Bible Talks - Traditional Church (Sunday 8am)
Christ Revealed
Sunday, 03 December 2006
Before I went on holidays we were looking at the Apostle Paul’s 1st letter to the infant Christian church at Thessalonica. Today we’re turning to his 2nd letter which was written shortly after the first letter. The scholars are not sure of the circumstances of the writing of this second letter but in it Paul takes up some of the ongoing issues that were addressed in the 1st letter. Issues of persecution, or suffering because of their new found Christian faith, issues relating to false teachers and issues relating to Christian behaviour. So let’s look at the first chapter of this short letter and see what it has to say to us.
Paul first gives a greeting, not only from himself but also from Silas and Timothy, who were well known in Thessalonica, having shared with Paul in the original evangelization of the city. He wishes the Thessalonians those greatest of all gifts, grace and peace, adding a reference to the source of these two blessings, God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
1. The letter proper begins in vs 3-4 with a thanksgiving for God's grace and blessing on the Thessalonian church:
We ought always to thank God for you, brothers, and rightly so, because your faith is growing more and more, and the love every one of you has for each other is increasing. Therefore, among God's churches we boast about your perseverance and faith in all the persecutions and trials you are enduring.
There is both a recognition of the Thessalonians' spiritual growth and at the same time he attributes their growth to God's grace.
Faith is a relationship of trust in God, and like all relationships is a living, dynamic, growing thing. There are degrees of faith, as Jesus implied when he said 'You of little faith' and another time 'I have not found anyone in Israel with such great faith'. It is similar with love. We assume rather helplessly that we either love somebody or we do not, and that we can do nothing about it. But love, like faith, is a living relationship, whose growth we can take steps to nurture. Their progress is due to God's active grace within them. Paul attributes their spiritual health to God, for, instead of congratulating them on their faith, love and perseverance, he thanks God for these things. When he is talking to God, he thanks him for his grace shown to the Thessalonians and when he is talking to people he boasts of God’s grace shown to the Thessalonians.
There is an important practical lesson here. What should our attitude be to Christians, either individuals or a church who are doing well in some aspect of their discipleship or ministry? Some people resort to congratulations: 'Well done! I think you're marvelous. I'm proud of you.' Others are uncomfortable with this and see an incongruity. It borders on flattery, promotes pride and robs God of his glory. So, although they may thank God privately in their prayers, they say nothing to the person concerned. They replace flattery with silence, which leaves the people concerned discouraged.
Paul exemplifies a third way, which affirms people without spoiling them. He not only thanks God for the Thessalonians; he also tells them that he is doing so: 'we ought always to thank God for you ... we boast about you'. If we follow this example, we will avoid both congratulation (which corrupts) and silence (which discourages). Instead, we can affirm and encourage people in the most Christian of all ways: 'I thank God for you, brother or sister. I thank him for the gifts he has given you, for his grace in your life, for what I see in you of the love and gentleness of Christ'. This way affirms without flattering, and encourages without puffing up.
2. In vs 5-10 Paul gives a defense of God's justice
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. God is just: He will pay back trouble to those who trouble you and give relief to you who are troubled, and to us as well. This will happen when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven in blazing fire with his powerful angels. He will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. 'They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord and from the majesty of his power on the day he comes to be glorified in his holy people and to be marveled at among all those who have believed. This includes you, because you believed our testimony to you.
Paul sees in the Thessalonians, he says, not only evidence of God's grace in their lives, but also 'evidence of the righteous judgment of God'. But what is it in the Thessalonian situation which Paul perceives as an a 'plain indication' that God's judgment is right or 'just'?
It is both fact that the Thessalonians are suffering for Christ and it is the faith, love and endurance which they are displaying in the midst of their sufferings.
In the gospels Jesus had taught that suffering was the unavoidable path to glory, both for himself and for his followers. Similarly, Paul had insisted that it is only through many tribulations that we can enter God's kingdom and that only if we share in Christ's sufferings will we ever share in his glory. So suffering and glory, tribulation and the kingdom, belong inseparably to one another. Therefore, since God was allowing the Thessalonians to suffer, they could know that he was preparing them for glory. Their suffering was itself evidence of the justice of God, because it was the first part of the equation which guaranteed that the second part, glory, would follow.
On the other hand, although God was allowing the persecutors some rope, it was evidently in the Thessalonians that he was especially at work. He was on their side, sustaining and sanctifying them. He was using their persecutions as a means through which to develop their faith, love and perseverance, in contrast to the prejudice, anger and bitterness of their persecutors, and so was preparing them for his eternal kingdom. By these qualities they were not 'made worthy' of the kingdom, in the sense of deserving it, but they were counted worthy of the kingdom of God, for which they were suffering.
This is an important distinction. We do not deserve glory simply because we’ve suffered. Many people who have suffered greatly are still under God's judgment because they have not turned to God in repentance and faith.
However, Paul states that because God is just, he will vindicate the Thessalonians publicly one day. He will reverse the fortunes of both groups, the persecutors and the persecuted, when Christ comes. He will pay back trouble to the trouble-makers and will give relief from affliction to his people who have been afflicted, including the apostles.
Of course it takes spiritual discernment to see in a situation of injustice evidence of the just judgment of God. Our tendency is to see only the surface appearance, and so make only superficial comments. We see the malice, cruelty, power and arrogance of the evil men who persecute. We see also the sufferings of the people of God, who are opposed, ridiculed, boycotted, harassed, imprisoned, tortured and killed. In other words, what we see is injustice - the wicked flourishing and the righteous suffering. It seems completely topsy-turvy. We are tempted to rail against God and against the miscarriage of justice. 'Why doesn't God do something?' we complain indignantly. And the answer is that he is doing something and will go on doing it. He is allowing his people to suffer, in order to prepare them for his heavenly kingdom. He is allowing the wicked to triumph temporarily, but his just judgment will fall upon them in the end. Thus Paul sees evidence that God's judgment is right in the very situation in which we might see nothing but injustice.
