I’m so grateful for correspondents who have communicated to me that they are reading and benefiting from the Everyday Bible Study Guides. This series fulfills my hope to stir more of us to read the Bible daily. I have included this morning the first section from 1 Thessalonians in the Philippians, 1-2 Thessalonians EBS volume. Perhaps you can think of getting small groups in your church to consider studying a book of the Bible with a study guide. The study guides include reflection questions for personal and group Bible study. The questions are written by Becky Castle Miller.
1 Thessalonians 1:1-10
1 Paul, Silas and Timothy,
To the church of the Thessalonians in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ: Grace and peace to you.
2 We always thank God for all of you and continually mention you in our prayers. 3 We remember before our God and Father your work produced by faith, your labor prompted by love, and your endurance inspired by hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.
4 For we know, brothers and sisters loved by God, that he has chosen you, 5 because our gospel came to you not simply with words but also with power, with the Holy Spirit and deep conviction. You know how we lived among you for your sake. 6 You became imitators of us and of the Lord, for you welcomed the message in the midst of severe suffering with the joy given by the Holy Spirit. 7 And so you became a model to all the believers in Macedonia and Achaia. 8 The Lord’s message rang out from you not only in Macedonia and Achaia—your faith in God has become known everywhere. Therefore we do not need to say anything about it, 9 for they themselves report what kind of reception you gave us. They tell how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, 10 and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead—Jesus, who rescues us from the coming wrath.
Many readers of Paul’s letters skim his opening greetings but they reward careful readers. The letter is written by three people, not just Paul. Paul, Silas, and Timothy are the writers. Paul gets the credit but they are co-authors. We will often say “Paul” as most do. The letter was carried by a courier who, in some cases, read the letter to the churches. Such a public reading was a performance, or what is sometimes called an “oral interpretation,” with pauses and stops and looking over the audience and gestures and fluctuating of voice and tone. Those listening would have participated by verbal responses and questioned looks on the face and harumphing, at times interrupting to ask questions. (So, very much not like our reading of the Bible on Sunday morning where we sit like little knobs on a frog’s back.) The reader, called a lector, would have adlibbed when she or he considered it necessary to make sure everyone understood. You can be sure some of Paul’s letters took a good long while to get through.
The church listening to this letter, the authors write, has a spiritual location: “in” both the “Father” and in “the Lord Jesus Christ” (1:1). Their greeting is “grace and peace to you,” two common words in the Greek world that had deep meanings for the early Christians.
“Why did he write us?” and “What does Paul have to say?” were the questions some in Thessalonica were asking when they gathered to hear this letter read. They will find out in what is nothing less than a pastoral narrative about Paul’s relationship with them. The passage above is a wonderful affirmation of them.
Affirming them in prayer
Jews of Paul’s day practiced a sacred rhythm of praying three times a day and Paul’s conversion to Jesus as Messiah did not interrupt his prayer rhythm a minute. Saying “always” and “continually” (or “incessantly”) does not mean all day long but in each of his times of prayer he expressed thanksgiving to God for them. His prayers combined the customary prayers recited from memory, like the “Hear O Israel” (Shema), but also spontaneous prayers for anything that came to mind. Kris and I pray for family and friends and students and their families before our dinner. We both know the encouragement when folks tell us they pray for us and we know that others say the same when we tell them we pray for them.
Affirming their virtues
Though the NIV translates “We remember” the term “remember” is actually connected to “We always thank God.” That is, he expresses thanksgiving for them to God by remembering them before God. His thanksgiving is a remembering. What he remembers about them before God is their three cardinal Christian virtues:
Faith (“your work of faith”),
Love (“your labor prompted by love”),
and Hope (“your endurance inspired by hope”)
In saying he remembers their “work [NIV adds “produced by”] of faith” we hear some of Paul’s most important and contested terms. Many by know that “works” when attached to “faith” breaks out into a Protestant rash but Paul will have none of that nervousness about “work.” For him “faith” is an act of turning to God in Christ and trusting God and becoming an allegiant follower of Jesus. This kind of “work of faith” does not merit redemption by human activity but expresses human agency in trusting Christ. Paul is thus reminding God of their conversions and their faithful discipleship. Faith is an “orientation of the whole self – of both thoughts and behaviors – toward the God of Jesus Christ” (Brookins, 1-2Thess, 31).
To combine “love” with “labor” may well have elicited some chuckles among the parents and among those struggling to get along with one another. So true: to love another person in Christ is not an easy idealistic romance but a rugged commitment to spend time with another person, to be an advocate for that person as a person, and to grow together in their allegiance to Christ. Some days are easier than others; some days one wants to give up and go live on island or in a monastery. Human relations are both the joy of life and the grime pits of despair. Say it with two emphases: the labor of love, the labor of love.
