Well, we finally come to the conclusion in our study of 1 Thessalonians. The church in Thessalonica was planted during the Apostle Paul's second missionary journey. And because of persecution, he could only stay with them for a short while. He was driven out of Thessalonica, and when he eventually got settled in Corinth, he wrote this epistle, which makes this one of Paul's earliest letters. The purpose of the letter was to help this fledgling church better understand the return of Christ and to live properly in light of that return. One of the delightful aspects of this particular epistle is Paul's deep affection for the Thessalonian church and the great esteem he had for them due to the fact that they so quickly made real progress in their Christian walk. So it's been a joy to work through this letter. And it's been my intention to immediately move right into 2 Thessalonians, but I've decided to pause. But when we do get to 2 Thessalonians, which was likely written just a few months after 1 Thessalonians, some similar themes will emerge, but the apostle will have to deal with them from a slightly different perspective. We're going to see that persecution actually intensifies, and alongside that there were false teachers who were trying to deceive the church and challenge the things that Paul had taught them. And Lord willing, we'll get to Second Thessalonians in early fall. What I want to do over the next few Lord's Days is a study on corporate worship. I think it'll be helpful to remind ourselves why we do the things we do in worship. And if my records are correct, the last time we actually had a series specifically on corporate worship. Excuse me, it was 2014, so that's quite a long time ago. So this will give us an opportunity to understand what we do and why we do what we do in worship, and most specifically to understand we are not traditional in the sense of doing things the way it's always been done in the past, as though history and tradition are the foundation we look to, but we really do seek to worship in a way that's So we're going to begin that next week. And one of the things I hope to do in this study is come at worship from a slightly different perspective. I not only want us to think about what we do when we come to worship God, but I want us to think also about what God does to us when we come to worship. And that's an element that's sometimes missed. Again, next Lord's Day. But for now, it's time to wrap up our study in 1 Thessalonians. So let's pray and we'll get to work. Pray with me once more. Our great God, we thank you for your eternal word. We're thankful, oh God, that Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever. So his word is true yesterday, today, and forever. We pray this truth, the truth of the passage we look at today, will bless us and help us to see something of the majesty of our God. We ask this through Jesus our Lord. Amen. If you would please open your Bibles to 1 Thessalonians 5. 1 Thessalonians 5. We're going to read verses 23 through 28. Our main text this morning. We'll be verses 25 through 28. But let's start reading in verse 23, in Paul's wonderful benediction there. Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit, soul, and body be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, He who calls you is faithful, who also will do it. Brethren, pray for us. Greet all the brethren with a holy kiss. I charge you by the Lord that this epistle be read to all the holy brethren. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. Amen. There ends the reading of God's holy and inspired word. May he bless it to our hearts this morning. Dearest congregation of our Lord Jesus Christ, this final section of 1 Thessalonians highlights how important the pursuit and growth of holiness is in the Christian life. After a bullet point list of Christian duties and attributes in 1 Thessalonians 5 verses 12-22, Paul speaks this benedictory prayer to and over the Thessalonians that God would continue to transform their whole person in sanctification. And what Paul wants more than anything else for this young church is that they continue to make progress in godliness by the power of the Holy Spirit. And that means that they would continue to live more and more unto righteousness and die more and more unto sin. And of course, this is no small charge that Paul's giving the church. And he understands that the Thessalonians, even though they're something of babes in Christ, will know that that's something completely unattainable in their own strength. So the apostle gives them this incredible word of comfort that God himself will sanctify you. He'll preserve you blameless at the coming. of the Lord Jesus Christ. He's begun a good work in you, and he's going to carry that work on till Christ appears in glory. And at that moment, our lowly bodies, they'll be translated to glorified bodies, and in that moment we'll be fully sanctified. And then Paul speaks a glorious word of promise to the Thessalonians and to us. He who calls you is faithful who