common. So what is fellowship
really about? It's not about finding commonality
in the world. It's about finding unity in the
Lord and the unity that comes in the Lord is no matter what
we're doing, whether we're observing these things or participating
in these things, whether we're eating or washing clothes or
we're at a sporting event or we're at a hunting club or we're
at a fabric store or wherever we might be, we have Christ in
common and the biggest thing about fellowship is that we are
considering each other in every moment of our lives that we may
embark on the relationship that God has established to the cross
of Christ. Because that is the most important
thing that we can do in life, is to be with fellow Christians
who we are in covenant with. Because we, as God's children,
are eternally together. Our blood relatives, if they're
not in Christ, are not eternal. They are not with us. Our family
in this world, by the Lord's grace, will all become saved
and believe on Christ. But friends, it's not a guarantee
that God will save everybody we love. It's not a guarantee. So our home is a temporary shadow,
but our church is an eternal shadow. It continues. Our relationship continues. My
wife will not always be my wife in death, but she will always
be my sister. And the purpose of marriage will
have no place in eternity because it's to point to Christ and His
church. to the text this morning. Paul has just taught the Thessalonians
how they are to... If I get in the right text, I'll
know when I was about to read you out of Timothy here. Paul
has taught them where their hope stands, and
it is in the foundations of God's love for them and the certainty
of God's election of them that He chose them in Himself, for
Himself, to be saved from the beginning. And that the work
of sanctification, the work of being set apart by God, for God,
is by God, by the Spirit, and it is evidenced, if you will,
by belief in the truth, as we've seen. I spent two weeks on this. And the ultimate outcome of our
salvation is the glory of God, in which we share the reflection
of His glory in our glorification. In chapter 3, He says these words,
Finally, brothers, pray for us. that the word of the Lord may
speed or run ahead and be honored as happened among you, and that
we may be delivered from wicked and evil men. For not all have
faith, but the Lord is faithful. He will establish you and guard
you against the evil one. And we have confidence in the
Lord about you that you are doing and will do the things that we
command. May the Lord direct your hearts to the love of God
and to the steadfastness of Christ. Now, over the last few weeks,
when we get to these texts and we ask ourselves, well, how is
it that I'm going to stand? And we hear that what Paul taught
last week is that we stand because God is faithful to save us through
His Word, through the gospel. We stand because God is faithful
to defeat His enemies. They will not overpower us and
take us away from Him. We stand because God is faithful,
as He said in chapter 2, to bring judgment against all evilness
and all wickedness, even so much as to prevent them from believing
once they continue to reject the truth because they love unrighteousness. Remember that little verbal slip
that I had there, and I kept saying they love righteousness,
so God condemns them. But they love unrighteousness. God is
faithful. God is faithful to secure them
through His Word and to help them stand by the remembrance
of what they were taught by His Word and through the teaching
of the apostles. God is faithful then to continue and that's what
Paul is saying now. Paul is saying that the effectual
reason that they will stand and that even the apostles will stand
and succeed is that we will pray that it is so. That we will pray that it is
so. Let me tell you why this doesn't work for us. Because
it's too easy. Well, if it was so easy, why
aren't we doing it? People say that to me a lot. Well, that
just seems too easy. I must do something else to stand
with the Lord. Even about salvation, there must
be something else I must do than just believe. I need to clean
my life up, I guess. I mean, there's some kind of
action on my part. Listen, faith is faith. We're
either believing on the work and the actions and the activity
and the person of Jesus, or we're believing on something else besides
Jesus. And if we believe on something
else besides Jesus, we do not believe on Christ or in Christ.
So therefore we have no hope. It is good to be exhorted to
walk in a manner worthy of the calling. Paul does that all the
time. It is good to hear the commands to love your neighbor.
It is good to hear these things. But friends, doing them does
not justify us. Doing the things of the commands
of God does not bring life. As a matter of fact, if we trust
in these things, it brings death. Many people say, well, so we
can just sin like we want to? And you have to be careful how
you ask that question, I mean, how you answer that question,
because a lot of people ask it in this sense. So I'm free to
live for the passions of my flesh and just enjoy life and sin because
God's grace is so sufficient. Absolutely not. It's impossible. Why? Because we've been born
of God. And I don't know about you, beloved, but I hate every
sin that I think about, much less commit. Sometimes I pray
that God would just kill me in the middle of the street, just
kill me. So if I ever die, you know, I
wonder if He prayed for death. I mean, I don't want sin in my
life. I hate it. I don't want to not
believe. I don't want to be angry. I don't
want to be frustrated. I don't want doubt. I don't want
to sit here and consider about how I'm going to be the agent
of change in other people's lives. I don't want to sit here and
fight the lust of the eyes and the pride of life and the pride
of possessions. I don't want to fight. I'm done.
