I Timothy 1:1-7 – Warnings Against False Teachers

We now come to what are called Paul’s pastoral epistles. Unlike his previous letters which are to entire churches, these letters are written to young pastors Timothy and Titus, thus pastoral. Paul gives them explicit and thorough instructions on how churches should be run, which makes them unique among his letters. They are also letters of personal encouragement and exhortation because being a pastor is never easy, but I imagine it was especially challenging in a time when the church was just getting off the ground. As we’ll see, Timothy is God’s shepherd of the church in Ephesus in what was then called Asia Minor, on the west coast of Modern Turkey. He calls Timothy his “true son in the faith,” so his letters are an older man, a mentor, teaching his beloved student.

Paul met Timothy on his second missionary journey, which we read about in Acts 16. Paul had spent time in Antioch with Barnabas (Acts 15), and they decided to head out and visit the churches they had established on their first missionary journey. The two had a falling out over John Mark, whom Paul didn’t trust, so they split. God turned their dispute into a positive, creating the opportunity for two missionary teams; one being Barnabas and John Mark who traveled to Cyprus and the other, Paul and Silas who traveled to Asia Minor. God providentially redirected Paul and Silas to Greece, bringing the gospel to Europe, which changed the world.

In almost every letter Paul establishes his Apostolic bona fides. He’s especially strong here:

Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the command of God our Savior and of Christ Jesus our hope,

² To Timothy my true son in the faith:

Although the letter is to Timothy, Paul knows it will be shared widely, and he’s placing his divine apostolic authority front and center on his affirmation of Timothy. I’d guess he does this just in case anyone is tempted to question Timothy’s authority given his youth.

Notice the Triune implications of his greeting. I’ve mentioned this numerous times, but it bears repeating. Many critics and skeptics (of the Dan Brown Da Vinci Code variety) have insisted that Jesus never claimed to be divine, and that the church basically invented that over time and officially adopted it by the Council of Nicea in 325. That is so obviously untrue to any fair minded reader of the New Testament, including this verse. If you look at the use of the word Savior in Paul (and Peter, John, and Jude) you’ll see that both God and Jesus are referred to with that title, which means the church saw Jesus as God from the very beginning. And he affirms Timothy as a worthy heir to the faith he is fighting for.

He then warns against false teachers:

³ As I urged you when I went into Macedonia, stay there in Ephesus so that you may command certain people not to teach false doctrines any longer ⁴ or to devote themselves to myths and endless genealogies. Such things promote controversial speculations rather than advancing God’s work—which is by faith.

We can infer from this that Timothy may have wanted to give up and leave Ephesus, but Paul won’t have it. Working with sinful people in ministry is a tough job, but running away is rarely the answer. We’re all called to contend for the faith, but that’s what ministers get paid to do, so contend they must.

As Paul’s son in the faith, Timothy, didn’t inherit his Apostolic authority, but as a leader in the church he does possess real authority, and Paul wants him to use it. That Paul’s concern is false doctrines means there are true doctrines. I know that’s obvious, but it always needs to be affirmed that Christianity isn’t a smorgasbord religion. People don’t get to pick and choose what they want to believe. There is no true for you, but not for me in Christianity. Christians disagree on many things, but all who claim the name of Christ agree on the core truths of the faith, Mere Christianity as C.S. Lewis wrote about, and what is affirmed in the Nicene Creed.

In contrast to false doctrines, Paul highlights what are basically distractions. I’m not sure what kind of myths he might be referring to, but clearly they have no basis in Scripture because they are speculation, human guessing with no basis in historical or biblical fact. Even speculation that extends from the Bible should be avoided, for example, how God’s sovereignty and human free will work. All we can say is they are both true, and we have absolutely no idea. Some things we can know, things God has revealed, and others we cannot, and wisdom knows the difference (Deut. 29:29). Genealogies would be a Jewish issue because they were an important part of Jewish religion as we can see from our Bibles. Obviously some people were obsessing over them, and they needed to stop. And what does Paul contrast these useless exercises to? God’s work! Which is all about trusting him (faith) for the concrete things he has done for us, and does in us to apply what he has done.

In this context, Paul again comes back to what for him is the quintessence of the Christian faith:

⁵ The goal of this command is love, which comes from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith.

This would be agapé love, that which is grounded in moral preference for the other. And he uses one of my favorite Greek words for goal, telos-έλος, properly, consummation (the end-goal, purpose), such as closure with all its results. There is nothing phony or hypocritical or self-serving about it. This kind of love is always the telos of Paul’s gospel. Otherwise you have meaningless talk which leads people away from the faith. He says some of these people think they are a big deal, “but they do not know what they are talking about or what they so confidently affirm.” This is always what happens when people get too far afield from God’s word.

2 Thessalonians 3 – Final Prayers and Warnings Against Idleness

Paul wraps up the letter with a request for prayer, some encouragement, and warnings against idleness. First, he asks for prayer that the message of the Lord may spread rapidly and be honored, as it was among them. We ought to pray this as well as the gospel almost 2,000 years after he wrote these words continues to spread rapidly and be honored all over the world. He also asks for them to pray that they may be delivered from wicked and evil men because “not everyone has faith,” an understatement if ever there was one. Then he turns it back on them:

³ But the Lord is faithful, and he will strengthen you and protect you from the evil one. ⁴ We have confidence in the Lord that you are doing and will continue to do the things we command. ⁵ May the Lord direct your hearts into God’s love and Christ’s perseverance.