will also do it. And this really is a marvelous comfort. I mean, we sometimes sing these words in a hymn, prone to wander, Lord I feel it, prone to leave the God I love. And we sing that because the old man in us and all the remaining sin that's in us, it's a war with the new man. And sometimes it feels like we're never gonna be able to make it off this battlefield. Paul wants us to know no matter how fierce the battle seems, the victory's completely won for us by Christ. And God will preserve us. Isn't this good news? He who calls you is faithful, who will also do it. And that's where we pick up this morning. Now Paul has four final exhortations for the church, and I'm going to summarize them using four simple words. Pray, kiss, read, and grace. Pray, kiss, read, and grace. So pray. Look there at verse 25. pray for us. Now you may have noticed this, but the apostle uses that word brethren three times in these final verses, and he actually uses it 17 times in this relatively short epistle. And it says something very tender to the recipients. This idea of brethren is the language we would use for brother and sister. Paul's saying to them, you're part of God's family. You're brothers and sisters within the household of faith because they're united to Christ and belong to Christ. They're united to and belong to each other. So it really highlights the intimate family relationship that ought to characterize the church. And we're going to come back to that in a moment and consider demonstrations of affection. But first, the apostle has a request for God's family. He wants them to pray for him and the other missionaries. Now, it's worth remembering that at least three times in this letter, he's told the church that he and the other missionaries are praying for them. Back in 1 Thessalonians 1 verse 2, Paul wrote, we give thanks to God always for you all, making mention of you in our prayers. Then in chapter 3 and in chapter 5, there's a record that Paul and the missionaries were praying for the believers in Thessalonica to advance in holiness. But now Paul's saying, guys, well, he probably didn't say guys, that's a paraphrase. But he's saying, Thessalonians, pray for us. We really need you to pray for us. And I'm sure you know this isn't a one-off for the Apostle Paul. He was constantly asking God's people to pray for him, and for a host of reasons. In Romans 15, verses 30 and 31, he offered this prayer request to the churches in Rome. I appeal to you brothers by our Lord Jesus Christ and by the love of the spirit to strive together with me in your prayers to God on my behalf that I may be delivered from the unbelievers in Judea and that my service for Jerusalem may be acceptable to the saints. So the apostle wants prayer for his physical safety from those who would persecute him in the area of Judea, and he wants to enjoy rich and satisfying fellowship with the saints in Jerusalem. In 2 Thessalonians 3, verses 1 and 2, he makes this plea for prayer. Finally, brothers, pray for us. that the word of the Lord may speed ahead and be honored as happened among you and that we may be delivered from wicked and evil men." So he's asking that the Lord will bless the preaching and teaching of his missionary band and his teaching and preaching in particular, that there'll be conversions that will be evident among his preaching and teaching just as there were conversions evident when he preached and taught among the Thessalonians. And again, he's praying that God's hand of protection would be over his ministry to keep evil men from harassing him or in some way subduing his ability to proclaim Christ and him crucified. He made a similar request to the church in Colossae. He found in Colossians 4, three verses, three and four, Paul made this request, pray also Pray also for us that God may open us a door for the Word, to declare the mystery of Christ, on account of which I'm in prison, that I may make it clear, which is how I ought to speak. So Paul wants the Spirit to go before him, open and prepare hearts to receive and believe the Gospel, and he prays the Lord will make his teaching easy to understand. And the apostle even prayed for courage. Excuse me, the apostle even asked the Ephesians to pray for him to have more courage. Listen to Ephesians 6, verses 19 and 20. Paul says, make supplications also for me, that words may be given to me, and opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of the gospel, for which I'm an ambassador in change, that I may declare it boldly as I ought to speak. It might be hard for us to envision this, but even the brave and heroic Paul needed God's power to embolden him in gospel ministry. Now think about what this means. As a missionary and as a theologian, the apostle Paul had no equal. And yet he knew with 100% confidence that the only way his ministry would thrive and prosper was with power from heaven. And he knew the way we gain access to heaven's power is by prayer. And so he was regularly saying to God's people, join in my ministry, labor with me as I