This sermon was preached to the
Saints of Grace Truth Church on May 8, 2016. We're in 1 Thessalonians
3, verses 11-13, which says, Now may our God and Father Himself
and our Lord Jesus direct our way to you, and may the Lord
make you increase and abound in love for one another and for
all, as we do for you, so that He may establish your hearts
blameless in holiness before our God and Father, at the coming
of our Lord Jesus with all the saints." This text teaches us
the reality of Paul's love, that Paul's love was not just an emotional
affection, but a powerful moving force within him, as he said
earlier that he loved them with all the affection of Christ.
Now we see what God speaks about love when he says, because God
loved us, he gave Christ so that we could be the righteousness
of God. So we're gonna look at love today and look at what it
actually means to be loving according to the Apostle Paul. Please enjoy. The power of the gospel to produce
a supernatural affection that surpasses the wisdom and the
understanding of the world. to such a degree that the world
is sort of confused and confounded, that there'd be such an affection.
And not just the affection for each other, because it's easy
to love those who are like us, who love like us, who talk like
us, who live like us, but also the affection that the church
had for the world, for the greater area, evidenced by the fact that
they shared the faith. that they prayed for their enemies
that we see not only here in this letter to the Thessalonians,
but also to the letter to the Philippians and the Ephesians
and other places where Paul teaches, not just sometimes through correction,
but here through exaltation of God to say, we see the Lord in
you because of your love. Just as Luke prayed earlier that
Jesus Himself said that they will know, you are my disciples. We will be known as followers
of Christ. For what? For your love for one
another. I made mention last week about
the reality of love and what it looks like sometimes in our
culture. I made the statement that love is not at any time
a feeling. Love is never how we feel about
someone. Love is not that which we feel
boiling up in our soul and our flesh and the cute fuzzies, the
warm fuzzies or the butterflies. That's like diarrhea. That's
not love. That's IBS. It's nerves. It's adrenaline.
The same feeling you can have if someone pulls out in front
of you and you slam on brakes, you must be in love with the
car. I mean, you know. We've misunderstood the idea of love
because our culture takes a word that in itself has deep, full
meaning and we change the meaning of it by the way we expressly
act out that word. For like the word friend. Oh,
that's my friend. Is it? That's your friend? What's
their middle name? Gotcha. And that's not a test
of friendship because most people don't like to give our middle
names. Most people don't think about that stuff. It's not really
important. But I mean, you know, if you've known someone for 10
years as your quote friend, you know a little more about them
than just their first name and what kind of car they drive or
where they live, what kind of glasses they might wear. Love is not about that. Love
is an investment. John would tell us in his first
epistle that God is love. And when we don't understand
the reality of love as it's defined by God, who is the creator of
such things, who is a reflection of His essence, then we then
take God and we mold Him into our definition of love. That,
my friend, is false worship. That's idol worship. That's a
false God, a false Christ, a false gospel. And friends, if we don't
learn the truth, chances are we can't teach the truth. I find
it very difficult if someone saw each other on the street,
and everyone was destitute, and someone was hungry, and you were
hungry, and you had nothing to eat, and they had nothing to
eat, that they would beg of you food. They would follow you around
and you could say, yes, I have some food to give you. Just come
with me. And they follow you around for 40 days, 50 days,
and you both die of starvation because you never had anything
to give them anyway. The same thing with water. The
same thing with the gospel. If you don't have the gospel,
you can't give the gospel. You can't give the gospel if you
don't know the gospel. You can't have the gospel if you don't
hear the gospel. Friends, you can't give love
if you don't know love. You can't have that which is not given
you. You can't give that which is
not of you. You can't be love. And that's
a better way of understanding love is that we are love. If
God is love and Christ is in us and we are in Christ and we
are the body, then that which is love in our lives is how we
are. It's who we are. It's what we
are. We are love. Not just loving,
not just affectionate, but all of those things combined because
we are love. Love is, as I've already said,
a very misunderstood reality. And in that sense, love is not
necessarily present in our reality, in our culture today. You might
think, well, why are we talking about love? Because that's what
Paul is about to pray. In chapter 3, verse 11 through
13, we see Paul say, now, look at verse 11, now may our God
and Father Himself and our Lord Jesus direct our way to you and
may the Lord make you increase and abound in love for one another
and for all as we do for you. so that he may establish your
hearts blameless in holiness before our God and Father at
the coming of our Lord Jesus with all the saints. And so the
text here is a continuation of what we looked at last week and
the week before, where Paul talks about their love. He is worried
about these Christians because they were abandoned. I'm reminding
us of the context of this writing. He's worried about that their
persecution may cause them to fall away from their professed
faith. He's worried that they may be led astray, and they were
led astray in some doctrinal issues and some theological issues,
like end times and the resurrection, and we'll look at that. But he was afraid in his spirit. It's not a spirit of doubting
God, but a spirit of burden. We have a spirit of burden. It
doesn't mean that we live in fear, but to say we have no fear,
we have no feeling of fear at all, or no thought or consciousness
of fear is just a lie. What are we doing? Repressing
it? Yes, we have a burden. If our children are going to
go driving for the first time by themselves, there's a fear there.
There's a healthy fear there, because it's a dangerous place.
