Transcription
Turn with me in your Bibles to 1 Thessalonians 5, and we're going to dive into verses 12 through 28. This morning is going to be where we find our text today, as we continue through our series through the "one another." This week's "one another" is "seek good for one another."
So, as we know, or you may not know, Paul is the writer of the majority of the New Testament. Um, and he writes in what is called Epistles—just uh, the Greek word for letters. Uh, Greek word, yes, Greek word for letters. Um, so he writes these letters to different individuals or different churches. And this is a letter he writes to the Church of Thessalonica.
And in those instructions, he gives them towards the end of his first letter to them, he gives this list of instructions for how to interact with each other as the church. So this morning, you know, um, there's not a lot of instruction for those who don't know the world, um, given there's always Christ in the center of every text, um, and it's the pastor's job to find it.
Um, as you all know, I'm a man who loves Charles Spurgeon, um, in his story, in history, and his teachings. And there's a story of he had a pastor's college, a place where he would raise up young pastors. And uh, we'll get to there one day. And um, he was training a young pastor, and the pastor was preaching. And as he got down from the pulpit, Spurgeon's um, critique for him was, "You didn't preach Christ." And he said, "Well, Pastor, my my my text was out of, you know, Ezekiel. You know, Christ was not there." He was like, "It's your job to find Christ there." And he paints this picture—I I don't remember exactly the quote—but there's a crimson cord through all the scripture that leads either from or to the cross. And in every piece of scripture, Christ is found. And whether it might not be the monopoly of the text, every pastor's job is to find Christ in the text because he is the word. Um, but that's by the by.
But this morning, the text is mainly written to the audience of Believers, a church here in Thessalonica. Now, their backstory was that they were so ready that Jesus was going to come again, and coming in quickly. I I've mentioned this in a few sermons. The prayer that the early first-century Church would pray was a prayer called "Maranatha," literally translates "God, come quickly." They were they were living in such expectation that the end times were not something in the far future but in the coming future that they were kind of living like, "Well, what's the m what's the matter tomorrow? We could be gone tomorrow. The Lord could could call us home. What's the point for living to the day?" They quit their jobs; they sat around, you know, kind of sucked their thumbs up their noses, and they just did whatever. And Paul's letter to the Thessalonians is one half comments of of, "Hey, I see your faith. I see how you live; that's great. But also, I need you I need you to get to work because we don't know the time is coming." Now, he gives these instructions to the Church of Thessalonica as he wraps up his uh, first epistle to them, and we're going to read this because this is where we find our "one another."
"Now we ask you, brothers and sisters, to give recognition to those who labor among you and lead you in the Lord and admonish you, and to regard them very highly in love because of their work. Be at peace among yourselves. And we exhort you, brothers and sisters, warn those who are idle. Comfort the discouraged. Help the weak. Be patient with everyone. See to it that no one repays evil for evil to anyone, but always pursue what is good for one another and for all." So I'm want to put a pin in it right there. This is our first section.
So Paul, as he is ending his letter, gives these exhortations to them, and he reminds them, "Brothers and sisters, this is how I want to see you interact with one another." And he he first he divides them into these two categories of the people who you're going to be interacting with: your co-laborers, your brothers who labor among you, or those who are over you in the Lord who admonish you. So he divides these two categories because there only should be two: those you are laboring side by side with and those who are encouraging you in your ministry and labors to the work. He he divides them into these two groups because I've I've said this many many many many many times: there is no hierarchy of salvation. Pastors and preachers and evangelists do not have a little more Jesus than you do, not have a little better Holy Spirit than you do, not have a better salvation. They don't have a VIP ticket, and you have a you have an economy ticket. We all have the same Christ, the same salvation, the same hope, the same gospel. But what we've done, and this is something that's, you know, again why I love church history because I love to see where we've come from and why we're here, is the Western church has taught us that there is a hierarchy, that those who are leadership in the church, well, they are closer to God than those who are just the quote-unquote "the common man." We even words invented for it, things called the clergy and the laity. And while I don't necessarily think those are evil words, they have been used to kind of tear people into, "Oh, well, I'm just I'm just the laity. I'm just a person. I just come to church on Sundays, but I'm not I'm not a p I don't have a title in front of my name. I don't have seminary or Bible college experience. I I'm not a clergyman or whatever. I'm just me." And that is something that has been a degradation to the church for centuries, um, but it's still something we find ourselves wrestling with. Is yes, God places leadership structure in the church because there's leadership structure everywhere. We see this over and over through Paul's Epistles, especially out of the book of First Corinthians, where Paul is addressing church leadership in the church, and he says, "Hey, there is God is a god of order, not a god of chaos. There is structure. Even look to the Trinity, and there is order. There is God the Father who guides, God the Son who instructs, God the Holy Spirit. There is there is order. They're all still God; they are all still equal, omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent, holy, and righteous, and everything in it, but there is order and structure in that relationship. The same in marriage; there is no hierarchy of who is better in marriage, but God has put a structure into the marriage covenant. There is no your children are no less than than parents, but there is a hierarchy structure of leadership for the betterment of the family, that there is order, not chaos."
