Chapter four. First Thessalonians four. I want to say a few words about divorce and remarriage. Because, you know, when I brought up the issue of the Pornia and First Thessalonians, chapter four, verse three, the sexual immorality, I tried to show that that's not exactly identical to adultery, my Kia, and that actually this work group Probably, I think if you look at all of it, you have to think that sexual immorality or porneia is a very large, if you think of a large circle for a semantic domain of a word, and it can have all these kinds of meanings, then adultery is only a subset within the porneia word family or domain. And so, moikia or adultery would be a form of sexual immorality, but it's not to be identified with it. It would be like the category of vehicle. If we have a vehicle and then I say a car is the term car identical to vehicle. Now, see, it's just a subset. It's one kind of vehicle. But you also have trucks, buses, other things that would also fit inside that semantic domain. And so basically what I want to do, because I had a question on this and several questions, actually, and what I want to do rather than just try to answer specifically these questions, I want to try to arrange something so that I won't just be sitting there chasing questions forever right now. Remember when you're trying to solve a theological issue. Your interest is in discovering what the text teaches. OK. Not reading into the text what you want the text to teach to justify whatever your action or behavior you've taken. So no I understand first of all that this is not an issue that is easily to resolve textually and the main one of the main reasons is because there are a lot of passages involved. I mean you know I can go through a list you know Genesis 1 Genesis 2 Genesis 3. You can go into Ezra 9, Deuteronomy 24, Leviticus 18, Malachi 3, Hosea, the first three chapters, Matthew 5, Matthew 9, Ephesians 5, 1 Corinthians 7, Revelation 21. There are a whole lot of passages involved, and all these have to be harmonized in one complete look. because God is a rational God, and everything that he thinks is coherent, and so it's not an easy issue to resolve textually. But the main reason it's not easy to resolve is because everybody has the natural tendency in an issue like this to see what they want to see in the text or to grab one verse that they think is going to support their position of whatever they did in life and justify it on the basis of that text. The bottom line is most people on these issues are not very good Bible students. But everybody at the same time wants scriptural authority for whatever they've done. So what you have to do is, of course, you have to train yourself to read the Bible to discover what it means, not what it means to you. OK, what it means. OK, because it doesn't matter what it means to you. It doesn't matter what it means to me. What matters is what it means. OK. And that's what God says. So being a pastor, one of the nice things is I have to approach the text that way because I don't just have a personal interest vested in this is just not me and my marriage, but actually, you know, I have to instruct other people on what they should do in their marriage. And so in that kind of a situation, what am I going to do? I'm going to say, well, you ought to do what I just do what I did. You know, I mean, I don't think that's going to fly very far. So what you have to do is you have to find out what God says, and you're going to tell them to follow what God does, not whatever, you know, I may have done. So there are four different views. And evangelicalism, let me make a, I forgot to make an announcement. And that's the, the shower has been moved to six 30 Tuesday night at Shelly Joffrey's house. So six 30 Tuesday night, Shelly Joffrey's house. Uh, I'm sure my hope, my wife, I think she'll be better by then. Okay. So look, there are four different views and evangelicalism today. Surprise. Okay. No divorce and no remarriage. Okay. view to divorce and no remarriage. View three divorce and remarriage for abandonment or adultery. In other words, if your partner abandon you or committed adultery, then then you have grounds for divorce and you can also be remarried. View for divorce and remarriage for a number of reasons. So go beyond abandonment or adultery would add all sorts of other things into that mix. OK, we have to find out, of course, what God says. In other words, what are all those passages? I mentioned Old and New Testament teaching about remarriage because there's a harmony to all these passages. It's very difficult to to reach, by the way. I mean, I didn't do this last week, OK? I've been working on this for a number of years because people came in with real life marital issues. And when you do that, you say, Lord, you know, I really have to understand what you're saying here. I even don't. First, you don't even know what all the passages are. You have to look at. And then you have to go through and you have to grammatically analyze and you have to historically analyze and you have to logically analyze them to see if there's coherence with other passages. And you have to put it all together into a harmony. OK. So there's a whole lot involved. And most pastors, I think, frankly, don't go to teach a whole lot of it. And you know why? Because it's just way too much involved to go into. I mean, one week you're going to be in Malachi 3 and next week you're going to be in Ezra 9 and next week you're going to be in Matthew 5. You know, and there's just so much involved. It could take for a long, long time to go through all these things. And I think that's why it's not just seriously taught many, very often. So what I'm going to do, and I'm going to tell you what I think about these four views, and I can't defend everything I'm saying here because of what I just said. OK, but if you want a class on this, I'm going to put the ball in your court. OK, after I finish First Thessalonians, I will come back if you want me to, and I'll go through all the passages. OK, but if you don't want to know, you just want to know what I believe, and that's fine. I'm going to tell you right now. Then I'll have a few very important words to say after this. OK, after I state my position. When all the grammatical, historical, theological and logical analysis is complete, I believe the scriptures teach you to. OK, so let's go back. OK, you two is divorce and no remarriage. OK. I didn't say you had to believe this. OK, I want you to go do your own study. OK, this is what I think the