So, it seems, part of them being protected from evil men, is the Thessalonians themselves being protected from the evil one. The Greek doesn’t say evil one, but has the definite article “the” before evil, so “the evil.” We could say “one” is implied. The Christian life, whether in ministry or just living out the faith in daily existence is a precarious affair. War is like that, including spiritual war. We are daily on the firing line, making our way through enemy territory, encountering opposition from battles that are part of any war. And somehow we expect things to be easy? We’re surprised when “stuff” happens? Duh! Any old dead fish can float downstream. We’re daily fighting the gravitational pull of sin, and it weighs heavy upon us, all the time. We’re fighting against spiritual forces of which we’re almost totally ignorant. So we pray! And pray some more!

Then notice Paul gives them a little Apostolic positive thinking. For us, his command is in our Bibles, and doing what it commands, what God commands, is part of God’s protection plan. Then he prays again for the Lord’s work in this war, a nice little sandwich of sanctification: God’s work, our responsibility, God’s work. I haven’t a clue how any of this “works,” only that what I’m to do is enveloped in something divine done in and for me. So I don’t see the perseverance Paul is speaking of as that belonging to Christ, but that which his work for us enables in us. We look to him, and we endure. Focusing on the right things is such an important part of the Christian life. Our temptation is always to take it off of God and his work for us, and onto us, or things, or other people, or circumstances. We must steadfastly focus on him! That means seeing him and his work in and through all things, praying in all things, and living not on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.

Next, he warns them again against idleness, which must have been a serious problem for the Thessalonians. And he does it in the strongest of terms:

⁶ In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, we command you, brothers, to keep away from every brother who is idle and disruptive and does not live according to the teaching you received from us. 

This is serious business, and it’s not just people who are lazy, but rebellious, who are likely contemptuous of the Apostles’ authority. Yet, he considers them still to be fellow Christians. He wants them to follow their example, Paul and his companions, who “worked night and day, laboring and toiling so that” they would not be a burden to them. As laborers for the gospel, they had every right to the support from those they minister to, but Paul thought being an industrious, self-sufficient example was more important. Then he adds this very uncaring, uncompassionate command:

¹⁰ For even when we were with you, we gave you this rule: “If anyone is unwilling to work he shall not eat.”

What? Paul, how callous of you. Shouldn’t that person get on welfare or food stamps? Nope! According to Paul, and biblical ethics, if an able bodied person is not willing to work, then they can starve. It’s amazing what hunger will do to a person’s motivation. Of course we know now, and common sense with any knowledge of human nature would have told us before, after almost 60 years of the so called “War on Poverty,” giving people something for nothing destroys their character and makes misery of their lives. Modern liberal well-meaning always does that. Paul reiterates this to these idle busybodies:

¹² Such people we command and urge in the Lord Jesus Christ to settle down and earn the food they eat.

In due course thanks to sociologist Max Weber this came to be known as the Protestant work ethic, but it’s just really the biblical work ethic. Only the neediest among us, in Bible terms, “the orphans and widows,” deserver our help. For the rest of us, we must embrace personal responsibility. If people are not willing to do this, Paul wants them to “take note” of them so that they may feel ashamed. Yet they are not to be regarded as enemies, but to be warned as brothers and sisters in the faith. It’s still amazing to me that simple teachings as these eventually transformed the ancient world into the modern world. He finishes with something that is ours in Christ, but not easy to realize as fallen people in a fallen world:

¹⁶ Now may the Lord of peace himself give you peace at all times and in every way. The Lord be with all of you.

Paul has in mind the Hebrew word shalom, properly, wholeness, i.e., when all essential parts are joined together; peace (God’s gift of wholeness). Our lives in him should never be a disjointed mess. He makes all the puzzle pieces fit, even if sometimes the pieces are puzzling. We have ultimate hope in all things because he is with us!

2 Thessalonians 2:13-17 – Love and Chosen from the Beginning by God

Paul has just told them about the second coming of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the signs that will accompany that great and awesome day, including the man without law who will deceive many. For the Thessalonians, however, Paul is confident that they are loved by the Lord, implying thus that they could not be deceived:

because God chose you from the beginning to be saved through the sanctifying work of the Spirit and through belief in the truth. 

As I’ve argued here before, God’s love is efficacious, effective, it works its purposes in and on the beloved, and God loves those he chooses, and chooses those he loves. This is why I love the Reformed perspective on the faith because it is completely God centered, as Paul explains here, and numerous other places in his letters. And as I’ve also said, it is not just our justification that is an efficacious work of God, but sanctification at well, our ongoing growth in holiness and love back to God. It requires trust (the word translated belief in the New Testament, pistis-πίστις), but our trust doesn’t induce God to love and choose us. God’s love and choosing induces our trust! This truth we trust in is Paul’s gospel through which they were called. Isn’t it comforting to know that our salvation and sanctification is God’s work not ours! I love the way Charles Hodge defined Christianity: The work of God in the soul of man.

He then says that God called them through their gospel that they might share in Christ’s glory, and exhorts them:

¹⁵ So then, brothers, stand firm and hold fast to the teachings we passed on to you, whether by word of mouth or by letter.

Since we’ve been called and chosen and loved, and that this great salvation is being accomplished in us by the sanctifying work of the Spirit, we cling to “the teachings” (In Greek, paradosis-παράδοσις, traditions, or handing down or over). How convenient it is for us these almost 20 centuries later that we don’t have to wait for Paul to roll into town, or have a letter read to us only when we gather with other trusters, but have “the teachings” at our fingertips anytime we want them. God’s revelation in creation is astounding and awe inspiring, but his revelation in Scripture, our Bibles, is every bit as amazing. The author of the universe has authored a book just for us! We don’t have to speculate about God’s will, or the meaning of life, or the reason there is evil and suffering, or how we are reconciled to God, because he has told us!

