If you have your Bible tonight, would you open to 1 Thessalonians chapter number 2. 1 Thessalonians chapter number 2. We've been a couple months now in the book of 1 Thessalonians. We started the last time in chapter 2. As we came to a conclusion of chapter 1 and had a really good study in the first chapter of this great book, I hope that you have been reading it and keeping it fresh on your thoughts, in your mind. And tonight we're going to pick up in chapter number 2 again. We looked at verse number 1 last time as we talked about the theme of a ministry that was not in vain. And we traced some of that along in the New Testament, that idea from the Apostle Paul. So tonight we're going to pick up again in chapter 2. And just for context, I want us to look in verses 1 through 12. We'll read all of it. We're not going to get through all of it, but I want to have it in our minds just for context. Chapter number 2, verse 1. For you yourselves know, brothers, that our coming to you was not in vain. But though we had already suffered and been shamefully treated at Philippi, as you know, we had boldness in our God to declare to you the gospel of God in the midst of much conflict. For our appeal does not spring from error or impurity, or any attempt to deceive. But just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel, so we speak, not to please man, but to please God, who tests our hearts. For we never came with words of flattery, as you know, nor with a pretext for greed. God is witness. Nor did we seek glory from people, whether from you or from others. But we could have made demands as apostles of Christ. But we were gentle among you, like a nursing mother taking care of her own children. So being affectionately desirous of you, we were ready to share with you not only the gospel of God, but also our own selves, because you had become very dear to us. For you remember, brothers, our labor and toil. We worked night and day that we might not be a burden to any of you while we proclaimed to you the gospel of God. You were witnesses, and God also. How holy and righteous and blameless was our conduct toward you believers. For you know how, like a father with his children, we exhorted each one of you and encouraged you and charged you to walk in a manner worthy of God who calls you into his own kingdom and glory. You'll remember that the church at Thessalonica was a church that was planted on Paul's second missionary journey. Paul had been traveling in the Mediterranean world and the Spirit of God led him to go to the southern border of Europe to a place called Philippi. And some amazing things happened there. There was a church that was planted there in Philippi. But because of persecution, Paul and his ministry companions, they ended up traveling westward about a hundred miles to this city of Thessalonica. And of course, this was a very important city. It was on the path of the Ignatian Highway and it ran east to west in the southern tip of Europe. You can get on a map and you can see that. And it was a port town. Of course, it was linked to the GNC. So it was a very important city, a highly populated city, a very busy city. A lot of Greek and Roman influence in that city. Very important place. But it was also a pagan place. Very pagan. And the Thessalonian church, along with the church at Philippi, were both planted in the fires of persecution. God gave favor as the Apostle Paul and his team went to preach the gospel. There were many people that were converted. Two churches were planted. But it was so severe that the Apostle Paul and the men, they couldn't stay. They were driven out of these places, so they were only there for a very, very short time because of that persecution. But Paul, with his pastoral heart and his love for these believers, he ended up sending Timothy to go back. after things had cooled down just a little bit. And he went back. Paul wanted him to go and check on these believers and see how the church was doing. So he went back and he was able to talk to them and he was able to get a report. And he came back to the Apostle Paul and he told them about their condition. And so as we look here at this letter from the Apostle Paul to the Thessalonian church, this is the Apostle Paul's response to the information that Timothy brought him from the report as he goes back to see those believers. Paul couldn't go there, so Timothy did and he got a report about it. Now in chapter one, when we study that chapter, you'll remember that Paul gives one of the highest commendations that you find all in the New Testament as it concerns a particular local church. And what we glean from that is that the Thessalonian church was a church that was on the right track. We argued from chapter number one that this church really was what we could call a model church. It was a persevering church. It was standing strong, even within the fires of persecution. And so there were many, many lessons that we can learn as a local church by looking at this model, by looking at this example. But now as we've transitioned over into chapter number 2, as we began last time, We see that Paul begins to describe, now get this so you can find the connection here, Paul begins to describe the kind of ministry that led to the kind of church that you read about in chapter 1. So you see that in chapter 1, you say, wow, that's an amazing church. Well, Paul says, alright, here we go in the next part of the letter, let me explain to you the kind of ministry that we engaged in that produces this kind of church. And so there's a massive lesson for us by way of implication. And that is, if we desire to be the kind of church of chapter one, then we need the kind of ministry in our church in chapter number two to produce that kind of church. So it's a massive connection. Many, many lessons for us from these two chapters as you read them and think about them. Now in chapter 2, the text that I just read to you, verses 1 through 12, and even Paul really, he goes on in this section all the way really through chapter 3 talking sort of in some of the same terms that he does here. There's many themes that he takes up. But you stand back and you ask the question about the text that we read. Why is it that Paul is explaining to the Thessalonian church why their ministry was not in vain. Why is it that Paul is describing the kind of ministry that they engaged in? I mean, it's interesting. If you look in this section that we read, verse 1, he says, "...our coming was not in vain." Also in verse 1, he says, "...you yourselves know." In verse 2 and in verse 5, he says, "...as you know." Verse 9, "...for you remember." Verse 10, "...for you are witnesses." Verse 11, "...for you know." Now, in just a few short verses, why is