So the Western church has formally put this lean on the idea of leadership and superiority, and that's not what that means. It's actually a bigger step of servanthood, or at least it's supposed to be. But he goes in First Thessalonians, and he describes these two different groups: "Give recognition to those who labor among you and those who lead you in the Lord and admonish you." So that first group is who labor among you. One of the other categories we've kind of invented in the Western church is the um, the nominal Christian, the person who comes and kind of shows up, and they're just kind of a a church Christian couch potato. They come; they're really not moving anywhere; they're just kind of they they fill the seat, but that's all about they do. Um, church, you I'm not someone who's much of a sports guy, but church is not a spectator sport. There are no positions in the Kingdom of of heaven where you're a a bench worker. We've all been called to—and I say this so much at some point you're probably going to be annoyed about it or make it into a cliché Nick catchphrase—but we've all been called to light up a corner of the darkness that only we can. There has never been a you before in history, for better or worse. You are uniquely designed, created, and placed to do what God has called you to do, and none other in history. None of us are called to just warm a pew for God because you see that when you talk to atheists or agnostics, it's like, "I don't understand why God's so concerned with attendance." He's not; he's concerned with the souls and lives lived with him and for him. There's no benchwarmers in the Kingdom of Heaven. He doesn't just care if we show up every Sunday and get our our ticket card punched. We're all to be co-laborers alongside of each other. We talked about this a few um, "one anothers" ago of "bear with one another," that the idea that we as the church are like yoked animals together, like when you when you were yoked together a group of animals, they share the burden with one another to make the work easier, to pull each other further ahead, and to lift the burden up those who might have weaker shoulders, that we as a church bear with one another so we can see the next generation, whether spiritually or literally, grow into the relationship with God and the kingdom of heaven. We are to co-labor with one another. But if we all show up to church on Sunday, we assume, "Ah, the preachers got it," then we're stifling and not not only the blessings of someone else but the blessings that we will receive for doing the labor God has called us to do. So we are all called to co-labor with one another. But he's also describes those who lead you in the Lord and admonish you. And we talked about this; it's not a me of superiority but of servant hood. To admonish you means to direct you, to challenge you, to to warn you. This is this check and balance of encouraging you, "Hey, you're you're just warming a bench right now. I need you to kind of wake up. I need you to get moving. I need you like to take a walk."