We tend to so take this book for granted, as if it was just inevitable it would end up in our hands, and in the hands of people in almost every language around the world. Only because there is a God, and it was his plan all along, was it inevitable. From a human perspective it is miraculous! It was written on parchment (animal skins) and papyrus (a plant) in two languages (mostly) over 1,500(!) years, and faithfully copied, by hand, for another 1,500(!) years until Guttenberg invented his printing printing press in the 1540s. Critics and skeptics think because it’s an old book, and people make mistakes, there is no way we can trust that the text is the same as the one written thousands of years ago. They would be terribly wrong.

First, there is a God, and God can get his word to us exactly as he wants it written by human beings through human beings. That is a reasonable assumption, but there is plenty of evidence as well. Because of the science of textual criticism, we can have an extremely high degree of certainty that what we read in our Bibles is pretty much what was written down by the actual authors thousands of years ago. We have copies of Scripture separated by hundreds of years, and more, and the texts are virtually identical. I learned something a few years back that blew my mind. Until the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered in the late 1940s, the oldest complete manuscript of the Old Testament we had, called the Masoretic Text, was from around 900 AD. One of the scrolls in those caves along the Dead Sea was a complete copy of the book of Isaiah which was dated to about 200 year before Christ. When that copy of Isaiah (which had been copied for 500 years from the actual Isaiah) was compared to the Masoretic copy of Isaiah from over 1,000(!) years later, the text was almost identical! Word for word, letter for letter. Jews, and Christians, took their copying very seriously.

As we “hold to the teachings” God will be doing his part, as Paul prays:

¹⁶ May our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father, who loved us and by his grace gave us eternal encouragement and good hope, ¹⁷ encourage your hearts and strengthen you in every good deed and word.

In this short passage we’ve seen that the “work of God in the soul of man” is a Trinitarian work. It didn’t take until the Council Of Nicea in 325 for the Church to embrace and proclaim God as Triune, Father, Son, and Spirit. Paul is doing that right here! And think about it, not only is your salvation, sanctification, and glorification not up to you, it is a work of the three-fold manifestation of God! Talk about eternal security. And I love the word Paul uses for strengthen, stérizó-στηρίζω, properly, set fast (fix); give support to secure (firmly establish); solidly plant (which eliminates vacillation). That is what God is doing in us! In you! In all his people! Does that not make you want to seek and love and proclaim him all the more? It should.

2 Thessalonians 2:5-12 – The Without Law One Destroyed by the Breath of Jesus’ Mouth!

Having explained that the Lord’s second coming will not be until a man of sin or lawlessness is revealed, and a great apostasy, he tells them that something is holding him back “so that he may be revealed at the proper time.” One of my favorite sayings about God is that he’s never in a hurry, which should have been a clue to those first Christians that the second coming of Christ might not be right around the corner. The fact of God’s seeming tardiness, however, has not stopped Christians throughout the ages, and as we see from the very beginning, to proclaim that Christ’s return is immanent. It may be, but that’s really none of our business. The proper time will happen at the proper time! In the Greek Paul says, “in his time.” We should always be more content waiting for God’s time, than insisting on our own, but rarely are. Yet another thing of which we can repent!

He says that they know what this holding back is, or more accurately who it is:

⁷ For the secret power of lawlessness is already at work; but the one who now holds it back will continue to do so till he is taken out of the way. 

The phrase secret power is not the best rendering of the Greek, which is the mystery of lawlessness. Paul uses that word, mustérion-μυστήριον, quite often in his letters. As I’ve written a number of times about that the word, it does not mean unknowable, as we’re inclined to understand it today, but what was hidden, and now can only be revealed by God. What has now been revealed is lawlessness, or literally in Greek without law, anomia-ἀνομία (remember the “a” before a word makes it negative, so nomos is law, anomos is no law).

For thousands of years prior to God choosing Abram out of Ur of the Chaldees, and thousands of years since, people have been trying to figure out why the world is so incredibly messed up. The speculations are endless and multitudinous, resulting in the history of philosophy and religion. The ancients blamed it on the gods, while eastern religions blamed it on existence itself, which they seek to escape into cosmic oblivion. Others sought to conquer it through the force of will. Most of the speculation is not so much why evil exists, what it means, but what to do about it.

The more fascinating question, though, is why. Skeptics, and probably many Christians, think “the problem of evil” is a problem for Christians. How could a loving God bla, bla, bla. But evil and suffering only make sense in a universe that was once perfect, and then fell into its current state. As Augustine said, evil is good perverted. We could not have known this, until until God revealed it. We learn the woeful story in Genesis 1-3, how without law entered the world. Imagine such a world, perfect anarchy, and it is horrifying. Fortunately, there is one who is holding it back, obviously the Holy Spirit of God. We might say, if you think it’s bad now . . .

⁸ And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will overthrow with the breath of his mouth and destroy by the splendor of his coming.

This one will be a personification of without law, but the Lord’s mere breath will destroy him. What a contrast, ultimate futility crumbling before ultimate power. Paul tells us that this one without law will come “according to the working of Satan.” Unfortunately, he will come with signs and “wonders of falsehood,” a Greek word that will sound familiar, pseudos-ψεῦδος. I say this because theses false miracles will serve the lie and deceive those who are capable of being deceived, which is “those who are perishing.” Here is why this will happen:

They perish because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. ¹¹ For this reason God sends them a powerful delusion so that they will believe the lie ¹² and so that all will be condemned who have not believed the truth but have delighted in wickedness.

