The Word, the Work and the Wrath of God

Transcript

GRM 560
02/15/1998
The Word, the Work, and the Wrath of God
1 Thessalonians 2:13-16
Gil Rugh

We’re going to be in 1 Thessalonians tonight and looking into chapter 2. The letter to the Thessalonians, written to a church that had been established in Thessalonica in Greece. It was a church that had a far-reaching testimony. In chapter 1, Paul referred to that fact in verse 7 of 1 Thessalonians 1, “that you became an example to all the believers in Macedonia and Achaia.” Two provinces of Greece, what they call the northern and southern parts. “For 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.” What a marvelous testimony! Paul says everywhere he went, people had heard about the testimony of the church at Thessalonica, the faith of those believers, their steadfastness, and the testimony they had for Christ, particularly in the midst of trial and tribulation.

In chapter 2, the first part of the chapter, Paul referred to his own personal character and conduct in ministry. He referred to the fact that, in verse 4, “just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel, so we speak, not as pleasing men but God, who examines our hearts.” You know we didn’t come with flattering speech. We didn’t come for financial gain to minister to you. But verse 7, “we proved to be gentle among you just as a nursing mother cares for her children.” The deep affection and love he has for them as a church and as a people that he was privileged to be involved in coming to the knowledge of Christ. His ministry was devoted, had been devoted, to enabling and encouraging them, verse 12, to “walk in a manner worthy of the God who calls you into His own kingdom and glory.”

We want to focus our attention, picking up with verse 13, where now he focuses on the way that they received the word. He’s talked about the way he brought the word to them, something of his own personal character and conduct in ministry. Now he turns his attention to how they received the word as he preached it to them in those early days of the establishing of this church. We read in verse 13, “And for this reason we also constantly thank God that when you received from us the word of God’s message, you accepted it not as the word of men, but for what it really is, the word of God, which also performs its work in you who believe.” Paul had already thanked God for the fruit of righteousness, which was manifest in their lives.

In chapter 1 again, verses 2 and 3, “We give thanks to God always for all of you, making mention of you in our prayers; constantly bearing in mind your work of faith and labor of love and steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ in the presence of our God and Father.” So they had been bearing fruit as evidence and testimony of their faith in Christ. Now he offers thanks. Even preceding what we just read in Chapter 1, back at the beginning, when he first brought the gospel to them, he is thankful that they received his message as the word of God. They received it, and they accepted it. So he said, “for this reason we also constantly thank God that when you received the word from us, from, when you received from us the word of God’s message, you accepted it as the word of God.” You know Paul never got tired of thanking God, he never got tired of thanking God for what He had done. Here he says, “we constantly thank God.” It was a cause of reoccurring gratitude in Paul’s prayers that the Thessalonians were open to hear the gospel when he came to Thessalonica. Then not only were they open to receive it, but then they accepted it for themselves.

Uh, that idea of “you received from us the word of God’s message” uh, that’s the idea of they listened to this message. When Paul proclaimed it, uh, they gave it a hearing; they gave attention to the content of what Paul was saying. And then he says, “you accepted it not as the word of men but as the word of God.” And that’s what it really is. And “you accepted it” is the more subjective aspect of their response to the message as they heard it. They gave it a favorable reception. They not only heard it; they not only gave assent to it, but they personally responded to it, appropriated it and uh, believed it for themselves.

Paul makes a point here in verse 13, “you received from us the word of God’s message, you accepted it not as the word of men but for what it really is, the word of God.” So that emphasis, negative and positive, it was the word of God’s message. It wasn’t man’s word. It really is the word of God. And that’s how you received it. Paul had an unshakable confidence and commitment to the fact that the message he proclaimed was the word of God. And he was willing to stand against all opposition. He was willing to stand alone if he had to boldly with his conviction. This is the word of God.

And when you stop and think about it, if you really believe that this is the word of God, that is really the conviction of your heart, you have placed your faith in it’s message and entrusted your eternal salvation to the truthfulness of what has been said here. We out to have a confident boldness in giving it forth. I mean, if I really, this is God’s word. I can tell you the very words of God. Should I be intimidated? Should I be reluctant? Should I be embarrassed? Should I be afraid that it’s not adequate, that it won’t work that it’s not effective? None of that! Paul was totally confident and committed to the truth of God’s word and this is the only message he preached. He was determined to know nothing else among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified. It was this message that he says in 2 Timothy 2:2 that he passed on to Timothy and Timothy is to pass on to faithful men who will teach others also. And by the grace of God that process has continued to here we are again, opening up the word of God.

