As you've been reading this letter
throughout the week, my prayer is that God has just been fully
alive in the reality of what it can do for you. I doubt any of us here today could
say of this week that we have perfectly lived before the Lord
in word and in deed and in thought. As a matter of fact, I'm probably
pretty sure, not as a mind reader, but just as a human like you,
there have been struggles. There have been struggles in
our faith, doubt, frustration, pain, pity, maybe anger, selfishness,
and the like. Much time and energy has been
spent this week by some of us on things that are not eternal.
Some of them necessary, like maintaining a home, cleaning
the toilet, tending to children, cleaning up messes, and some
of them not necessary. Leisure activity. That may not
be wrong in itself, but if we sat down and saw the work and
the leisure and the play and the maintenance and the minutia
of life, we would find very little time in comparison with Christ.
And because of that, a lot of times, when we hear the Word
of God, we come to a place where we feel convicted in such a way
that it's not healthy. We come to that place where we
become condemned, self-condemned in our own hearts. We find it
very easy, especially in our historical Baptist tradition,
to put ourselves in such a place of depravity and unworthiness
that we often find that our view of grace is non-biblical. which then the yo-yo slingshot
retraction of that, the reverberation of the reciprocity of such thinking
sometimes is even, I don't know, heresy as we see so many coming
to a hyper-grace. But friends, the reality is this.
We look at the lives of the Thessalonians and we see one of three things
in relation to our own lives. we see a people that we could
never be like. There's no way that we could
be like these people. They live in a time, we would
say, that just doesn't exist anymore. To which Paul says,
baloney. He says, to the church of the
Thessalonians in God, therefore in the same vein to the church
of Claxton, to the church of Statesboro, to the church of
Mentor, to the church, to the church, to the church of Jesus
Christ in these days, in these places. Friends, you are no more
or no less equipped to live for Christ this day than the Thessalonians
were that day. And just because they were known
collectively for their Faith for the power of God collectively
does not mean that there were individual circumstances that
arose among them where these people failed and doubted and
struggled. They struggled. They struggled
to believe the gospel in certain aspects of the truth and the
sufficiency of their salvation. They struggled to realize every
day when they went to bed that they were sealed with the Holy
Spirit of God. And they still, even though they
had a good gospel, they lived a good gospel, they lived as
the church in power, they still frustrated themselves with the
reality that there must be something more. We must do something more. We must be something more. And friends, as Paul continues
in this introduction of this letter, he gives the clear, pure,
powerful reality that it is by the grace of God that this church
exists. It is by the grace of God that
you, beloved, sit here this day born of Him. And nothing that
you do will sufficiently satisfy God. Nothing that you say, nothing
that you achieve, no goal that you have, none of these things
will sufficiently place you justified before Him. It is about Christ,
and Christ, and Christ. No other work, no other person,
no other name, and no other power. And we consider that it ought
to bring us joy. And when we think about what
Peter wrote to those Jews that were suffering at the sword,
when he says, you will have a joy that is inexpressible. Well,
how do we have a joy that is inexpressible? Friends, because
when I consider who I really am, and then how God has saved
me, and the power of Christ that rests and compels me, I am awestruck
with silence. I have nothing to say. I have
nothing to sing. I have nothing to think, except
why? Why me, God? Why this day did
You place Your Spirit in me? Why did You bring Your Word to
me in power? Why did You bring Your Spirit
in me and save me through Christ? Why did Christ go to the cross
with me on His mind? Why was I the object of Your
affection? Why, Lord, when there are many
more worthy to which the Word of God says there are none worthy? Not one. No, not one righteous. That our mouths are like open
graves, our tongues are like the tongues of asps. But yet,
God in His wisdom has given us salvation in Jesus Christ. And
one way of looking at these people of Thessalonica is we think we
can never be like that. But we can, and we are beloved. living in grace, powerfully,
that we might be the people that reflect the nature of God, which
is what we'll see this morning. Another thing that some people
look at when they see this, some of us may have looked at this
and thought, yeah, that's me, I'm living like the Thessalonians.
Yeah, I got it together. My life is a reflection of the
beauty of Christ. Everything's great. Thank God
I'm holy. To which I would say, be careful.