Bible teaches. OK. Divorce and no remarriage, even though marital separation or legal divorce may be advisable under some circumstances. And I think that it may. Jesus taught that his disciples should not remarry after divorce, Matthew five thirty two and nineteen nine and ten. Why? Well, because it would be contrary to the nature of marriage as God designed it at creation. Quote, The two shall become one flesh. Genesis two twenty four. and a violation of the Sixth Commandment quote you shall not commit adultery Exodus twenty fourteen. If separation or legal divorce occurs it should be done with the sincere hope and aim that reconciliation would be possible eventually. First Corinthians seven eleven in the case that reconciliation does not occur they must remain unmarried. The New Testament allows Christians to remarry another Christian after divorce only an event that marriage at the marriage has been dissolved through the death of one of the partners partners. The Roman seven two to three. First Corinthians seven thirty nine. And first Timothy five eleven to fourteen. All right. My position being stated let me say a few words to those who are remarried into all of us frankly for the same principles involved. I think Christians who are remarried can get very emotional about remarriage, because they think that if it's wrong, they're committing a habitual sin or are living in sin. The Bible does not address this issue directly. However, it is very helpful for me personally to use David and Solomon as a model to think through this and related issues. First Kings chapter 11 verse six states that in the final analysis, David followed the Lord fully. He was a man after God's own heart. Yet. The record we have of the sins that David did. Is far less than Sterling is it not. How can David who committed sexual immorality and murder received the divine analysis that he followed the Lord fully. Now David is helping us to understand what God is looking for in our lives. OK. God is not looking. First of all, what is he not looking for? He is not looking for sinless perfection in your life. He already found that in one person, and that is the life of the Lord Jesus Christ. What he is looking for in your life are believers who, when they sin, are sensitive enough to their sin to confess their sin, get restored, and persevere in the faith until the end of their life on earth. So God is very interested in us persevering to the end. Not to go to heaven, but that's how he wants us to live. This is God's will for your life. Paul himself prayed that he would keep the faith and that he would run the race to the end. When he reached the end of his life, he said, I have finished the race. I have fought the good fight. I have kept the faith. Now this perseverance is what the Lord is looking for. And that is the perseverance that David gives as an example. OK, he confessed he was restored and he persevered until the end. Now, as a contrasting example, it says in the same verse, first Corinthians, first Kings eleven six that Solomon did not follow the Lord fully. Now, if Solomon did not and David did, then what is the one distinguishing mark between David and Solomon? Answer. OK, it isn't that one sin and the other one didn't. OK, they both sin. The difference lies in the fact that when David sinned, he confessed he got with the program. He persevered in the end of his life. When Solomon sinned, he stayed down. He did not confess and he did not get with the program. He failed to persevere to the end of his life. And I hope that through that a remarried person can find encouragement to press on. OK, now, if I were you. OK, and my spouse were still living. OK, and I would not, you know, and I was remarried. I was remarried and my spouse, ex-spouse, was still running around. I would not run around beating myself up and worrying if I was going to be accepted by every other Christian group. OK, I would admit to people, yes, and remarriage is a sin. It's a sin of adultery, and I have confessed that when it came to my knowledge. And now I'm striving to live a life like David. I'm trying to persevere until the end of my life in faith. Now, the thing is, see what happens. See, life just happens, right? I mean, you're going along in life and most Christians, we don't know the Bible, what it was saying about this issue and something happened in our life. And so whatever happened, happened. And now we're having to live in this in this fallout of this thing. So that's why I say just pay attention to David. OK, that's not you're not aiming for sinless perfection. OK. You're aiming to get back with the program and persevere to the end of life. Now, if you ask me, Jeremy, well, what would you have done 15 years ago on this issue? I would have said, well, yeah, I would have been very wishy washy on the issue. I wouldn't have been able to make any kind of a solid biblical case. I wouldn't even know where the passages were 15 years ago. If you were to ask me now, now that you studied this and other related texts and you tried to understand the grammar and the history and the logic and all that of it, all theological points, I would say this. All right. If Robin left me. OK. You can put this in a safe deposit box if you want to hold me to it if it ever happens. OK. Because I'm putting it on the line. This is what I think the word of God teaches is what I'm going to do. OK. If Robin left me or we got a divorce for any reason, whatever. OK. Sexual immorality, whatever. Abandonment. It doesn't matter. I would strive for reconciliation. If we could not be reconciled, I would remain unmarried for the rest of my life until she died. Now, if she died at some point, okay, that's point B, then I would be free to remarry, okay? A believer, okay? I would be free to remarry a believer. I don't know if I would or not, but the point is that that is what I would do, okay? So, if you want to know more about all that and how it all works, you have to make a special request, and if I get enough special requests, then I'll think it's justified, and we'll do it. Now, if you'd open your Bible, the first Thessalonians chapter four. We want to look at the final call to excel still more by extending love to others. And a problem in the church about a certain group that was not loving others. OK, they were meddling in other people's business and they were they were lazy and so they wouldn't go out and earn a dollar and they were just borrowing off everybody else. But before we get into all these things, we want to review what Paul has to say