If you will now, let's turn back
in our Bibles to 1 Thessalonians chapter four. As most of you know, we have
been studying through 1 Thessalonians on Sunday mornings, and now we've
come to scriptures which deal with the practice of the children
of God. If you notice in verse one, these
words, how you ought to walk and to please God. Life is represented
by many people as a journey. And truly it is a journey. From
the moment that we began to live, we're on a journey to eternity. And in eternity, nothing will
ever change. God doesn't change. Once we leave this world, our
place is fixed. Scripture says, let the righteous
be righteous still. Let the filthy be filthy still. A journey. Every man, every woman,
we're all on a journey. But to the believers, to the
children of God, the apostle speaks of our life in this world
as a walk, how you ought to walk. This walk begins, now our walk,
our journey to eternity begins the moment that we begin to live. And the same is true of our Christian
walk, how we ought to walk in this world. It begins the moment
that by the grace of God, as Paul says in Colossians chapter
one, God delivers us from the power of darkness. You see, by
nature, we come into this world in the kingdom of Satan, kingdom
of darkness. And we can't get out, not by
our power, not by our so-called free will. We're trapped. We're enslaved. Depraved is the
word that theologians use. Scripture says, for all have
sinned and come short of the glory of God. We can't deliver
ourselves. No, but God can. And God does
deliver his people. This walk, this Christian walk
begins when God delivers us from the power of darkness and translates
us into the kingdom of his dear son or the son of his love. As
I said, by nature, we are in a kingdom of darkness and we
know who the prince of darkness is and we're under his power
and dominion until God in mercy and grace snatches us as brands
from the burning. Out of that kingdom of darkness,
and translates us into the kingdom of his dear son. Then we began
to walk in the narrow way, the way which God has given us in
his word to direct our steps. Along with that translation comes,
of course, the fear of God. The fear of the Lord, the scripture
says, is the beginning of wisdom. What does it mean to fear God? Well, first of all, it means
to have a holy awe of God, a recognition of who God really is. Not the
God of modern day religion, but the God of the Bible, the thrice
holy God. So pure, so holy that even He
charges the holy angels with sin. So pure, so holy that when
Isaiah was given a vision into the throne room of God, and who
did he see? He saw Christ. Yes, you say,
well, Christ wasn't born in this world for 600 more years. I understand
that. But he saw a pre-existent revelation
of the Lord Jesus Christ upon the throne. And the scripture
says that his train filled the temple. I heard one time someone
said these rulers, these kings and queens, you know, the longer
their train is, the more powerful they are. If they just have a
robe that just kind of hits the back of their legs, they've got
a small kingdom. But if their train, if their
robe goes back a long way, well his train filled the temple. He's the King of Kings and the
Lord of Lords. We get some idea when God saves
us of the holiness of God. And we feel like John the Baptist,
when he spoke about the Lord Jesus Christ, he said, I'm not
worthy even to bow down and just unloose his shoestrings, his
latchet on his sandals. Reverence of God. That's one
of the great tragedies of our generation, of my generation. We in this country have lost
the awe, the fear of God. He's my co-pilot now. Well, if
he's your co-pilot, that means you're the pilot, right? He's not your co-pilot. No. He is God Almighty who lives
eternally and reigns over all places and all peoples at all
times. We get some idea, and I believe
it's just a small idea really, that any of us really have of
how great God really is. How holy He really is. And to think, to think that he
would consider us worms. That's what the scripture calls
us, worms. Fear not, thou worm, Jacob. That he would consider us and
love us so much that he would give his only begotten son to
die to redeem us from all iniquity. That's the first thing about
the fear of God. There's a holy awe of God. And secondly, there is a dread
of displeasing Him. You know, the scripture here
says, Paul is writing to these believers, Thessalonica, and
he says, how you ought to walk and to please God. Every child
of God desires to please Him because we love Him. because
he's done so much for us. We want to live a life that is
pleasing unto him. The scripture says, the word
is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path. God's word, we're
so thankful that he's given us his holy word that shows us and
teaches us how we are to walk in this world so as to please
God. You know, the metaphor from that
text, thy word is a lamp unto my feet. The metaphor is of a
man who's walking in a mountainous area. And he's on a ledge and
it's dark and just one misstep and he goes down the cliff to
his destruction. The lamp is a light into my feet. How precious is the word of God
to a child of God. We want to please our father
and the way we walk so as to please him is revealed to us
in his word. We sang that hymn just a few
minutes ago, and one of the lines said, he breaks the power of