proclaim the gospel, and do so on your knees, because my ministry needs the power of God, and I want you good folks to call the power of God down. So Paul says, brethren, pray for us. This is something our dear old brother Charles Spurgeon knew well. Like Paul, he was a man of extraordinary gifts and abilities, but he knew he needed heaven's power for those gifts to have maximum effectiveness. So listen to what Spurgeon wrote. Sorry. All hell is vanquished when the believer bows his knee in supplication. Beloved brethren, let us pray. We cannot all argue, but we can all pray. We cannot all be leaders, but we can all be pleaders. We cannot all be mighty in rhetoric, but we can all be prevalent in prayer. I would sooner see you eloquent with God than with men. Prayer links us with the eternal, the omnipotent, the infinite, and hence it is our chief resort. Be sure that you are with God, and then you may be sure that God is with you. Not everyone could or would be called to the kind of ministry that Spurgeon had in the 19th century, but this dear man knew it was prayer that pressed back the advances of hell, and it was prayer that catapulted God's ministers and God's ministries forward in history. In another place, Spurgeon said to a group of theological students, your ministry will ultimately be decided on the knees of the saints. The point is, Paul teaches us that every church leader, every ministry leader ought to be regularly saying to the family of God, out of necessity, brethren, pray for us. That brings us to our second word, kiss. Glenn said verse 26, greet all the brethren with a holy kiss. Now I should say the imperative in this verse is greet. And the idea of greeting here is more than simply saying hi. It means offering an intentional and personal expression of affectionate, brotherly love. And in this instance, the family greeting Paul's calling the church to involves a holy kiss. And this isn't the only time the apostle tells the church to greet with a holy kiss. in Romans 16, in 1 Corinthians 16, and in 2 Corinthians 13. In 1 Peter 5, Peter exhorts the church to greet one another with a kiss of love. And frankly, the Bible speaks a lot about kissing. I want to mention five ways that you find kissing in the Bible. And this isn't exhaustive, it's simply to drive home that the Bible places no small significance on the act of kissing. Again, it's not comprehensive, but just enough to give you the sense that the Bible places no small significance on the act of kissing. So first off, a kiss in the Bible, it can be a romantic gesture. You find that in places like Song of Solomon. It says in Song of Solomon 1 verse 2, let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth for your love is better than wine. So that's a romantic kiss. And likely that's the first kind of smooch that comes to mind when you and I think about it. But it's hardly the only way it's used in the Bible. Second, a kiss can be a demonstration of submission to authority. In 1 Samuel 10, when Samuel was anointing Saul to be the first king of Israel, he poured oil over his head and kissed him. It was a sign of submission that Samuel was placing himself under Saul's authority. And of course in Psalm 2, there's the universal command, kiss the son lest he be angry and you perish in the way. This is a kiss of submission offered to God's Messiah. Third, sometimes kisses are acts of betrayal and deception. In Proverbs 7, the crafty harlot grabs and kisses a gullible young man before she leads him to the slaughter. And of course the best known example of a kiss of betrayal was the kiss Judas gave to Jesus on the night he was betrayed. Fourth, a kiss can symbolize forgiveness. and reconciliation. An example of this would be how Esau greeted Jacob when he returned home. You'll remember that Jacob, having hoodwinked Esau out of his blessing, was afraid that when Esau saw him coming, He would want to exact revenge on his brother, but that's not what happened. It says in Genesis 33 that when Esau saw Jacob, he ran to him and he met him and he fell on his neck and he kissed him. It was a kiss of forgiveness and reconciliation. Or think of the prodigal son. After he had squandered his portion, of the family inheritance in riotous living. He returned back to his father, hat in hand, fully expecting a rebuke. And instead in Luke 15, what happens is the father runs out to meet him, falls on his neck and kissed him. So there's such a thing as a kiss of forgiveness and reconciliation. And then fifth, a kiss can demonstrate a tender, loyal, covenant relationship, which I do believe is what Paul has in mind here. An example of this kind of kiss could be found in the relationship between David and Jonathan. You'll remember Saul. was hounding David because of jealousy and desperately trying to kill David. But Saul's son, Jonathan, remained faithful to David. And you have this very tender scene in 1 Samuel 20 where Jonathan pledged his devotion and loyalty to David and covenanted with him. And in 1 Samuel 20, 41, they sealed that