People die in cars. We put our child in daycare or
preschool for the first time, we drive away and we fall apart
at the end of the drive, like, oh my baby, somebody's going
to, like, kill it. No, they're going to take care
of it. But we have this fear. Paul had a concern, a burden,
that if he didn't get back there soon enough that many Christians
may fall away, or many professing believers may be tempted to fall
away. Maybe they weren't believing,
really believing. Maybe they were just, what did
I say last week, enthusiastic about the gospel message, and
that if temptation came to fall away because it would cost them
something, that they would. And so He wanted to be there
on the ground, not only to see with His eyes that they were
staying in the faith, but most importantly, so that those who
did not stay in the faith, they could preach the gospel, and
that by hearing the gospel, God would give them hearts and eyes
to hear the gospel, and they would be saved. You see how that
works? Paul never says, I want to go and keep these people on
their path. He understood very clearly that
if anyone falls away, we pray for them, we preach to them,
we pray for them, we preach to them. You cannot disciple an
unbeliever, beloved. It's impossible. That's like
putting wings on a horse and calling it Pegasus and pushing
it off a cliff. It's going to go right to the
bottom. It will never fly. Neither will an unbeliever ever
grow in the grace of God. We can grow in our knowledge
of what the text says. We can even be enthusiastic about
this Christ that we read. But if we do not persevere, if
we do not endure, we never were in the body, you see. Love is one of the foundational
outcomes, one of the foundational realities, one of the foundational
fruits of God-fearing, God-centered, God-saved people. So if we are
called to love, friends, we cannot read this text in light of our
understanding of love in our culture today. And I know some
higher critics and Greek scholars like to get about the three different
types of love, phileo, eros. What is that other one? Agape.
It doesn't matter. The words are used interchangeably,
sometimes differentiated, like eros being more of a sexual love,
but even then it can be something that's not grotesque or an abomination. But in reality what we see in
the New Testament is there is a defining of love by Jesus Christ
and a displaying of love by Jesus Christ, effectually then imparting
that love as it is a part of His righteousness to the people
who He saves. See that? So therefore we don't
look and say, we've got to learn to love. We've got to teach each
other. We don't need a class on love. We need Christ. We don't need to make disciples
with a Sunday school class on 1 Corinthians 13. We need to see those words and
we need to recognize when we look in the mirror and say, I
don't love the way I'm supposed to love. You know what that means?
We don't love. If we love with hate, it's not
love. If we love holding on to the
baggage of all these things that have been done to us against
this person, we don't love. If we love considering the reality
of what it will cost us, and we gauge that as to how far we
invest in a relationship, we aren't loving. Love in our culture is misplaced.
It's misaligned with things that the outside world displeases God with. It's outside
the will of God for the reality of His righteousness. And love
at its center is a reflection of the epitome of the holiness
of God. It defines Him perfectly in the reality of how He works
with us, for us, and toward us. This is what we need to understand
today. Many things we need to understand today, but today in
specifics, as Paul is teaching, we need to understand that love
is one of those things that compels us to do that which is selfless,
costly and sacrificial. Love invests, love invites, love
works and displays the heart of God to others. So how do we
love? How do you and I love this very
day? What is it that we're doing in the context of our living
that is loving? I think we should measure it
by what we see in the Word of God, not by what we've been taught
by good motivational speakers, by books. Heavens to Betsy, please,
whatever that means. Please, please stop reading books
without discriminating. Well, that sounds a little ugly.
The word discern at the root is discriminate. We hear something,
we discriminate against that which we hear. Like the Bereans,
they heard the Word of God through the mouth of Paul and they went,
let me discriminate that. Let me be discriminatory against
that which I know in the Word versus that which I hear with
my ears. It matches, yay, we receive it. It doesn't match,
we throw it away. And I will charge you, church, that make
sure that you don't spend more time watching videos, listening
to sermons, and reading other people's books than you do in
the Word of God, lest you be tempted and thrown away like
a leaf in the sea or in the wind, tossed to and fro. And I know
I've used this illustration before. When a family member of mine
called and we lived in California and started talking about how
amazing the Lord was and then inquiring on what this newfound
revelation was birthed from, they said it was birthed from
a book, the shack. I said, oh dear heaven, so I
got on my bicycle and I rode all the way into town and I bought
the shack and I came back and I read it in just a few hours,
just read it quickly. And I got back on the phone and
the conversation didn't go very well. Because not one place did I see
the revelation of God through that text. This is the revelation
of God. If you need the shack, or the sheik, or the shimmy,
or anything else to show you the power of God and the love
of God, I suggest you just find another God because you've found
one already. You see, the Word of God is the only revelation
of Jesus Christ. And any commentator, author,
preacher, pastor, teacher, helper, whatever he might be, whatever
she might be, that does not give you the Word of God in its fullest
is a liar and a false teacher and should not be heard, listened
to, or instructed. Why do you say such dogmatic
things? Because I care more about your eternal joy than I do what
you think of me this very day. You can hate me to the end of
eternity, but I'd rather you hate me now and live with me
for all of eternity. than to hate the God of the Bible
just because He puts a stomp on our toes of idolatry. And
that's what He does. You know how hard it is to go
through your bookshelf and start pulling off books that are just
full of garbage? You're like, wow, my shelves
are empty. Now my pocketbook's empty and my shelves are empty.
Now I've got to undo all this junk that I used to get really
excited about. What am I going to put on my shelf? Well, just
buy more Bibles. You go, what am I going to read today? Just
close your eyes, grab one. There you go, start there, end
there, and we're all in a safer place. It bugs me in my soul
because I've been in that place when people always, they catch
me in town, they catch me online, they catch me wherever. Oh, pastor,
they always call me sometimes and they don't even know hardly
anything about me. I'm not talking about you, I'm talking about
others. I read a great book. I saw a great sermon. I saw a
good video. Did you see on YouTube? And I'll watch it. And I mean,
I'm not going to spend, and I say that now, I'm not going to spend
15 minutes watching this. Why? Because it's Stephen Furtick.
I'm not going to listen to that heretic. We should hear some truth in
there. I said, well, there's some good food inside of a bag
of garbage inside the dumpster too, but I'm not going to dig
through it to get it. You want the roaches flicked
off your food before it comes out so you're ignorant of the
idea that they lived with your food before you ate it? Or do
you want a sanitary kitchen from the beginning to the end? Friends,
you want a pure gospel, you want a pure God, you've got to have
a pure word and you need to understand that the minute I deter and detract
from the Scriptures, you need to throw me out on my behind.
Try to restore me first, then throw me out on my behind if
I don't repent. And by the grace of God, I pray I never fall prey
to that again. Two different prays, one with
an E and one with an A. We hear in this text in verse
11, Paul says, now, look at this, look at this language. He says,
now may our God and father himself and our Lord Jesus Christ direct
our way to you. See, we've already heard the
report that Paul said that Timothy brought. Timothy was sent. Remember
that? I'm just going to remind you
of some preaching that we did. The texts teach us that the needs
of the apostles were laid down for the needs of the joy of the
saints in Thessalonica. Remember? They had missions to
do. They had church planning to do.
had to be there in order for these things to be successful.