about sexual immorality in 4, 1 through 8. Paul recognized that sexual immorality is a key battlefield in the Christian life. I might repeat that because I know you're just getting warmed up to the text. Paul recognized that sexual immorality is a key battlefield in the Christian life. And the early church also recognized this is a major battle facing the early church. Today, the church knows that it is a major, major battlefield, and some groups, of course, are doing things about it, but most just want to be silent on the issue and act like it's not a problem. I guess because we're afraid it might step on somebody's toes or we might be labeled as politically incorrect. If that is the case, then, of course, that church's love for Christ has grown cold. Paul says in verse 2 of 1 Thess 4, For, you know, what commandments we gave you by the authority of the Lord Jesus, for this is the will of God, your sanctification. OK, and then he targets sexual immorality definitively that you abstain from sexual immorality, Paul thought abstinence from sexual immorality. That is, since we defined sexual immorality, Pornia last week is abstinence from sexual contact, whether it be verbal or physical outside of a marriage contract. OK. Now, the verb abstain in verse two is in the middle voice. It means hold yourself back. It's a command to an individual person to hold themselves back, to distance themselves from it. It's a verb of distance, and it means you have to make a conscious effort to distance yourself from sexual immorality. I mean, if you have a problem with this, don't go driving around the red light district. I mean, it's about the stupidest thing you could do. I'd slap you silly, OK? If I saw you there, I'd slap you silly, OK? And I'd usher you home. I'd pay the taxi fare or whatever, OK? The reason that you have to distance yourself from it is because it's so tempting. It's very alluring, okay, and it's very easily accessible in today's society. If you think you can flirt with it, you're just dead wrong, and I'll tell you that too, and I'll slap you silly, okay? I'll slap you silly some more until you get it. You're fooling around with fire. You're playing with it. It's a mess, and you're going to blow up, okay? So you need to distance yourself from it, that middle voice, abstain, Because once you get close to it, it can draw you in. It's going to trap you. And it's very difficult to get out of. OK. Christians can get into this kind of a thing and get addicted to sexual immorality to the point it dominates their life. And then for the rest of their life, they struggle with it. It's a life issue. OK. So it's just very difficult to come out of once you've fallen into it. OK. Difficult and not impossible. Not impossible. With God, all things are possible. So it is possible to get out by learning to walk by the spirit more and more and more. And that's why Paul says excel still more here. In other words, let's let's say that you were enslaved to sexual immorality. OK, well, what has to happen if you're in that situation? Well, the first thing is you have to actually be convicted that what you're doing is sinful. And you'll be surprised that a lot of these people don't think it's sinful. OK, I just read you a quote last week from the W.O.W. Conference of what, 1993? group you group of the ecumenical Christians getting together, saying that a threesome can be just as sanctified as to some. So I mean, don't be surprised. OK, these people put all their rationalistic spin on the whole thing and try to justify it. OK, so it's a lot of work just to try to get somebody convicted of their sin, first of all. So and that's because these people, when when you get involved in heavy sin. your conscience begins to black out. Okay. And so you start trying to justify everything. Well, you know, my spouse wouldn't give me as much sex as I wanted. And that's why I do it. And it's all excuse of the sinful flesh. Okay. It's not her fault. I mean, what are you doing? You're doing the same thing Adam and Eve did. You're just blame shooting with everybody else's fault. And if everybody would just cater to all my desires, I'd be fine. I wouldn't get into it. Baloney. Okay. So it may take God disciplining you, you know, lower in the panel to wake you up to the fact that you have a serious problem here and you've got to get out. So after you're convicted, then you can confess. And here we're talking about genuine confession. I mean, there is true confession and false confession in the scriptures. False confession is just going through religious motion. You know, it's just I'll just say a bunch of words, you know, hot air and baloney talk. And a lot of times the people that are doing this, this is their this is their whole approach to 1 John 1 9. Well, I've got this sin out there and I really want to do it. So but you know what? I got 1 John 1 9. So I'm going to do that sin. And then when I get done, I'm going to come back and go to 1 John 1 9. I'm going to say that's baloney. I'm going to come and I'm going to slap you silly. You know, wake up. Hello. That's not the way it works. OK. God is not fooled by this little I'm going to go through some religious gimmicks game. OK. It doesn't work that way. It has to be genuine. You can go through all the religious motion like that. You're not going to get restored to fellowship. OK. So there has to be true confession, genuine heart confession that, you know, I sin against God and God alone. Then you're restored. And then you need to start growing spiritually, studying the word, learning to articulate the Christian faith to other people. That really helps you learn it. And you really are going to have to start doing that. If you're not, it's just going to be harder to grow as fast. And then you're going to be doing what Paul is saying. You're going to excel still more. Now, what function is Paul interested in accomplishing through excel still more? What does he want this to do for the believers? What he wants than to do is excel still more. Why? Because it's going to build a protective hedge around you. OK, it shores up your faith, it creates sort of an insulating barrier around you to protect you from falling into these kinds of sins. And if we don't excel still more and we get really lazy and lax in the Christian life. And you know what? You're opening yourself up to the dangers of these sins, like sexual immorality creeping in that destroy to such a great degree everything around you. OK, so Paul says excel still more. Paul is saying, you know, you really got to