I'm sick of it. I hate sin. I want to worship God with all
of my heart, my soul and strength, but unfortunately the flesh that's
attached to my soul continues to fight that. So no, I hate
sin. No believer loves sin. No believer
loves the flesh. No believer, no one who is in
Christ loves wickedness. None of us love evil, though
we are tempted by it and sometimes we fall prey to it. We don't
love it. We don't love it. Do not love the world or the
things of the world. Do not love them. For the love
of God is not in those who love the world." Friends, we don't
love it. But here, we're not working to please God
in obedience, because God is pleased in the obedience of Christ.
He's satisfied in the death of Christ. He is perfectly just
and righteous in justifying us. That means declaring us innocent
before we even were born. God said, you're righteous, you're
justified. What sin? The sin that Christ
took. See, that's the gospel. That's
good news. Because I don't know about you, beloved, but I have
worked really hard in my life to keep myself in the love of
God with my own flesh. Have you? It doesn't work. It doesn't work. I keep myself
in the love of God by believing in Christ, by holding fast to
the confession of our hope. And Paul says that very well
here. And it doesn't settle with us,
because we want a list of things to do. We want that Ten Commandments
to be printed on our refrigerator so we can work on it. Good luck.
The Pharisees obeyed the Ten Commandments. The rich young
ruler obeyed the Ten Commandments. Jesus told him, well, good, you've
kept all the commandments, then do this. Take everything you
love, all your wealth, and give it to the people who don't deserve
it, who hasn't worked for it. I can't do that. Well, if you
do, you have treasure in heaven, then follow me. I'm not exchanging
my treasure for you. I love my life more than you,
Christ." That's why he walked away dejected. And the Pharisees
were seen as this pious people and they walked accordingly.
And they did everything that was instructed to them by the
Scriptures. And you know what Jesus said to the masses in their
hearing? He says, hey, all of you, if
your righteousness, that means if your obedience is not greater
than that of the Pharisees, you will not inherit the kingdom
of heaven. So think about the most holy, righteous, pious,
Bible-reading, beloved man or woman you can think of in life.
And if your righteousness is not a hundredfold better than
theirs, you can't enter the Kingdom of Heaven. You know why? Because
holiness is required to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Perfection. And perfection by definition
means never a problem. Something can't become perfect
once it's been imperfect. You can't buff the fingerprint
off of a gold coin. Once somebody touches it, duh!
It's a 20% discount. You can't take the scratch, and
even if you do, and you can make it look brand new, is it brand
new? No, it's faulted. The only way we're righteous,
beloved, is because Christ is perfect. And here in this chapter,
He teaches that. Let's break it down. Here now
is a prayer. Paul, the Apostle Paul, asking
the church that he's instructing to pray for him. Isn't that backward? I could
just teach on that for the next 20 minutes. Paul, the apostle
who planted the church in Thessalonica. is instructing them in the faith,
correcting their false teaching, exhorting them and encouraging
them that they are walking in a manner worthy, and he says,
continue to do so. Remember the first letter? I
pray that God will continue to work this out in you and you
continue to love, they were loving, continue to serve, they were
serving, continue to teach, they were teaching. You just continue
to do what you're doing and I pray that you do it all the more. And then he says, pray for me.
Pray for us. Prayer is a doctrine of scripture
that often goes unlearned. Many people believe that prayer
is a blessing and a meal, or just a little time to get with
God and talk about the little things that bother them. Or maybe
it's a time to really sit down and deal with some hard things
that are going on in life. Some people think that it's only
one of the others. Prayer, by definition, or by example, yields
to the supremacy of God in everything. And the reason that we pray is
because God purposes prayer in His people. Did you hear me?