canceled sin. You know, thou shalt call his
name Jesus, the Lord, the angel told Joseph. Thou shalt call
his name Jesus, for he shall save his people, not in their
sins, but from their sins. And yes, the salvation that he
brings us delivers us from the penalty of sin, but the Holy
Spirit comes to live within us and we have the power to overcome
the power of sin, the power of sin that has us shackled and
chained. And that's what Paul is writing
about here. I want you to notice two things
before we look at the first verse. Notice these two words, more
and more. We find that in verse one. At
the end of verse one, more and more. And then also in verse
10, you see these two words again at the end of the verse, more
and more. God's children, we are to abound
more and more. We are to increase more and more
until the Lord Jesus Christ calls us home. Then our thoughts should
be like the Apostle Paul when he said, forgetting those things
which are behind, I press toward the mark. for the prize of the
high calling of God in Christ Jesus. As we live in this world,
we still have that old nature. We believe in imputed righteousness,
that is, the righteousness of Christ is imputed to everyone
that believes, and because of that righteousness, we are justified. God declares us just as if we
had never sinned. But we know also the Word of
God teaches there is imparted righteousness. That is, we receive
a new nature, a nature that fights against that old nature, yes,
but a nature that desires to live for God's glory and to please
Him. Now, I have three divisions in
my message. First of all, an example for
preachers. Verse one, furthermore then we
beseech you, brethren, and exhort you by the Lord Jesus, that as
you have received of us how you ought to walk and to please God,
so you would abound more and more. First of all, an example
for preachers. Paul is writing these words Paul
was an apostle of Jesus Christ. And do you know with that office
came authority? With the office of an apostle
came authority. We have examples in his letters
where he used that authority as an apostle. One example is
found in 1 Corinthians chapter 5. There was a man in that church
who was living with his father's wife, not his mother, but his
father's wife. And the church was puffed up,
you know, we believe so much in grace, we're just gonna let
this go on, continue. And Paul wrote back, or wrote
to them as an apostle, and he said, in the name of our Lord
Jesus Christ, when you are gathered together, and my spirit with
the power of our Lord Jesus Christ to deliver such and one unto
Satan for the destruction of the flesh that the spirit may
be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus. Now Paul, he said, I'm
not writing a suggestion to you. This is what you're to do when
you're gathered together. How could he do that? What would
you think of me? Or what would some pastor think
of me if I wrote to another church, say a church up in Kentucky?
We have a lot of friends in that state who are good preachers,
preach the gospel. What if I wrote to one of them
and said, now listen, this is what you need to do? You know
what they'd probably tell me? Mind your own business. You're
a pastor at Lincolnwood Baptist Church. You have no authority
up here. Well, Paul was an apostle, but
I said here we have an example for preachers. He had authority,
but when he comes to exhort believers about how we ought to live, you
notice how he writes. He does so in a very kind, and
a very tender way. He writes in such a way that
they cannot help but see and feel and know. He has a genuine
love for us. He has concern for us. If you
notice in that first verse, there's two marginal readings. We request. It's not like when he wrote to
that church and said, when you're gathered together and my spirit's
with you, you do this. No, he said, we request. We beseech you. We have the same in his letter
to Romans. You know, for 11 chapters, first
chapter all the way through 11 chapters, he's dealing with doctrine. Doctrine. And oh, how high is
that doctrine that he deals with there. But then he comes to chapter
12, to the practical application of his teaching. And now it is,
we beseech you, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you
present your bodies as a living sacrifice, wholly acceptable
unto God. Now, when he said present your
body, of course, he means all of you, not just your physical
body, but body and soul, to the service of God. So that's my
first point. an example for preachers. My
second point is simply this, a further example for preachers. Notice verse two, a further example
for preachers. For you know what commandments
we gave you by the Lord Jesus. Now what does that mean? Paul
says he's reminding them, you know what precepts and commandments
and doctrine we gave you, but notice it is by the commandment by the Lord Jesus. I set a further
example to preachers, and that's something we find through the
word of God. Preach the word. Preach the word. God calls you to preach, he calls
you to preach his word. God has given us 66 books in
this one book. And it is here in this book that
we learn about God. That's why we're here today,
isn't it? To learn about God, to learn about ourselves, what
we are, to learn about God's covenant of peace, his covenant
of grace. We're here to learn about him.