it that Paul is going through all this rehearsal? Why all of this remembering together? It's as if he's wanting the Thessalonian church to sort of take a stroll down memory lane with him. So why is he doing that? Why is he talking about all of these different things that they already know? Why rehearse it? Why talk about it again? Well, the answer to that is that Paul is giving a defense of his ministry against those persons who would seek to discredit the work that went on with this church, with these people. He's answering charges. You could say that the Apostle Paul is combating opposition. And the way that he's combating that opposition is he's taking a hard look and reminiscing about the ministry itself as a justification of the genuineness of the ministry. That's interesting that he would do that. That when a church is attacked, when that ministry is attacked, when the leaders are attacked, the way that the Apostle Paul defends that is to talk about the genuineness of the ministry. There's a sense in which we all know that the Bible stands on its own two feet and a true gospel ministry stands on its own two feet. As Spurgeon said about the Bible, you don't have to defend a lion. The Bible is like a lion. Just let it out of the cage. And sort of in the same way that a true ministry has a way of kind of defending itself. It stands on its own two feet as a result of the work of God and in through the people. And so that's what's going on. So get the situation in your mind, the context of what's going on here. Paul comes into the town. They preach the gospel to a lot of people. The church has started. But he's not there very long. I mean his stay is short and his exit is quick. And after they leave, What happened here, most commentators believe, and even in church history we find, that it seems as if there were a group of people that came behind the Apostle Paul and the ministry team and began to discredit their work. Because again, they were there in short order. And here's these other groups that's coming behind, trying to put a wet blanket on everything that was going on. And so the things that the Thessalonian church would have been hearing from these groups about the Apostle Paul and his friends was that they couldn't be trusted. That Paul was the kind of man who was a fake, he was a phony, he was a fraud. Those are the messages. This is what the Thessalonian church would have been hearing. You know, I think we should take note that anywhere there's true gospel preaching or a true ministry that's taking place, there's going to be satanic opposition to that ministry. The devil is always seeking to overthrow the work of the gospel. Anytime there's souls on the line, The devil is very active. I mean, the Bible teaches that lost people are of their father, the devil. And anytime his kingdom is threatened with the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, I mean, he takes up arms against that. And one of the ways that he seeks to do that is to discredit the message that's preached and also the messengers of the message. You go back, as you think again, of the Garden of Eden, and you think about how Satan went against Eve, and what was the temptation. Has God really said, let's challenge the message, let's go against the Word that God said. That is Satan's chief tactic, is to, has God said, is to challenge the Word of God. And that's exactly what he ends up doing after the Apostle Paul and the team leaves. Spiritual warfare. As a matter of fact, if you look at the end of chapter number two, look in verse 17 and following, Paul says, But since we were torn away from you, brothers, for a short time, in person, not in heart, we endeavored the more eagerly and with great desire to see you face to face. Paul's just saying, we were torn away from you because of persecution and we wanted to come back and see you face to face. I wanted to come to you. I, Paul, again and again. And then what does he say? But Satan hindered us. So Paul, even in this letter, is recognizing the reality of spiritual warfare and the activity of Satan that comes against a true and a genuine work of God. That's the tactic of the devil. Again, mark that down. It's very important. He attacks the message and he also attacks the messengers. As a matter of fact, you continue to read on in the New Testament. Think of the Apostle Peter. If you think of his first letter, the Apostle Peter is dealing with attacks that come against God's people from the outside. Persecutions and difficulties that come against God's people. But then when you look in 2 Peter, What's Peter dealing with? He's dealing with attacks that come from inside. And so the devil seeks to attack the people and the work of God from any direction that he can. He comes against God's people from outsiders. He comes from insiders. Sometimes his attacks are frontal attacks. They're visible attacks. They're not hidden. And then other times those attacks are secret and they're hidden. And he tries to assault the people of God by taking them by surprise. He's very crafty. He's the devil. He's Satan. He hates God. He hates His Word. And so what Paul's doing here in chapter number 2 is this is his defense against the attacks that are coming against these people after they left. These people that are saying, Paul is a fraud, he's a phony, he's a fake, he's trying to take advantage of you. And so Paul is trying to authenticate the Word by talking about the authentic nature of the ministry. That's the theme. That's the theme of this whole section. Now with that said, the first thing I want to point out to you here in verses 2 through 4 is that Paul wants to talk about the message behind the ministry. Again, if he's going to talk about the authentic nature of the ministry, he's got to talk about the message because everything in gospel ministry surrounds the gospel. The gospel is a message, isn't it? It's the message that we proclaim, the message of the Lord Jesus Christ and Him crucified. And everywhere you look in the New Testament, as Paul is writing to these various churches, he's always wanting to talk about the gospel, isn't he? I mean, Paul is one of the ones who shapes our understanding of what the gospel is all about. And that's what he did when he wrote to these different churches. We've already seen some of this in chapter 1, but here it is again in chapter number 2. He's going to talk about the message of the gospel. And as he talks about the gospel in verse number 2, Paul wants to talk about the price that he and his friends paid to preach the message of the gospel. Look in verse 2. He said, But though we had already suffered and been shamefully treated at Philippi, as you know, we had boldness in our God to declare to you the gospel