When we don't know how we ought to pray, Christians pray because
the Spirit of God, according to Romans 8, prays for us. And so our souls are learned
and are taught to pray. We are compelled to pray as God's
people. God has purposed prayer. And
by their prayers, by our prayers, God answers those prayers. And the will of God is brought
forth in prayer. Jesus teaches that. Pray in this
way, thy will be done. Because that's what we want,
isn't it? Jesus gives an example of that
in His own life. When He's in the Garden of Gethsemane
and the inner three are asleep. And He says, keep watching what?
He says what? Pray. And these are the disciples,
and what do they do? Sleep. So when you can't pray
and you sleep, hey, you're in good company. I'm not saying
it's the norm, but it's what the flesh does. The Spirit is
willing, but the flesh is weak. So then what do we do? Well,
God will purpose prayer. Jesus prayed, O Father, take
this cup from me. What's He mean by that? I don't
want to feel the sting of the judgment, that is due to those
who sin. I do not want to be paid in my
flesh the wage of sin. But in the same breath, he says,
but not my will, but yours be done. How is it that Jesus, the
man who was also Jesus, the God man, how was Jesus in his humanity
able to stand under the consequence of sin? that he had not committed. He prayed that God would sustain
him and that his will would be done. A prayerless person is a powerless
person. Powerless. He answers our prayers. When
we feel the need to pray, we should pray. If you do not feel
the need to pray today, pray that God will give you the desire
to pray. You see how that works? Here, Paul says, pray, brothers,
for us. And here's the specifics. He
gives these specifics. Pray that the Word of God will
speed ahead, run quickly ahead. What does that mean? Well, he
also prays it would be honored as it was among you. See, the
Thessalonians received the Word of God, according to 1 Thessalonians,
not as just mere words, but with power and in the Spirit. And that means that the Word
of God came to Thessalonica and without any... They didn't know
what was going to happen. What does Paul say? The only
thing he knew that was going to happen, for sure, is what? Imprisonment. That everywhere he went, he was
going to be locked up and beaten. Everywhere he went. He knew that
trials and tribulations and imprisonment would befall him. He did not
know if the Lord was going to allow people to hear the Word
of God or to reject the Word of God or what was going to happen.
But in Thessalonica, God brought these people to faith through
the hearing of the Word. So the Word, then, Paul is saying,
please pray that as it happened among you, it will happen where
we are going, so that the Word of God would run quickly and
freely, that the Word of God would be sent forth, and that
it would also be honored. See, it was not the apostles
that caused their conversion. You realize that, don't you?
There's a real big problem in the celebrity evangelistic circles
of our day where people think, man, if I can get Billy Bob so-and-so
to come preach, man, revival's going to come. You ever heard
that? I've never in my life understood that. For if God can speak through
anyone, if God can bring revival in the hotel room with a Gideon
Bible so gracefully placed next to the Pearl of Great Price, then God doesn't need my charisma
and God doesn't need my preparation to bring revival in you. Did
you hear that? is the doer of revival. God is the giver of life. The
apostles were not. They were just vocal cords and
bodies through whom God worked greatly. It was not the charisma
or the central voice of the apostles that created life. It was God
who created life. And God creates life in dead
people through the hearing of His Word. Why then is it so difficult
for so many people to sit under exposition? Why would it be better
for the majority of the world out there who claim to be in
Christ to hear me hoot and holler for 30 minutes and get everybody
excited? Because it feeds the flesh, not
the soul. See, the gospel not only feeds
the soul, it brings it to life. The gospel of Jesus Christ simply
Do I have to get real negative and show you the consequence
of sin and tell you a big bad story about how sin has ruined
my life and ruined somebody else's? No. For the wages of sin is death. You are dead, beloved, before
you were saved. And the world is dead if it does
not believe on Christ. And the world knows it. The reason it's hard to sit under
exposition is because it conflicts with our worldview. It tears
the caricature of Jesus Christ down from our walls. It takes
the picture of Jesus so softly knocking on the door of our dining
room so He could come and sup with us and us with Him, and
it burns it. It puts the image that we have
of God loving every single person no matter how they believe. And
it destroys it. Because God's Word in context
teaches the truth of His heart and His mind and His soul and
His decrees. And God will only save those
who believe on Christ. Who cannot save themselves in
any merit, in any religion, in any practice, in any discipline.