Paul said, you know, these commandments, what commandments we gave you
by the Lord Jesus. What we taught you, what we preached
unto you, we just received from Christ. It just passed through
us. It just filtered through us.
When our Lord, after His resurrection, sent out The church and all the
world have preached the gospel to every creature. You remember
what he said? He said what? To observe, teach
them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you. The preacher doesn't make the
message, he preaches the message. He preaches the word of God.
And I just set a further example for preachers. Stick to it. You
say, well, I've preached that before. Preach it again. Preach
it again. God's people never get tired
of hearing about Christ, about his precious blood, about his
righteousness, about his so great salvation. God's people. Preach it again, preach it again. Don't get sidetracked. It's so
easy today for preachers to get sidetracked into politics. We
want to straighten everybody out. Don't get sidetracked. Preach the word. Preach the gospel
of Jesus Christ. You know what sidetracked is?
Some of you may not know. There's a whole lot of train
cars in the United States. And some of them are just sitting
on tracks, and the train just passes them by. Every day, there's
a train goes this way, there's a train comes this way. But they're
side tracks. They have no use right now. They're
just sitting on the side. I think if you go down Hardee's
toll road, you can see a long line of cars. They just sit there. Don't get sidetracked onto issues
of the day. Preach the word. Preach the gospel. I'm going to tell you, I love
our country. I know you do. And I'm concerned
about our country. But do you know the way The gospel,
think about this, when Paul was preaching, when he wrote this
letter, they were living under a dictator, Roman emperor, and
one of the worst dictators. But how, how did the gospel change
society? How did it do that? Did he say,
now I want you folks to get together up there in Thessalonica and
boycott these stores that sell these certain magazines or something
like that? Is that the way the gospel changed? And yes, the gospel has changed
this world in many ways, and it will change it again. if men
would preach the gospel. Because when God saves sinners,
they just begin to live differently. Not because there's some law
passed in Washington or Austin demanding that people do a certain
thing. No, they have God's word. And
because they're God's people, they want to please God. They
want to live so as to please Him. That's the way the gospel
has always changed society. Well, here's my third point.
It deals now with some very practical holiness. Four areas. First of all, uncleanness. Let's
read verses three through eight. Uncleanness. For this is the
will of God, your sanctification, that you should abstain from
fornication, that every one of you should know how to possess
his vessel in sanctification and honor, not in the lust of
concupiscence, even as the Gentiles, which know not God, that no man
go beyond and defraud his brother in any matter, because that the
Lord is the avenger of all such, as we also have forewarned you
and testified. For God hath not called us unto
uncleanness, but unto holiness. He therefore that despiseth,
despiseth not man, but God, who hath also given unto us his Holy
Spirit. He deals with this matter of
uncleanness. The word uncleanness here means
impurity. And in the context, of course,
he's talking about sexual impurity. He mentions one word or uses
one word, fornication, but he, this word includes all sexual
uncleanness, adultery, pornography, All of it is lumped in here together. We are to abstain from all impurity,
all uncleanness. You say, why would Paul need
to write a church about this? Remember the society they came
from, that they were a part of, thought nothing at all about
these things. It was accepted. The Greeks accepted
it. All of these sins of uncleanness,
they're just common practice. No one thought anything about
it. Let me show you, turn back to Acts 15 just a moment. When the believers met in Jerusalem,
over the issue of the Gentiles who were saved, their relationship
to the law, to the law of Moses. What's their relationship? Do
they have to become Jews if they're saved? Must they be circumcised
and observe the Sabbath day and not eat pork? And all these things
that were included, was included in the Sabbath, in the Mosaic
law. What's the relation of believers,
Gentile believers, to these things? And you know, some of them were
even teaching, well, if a person doesn't come under the law, then
he can't be saved. He can't be saved. Of course,
that just flew in the face, didn't it? Of everything the gospel
teaches, that salvation is by grace. And Peter spoke, and Paul
spoke, James, I believe, he spoke at this council, and they came
to this conclusion that we're saved by grace, apart from the
works of the law. But they wanted to write a letter
to these Gentile believers, and I want you to notice what they
included in this letter, in verse 28. For it seemed good to the
Holy Spirit and to us to lay upon you no greater burden than
these necessary things, that you abstain from meats offered