Back in verse 9 Paul alluded to this fact when he said, “For you recall, brethren, our labor and hardship, how working night and day so as not to be a burden to any of you, we proclaimed to you the gospel of God.” We proclaimed to you the gospel of God, the good news that was of God. And we proclaimed it. And that word “to proclaim” means to act as a herald. And a herald was someone who was entrusted with a message. A king would send out a herald and the only responsibility of that herald was to go and give forth the message that king had given him. Not add to it, not take away from it, give the message that had been entrusted to him. So Paul said, “we proclaimed,” we gave forth as a herald, “to you the gospel of God.”

And you’ll note at the end of verse 13, “which also performs its work in you who believe.” Which also, uh, he’s going to say something else. It is God’s word and it also performs its work in you who believe. And this is based upon the fact that it is God’s word. Because it is God’s word, it is effective, it is powerful, it accomplishes God’s work. So you see the word of God is personified here. It’s the word of God, which also performs its work. This is not just words on a page. They are words on a page. This is a physical book, but the words of this book are more than just words on a page. They’re just not, more; they are more than words spoken. They are words that perform work. They do something in the lives of those who believe. “It performs it work.”

This word “to perform a work” is usually used of, uh; supernatural activity in the New Testament and this is definitely a supernatural activity here. This word is continually producing an effect in the lives of those who believe it. Now this is a simple truth. And we sit and we assent to it and we agree. We say, “This is really foundational and basic.” But we come to an area here, where we’re constantly being challenged as to the validity of it. Whether we really believe, number 1 that this is God’s word, and number 2, do we really believe that it performs its work in lives? And the church is rapidly, I fear, losing its confidence in the ability of this word to perform its work. We still will hold to our doctrinal statements that this is the word of God, although there has been shrinkage there with a significant portion of the professing church no longer believing that this is the fully inspired, inerrant word of God. But there is even more deterioration in the realm of confidence that it performs its work. It is continually active producing God’s intended effect in the lives of those who believe. “It performs its work in you who believe.”

This becomes the vehicle that God has ordained to use in the world today to accomplish His purposes in the lives of those that He has called to Himself. In Isaiah, chapter 55 and verse 11, the prophet spoke a verse that we have memorized. We have it as a verse today. And in Isaiah 55:11, it’s a great chapter that begins by exhorting us to come to salvation in Christ. “Every one who thirsts, come to the waters; you who have no money come, buy and eat. Come, buy wine and milk without money and without cost.” God invites us in verse to come and listen to Him and live. In verse 6, “Seek the Lord while He may be found; call upon Him while He is near. Let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts; and let him return to the Lord, and He will have compassion on him; and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon. For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts. For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return there without watering the earth, and making I bear and sprout, and furnishing seed to the sower and bread to the eater; so shall My word be which goes forth from My mouth; it shall not return to Me empty, without accomplishing what I desire, and without succeeding in the matter for which I sent it.”

Note that. The word of God is guaranteed success. God never sends forth His word and it fails. It will succeed “in the matter for which I sent it.” So that confidence that this is a word that works, that is alive, that is powerful.

Over in Romans, chapter 1. The Apostle Paul began his letter to the Romans by saying in Romans chapter 1, verse 16, “I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.” The supernatural character of God’s word, it is God’s power. Say, “Oh, if I only had the power of God.” We had, uh, it was popularized with John Wimber, who recently passed from this life, and uh, founder of the Vineyard Movement, power evangelism. And the concept was, we need demonstrations of power so that people will believe and be saved, miracles and signs and wonders. But God does have power evangelism. But His power is not operating in the miracles and in the signs and in the wonders today, but His word is His power for salvation. Now if we really believe it performs its work, it always succeeds in accomplishing God’s purposes, that it is the power of God for salvation, what is our role? Turn it loose. Give it forth. Uh, like I have the power of God in my hand. What would you do? Demonstrate it everywhere I go. So here I go. And I can get it in a lot smaller versions than this and I take it with me. What? Give it out. Here’s the power of God. Let me tell you what God said. “For God so loved the world. All have sinned. There is none righteous. Call upon the name of the Lord and you’ll be saved.” What? Turning loose the power of God, so that God can accomplish His purposes in the lives who come under the sound of the message.