It is by faith alone Period. And there is no other means through
which we can obtain salvation. And that object of our faith
must be Jesus Christ and the fullness of all that He is and
all that He's done. And the reason that lost people
don't like that, the reason that, let me use these air quotes,
religious people who have made their own way don't like that
is because it calls every idol in our lives ugly. It does. Some people ask, when I mention
my depression, they say, what caused it? The realization that
I was a purveyor of false gospels. Ultimately. The sin of teaching people certain
things could keep them in the love of God. God's Word says of itself, in
Hebrews 4.12, that the Word of God is living and breathing and
sharper than any two-edged sword. And it will cut flesh and bone
and marrow and soul. The Word of God, Paul is saying,
he is asking them to pray that the Word of God would go swiftly
and powerfully into the places where they were about to be.
And he is asking them to pray that it will accomplish salvation
for its hearers. How often do we labor with people
who we're begging to hear the truth and they will not hear
the truth? I mean, just in the last few days, a dear soul considering
that they might have committed the unpardonable sin and explaining
what that was and explaining the grace and the mercy of God,
this person came back this morning and said to me, you preach a
doctrine of demons when you preach that God's grace
is sufficient for my soul. You know what that is? Blasphemy
of the Holy Spirit. When we take the work of Jesus
Christ and we call it the teaching of the devil. Paul prays that not only would
the word go out, but that it would be honored, not rejected,
but received. Beloved, all we can do to pray
for a person like that, I mean, to reach a person like that is
to pray that the word of God that is there will set root in
their soul and that he would bring them alive to the gospel
that they've heard. and that He would not set them apart from
Him permanently. But as we've seen just in this
text and three weeks ago, God does, He does set people's heart
to reprobation. Paul is praying that God will
bring life to others. And if God does not make His
Word effectual for salvation, there will be no salvation for
these people. Jesus Christ did the work. He
provided all that is needed for salvation. He stood in our place. It's amazing, and I use this
term a lot. Oh, Lord, have mercy. When I see the condition of the
world, when I see just even my own flesh, and I say, Oh, Lord,
have mercy. Listen, God has mercy. His name
is Jesus. If you were to take and study
the words, and I know Brother Trey's been doing this this week.
If you were to study the words of propitiation, atoning sacrifice,
expiation, some of those words that mean that God is satisfied
with the punishment that was put upon Christ. So therefore,
now there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Beloved, this is difficult for
people to receive because unless they've been brought to a place
where the Word and the Spirit opens their eyes, they cannot
see it because there's got to be another way. But Jesus stood in our place
and He is the mercy of God. As a matter of fact, in Hebrews,
the word there, propitiation, is translated, not propitiation,
it's translated the mercy seat. Jesus is the mercy seat. where
the blood was poured, where atonement is made, where forgiveness is
found. And we need to pray that God's
Word would work just like that in our own hearts. We need to
pray that God's Word would be effectual not just to salvation,
but continually for the sealing of our souls. Continually for our hope. We
hold fast to our confession. We strive, we learn, we live,
we hold, we run the race. What does it look like to run
the race? Believing on Jesus Christ alone
is what it looks like to run the race. When we see sin in
our lives, we don't come to the throne of grace and say, Father,
Daddy, I'm going to straighten this up, okay, so don't worry
about this, I know it looks bad and I've really been falling
down lately. No, we come to the throne of grace which said, your
son took this sin on himself, it is no longer mine. Oh God, you had mercy on me and
Jesus Christ. We don't have to cry for mercy
for our souls when we're in Christ, for Christ is our mercy. We have
been given mercy and we will forever be given mercy. He prays that the Word of God
will be honored. Beloved, our sin is not ours to bear, for
Christ has borne it in His body. You hear that? That's good news. And you know what God does with
the gospel when He brings us to life in Christ? He works in
us a way out of our sin. How's that? Remember the things
that we've taught and the Word that we've written. What is that
Word? Christ bore your sin in His body.
If you're being tempted by sin and you remember the gospel of
Jesus, beloved, you will lay that sin aside even if it is
difficult. Until it knocks on your shoulder
again. And then we keep believing in the gospel of Jesus. He also prays that they would
be delivered from wicked men. Because, see, in contrast here,
he's talked about those wicked men who taught to the Thessalonians
the lie that they missed the coming of the Lord Jesus. And
He said to them, Don't be deceived by anyone, either in word or
by letter, assuming to be from us, for what we've told you stands. And had the Lord already come,
the evil one, the man of lawlessness, would already have been revealed,
because in the coming of Christ, God, Jesus Christ, the Lord,
will bring judgment against him, and all will know who he is.
