2 Thessalonians chapter 3 and verse
1. Finally brethren pray for us
that the word of the Lord may have free course and be glorified
even as it is with you and that we may be delivered from unreasonable
and wicked men for all men have not faith But the Lord is faithful,
who shall establish you and keep you from evil. And we have confidence
in the Lord touching you, that ye both do and will do the things
which we command you. And the Lord direct your hearts
into the love of God and into the patient waiting for Christ. Amen. May the Lord bless this
reading from his word. I think that there is in these
few verses a lovely little lesson for believers in sovereign grace,
for the Lord's people in the context of our understanding
of the gospel. We confidently affirm the divine
majesty and omnipotence of our God. We glory in the victory
won by our Lord Jesus Christ on the cross. By faith we rest
in the blessings secured by Christ's death for his church and his
people. We cherish God's intimate, personal
love and distinguishing grace. We rejoice to be numbered among
those made righteous in Christ, accepted in the beloved and saved
according to the terms of the everlasting covenant of peace. We delight in the gospel, and
we bow to the will and purpose and sovereign decrees of Jehovah
God, the judge of all the earth, who, says the psalmist, is righteous
in all his ways and holy in all his works. And in this, we follow
Paul. We say with the apostle, We believe
that he is and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek
him. And we know that all things work
together for good to them that love God, to them who are the
called according to his purpose. Like Paul, we have received these
truths We have believed these truths and we profess them to
be true. And here I think it is interesting
that the same apostle who writes of these truths also writes to
the Thessalonians and asks them for help. for all of God's sovereignty,
for all of God's glory, for all of God's accomplishments, for
all of the certainty that we have in the great work of salvation
and in the covenant purposes of God. Here the apostle is writing
to this little group of persecuted saints in the corner of Europe
and saying, brethren, pray for us. Pray for us. Paul is seeking the involvement
and the support and the assistance of these new believers in the
cause of the gospel and in the lives of its ministers. And that
doesn't in any way detract from his conviction and from his testimony
as to the sovereignty and dominion of God in all things. And yet
here also is a request that these few, young believers engaged
together with the Apostle and his fellow Apostles in preaching
the Gospel. And I think that this is a very
blessed matter, one that encourages all the Lord's people, and we'll
note there that the Apostle says brethren, it's an inclusive term
for the whole congregation, but it is an encouragement to all
the Lord's people to be aware of the work and the challenges
and even the dangers that face preachers of the gospel. And
it is direction for us to uphold in prayer those engaged in the
front line of ministering the truth. And thereby, particularly being
subject to the attacks and hindrances from the gospel's enemies. And
what I'm going to do in the next few minutes is just take a couple
of phrases, well, three phrases from these verses, and just,
if I may, draw out a couple of points in the context of what
we've said, as it were, in the introduction here. And just to
return again to this point, brethren, pray for us. I think here we
see something of the intimacy. There is a clear personal dimension
in the apostle's request. Paul could have said, right? He could have said, brethren,
pray for the gospel. He could have said, pray for
the work. He might have said, pray for
the hearers. but he didn't say any of those
things. And let me suggest to you why. The gospel does not
need our prayers. The gospel is the perfect work
of God. It is the successful accomplishments
of Christ. It's the power of God unto salvation. And in that sense, we no more
have to pray for the gospel than we have to pray for God. We don't have to pray for the
sword, but for the man who wields the sword. And again, we don't
have to pray for the work, because it's God's work. The church is
His workmanship and not one of those for whom Christ died will
be lost. There's no chain that the devil
can forge sufficient to bind one of the Lord's elect set at
liberty. The work of the Gospel goes on
apace and we should never imagine that it is faltering or that
it is failing. And even praying for the Gospel's
hearers ought to be rightly understood. Yes, we want as many to hear
as possible. We long to see souls saved, especially
those that we know, especially those that we love. So let us
pray. Let us pray with feeling. Let
us pray with commitment for those whom the Lord lays on our heart. knowing that the effectual fervent
prayer of a righteous man availeth much. But know this too, it is
the Holy Spirit's work to open eyes and ears and hearts, and
nothing less than a divine work of creative power can make a
dead soul live. But the apostle does say, pray
for us because he knew where the weak link was and he felt
his own inadequacy and vulnerability and the vulnerabilities of those
who preached with him. You see, as preachers, as ministers
of the gospel, we carry precious truth in earthen vessels. a glorious gospel upon lips of
clay, a mighty message in a feeble frame. And with this in view,
I can't improve upon the way that Dr. Gill describes this
obligation that the Apostle lays on the Thessalonians. He says,
and it's for us all of course, pray that your ministers might
be directed to suitable subjects, that their minds might be opened
to understand the scriptures, that their gifts might be increased
and they more and more fitted for public service. that opportunity
be given them to preach the gospel freely and boldly as it ought
to be spoken, and their ministry be blessed to saints and sinners
alike. That's a lovely way of describing
a suitable prayer for the ministers of the gospel. Pray they might