It's a very bad proposition. It's a very bad stand to take
before Christ. Whereas Jesus told the story
of a Pharisee and a publican. He told the story that the Pharisee
stood out in public and raised his arms and raised his head
high and said, thank you God, I am the way I am. But yet the
publican, shamed, hidden from view, bowed his head, never to
even dare look at the heavens, tore his clothes and beat upon
his chest and said, Oh God, have mercy on me, a sinner. Jesus
says this man went home justified. That man went home condemned. So let us not think for a moment
that we have lived this last week nor this last day without
some fleshly displeasure to the Lord. But yet we who are in Christ,
though we may live and at an occasion willfully rebel against
Him, this life that we live because we belong to Christ is not a
stench to the nose of our Father, but is a fragrant offering. We
live in the power of the economy of God's grace, and we live in
such a way that God is always well pleased with the work of
His Son in us. And beloved, Christ. Remember Philippians? See, that's
the bad thing about the introductions to these letters, because they're
so strong and powerful, and they plow us deep within the soil
of truth. And then we just sort of sprout,
and we forget the foundation of our organic birth, of our
supernatural birth. Just like the Philippians. When
Paul wrote to the Philippians, and he says to them, He who began
a good work in you is fateful to see it to completion. What
does that mean? That means that when our hearts
are shaken by sin, when our lives are just disarrayed because of
our flesh, that we stand completed in Christ and one day He will
finish that which He began. And that when we strive to walk
in Him, that's a good effort, it's a good desire, but those
efforts and those desires do not produce the walking that
Christ requires. But Christ Himself produces that
which is true. Friends, you will not be given
up on. You will not fail in your faith
if you belong to God. You will not allow sin to take
you by the throat, though it may seem that way this present
day. God will restore you. God will
bring you to completion. God will bring you to eternal
life. And there may be seasons where
you look just like a Thessalonian. And there may be seasons where
you look just like a First Corinthian. And friends, there may be days,
if you're like me, that you look in the mirror and you don't.
You see both. And then if you really look deep
into that, under your eyes, you see yourself as a Galatian. I've
been adding to the gospel. But we should look in the mirror,
seeing our insufficiency, and then look in the mirror of our
soul through the Word of God and see Christ's sufficiency. Look at the letter. I'll just
start in verse 1, go through verse 8. Paul, Silvanus, we know
his name is Silas, and Timothy, to the church of the Thessalonians,
in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, grace to you and
peace. We give thanks to God always
for all of you, constantly mentioning you in our prayers, remembering
before our God and Father your work of faith and labor of love
and steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ. For we
know, brothers, loved by God, that He has chosen you because
our gospel came to you not only in word, but also in power and
in the Holy Spirit and with full conviction. You know what kind
of men we proved to be among you for your sake. And you became
imitators of us and imitators of the Lord. For you received
the Word in much affliction with the joy of the Holy Spirit, so
that you became an example to all the believers in Macedonia
and in Achaia. For not only has the Word of
the Lord sounded forth from you in Macedonia and Achaia, but
your faith in God has gone forth everywhere so that we need not
say anything." Think of that for a moment. Specifically, we've
gone through these first three verses. We've seen that God brings
peace and grace through Jesus Christ, that we are sealed in
Christ. We are the beloved, the church,
the ecclesia, the called out, the anointed, the set apart. And that the result of that in
the life of the apostles, the result of that in the life of
the church, friends, is that we have an affection that is
all the affection of Christ. Listen, many people ponder, what's
the application of preaching? Well, friends, if I have to give
you a point with an underline, you're not listening. The point and the underline is
there. Paul says, we give thanks to God always. Therefore, in
the same vein, with the same spirit, with the same power,
when we see the life of Christ and those around us, we give
thanks to God always. We remember each other in our
prayers. Do we have to spell it out in
such a way? that the Christian who is saved
by the grace of God and has received the peace of God, who is called
out by God, prays for each other. Fill in the blank, prays for
each other. No, we don't have to do that. We live in a day and age where
our brains are idle 90% of the time. We walk around in an emotional
fog. We walk around in an intellectual
decay. We don't think, we don't process what we see, we don't
process what we hear. We walk around considering when
we're going to check the next social media, when we're going
to look at our phone, when we're going to see the next show, when we're
going to escape the next reality. We're going to live vicariously
through things, through entertainment, through education, through everything.
