1 Thess. 5:12-28 “Church Life in Light of the Gospel”

1:28But in probably what was a misguided Attempt to open the doors of church membership, that practice fell into disuse in the mid-20th century because it was, I think, wrongly believed that stating specifically how we intend to live together would scare people away from church membership. But look at what Mark Dever wrote about church covenants. He said, Requiring people to sign a church covenant lets them know that they will be expected not only to believe the statement of faith, but to live it out. Church covenants make membership meaningful because they clarify the spiritual and relational commitments that membership signifies. Clarifying the commitments of membership promotes the health of the local church because it keeps nominalism at bay and keeps us accountable to growing in real Christian piety.

2:26This morning we're wrapping up our study of Paul's first letter to the Thessalonians. And his conclusion focuses on the very thing that Dever is talking about with respect to church covenants. How exactly are we called to live out what we believe together as a body of Christ? That's what this passage is about at the end of 1 Thessalonians. And so this morning we're going to be challenged that in light of the gospel, we are called to honor our leaders, to serve. One another and to submit to God's word. So let's take a look together now at verse 12, chapter 5.

3:09Paul begins, we ask you, brothers, to respect those who labor among you and are over you in the Lord and admonish you, and to esteem them very highly in love because of their work. Now, in these first two verses of this section, Paul begins by asking the Thessalonians to honor their leaders, to respect them, and to esteem them very highly in love. And it seems from the way that he describes those leaders that Paul is specifically talking about the elders of the church, those men who serve as pastors. He describes them as those who labor among you, who are over you in the Lord, and who admonish you.

3:55Those are all functions of pastoral ministry. I want you to look on the screen at how the work of pastoral ministry is described in Scripture. 1 Timothy 5:17 says this: Let the elders who rule well be considered worthy of double honor, especially those who labor in preaching and teaching. The work of preaching and teaching is described in this passage as labor, which is the same word that Paul uses in 1 Thessalonians 5. That word most often refers to manual occupation. And means to toil or strive in a difficult endeavor, growing weary in doing so.

4:40Brothers and sisters, preaching and teaching God's Word is a labor of love for pastors, but it is labor. Studying the Word of God for hours and hours each week to rightly explain and apply the Word of God to His people, knowing that eternal destinies hang in the balance, knowing that eternal rewards and punishment hangs in the balance, is taxing work. Pastoral ministry is labor, and a good part of that labor is working to rightly preach and teach God's Word.

5:23Look now at Acts 20:28 on the screen. Paul is speaking to the Ephesian elders, and he says, Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers to care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood. In this passage, as Paul addresses these elders, whom he also calls overseers, his charge is to shepherd, to give attention to all of the sheep of the flock. And that's because God the Holy Spirit has called them to. To that work. So, in addition to preaching and teaching, pastors are called to oversee, to pay careful attention to, all the sheep in their flock, to keep watch over their souls, because human pastors are one of the primary ways that Jesus, the good shepherd, shepherds and cares for his flock.

6:23And then look at Titus 1:9 on the screen. He's giving the qualifications for elders, and he says he must hold firm to the trustworthy word as taught, so that he may be able to give instruction in sound doctrine and also to rebuke those who contradict it. Well, friends, the word admonish means something like to strongly warn and bring correction. So, Paul writes in Titus 1 that pastors must be able to rebuke those who contradict sound doctrine by their words or by their lives.

7:00Now, admonishing is not fun work, it is not fun to warn and correct, as we all know. And contrary to what some seem to believe, pastors are not eager to admonish members of the church because, and I want to make this shirt one day, pastors are people too. And therefore, we are conflict averse. We don't want to do those things, but it is important. Work and work that pastors are called to because we all must be warned and corrected from time to time.

7:36So, friends, from these verses, it seems clear that Paul is telling the church to respect and esteem very highly in love their elders, their pastors, because they labor in preaching and teaching, because they oversee them, keeping watch over their souls, and they admonish them when necessary. But look what he writes in verse 13 here. He says at the end, Be at peace among yourselves. Why is that there? Well, it seems as though there were some in the church that were not respecting and esteeming very highly and love their pastors. And so instead of peace, there was conflict, there was division, there was unrest.

8:21And that is not helpful to anyone, either the pastors or the people. Hebrews 13 makes this clear. Take a look on the screen. Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls as those who will have to give an account. Let them do this with joy and not with groaning, for that would be of no advantage to you. It is no advantage for any Christian to make the hard labor of pastoral ministry more difficult through complaining or gossiping or causing division.