Notice there is a connection between truth and wickedness. Those who love truth hate wickedness, while those who hate truth love wickedness. Remember this handy apologetics point: People do not reject Christianity because it is intellectually insufficient, but because they love their sin. And when we say this we’re not saying, necessarily, that they love their specific acts of sin, although that is included. Rather, we’re saying they love their autonomy, which as you’ll pick up from our discussion here, is self-law. Here is the heart of sin, and why people reject the truth:

⁴ “You will not certainly die,” the serpent said to the woman. ⁵ “For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

Sinners want to be their own God! It’s really that simple. That’s why you may be able to put a non-Christian up against a Christian, and on the outside see very little moral difference, but inside the non-Christian is determined to call their own shots. The Christian, by contrast, delights in, “Thy will be done.” And the truth Paul is speaking of, and which Christians defend and believe in, is not abstract propositions or intellectual assertions about the nature of things, but Jesus the Messiah! He of the way, the truth, and the life. Then we might go to 2+2=4, which is truth, but that only makes sense because Jesus is the truth, and truth exists! As it’s been said, all truth is ultimately God’s truth. But if we don’t start with Jesus, God himself will give us what we want, delusions to believe the lies we want to believe. Praise be to God that he has saved us from ourselves!

2 Thessalonians 2:1-The Coming of the Lord, and the Man of Lawlessness

Paul now addresses the Lord’s second coming, adding on to what he talked about in his first letter. It seems the Thessalonians were alarmed that “the day of the Lord” had already come. Premillennial dispensationalists have a field day with this passage, believing that Paul is teaching that there will be a rapture in history, and a thousand year reign of Christ on the earth. This take on the “end times” was very popular when I became a Christian in the late 70s. Books like The Late Grate Planet Earth by Hal Lindsey were massively popular. This has died down quite a bit as the rampant speculation of such teaching has proven to be wrong time and again. These folks were constantly predicting that world events and leaders were signs of the end times, and that the anti-Christ and the rapture were around the corner. I think Paul’s teaching here is much more pedestrian, as we’ll see.

In his first letter, Paul addressed their concern that people were dying before the Lord’s return, so they will miss out on the resurrection. Now, they are “unsettled and alarmed” that he has already returned, but Paul wants them to know that some very specific things must happen before he does. He said (I Thess. 5:2) that “the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night,” and it seems some took this to mean that it could happen without them evening knowing it. So when they got reports that the Apostles had supposedly said this day had already come, he wants to be very clear they had not said that at all. So he tells them what must happen before the Lord’s return, to “remember that when I was with you I used to tell you these things.” Specifically, two things:

³ Don’t let anyone deceive you in any way, for that day will not come until the rebellion occurs and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the man doomed to destruction.

The word for rebellion is one we’re familiar with, apostasia-ἀποστασία, properly, departure (implying desertion); apostasy – literally, “a leaving, from a previous standing.” This has been interpreted in a variety of ways, but I’d lean toward it being Christians, or those who once embraced Christianity. There is something we call the visible and invisible church. The former includes everyone who belongs to the church, all who profess faith in Christ, while the latter is all those whose hearts have in reality been transformed by Christ. Even Jesus said, “Many will say to me on that day . . . .” Judas was part of the “visible church.” None of the others thought he could be capable of his apostacy. At some point before the Lord returns there will be a significant apostacy.

Then this man of  lawlessness, iniquity, disobedience, sin will be revealed. The word revealed is also one that will be familiar to us, apokaluptó-ἀποκαλύπτω, properly, uncover, revealing what is hidden (veiled, obstructed), especially its inner make-up; (figuratively) to make plain (manifest), particularly what is immaterial (invisible). In Christian usage apocalyptic refers to the end of everything, the ultimate revealing of all things, so Paul is telling that us this man is a sign that the consummation of all things is soon to come. He tells us more about this doomed man:

⁴ He will oppose and will exalt himself over everything that is called God or is worshiped, so that he sets himself up in God’s temple, proclaiming himself to be God.

There is a lot of speculation as to what this means, specifically God’s temple. Dispensationalists say that the temple will be rebuilt in Jerusalem after Christ returns, and that is what Paul is referring to. I think that’s pretty much impossible because the purpose of Christ’s second coming isn’t to set up shop again, but to judge the living and the dead. He said in his first letter to them that his coming will be for the resurrection, not a continued life on this fallen earth. Some think God’s temple is a reference to the church, as we are now his temple, which seems the most plausible explanation because once the temple curtain was torn in two as Jesus accomplished his mission on the cross, God’s presence with his people, his temple, could no longer be limited to a physical space. Whatever the details, it will be readily apparent that a great usurper is on the scene. Paul is also likely thinking of Daniel 11 where a king who exalts himself over everything is described.

I’ll have to address the rest of this passage in another post, but the pedestrian lesson I mentioned above is simple. We’re not to be obsessed with endless speculation about the Lord’s second coming. Stop it! Rather, we should heed the words of Jesus, that no one knows that day or the hour. Rather, we’re to live in a manner worth of the calling of our great Savior, as Paul has exhorted over and over in his letters. We can also learn from God’s words through Jeremiah (29) to the exiles in Babylon. He encouraged them to live and build their lives, and not to listen to prophets who lie to them. In our case, to those who obsess about end times speculation, which again is not nearly the issue it was when I was a young Christian. We can trust that God is in total control of whatever happens, as we’ll see in the rest of this passage.

2 Thessalonians 1:11-12 – The What and Why of Glorious Gospel Prayer

Before Paul segues into addressing the second coming of the Lord, he explains what he is going to pray for them, and why. He starts by saying, “With this in mind . . . ” He has praised them for standing up to the suffering and persecution they are enduring because they believed the testimony of Paul and his companions. Now the what:

we constantly pray for you, that our God may make you worthy of his calling, and that by his power he may bring to fruition your every desire for goodness and your every deed prompted by faith.