of God in the midst of much conflict. Paul talks about, as they were ministering the message of the Gospel, they endured suffering, they endured shameful treatment. So you have, again, when persecution breaks out against the people of God, these are some of the experiences that are going to take place. There's suffering, there's personal harm that comes, there's shame. Lost people seek to heap shame and embarrassment upon the people of God. Paul and his men certainly endured that. And Paul's talking, he uses the word conflict. And so at every turn, every time they tried to preach the gospel, everywhere they went, they're meeting opposition, they're having conflict. That's the way it works when you share the gospel, isn't it? I mean, so many things, so many distractions, so many obstacles in getting the gospel to people. And if you don't know that, it's just because you haven't tried to get the gospel to people. You get out and you start evangelizing and sharing the message of the good news of Jesus Christ with people. And I promise you, you're going to run into obstacles. You're going to have hardships. You may endure a certain amount of suffering or shameful treatment at least. I say so many times here in America, we have protections that allow us to be able to share the gospel. And so the kind of persecution we have here in America is somewhat limited in comparison to what our brothers and sisters in other parts of the world endure. But nevertheless, lost people are still going to try to heap shame and contempt upon you. And I think the reason that Paul is doing this is because he wants the Thessalonian believers and us who would read this letter to see that this enduring of these difficult circumstances says something about the message that they preached. Maybe you can make that connection there. What's he saying here? At least, at the very least, one would have to deduce that the Apostle Paul and the ministry team, that they themselves really believed that this message that they preached was true and genuine. If they're willing to undergo persecution and difficulty, you know that they themselves, at the least, they believed it. And of course, at the best, and the truth is that it really is true. And it really is genuine. It is a genuine message. It's a message that's given by God, as we'll see here in just a little while. So, I think Paul's reasoning is, why would we suffer? Why would we endure all of the things that we endured if this message was not a true and an authentic and a genuine message? You know, that's very instructive for us. To think about the mindset of the Apostle Paul, we endured this suffering because we have something important to share with people. This is the words of eternal life. This is a true and a genuine and an authentic message from God. And we will even put up with great difficulty in order to get the message out because this message is beneficial to men. It's saving and it glorifies the God that we adore. I mean, can you say that about yourself tonight? Is that your mindset about the gospel? Do we have this same mind that I'm willing to endure personal affliction and personal difficulty for the sake of the gospel, for the sake of the Lord Jesus Christ being lifted up and glorified? That's a pretty good test for us to kind of pass through tonight, to think about it, to challenge our own life. We need to have the same mind as the Apostle Paul. that we're willing to undergo persecution and difficulty and conflict for the sake of the gospel. So Paul says, look, it cost us to preach the gospel. As one preacher said, as he was talking to other preachers, he said, boys, sometimes you get paid to preach the gospel and sometimes you gotta pay to preach the gospel. Are we willing to endure both situations? The Apostle Paul certainly was. Now in verse 3, he starts talking about some of the specific charges that were being made against them. And you'll see the first one there in verse number 3. He says, "...our appeal does not spring from error." So evidently, these people who were coming alongside after Paul had left town, They were coming along to these believers and to others and they were saying, look, the Apostle Paul and these men that came, they blew through here, you know, they were just here for a little while and in and out. These guys, you need to understand that they were in error about the things that they told you. They were sharing things with you. They were sharing ideas with you and thoughts with you. And these things were in error. And this word error, it has the idea behind it of wandering away from the truth. Kind of like a little child with his parents who wanders off maybe away from the parent and gets in the woods maybe or in tall corn and gets lost. They wandered away from the parent. Or like a boat that's docked and the ropes break loose and it begins to drift away from the dock. It wanders away. And so these people were saying, the Apostle Paul, they wandered away from truth. Well that, I think, brings up an interesting question because you have to ask this question, what truth have they wandered from? Because who were these people that were coming behind the Apostle Paul? They certainly weren't gospel preachers. So you have to ask, what was the idea of truth that these people were saying the Apostle Paul and his men had wandered away from? Well, who was it that was there in the city of Thessalonica? Well, we know that it was a pagan place, heavily influenced by Greek and Roman culture. Also, there was a community of Jewish people there, so you would have had some Jewish people who weren't orthodox in the sense of a proper understanding of Old Testament. You remember, by the time of Jesus and by the time of the Apostle Paul, a true understanding of the Old Testament had been perverted by the religious leaders in the nation of Israel. And as these Jews wandered around and were in different places, they weren't holding to the true message. So you could say that there were pagan ideas that were flooding the particular city and also false religious ideas of truth. Again, you have pagans and false religionists. And so you would have had all of these pagan notions of the truth. Now just think with me for a minute. The Bible tells us in Romans chapter 1 that God has given knowledge to all men that He exists. I mean everybody the world over has knowledge of the one true God because God has revealed that to men in general revelation. The Bible says that His attributes are clearly seen. We say it so many times but there's no such thing as an intellectual atheist. They don't exist. The Bible says the heavens declare the glory of God. We know that to be true. We understand that. But the Scripture says that what man does, he takes that