9:01Because God the Holy Spirit has called those men to keep watch over your souls through preaching and teaching, through prayer, and through warning you when necessary, and because we have to give an account to God for how we do that work, you can joyfully submit to those men that God has placed over you as pastors to care for your souls, knowing that anyone who goes into that work for sinful reasons is going to have to answer to God. Anyone who does that work in a sinful way is going to have to give an account to God.

9:38Church, every elder at New Life is humbled and honored to work hard on your behalf for your eternal good. So let's be at peace among ourselves as our elders give our time, attention, and energy to you, as you respect and esteem us highly in love because of our work. It is so important to remember that the world does not relate to leaders this way. Jesus said as he was teaching that the Gentiles lorded it over them. The leaders used the people for their own benefit, and the people despised their leaders.

10:17We've been trained by the world to suspect, criticize, and subvert our leaders. But that's not how things should be in Christ's church. And love the leaders that God has graciously given to you for your good, it is an act of submission and worship to God, and it's an outflow of your belief in the gospel. And so, Paul begins by asking the church to honor and to love their leaders, to respect and esteem them highly in love. And he moves from asking to urging in verse 14. Let's pick up there.

10:58And we urge you, brothers, admonish the idol, encourage the faint-hearted, help the weak, be patient with them all. So, notice here, Paul is still addressing the brothers, that is, the brothers and sisters, the men and women who make up the church at Thessalonica, not just the leaders. And he's urging them to serve one another by patiently admonishing the idol, encouraging the faint-hearted, and helping the weak. And so, let's consider each one of those in turn. First, we're called to patiently admonish the idol.

11:39Some of the believers had stopped working, and their rationale seemed to be that if Jesus is coming back, what's the point of going to work? It's a very convenient belief to hold, isn't it? But this meant that they became dependent on the generosity of other Christians who were continuing to work hard. As unto the Lord and earn their own living. So, whatever the reason that they became idle, some Christians in Thessalonica were failing to love God and to love their neighbor by their idleness. And so, Paul urged the believers to patiently admonish them, to strongly warn and bring correction to them. Now, in our context, we don't have a whole lot of people who are clearly idle, who are simply not showing up for work or class at all.

12:31But we do have some who are functionally idle, some who are underemployed, some who are not working hard at their job as unto the Lord, some students who are wasting a lot of time every day instead of getting a part-time job or putting more work and effort into their study. And as we talked about two weeks ago, idleness dishonors God and it leads both Christians and non-Christians astray. It sets a bad example for other Christians who are then encouraged to be idle themselves, and it's a bad witness to non-Christians who conclude that believers in Jesus Christ are lazy and they don't take their work seriously.

13:15Paul says that we must patiently admonish the idol. Is there anyone in your life who needs a loving warning about their idleness? Second, We must patiently encourage the faint-hearted. The word faint-hearted refers to those who are discouraged, to those who have lost heart for one reason or another. And in Thessalonica, the most likely cause of the discouragement was the persecution that they were experiencing as a church, or the deaths that they had gone through, maybe as a result of that persecution, or both. But whatever the reason, some Christians in the church were faint-hearted, and so Paul encourages the Thessalonians to encourage those people, to give them fresh courage.

14:09Brothers and sisters, there are many among us who are faint-hearted, discouraged, even depressed. There are lots of reasons for this. For some, it's their job or their financial situation. For others, it's strained or even failed relationships. For many, it's the losing battle with temptation and sin. And for an increasing number among us who are discouraged or depressed, they don't know why. And so far, trained professionals have not helped them to solve that puzzle. What do these Christians need?

14:55They need you. They need me. They need others. We must come alongside them, not in an attempt to fix them, because, friends, there are so many things that simply cannot be fixed by us. No, they need us to come alongside to encourage them through our prayers, our presence, and our well-timed reminders of God's promises and character. If you've ever sought to encourage somebody who is discouraged or even depressed, then you know just how difficult that can be.

15:41It requires a lot of patience. You can't just pop over to their house, read a Bible verse, pray a prayer, and call it good. No, you have to patiently sit with them, sometimes for hours, sometimes for days or weeks, even months or years, as God does a work in their hearts through His Holy Spirit, through His Word, and through you. But it requires great patience. Who in your life needs your patient encouragement this week? And then, third and finally, We must patiently help the weak.

16:34Paul might be referring to those who are physically weak. That would be the elderly, the disabled, the sick, and many others. And it's certainly true that we must patiently help them. But I think more likely, based on the context of the letter, Paul is referring to the spiritually weak, to those new believers who continue to fall back into old sinful habits and patterns. If you think back to chapter 4, Paul taught at length about sexual purity. He said that Christians need to abstain from every form of sexual immorality to honor God and to love others. And so it's likely that these weak Christians are those who genuinely believed in Jesus, but kept falling back into the same sinful habits and patterns, especially with respect to sexual immorality.