Friends, the power of God comes only through the meditation of
the Word of God. There is no other power under
the sun of this cosmos. There is no other anointing to
receive except that we eat the Word of God who is Jesus Christ,
the Word that became flesh, and then we meditate on Him day and
night so that we are successful in all that we do. We want prosperity
in the context of our spiritual lives, but yet we do not do that
which is necessary for us to feed and grow and be prosperous
in those things. We give more time to our jobs,
to our children, to our houses, to our banks. We give more time
to what people think of us in the community. We give more time
preparing for tomorrow than we do living today in the power
of the cross of Jesus Christ. Friends, if you have a job, you
are there to shine brightly to the point that people are blinded
and hate you, or their eyes are opened and they love the Christ
that reigns within you. You raise your children so that
as they see you sin, they see you repent, they see you bow
before the Lord, they see you work through your differences
at home, they see you do what is right by them in discipline,
they see you not love the world, don't give them everything, don't
share with them everything, don't show them that the world is theirs
and they can take it by storm. Friends, the world belongs to
the devil and he and everything in the world that is not of Christ
will suffer the judgment equally under the wrath of the fury of
God and God will destroy all things that are not for Him and
not in Him, and the torment of their destruction will go up
forever. Jesus said it very clearly, what good does it a man to gain
the whole world but lose his soul? And sadly I believe that
sometimes our ministry and our faith is in the world. The Word of God is alive and
it works in us or we are dead to it. And Paul says, I prayed for you. Why didn't you pray for them?
Because God had to do the work or it would not get done. God
had to seal them and secure them in their faith or they wouldn't
have no security. And there is no teacher, there
is no school, there is no denomination, there is no pastor, there is
no group of Christians, there's no program, there's no book,
there's no conference, there's nothing that can give you that.
You know what a conference does? It gets you good there. And you
come home and you fizzle out. Oh, I wish I could feel that
again. I've never been to a conference that gave me the great joy that
the Word of God gives me. I could be more alive in the
trunk of my car with this Bible than I could be in the middle
of 50,000 people singing Horatio Spafford's It Is Well. Now, it's
moving. But you know what? When I hear
the initial chord of a Mozart piece live, I cry. It just overwhelms
me. I'm like, that's beautiful. That's not God. That that I feel is not truth.
It's that that I know that is truth. The one that I know. That
which was from the beginning. That which we have seen and touched
and heard. And we now proclaim to you the
eternal life that was manifest to you. That we now proclaim
that you may have fellowship with us. And indeed our fellowship
is with the Father and with the Son. And these things, what does
John say many times, are written that your joy may be full. We
need to think, church. We need to hear. We need to pause
for a moment. We need to go back to the day
when a letter meant something. I remember the first time I got
a letter in many years, I thought, this is weird. This guy is crazy. Why would he do this? Most of
the time when somebody sends you a letter, it's hate mail. Why would they write letters?
Friends, that's what God has done. God has purposed to write
to us. I don't know who said it. Somebody
in this fellowship posted it some weeks ago. It's amazing
how when we leave the house and our phones are left on the table,
we'll break our neck and nearly have a wreck to go back and get
our phones. But yet our Bible can sit idle all week. It's a disconcerting reality
when I see men called of Christ to preach the gospel who do not
carry a Bible. They don't have one accessible,
and yet dogs them out. I ordered me a waterproof Bible
a couple of weeks ago, and it's too heavy to carry. It weighs
like six pounds. And it's ugly. It's got clouds
on it. Do you have the Word of God close?
I know we've got digital media now, we can pull it up all the
time. But I'll be honest with you, I've never seen anybody
that just out of habit picks up their phone to check the Bible.