covenant with a kiss. And we're told there that the nature of their covenant relationship with each other was based on their covenant relationship to Yahweh. David said to Jonathan, Yahweh is between you and me. And this certainly can be said of Christians. We're in covenant with each other because we're in covenant with Jesus. And that kind of intimate fellowship, The kind of fellowship that's depicted in a kiss ought to be demonstrated by God's people in genuine acts of affection. And a holy kiss, you probably know this if you've studied a bit of church history, a holy kiss became the norm in the early church. And it frequently took place after the Lord's Supper had been celebrated. Believers would partake of one bread, indicating that they're one body. And after communion, there would be kiss kiss might be on the cheek might be on the forehead it might be on the lips interestingly it was typically men kissing men and women kissing women and it was a visible way to demonstrate genuine affection you might think of it this way the kiss was a way to seal the bond of love within the body of Christ it meant this body is unified we're at peace with God and we're at peace with with one another. And did you notice there in verse 26, it says, greet all the brethren with a holy kiss, all the brethren. How much animosity there was in the early church between Jews and Gentiles. Sometimes it's presented to us as though any kind of racial animosity is something that maybe began to exist in America in the 17th century. But that's just simply not the case. It's always been a problem in the world. It should never have been a problem in the church. And Paul's saying, Jew, Gentile, if they're in the family of God, don't treat them any differently. Give them a kiss. Unless, of course, they eat anchovies. I'm paraphrasing. Now, if they look different, if a person comes from a different background, if they're in Christ, they are part of your family. And we ought not to be shy in demonstrating affection to one another. And let me say, Although I feel miserable today, you can probably tell. It's actually a happy providence of God because it ensures none of you will be inclined to give me a kiss after the service. But let me say, if I feel great next week, still don't give me a kiss. That's not how we demonstrate affection in our cultural moment, is it? But let's not make the mistake that the one hand shake, pump and dump that we do, that that communicates the kind of intimacy that ought to exist in the family of God. If our greeting and our affection with brothers and sisters in Christ is no different than the way we would greet an insurance salesman at our front door, something's off, isn't it? He has to be sure there are appropriate and inappropriate ways to do affection between men and women and so on. And those boundaries have to be minded to be sure. But we can't let those boundaries diminish Paul's exhortation, greet all the brethren with a holy kiss. And let me say, one of the things COVID robbed from our precious senior citizens who were in assisted care facilities was the gift of Touch, the gift of touch. They couldn't have a husband, a wife, a son, a daughter, a grandchild come and hold their hand, rub their brow. And God has hardwired us to communicate affection by touch. And it ought to be part of what we experience and lean into as the family of God. Well, that brings us to our third word, read, read. Listen once more to verse 27. I charge you by the Lord that this epistle be read to all the holy brethren. This is an amazing statement. First of all, Paul writes this when he says, I charge you, he writes it in the first person singular, which indicates that he's now writing these words. with his own hand. Normally he would use a stenographer or a secretary. But it's as if he said, give me the pen. I want to make sure the Thessalonians understand the significance of this and that they don't miss the gravity of this charge. So he writes it in his own hand. And in addition to Paul writing these words, notice that he's putting them under oath. Now the New King James doesn't quite get the force of the language. The ESV actually captures this best of our various modern translations. And here's how they translate it. 27, I put you under oath before the Lord to have this letter read to all the brothers. He's putting them under oath. oath by the Lord. So in the strongest possible terms, the Apostles telling the church, the whole church must hear this letter. I'm putting you under an oath before our God. Now there are a couple implications we can draw from this. First, the apostle understood his official authoritative teaching was nothing less than scripture. That's why he can insist it's read without qualification or caveat. Think about this. If I wrote a letter to your family, you might be inclined to say, well, it's from Pastor Byrne, I'll read it and I'll read it to the members of my family. But if I said, I put you under oath before God, you must read that letter. to your family, you'd think I was off