When I worked as a supervisor um, for third shift uh, a residential facility, one of my main jobs was to go into to stir the staff. Third shift is astronomically difficult in its own degree because the human body just wants to go to bed, even you know, if you're working third shift in a factory, you're moving; you're able to kind of keep yourself up a little better, but our job was to just make sure the clients and the students were safe, where they were supposed to be, and that meant sitting in a dark empty floor staring at dark empty bedrooms and making sure people were alive and were where they were supposed to be, and you were not waking them up. It's exhausting to be the one person awake on the floor when everyone else is supposed to be to sleep. So part of my job was walking around and kind of kicking people on the in the shoes, say, "Hey, you look like you're you're hurting. Go walk around, take a lap, get a cup of coffee, go stretch, go do whatever you got to do to kind of wake yourself up. I'll give you a break." Um, and that's what leadership here is supposed to do, to admonish one another. It is so—and I talked about this so many Sundays—it is so easy to let life kind of pull you into a rut and let church and Christianity and your faith be something that's just on the back burner, that's something that just kind of happens, that we turn it into the common rather than what it is: a living miracle. When you have a relationship with Jesus Christ, when you have salvation in him, you are living a daily miracle. Today is 316, that you know it's uh uh, they call it, you know, John 3:16 day. Just remember this a quirky little thing, but remembering the gospel: there is no just "ah, yeah, I'm born again." You are born again to a living hope; you have new life in Christ; you are living a miracle. But life makes it so easy to kind of put those things on the back burner. "I got to run to the store. I got to go to work. I got to bring the kids to the recital. I got to go do this X, Y, and Z," and it it's so easy to put it on the back burner. But that's why we need to stir each other up and to stir one another up, and that's what part of leadership is. My goal on Sunday is not just to say, "Man, I hope they walk away saying, 'Man, what a great preacher,'" but to stir you up as you walk out the door to say, "Man, what a great God! I'm energized; let's go live for him!" And that's what the point of leadership is: is to equip and admonish the laborers as they co-labor together. And then he goes on; he even says more than that. So he identifies these two groups, and then he says, "And to regard them very highly in love, um, because of their work. Be at peace among one another." So he kind of says these two things in regards to both the co-laborer and the the leader: is to esteem them for the work, for what they're doing; praise them and thank them for it. You know, when you when you have co-workers, sometimes either your best friend are the most frustrating part of your day, because how many of us have worked with a coworker who says they do all the work and no one else does anything, and they seem to be always the one who never does anything when you walk in the room? I always noticed the person who complains the most is one who's generally doing the least. But here Paul is saying, ad um, to regard them in esteem for what they're doing. We talked about it a few weeks ago about bearing up with one another, and that yes, sometimes we grin and bear, you know, the frustrations of interacting with our church family because family is family, and family can be messy, and family has rough edges. We all have growing pains; we are all broken people being redeemed and being more like Christ each and every day. But he calls us to um, regard them highly for their work because what they're doing is God's work, even if they do it imperfectly, even if they do it and it's frustrating, even if you like, "Oh, man, like why do we have to do this again?" If they're doing God's work, praise God for what they're doing, even if you have to iron out some issues, even if you have to work on some uh, co-labor relations. If they're doing the work of the Lord, praise God for them, and to do it in love, again, not gritting and bearing it but in love. There's root in the work of the Lord; praise God for that, and to live at peace among yourselves. The benchmark is always if when enable live at peace. It's not always easy; it's not always perfect. There are sometimes where you have to take the high road, and they are going to show their their lack or their immaturity, but that's where we grin and bear with one another; that's where we lift the load; that's where we we we love as Christ is love; we forgive as Christ is forgiven because what the benchmark is: if under all possible live in peace. And there's going to be those rough edges, and there's going to be those co-laborer conflicts, but we lift each other up; we live—that's the goal—to live in peace, to admonish one another. And then he says, "Here's the responsibilities for these people, whether you're a co-laborer or a leader." He says this is in verse um, 14 to 15: "And we exhort you, brothers and sisters, to warn those who are idle." It's not just the preacher; it's not just the leader who's to warn and admonish each other. We're called to stir up those who are idle. If you see someone sleeping on the floor, kick them in the shoes and say, "Hey, do you need a cup of coffee? You need to take a lap." When we see someone idling spiritually, encourage them, admonish them, say, "Hey, look, you seem like you're in a rut. Can I pray for you? Hey, this this Devo I just read, it was a huge blessing to me. Hey, this worship song is really just engaged my heart this week; like I pray you're blessed by it." Stir each other up. If we are all coming to church expecting to give, not just to get, how blessed will we be? How much will we walk away so full and so enriched? So also says to comfort the discouraged. There's a reason that we are born again into this community, that we don't just do it by ourselves, that we share burdens with one another, that we share enjoyment with one another, so that we are not doing it alone, that we're not doing life alone. When we have friends, brothers and sisters in Christ who are mourning, we can mourn with them, and we can encourage them, even if it's just being with them. You know, take the lesson from Job's friends: of sometimes less conversation is more, but we can be each other's encouragement; we can be a blessing to each other when discouraged. We're not meant to do it alone; that's that's been the a major theme of this "one another" series is that we're not called to do it as the one; we're one another; we're a community. And this is the reason why we are born again into this community is because we were never meant to do it alone. "Help the weak" is the next instruction. We talked about that a few Sundays ago where we bear with one another, that we that we share the load, that we that we take on a little extra work, that we pave the way for the next generation, for the person going through the struggle, because we have all been that person with the rough edges. We've all been that person who is a babe in Christ. We've all been that person in a valley or in a struggle or in a storm, and someone in our family of Christ has borne the wait for us, has has lifted the load a little higher off our shoulders that we could move a little farther forward. Encourage the weak. "Be patient with everyone. See to it that no one repays evils for evil, but always pursue what is good for one another." We've talked about this several times through this series: not just looking to my needs but looking to the needs of others, thinking about how this affects other people, the think of how this could bless one another, not just being consumed with my retribution if someone wrongs me, looking to how this would be a blessing to everyone or how this would be a hindrance, to look outside of ourselves. This is what Paul is encouraging the Thessalonians to do and just as us as well.