And Paul needed his help. But Paul said, what we're doing
here is less important than we knowing how you're doing there.
So we send what we need to you for the sake of your joy, for
the sake of your growth, for the sake of your worship, for
the sake of the gospel. so that you can grow, and your
love for Christ can grow, and your love for each other can
grow, and your knowledge of the truth can grow, so that you can stand
in the midst of death and celebrate, and celebrate, and be at peace
with this persecution, because Christ is alive in you, and you
are alive in Him. And so he says that you came
back, Timothy came back, and your love that we'd heard about
was not just a story, it was real! And then when Timothy came,
your love for us was there. How are the apostles? How is
Silas, Silvanus? How is Paul? How is everybody
doing? We long to see them. We want
to see them. We are so glad that Timothy came.
And Paul says that we heard of your reception, your love for
us, and how you received us with joy, and how you were concerned
for us as we are also in love with you and concerned for you.
Keep this in mind, church, that these people in both places were
suffering greatly. Their lives were being taken
because of their faith in Jesus Christ. They weren't just having
a hard time. They weren't down on their luck.
They weren't in the unemployment lines eating soup or free food. They
weren't just having bad days. They were dying for the sake
of Christ. And yet, you don't ever hear
that. Paul would say that the Philippians do all things without
grumbling and complaining. Maintain this steadfastness of
faith and the steadfastness in the light of suffering and death
and persecution for the sake of the joy that is in Christ
alone, so that the world looks on and is baffled. What does
Paul tell the Ephesians when he says that the purpose of the
church is to what? In 310, display the manifold
wisdom of God to the rulers and authorities of the heavenly places.
And for the others of you who are around when I preach that,
I've sort of stated it like this. is that because the church exists
and glorifies God in the darkness of life and under strict persecution,
cautiously, the devil and all the demons of his realm know
that Christ is King. It's there. And he says in chapter
6 of Ephesians, you stand firm. Christ is your victor. He can't
touch you. And if He does touch you, it's
because your Father has sent Him there to touch you to the
praise of His glorious grace that you might see the joy in
the pain and that God be praised through it. Paul begins to pray. He says, praying day and night
without ceasing for you. We're praying. We love you. We
can't wait to see you now. And in his pen, he just exclaims
a prayer. Now may our God and Father Himself
and our Lord Jesus Christ direct our way to you. Paul has exclaimed
the beauty, the beauty of God's work in these Thessalonians and
is now compelled to pray for them all the more. So he was
concerned that they may have fallen away, that their joy and
their love and all of these things were just hearsay and that it
wasn't really happening. It was just a story. But he saw
it. Timothy saw it with his own eyes and reported back, it is
true. And so what Paul was praying for in the beginning, he prays
all the more for now. Lord, I pray they stand in the
faith, they have love for one another, and that their joy abounds.
And Timothy comes back and says, it's happening, Paul. It's really
happening. Great! He writes him a letter.
Now I'm praying that God will abound in you more of this. You
want to see us? I pray that God will direct our
way to you. He begins his prayer entrusting
what? Entrusting his plans to whom?
To God the Father Himself. Paul prays to God Himself and
Jesus Christ the Lord, both the Father and the Son of the Godhead.
Two parts of the Godhead he prays to them. What does this show
us? It shows us a bunch of things
here. First and foremost, it provides
a clear and explicit doctrine, teaching that Jesus the Christ,
the Son of God, is indeed God. It shows us that there is no
reason to speak to anyone in our prayers and in our time of
need but God. Listen to me, church. The national day of so-called
prayer was Thursday. Let me tell you something. Unbelievers
cannot pray to God. You hear that? God is not their father. So when
the masses of a nation gather around, oh God, heal our land,
heal our land, they might as well, they might as well be doing
a concert. They might as well be doing hip
hop, or break dancing, or line dancing, or whatever it is they
need to do. They need to dance before a totem
pole. Praying to God as an unbeliever,
it just, as my grandmother would always say, your prayers just
hit the ceiling and fall down. What is up with that? See, we
misunderstand prayer, and at the end of this, I'm going to
give us some things to think about when it comes to prayer. Paul
shows us, not just here, but specifically here, he prays to
God. Now, why am I making that emphatic
point? Because we have a very big problem
in our culture that people who are in Christ pray to the devil.
I've never heard it. Yes, you have. You've heard it.
You might have partaken of it. Tell the devil what to do. Tell
the devil what not to do. Rebuke him, bind him, move him,
shove him, stick him in a closet, put him in a box, tape him to
the wall, whatever. We talk to him. Why do we talk to the devil?
That's what he wants. That's the temptation that he
gave Christ on the mount. He said, look, go over there.
Look, if you just bow down and worship me, I'll give you all
of this. That's the reason he fell from
heaven to begin with. He saw the reflection of God's
perfection and holiness and righteousness and power and sovereignty in
himself, and he thought himself worthy of praise. He didn't say,
I'll take you off your throne. He wasn't a fool. But he did
say, I'm worthy to stand next to you in glory. Equality with
God is something I want. But the devil, Satan, Lucifer,
the angel of the light, the most beautiful of all the angels,
is not equal with God. He's just a pinpoint reflection
of God's majesty. Jesus is equal with God and is
worthy of all praise. So we don't pray to anyone but
God. Some of you go, I don't understand.