17:31And if you're a mature Christian, it is so important for you to understand how much weaker Christians need your patient help. After ministering in a college town for nearly two decades, I've had hundreds of conversations with young Christian men who keep falling back into sexual sin. And I have to be honest with you, when I get an email or a text from a young person, Christian man saying, hey, can we talk? I'm tempted to think, here we go again, because I already know what this is about.

18:1199% of the time, it's about lust, it's about pornography, it's about what they did with their girlfriend last weekend. What do these young men need from me? What do the young women and men in your life, what do your peers, what even do those who are older than you, who keep falling into the same sinful habits and patterns, what do they need from us, friends? They need our patient help. They need us to patiently listen to them, to enter into their grief over their sin.

18:55They need to be reminded that the gospel of Jesus Christ is sufficient for them, not just to forgive them from whatever it is that they have done, but to empower them not to repeat those same sinful patterns anymore in the future. They need us to pray for them. How many times are we called to do this? Up to seven times? Jesus says to us, no, but 70 times seven. We do it for others in the body of Christ. Over and over and over again, because that is how God deals with us in our sin. He patiently comes to us, meets us, and pours out His grace on us when we have sinned and failed in the same way yet again.

19:47So Paul urges the church to patiently help the weak. Church, who in your life needs your patient help this week? He adds this in verse 15. Take a look there. See that no one repays anyone evil for evil, but always seek to do good to one another and to everyone. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus taught us to love our enemies, to pray for those who persecute us, and to do good to those who hate us.

20:27Paul taught in Romans 12 that we are never to avenge ourselves, but to leave that to God. Instead, we are to bless our enemies with our actions. So, in the context here of 1 Thessalonians 5, you've got people here who are idle and taking advantage of others. You've got people who are faint-hearted and not pulling their weight in the church. You've got others who are weak and who are sinning against God and other members of the church.

21:00And so, what is the temptation? The temptation is to pay those people back, either by withholding your love from them or by actively doing wrong to them, because you're frustrated. You're tired of dealing with those same issues over and over again. But, friends, Paul says that's not the Christian way because it's not the way that God has treated us. What do we deserve for our sin? We deserve to be slaves to sin, and we deserve to be judged eternally and punished eternally for our rebellion against God. But what has God done for us? He's poured out His mercy and grace upon us, He has not treated us as our sins deserve, He has actively done good for us. And so, in the same way, we are called to treat others on that same basis, even those in the body of Christ who take advantage of us, who use us, or who sin against us.

22:11That is a powerful witness to Christ and the power of the gospel, both to other Christians and to the watching world around us. So, Paul has asked the church to honor their leaders, and he's urged them to patiently serve one another. And so now he's going to command us to submit to God's Word. Let's pick up in verse 16. Rejoice always. Pray without ceasing. Give thanks in all circumstances, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. Do not quench the spirit. Do not despise prophecies, but test everything. Hold fast what is good. Abstain from every form of evil.

23:11In these verses, Paul is no longer asking, he's not even urging. He is commanding us as an apostle of Christ. And he writes that God's will for us in Christ is to rejoice always, pray without ceasing, and give thanks in all circumstances. Now, for just a moment, I want you to pretend that you've never read those verses before. I want you to forget what you've thought about those verses, and I want you to forget what you've heard taught about those verses, and I just want you to look at those commands.

23:50Rejoice always. Pray without ceasing. Give thanks in all circumstances? I'm sorry, how is that possible? We've read and heard those so many times that I don't think we grapple any longer with the real meaning of those words. How is that possible? Well, friends, the answer to that is that it is not possible, humanly speaking, to do those things. And so, this is an opportunity for us to consider whether our theology is theoretical or practical. Whether we just believe these things to be true in our heads or whether we believe these things to be true in our hearts so that they actually have an outflow into our lives.

24:50Because in the midst of life's trials and setbacks and crushing disappointments, we will see what we truly believe. And so, if your life, like mine, is not marked by endless rejoicing, unceasing prayer, and permanent thankfulness, what is the problem? I suggest to you this morning that perhaps the problem that we are all dealing with is forgetfulness. We forget God's gospel, God's power, and God's character. So, we have to work to remember those things. If we want to be people who always rejoice, always pray, and give thanks in all circumstances, the first thing we must do is remember God's gospel.