Our second section here in verses 16-22, it says this: "Rejoice always. Pray constantly. Give thanks in everything, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus." Don't don't stifle the spirit. Don't despise prophecies, but test all things. Hold on to what is good. Stay away from every kind of evil.
So the first section, we see Paul talking about the church, the the two different groups: you're either co-laborers or your leaders, and this is how I want to see you engaging with one another. But then he gives more detailed instruction of how we are called to to live in the body of Christ as members of the church. And those instructions are simple: "Rejoice always." We of all people in the world should be some of the most joyful people, and yet sometimes we have more of a sour puss than anyone. We're still mourning even though we know how the story ends. We are still grumpy because everything in life is inconvenience to us, even though we know the blessings we have. I it's so easy, like I said, for life to swoop in, into eclipse, and to make you be distracted from the reality we have in Christ. And in some of those mornings, the first thing I try to think of before I even am able to do anything, before life tries to sweep in and steal and distract me, I wake up, I look out the window, and I said, "This is the day that the Lord has made; I will rejoice and be glad in it." This day has never existed, never will exist again, and yet God has specially made it full of blessings that have um, never been before or never will be again. Help me rejoice in that, just that that little 10-cent mindfulness of reminding me, "God, let me rejoice because there is plenty to be rejoicing in. Let me let me just be in awe of you because this is the day that the Lord has made. Morning by morning, new mercies I seek." Just remind me of this, God. So "Rejoice always." "Pray constantly." Now it doesn't mean—now some people have taken that very literally because we think of prayer, and we think of the active conversation between us and God. And yet we see over and over in Scripture that prayer sometimes goes beyond words and is just our presence in God. I love how the Bible says that you know he hears our prayers that are you know, just [Music] groans. This "praying constantly" is more than just the active conversation; it's the seeking presence of just God, just God, and just the the spiritual growing. I I can't describe it in any other better way than just seeking God's presence, and you just know you're approaching the Throne of heaven, and even though you don't have a lot to say, you're you're you're before Heaven. You're saying, "God…" He knows what that means; he knows it better than what I do, but it's just whether it's an active conversation, which those those prayer times are beautiful. Redeem the times where you think, "Hey, man, I don't have time to pray." We have commutes; we have commercial breaks; we have bathroom trips; we have cooking dinners; we have all these little moments where we can take them and redeem them to time of God. But also spending that time just in a constant presence, this that inaudible groan of God, just "Here's my stuff; I lay it at your feet because I don't know else to bring this to you. You tell me to cast my cares upon you because you care for me." Pray continuously. He then also says, "Give thanks always," very similar to the "rejoice always," but that giv giving thanks, I think of it is slightly different. Just the fact that the "rejoice always" is a kind of time of of prayer, and that thankfulness is that time of just appreciation. There are times where I can rejoice, and I'm not very appreciative. Saul and uh, Paul Paul and Silas, I'm sure were not appreciative of the chains, but they were rejoicing; they sang and they worshiped with all of who they were because their God was a great God. But then there's those times of thankfulness where you say, "Yes and amen," and you were just thankful for the blessings and mercies that you've received. Get a minute difference, but this is what he's called us to. And he goes on, and he says, "So this is what we wants us to do, and this is how we are to interact with God." He says, "Don't quench the spirit, and do not despise prophecy." Now we are not a Pentecostal Church. Um, if people who will come through the doors who are a little more charismatic or Pentecostal-sized, I will love the death out of them. My first church I ever worked in was a Pentecostal church, and I was the the Baptist boy, and we definitely had some different theological views on some things, and you could kind of have a longer conversation about the nuance of this when you talk about quenching the Holy Spirit or prophesying or all these things. But if you're going to boil it down, I want us to walk away with the fact that one, don't quench the spirit. Don't let legalism choke the root of our relationship with God. Like you say, legalism would say that that groaning to God, that's that's not prayer; that's that's that's some nonsense. Or if you feel the Holy Spirit is stirring in you, like, "I need to do something," as long as it is not against God's word and you feel that God has called you to do it, listen to what the