to idols, and from blood, and from things strangled, and from
fornication." Now, of all the things that they felt it necessary
to write to these Gentile believers, you notice fornication is in
that group. Of course, they mentioned blood. The Jewish nation had been taught
by God, and even before Abraham, God had taught the preciousness
of blood. The life of the flesh is in the
blood. And the sacrifices that were
offered were blood sacrifices. showing how God would put away
the sin of his people by the shedding of his son's blood. Well, Gentiles, they ate flesh,
animals that had been slaughtered, and their blood had not been
drained. They thought nothing of it. And they thought nothing
of fornication, adultery. homosexuality, all of these sexual
impurities. Now, Paul is writing to this
church of people who came from that background, and he finds
it necessary to warn about these things. And there were those
who taught, well, you know, the body, it doesn't matter what
the body does, doesn't matter how we live, that's the body,
that's the flesh, and all flesh is Corrupt? No. All it's showing us, yes, it
does matter how we live. I wanted to say a word in that
passage here back in 1 Thessalonians about the vessel. Verse 4 says that every one of
you should know how to possess his vessel. Now some of the writers
believe he's referring to a man's wife, his vessel, because the
apostle Peter does refer to the wife as a vessel, the weaker
vessel, doesn't he? But listen, Paul's not just writing
to the men in this church, he's writing to the church. And we
know there was women mentioned in Acts chapter 17. We read that
several times that were part of this church, the great women,
people of renown in that city, women of renown. So no, I don't
believe he's talking about a man's wife when he refers to his vessel
so much as he's talking about his body. You remember he uses
that term, we have this treasure in an earthen vessel, that is
the gospel. We have this gospel in this earthen
vessel. Well, a vessel holds something,
doesn't it? A vessel holds something. What
he's talking about how to possess your vessel, this body holds
our soul. You know, when a person dies,
what happens? The soul leaves the body. The body is the vessel, the tent,
as Paul would say in 2 Corinthians, I believe, 5, this tent, this
vessel. In other words, how we are to
to live concerns not only our soul, our spiritual being, but
it influences our bodies also. Look with me in 2 Corinthians
7, just a moment. 2 Corinthians 7 and verse 1,
Paul said, having therefore these promises, And the promises are
given in chapter six, and they're wonderful promises. Having therefore these promises,
dearly beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness
of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear
of God. Yes, uncleanness. We should be careful about these
things because we are in a society that accepts these things pretty
much as normal. Even a few years ago, it seems
like I remember reading some counselors advising young people,
well, just live together before you get married. Find out if
you like each other. What kind of a counselor is that?
What kind of a person who's supposed to be a counselor would tell
a young person just to live with a person of the other sex and
find out if you're compatible before you get married? No, we
live in a society where these things have come back around,
haven't they? They really have. So this is
needful for you and it's needful for me. Our Lord said, whosoever
looketh upon a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery
with her already. And we are confronted, our eyes
see things, we're confronted in this world with things that
are prone to cause God's people to fail in this matter. The second
thing, the second area has to do with honesty. Not just uncleanness,
but he deals with honesty. This has part, he says, of our
sanctification. Verse six, that no man go beyond
and defraud his brother in any matter. If you look in the margin
of that verse, you see to overpass or overreach a person. We live
in this world and we do business in this world, and we are to
be honest. Our word is to be our bond. When we tell somebody we will
do something, then we should do it. And I would really caution
parents about telling your children you're going to do something
and then not doing it. Be careful. No, our words should
be our bond. We should live honestly in this
world. You go to the store and you give
the person a $10 bill, and he gives you change back for 20,
and you just stick it all in your pocket and say, boy, this
is my lucky day. No, no. Live honestly. Don't overreach. God was very
clear in the Old Testament about weights and meats and boundaries
and things like that. Don't remove the old landmark,
he told the people. You know, a landmark, it wasn't
like today you have surveyors and they go out there and they
survey your property and put steel stakes down on every corner. No, they just put a stone here
and a stone over there and a guy would go out and he'd just kind
of kick that stone over a little bit, increasing his property. And
when you go to the market, the man would have two sets of weights.