If I pick up the phone, I'm going to see who's called. Or if I'm
going to check the Bible and I see people have called. Oh,
I've missed. Oh, great. What's going on? Oh, cool. Oh,
I wonder what they said on Facebook. Oh, there's an email too. I do
need a new pair of shoes. Speaking of shoes, I forgot to
clean those off the porch. Oh, I need to go blow the porch
off. You see how that works? We're never going to get around to
Jesus. The Word of God here has done
its full work in the lives of these Christians. Look at verse
4. He says, we remember you, we
thank God for all these things, for these three things, for the
labor of love, the work of faith, the steadfastness of hope in
Christ. Verse 4, for we know. I thought about just preaching
that this morning. For we know. Now, if I say without a shadow
of a doubt that I know something, I know, and I'm usually right,
you know, aren't y'all? Aren't we usually right? You're
always right. Pam is always right. Come on
Tuesday nights sometimes. She's got it. We know what we
know, but if I say I know, unequivocally, without doubt, no problem, that
doesn't always mean it's true. because I am not speaking under
the authority of inerrancy by the Spirit of God in everything
I say. I do when I read Paul. When I read God's Word to you,
it is inerrant. When I talk about it, problems
could come. That's why we go back to the
Word in its context to see if that which I just commentated
matched the play. But Paul then says, for we know. So that means that by the power
of God, that as Paul wrote, God spoke. God is saying Paul knows with
an absolute certainty what he's about to say. Do you understand
that? That's why the Word of God is
the source of our power. That's why the Word of God is
the vehicle for grace. That's why we must be in the
Word. That's why the church must eat
and breathe and live the Bible. Because it is only through the
Scriptures we can know anything. Jesus says in John 17, this is
eternal life, that you know the one true God and the Son whom
He has sent. Do you know? Because if the knowledge
of God that we have, the intimacy with this Jesus that we know,
is not the one that's given to us through Scripture. It's not
the true God. It's not the true Jesus. It's
not the true faith. It's not the true good news.
It's not good news at all. But it's cut off. It's anathemas.
It's not truth. For we know. What is it that
we know? Brothers loved by God. You see that parenthetical? You
see that little pause there? For we know brothers loved by
God. That's what he's calling the
Christians. Now don't take that wrongly. Don't believe Paul being
misogynist. He's not. Brethren is the collective
nature of the siblings of Christ. It's what we call ourselves. It's what they use. For we know brothers in Christ,
grace and peace have been given to you in the Lord Jesus Christ
and God the Father. You are our brothers and sisters
in Christ. We know you are our brothers. And because our brothers, we
know that you are loved by God. I want you to see that. See,
it's not just a passing thought. It's not just a passing expression,
an identifier of the audience. It's a theological firmness.
Brothers, loved by God, we know that He has chosen you. That's
the knowledge. And people get all weirded out
right here. But friends, this is some of
the strongest, most beautiful, most passionate, most powerful
realities of God that you will ever understand in your life. We know that He has chosen you. How can you be so sure? Doesn't
the world always question our salvation? Don't we question
each other's? Don't we question our own? It's
not a bad thing to put it into question. But I guess the answer
to how we know that we know that we know, you've never heard that,
have you? If you haven't, Lord bless you, because that's good.
But I grew up hearing that. Do you want to know? Listen. Do you want to know? Do you want
to know that you know that you know? Have you ever tried to
diagram how that works on paper? You don't have to know that you
know that you know. You can know that Christ God has chosen you. Paul says in the Romans that
the Spirit of God testifies to our spirit that we are children
of God. The Scripture teaches that we
are the beloved in Christ. So how did these Thessalonians
know that they were chosen? How did Paul know that they were
chosen? Let me tell you something. If you go to 1 Corinthians and you
see the problem that Chloe tattled, she snitched on these people.
The elders lied to Paul and said, all is good. Chloe's like, I
ain't letting them get away with that. Chloe wrote to Paul and
said, they're lying. We are eat up with sin. And so
by the standard in which we live in our culture, this is what
happens. This is how it would be done
if we were to write a letter to the Corinthians today by the
standard of our culture. Oh, you see all that sin down
there and those people? They're not believers. We'd have written
a letter. Paul called by the will of God
to be an apostle of Christ Jesus and our brother Sosthenes to
the so-called church of God that is in Corinth. To those that
say they're sanctified in Jesus Christ, called to be saints. Yeah, right, not. With all those
in every place who say they've called upon the name of the Lord.
You see how that sounds? Paul doesn't say that to the Corinthians.
Paul is sure of their election. Paul is sure that God has chosen
them. He says, to the church of God that is in Corinth. Now, was everyone who claimed
to be the church in the church? No! Were some of the people who
were sinning in that church not the church? That's right. But
were some people who were caught up in that sin the church? Yes,
they were. That's why he corrects it. He
didn't say, throw people out who live this way. He says, correct
them, and then if they don't correct, throw them out. Throw
them out of your lives, not out of the worship service. There
was no such thing. Throw them out of your life if
you live wrongly and don't stop. to the church of God that is
in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be
sanctified together with all those who in every place call
upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours,
grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus
Christ. We know that God has chosen you, brothers. You can
say the same thing to Corinth. You know what that teaches us?