Good! And you're not... I'm talking to that moment. But
friends, none of us are there, but we hear it. You know, I interrupt
people when they pray like that around me now. People in town,
I'm going to pray for you. It's just, I don't mind that,
but I'm always suspicious. Are you even saved? Are you going
to pray for me? You know, we don't need to be
flippant with our faith. We don't need to just, we don't
need to pray God's protection over the french fries at McDonald's
and pray that the devil isn't in there with sickness. I mean,
you know, and I'm not making fun of people, I'm concerned
for their souls. But when people bind Satan, or
people come to the place where they're starting to talk to the
devil, I say, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, that's not necessary. And I teach them what Scripture
teaches us about that. Really. Because most people who
do that, they live in fear. Oh, I didn't get him out of the
way today. You know how to get the devil
out of the way? Flee. Number one, sexual temptation,
flee temptation. But here's how you get the devil
out of the way. God's already done it. You pray to the Lord. Jesus teaches
us to pray. He never says that. He says,
lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Who's
He talking to? Our Father who is in heaven.
Holy is Your name. You see? Paul is just really
pouring the point out for these Thessalonians. You don't need
to be praying about the opposition that we have except to God. Because
what is the opposition? What was it? Just a few verses
back. It says, Oh, goodness, it's up there. Chapter 3, verse 1, we can bear
it no longer. No, chapter 2, verse 18, because we wanted to
come to you, I, Paul, again and again, but Satan hindered us. And the response of this hindering
of Satan, Paul prays to God. Paul prays to the Son and to
the Father. And what does he do? He says,
God, You open the door to direct our way to these people. I am
praying that God would do His will and open the door for us
to come to You. You know what Paul did not do?
He did not organize a committee to plan the trip to Thessalonica. You know what Paul did not do?
He did not raise funds to try to get missionaries on the ground
in Thessalonica. You know what else he didn't
do? He didn't stop preaching the gospel and praying for God
to do the will that he had set out before the world began. God
will open the door to you, and that's the end of it. And if
we don't get to go, then thy will be done. If we get to go,
thy will is done. Why did he want to go? To fill
up what is lacking in their faith. What's lacking in their faith?
Paul prays for their love to abound. But he just got a report
that their love was abounding. Paul was just crazy. He'd been
locked up too long. No, Paul wasn't crazy. Paul knew the power
of God. And Paul knew that no matter how bold and expressive
the gospel is in our lives, no matter how powerful our faith
is, no matter how abundant our love is, that there's more. That God can do more. And if
God doesn't do more, we will do less. And I'll tell you this,
the minute we think we've arrived in our faith in any aspect of
it, we have stepped off the edge of not being in it. Imagine that
as a cliff, you know? A lot of cliffs today. There's
a horse down there already. We're heading off to that cliff.
And we're thinking, look how high I am. I am just... This
is where I wanted to be with Christ. Don't ever say that. By Your grace, God, I am where
I am this day. Would You bring me higher? Would
You bring me deeper? Would You help me love more?
Paul understood that. Paul even says, and I don't think
it's hyperbolic, I don't think he's exaggerating, he says, I
have all the affection for Christ for you. So that all the love
that I have is equal to all the love that Christ has. So, if Paul had that type of
love, then why in the world would he need more? Why would the Thessalonians
need more? Because there's more to understand. Friends, do you
understand eternal? Do you understand unknowable?
Do you understand the richness of the vastness of God and His
character and His nature? That there is no limit to God. God is not moved by anything
but His own will. God is not measured by anything
but His immeasurable being. And the love of Christ that we
see displayed on the cross at Calvary, the love of Christ that
God would forsake His own glory in the sense of stepping out
of that to be named among humanity, that amount of love is immeasurable. Though we see it and go, wow,
it's so big! It's bigger than we can see that
it's big. I can't believe I love these
people so much. You can love them more. I can't believe that I can worship
so deeply. You can worship deeper. It's not a new experience. I'm
not talking about it. I'm just saying there's more.
Don't ever be satisfied and say, I've arrived. I know how to pray.
I know how to worship. I know how to love. I know how
to minister. Man, this is great. No, it's not. It's just getting
started. And on the flip side of that,
when we see ourselves waning, we're in the same place. In need
of more of the grace of God. In need of more of the power
of God. In need of more of the intimacy of God. In need of more
of the love of God. So where do we stand? In need
of God. How is that evidenced? Through our prayers. Paul prays to God the Father
and to the Son. They are the recipients of these
prayers. Let's do this now instead of at the end. Are you compelled
to pray on an ongoing basis? Do you pray often? Or are our prayers prompted by
those pull out in front moments? Oh God, help me. Are our prayers prompted by the
smoke alarm of our lives? Yeah, pray then, but friends,
you know what, if we're in a practice of praying, those prayers are
just naturally in sequence. And I'll tell you, prayer is
a difficult thing. Because even in practice, if you read, you
know, I've read some contemporary, I've got seminary professors
who wrote a book on prayer and fasting and all that. This is
too mystical for me. I'm not getting into that. And
then I read the text and it's so simple and transparent. Ask
anything? Alright, God, I want this and
I want that and I want this thing or that thing or the other. Give
me, give me, give me. And that's not what it means. And then I see Solomon writing
about the desires of our hearts and all these other things and
I'm like, wait a minute. What is the desire of our heart?
See, that's the reality of what prayer is. It shows the desire
of our heart. How we pray is directly relative
to what we love. I want you to hear me. And how
we pray is directly relative and parallel to what we know
about who God is. Prayer, in essence, in this creation,
is given to us by God. Intimacy with God is seen in
His Word and then praying. Dependence upon God is seen in
prayer. Why? Paul did not think one minute
about organizing the efforts to get to Thessalonica. And I'm
not saying he flies by the seat of his pants. That's lazy. Just like Abram. He got up early
the next morning, got his things together, took his son, took
his servants, took the knife to cut his son's throat, and
went out on his journey. Early. I'd have overslept on
purpose. Oh, look at the time. I have to do it tomorrow, God.
You know, he believed that God calling him to kill the very
most beloved thing in his life was good for him. He had no idea that God would
stay that boy's death. He was probably shocked. A prayer, according to Romans
8, is prepared by God. When we don't know how we ought
to pray, Paul says. Who's he talking to? He's talking
to people who have never prayed in their entire lives. And Romans,
they never prayed ever. These aren't the Jews who have
been praying to Yahweh forever. Jews prayed out of obligation.