You don't buy a kilo of tortillas. Well, he'd set one weight on
there, but that wasn't quite two kilos. He'd have another
weight in his bag, so when the state comes along and checks
them out, you see that on the pumps, don't you, when you buy
gasoline? You see that Texas has men that
come by, men and women, I suppose, who come by and they check to
make sure that when it says you're getting a gallon, you get a gallon.
Why do they have to have people to do that? Because people take
advantage of other people. But not God's people. God's people
want to make sure, by the grace of God, that they're honest when
they deal with other people. And then fourthly, or thirdly,
brotherly love in verses nine and 10. But as touching brotherly
love you need not that I write unto you, for you yourselves
are taught of God to love one another. And indeed you do it
toward all the brethren which are in all Macedonia. You know, He said, I don't really
need to write to you about this concerning brotherly love. One
writer said, this is one of the elementary effects of salvation
to lead us to love one another, lead us to love the brethren.
And in the epistle of first John, remember that's one of the signs
that John gave. If you want to know if you've
been born of the spirit of God, do you love the brethren? That's
what he rose. We know that we have passed from
death unto life because we love the brethren. But again, we say that this grace
of love should increase more and more. I was visiting with a pastor
recently on the phone, and he brought up his prayer life. He
said, I pray, and he started naming a number of things that
he prayed for for himself. And I said, really? Aren't you just asking
to be made like Christ? I mean, he was talking about
have more love, have more humility. I mean, he just had a long list. I said, well, really, aren't
you just asking to be made more like Christ? When it's all said
and done, just to be more like him. He loved his brother, didn't
he? He even loved his enemies. He
loved you. Love me. The last area here is
living in peace, verses 11 and 12. And that you study to be
quiet, do your own business, and to work with your own hands
as we commanded you, that you may walk honestly toward them
that are without, and that you may have lack of nothing. Three
things mentioned in those verses to live living in peace, study
to be quiet, do your own business. One of the commentators said
that word study, it actually means make it a point of honor.
And John Gill said, be ambitious of it, strive, strive to outdo
each other as who shall have the honor of being the quietest
person and the most peaceable member in the community. Don't
be a busybody, Paul says, in other people's matters. I had
an experience recently. I took some information to a
lady that lives on the same street. She's a single lady. And I thought
it would be helpful, but I was so afraid that she would think
by what I did, giving her a phone number, that I'd be a busybody. I'd be engaged in her business. But I wanted to help her. I wanted
to give her some information that I wasn't sure if she had.
Had to do with the debris from the storm. There was a number
you could call and they'd come by Well, everybody on the road,
everybody on our street, all the debris was gone except this
woman. And she had a lot of it out there.
And I thought, well, maybe she doesn't know that number. Maybe
she hasn't seen that on the bulletin board up there. So I gave her
the number. And she took it very well, I
believe. But, you know, just don't be
involved in other people's business, Paul said. Don't be a busybody.
Study to be quiet. And secondly, honest labor, to
work with your hands. Of course, it'd be the same,
work with your mind. I know many of you, you work
with your minds. Some of us, some of you maybe
work with your hands, but whatever. Just work and support your own
family so that you, and Paul must have realized there was
a problem in this church. He deals with it in his second
letter because there were some people who didn't work. Some
men who didn't work, and they expected the church to support
them. No, Paul said, work with your
own hands. A good testimony, providing for
honest things, not only in the sight of men, but in the sight
of God. Well, I pray the Lord would bless
these thoughts and words to all of us here.