stay on top of your game as a Christian. You've got to push further, grow more, because that's going to build a greater insulating barrier around you to keep you from falling into these sins. And Peter teaches the same thing in his epistle. By way of analogy, if it helps you, go over to the sports realm like we did last week. You know, I was an athlete. If I was a football, I told Robin, if I was a quarterback, man, everybody would be in his place, okay? And that's true, okay? I really think that's true. You know, people will come from everywhere. He's a quarterback. He's a believer. You know, blah, blah, blah. OK, but I was just a soccer player. So, OK, so and anyone knows, let's see if I lived where? If I lived anywhere else in the world, we have the doors, you know, breaking down because we want to see this guy juggle a soccer ball and teach theology at the same time. Now, I was an athlete and anyone who knows, who's a good athlete, knows that it's easier to get to the top, to get to the number one position in, say, a sport like tennis, than it is to stay on top. OK? It's much harder to stay on top. And the reason is simply everybody is gunning for you. OK? And they're hungry. They want to be at the top. And you've already made it there, so you've had your hunger satisfied, and now you kind of get lax. And you don't practice as much. You don't work on your game as much. You stop improving as much. And then before you know it, somebody's done what? They knocked you off. OK? That's why if you see an athlete that is able to stay on top for a long time, that's a person that you want to study. OK, if you're an athlete, because he's not just going through the motions. OK, behind all that is a lot of hard work. OK, he's improving. He's excelling still more. And that's why nobody can knock him off. So that's the kind of Christian you want to be. You want to keep working hard to learn more of the word of God and to put it to work in your life, improving your game, learning to walk by the Holy Spirit. And this will build up an insulating barrier to keep you from getting knocked off. So that's Paul's point with his whole Excel still more bit. You know, it's like layoff, Paul. Could we just get a break here? No, Excel still more, he says. And I'm not going to give you a break either. I'm going to say just keep going. Excel still more because I don't give myself a break either. OK. I know when I get lax, you know, when you get lax, OK, Excel still more. So let's see more of it in four, nine through 12. OK, don't ever get complacent in the Christian life or really try not to, because you have enemies out there. And I gave you a little handout this week that covers all the doctrine of sanctification. The bottom left corner, you'll see the enemies. You have three of them. They're not very nice fellows. OK, they're the world, the flesh and the devil, and they are very hostile to your sanctification. It's a never ending battle. I mean, they never want to let you get up. OK, and they're not going to quit until you either die or you're raptured out of this world. We'll talk about the rapture next week. So don't get complacent, because the moment you do, what's going to happen? You're going to be cruising along and all of a sudden You're going to get blindsided, OK, and it's not going to feel good and it's going to hurt. And everybody around you is going to be like, Holly, I wish they'd been on their game because now everybody has to hurt. That's right. And then all the Christians are going to pick up the ball and they're going to bear your burdens. Why? Because they love you. That's why. But they're going to do it. Doesn't mean we like doing it, but we're going to do it because when we fall and we get blindsided, we're going to you're going to do the same for us. Right now. Verse nine. Now, as the love as to the love of the brethren now, as that's Perry Day in the Greek, whenever Perry Day is used by Paul, it means Paul saying, I'm going to shift the subject now. So I've got a new subject now and the new subject is the love of the brethren. Now, this is one word in the Greek text, Philadelphia. It was used exclusively in Jewish and Greek culture to refer to love between siblings, brotherly love, sisterly love. It's the kinship of blood. But Paul took this word that was used exclusively of blood brothers and sisters, and he applied it to those who are blood brothers and sisters in Christ. He saw that strong a connection between believers when we come to Christ. We are now siblings. OK, we are in a new family because we've been purchased by the blood of Christ. We are all kin in Christ. And Paul wants to show us what love is not not what love is, excuse me, but how to love one another as in Christ as brothers and sisters. OK, so this section is about how brothers and sisters in Christ are to love one another, not what love is, how to love. Now, as to the love of the brethren, you have no need for anyone to write to you. And he's he's he's that's a pretty nice commendation. It's kind of like, well, you don't even have to write it. I mean. that that. Thank you, Paul. It's so nice that you would write it. But why did you write it? If you didn't have to write it? I'll explain in a minute. He's about to enter into what we call a gentle rebuke and versus ten B through twelve. He's going to rebuke a subset of the church in Thessalonica, not the whole church. There's a majority of the church and they're practicing Philadelphia. He says, you know, I don't even have anything I need to write to you guys versus nine and ten. That's that's all about the majority. They're doing it. Their Philadelphia love. But there's a minority in the church that are not practicing Philadelphia love. OK, versus 10 B to 12, I mean, these are obnoxious, lazy mooches, slouches, OK, and in the church. And this is his first rebuke to them. He's going to allude to them again. If you look over at 514, you'll see. OK. Do I admonish the unruly, you know, encourage the fainthearted? I mean, there's some the idea in that verse of the Greek words is there's an idol group. You know, they're just sitting there, you know, thumbing their fingers. They don't work. They're lazy. And then in the second letter to the Thessalonians, Paul's going to give them a much stronger rebuke, because they still haven't corrected the behavior. And that's over in chapter three of the second Thessalonians, verses six to 15. OK, so chapter three, verses six to 15. So we have a section here that has as its great context, this Philadelphia love. And most of