We see in this prayer Paul’s perfect combination of God’s sovereignty and human volition. Paul is praying for a work of God’s power in these Christians, which assumes God can accomplish what Paul is praying for. It is God who makes us worthy. That’s not an insignificant distinction, because our sinful human tendency is to see this as our job. If we just do more Bible reading, and pray more, and sin less, and help more old ladies across the street, we’ll prove ourselves worthy, doggone it! We need to do all these things, or not as the case may be, but we’re not pulling off the Christian life because we’re trying really, really hard. We’re walking worthy of the calling because God is merciful and gracious! And he is able, has the power, to enable us to bear fruit unto eternal life.

We always need to keep the focus up and out, not in and down. God says through Isaiah that he will not give his glory to another, and Paul says twice (I Corinthians and Ephesians) that this salvation and all that comes with it is of God “so that no one can boast.” When we give God the glory (but he’ll get it whether we give it to him or not), that glory in all it’s goodness is reflected back on us. As life on earth in all its multitudinous manifestations is made possible by the sun, so is the Christian life made possible in its many manifestations by the Son. As C.S. Lewis said, he believed in Christianity like he believed in the sun, not that he sees it but that by it he sees everything else. Jesus makes sense of everything! With him the puzzle pieces of life fit perfectly, without him the pieces don’t fit at all, and life is a confusing mess.

Paul speaks of their desire for goodness and faith, or trust. These too are of God. Before we were found in Christ, we were dead in our sin, God’s enemies, with spiritual hearts of stone. It took a supernatural work of God to transform us to life, family, and flesh. He gives us these desires, enables us to trust him, and then works to help us to accomplish the means to those ends. It’s really remarkable how much we can trust him, even as it often proves so hard to do. After more than four decades following Jesus, I’ve realized that is my biggest failure as a Christian, not trusting God in a manner worthy of who he is, and what he has done for me. Romans 8:28 is true, or it is not. And when I’m worried or anxious or fearful or impatience, I obviously believe it is not. So I repent!

Then the why:

¹² We pray this so that the name of our Lord Jesus may be glorified in you, and you in him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ.

The why, the Lord being glorified in us, is directly related to the what. If we understand the gospel is all its manifest beauty, Jesus will be glorified, not us. If we mix some law in with that gospel, he will not. The difference between law and gospel is the difference between the proverbial night and day, even as it can be deceptively subtle. If we allow ourselves to fall into the clutches of the law, we begin to see our obedience as a means to God’s acceptance, rather than a gracious opportunity to show our love and affection for him. Big, huge, difference! We cannot be any more accepted by God than in Christ, and it is in him in which we live, and move, and have our being. This came home to me in a powerful, life-changing way when I finally after several decades as a Christian understood I Corinthians 1:30:

It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God—that is, our righteousness, holiness (sanctification) and redemption.

I am in Christ Jesus not because of anything I’ve done, or any decision or choice that I’ve made, but because of God! We must first understand that. Then we must understand what Jesus is for us, and that is everything related to our salvation from sin, justification, sanctification, and glorification.

Too many Christians see Jesus as first and the last of these, but think sanctification is up to them. This is where law sneaks in, deceiving us into thinking if I just do better God will like me more. No he won’t! We are now, at this very moment, in Christ, fully and completely and totally accepted before God; we can’t be any more accepted based on what we do or don’t do. From there we work out our salvation with fear and trembling. But it’s not fear of not measuring up, and if I don’t God will pound me, but a fear of awe and respect that Almighty God, the Creator of the universe, is actually working in us, in sinners like us, who loved us even when we were his enemies. Oh praise him for such a great and glorious, and completely counter intuitive gospel! Which is why it could not be made up by any human being. It must be true!

2 Thessalonians 1:1-10 – Marvel at God’s Justice and Glory in Christ for His Saints

The second letter to the church at Thessalonica is also one of Paul’s earliest letters we have, probably from 51 or 52 AD. He addresses similar issues as in his first letter, including persecution and the Lord’s second coming. He starts by giving thanks for their growing faith and love, and says how proud he is of how they are enduring all the persecutions and trials. It was tough to be a Christian in the ancient pagan world, but the Thessalonians seem to have had an especially tough time of it, as Paul did in his short initial visit. He wants them to understand that this is, in effect, part of God’s plan, and that their suffering is not in vain:

⁵ All this is evidence that God’s judgment is right, and as a result you will be counted worthy of the kingdom of God, for which you are suffering.

Their suffering, or any suffering the Christian endures for their faith, is part of a much bigger plan, like the entire universe compared to one planet bigger, only much more so. We can take much comfort in that because our circumstances are never to be seen apart from God’s eternal picture.

What does Paul mean by God’s judgment is right, and that the persecutions and trials are evidence of this judgment? We tend to think that when things are going well, when there is no suffering or persecution, that that is the way things are supposed to be. Anyone who thinks that, and all of us do at times, is not familiar enough with their Bible. This fallen world is not our home! Although we far too often act as if it is. The gravitational pull of sin, the fall, the thorns and thistles, will manifest itself in an infinite variety of ways, including persecution. It is the standing up under it, the giving thanks for God’s providence in the midst of it, that proves we are worthy of his kingdom, and that his ultimate judgment on the cross is manifesting itself in our lives.

But Paul also wants them to understand God is just, and that those who cause their suffering will be held accountable for it. He dealt with Jesus’ second coming in judgment in his first letter to them, and says it is that coming that will result in ultimate justice:

This will happen when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven in blazing fire with his powerful angels. ⁸ He will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. ⁹ They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might ¹⁰ on the day he comes to be glorified in his holy people and to be marveled at among all those who have believed.