Go past Romans to 1 Corinthians, 1 Corinthians, chapter 1, verse 17. The Apostle Paul says, “For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel, not in cleverness of speech, that the cross of Christ should not be made void. For the word of the cross is to those who are perishing foolishness, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” Paul said, “I didn’t want to become clever in my preaching because I didn’t want to cancel out the power of the simple purity of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Uh, it is the power of God.”

Look at verse 21. “For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not come to know God, God was well-pleased through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe. For indeed Jews ask for signs, and Greeks search for wisdom; but we preach Christ crucified, to Jews a stumbling block, to Gentiles foolishness, but to those who are the called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.”

So you come down to chapter 2, “And I came to you brethren, I did not come, when I came to you I did not come with superiority of speech or of wisdom, proclaiming to you the testimony of God. For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling. And my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, that your faith should not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God.” Oh, the tragedy of the church moving away from the presentation of the simple pure message of God’s truth! And being able to gather crowds but the faith is not in the power of God. There are no substitutes. I can’t change the fact. To the Jews it’s a stumbling block. To the Greeks it’s foolishness. But the reality of it is, to those who are the called, those who are God’s elect called to His salvation, by God’s grace they will come and experience it as the power of God for salvation in their lives.

Many other passages, Hebrews chapter 4, verse 12 says, “The word of God is alive and powerful.” It is living. There’s life in this book. “It’s alive and powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword. Piercing even the dividing asunder of joints and marrow and soul and spirit. It’s a discerner of the thoughts and intentions of the heart.” Remarkable, the power of the word! Peter wrote in 1 Peter, chapter 1, verse 23 that we are born again by the “living and abiding word of God.” It’s a word that is living. Uh, it’s alive. I say this because we don’t have confidence not only that this is the word of God, but this is the word of God that performs the work of God in the lives of those who believe. And that is crucial. So then I believe it is sufficient. It is enough and it will be successful to accomplish God’s purposes.

Come over to 1 Thessalonians again. It’s “the word of God which also performs its work in you who believe.” The word of God works in the lives of those who believe. We’ve seen that in some of the passages we’ve just read. Uh, great danger in deciding we are going to do what is appealing to the non-elect. Now I don’t know who the non-elect are but I know the elect will respond to the sound of the gospel and the message of truth so I give it forth. That is the purpose and the goal. It works in you who believe.

You realize the work the word of God does not work in power in the lives of the non-believer. Oh, it accomplishes something. It is a savor of life to life and death to death. But as far as the power of God working in the life, that is a privilege experienced and enjoyed only by those who believe, the called of God. And the elect must hear the word. “Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God,” Romans 10:17 says. So it is through the hearing of the word that the elect are drawn to salvation and experience the power of God in their life. And it is an on-going experience of God’s people that the word of God accomplishes it’s work in those who believe, not just the initial salvation, which is the work of the word in those who believe, but we live by faith. We’re not only initially saved by faith but the walk of the believer is by faith and by the power of God at work in our lives through the word of God.

So, as the word works in our lives we are built to maturity in Christ. Uh, that’s the on-going work of the word of God in the lives of those who believe. That’s supernatural. There’s no good explanation that you should sit down and share this truth with someone concerning what God has said about them and about His Son. And something supernatural happens and they believe it and their life is changed? They are made new. I say, “That is amazing, I, uh, it’s just amazing.”

We have to have that confidence that this is the word that works in those who believe. We ought to be experiencing its work in our lives and have that full confidence that it will be working in the lives of other who believe as well.

Now verse 14 of 1 Thessalonians 2, Paul offers some evidence of the working of the word in their lives, which indicates he’s not just talking about the initial salvation they experienced. But that is an on-going work. It began when I trusted Christ as my Savior. But it continues on in its work because that was the beginning of a life of faith, not as thought faith was an action done and over. But I trusted Him and that was the beginning of a life of faith. And “the just shall live by faith” not only includes my initial saving faith buy my on-going walk of faith as well.

These Thessalonian believers, they are remaining firm under intense persecution. And that is an indication that they really have believed the gospel. Persecution causes those who don’t believe to fall away. Verse 14, “For you brethren, became imitators of the churches of God in Christ Jesus that are in Judea, for you also endured the same sufferings at the hands of your own countrymen, even as they did from the Jews.”