knowledge, he suppresses the knowledge of God, he exchanges the truth of God for a lie, and then he begins to develop his own system, his own grid, his own paradigm, his own way to process the world, his own worldview that pushes God out, replaces it with lies, and he begins to serve the creation or the created order rather than the true Creator. So, pagan notions of the truth. You can see this in Greek culture, Roman culture, even all the way back to the Egyptians. And you can see all of their false gods that are made in the image of man. And you can look at all of that and you can see there's plenty of evidence out there that show us what pagan people do with natural revelation without special revelation. And so they get these wacky ideas of truth. All these false gods. And if you've read any of that Greek mythology, Greek gods, any of that stuff, you understand what I'm talking about. And you don't just have to look to the Greeks or the Romans. There's people alive today that have not received the true message of the Gospel and they take natural revelation. They do the exact same thing. You can talk to missionaries who've gone and spoken to people groups that have never encountered other people other than their own group. They do the exact same thing. And so these are the kind of people that are coming to the church at Thessalonica saying, Paul and his team, they've wandered away from the truth. From our pagan notions of the truth. From our religious, our false religion ideas or understandings of the truth. And really what's going on here is that these believers are being challenged by a different world view. It's a worldview clash, isn't it? And by the way, Christians will always be charged with being in the wrong by pagans and by false religionists. It happens pretty commonly today. You can go off to secular university and guess what you're going to be challenged with? If you're Christian, you're going to be challenged with pagan notions of what is true. Listen, there's some big ideas in this world that people long for answers to. They look for answers concerning origin and meaning and purpose and destiny. These big questions of life. And the pagans, they have their different explanations of those things, don't they? False religion. I mean, think of evolution and you think of, alright, what's meaning in this world? What's purpose? And the pagan man, he defaults to hedonism. And just it's all about living in the here and now. My purpose is just to, you know, enjoy my life and to do what I want to do. And this is the grid. These are the lenses. These are the glasses that people put on. And so these pagans, these false religionists, they're coming to these people. that Paul and his friends had been sharing the gospel with and said, no, no, no, no, no. They've come in here and they've rocked the boat from the standardized understanding in this culture of what is true and what true meaning is and how we come to understand those things. So, don't you see this? Brothers and sisters, understand, when you go out into the world with the message of the gospel, you are going to have a worldview clash with people. And it's the task of the Christian to take every thought captive to the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. And we have to learn to do this and we have to get skilled in this. Now listen, you mark it down well. I don't care what some college professor says or somebody that's got alphabet soup behind his name. None of that matters. Listen to me. Gospel teaching is not a drift from the truth. It's actually to land on the truth. It's not a drift from the truth. It's to land on the truth. And it's always going to be opposed to pagan ideas of the truth, false religious ideas of the truth, because it is the truth. And men hate that. Because they're in a different kingdom. They're in a different world. They have a whole different standard and understanding. And this was the charge against the Apostle Paul. They've come into our town and they've been speaking a contrary message to that which is the standard understanding of how things work. There's another thing, another charge that was made against the Apostle Paul and his men, and that is that they were charged with impurity. Saying that they were impure men. You notice the text again, verse 3. For our appeal does not spring from error or impurity. So there was the message that was going around that these travelers that have just been passing through, they're just looking for religious converts. And really in the mind of these people, They were thinking in terms of these religious men trying to gain converts so that they could have sexual favors from their converts. So they're charging them with impure motives and wrong ways of thinking, impurity, and unholy life. Also, they were charged with deception. You'll see that also in verse number 3. Our appeal does not spring from error or impurity or any attempt to deceive. So they were saying these men are deceptive. These guys are sheep, or excuse me, are wolves in sheep clothing trying to lure people away. They're giving you false hopes. They're telling you about another God. We have our gods, little g-gods. They're telling you about this one God. They say He's the one true God. They're telling you about this gospel. They're telling you about some man that rose from the dead. These guys are rocking the boat. They're just deceptive. They're just trying to pull you away. They're giving you false hopes. They're looking for converts. They're looking to establish their own little kingdom. And so, Paul is defending their ministry. Because the attack was they have a bad message, they have bad character, and they're dangerous because they are deceptive. And brothers and sisters, just the opposite of all that was true. Just the opposite. The Apostle Paul carried the true message. He had an impeccable character and so did his men. And they genuinely were honest men, not deceptive in the least. You'll also notice here in the text that the Apostle Paul wants to talk about the magnitude of the gospel. You see the gospel just fills his mind. He comes away with this message of the gospel as an overwhelming responsibility that's laid upon him. As an apostle, as one who was called by God. You'll see here in verse number 2, as he begins to talk about the gospel, He says, we declared to you the gospel of God. Now isn't that interesting that he doesn't use the statement, the gospel of Jesus Christ, but he uses the gospel of God. That was a favorite way for the Apostle Paul to talk about the gospel. Flip over to Romans, I want to show it to you. Here's a clear explanation of what he means by the gospel of God. As a matter of fact, when he begins the letter of Romans, that's how he