And not only will all know who the devil is, but they will know
who all of those the devil owns. All those who do not believe.
We will know. Why? Because judgment is done.
The light of the gospel is shined perfectly and eternally. The
good news of Jesus Christ is that here are all the sheep that
are mine. Well done. Here are all the goats.
Into the lake of fire you go. It's an immediate thing, Paul
says in 1 Thessalonians, like the twinkling of an eye. And Paul was about to go somewhere
else, and everywhere he went, there were wicked men. Now, let
me tell you something. In our culture today, it's very
hard to put our place amongst these Thessalonians, because
the persecution that we endure in our world, especially in this
part of America, is not as hostile as it is in most places. People
lose their lives daily if they're caught with the Bible, if they're
suspected to be a Christian. People's children are taken,
murdered in front of them because of the fact that they may be
helping a missionary get into the country. And governments
hate Christianity. But if those of you who have
been following our Tuesday night teaching, you realize that even though
the hostility may not be as aggravated, it is still as evil. And that
a lot of hostility coming against the gospel of Jesus Christ comes
from those who profess it. Think about it for a second.
The problem with Paul and the apostles was not as much as the
Roman government coming in, but those religious zealots coming
after them, causing the government to step in. Saul himself was
the catalyst for that. He started it and then he had
to endure under it. He created the instrument through
which the church would be persecuted, and then God saved him and snatched
him out of the domain of darkness and set him in the light of Christ,
and then now he's running for his life. Beautiful. What prayers Paul must have prayed
before he went to sleep every night? What dreams must have
come into his mind as he considered the fact, had I just not been
so rebellious? But we know what it took to save
Paul. a miraculous overpowering of his will and his mind through
the words of Christ as Christ met him on that road to Damascus
and did not ask him but one question, why do you persecute me? To which Paul could have easily
answered, I haven't persecuted you, I'm persecuting these idiots
out here. When people persecute God's church,
they persecute Christ. And Paul is saying, please pray
that the Word of God will be effectual here and also pray
for us to be delivered from wicked men, for not all have faith. You see that? That's how I know
that he's talking more about many who would actually claim
to be in the faith, like the Judaizers, or even similar to
the faith with some twist of philosophical hope or weird metaphysical
ideals like the Gnostics. Oh, you know, it all matters
bad. Oh, it's Jesus plus this. You know, Jesus alone saves,
but if you don't... Like people today in our day who come and
say that we must keep ourselves in obedience lest we fall away
from God. That every time we sin, if we
do not seek forgiveness before we die, we will be in the judgment
seat, to which I even argued a young man Friday afternoon
right here in this building. He didn't know I was arguing,
but I was arguing with him. That even when he thinks he's
got it right, every night he goes to sleep he thinks he's
well with the Lord. He has sinned in his heart that he might not
even know. Deliver us from wicked men. that
do not have faith, pray that the Lord would bring faith, but
not all would come. Not all people love the gospel
because they love the will of men. They love the sovereignty
of humanity. They love men's ability, which
rules in their own hearts and lives. Wicked men who continue
to work to plow the hearts of others to receive the Word of
God, like Charles Finney, 19th century evangelist, kicked out
of Princeton. who said that revival starts
with men. And that men, with their eloquence
and with the draw of music, like he taught D.L. Moody, to draw
with music and other things that could come and get people's hearts
toiled and the soil plowed that they might receive the Word of
God. Charles Finney would actually
write, and you can read this, it's online for free, all of
his stuff is. Charles Finney would actually
write a book about revival and how to start it. And he'd give
instance after instance after instance after instance of what
men could do in their revival services to create new life. And one of the main things that
he continued to press is that the openness to the Word of God
is somewhere inside every sinner. And if we could just get it knocked
down just a little bit, if we could get the emotion a little
bit raw, we could find it and we could put the Word of God
in it. Even so much as to train and hire people to begin to weep
during the services and to come forward in fits of agony, praying
so that others may be convicted and encouraged to come. Beloved,
it is the evangelical world in which we live is the product
and the grandchildren and the great-grandchildren of that particular
stuff. And before He came, there was
no such practice in the world. People love their power. People love their power. Wicked
men who blaspheme the Spirit of God, who labor for the fruits
of their pride and righteousness that leads to destruction. Wicked
men who passionately preach against the truth. Have you noticed that
when people come and begin to share the gospel, the truth of
just the simple gospel of Jesus, that it is a sovereign and free
grace, that God alone saves through the hearing of His Word, that
it is all the work of God, and that man has no merit or arm
in it. People don't only, they've never
shared what they believe as the gospel in their entire lives.