25:44There are so many things in life that can steal our joy, but the main culprit is the power and the penalty of sin. When your life is dominated by sin, by guilt and shame, by the knowledge that you will be judged by God for your sin, true and lasting joy is not possible. But, friends, the good news of the gospel is that Jesus came to deliver us from the power and penalty of sin through his sinless life, his death in our place, and his resurrection from the grave. That is the good news of the gospel. Look at how Paul rejoices in it in Ephesians chapter 2.

26:33He says, And you were dead in your trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience, among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature changed. Children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ, by grace you have been saved, and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace and kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. Amen.

27:43That is the good news of the gospel. Friends, no matter how life is going, we are always doing better than we deserve because we deserve to be slaves to sin and we deserve to be eternally judged and punished for our rebellion against God. Instead, he has poured out his limitless mercy and grace. And so to rejoice always, we must remember the gospel. To pray without ceasing, we must remember God's power. I think most of us would say that we pray far less than we want to, much less without ceasing. But what's really the issue with our prayer life?

28:32Is it time? I don't think so. I think most of us would admit that we have plenty of time. Is it knowledge? Again, I don't think so. I think most of us know how to pray. We know where to go in the Bible for instruction about prayer. We know where to go in the Bible for examples of prayer. Now, I suggest to you this morning that our prayerlessness is not due to a lack of time or knowledge or anything else that's like that.

29:07It's due to a lack of faith in God and in His Word. Look at what Tim Keller wrote: To fail to pray, then, is not to merely break some religious rule, it is a failure to treat God as God. In other words, when we fail to pray, we are failing to believe that God exists, that He hears us when we pray, that He is powerful enough to do something about our prayers, and that He is good and loving enough to do what is best for us at all times. Friends, to remember those things is to become a person of prayer, it is to treat God as God.

29:58So, if we want to become People who pray without ceasing, we're going to have to remember God's power. As Don Whitney has said once before, if we really believe that God heard and would answer every prayer that we prayed, every pair of pants would have holes in the knees because we'd be praying so often. Why would we believe that we have access to an infinitely powerful and good God and not go to Him with our daily needs and requests?

30:34To become people of prayer and to pray without ceasing, we must remember God's power. And then finally, to give thanks in all circumstances, we must remember God's character. Because we live in a fallen and cursed world due to our sin, all sorts of bad things happen to us. Hurricanes ravage cities, diseases ravage our bodies, people ravage us through their sin. We can't give thanks for those things because they're all evil. They're bad. They're hurtful or deadly.

31:25But that is not what God commands us to do. He doesn't command us to give thanks. For all things, he commands us to give thanks in all circumstances. Why? Because of his character. He is perfectly good, perfectly wise, and perfectly loving. So, when talking about the suffering that Christians were enduring in Rome, Paul wrote, And we know that for those who love God, all things work together for good. And then he concludes with these verses at the end of that chapter. Look on the screen: For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

32:34To give thanks in all circumstances, we must remember God's character. Friends, our great problem is forgetfulness. How can you take active steps this week to put reminders in your life of the gospel and God's power and God's character so that you can begin to? To be a person who rejoices always, prays without ceasing, and gives thanks in all circumstances. Paul moves on in verse 19, and he issues a command regarding prophecies, which is not referring to divine words given to God's prophets and apostles, because those were not to be tested, those were to be received and obeyed. And Paul is also not talking about predicting the future, since most biblical prophecy is not about the future, it's about the present.

33:35By prophecies, Paul is referring to words spoken by a believer, gifted by the Holy Spirit, to build others up through instruction, encouragement, and correction. To boil it down, prophecies are godly words spoken by godly people. He begins this section with: do not quench the Spirit, and the word quench means to extinguish a flame. It's appropriate since the Holy Spirit is often pictured in Scripture as fire. Do not quench, do not extinguish the Holy Spirit. And Paul says that one way we can extinguish the fire of the Holy Spirit is by despising prophecies, refusing to listen to godly words from godly people.

34:30Now, it's understandable why some would want to close their ears to prophecy because, in every age, there have been ungodly people speaking ungodly words. And so, many Christians have said, at least functionally, I despise prophecy, I don't want to hear it. But, church, we must remember that the Holy Spirit has given gifts to every Christian, and some believers have been given the gift of prophecy, the calling and ability to build up other Christians with godly words. But because only God's prophets and apostles spoke and wrote without error, that means that every other prophecy has to be tested. It's got to be tested against the inerrant, infallible word of God.