starts out talking about the gospel. It's the Gospel of God. You'll see it there in chapter 1, verse number 1. Here's some definition of the Gospel of God. Paul, the servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle, set apart... mark it down, for what? For the Gospel of God. which He promised beforehand through His prophets in the Holy Scriptures concerning His Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh, and was declared to be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness, by His resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord, through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of His name among all the nations, including you who are called to belong to Jesus Christ." When Paul talks about the gospel of God, he puts it in the terms of promises, doesn't he? And he's referring back to the full scope of Scripture. He's giving us a biblical theology of redemption as he's tying the storyline of Scripture all the way through. He's talking about promises that God made beforehand in the prophets. So listen brothers and sisters, you can go to the Old Testament and you find Jesus in the Old Testament. God prophesied about Jesus in the Old Testament, telling them of the One who was to come. And then it gets more specific concerning His Son. His Son, the Lord Jesus, who was descended from David according to the flesh. Well, there you have the Davidic covenant. God made promises to David about one who would rule from the throne of David. And he was declared to be the son of God in power according to the spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead. And so there you see that God validates his gospel through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. This is the gospel of God. Promises made, promises kept, promises validated. All of that is the work of God. That is the unfolding storyline of Scripture. And so here Paul, he's talking about this message. And Paul wants the Thessalonians, he wants to remind them once again. No, no, no. We weren't preaching a message that was in error. We weren't doing the things that are being charged against us as doing. We were preaching the true message and we know that it's true because it was from God. The God who cannot lie. So it was a true message. Notice also in verse number two the way that they preached the message of the gospel. This is amazing. For you know we had boldness in our God to declare to you the gospel of God in the midst of much conflict. I love it that the Apostle Paul says we preach the message in boldness. You should think about that. What do you mean by boldness? Well, we were bold as we preached the gospel to preach the full counsel of the gospel. We preached all the different angles. We didn't shy away from the tough doctrines in the Bible. We talked about all of it. We didn't have any edits. We didn't have any alterations when we preached the Gospel. We came to you with the message of the Gospel and we started with the glory of God and the holiness of God and we thundered that message out and we showed that man was accountable to God and he felled in that accountability and the wrath of God was on men. So Paul is saying we didn't hold back the bad news. We didn't just preach God has a wonderful plan for your life and everything is going to be fine. We didn't start our message of the gospel with God loves you. No. We started with the wrath of God and the holiness of God and the sinfulness of man. We were bold to say those things. Brothers and sisters, it's tough to be bold sometimes. It's tough to stand and to not edit the message. Why? Because you know there's going to be conflict and there's going to be persecution. You know, you always have to remind yourself though. You know, if you saw a blind man walking towards a cliff and he was about to fall over, one of the best things that you could do was to yell and scream at him and tell him the bad news that he's about to go over the cliff. Right? And he may not like it, you screaming and yelling in his ear, telling him he's about to go over the cliff. But isn't that the most loving thing that you can do, is to first tell him the bad news? Before you tell him the good news. Hey, turn around! You know? This is Paul. We were bold with the message. We didn't hold anything back. You know, I think it's easy to see this. If you think about Paul's method here. You know, we have massive problems today, don't we? As it concerns this very issue. We have so many churches, so many pastors today where the true gospel is not even really understood to begin with. I lament so many times our Baptist churches. I'm glad to be a Baptist. You know, one preacher was asked one time, why aren't you this denomination? Why are you Baptists? He says, well, do you believe this denomination? These people are going to go to heaven. He says, yeah, I believe they're going to go. I just want to go first class. But listen, I love being a Baptist and you know my saying, if you asked me what I'd be if I wasn't a Baptist, I'd be ashamed. But listen, our Baptist churches, there's a lot of Baptist churches that got it messed up. Because they have departed from the true Gospel. There's been a breakdown as it concerns the Gospel. There's no boldness. A lot of men today, because they want a hearing, because they don't want people to be angry at them, they fail to be bold and they water down the Gospel. They edit the Gospel. They make compromises with the Gospel. They alter the Gospel. They sound more like self-help gurus than they do preachers of the Gospel who say, thus says the Lord. And we need ongoing recovery and faithful proclamation of the Gospel. And Paul says, that's what we did. We brought the Gospel with full boldness. No edits. No alterations. Notice also in verse 4. Paul talks about their ministry and their calling, and he says, we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel. And so we speak not to please man, but to please God who tests our hearts. Paul says we were approved by God. We were men who had been given a job by God to do. There was a true calling on our life. God gave us this ongoing errand for the king that we have to go where our king needs us and employs us and puts us. And by the way, that should be the attitude of all of us, not just gospel ministers. That we have a king to answer to. And He has jobs for us, and tasks for us, and opportunities, and there's people at the grocery store, and people at this place, and people at that place that you're going to bump into, and God's going to give you divine appointments to share the gospel with them. We need to see that, that we have a job. Paul says he was also entrusted with the Gospel. There's this view of looking at the Gospel as a stewardship, that you're