Jews prayed on schedule. Jews prayed with regality and
pomp and circumstance. Jews prayed in liturgy. Jews prayed. And so prayer for the Roman Christian
was like, what is this? Where is God? When I pray, I'm
used to talking to my statue. When I pray, I'm used to talking...
Why do I even pray? Is God like Zeus? The people
of Ephesus? Poor Timothy? Poor Paul? Is God like Athena? Is God like Artemis? How do we pray? Paul said, look,
when you can't pray and you don't know how to pray, the Spirit
of God intercedes for us and we pray with groans and utterances
that cannot be understood. God has prepared prayer for His
children so that in the same way, those who pray or do not
pray, or in contrast, those who do not pray or do not want to
pray or are not burdened to pray or are not fighting to learn
to pray, friends, there's something just dynamically wrong with our
faith. And that's a reality. When you
read Spurgeon, Spurgeon was a prayerful man. And Spurgeon struggled with
prayer. And that's good for us to see
that. Because we see Paul like, whoa! Paul didn't struggle with
prayer. Yes he did. He just didn't write about it.
Because it wasn't important. He just wanted us to see what
he prayed. Paul struggled when he laid naked and blistered and
cut open and bleeding and hungry and cold. He struggled. Do I pray for God
to deliver me from this or do I just pray for those Christians?
Do I pray for God's Word to go out? And he prayed the latter. We see Jesus, did He pray continually
for God to just take the cross away? He did pray, He did ask.
Did Paul pray for God to take His thorns? Yes, but then the
sufficiency of God's grace was enough and He stopped. Even Jesus, the perfect man who
is also God, He prayed, God take this cup. Father, please, if
there be any other way, take this cup from me. I don't want
to experience death in my flesh. I don't want to experience Your
judgment and wrath. but not My will but Yours be
done." And Jesus never prayed that prayer again. Prayer has been prepared by God
for us. Prayer is also a sign of concern.
When we're prompted to pray for each other, it means we're thinking
of each other. It means the Spirit of God is at work within us,
that we're not so consumed with our own lives, that we actually
are being used by God for the sake of the growth and the health
and the intimacy and the joy of our people for each other,
our body. Friends, I was tired yesterday, Brother Jack in the
back. I was too tired. He said, go slam your hand or
hit your hand or something. You'll be awake for a few days.
And I'm like, that's true. Isn't that true? It's hard to call
you out on that. Just hit your hand, you know?
See, if my hand was pulsing in pain, I'm not going to worry
about the dishes. I'm not going to worry about
the yard that needs weeding. I'm not going to wonder, did
I sprinkle the poison on that ant bed or not? I'm like, ow,
my hand hurts. I'm going to lay down, my hand
hurts. Put it in my pocket to get something
out. I don't care it's in my pocket, my hand hurts. Lay down at night,
you feel the throb. I mean, it's good. It's a good
analogy. In the same way, we are one body.
And when one of us is beaten down and pulsing, and all the
receptors of our nerves are centered in that particular one's life,
we feel that pain. And therefore, we're not concerned
about the lesser needs, but we're concerned about the greater needs.
So therefore, we pray. You see how that works? It's
a sign of concern. It's a reaction that's birthed
from humility. Prayer, by definition, is an
act of humility. It's like, I can't do this anymore. It's sort of like kids. No, I
can do it. I can tie my shoe. I can walk the stairs. I can
open the door. And then they fall down, bump their heads,
scuff their knees. There's a little bit of pride
in us that wants us to be able to manage these things in our
lives. Paul learned and knew and understood
that it takes humility to depend on God. Prayer by action is a
sign of God's birth. God births humility in our lives. We know that we cannot affect
the change that needs to take place. Paul never once thought,
if I could just get to Thessalonica, I could teach these people to
stand in the faith. Brother Jesse never thinks, if
I can just get down there to the abortion clinic on Friday,
I know I can convince these people to not abort their babies. Never
thinks that. None of us should think, if I
can just... You ever had that? We got the probation office next
to my wife's office and we see all these teenagers come by constantly. And I'm like, eh, just beat that
kid's tail, he'll straighten up. You know? So easily said. Man, let him come stay at my
house for a couple of months. We'll straighten him out. You
might affect a change in behavior, but we'll not change the hearts. And as long as Paul was around,
like with the Corinthians, they walked the chalk line. But the
minute he left, party! They just went loose and lost
all sense of wisdom. Which is why he starts out 1
Corinthians with that big mantra. Who are wise among you? None of you. None of you were
noble birth. None of you were somebody to be looked at and
all over. You're just nothing. Praise God,
God takes the nothings of the world to bring the things that
are to nothing. Christ became nothing so that
we could be something. Prayer is an overflow of the
heart from what our affections are. As we speak with our mouths,
we reveal our heart. What we talk about and spend
time with, prayer in the same way is an overflow of our heart.
What we pray for is a reflection of what we desire, you see? And
what we desire is a reflection of what we love. Do we love the
church? Prince, don't ever pray for a
ministry. Don't ever pray for people. Pray for persons by name. Pray
for people in circumstances. But don't ever pray for the administration
of something, the execution of something, in the context of
thinking that it's praying for people. Because I tell you, God is more
glorified. You think it was Paul's plan to get locked up everywhere?
No, but it was God's plan and he knew it. God told him it would
happen. He says, I don't know what's going to happen today
or tomorrow or the next week. I don't know what's going to
happen in this city or that city, except that God told me by His Spirit
that everywhere I go I'm going to suffer persecution and be
locked up. Now if I had that foresight,
I would change plans, wouldn't you? but we pray that God's will
is done. Paul prayed for these people
because he loved them. He was concerned more about their
joy than his joy. He was concerned more about their
salvation and their endurance and suffering than his suffering.
He was concerned more about their needs than his needs. Friends,
love, back to the beginning, is costly. Love is sacrificial. Love is a burden. And most importantly, love is
an expression of understanding God's power and His sovereignty.