This is a frightening picture, and one modern people are loathe to contemplate, including me. In the last several hundred years, since the so-called Enlightenment, a God of love has completely swallowed up the God Paul reveals to us here, one who would punish sinners with everlasting destruction. That’s a long time! And if we’re honest and decent human beings, troubling. Those people didn’t choose to be born, and God didn’t choose them, yet he will reject them forever. Sure, each of us longs for justice to be done, for wrongs to be righted, evil to be punished, but forever? Maybe the real baddies like Stalin, Hitler, and Mao, or rapists’, child molesters, and murderers, but those who appear to us good and decent people? Jesus spoke of hell more than anyone else in the New Testament, and he came back from the dead, so I have to believe what he says, but it is hard to accept nonetheless. Whenever I come up against my ignorance and finitude in light of such difficult biblical truths, I lean on Moses’ assertion about the character of God in Deuteronomy 32:

³ I will proclaim the name of the Lord.
    Oh, praise the greatness of our God!
⁴ He is the Rock, his works are perfect,
    and all his ways are just.
A faithful God who does no wrong,
    upright and just is he.

Only God himself is competent to know and execute perfect justice, and that’s good enough for me. If I don’t accept this, then I have decided that I am competent to judge him. No thank you!

It is a beautiful and comforting thing to ponder that when Jesus does return he will be glorified in his saints, which is the Greek word for holy people, those set apart for God. I’m not sure why, or by what theological justification, the Catholic church thinks it can canonize someone as a “saint,” but the Bible is very clear that all of God’s people are set apart and holy because they are set apart by him, are saints. In other words, as I’ve argued since Genesis 1, this isn’t about us! But what God in Christ has done for us! And of course to us. We are saints because of what he’s done, not because we’ve done any supernatural or super human thing. That’s why he will be glorified in us!

At that time we will also marvel at him. I love the word Paul uses, thaumazó-θαυμάζω, properly, wonder at, be amazed (marvel), i.e., astonished out of one’s senses; awestruck, “wondering very greatly.” I would suggest that those who marvel at Jesus in this way when he returns, will marvel at Jesus in this way now. If we’re not, if we’re going through the Christian motions, I would suggest something is very wrong with our Christianity. This type of marveling happens within those “who have believed.” We must understand that biblical belief is not primarily intellectual assent to propositions, but trust in a person, God in Christ. The former without the latter is still a heart of stone waiting to be transformed into a heart of flesh.

Plato and Aristotle argued that philosophy, the highest form of knowledge they knew, the love of wisdom, begins in wonder. This meant their focus was on things out there, outside of the self, what Christians know as Creation. That’s why while they got much wrong, they got so much right. So for us, marveling starts with Creation, where God’s invisible qualities, Paul says in Romans 1, his eternal power and divine nature, “have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made.” And the more scientific knowledge advances, the more wonderous it becomes. Marvel at a sunset, marvel at a fly, an orange, water, the human cell, a full moon, marvel, marvel, marvel! Then marvel at God’s revelation to us in the Bible, Scripture, on every word of which we live. Then marvel at Christ, his love, mercy, and grace displayed for you in his bloody and battered body in the ultimate revelation of God’s being for you!

I Thessalonians 5:12-28 – Final Exhortations: God Will Do It!

Paul ends the letter with almost a bullet point list of final instructions, as if he’s running out of time and he wants to get in as much as he can; no excess of words here. It’s probably easiest for me to treat it that way.

• He encourages (asks) them to respect and honor those who are over them, and who admonish them. I imagine acceptance for biblical authority wasn’t easy for pagans. Authority in the wider Roman-Greek world was based on a power dynamic, with the threat of violence to back it up, not love. For the Christian it’s a natural part of church life, and he tells to hold church leaders “in the highest regard in love because of their work.” There’s nothing of a power dynamic here.
• “Live in peace with each other.” Time for a vocabulary lesson. Paul uses the Greek word for peace from which we get irenic, an adjective meaning to promote peace or being conciliatory, eiréneuó-eiréneuó. Paul uses it throughout his letters, and it’s a more God focused word than mere absence of conflict: living in the condition of God’s peace (gift of wholeness, integrity of being). We can live in this peace with others because first we have peace with God. Why? His mercy and grace and love, therefore we can have peace with others because of mercy and grace and love, his and ours. It allows a beauty and flourishing that can only happen in a God-drenched environment. It obviously doesn’t come easily, though, which is why Paul commands it.
• He urges them to:
  • admonish the idle (unruly)
  • encourage the fainthearted
  • help the weak
  • be patient with everyone

I’ll say it yet again, how radical and transformational such an others oriented ethic was in the ancient world, and can still be in ours.