the church at Thessalonica is practicing that. But in the context, you know, there are certain subset of the people that are in the church that are not practicing Philadelphia love. And Paul wants to get them straightened out. So the majority of the church is being addressed in verses 9 and 10a. Now, as to the love of the brethren, you have no need for anyone to write to you. You say, well, if it's not necessary to write, then why did you write this to him, Paul? Why waste the ink? I mean, paper and ink were not cheap in the first century. Why would you spend all this time to write this whole verse? Well, exactly, because he's trying to set up a rebuke. For the smaller element of the church, it's all a setup. For you yourselves are taught by God to love one another. Look at the words taught by God. It's a word that Paul coined. You know, we always say he coined the word theopneustos, you know, the word for inspiration or God breathed. Here's another word that Paul coined, theodidactos. Theo for God, T-H-E-O, didactos for teach, D-I-D, we get the word didactic from it, right? D-I-D-A-K-T-O-S. Theododectus, it's used only here. It's not even used in the early church, even after in father's writings and so forth. What it refers to is the teaching ministry of God, the Holy Spirit. See, when we come to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, God, the Holy Spirit comes to indwell us instantaneously. And part of this teaching curriculum is that we love one another. This is one of the things that he wants us to do. So this is a different word for love. And then used in the beginning of the verse. First, it was Philadelphia right at the kinship love, brotherly, sisterly love. Now it's Agapao love. And he's using the words synonymously in this context, so they don't always are not always synonyms, but it refers to an affectionate family love like a sibling love. All siblings don't love one another, but they're supposed to. Right. And that's the whole point. OK, God, the Holy Spirit teaches us to love one another because we're all in a new family now. Think of how great the family is that we have entered into. It includes all the believers at this present time on earth. But more than that, all those that stretch back to the day of Pentecost are our fellow brothers and sisters in Christ. I mean, this is one big, great family. And we're going to talk about family reunions in the next few weeks in the following verses. You know, what about those family members who have been brought into the body of Christ and they've been severed from us? They've died physically. How and when is the reunion to be restored to this family. So this all sets the context for that for. And here he's giving an explanation or proof for indeed you do practice it toward all the brethren who are in all Macedonia. He's saying look I look at the majority of the Church of Thessalonica and here's evidence that God teaches us to love one another. It's that you indeed do it. I mean, how else could we explain that you have done it for all the people in Macedonia if God the Holy Spirit didn't teach you to do it? Now, one observation we want to make about this is that this is brotherly love that goes far outside of Thessalonica. Thessalonica was a city of about 200,000. I forgot to get my map to put it up here. But if you have a map of Paul's missionary journeys in the back of your Bible, then you should see Thessalonia or Thessalonica on the second journey map over in Europe. just on the west side of the Aegean Sea. Thessalonica was a big city. I mean, 200,000 people. It was a port city. It was a commercial city. It was the center of the Roman government in that province. So it was a very influential city. And Macedonia is a very, very large area. And I meant to show my map, but I forgot it. It has other cities like Apollonia, Amphipolis, Berea, and probably Pella and Bitola. And they're all in Macedonia. But what I'm saying here is that Paul had planted churches in several of these towns and what happens. He got he Paul would go all the major metropolitan areas and some of the smaller towns and he preached the gospel. He'd form a church there. He'd train or disciple the believers and then he would leave. And what he expected was that the believers in that town would trickle down into the rural areas and you'd see little churches sprout up and smaller surrounding towns right and villages. And so that's what he's hoping for. And here's what he's saying is, you know, you've done this toward all the brethren who are in all Macedonia. I mean, Paul looks back. He says, I went on a certain track. But, you know, there's other towns out there that now have churches, too, because the believers in those cities that I went to now went out to other cities and they founded churches there. And I'm getting reports from Timothy that you practice love toward all of them. We say, how could the Thessalonians be practicing love toward all the Macedonians? I mean, they're going door to door, village to village. No, they're not. Because Thessalonica is what? It's the port city. It's the commercial city. It's the seat of the Roman government in that province. Therefore, what? Everybody goes to Thessalonica. If you're going to take a boat trip from Macedonia anywhere close to Thessalonica, you're going to go to Thessalonica, get on a ship and go out. So when they arrive, they don't know anybody in Thessalonica. So now they say, you know what? We've got believers there. I mean, Paul went there, too. He established a church there. Let's find the believers. They find the believers. What are the believers in Thessalonica doing? They're showing hospitality toward these believers. They didn't know him personally, but guess what? They were now in the same family. They were siblings. They had kinship in Christ and they were to show Philadelphia love to them. That's what God, the Holy Spirit taught them to do. And so that is why they had such a great testimony in chapter one, verses six through 10. Remember, chapter one, verses six through 10 is the great testimony. He says, you also became imitators of us and of the Lord, having received the word in much tribulation with the joy of the Holy Spirit. So that you became an example to all believers in Macedonia and in Achaia. Look at that. For the word of God or the word of the Lord has sounded forth from you, not only in Macedonia and Achaia, but also in every place your faith toward God has gone forth so that we have no need to say anything. They themselves report about us what kind of a