“You became imitators of the churches in Judea.” In verse 6 of chapter 1, Paul said, “You became imitators of us and of the Lord, having received the word in much tribulation with the joy of the Holy Spirit.” Unique circumstances. Everything wasn’t right. It was a time of persecution, opposition. But they received the word. They responded to it. They rejoiced in it even though they became the subject of persecution and opposition. And now Paul says, “You not only became imitators of us and of the Lord, you’ve imitated believing churches, particularly those in Judea,” which would be over in, uh, Palestine a realm of Jerusalem, that area, where churches had undergone intense persecution. And really where the persecution began. And you’ve been imitators of them. And your settled faith and willingness to suffer for the gospel.

“You became imitators of the churches of God in Christ Jesus.” Uh, churches of God, other churches that belong to God. In Acts chapter 20, verse 28, remember Paul instructed the elders from the church at Ephesus to “be on guard”. They were responsible for protecting and guarding the church at Ephesus. And it was “the church of God which He purchased with His own blood.” It belongs to Him by right of purchase. We are not our own. We’ve been bought with a price. And the church is His by redemption.

“The churches of God in Christ Jesus,” um, they are unique, cutoff from all other religious organizations, all other kinds of churches as they have developed today. We’re talking about true churches, the churches of God in Christ Jesus. And particularly he’s focusing on the ones in Judea that have undergone such intense persecution. And those at Thessalonica were following in those footsteps. Isn’t it great? You know persecution wasn’t pleasant for the churches in Judea. But isn’t it amazing the testimony of those churches goes forth and here Paul says the church at Thessalonica is just like the believing church in Judea? You know true churches have certain characteristics. And faithfulness is one of those characteristics. And they follow in the footsteps of being faithful even in the face of opposition and persecution.

You note here, too, where Paul focuses. It’s on local churches. And he writes to the believers who were in Thessalonica and they are following the examples of local churches in other areas. That’s the manifestation of the body of Christ in the world.

This moves Paul into further elaboration on the matter of persecution. “You endured,” the middle of verse 14, “for you also endured the same sufferings at the hands of your own countrymen, even as they did from the Jews.” The churches in Judea had experienced persecution from the Jews. And remember Paul was a leader of the persecution in its early days. The book of acts. Now they were experiencing it from their own countrymen, fellow Greeks in Thessalonica. But you know the persecution; even in Thessalonica had its roots in the opposition stirred up by the Jews. I say that because Paul was going to say some of the harshest things he says anywhere in any of his letters about the Jews in the words that follow.

Back up to Acts, chapter 17, just to see the, uh, setting. Paul comes here from Philippi where he had been beaten and imprisoned and he leaves there and comes to Thessalonica. In verse 1, where there was synagogue of the Jews, in verse 2, “according to his custom, he went to them, and for three Sabbaths reasoned with them from the Scriptures” about the death and resurrection of Christ using their Old Testament Scriptures. I take it passages like Isaiah 53 to show that the coming Messiah had to suffer and die paying the penalty for sin. But, and he has some converts, verse 4. And then in verse 5, “But the Jews, becoming jealous and taking along some wicked men from the marketplace, formed a mob and set the city in an uproar; and coming upon the house of Jason, they were seeking to bring them out to the people. And when they did not find them, they began dragging Jason and some brethren before the city authorities, shouting, ‘These men who have upset the world have come here.’” So, you see this intense persecution has its roots in the opposition of the Jews to the message of Christ. They don’t want to believe it and they don’t want anyone else to believe it. They want to do all they can to stop proclamation of the message of Christ.

Come back to 1 Thessalonians. Now the Thessalonians suffered mainly at the hands of their own countrymen. But their countrymen were stirred up by the Jews and the Jews inflamed them and worked them up which caused Paul to have to leave Thessalonica and move on to Berea and other areas. Verse 15, Paul mentions the Jews and he now gives, really, a burning denunciation of the Jews. He is himself a Jew, so you can’t accuse him of being anti-Semitic. But he has some harsh things to say. Verse 15, these Jews, “who both killed the Lord Jesus and the prophets and drove us out.” And that’s what we just read in Thessalonica. If you read the full account they stirred up the people of Thessalonica so that Paul had to leave. “They killed the Lord Jesus; they have killed the prophets and drove us out. They are not pleasing to God but hostile to all men.”