• He continues, encouraging them not to pay back wrong for wrong (mercy), “but always strive to do what is good for each other and for everyone else.” Yes, radical and transformational.
• “Rejoice (be glad) always.” What, not just sometimes? Not just when our circumstances warrant it? Even when things are bad? I’d guess for Paul, always means always. The word Paul uses, chairó-χαίρω, as usual is God centered, not us or others or circumstances centered: properly, to delight in God’s grace (“rejoice”) – literally, to experience God’s grace (favor), be conscious (glad) for His grace.
• “Pray without ceasing.” Like breathing, pray without ceasing. Live a life of prayer, all our moments unto God. I’m afraid I’m not very good at this, so it’s a mindset for which I strive.
• “Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” This doesn’t need much commentary, but to remind us how terrible we all are at actually doing this. And Paul rubs it in by telling us it is God’s express will in Christ. I have found, though, that as I age I do get better at giving thanks when I don’t feel at all thankful. I think maybe that’s the point.
• “Do not quench the Spirit. ” It is important to see this command in context: ²⁰ Do not treat prophecies with contempt ²¹ but test them all; hold on to what is good, ²² reject every kind of evil. Contempt is to treat them as if they were nothing. So extinguishing the Spirit has to do with ignoring God’s revelation, and living for the evil and rejecting the good. In letting the Spirit thrive, we are to test or examine all revelation. We don’t have the same dynamic as the early church did because the prophetic word is now found in the New Testament canon. But we can test those who teach based on the authority of God’s word found there. I love it that we’re not just supposed to be robots, and unquestioningly accept whatever comes from some authority, but at the same time we’re not to be quenchers, as if what we’re taught or commanded is just nothing. It’s so different from the world of a cult on the one hand, and secularly autonomy on the other. It’s wonderfully balanced in truth in God in Christ in Scripture. As Paul says of the Berean Jews in Acts 17, they “were of more noble character than those in Thessalonica, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true.” Even Paul expected to be checked against God’s word. (BTW, Luke is writing about the Jews in Thessalonica that rejected Paul’s message, not the one’s Paul is writing to in this letter, who are mostly ex-pagans.)
• And finally, ²³ May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. ²⁴ The one who calls you is faithful, and he will do it.

It is critical that the Christian understand that sanctification is not our work but God’s. We cannot make ourselves more holy, more set apart for him by our decisions or will or choices, although they are obviously included in the process. They are rightly understood as a response to his work within us and upon us. In I John 1:9, the Apostle says it is God who cleanses or purifies us from all unrighteousness. Why is this so critical, apart from it being the truth and the nature of the thing? Because we don’t have the power of ourselves to change or transform the fundamental orientation of our being, the essence of our affections, what we are to love, what we are to abhor. Only God can do that.

I don’t know about you, but that takes off all the pressure, of me thinking I have the ability to measure up, to be what God requires of me. And it takes the focus off of me, as much as that is even possible. It directs me to the source of life itself, the same one who by his supernatural power raised me spiritually from the dead (justification—in other words I had no choice), through that same power will transform me (sanctification—in other words I have no choice) into his image, and ultimately glorify me to be with him forever (I certainly have no choice in that!). Read Romans 8:28, and realize that was the plan from the beginning, that it’s up to him not us! Thanks be to God!

1 Thessalonians 5:1-11 – Destined for Salvation, Not Wrath

Paul continues addressing the Second Coming, and how to live in light of it. As in the rest of Christian history, people in the first were obsessed with “times and dates.” Paul tells them any such speculation is fruitless because they “know very well that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night,” which is to say unexpectedly. This second coming, this “day of the Lord,” is not just to take believers to eternal life, but to bring judgment on the world:

³ While people are saying, “Peace and safety,” destruction will come on them suddenly, as labor pains on a pregnant woman, and they will not escape.

John the Baptist thought the Messiah’s coming, his only coming, would be in judgment:

He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. ¹² His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor, gathering his wheat into the barn and burning up the chaff with unquenchable fire.

Jesus first coming, however, was not to bring judgment on the Roman Empire, on Israel’s enemies, but to take the judgment, and pay the penalty for our sin. He will bring that winnowing fork in his second coming, and it will happen when nobody expects it. Most people live lives of blissful ignorance, assuming this life is it, or that they’re basically decent people, and would certainly never incur God’s wrath for their sin. God is a God of love, right? Indeed he is, which is why he came first to save. He is also holy, and will return to earth a second time to judge, what Paul calls “destruction.” Whatever that looks like, it will not be pleasant. So we say to those yet to accept Jesus, repent! The day is near!

He then tells the Thessalonians that they are not in darkness so that this day should surprise them like a thief. Since they belong to the light and the day, not the night or darkness, they will live like it, “alert and self-controlled.” Christianity is a binary view of life, as we would say in the computer age, either/or, one or the other; there is no in between. Paul always tends to make the contrast stark, either you live a holy, self-controlled life, or you are a raving drunkard. In fact most people are generally decent, but decency will never reconcile a sinner to a holy God. Yet Paul’s contrasts here, between light and darkness, night and day, being asleep or awake, being drunk or self-controlled, are made for a reason. We live in an ever present awareness as Christians, or should, in light of God’s presence with us in Christ, his concrete reality to us, and everything that means for every moment of our existence. There ain’t no such thing as a part-time Christian. What does that look like?

⁸ But since we belong to the day, let us be sober, putting on faith and love as a breastplate, and the hope of salvation as a helmet.

There they are again, faith, hope, and love. Thankfully, Paul isn’t telling us we need to be teetotalers. Rather we are to be néphó-νήφω, properly, to be sober (not drunk), not intoxicated; (figuratively) free from illusion, i.e., from the intoxicating influences of sin (like the impact of selfish passion, greed, etc.). Further, it refers to having presence of mind (clear judgment), enabling someone to be temperate (self-controlled). So, “uninfluenced by intoxicants” means to have “one’s wits (faculties) about them,” which is the opposite of being irrational. Meaning we think our way through life, living our lives based on something other than our passions. And we don’t do this by not doing things, but by putting on these other things, virtues as the Greeks would call them. They allow us to put God first, so we put ourselves and others in their proper relationship, not too much of one or the other, but the right amount that allows us to live for the good of ourselves and others, and God’s glory. And these virtues protect is as a breastplate and helmet protected a Roman warrior from those things that are not of God, night, darkness, and sleep as Paul puts it here. The reason we can do this?

⁹ For God did not appoint us to suffer wrath but to receive salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ. 