You know why? Because Paul says right here,
he says, I pray now may God the Father Himself and our Lord Jesus
direct our way to you. Only Christ, hear this church,
only Christ can open the doors to the will of God. Only Christ
can do that which is impossible. Only Christ can change hearts. Only Christ can change circumstances. Only Christ can change despair
into hope. Only Christ can heal a marriage.
Only Christ can save Christ, Christ alone. In verse 12, He not only prays for
that, He not only prays that Christ is the answer against
the devil. He not only prays that Christ's work would be done
and that He would stay the course. He not only prays that the will
and the purpose of God would provide for their needs. In Christ
alone, He prays that the Lord would make you increase in love
and abound in love. And when you see that combination,
increase and abound, it's redundant. Because we see increase get more
You know, if I've got a dollar in my pocket and I want it to
increase, and there's four dollars, I'd have that increase. But Paul
says, increase and what? Abound. Abound would be that
it overflows immeasurably. And in this he's saying, I pray
that the Lord would make you increase and abound. Where? How? In love. I pray that God would make you
increase and abound, abundantly abound in love for one another
and for all as we do for you. So let's look at this for a second.
Paul prayed for the Lord to do what he's already doing. Paul
asked God to continue in the work that he was already working.
Lord, You do the love. We see the love of these Christians
for each other. We see the love of these Christians for the lost.
We see the love of these Christians for us. Would You work in them
to make that love bigger, abounding, immeasurable? What does that
look like, church? It looks to the point when we
start loving people in spite of considering what it cost us
over and over and over again. Because see, even if we do love
someone in abundance, right now, many of us, and sometimes in
our life, we count the cost before we love. And we say, I'm willing
to let that go. It's money, time, just pure frustration
of having to deal with certain peoples. You don't think somebody
doesn't like you? Sorry. Everybody in here, somebody
doesn't like us. But everybody in here, by the
grace of God, love each other. And we give and we sacrifice
our days for the sake of each other. Paul has already shown
us in verse 6 there, you're longing to see us, you're warning reception
of us. They are loving people and have been told that they
were. But Paul wants to pray because he understands that Jesus
Christ is the effectual agent for such an affection. That Jesus
is the one who causes it, and Jesus is the one who, listen,
keeps it. And then grows it. In Christ we love. If Christ is in us and we are
in Christ, then Christ's love is abundant and Christ's love
is increasing. But Paul says, I don't want you
just to stay the course. I pray that the Lord will help
you love more and more and more and more. He's praying that the church
would be more loving toward each other. And this is a godly and
powerful prayer, church. This is a godly prayer because
it is the will of God that we have love for one another. It
is a powerful prayer because it is dependence upon God that
He does the work in us that we would love each other this way. Yes, we pray when we see unloving
people that God may save them, thus their love would then grow. And when we see unloving brothers
and sisters, we see a part of our body who acts unlovingly,
we say, listen, the love of God in us abounds more and more. And those who are in Christ,
the Spirit of God testifies with their spirit that they are the
children of God, and they hear, receive, and respond in repentance. That's God. And then we correct
that error of unlovingness, or we, as Paul would tell us many
times, put to death the flesh of selfishness. What we pray for, as I've already
said, directly relates to our heart, our desire, our motive,
and that which we look for in glory. More and more and more,
please, Lord, give them that love that abounds more and more
and more. This reveals the intention of
the one who prays. Paul wanted these Christians
to have the fullness of their joy. knowing that only by them
being satisfied and sustained in Jesus Christ would they have
it. How is that possible? Sola Scriptura. The Word of God
alone. Friends, we cannot look to each
other for our joy, though we can find it sometimes. It wanes. There's ebb and flow with our
interaction. And some of us in our personalities,
we don't want to have help. Some of us are overly helpful
and there's a big blend in between. We're satisfied in Christ. We're
satisfied and when we pray for each other to have that joy,
to have that love, it shows that we really love each other. We can give and do and serve,
but friends, if we're not praying for each other, it is worthless
long term. Do you hear that? Sometimes I
say things that are just mutually exclusive in your ears and I
forget to tell you that they're not. So you're saying we shouldn't
serve? No. You do that what you're doing,
but we need to pray more. And when we go, if I'm picking
up this cold cup of water to give you and quench your thirst,
I pray that the Lord would abound in love as I give this to you,
that you would not see this water as satisfying, but that you would
see Christ as the living water. That your joy would be overflowing. As Jesus said in John 4, that
I'll give you water that overflows, that wells up to eternal life. and that my love for you would
abound, and that your love for Christ would abound, and that
your love for each other would abound. This is the prayer of the church
for each other. Because friends, when we truly
love each other, we don't have to be taught the specifics and
the basics of sacrifice in our lives together. Do we? We don't have to have a chart
to teach us how to pray. When Jesus taught us very clearly
in Matthew, We don't worry and wring our
hands in despair wondering if we're doing that which is right
by the will of God, because we are so in tune with our affection,
with Christ and His affection, that it just overflows into our
lives. And He just says, not just for
one another, look at that. He says, I want your love to
not just have a love for one another, but a love that abounds,
that overflows beyond the measure of the world. I want you to have
a love that is an amazing love, that's counter to the hatred
and the rejection that we've seen in the world. Those people
that persecute you, that reject the gospel, that reject Jesus,
they hate you. And so though you are experiencing
rejection, you embrace each other. Though you're suffering greatly,
you engage with each other in such a way that the world is
just blown away. And they look at your love and
say, oh, look at how loving they are, but let me show them. They
won't love me after I do this. That's why Paul then says, and
for all people. For all. Not just the church.
Most importantly, the church. But we're to love all people. We're to love haters and posers
and losers and any other errs we can think of. We're to love Democrats and Republicans
and Libertarians and Constitutionalists and Independents who are really
a mix of those. We're to love smart people and
ignorant people and ugly people and pretty people, loud people
and soft people. We're to love all people. We
are to love our enemies. We were enemies of God and Christ
in His great love for us put Himself in the harm of men by
the will of the Father and He subjected Himself to the judgment
of God when He was not His to bear. Because He loved us. In like manner, we also love
in that way. We should love all people. Their
love was superb. And their love for each other
was superb and their love for all others was superb and insurmountable
and clear. Let me give you some things to
think about in closing in regard to loving all people. Because
I think we've learned or have been learning about loving each
other. And we'll continue to learn that as we go through this
letter and the second letter and all through the letters of the
New Testament. But I think sometimes it's hard for us to learn to
love those who rub us the wrong way. There we go. That's a tongue
twister. What does Paul tell Timothy?