They are set in their opposition to God. This is amazing. The people most intensely opposed to Jesus Christ were the people that God had called out to be a nation for Himself and to have Jesus as their Christ, their Messiah, their King, their Savior. They are relentless and fierce in their opposition to the gospel, to Christ, to the prophets. They oppose the truth, not only from Paul but from their own prophets in bygone days.

“They killed the Lord Jesus.” This is put first, not because it’s first in order of time, because obviously they killed the prophets before they killed Christ, but this is first in order of importance. The most awful thing ever done humanly speaking, the most awful thing done by Israel is they were guilty of the execution of their own Messiah. You note here, 20 years have passed since the crucifixion of Christ and Paul lays the blame for the crucifixion of Christ at the feet of the Jews. I realize there’s discussion that goes on about this and we want to be very careful how we say things because we want don’t want to be view as anti-Jewish, and I am not. I believe the Jews are God’s chosen people. And I am less anti-semantic and anti-Jewish than, most who would even claim to be Christian because I believe there’s a future for Israel. I believe as awful as their sin was in rejecting and crucifying their Messiah God still loves Israel and will someday bring them to Himself and establish them as His people and Christ as their Messiah. But the Jews are responsible and accountable to God for the execution of their Messiah.

Back in Acts, Chapter 2, Peter is preaching on the day of Pentecost. He’s preaching to the Jews and he says, “Men of Israel,” verse 22, “listen to these words: Jesus the Nazarene, a man attested to you by God with miracles and wonders and signs which God performed through Him in your midst, just as you yourselves know—this Man, delivered up by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to a cross by the hands of godless men and put Him to death.” You did it. You used godless men—the Romans. They were godless, but you used them to crucify the Messiah. Pilate wasn’t particularly in favor of crucifying Christ. That doesn’t absolve him from guilt, but he wasn’t the motivator in the crucifixion of Christ. The Jews were and they are accountable. In Matthew, chapter 27, verse 25, they said, “Let His blood be on our hands and the hands of our children.” And so it is. And Paul refers to that fact.

Go back to Matthew, chapter 23. They not only killed Christ, they killed the prophets. Matthew 23, verse 31. In this section referred to in our study earlier today about Christ’s condemnation of the religious leaders. Verse 31, “Consequently you bear witness against yourselves, that you are sons of those who murder, murdered the prophets.” Verse 37, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together and you were unwilling.”

You see, it’s an ongoing pattern of rejection. How sad! The nation that God has chosen for Himself would not hear what He had to say any longer. Can’t help but think of what Paul wrote to Timothy when he said to, uh, “preach the word and to be instant in season and out of season for the time will come when they will not be willing to listen to sound teaching, but they’ll heap up for themselves teachers having itching ears.” That deterioration within, if you will, the professing people of God comes to the point they want all the privileges of being called the people of God, but they are unwilling to hear what God has to say. Tragic state of affairs!

Back in 1 Thessalonians, chapter 2, “They killed the Lord Jesus, they killed the prophets, they drove us out,” as we saw in, uh, Acts chapter 17. He says, “They are not pleasing to God.” Present tense denotes their ongoing condition. “They are not pleasing to God.” They have a zeal for God; you don’t want to lose track here. These Jews are still intensely religious. In Romans chapter 10, verse 2, Paul says, “I bear witness on behalf of the Jews, that they have a zeal for God but not according to knowledge.” Because they have rejected the word of God.

“Not pleasing to God. They are hostile to all men.” This is explained in the following sentence: “hindering us from speaking to the Gentiles.” They have become so perverted. Instead of being a channel through which the world is exposed to the truth of God, they have become a barrier trying to keep the world from hearing the message from God. So “they are hostile to all men, hindering us from speaking to the Gentiles.” The Jews not only don’t want Jews to hear it; they don’t want Gentiles to hear it. Ever notice that? Some of you experience it even in your families. It’s not just that these people don’t want you telling them the gospel, they don’t want you telling anyone else the gospel. And they get upset that you’re presenting the gospel. And you say, “Well, you don’t have to believe it. That’s fine.” But they are agitated. And the Jews intensely so because the message of Jesus Christ is a message that announces, if you will, judgement on Israel, guilt upon Israel, and God’s wrath upon them as He will say in a moment.