And they don't start then, but they start passionately sharing
against that gospel. Have you noticed that? It is
the majority of the blogosphere. It is the majority of social
media. It is the majority of the Baptist associations of our
world. No, it is Christ alone. Well,
you know what? That guy that says Christ alone,
he's a heretic. He's a liar. He's this. Open
your eyes, beloved. Look at it. They preach against
the true gospel passionately. Wicked men who breed for the
mere purpose of thwarting the work of the church. No, no, no,
no, no, no. We've got to do this if we're
the church. We've got to do these things. Who in the world in their
right mind would just teach the Bible and pray and sing and love
each other and go home? You've got to do more. The world
needs more. The world needs something else
besides just the Word. That's what people say. No, they
don't. Beloved, I would say that many
people love the stuff of ministry rather than the Christ of heaven.
And they'll be sifted in due time. And in a matter of time, they
will stumble. Who are these wicked ones? Well, if you start living
out your faith and sharing your faith, you'll find some. You'll
find some. And it may just be the neighbor
that goes, rolls their eyes at you. It may be the government
of your local community who try to make it hard on you, make
you pay for everything. Sweeping the salt, you got a
permit for that? It may be the government one
day. It may be your own spouse. Your
own children, your own church member friends. But wicked men, evil men are
those who are one day going to stand in judgment because they've
rejected the mercy of God through Christ. It is Jesus alone that
people hate, beloved. Many like Jesus plus this, or
Jesus and this. Many like to add Jesus to the
plate of their course, but they do not desire to eat the bread
of life alone. In 2 Corinthians 1, Paul writes,
For we do not want you to be unaware, brothers, of the affliction
we experienced in Asia. For we were so utterly burdened
beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt
that we had received the sentence of death. but that was to make
us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead. He
delivered us from such a deadly peril and He will deliver us.
On Him we have set our hope that He will deliver us again. You
also must help us by prayer so that many will give thanks on
our behalf for the blessing granted us through the prayers of many."
You see what Paul's trying to have happen? That if we pray,
If the Thessalonians pray for Paul, and for the Word to go,
and the Word to bring life, and the Word to be successful, and
no matter how many people come against the apostles in their
effort to plant a church, nothing's going to stop them. Even if they
believe they're about to die, or even if they do die, nothing
will stop the power of God in the Gospel. He told them to pray. He asked the Corinthians to pray.
And every other place we see in Scripture where he wrote,
he asked for the people to pray. Beloved, we stand firm, successful
to the end when we pray for God's will to be done and for His Word
to work and for the people who hear it to stand firm in it.
God brings salvation and God keeps salvation. Unbelievers work against the
truth, but God is the Lord over them. He rules them. They cannot
thwart His plans. As long as the church sits quietly
at home, though, nothing happens. But when we gather, when the
Lord's Word is preached, and when we speak the Lord's Word,
when sheep come to hear and behold, false believers come against
us. And it may not be against any of us individually, but friends,
listen, if you're sharing the gospel with somebody, if you're
mentoring somebody in the faith, if you're making a disciple of
somebody, bet your last dollar, and that's a phrase, I don't
mean do it, that there's somebody else in
that person's life who's trying to undo what you're doing. Somebody is trying to undo it.