35:19And if we fail to test prophecies, we do so at our own peril. 40 years ago in Waco, Texas, a man named David Koresh falsely claimed to be the Messiah. He started a cult, and he took married women and young girls to be his wives and concubines, claiming that God had told him to do this. His cult members were led into evil by his words, and had they obeyed Paul's command here in 1 Thessalonians 5, they would have tested. His words against Scripture, recognized him as a false prophet, and been spared death or a lifetime of pain and regret.

36:13But they didn't, and they paid dearly for it. So, friends, we are not to despise godly words from godly people, but we must be discerning. We have to test everything we hear, hold fast to what is good, and abstain from every form of evil. That is how we submit to God's word. Let's close the book and the sermon this morning with verses 23 through 28. Paul concludes: Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. He who calls you is faithful, he will surely do it. Brothers, pray for us. Greet all the brothers with a holy kiss. I put you under oath before the Lord to have this letter read to all the brothers. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you.

37:19So, Paul closes this letter with a prayer, an encouragement, and some final instructions, as was his normal custom. His prayer is that the God of peace, and think about how powerful those words must have been to people who are being persecuted, who have watched loved ones die, who are struggling with sin of various kinds, and who have been apart from these missionaries for many, many months. His prayer is that the God of peace would sanctify them completely so that they are blameless when Jesus returns.

38:01And he writes, Your whole spirit and soul and body. And some Christians have taken that to mean that human beings have three parts. But elsewhere in Scripture, human beings are referred to as body and soul or body and spirit. And so I don't think Paul is trying to make a definitive statement about the nature of human beings, but rather he's trying to say that God's will is that all of us, our physical bodies that we can see and touch, and our spiritual souls that we cannot, that all of us would be completely sanctified. That's his prayer. His encouragement is not that the Thessalonians can sanctify themselves if they'll just work hard enough. No, his encouragement is, he who calls you is faithful, he will show you. Surely do it.

39:02Friends, we can have full confidence on the day that Christ returns, not because we have been faithful enough, but because God is faithful, and He will surely do what He has promised to do for all those who have trusted in Christ. And His final instructions are to pray for them, to greet the brothers with a holy kiss. That's a practice that Pastor Joshua wants to revive here. Just want you to be aware of that in case he starts moving towards you.

39:36Try to obey the word. Yeah, I see that. And to make sure that every professing Christian in Thessalonica hears the words in this letter. You notice also there's no command to test those words because Paul is conscious that he is writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Friends, for some of you today, listening to Paul tell Christians to honor their leaders, to serve one another, and to submit to God's word sounds very strange, even incomprehensible.

40:13You wonder, how can anyone be expected to honor leaders when so many of them have abused their power and have hurt the people that they're supposed to be serving? How can anyone be expected to serve people who are lazy or weak and causing problems? How can anyone be expected to submit to God's word when he says things like, rejoice in all circumstances, and your life seems like a total wreck? The answer to all of those questions is faith.

40:50You see, because we have faith in God, we can honor leaders even though we know that they will fail us sometimes, even catastrophically. Because our hope ultimately is not in our pastors, it's not in our senators or representatives or whoever the president is. It is in God, and we can trust him. Because we have faith in the God who saved us, even though we were spiritually lazy and weak, we can serve other Christians who are spiritually lazy and weak and need help without judging them because every one of us has needed the same patience and love and care from God.

41:41And because we have faith in God, who is in control of all things, we can rejoice and pray and give thanks no matter what our circumstances are, knowing that his purposes for us are eternally good, even if our temporary circumstances. Are not. You see, faith in God, His Word, and the life, death, and resurrection of His Son Jesus is what enables us to do these things. As Christians, we don't walk by sight, by human wisdom. We walk by faith. And we need the grace of God to do this, which is why he concludes this letter with, The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you.

42:31So, friends, this morning, we invite you to do just that: to turn to Jesus Christ and to put your faith in him, receiving his perfect life, death, and resurrection on your behalf. We invite you to put your faith in Christ rather than human leaders or your peers or whatever is going on in your circumstances. We urge you to receive the grace of God this morning. When you do, you will know peace because you will know the God of peace. And that will transform the entire way that you walk through life. Because you will know, as Paul said earlier in the letter, that whether you are awake or asleep, you will be alive with Christ for eternity. Thanks be to God. Let's pray.

43:53Father, we pray that you would help us to live our church life together in light of the gospel. Help us to honor our leaders, serve one another, and submit to your word. That the body of Christ would be built up, and that this community in our world would have a compelling witness to the truth of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. It's in his name we pray. Amen. Thank you for listening to the sermon audio from New Life Baptist Church in College Station, Texas. For more information or to support our ministry, visit us online at newlifecs.net.