That we have security in our salvation, even when we see sin
in our lives, because our hope is not in repenting of sin, but
in the person of Jesus Christ. If our security is in the walking
of holiness, friends, we are doomed. If our security, because
our standard of holiness is so far off the mark, even as Christians,
even as the saints of God, our standard of what living an upright
life looks like in righteousness is wrong. I'm doing this, I'm doing that,
I'm following this, I'm living this way, I'm believing this
way, I'm thinking this way, I'm putting to death my flesh, but
you're still mired in flesh. The difference is as believers,
we are no longer bound to the flesh. We're no longer controlled
by the flesh. We can put it to death. But even
our view of holiness is not pure. It is not full. Because we cannot in our infinite
minds, I mean in our finite minds, understand and see the infinite
reality of holiness. We can't grasp it. It's not about us walking, but
yet God produces a walking, and that's what Paul's about to show.
Paul says, you are chosen by God. So the gratitude of Paul
and the apostles was that he saw their labor of love, their
labor of work, and the work of faith, the labor that they had,
and their love for one another. And he says, then I see your
spiritual fruit, verse 4. We know that God has chosen you,
five, because Our gospel came to you not only in word, we didn't
just preach it, but it came in power in the Holy Spirit and
with full conviction. So let's unpack that for a minute.
Let's unpack this for a minute, that this made the disciples,
the apostles, thankful to God because God produced a spiritual
fruit in them. Thank you, God, that they have
love. Thank you, God, they have faith.
Thank you, God, that they are known for the glory of your work
and your grace and your gospel. Thank you, God, you've produced
a fruitfulness in them. So if we as Grace Truth are not
known for the fruitfulness of the gospel, what are we known
for? Right teaching? Who cares? It's
important. But if it doesn't produce the
fruit of faith, what good is it? There's a certainty of your election.
There's a certainty of your salvation. Paul says, I have a knowledge,
a sure, apostolic, authoritative knowledge that you are elect. You are the church. You are the
saints. You have been chosen by God. Why? Because we came and preached
to you in language, but it did not just stop with you hearing
us talk. There was power involved in the
hearing of this gospel. And when you see the word Spirit
and in power, friends, they're synonymous. That which is in the Spirit is
powerful. That which is powerful is so
because of the Spirit. Is the Word of God powerful in
you? Is the Spirit of God at work in you? He cannot be except
that the Word of God be richly and continually invited into
you through your eyes and through your ears and through your mind.
Well, that seems like we're limiting God. No, that is God in His wisdom. That's how He chose to be powerful. God no longer speaks apart from
His Word because He doesn't need to. He only speaks through this. So this gratefulness, this election,
came because of the Word. This election came because of
the power of God through the Spirit. And so in the Spirit,
as Paul would say there, because our gospel came to you not only
in the Word, but in power and in the Holy Spirit with full
conviction. In this Holy Spirit, this is Paul saying, we know
that you are indeed the elect of God. You are indeed the church.
Because the Spirit of God in you is proof of your election. The Spirit of God in you is proof
of your salvation. The Spirit of God in you shows
that God is in you. For you, beloved Thessalonians,
who were left and abandoned under the persecution of me and Silas,
We left you and you are infants. You know not what even you speak
of, but you know Christ and Him crucified. And the power of the
Spirit of God has transformed you even without being discipled,
even without growing in your knowledge of the truth. You are
growing in your... and the reality of that truth
because God has worked in you. Therefore, I know your election
is true. I know that you are chosen by
God. I know that grace and peace has come to you through Jesus
Christ because you exemplify as witnesses and testimony of
the power of God. And nobody can say, I taught
them to do that. You see that? We can follow the rules. We can
look Christian. But friends, the Thessalonians
didn't know how. But they did. Because the Spirit
of God is proof. How are we sealed in our faith?
How are we sealed for the day of redemption? By the Spirit.
He comes. He takes us. He submerges us
in Him. And He never leaves. God, the
Holy Spirit, indwells His people. And He produces all that is required. The power of the gospel in the
life of the true church changes her, molds her, makes her, secures
her. What about this conviction? What
does it mean? You know what a conviction is?
A conviction is a certainty. When someone is accused of a
crime, and the evidence shows they did it, and they are convicted,
that means with certainty he did it. So in the same way, conviction
inside of our hearts and minds proves that we are in Christ
because our belief produces an outward expression. Our belief,
as Paul would say in 2 Corinthians 4, I believe, therefore I spoke. You know why I preach the gospel?