Spirit is directing you. That idea of not quenching the spirit is being open to guidance from the Lord. Now some of us ask for a sign, and we use it to ignore the signs he's already placed in God's word. We have the big sign right here; search it daily. But sometimes we want that little extra sign, and then God gives it to us, and those don't necessarily contradict each other, but we always use God's word as the staple um, because his word, his Spirit wrote the word, and his spirit that moves in you is never going to contradict those the word. So use this as the litmus test. We talked about he also says um, "Don't despise prophecy." Again, it's similar with not quenching the spirit. If you feel God is just speaking a word over you, if something is just kind of given—not trying to move into mysticism—but that God is just pulling my heart towards something, you know, be open to doing what God has called you to do. My favorite people through church history—again, why I love history so much—have been dozens of people who felt the moving of the Spirit of God on their lives to go and do something, and yet the world and the leadership of the church said, "No, that's ridiculous. You you're you're being a fool; you're going against church leadership; like what are you doing?" And them saying, "I'm not trying to be disrespectful; I respect your authority; I've prayed on it, but I'm God's telling me to do it, and I need to do it." There was a woman by the name of Gladys Aylward who felt called to the ministry, and yet the missions board of her time said, "You're too old; you're too uneducated; you can do other things, but you can't go overseas." And yet for years she felt that's what she was called to do, and her heart just stirred up in her, and she's like, "Look, I I I listen to you; I respect you, but this is what God has called them to do, and I need to do it." And she went; she earned her own funds; she prayed and prayed until the door was open, and she went with nothing but a hope to go cross seas and serve the Lord, and she did amazing things. But it's that idea of being open to the moving of God. Of course, even in answering that, he says um, "But to test all things, hold on to what is good, and stay away from what is evil." Again, kind of ties into what we were talking about: the litmus test of the moving of the spirit. If the spirit says you need to go have a second wife, just like the the people of the Old Testament, you might want to take a second to say, "Well, hold on a second; what scriptures say? Let's let's test that." Like the um, the Bereans, when Paul came and preached, they went and they checked the word of God to make sure what he was saying was true. Test it because even if an angel of the Lord comes and tells you something different, test it against the word of God. But so that's that's his caution with that as well.
In our third and last section here, Thessalonians 5:23 through 28, he says this: "Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit, soul, and body be kept sound and blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. He who called you is faithful; he will do it. Brothers and sisters, pray for us also. Greet all the brothers and sisters with a holy kiss. I charge you by the Lord that this letter would be read by all the brothers and sisters, and that the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you."
Paul has talked a lot about how we as the church should interact with one another and interact with him um, with with God. And I love how he ends up his letter with telling them that, "God will completely sanctify you in body, soul, and spirit, that he who called you is faithful, and he will do it." So many of us feel—and it's very easy to feel this way—"I am just so far from God. You know, I I I'm I'm more the old man than the new man. I feel like I've spent all this time with God or pursuing God, and yet I am still wrestling with the same old junk. I just God, I'm supposed to be more like you."
And it makes it easy to feel like a failure, and you're losing the battle. But sanctification is not a one-and-one; it is a journey on the side of glory. And I love what he says in Philippians: that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion. You and I are just an unfinished Masterpiece on this side of Glory. Yes, we are still rough around the edges, and we still have many things to be done, and we are still not perfectly yet like Jesus. Yet His promise here, the end of this, is that He will Himself sanctify you completely, and that He who called you was faithful and will do it. One day, there's will be a day where we will look more like Jesus than ever before. But in the here and the now, that's what we strive through—to look like Jesus today.
Let's pray. Heavenly God, Father, thank you for this day. Thank you for all of who You are and who we are in You. Thankful that You are faithful and that You will accomplish Your, Your promises. I pray, Lord, that You would help us live like You amongst one another, that we would be a blessing to each other, that we would encourage each other, and that You would make us more like You each and every day, in the sight of paradise. We love You and praise You. Amen, and amen.