In 2 Timothy 2.24, And the Lord's slave should not be quarrelsome,
but kind to everyone, able to teach, This is the kicker,
right in the T. Patiently enduring what? Evil. Oh my gosh, we are all in a mess
right now. Patiently enduring evil. Not woefully. Not fearfully. Not frustrated. Not boldly. Patiently. Kindly. Enduring evil. What is evil? Everything everyone
does and says that is not for the sake of the glory of God.
Everything that anyone does that is not for the glory of God.
Even any act of righteousness that is not for the glory of
God. Evil. We patiently endure it. The dark,
dark, obvious, sickening, weird, worldly, satanic evils that are
really not satanic, they come from our minds and bodies and
flesh. The devil doesn't put them there. They're there already
according to James 1. No man can be tempted from anything
that's not already living inside of him. We are living in an evil world
and we're to patiently endure it. We've already gone through
Titus as a church. Titus commands this, to speak evil of no one. He's not talking about the church.
He's talking about the world. You know, gossip on the world stage
is still murder in the heart. Still murder in the heart. So
our love for each other can be great, but if our love for the
world is waning, friends, it doesn't work. Everybody expects you to love
your children and your cousins and your brothers and your sisters
and all that. As they say, cousins and them. But when we love our enemies,
When we let our lives, when we're quiet, when we're patient, when
we endure suffering, when we endure evil. Now listen, we are
to call out, Titus, we even see this in Titus, we are to call
out that which is ungodly amongst us. We don't turn a blind eye
to evil and wickedness. But we are not to be those people
who go around speaking evil of those who are evil. Speak evil of no one to avoid
quarreling to be gentle, to show perfect courtesy toward all people. I mean, Jesus' ministry, if we
look in John's Gospel, we see the discourse that He had with
the Jews, with the Pharisees and the Sadducees and the Sanhedrin.
We see these groups all interacting with Jesus. And we see Jesus
very harshly rebuke them with the Word of God, And we see Jesus very graciously
command the gospel before them. But we don't see Jesus going
around in His social circles talking trash about them. Posting
it on their... I don't know what you call it.
It wouldn't be their Facebook. I don't know what it would be.
Their scroll book. We don't see writings where the
apostles went around just talking trash about people. We don't
see the letter about the Gnostics, those trashy Gnostics, those
stupid Gnostics, those idiot Gnostics. We don't see that because
it's not what is in the heart of a Christian. We've got to love people and
part of that is not speaking murderously against them. Even
when it's true, we don't speak evil of people. Well, if what
they do is evil, then say that. What they've done is evil. But
don't defame them. You see the point? It's okay
to say abortion is murder. But don't blow up an abortion
clinic. Don't get out there and talk
about how worthless the doctors are. What is that? They know
where they stand. Romans chapter 1 says they know
where they stand. And I know there's examples,
there's so many more. Just some that are on the top
of my head. But why should we do that? Look at verse 13 in
closing. Why? Why do we have to be loving
toward the world and all the enemies of the cross? Why do
we have to be kind and gentle and courteous? Why do we have
to be patient? What's the point? What's the point of the lost
being with us? Why do we stay here? When God saves us by His
power, why not just snatch us out of this world? That would
be ideal. Friends, the way the lost, wicked,
evil world of which we once were in Ephesians chapter 2 comes
to become the holy, blameless, perfect, spotless, glorious body
of Christ is when the body of Christ goes and lovingly, kindly,
gently, but powerfully proclaims the gospel of Christ, which is
good news to all the world who are able to hear and believe
on Christ. That's why we're here. So how
do we murder man on this side of our face and pray for him
on this side of our face? How do we say, oh God have mercy
on these wicked, evil people, let's start a campaign about
all... And then turn around and say, but save them Lord, save
them Lord. And the Word of God says, go preach to them and I'll
save them. You think I want to hear what
you have to say after you defame me all over? Don't bring your
gospel to my doorstep. You know? God is sovereign in
all this. We're not going to put the blame
on us for God not getting His will done. His will would be
done. But friends, the point that Paul points to is that it
is an opportunity to establish the reality of our righteousness
before men. But most importantly, before
Christ. Look at verse 13. So that... See, that's the action. Do this, so that... cause and
effect. You do this so that this will
take place. So that He, who? Who's doing this work? Who's
loving? Who's teaching us to love? Who's loving through us?
Christ. So that Christ, God, may establish our hearts blameless. And not just blameless, but blameless
in righteousness, blameless in holiness before God our Father. before our God and Father at
the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ with all the saints, so
that He may establish us blameless in our hearts. Friends, this
heart here is the center. What Paul means is that the center,
the central reality of our lives, of our will and decisions, that
which we do and how we live our lives is visible. The heart is revealed visibly. I want you to live in this darkness
as lovers of all people. Thessalonians, I want you to
love those people that just took your kids to a slave camp. What? When they come back around and
they snatch up some of your other kids in the group, when they
snatch up some of your women and they sell them into slavery,
I want you to love them. I want you to pray for them.
I don't want you to take a sword and fight. Don't do that. Don't take up the sword in the
proclamation of the Gospel. We don't live by the sword. We
live by the Word of God. Proclamation of the Gospel, just
a little caveat there, is not a burglar invading your home. Missions and hope he's got life
insurance. We don't do these things. And
so that when we love our enemies, it is establishing before Christ
the reality of His sanctification in us, that the gospel has come
to us, that we've received the Word of God. How does Paul put
it? In word and with power, with much affliction. There we go.
So it's not just loving each other. It's loving your neighbor
as much as you love yourself. In holiness, your heart will
be seen before God, our Father. As they live with righteousness
and morality, it is seen as a being not of the world, but in it.