be good servants and good soldiers, faithful in conduct and good
examples in the fight of faith, bold in declaring truth and confronting
error, and yet humble and meek and modest in themselves. Pray that they might not be tempted
by inappropriate feelings or unfounded flattery. Satan cannot diminish the message
and he can't detain God's elect for a moment longer when the
quickening word goes forth in power. but he can and he does
hinder and deter those who labour in word and doctrine. And therefore
the apostle says, brethren, pray for us. And yet, having brought
his request, Paul nevertheless maintains an attitude of confidence
and positivity. because he goes on to declare,
the Lord is faithful. And this is said, if you look
at the verses, this is said immediately following Paul's remark that
not all men have faith. Now, that's such a truism as
to probably need some explanation. We've been thinking actually
about this in our passage from Isaiah recently. Paul's meaning
is that not all who profess Christianity have faith. Not all who are church
members have faith. And even not all who preach have
faith. Faith is rare and precious. It is to be treasured wherever
it is found. And this is the preacher's dilemma. Paul knew that by expressing
himself thus, that not all men have faith, by expressing himself
thus, he would at once cause those with a tender conscience
to question their own faith and wonder if Paul was talking about
them. Because the sad reality is that
often those who have no faith have no doubt, while those who
have true faith doubt that they have any. Paul reminds us our
standing is in Christ and our hope is not in our own faith,
which ebbs and flows and comes and goes, but in the faithfulness
of the Lord who saves and keeps his people and ministers to our
souls in the face of the doubts and
the challenges and the troubles that we face. The Lord is faithful,
says the apostle, and it is a truth that he encourages the Thessalonians
to lay hold upon and to nurture. And it is a truth that you and
I ought to lay hold upon and nurture as well. Think of it
as a promise to be believed in the face of contradiction. The
apostle says, the Lord will establish you. That means that he will
establish you. And I like the idea of the establish
as opposed to establish. He will establish you. Think
about the way in which a little plant is established or a tree
is established. It's the beginning. It's when
it comes from the seed. It's when it starts to grow.
It's when the first shoot appears. And we say, oh, it looks as if
it's established. That's the beginning. But it's
not actually the word that's used. He says, establish you.
And I like to think that there's a difference between establish
and stablish in this sense. That establish also means to
stabilise. So we're established like that
young tender plant. But then even as we grow, we're
stabilised. He begins the work and he carries
it through to the end. He creates, then he protects
and preserves from evil. So that when the winds come and
the floods come and the blasts come and the problems come, we
might stand when that evil day comes. As it surely will. And finally, just one more wee
point and then I'm done. The apostle says, the Lord direct
your hearts. There at the verse five. The Lord direct your hearts into
the love of God and into the patient waiting for Christ. That's a lovely phrase, isn't
it? The Lord direct your hearts. Her hearts are deceitful and
desperately wicked. Who can know it? But the apostle
says the Lord directs your hearts. There's a lovely prayer for a
wayward people. The Lord directs your hearts.
And what he's saying is here, the Lord directs your hearts
into the love of God. and into the patient waiting
for Christ. The love of God for his people,
the love of God for his people is real and personal. and active. I have no time for
this idea of a general universal love. The Lord's love for his
people is personal, it is distinguishing and it is active in their lives.
It's a lively love that does us good and brings us blessing
and help and comfort to our souls. And Paul's prayer is that the
Thessalonians and all God's people might have our hearts made alert
to discern and discover the experience of God's love in our lives in
personal and intimate ways and be sensitive to its comfort and
God's passion towards us. It may well be that God's love
is the greatest, sweetest, and most intimate attribute of our
God that we shall ever experience. And I don't doubt for a moment
that that is why love has such an importance and an esteem in
human relationships as well. because it's a mere shadow and
picture, a type if you like, of the greater, grander manifestation
of God's love to his elect. And I think that we will spend
eternity discovering marvellous new examples of God's love and
the dimensions of God's infinite love. Elsewhere, the Apostle
Paul says, God commendeth his love toward us in that while
we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. So there is a concrete
manifestation of God's love to his elect. Christ died for us. And Paul goes on to ask, who
shall be able to separate us from the love of God? which is
in Christ Jesus, our Lord. That's another concrete manifestation
of the love of God. So when Paul says that he wants
the Lord to direct our hearts to the love of God, it's that
we might take an experiential benefit and comfort from the
death of Christ towards us and the blessings that we possess in
that. So perhaps I can simply close today by reflecting that
it was the everlasting love of God that first formed the covenant
of grace. It was the everlasting love of
God that first set forth the plan of salvation and the everlasting
love of God to his people that sent the Lord Jesus Christ to
die for us. It's a wonderful love. And if
the Lord does indeed direct our hearts into the love of God,
then we may, with the Ephesians, begin to be able to comprehend
with all saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height,
and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, as we
wait patiently for the coming of our Saviour. May the Lord
bless these thoughts to us. Amen.