a steward of that message. This is especially true, I think, for ministers of the Gospel, that there's this treasure that's been given to us that we guard, that we keep, that we dish out to people, that we give that message to people. So there's this approval and this entrusting with the Gospel. By the way, how do you know if a man is approved and entrusted with the Gospel. I think it's a good place to talk about that. In other words, we could say it this way. How do you know if a man's truly been called to do that task? I mean, it's true that all believers are given the job to give a faithful witness of the Gospel. Isn't that right? But not all believers are called to an official role of being a pastor or elder, teacher. So how do you know if a man has been approved by God and entrusted with the Gospel of the Lord Jesus? I think there's two sides to it. I think there's an internal call and there's an external call. And what I mean by the internal call is that this is something that's personal and something that's subjective on the one hand, where they begin to demonstrate certain giftedness that fits the mold of someone who would be in that calling. Also, I think when God calls a man, He puts a compulsion on the inside of the man. That there's this overwhelming desire that says, I must preach the gospel. I mean, I'm gonna preach the gospel. And they do it naturally. They naturally take the scriptures and learn the scriptures and have this deep desire to learn the Word of God so that they can unleash it in the lives of other people. So there's a compulsion, there's activity, there's fruit. They already naturally do the work of the ministry. So there's this internal call. There's this time when God begins to deal with a man. And I remember how that was for me. When I was doing one thing and God got my attention and totally began to reorient my thinking to be a preacher of the gospel. So there's an internal call. But that internal call is also validated by what we call the external call. And that external call is something that takes place within the context of a local church where the church, where the body, sees that the man has also been given the internal call. You know, I mean, there's a lot of guys that will stand up and say, you know, I've been called to preach. But you know, when you look at them, they can't talk to people. They're not personable with people. They don't understand doctrine properly. And you can see that they don't have the giftedness for that. Maybe they just want the glory of it or they think it'd be a neat profession to get into or whatever. This is why the local church is so important. Because the Spirit of God indwells the believers of the church. And they have the mind of Christ. And they can look at a man and they can say, if he says, you know, I really feel like God's called me into the ministry. Well, the church ought to be wise enough to stand back and say, okay, well, let's watch and let's see. Do we see the giftedness? Do we see that compulsion? Do we see the ability to minister the Word of God? And if the church recognizes a man that he has it, that church ought to take responsibility to train the man. And then once the man is trained, he ought to be approved by the church and ordained by the church and enlisted in the gospel ministry. This is how you know. There's an internal call and there's an external call. Well, you go on there and you see that Paul also said, as it pertained to the gospel, they were pleasers of God, not men. This was primary motivation. They were motivated, listen to this, by a divine audience of one rather than a human audience of many. And that again is another very important lesson for us. Do we live our life living in the fear of God or the fear of men? Are we more concerned about what God thinks or about what men think? That's an important question. It's an important thing to consider. Are we men-pleasers or are we God-pleasers? Do you think in those terms of I'm living my life before an audience of one, the one true Holy God? That's how Paul thought. Paul said, we're not doing this because we're seeking to please men. We're not doing that. We've been approved by God. We've been entrusted by God with the Gospel. And so we're speaking. We're taking that stewardship because we want to please God with the stewardship. We're slaves of God. He's our king. He's our master. He's the one who owns us and we want to please Him. And God also is the one who tests our hearts. So He knows if we're really living before Him as if the audience of one or if we're living before human audience because we care more about what they think. So what are we getting at with this? Paul is wanting us to see and he wanted the Thessalonian believers to see that they handled the truth properly and they were faithful in Thessalonica even under great, great pressure. They were true men of God. They weren't shady charlatans that these people were accusing them of being. Now I want you to notice the next thing that Paul moves from the message to now deal with charges that were being levied against them as it concerned their motives. So he talks about motives, the motives behind their ministry. Look in verse 5 and 6. For we never came with words of flattery, as you know, nor with a pretext for greed God has witnessed, nor did we seek glory from people, whether from you or from others, though we could have made demands as apostles of Christ. Now I think as you read those two verses, there's two main charges that were being brought against Paul and his men as it concerned their motives. Two things. Number one, they were being accused of being greedy. And secondly, they were being accused of only desiring personal glory. Those were the two things that was motivating their ministry in terms of what they were doing with the Thessalonian people. So they were greedy. These folks were saying, listen, why would you listen to these guys? We already told you they were in error. They pulled away from the truth. They're trying to deceive you. And listen, the main reason why they're trying to deceive you is because they wanted your money. That's it. They were greedy. They were covetous. They're only trying to enrich themselves at your expense. They're not interested in you. It's your money that they want. And by the way, who is it that does that? That's what a false teacher does. The Bible warns us of men who are like that. By the way, just as a side note, let me say to you, the Bible has a lot to say about greed. It's condemned in the Scripture. It's a characteristic of a false prophet. It's a form of idolatry, according to the Apostle Paul in Colossians. True men of God are to be free from covetousness and greed. True men of God are not to be fond of sordid