At the coming of our Lord Jesus, this eschatological point that
He makes here is about to launch into other portions of this text
to teach them that they haven't missed the Second Coming. They
ought to live as though Christ is coming this very day, preparing
to be with Him. Does Jesus not give that same
example in His parables? Be prepared. Keep oil in your
lamp. Be ready for the bridegroom when
he comes. Don't sit around as though he's
not coming for you. He'll come like a thief in the
night and a twinkling of an eye and we won't even know. We won't
see him. Oh, here he comes, Jesus. Get
ready. He's coming. Do we want to be in Christ when
he gets here? Paul's not saying you love and
you'll stay in Christ. Paul's saying if you're in Christ,
you'll love. And you'll love not just each other, you'll love
those who hate you. We love each other, we love the
lost, we have patience, kindness, long-suffering, meekness. And
it's not just for our sake, it's for the sake of all the saints.
We are one body. Listen, beloved, and I'm through.
We, each individually, reflect the nature of each other. So that when I am unloving in
my spirit, And I reflect that publicly toward any human being
in this world. I'm reflecting you. I am putting that as if it were
you. If I sin before men, then I'm
bringing reproach upon you. For we are the body of Christ.
That's why this mystery of the church is so profound. We are responsible to each other.
Paul clearly teaches us in Ephesians 5, we are to be submitting to
each other, continually, as we are looking after each other,
not as spiritual police officers to affect morality, but as brothers
and sisters of the same body who continue to press each other
and encourage each other into righteousness. No one hates his own body. We
should not hate each other. And no one hates those to whom
we pray God would help us to become or help to bring to become
the body. Opportunity of love, true love,
sacrificial love, burdened love is seen in prayer for each other. Opportunity for love is seen
in the midst of conflict as we forgive each other, as we forbear
each other. And opportunity for love is seen
when we have fear and doubt, when we rest with uncertainty,
because we can rest peaceably in Christ and know that He is
working in the lives of others as well as in our own lives.
And if He takes His hand of work and His hand of grace off of
any of them, any person, we fail. An opportunity for love is seen
in proclaiming the Holy Truth of God's Word, preaching the
Gospel, teaching the Scripture, standing firm in truth and not
falling prey to the whims and wishes and the blowings of this
world and of our own souls and conscience. And so, beloved,
as we close this time in the Word today, I pray that you would
be empowered I pray that you'd be empowered to understand that
as we've said time and time again already this morning, that the
only hope we have individually and corporately is Christ Jesus.
You cannot affect salvation for yourself. Being here today doesn't
make you any closer to God than being in the swamp. If you are
not in Christ Jesus by faith alone, believing that He is God,
come to this earth, lived a holy and perfect life, satisfied all
the obedience of the law, and then suffered on the cross willingly
and powerfully by the hand of God, and then was raised from
the dead. If you do not believe that all of who Christ is sufficiently
satisfies the wrath of God against you, you cannot have eternal
life. And you need to understand that belief is not just a precept
that you agree with, but it's a power that you are a part of.
That believing produces loving. That believing produces putting
to death the flesh. That believing produces faith
and resting, trusting, living, longing, pressing, enduring. These are verbs. Loving is what
we do, not what we feel. If we love Christ, then everything
we do is centered to try to please Him, though it may not ever please
Him. We want to please Him. But when we do the works of righteousness
in Christ, it does please Him because it is His work that He
began in us, that He promises to fulfill and to complete. This opportunity for love is
standing in your ears this very moment. As you have the opportunity
to hear it, do you hear it? Do you believe on Christ right
now? Is your hope in your ever-present
faith that Christ alone is satisfied God's wrath? Is your trusting
in the true person of Christ, or are you trusting in yourself?
Are you trusting in your affection? Are you trusting in your mission?
Are you trusting in your ministry? Are you trusting in your attendance?
Are you trusting in anything but Christ? If you are, trust
in Christ. For there is no other way. And
beloved, as we find ourselves not loving as we should, we rejoice
because God is at work within us. And when we find ourselves
loving as though we can never love anymore, we can rejoice
because God will give us more love for each other and for Him. and for this lost and dying world
to which we've been called to preach. Let's pray. Your Word is enough, Father. And we thank You for it. We thank You for Your ever-present
Grace, Spirit, Your power, Your love that works in us every moment. Father, we all would readily
admit this very day that we are not where we desire to be. So Lord, keep us right there.
Hold us right there. Dependent upon You as we pray
for ourselves, as we pray for each other, as we pray for You
to do the work that You alone can do, as we pray for Your will
to be done in our plans, in our focus, in our ministry, in our
lives, in our future. Lord, also help us to take very,
very good stock at the very moment that we live this very second.
Where are we? What are we? And whose are we
this very moment? Help us to live now in Your will
and in Your presence and for Your glory by the power of Your
grace. Don't let us look so far away that we miss this moment. Father, the children that are
here today, I thank You for them. I pray You would just speak to
their hearts And though they may hear some of the funny things
that I say, Lord, God, I know that by Your power they can hear
the grave and heavy things that I say. So Father, grow roots
in their souls that they may truly, truly come
to know Christ and be saved. Lord, as we gather again soon,
May it be a culmination of the overflow of Your goodness toward
us as we pray for each other, not just our needs, but also
our joy. We thank You, Lord, that You
give us that joy through Your Word, through Your Spirit, and
that we can share that joy with each other as we fellowship together
each week. And until we meet again, we thank You, Lord, that
we are still united in Christ. In His name we pray, Amen. We
thank you for listening to our sermon today out of First Thessalonians. We pray that it's been a blessing
to you and that the reality of the glories of God through the
face of Jesus Christ have been clearly seen. If you'd like to
connect with us, contact us for prayer, or have questions about
our ministry, please do so by going on the web at www.gracetruth.org,
that's gracetruth.org, or call us toll free at 1-877-789-7725.
Again, 877-789-7725. Grace Truth desires to be a people
for God's glory by the power of His grace.