The binary again, wrath or salvation, and it is God who decides. It’s amazing to me how many Christians have a problem with God deciding who he saves, as if that’s just not fair! Everyone should have a chance, they think. Only then can God be just. It’s nice that they a jealous for God’s character, but God is by definition just, not arbitrary (as they imply by rejecting God’s sovereign choosing in salvation). I wonder why God would allow anyone to be created or born who he knows he will not save. That bothers me, but with Paul I accept, Who are you, O man . . . I am limited in every conceivable way, so how could I ever sit in judgment of God. Rather, I take great comfort that my salvation was determined and destined for me by God. That it’s not up to me! And that because of that, I never have to fear God’s wrath, his punishment for my sin, because he himself in Christ took that for me. So now I do my best to live in the day and the light, like one awake to the truth of that faith, hope, and love. And to affirm yet again that our souls, i.e., us, never die, he says:

¹⁰ He died for us so that, whether we are awake or asleep, we may live together with him.

As Jesus said to Martha at the tomb of Lazarus, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he die; and whoever lives by believing in me will never die.” He then asks her, “Do you believe this?” Yes! Even though it’s really hard to believe. Let’s get binary again. If it’s not true, what is? Islam? Judaism? Atheism/materialism? Buddhism? Hinduism? Something has to be true about the actual nature of reality. I go with Jesus and the Eyewitnesses, because nothing else comes close to explaining reality better, nor has the historical, textual, archeological, or logical evidence that Christianity has. Therefore, as Paul says, “encourage one another and build each other up,” because we will in fact live together with him forever!

1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 – We Will Be With the Lord Forever!

Paul did not get to spend a lot of time, maybe just a few weeks, with the Thessalonians when he founded the church, so he wasn’t able to do much in depth theological teaching. One issue they seem to have been confused over is life after death:

¹³ Brothers, we do not want you to be ignorant about those who have fallen asleep, so that you do not grieve like the rest of those who have no hope. 

Paul is obviously speaking of death, and their ignorance implies that was not something he was able to address when he was with them, what exactly happens after we die. They just didn’t know, so their grief didn’t differ from the hopeless. The finality of death seems so brutally forever. It appears that we will never see those we love again. But that is not true, at least for those who die in Christ. We grieve because death is a painful loss, being separated from those we care about in such an absolute way. But we have an incredible hope:

¹⁴ For we believe that Jesus died and rose again, and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him. 

They didn’t understand the implications Jesus’ resurrection had for them after they died, that death is not the end at all, but only the end of the beginning. I love this image of God bringing those who die “in him” to be with Jesus. I imagine he comes somehow to take us by our now spiritual hand to personally escort us to Jesus at the moment of death. And he comes to get us, which means “us” is not our bodies, but our soul. Jesus says as much in Matthew 10:

Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.

While the soul and body are not identical, and we, us, our soul, can live without the body, soul and body will eventually be united for eternity, in heaven or hell. I do not like to think about the latter because I have no idea what it means. When it comes to such things, I trust God, and refuse the temptation of speculation.

Death is an ugly separation, us from our loved ones when they die, and us from our bodies when we die. This separation was a horrible shattering of the pre-fall union of body and soul that will only be finally rectified at the resurrection. That’s why death is so horrible, why Jesus himself cried at Lazarus’ tomb even though he knew he would bring him back to life shortly. That separation is bad, evil, ugly, so we do grieve, but with hope! Unlike every religion on earth, Christianity stands or falls on two historical events that either happened, or they did not.

The death of Jesus of Nazareth on a Roman cross under Pontius Pilot is, by far, the most well established fact of ancient history. The resurrection is only rejected by those who have an apriori anti-supernatural bias; they come to the evidence assuming the miraculous can’t happen, ergo the resurrection didn’t happen. The historical evidence, however, taken at face value makes the resurrection not only possible but probable. There really is no other explanation for the empty tomb, which most scholars accept, or the radical transformation of Jesus’ followers. Ancient pious Jews do not make up a story about God becoming man, dying on a Roman cross, and coming back from the dead in history. How do people make up something they can’t conceive? They don’t! Therefore, Jesus actually did raise from the dead, and what Paul says here is true: When we die, we will be with Jesus.

The Thessalonians must have been confused about what happens when Jesus returns:

¹⁵ According to the Lord’s word, we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep.

In AD 50, about the time Paul wrote this, all Christians expected Jesus to return any time. That was not to be, thankfully, because obviously God had a lot of populating to do for heaven, and the new heavens and earth. The dead, and those who are still living when Jesus does finally return, will all be gathered together simultaneously:

¹⁶ For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. ¹⁷ After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever.

Oh what a day that will be! Imagine the power of the being who can do such a thing. It’s completely believable when you realize that being, God, is the Creator of all things, which reveal his invisible qualities, his eternal power and divine nature. And the more we learn about his creation, the more it is obvious it can only be explained by Almighty God. He made it all by the power of his word, and he will raise us from the dead by that same word.

Paul uses the phrase the trumpet call of God for a reason. A salpigx-σάλπιγξ was properly, a war-trumpet that boldly announces God’s victory (the vanquishing of His enemies). We are in a spiritual war, in case you hadn’t noticed, and the final enemy to be vanquished is death. What sweet music that will be! This is for reals, brothers and sisters! This ain’t no pipe dream, for the hopelessly deluded who can’t handle that we just go into the dirt and rot, forever. The philosopher that inspired Marx, Ludwig Feuerbach, said that religion was merely projection. We want a thing to be true, heaven, life after death, we project it to be so. It takes a whole lot more faith to believe Feuerbach than it does the Apostle Paul. No, we will be raised from the dead, and “we will be with the Lord forever.” Paul concludes:

¹⁸ Therefore encourage one another with these words.

In the face of death we weep, we rage, we wonder, but we also hope in our risen Lord, who in fact, in history, in space and time, came back from the dead, and so will we.