my rocker suffering from illusions of grandeur. Paul isn't at all conflicted about this directive because he knew he was communicating God's revelation to God's people. You see, when the Jews gathered in the synagogue during Paul's day, a significant part of their worship was reading God's word. And what's Paul saying is now, when the church gathers, You need to read this because it's God's Word. And it's worth mentioning that even Peter acknowledged that Paul's epistles were divine scripture, 2 Peter 3, 15 and 16. So that's the first implication. The force of Paul's charge tells us this letter is scripture. I was gonna work out some information on the canon of Scripture, but I'm gonna bypass that for time reasons. Another implication is the importance of the public reading of Scripture. And isn't that exactly what God's people need in every generation? Dear ones, more of the Bible, more exposure to the truth of Scripture. And how many heartaches and divisions and separations would there be if people really started from the Bible? That's not to say that good godly people can't come to different conclusions, but if we at least start at the same point, we cover a great multitude of the errors we address. We need the truth of Scripture to ground our lives. When Jesus was in the shadow of the cross, he prayed to his father. In John 17, 17, Father, sanctify them by your truth. Your word is truth. And throughout this epistle, 1 Thessalonians, one of the ways Paul has evaluated the faith of these new believers was in regard to their relationship to God's word. So for example, back in 1 Thessalonians 2.13, He said to them, for this reason, we also thank God without ceasing, because when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you welcomed it, not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which also effectively works in you who believe. You see, for Paul, that was evidence of a genuine faith. And now Paul's saying when you gather as a corporate body, make sure you read this letter publicly and read it out loud because you need to get more of God's Word in you. And of course in this particular situation, it would have addressed the struggles and the challenges that this church faced. For us, dear ones, if we're constantly reading the Bible, in our homes to be sure, in our families to be sure, but in all the appropriate public gatherings, if we're reading the word of God, eventually it will cover every need and every struggle and answer the questions we need for life and godliness. So read the word, get it in you, and make sure it's read publicly, particularly in the church context. One of the last things Paul told Timothy in 1 Timothy chapter 4 is, until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture. That's why in our liturgy, I'm explaining to you constantly, this is where the call to worship comes from, this is where the responsive reading comes, this is where the law of God comes from, this is where the assurance of pardon comes from. so that you understand all these things we're reading and doing. It's actually reading scripture. To read the word, read it at home, read it by yourself, but read it out loud, read it in public whenever it's appropriate. Paul wraps up his letter with what is actually his most common benediction and found at the end of all his epistles. Verse 28, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. Amen. Dr. Duncan writes, grace is God's free gift to us in Jesus Christ. That He lived for us a life that we couldn't live. He died for us a death He didn't deserve so that we might receive a forgiveness for which we did not pay and receive an eternal fellowship with Him that we did not deserve. All at His expense, freely given. That's grace. It's also worth mentioning, I think, that the Reformed speak often of the importance of a means of grace ministry. And the primary means of grace are prayer, sacrament, and the Word. And isn't it interesting that just before this, the three exhortations that Paul gives has to do with prayer, brethren pray for me, an allusion to the Lord's Supper, that's where the kissing took place in the first century, and read this letter publicly, prayer, sacraments, and word. Well, let me wrap up with this. John Stott wrote, very helpfully I think, if a local church is to become a gospel church, It must not only receive the gospel and pass it on, but must embody it in a community life of mutual love, and nothing but the grace of Christ can accomplish that. And so that's Paul's departing blessing, the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with you. Amen. Let's pray. Father, we thank you and bless you for your word. We're thankful that it's powerful in the lives of your people. We're thankful for incredible grace gifts we have in Jesus Christ. We pray that that grace would saturate our lives, our interactions with one another, and that the way we lean into grace, would be demonstrations to those around us that we've been saved by grace. As it worked powerfully in us, we ask in Jesus' name, amen.