reception we had with you and how you turned to God from idols to serve a living and true God and to wait for a son from heaven whom he raised from the dead. That is Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come. See that great testimony. was going forth and sounding forth in all Macedonia and Achaia and even further, because everybody came to Thessalonica and passed through. And here was this nice, beautiful, hospitable group of believers. Never met them in their life, and they're offering Philadelphia love to them. Hospitality. Now, we should follow their example, of course. We should love all the brethren, whether they be in Fredericksburg, Harper, Mason, Llano, San Saba, Johnson City, Austin, San Antonio, anywhere in the entire world. because a lot of people do come and visit this little town called Fredericksburg, and they'll come and a lot of times they'll come into this church. And normally they're believers because I talked to him and they kind of set it up. They wanted to come here. They already knew they were on the Internet looking at the web or something. And they're like, this is the kind of church we want to go to. And a lot of times they'll come every year and you'll meet them over and over and over. But what hospitality would we show them? What testimony can we give them so that when they go back to wherever they're from, they take a testimony about what's going on in Fredericksburg. That's what he's talking about. That's what the Thessalonians were doing. This is what God, the Holy Spirit teaches us to do. Verse 10b. OK, but now we're going to shift. But we urge you, brethren, to still excel still more. In other words, he's been very nice. I mean, this is one of the nicest ways I've ever seen anybody kind of work into a rebuke. You can hardly detect it. I mean, unless you kind of know some of the language and it's sort of in the Greek, it's sort of like sneaky. It's like a sneak attack. I'm going to sneak one up on you. OK, but there's this little group in the church, you know. OK, so in other words, he gave him a great kind of commendation. But there's this little problem element in the church. There's a group that are not loving others. OK, they were mooching off others. They were lazy. OK, they didn't want to work. And so they were a drag on everybody else who did work hard. Why might they not be working? We don't know. I mean, I have to speculate a little bit here, so don't take this as the final word. But I mean, all places have lazy people. But what Mike Paul has taught that made them think, you know, we don't really need to work anymore. We just be lazy. Well, Christ could come at any moment. I mean, if Christ is going to come next week, I mean, why work a job this week? You know, who cares? So apparently some of them may have taken this as an excuse. Well, we don't need to work anymore. will be raptured next week. But that's a misapplication of the doctrine. OK, why? Well, because we don't know when we're going to be raptured. I mean, they were a little bit wrong. It could be next week, but it could be 2000 years from now. So Christians should never avoid his responsibility to work for the glory of God just because he thinks Jesus is coming next week. That would be a wrong deduction from a right doctrine. So he's appealing to this lazy element in the church and he gives them four imperatives in verses 10 and 11. They're really infinitives in the Greek, if you study that thing out, but you'll see if you work on the if you know Greek really well, then you'll understand that an infinitive can be used as an imperative. And it is here in verse 10. We urge you to excel still more. OK, so there's the urgent urging. And that's the strong, strong verb here, which controls basically everything. And he's looking back to verse one, because what did he say back in verse one? He also urged them there, the word exhort in verse one is the same one used here. Par Kaleo in verse 10, and it means to urge strongly. OK, and then he also says in verse one, what at the end of the verse, he says, Excel still more. What does he say in verse 10? Excel still more. So he's looking back to verse one and giving similar commands. And he's looking at this one problem element in the church. They're taking advantage of others who are loving. And what we have here is not what you would expect, unfortunately. With all the positive things that Paul has said, now all of a sudden we have commands that don't seem to fit all the positive things about this church. So it's this strange little group. In verse 11, he commands them, make it your ambition to lead a quiet life. You know, people who are lazy and don't have jobs tend to disrupt everybody else, and the reason is because they have a lot of dead time on their hands and they get bored and then they're knocking on your door and they're bugging you and you can't get anything done because who is this person? I mean, what are they doing here again? I mean, this is like a nuisance. I can't do anything. So Paul says, make it your ambition or consider it an honor just to live a quiet life. The idea of the quiet life, that word is like a peaceable, orderly life. You know, people that don't don't have anything to do, they often don't really have very ordered lives either. I mean, it's pretty disorderly. OK. And so he's saying, get your life in order. And then he's going to explain how, because You know, as it is right now, they have no order in their lives. They're disrupting everybody else's life. He says, and attend to your own business. See, that's one way you can do that. You know, we'd say if we were to translate that in our day, would you just mind your own business? OK, get out of mine. OK, but out, go somewhere else, make yourself useful. OK, somewhere. So these people were in everybody else's business. That's not loving. I mean, you can say, well, I came over, I visited you. That can be loving, yeah? But when it's this kind of thing, you're bothering everybody, you're just butting into everybody's business. Visiting is not loving. It's butting into other people's business. OK, so part of loving others is staying out of their business, Paul says, and attending to your own. This also relates to some of the gossip passages, you know, don't be a gossip. I mean, if you if you have to know the latest and greatest about every person on Facebook or Twitter every five minutes and you got to peer into their lives and find out what they're doing. You need to go get a life, OK? That's a short, very nice rebuke. And then he says, to