And let me tell you what those somebody's do. If they can't
undo it with false teaching, they will tear you apart. They
will say things about you that cause people to doubt that whatever
you say is true. They will lie about you. They
will say, well, you know, they're part of a cult, or these people
are weird, or they don't even understand, or so-and-so. They will lie. But the Bible
has just taught us that all these false believers, everything that
they do is the work of the devil in them and through them. And
they are bound by the sovereignty of God and one day will meet
their end. But the Lord is faithful. Look
at verse 3. He will establish you and guard you against the
evil one. So this is coming. Pray that it doesn't come, but
it will come. But God will establish you and guard you against the
evil one, beloved. What's the point of the text
here? I took so long to get here. God's faithfulness once again
is revealed. He will establish you. We don't
have to sit and wonder, how will I stand? What shall I do? Where
am I going to find the power to stand up and to live like
God has called me to live? Oh, what will I do now that this
has come upon me? How am I going to survive this
burden or this pestilence or this persecution? What now? We
don't have to ask those questions because God will establish us. He will guard us against the
evil one. Romans 16, now to Him, this is a doxology, now to Him
who is able to strengthen you, how? According to my gospel and
to strengthen you through the preaching of Jesus Christ. According
to the revelation of the mystery that was kept secret for long
ages. Now to Him who is able. You see that? See why we gather
each week? So that we might learn the glory
of God and salvation. So that we might learn the power
of God and redemption. So that we might stand firm in
the Word of God. The gospel that's preached is
what strengthens us. The gospel that's preached is
what enables us to stand. And after you suffer for a little
while, Peter says to these Jews in the dispersion, the God of
all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ,
will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you.
The gospel writer Luke says the same thing. But I've prayed for
you that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned again,
strengthen your brothers. What's that mean? What is Paul
really trying to teach the Thessalonians here? If you hold fast to the
Gospel of Jesus as taught in the Word of God, and it is all
you need and all you eat, if you stay in these words, God
is going to keep you and guard you. And here's the other part
of that. Even if you don't, God is going
to purpose that you stand and you will come back to the Word. You come back to the Word. It's not even about the discipline
of scripture reading, or prayer, or devotion. It's not about devotion. It's about Christ and His devotion
to the will of the Father. His righteousness, His work,
this confidence. We pray and the Lord answers.
You will not fail in your faith, beloved. You may feel as though
you're going to fail in your faith. You may feel this very
day that everything within you is about to give up on Jesus.
But He is not going to let you fail. You hear that? Now if that doesn't empower you,
I have nothing else. If that doesn't help you stand,
there's nothing else to stand upon. There's no rock, there's
no ladder, there's no tower, there's no building, there's
nothing that can get you higher and more secure than that. You
will not fall, beloved. You will not. What do I do with my sin? Come
to the cross of Christ. Come to the cross of Christ.
Christ effectually keeps His people. Paul shows that in verse
4. Look, and we have confidence in the Lord about you. Did he
say, I have confidence in you? No. I have confidence in the
Lord concerning you, that you are doing and will do the things
that we command, which is to keep doing what they're doing,
holding fast to the faith in Jesus Christ and the work of
Him, as a righteousness who transformed them as a people. Oh, how the
mercy and grace of God is sure and certain. May the Lord, this
final prayer, verse 5. May the Lord direct your hearts
to the love of God and to the steadfastness of Christ. This
is the conduct that Paul is asking for. And I wish I had 30 more
minutes, but let me give it to you in 30 seconds. We consider
Christ. and His gospel, His life, His
Word, and we are not shaken. When we meditate on the truth
that we hold to, we stand. We look to Jesus, as Hebrews
writes, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who, for the joy
that was set before Him, endured the cross, despising the shame,
and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. We do not
grow weary then, considering Him who endured from sinners
such hostility against Himself, so that you may not grow weary.
or faint-hearted? Do you feel weary and faint-hearted?
The answer to that weariness is to trust in the gospel of
Jesus, is to believe on Christ. Christ did not give up and He
is faithful. And beloved, if you believe,
He's faithful. And we know that Paul teaches
that because you believe proves He's faithful. He proves Himself
faithful. Let's pray. Lord, how so often I'm overly
verbose on things that might not matter. How I pray, Father, that the
truth of this Scripture would rest deep into our hearts and
souls, that we would be calmed and encouraged and strengthened
by the gospel of Jesus. And Lord, that we would pray
for ourselves and for each other to be strengthened and encouraged
and held in the gospel of Jesus. And Father, I thank You that
Your Word is true. And I pray, I pray, Lord, that we as a people
would hold fast that we would not let the distractions of our
lives move our eyes and our gaze from the gospel of Jesus. Father,
that we would not look at our effort against sin as hope, but
that we would see that Christ has lived and died in our place,
and He is our hope. And Father, I pray this for our
congregation. individually and collectively. And father, I pray
that we would be empowered to share the faith as you bring
people into our lives. In your timing and in your purpose.
That your word of God would that your word, God would run quickly
ahead of us. And be effectual. And protect
us. that we might give you all glory
and honor and praise and all that we are in Jesus name.