gain. The Bible says that we're not to be hucksters or peddlers of God's Word. So it has a lot to say about greed, and it has a lot to say about greed as it concerns a minister of the Gospel. And so this is an accusation against their motives. They're just greedy. They just want your money. But then also in verse 6, they want personal glory. What do they mean by that? Well, these guys, they like oratory, they like to stand before people, they like recognition, they like preeminence, they want to be esteemed. You remember the Pharisees in the New Testament? They walked through, they liked everybody to sort of bow to them and give them reverence and respect to the max. And by the way, that kind of glory is only to be given to God. There is a certain amount, obviously, God commands it in the Scriptures, where men who are ministers of His Word, they are to be esteemed, they are to be held in high regard for their work's sake. But not to the degree of what the Apostle Paul and them are being charged of from these people. We're talking about a kind of estimation of the men that moves beyond just you know, basic respect for them to the point of almost worshiping them or bowing down. That's what they're saying about Paul. These guys wanted you to just kind of bow to them and almost worship them. They want personal glory from you for themselves. Of course, Paul is handling this charge and he's saying that's not it at all. By the way, again, this only belongs to God and Jesus himself tells us the way that all believers really are supposed to act and it's humility, not pride, not personal glory. One of my favorite texts that gives us this lesson is in John chapter number 13. Just mark it down. You don't have to turn unless you want to. But John 13 verse 14 and 15. Listen to this from Jesus. This is the scenario where He's washing the feet of the disciples. Remember that? If I then your Lord and Teacher have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet. For I have given you an example that you also should do just as I have done to you. In other words, the call from the Lord Jesus in our actions with other people is that we are to be servants of other people. It's not about vainglory. It's not about self. God has put us in this world. He has saved us to serve other people. To serve people. Again, that's another really good test for us to think about tonight. As I go about my life and my thinking in my home, for example, men. You should ask yourself, am I serving my wife or am I only seeking to be served? Parents, with your children, am I serving my children the way that I should serve them Or is my parenting towards them really just out of personal convenience and what makes it easy for me? It might not be best for them, but it's more comfortable for me. If I just tell you to just go to your room and, you know, I don't want to deal with that right now. Is that serving our child? Is that what's best for them in the moment? Or are we just wanting, you know, I'm watching the ball game and I don't want you to interrupt me? You see, if we're following the commands of the Lord Jesus and if we're looking at His example, He stooped to wash the feet of His disciples, to serve them. I mean, ultimately He went to the cross to serve, didn't He? And we too should follow in His example. And that means you're going to have to bear an unfair load. And that means that it's going to be difficult. It means it's going to be hard. Service to other people is not always easy. It goes against the natural grain, so to speak. Because we like comfort and we like ease and we would rather be served than to serve. But the Lord Jesus calls us to this kind of service. It's a life of humility, not vain glory. Oh, and how much more so should that be modeled in the lives of those who have been called to preach and teach the gospel of the Lord Jesus. So Paul handles this. Let me show you something else here. Paul addresses even the means that they were being charged of using to carry out their greedy desires and their personal glory. And he talks about in verse number 5 how they used flattery. Paul's saying this is what they're being accused of. Look at it there again. We never came with words of flattery. We've been charged with flattery. And he also says, "...nor with a pretext for greed God is witness." And again, we didn't seek glory from other people, whether from you or others, though we could have made demands as apostles. So words of flattery. In other words, they were being charged of using a type of verbal manipulation to get people to do what they wanted to do, to try to gain power. Let me just hit the pause button here for a second and give you a couple texts that have to do with flattery. Just a little Bible study in Proverbs real quick. You need to mark these verses down, especially maybe some of you younger people in here. I just exhort you young people in here that you need to, while you're young, you need to dive into the Proverbs. The book of Proverbs is the educational book of the Scripture. It's the childhood educational book that God has intended for you to learn and to study and for us as parents to be teaching to our children. And the Proverbs covers just about every conceivable subject. And it's not silent on this idea of flattery. Just a couple of thoughts, just three verses. It is a temptation to be a flatterer of people. Why? Because you think, perhaps, if you use flattery, you can get what you want. If I can butter somebody up, if I can talk highly about them, maybe I can manipulate them to get them to do what I want. But the Bible tells you that that's going to backfire on you. Look at this, in Proverbs 28, verse number 23. Now get this. Whoever rebukes a man will afterward find more favor than he who flatters with his tongue. Did you catch that? He who rebukes a man will afterward find more favor, meaning from the man that he rebuked, rather than flattering that man with the tongue. How foolish it is if we see somebody in their life making massive mistakes and we just come and pat them on the back and flatter them and say, you know, oh, you're doing so great. It's so wonderful. No, no, no. It would be much more wise for you to use wisdom and gentleness to come to that person and actually point out a wrongdoing that would be the best help because that would perhaps turn them from a bad way rather than flatter them. And that person will thank you more if you tell them the truth rather than just flatter them and pat them on the back and they end up falling on their face because nobody gave them the truth. So you will be respected more, brothers and sisters, if you use words of truth with people and tell it like it is, with gentleness and kindness, but not hold back the truth. So that's