elaborate, he says, work with your own hands. You know, not only attend your own business, but get a job. That's the way we go. Get a job. Would you get a job? Get out of here. Go fill out some resumes or something. Go fill out some interview applications or something. So these people have all kinds of time on their hands. And it wasn't because they were wealthy and they didn't have to work a job. It was because, well, we quit our job, you know, and we're going to mooch off those who do work. And they're very generous anyway. They can support us. And we give them an opportunity to love. We're even giving them an opportunity to love us. Paul says, no, get busy, do something productive, produce something for a change. Stop being a mooch. Now, this is one of the things that kind of I think I think it's a gracious aspect of God's curse on nature. You know, when man fell and God cursed man because of sin in the garden. The very next thing he did is he cursed nature, and he said, Now nature is going to rebel against you. And you're going to go out and you're going to try to take care of the garden, Adam, but you know, guess what? It's going to rebel against you. It's going to be thorns, it's going to be thistles, it's going to be sweat, you know, physiological changes in your body. And all of this, you know, animals aren't going to just go along with whatever you want. When you want to use them to plow your field, they're going to, you know, they're going to not budge every once in a while. And it's going to be very frustrating. And that means it's going to take you 10 hours to get done what you could have got done in one hour if you hadn't had all these problems in nature. And see, but the problem, what I mean by being gracious is this. Let's say God set it up and he didn't curse nature and you go out and you get all your work done in one hour every day. That's all you have to do is one hour of work. And then you got the rest of the time, free time. I'm going to tell you, this world would be a total wreck. OK, the worst thing that fallen men can have on their hands is a lot of free time, because all they're going to do with it is bother everybody else. OK, OK, it's one of the blessings of the curse that there's this inefficiency in our labor and there's no inefficiency. Well, it would the world would be the place even more full of gossip and chaos and horror and destructive crimes, because people would have all the time in the world to think of how they do it better next time so they don't get caught. Then he concludes in verse 11, just as we commanded you, in other words, he's saying this isn't new. When Paul went there, Immediately when he began to teach this thing over the first month or two, people began to quit off their jobs. Jesus is coming. We'll just sit down. We won't do anything. And Paul says, no, you guys got to you guys got to work. He had obviously taught that when he was there. Now he says, you know, we already commanded you this. OK, so they weren't obeying it, you know, and now he has to write this because they're still not obeying it. You know, it's the same thing that goes on with all Christians, right? You give the word. To the people, you tell them the word of God and what do they do? They stare at you. They stare. And that's what happens. OK, they're not going to change. OK, they're going to do the same old thing. Oh, that was a command. Oh, I'll get to that later. You know, when when it fits my schedule. No, today, get with the program. OK. Why? Verse 12. Two reasons why they should get with the program and why we all ought to. Two purpose clauses. Number one, so that you will behave properly toward outsiders. You know, that's your witness to the world. The world is watching and the world should be watching the church. They should be watching to see. We ought to live. We ought to be so far above reproach. They can't get anything on us. It's like I loved it when I went to that creation museum up in Kentucky because the thing was so well done. I mean, down to the you know, the parties, you know, the place was spectacular. You know, I was like, now this this is a place you can come in here. You can get upset with the content because you believe in macroevolution and the whole big bang theory and all that cosmic evolution, you can get upset over the content, but you can't get upset with any way that place is run or the people that are running it. It is just being run at top notch. We ought to be totally above reproach because the world is watching and they should be watching because our lives should be different. And if all we do is gossip and slack off, what kind of testimony is that? You think you're going to win people to Christ if that's you? You think you're going to sit down with your co-worker at lunch one day and you're going to go, I'm going to tell them about Jesus today. I've been working this up for six months. I'm going to, I'm going to do today, today, today, today. And you start and Jesus died for your own sins. And they're going to laugh in your face. They're going to laugh in your face because your life is no different than theirs. Why do they need Christ to do what you already do? Slack off. So they're going to brush you off and I don't blame them one bit. Paul says live an ordered, quiet life. Mind your own business. Work hard. Then you're in a position to sit down over lunch and share Christ. Then you have something to say more than just empty words. Then the last reason they should get with the program is that you will not be in any need. You know every Christian. According to Galatians six is to carry his own load. It's not that there are times when we we need others to help us carry the load. OK, to carry other people's burdens. There are times like that. But generally speaking, you know what? Each needs to carry his own load and not be a burden on everybody else. Even Paul himself, when he was in Thessalonica, if you look back at chapter two, verse nine, you see that he carried his own load. In other words, he was laying down an example. In verse nine of chapter two, for you recall, brethren, our labor and hardship, how working night and day so as not to be a burden on any of you. You know, he had to make ten, you know, he had to provide a living until somebody provided goods and services from outside of Thessalonica so that he could just teach the word full time, you know, and we shouldn't slack off. You know. That's not the way it works, OK, everybody ought to carry their own law, their own Pack their own load. It's wrong to slack and