He also affirms their “endurance of [NIV adds “inspired by”] hope” that is oriented on the return of “our Lord Jesus Christ” (1:3). Hope does not mean “I hope the Cleveland Guardians will win the World Series this year” nor does it mean hoping against all odds, and neither is hope the odds of a good chance. Rather, hope is a steadying virtue in life as one learns to look through the sufferings and troubles and relational challenges, that is, looking through all these to the final joys and glories of the kingdom of God, the New Jerusalem, where all will be well. John Byron speaks of hope as waiting (1-2Thess, 50-51). Death defeated, the Dragon doomed, and peace and justice and love and wisdom flourishing across the land forever and ever. Where, and I think C.S. Lewis said this somewhere, “each chapter is better than the previous one.” That’s hope. It’s confident and assured and still waiting.
Paul affirms the Thessalonians by publicly speaking well of their faith, love, and hope. He continues.
Affirming their exemplary life
Paul affirms that God has chosen them because he, along with Silas and Timothy, watched the power of the gospel take hold in their personal lives and among them as a group. That gospel-taking-hold was “not simply with words,” that is affirming truths of the gospel. No, the gospel took hold of them “with power, with the Holy Spirit, and with deep conviction” (1:5). Their conversions were the kind that stick, that dig deep roots, that change lives and conversations and marriages and relationships. A big word here is “Spirit,” used in this context because the effectiveness of the gospel was so powerful the “only explanation I can find” is God’s Spirit at work. Another big word here is “gospel,” often translated “good news.” The word refers to the preaching about Jesus, telling his story as the fulfillment of Israel’s story (1 Corinthians 15:1-8). His story is about his life and teachings and death and burial and resurrection and ascension as the world’s Savior and true Lord (McKnight, King Jesus Gospel).
The example of Paul, Silas, and Timothy (he says “we” not “my”) in daily living became a living embodiment of gospel living so much the Thessalonians “became imitators” both of them and the Lord. Emulation of a good models is the deepest form of education, but for Paul imitation was not just of them but of those who were following Christ (1 Corinthians 11:1). A contemporary observed that “people put more trust in their eyes than in their ears,” that is, what they observe in examples than what they hear from them (Seneca, Letters 6.5). What young Christians need most are good models of Jesus followers, people’s lives that embody the way of Christ, and who are then worthy of being copied.
This imitation was in the midst of suffering and opposition to the gospel, which ramped up what it meant to get baptized, to participate in the house churches, to associate with other Jesus followers, and to turn away from “idols to serve the living and true God” (1:9). Recently I read an early Greek novel called Anthia and Habrocomes, and what stood out to me was this in-love-but-separated young couple were in two different exiles and in each location they offered sacrifices to the gods and idols of each location. They didn’t have one god or goddess; they worshiped whoever local god was wherever they were. Such was the Roman world. From such a way of life followers of Jesus converted. That conversion from was a conversion to, as well. They turned from false gods to the true God and to his Son who was coming back and who “rescues us from the coming wrath” (1:10). Wrath, which gets more attention chapters four and five and then later in Paul’s second letter to them, captures God’s act of destroying evil and death in order to establish justice and the lordship of the world’s one true Lord, Jesus.
Paul can’t affirm the Thessalonians enough. So deep were their conversions in the crucible of suffering that they became a “model” for believers in the surrounding Macedonia and down the coast to Achaia, which means Philippi, Berea, Athens and Corinth. They were Paul’s success story. It’s one thing to hear you are doing well in your music ministry or in your parenting or at the workplace but it’s another to say “You have become the paradigm of what it means to do these things.” Paul doesn’t even have to tell those churches about the deep rootedness of the gospel among the Thessalonians. Word about them was suffusing like sunlight. Good followers of Jesus suffuse the light that way.
The tell-tale sign of a genuine conversion is when a person reworks their autobiography from “BC days” (Before Christ) to “AC days” (After Christ). That is, “I once was like that but now I’m different.” Not long ago on a podcast I heard a well-known columnist say, “You can ask any of my friends. They’ll all say I’m a different person. I’m not the person I was.” That’s conversion, and that’s what Paul affirms about the Thessalonians. His words are a kind of “everybody’s talking about you folks. And it’s all good.”
Words of affirmation carry deep value in the heart of those who are affirmed. Offer affirming words to your pastors about their ministries; to your neighbor about shoveling your snow when you were gone; about the beautiful personality of your spouse and your children; about the work a co-worker is doing. Figure out how you can affirm some fellow believers for their faith or love or hope, and maybe think about it through the terms Paul uses: work and labor and endurance.
Scot McKnight, The King Jesus Gospel: The Original Good News Revisited (2d ed.; Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2015).
This speaks mightily to me. I will read it and re-read it. Affirmation really does give life to others. "A contemporary observed that “people put more trust in their eyes than in their ears,” that is, what they observe in examples than what they hear from them (Seneca, Letters 6.5). What young Christians need most are good models of Jesus followers, people’s lives that embody the way of Christ, and who are then worthy of being copied." And then the emphasis on this was a crescendo, imploring us to be more like Christ in the way we speak to and treat others. Thanks!
Hi, Scott, this excerpt from your commentary is superb in mere exposition and subtle gentle-but-firm “go thou and do likewise” thrust. How I wish I could participate in a small study group with you conversing about this excerpt.