Because I believe it. My trust is in Christ, so I preach
Christ and Him crucified. This was true of the Thessalonians. They were certainly Christ's
because all they talked about was Christ. I hear, I have heard through
my life, time and time again, talking with individuals, in
an attempt to make themselves feel better about their weakness
and their lack of passion for the gospel. We can't just talk
about Jesus all the time. Yes, we can. You give me one topic that is
more exhilarating, more vigorating, more glorious than the gospel
of Jesus. And we'll stop right now and
we'll go to that. And sadly, beloved, many people
think politics and athletics and everything else is more glorious
than Christ. There's nothing else. Everything
else in comparison is boring. With full conviction, the belief
of these Christians produced an absolute resolve that nothing
would shake them. They were convicted to the core.
They had a conviction of mind and soul and spirit that they
were going to live for Christ. They didn't care what it cost
them. They wanted nothing more than to walk and preach and live
the gospel. And that's what they did. Election is the power and work
of God through the Spirit. This choosing, these are one
and the same. And something you need to remember
about election, it's a scary word. It's a word that we don't
use in our vernacular because it causes us to have to put aside
the power of our own glory. It causes us to have to put aside
the working of our own flesh and the choices of our own will.
Let me tell you what our will is. It is bound by the flesh. It is free completely to choose
that which it is bound to. I cannot change a thing about
what I am, who I am, period. I can't transform myself into
a giraffe, change the color of my skin, decide I want to be
green-eyed, it doesn't work. No matter how free I am to decide
those things, the choices in those areas are bound by my physical
makeup, by how God has created me. And when it comes to spiritual
things, my will is bound by that which I am corrupted. No one seeks after God. No, not
one. But God in His mercy, while we
were dead in our sins and trespasses against Him, made us alive in
Christ. Friends, God has chosen us and
this election is eternal. In Ephesians 1 verse 4 it says,
"...even as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the
world." This election is not just eternal. This election is
evident, as we see right there in verse 4. Verse 4, that we know it's evident. Election is evident. And finally,
election, there's not complete, but there's three things to think
about. Election is effectual. In Romans 11.7, what then? Israel failed to obtain what
it was seeking. The elect obtained it, but the
rest were hardened. In Titus 1.1, Paul, a servant
of God and an apostle of Christ, for the sake of the fate of God's
elect and their knowledge of the truth, which accords with
godliness. Paul would say to the Corinthians that as grace
extends to more and more, it produces thanksgiving to God.
Listen, friends. God's Word does that which it
was intended to do. And when God's Word goes out,
if you see someone come to faith, it is because that is what God
intended for it to happen. When you see someone not believe,
it is that which God intended to happen. Paul is saying to them, don't
be deceived by what people would tell you. Don't be deceived by
what people would share with you. Don't be deceived to think
that their salvation is not secure in the Gospel of Christ, because
your life and your preaching, your testimony shows God's Spirit
is in you and the power of God rests upon you. And you know, our life showed
that, he says. Look at it. You know what kind
of men we proved to be among you for your sake? We prove that
we were indeed the elect. We prove that we were the brothers
of Christ because we came to You in power. We came to You
living a life according to the work of God within us. And therefore,
we now see it in You. Not only did You see it among
us, but in verse 6, You imitated us. You're doing what we do. You're living as we live and
we're not even there to show you. And you receive the word of God,
not easy. Look at this. This is a great
point. We're almost done. You did not
receive the Word of God sitting with your hands folded and your
legs crossed, the air-conditioned blowing, everything was good.
Oh yeah, this is good, this is true. You received the Word in
much affliction. You know what that looks like?
You know one thing that you can tell someone truly is hungry
for Christ is that they come, flood or famine, to see the body
of Christ worshiped together and to hear the Word. 4.30 on my clock, I saw this morning
before I went to sleep. It's good. Now I'll sleep probably
6 o'clock on until in the morning. It's more important to be in
the Word together with the saints than to sleep. It's more important to eat the
Word of God together than to eat Oh, I'm so hungry. Are you? When I'm working on
a project with my hammer, I forget to eat. Because I want to see
it come together. I want to see the paint go up.
I want to see the project finished. If I'm programming a radio, or
if I'm doing... Man, I feel like I'm about to
faint when you stand up. Oh, I haven't eaten in 17 hours.