We need the same spiritual discernment and godly perspective as Paul had. In the Thessalonians' success, instead of flattering them, he thanked God for the evidence of his grace. In their sufferings, instead of complaining, he thanked God for the evidence of his justice.
Paul's assurance of the righteousness of God's future judgment naturally prompts three questions: (1) When will it happen? (2) Who will be punished? (3) What form will the punishment take?
So Question 1: When will God vindicate his justice and redress the present imbalance of human experience?
Answer: This will happen when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven in blazing fire with his powerful angels. Jesus’ coming will be personal, visible and glorious. His first coming, which we’re about to celebrate at Christmas, was in weakness and obscurity, his second coming, when it comes, will be in power and public magnificence.
Question2: Who will be punished when our Lord comes as judge. Answer: Paul writes in v8:
He will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus.
Both expressions describe unbelievers in general, indeed their willful rejection of both the knowledge of God and the gospel of Christ. This is a bit of a worry isn’t it. The popular folk religion of our society tells us that only really bad people go to hell. Alternately liberal Christianity denies the existence of hell altogether so everyone goes to heaven. But what the Bible clearly teaches is that God “will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus.” It is important that we remember everyone stands under God's judgment, no exceptions, and the only way to avoid it is through genuine faith in Jesus Christ.
Question 3: What will their judgment be?
Answer: They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord and from the majesty of his power. That the final state of those who reject God and Christ will be awful and eternal is not in dispute. But the question whether their exclusion-destruction means conscious torment or ultimate annihilation cannot be settled by an appeal to this verse since the apostle does not here clearly allude to either. Whatever it is, just make sure that you avoid it by trusting in Jesus.
In contrast to the appalling nature of hell, Paul then goes on to portray the glory of heaven. For when Christ comes, he will not only judge those who reject the gospel, but he will also be glorified in his holy people and be marveled at among all those who have believed. This includes the Thessalonians who, on hearing the apostle's testimony to them had believed. So not only will the Lord Jesus be 'revealed' objectively in his own splendour so that we see it, but his splendour will be revealed in us, his redeemed people, so that we will be transformed by it and will become vehicles by which it is displayed to the world. We won’t just be spectators of the revelation of Christ’s glory we’ll actually be part of it. We will not only see, but share, his glory. We will be more than a filament which glows temporarily, only to become dark and cold again when the current is switched off. We will be radically and permanently changed, being transformed into his likeness.
Take the Transfiguration as an illustration. On that occasion Jesus was glorified in his physical body. His face shone like the sun, while his skin and clothing glistened and became as white as light. In other words, his body became a vehicle for his glory. So will it be with his spiritual body, the church. The Body of Christ will be transfigured by the glory of Christ, not temporarily as at the Transfiguration, but eternally. One commentator wrote that if we could see ourselves as we will be when we are transformed by the glory of Christ, we would bow down and worship ourselves as the disciples wanted to do when they saw Jesus, Moses and Elijah in all their glory and the mount of transfiguration.
3.The last couple of verses of Ch 1 are a prayer for God's power
With this in mind, we constantly pray for you, that our God may count you worthy of his calling, and that by his power he may fulfill every good purpose of yours and every act prompted by your faith. 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.
Although the future of God's people is secure, Paul does not presume upon it. On the contrary, the prospect of our final transformation is an incentive to the pursuit of holiness now. So Paul's eschatological vision, his vision of the ultimate triumph of God and the vindication o0f his people, leads him to earnest prayer. It is prayer which links the future to the present, the vision of what is to come with the reality of what is. Paul's prayer consists of two parallel petitions. The first is that our God may count them worthy of his calling.
We’ve already seen, that this doesn’t mean to 'make worthy' There is no possibility of our establishing or accumulating merit in such a way as to deserve God's favour. No, when God called us to himself through Christ, he did it in his free grace to the unworthy and the undeserving. Since then, he has been summoning us to 'live a life worthy of the calling' with which we have been called. He has also been working in us in order to narrow the gap between what we were when he called us and what we should be and shall be. Only in this way can we be 'counted worthy' of his call and so receive entry into his kingdom.
The second petition in Paul's prayer is that by his power God may fulfill their every good purpose and every act prompted by their faith. He is not asking God to fulfill every thing they ask or whatever whim takes them but everything that is good and is prompted by their faith and so will result in good deeds. And the purpose of this is that the Name of Christ may be glorified in them and also that they in Christ.
When by God's power God's people live a life worthy of his call, and when their resolve issues in goodness and their faith in good works, then Jesus himself is seen and honoured in them, and they through union with him are seen in their true humanness as the image of God. In other words we don’t have to wait until Christ returns for us to share in his glory. It is a breath-taking, present reality.
4.Conclusion: the glory of Jesus Christ
Throughout this first chapter of 2 Thessalonians are recurring references to the glory of Christ.
· In verse 7 the Lord Jesus will be revealed in his glory.
· In verses 8 & 9 those who reject Christ will be excluded from his glory.
· In verse 10 the Lord Jesus will be glorified in his people.
· In verse 12 Jesus Christ must begin to be glorified his people, in us,
In his farewell discourse in that upper room, the night before his crucifixion, Jesus taught this same progression. He prayed that he might be glorified by means or his death and resurrection and that his own people might see his glory in heaven. But in the meantime he made the astonishing statement 'I am glorified in them'.
What is the meaning of life? It is to prepare us for the glory of heaven, but we don’t have to wait until then for as we live our lives honouring Christ, that glory is already ours.
Let us pray.