“They are hostile to all men.” Verse 16, “hindering us from speaking to the Gentiles that they might be saved; with the result that they always fill up the measure of their sins. But wrath has come upon them to the utmost.” One writer said, “The worst thing about unbelief is not that it damns the unbeliever but that it hinders the salvation of others.” The Jews wanted to do all they could to prevent Gentiles from hearing the gospel as well because the Jews wanted to believe to be saved you have to become a Jew. Any other message was unacceptable to them.

“They are always filling up the measure of their sins. They always fill up the measure of their sins.” In a graphic picture here each new act of hostility towards Christ and towards the preaching of the gospel, uh, was another drop, if you will, added to the cup of guilt of the Jews. They keep adding their guilt every time they oppose the gospel, every time they oppose the preaching of Christ. They are adding more to the cup of their guilt. It’s like Romans chapter 2 says that those who keep rejecting the grace of God are “storing up wrath against the day of wrath” when God will deal in judgement. It’s a picture here of a cup filled to the brim starting to overflow, something that is ready and prepared for judgement.

“They fill up the measure of their sins. But wrath has come upon them to the uttermost.” They have come under the wrath of God. Uh, the wrath here may well be eschatological wrath in that it’s looking toward the future wrath that will come upon them in the Tribulation when God pours out His wrath upon the unbelieving nation. Uh, in chapter 1, verse 10, Paul encouraged those believers by saying, we await, uh, “His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead, Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come.” And in chapter 5 he speaks about the day of the Lord in verse 2, will come “like a thief in the night” and, will bring destruction upon the unbelieving and unprepared anticipating the coming tribulation. But in verse 9 of chapter 5, “God has not destined us for wrath, but for salvation.” You know in the context of the book it would seem that the coming wrath of God that will be poured out on the nation in the coming seventieth week of Daniel is the wrath they have brought upon themselves as a nation. Now it’s true. Individual Jews who reject Christ and die in unbelief also experience the wrath of hell. And the nation today is experiencing the wrath of God that is poured out on sinners, so, uh, that is a wrath that is ongoing, as unbelievers, according to Romans 1, live under the wrath of God. “The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against the unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness.” And Israel even more than any other nation is guilty of suppressing the truth because as Paul says later in Romans, “to them were entrusted the oracles of God.” The very word of God was given to Israel and so they even have a greater guilt and suppressing the truth.

They are experiencing God’s wrath today in the troubles and trials of Israel down to this present century and the holocaust and the tribulation that yet awaits that is far worse than the holocaust that they have already experienced. All the trials that’s the result of the wrath of God poured out on a nation that has rejected the Savior.

But this is given in the context God’s grace is at work. These Thessalonians have come to believe the gospel in the context of such intense opposition, and they have remained faithful because they believe that this is the word of God and it performs it’s work in the lives of those who believe. And part of that work of the word in the lives of those who believe is they remain faithful even in the face of opposition, persecution, trial and difficulty.

Praise God for the testimony of the church at Thessalonica. And I trust we’d be encouraged as a church today to be such a testimony. That we would not drift and flow with the tide of the world, we would not drift and flow with the tide of the church, broadly speaking, but that we would be committed to the truth of God and an unshakable conviction: This is God’s word and it performs its work in those who believe. So we are committed to a ministry of the word until Christ comes and that means we are committed to be faithful and true to this word no matter what the reaction and response of those around us is. If it is rejection, if it is persecution, if it is overt persecution that can become very costly, my commitment is not shaken by that. This is God’s word. It performs its work in the lives of those who believe. It’s working in my life. It’s working in your life. And it will work in the lives of those who God has called to Himself. It will always accomplish God’ work in the world succeeding in what He sends it to do. May God grant that we’ll be faithful in the ministry we have in being entrusted with this truth in these days? Let’s pray together.

Thank you, Lord, for the church at Thessalonica. Thank you for their testimony that, Lord, was spread abroad in the world of that day and little did they know that 2000 years later churches round the world would still be encouraged and challenged and uplifted by the testimony of that body of believers in that place. And, Lord, we desire to have such a permanent enduring testimony as your church in these days. We desire to have that same unshakable unswerving commitment to You and to Your word and to Your work through Your word in our lives and the lives of others. Thank you for the privilege of giving forth the word, which is Your power for salvation in these days. We desire to see it work in the accomplishing of salvation in many lives and, Lord, we are satisfied to know that it will succeed in accomplishing Your purposes whatever they be. And we praise You in Christ’s name. Amen.

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