one angle to get a hold of. And on top of that, see the danger of flattery. The danger of flattery. Look in Proverbs 29 verse 5. A man who flatters his neighbor spreads a net for his feet. Very, very dangerous. Also in chapter 26, look over there in chapter 26 verse 28, A lying tongue hates its victims, and a flattering mouth works ruin." So you see, to use this tactic of flattery, it's a dangerous thing. And so by implication, don't be a flatterer yourself, and be on the lookout for the person who is a flatterer so that you can learn to avoid that person. Alright? You'll do well if you listen to those words of wisdom from Solomon. Alright, back to 1 Thessalonians. So Paul is addressing this issue. They're telling him that they were flatterers. Also, they were accused of using actions of deception. Look there in verse number 5. We never came with words of flattery, as you know, nor with a pretext for greed. Some translations say a cloak, like a covering. Paul says we didn't do that. We weren't using trickery. We weren't trying to deceive anyone. Furthermore, verse number 6, Paul says, contrary to what's being said about us, we weren't even using our positions as apostles to try to get advantage of other people. He says we could have made demands as apostles of Christ, but he says we didn't do that. In other words, they were being charged with being authoritarian and domineering and trying to be dictator-like in their ministry to these people. And Paul says, look, verse number 5, God is our witness. That's not the case. God knows our heart. He knows that these were not our motives. So, what's Paul done? Paul is showing us that they had the proper message, they had the proper motives. And now one more thing. Paul wants us to see that their true motives were revealed from the ministry methods that they used. Their method was to relate to them, now get this, very important, was to relate to them as loving parents as they would towards children that were precious to them. Now look with me there in verse 7. This is beautiful. We're not going to have time to look at all tonight, but we were gentle among you. Completely contrary to what's being charged against us. We were gentle among you, like a nursing mother taking care of her own little children, so being affectionately desirous of you. We were ready to share with you not only the Gospel of God, but also our own selves, because you had become very dear to us. Then jump on down to verse 11 and 12. For you know how like a father with his children, we exhorted each one of you and encouraged you and charged you to walk in a manner worthy of God who calls you into His own kingdom and glory." Paul says, these people that came in after us, they said we had awful motives towards you, bad intentions towards you. And Paul says, let me give it to you in the most tender way that I can give it to you. we didn't have bad motives towards you. As a matter of fact, we looked at you like you were our precious children. And we came to you just like a nursing mother would to her child, and just like a good godly father would towards his children. And with that, what we come to in Thessalonians is a ministry view from the Apostle Paul that shows us this beautiful way in which the pastors, the elders of the church, are to relate to the people. And that is, there's supposed to be this parental understanding of the ministry that a pastor has towards the people. But again, we'll have to save that for next time. Let me close. Just mark it down that true gospel ministry is always going to be opposed by the enemy. It's always going to happen. True gospel ministry is always going to be opposed by the enemy. He hates the message. He hates the ministers of the message. Opposition is going to come from the inside. It's going to come from the outside. It's going to come straight ahead. And it's going to come by surprise. You can just mark it down. Attacks. The second thing. Attacks on the ministry must be answered with authentic ministry. Again, true gospel ministry stands for itself. It stands on its own. An authentic ministry, according to Paul, was that you have to have the right message, which is the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. You have to have the right motives, and you have to have the right relational methods. To be the church of chapter 1, the church on the right track, the model church, the commendable church that we saw in chapter 1, we have to engage in the ministry of chapter number 2. And may we pray and labor to those ends. Amen? Father, thank you for your Word tonight, Lord. Father, I ask that you would make the things that have been spoken tonight effectual to you people. Lord, help us to see this view of ministry that's wholesome and good and profitable and revealed from heaven for us to use. Lord, we want to carry the message of the Gospel properly to people. We want to minister Your Word because it's been entrusted to us. We've been given a stewardship of that. Lord, we want to have the right motives. Lord, we do. We want to guard against all of these things that the Apostle Paul mentions, the things that they were being charged with, Lord. I pray, Lord, that among the leaders of the church, especially, you would always keep the motives pure. And Father, help us, as we're going to talk about next time, to engage in the right relational method that the Apostle Paul used with these precious saints at Thessalonica. Lord, that he viewed his work among them as a as a nursing mother and as a godly father. Lord, we need this view of ministry. It's a beautiful picture for us. Lord, we long to learn more about it and to be able to use it. Father, I pray that you would guard this church tonight from attacks that would come against us from the enemy. Lord, we know that Satan hates anywhere the gospel is preached in clarity and fullness. And Lord, we desire to preach it in clarity and fullness. So, Lord, because of that desire, we also desire and ask tonight, Father, for your aid in protecting us and keeping us and guarding us. Help us to be on the lookout for surprise attacks or frontal attacks or attacks from the inside, attacks from the outside, wherever they might come. Help us to be wise and discerning, we pray. Lord, be with each person that's here tonight. Lord, I pray that they've been blessed from our time together. Lord, I pray that as they leave these walls tonight, Lord, that through the rest of the week, they would continue to walk with you. And as we come back on Sunday, Lord, that our hearts would overflow in corporate worship and that we would all minister to one another as we come back together. We love you tonight. We thank you for the gift of the gospel. Thank you for your son. In his name we pray. Amen.