I better go eat. And those boring, benign, wasteful,
temporary things can cause us to skip food. Why not the Word
and the fellowship of the saints? It's about power. It's about
the Spirit. It's about the truth within us.
It's about the conviction of our souls. You receive the Word in much
affliction. It wasn't easy for you. We came
preaching after being imprisoned. And now we're coming here and
they're trying to lock us up too. And they're coming after you
now because you believed in Christ as we preached Him. You received
the Word and much affliction, but in that affliction you had
great joy, which was yours in the Holy Spirit. Oh Lord, thank
You so. God, bless You so. Lord Jesus. You are so real with us. We believe
this Word that You brought through these apostles, though we've
had to send them on their way to protect their lives. Oh Lord,
here comes the posse. Here comes the judge. Here comes
the sword. Hallelujah. You received it with much affliction
and with much joy in the Spirit. Paul says we see these things,
your lives are genuine. Friends, there are people who
will not come fellowship under the Word of God because the air
doesn't work, or the heat doesn't work, or the fact that there's
not enough seats, or the fact that it's just weird because
you're in a gas station. or there's nothing for my children.
There's everything for our children. The Word of God alone will save
your children. Anything else we give your children
to give them an appeasement of their faith will send them to
hell. And when they're 40 and they're 50, they will look back
on the things that they do and they will satisfy their souls
in a worldly famine. Children, if you do not believe
the gospel of Jesus, if you do not hear the Word of God, you
will perish in your sin. With much affliction, brothers and sisters across this
world are dragging their infant children to an illegal location
to hear this same type of preaching. knowing that if they're caught,
their very children will be beheaded before them on the street and
they take them. God have mercy on our easy believism
in America. There are more Christians in
third world nations than there will ever be in the United States
of America. Friends, there are less than
one half of a percent of our population who are born of God.
And that's by their confession in the last 20 years of polls. Their hope is not in Christ.
They're religious. They're churchy. They're not
the saints of God. You proclaimed Christ as we did. You imitated us in preaching.
You imitated us in living. You imitated us in wisdom. You
imitated us in power. And your joy was full even though
everything that you experienced was pain. Therefore, verse 7, look at that.
You became an example to all the believers in Macedonia and
Achaia. You want to impact the world?
You want to change the culture? You want to transform your family?
You want to see your kids grow up and love Christ or at least know
Him? Then we've got to live as an
example. And that example is not some
contrived, low-minded, worldly Christianity. That example is
a white, hot, blinding devotion to Christ with joy and suffering. Because it's going to cost you
when you stand for truth. Not only has the Word of the
Lord sounded from you, not only have you preached it, not only
have you proclaimed it, But your faith in God has gone forth everywhere
that you need not say anything. What's that look like? It's like
Paul would say to the church at Colossae, I pray that I may
fill up what is lacking in the suffering of Christ in my body for your sake. It's easy to love Jesus when
life's a bed of roses. Take your health, take your family,
take your freedom, take your prosperity, take your influence,
take your peers, take the esteem that's given to you by your job
and by your place in society away, and then stand in joy and
preach Jesus like a fool. That's how they were witnesses.
And friends, that's the only example that matters in this
life. It's only one. Having Christian literature on
the table, doesn't matter. Having scripture on your wall,
doesn't matter. Having a bumper sticker that says, I love Jesus,
doesn't matter. What matters is, is that we live
as an example as we pursue Christ, which will cause suffering and
we are joyful in it. And we resolve to maintain that.
Because of our full conviction. So beloved, Will you be a witness? Are you a witness? The only way
we will be a witness is if we together continually grow in
the Word of God. Let's pray. Father, bring true and powerfully
this text in our lives. Give us a sense of all and a
peace that surpasses all understanding as we look to be the body in
power. Help us to pray for each other.
Help us to teach each other. Help us to stop convicting each
other of reprobation when we are the beloved of Christ. Help
us to be certain of our salvation and drive us to the center of
the cross, the center of the gospel, the center of Jesus Christ.
Drive us there in our passions through Your Word and keep us
there by Your Spirit. Help us to look after one another
Help us to encourage each other. Help us to pray for each other. And help us to let go of the
idols of our world's religion. And trust fully in the simplicity
and the power of Jesus Christ, who is the living Word. In His
name we pray, Amen.