mooch. You know, we have a lot of problems with this today, and I won't go into all of them because we're running out of time. But it's such a problem. They made a movie about it, you know, about a guy who's 38, you know, no job, you know, plays video games all day long, you know, and they're very good at video games and they're good at that boy. I mean, OK, they're child men, OK, and they're mooches. OK, and you've got to cut them off or they'll never grow up. They'll just slack, they'll just keep slacking, mooching and sleeping till noon, OK? And the work ethic these days is a wreck. OK, it's not it's no wonder we have economic problems. You got to work, OK, to produce something of value. To build an economy, you just have to do that. And you have to stop government spending, yes. OK. In conclusion, see, Paul is commending the body at large from Thessalonica for their love for all the brethren. I mean, their testimony as a whole as a whole is fantastic. Everybody comes to Thessalonica. on their way to wherever they're headed. But one small group in that church is taking advantage of all the others. OK, they bother everyone. A bunch of gossips, you know, metal in everybody's business. They won't lift a finger to earn a living. And that's not love. And Paul's saying you cannot. And that's not what true love does. That's not how God, the Holy Spirit teaches you. That is abusing other people. And Paul is upset with the abuse. But like so many believers, guess what? You know, this little contingency, this little element, they're not going to do anything about it. They're just going to keep on and Paul's going to have to get a little bit nasty in the next letter. So I guess I guess that's what you do if you if you get real nice with believers and you kind of cushion them and say, here's what you need to do and they don't do anything, then you have to get nasty with them. OK, finally, OK, and it's not fair to you if I don't come on, comment on one more thing as we conclude. This whole section that Gordon read the last two weeks in verses one through 12 is chock full of what's called an infinitive. I mean, usually we say when we translate an infinitive, it's like to something. OK, to whatever. OK, to agree to disagree, whatever. Those are infinitives. And the reason that he's using so many infinitives in here in this section is because this is all very urgent. Now, why is Paul thinking that all of these things are so urgent? Why is he urgently appealing to them? Because this letter is about the coming of Christ. This letter is that about the fact that Christ could come at any moment. That means you need to be living like this today. OK, not tomorrow, not next week, not next year, not whenever it gets convenient for you. Paul lived every day like this is the day that Jesus Christ is coming for his church today, right now. And if you do that, you know what you will have if you live that way. You will have nothing to be ashamed of at the judgment seat of Jesus Christ. Now, we live 2,000 years later, and you know what? We have lost that way of living. We have lost that sense. Oh, you know, this is the attitude. This is how we wake up. Jesus probably isn't coming back today. I mean, gosh, it's been over almost 2,000 years. That's our attitude. That's the way we live. And you know something? I'm telling you right now, it shows. I'm not telling you specifically, I'm talking about the Church of Jesus Christ in general. OK, it may be you. It may not be, but I'm just saying is the generality. It shows you can tell. And every one of you knows what I'm telling you right now, I'm just pointing it out. OK, we've lost the sense that Jesus Christ is coming today and I'm going to wake up today and I'm going to live like he's coming today. But if we did that every day, I guarantee you would make such a tremendous difference. You wouldn't understand. You wouldn't even recognize the church. It would be a totally different looking organism. OK, the productivity level of our lives would skyrocket. I mean, it's like Paul. I mean, the guy, you couldn't stop the guy when he walked, you know, rather than taking the boat. You know what he did on those walks? He took believers and he trained them on the walks. You know, the guy worked night and day as we just read, because he loved the word of God and he knew that Christ could come at any moment. And if there was a person's life he could touch with the gospel, that was another person who would be resurrected unto eternal life and not resurrected into eternal damnation. There are a lot of people on this planet, about six and a half billion of them. You know, there was a lot of people before the flood. How many do you think got on the ark? Eight. Millions on a very conservative Population growth rate scale were alive on earth before the flood. Eight got on that ship. Eight. I'm afraid today we have similar type proportions with six and a half billion people on the planet. How many of them do you think are going to be resurrected unto eternal life and be in Christ? Well, we ought to live as if Jesus Christ is coming back today. And if I don't get to talk to that person today, it could be over. I know one thing. We wouldn't be sitting on the couch eating and watching TV for five hours a day. I can guarantee you that. I can guarantee you we'd be out like Paul, preaching the gospel, preaching the good news of Jesus Christ, studying to show ourselves the proof, thinking, you know, I've got this person I'm working with and they've got issues and I've got to figure out how I can communicate with them. What are my ends with this person? Let me think about past conversations I've had with them. What did they say? What did they not say? What did we address? What did we not address? What needs to be addressed so I can get this person to understand the gospel and come to Christ? OK, anyway, that's all the point of the infinities in verses one through 12. Paul is writing with great urgency, great expectancy, because Christ can come at any moment. And he says, don't just give up sexual immorality next week. Do it now. OK. Don't just start getting a job. You know, maybe I'll do that next month. Do it now. OK, live in the Christ. Don't just stop gossiping, you know, gradually. You know, I'll do that in a few weeks. Right now, I've got to finish this one thing we're in. No, stop it right now, because Christ could come today. OK, now, since he's coming at any moment next week, we'll start to get into that great truth in verses 13 through 18. Let's close with a word of prayer.