Sunday Morning Service

I Thessalonians 4

“The Christian's Call” • 12.14.14 • Calvary Christian Fellowship, Sunday Morning Service

Intro.

- Paul has spent the first three chapters of this book catching up with the Thessalonicans. They are on the same page regarding their past. Paul turns now to the subject of their future.

- His love for them, their love for him and their combined allegiance to the Lord, requires that they be united in purpose, as time marches forward.

- Some of what we are about to examine are Paul's further instructions based upon Timothy's report and some of it has to do with a question that he received about the death of believers.

- In response to what he has heard, the Apostle spells out three aspects of Christian living that must define the Christian of any age.

I. Intent Upon Holiness (v.1-8)

II. Increase In Brotherly Love (v.9-12)

III. Informed On Last Things (v.13-18)

Text

I. Intent Upon Holiness (v.1-8)

• I Thessalonians 4:1,2 : "Finally then, brethren, we urge and exhort in the Lord Jesus that you should abound more and more, just as you received from us how you ought to walk and to please God; for you know what commandments we gave you through the Lord Jesus." : In the present tense it sounds pressing and urgent. We are urging and exhorting you right now! This is important.

- They call them toward this action as brothers who must do the same but then strengthen this by appealing to the authority that they have in the Lord.

- What they are about to say is tied to the Lord's authority over their life! This was not simply their desire or opinion. For those who live in Christ, this is command level teaching.

- If you have not acknowledged Christ as Lord, this holds no bearing over you. But if Christ has saved you and you have entered into a relationship with Him, these are non-negotiable items.

- He tells them first to continue doing what it is that they have been doing. Keep at it. Exceed the measure you've been given and excel to a greater degree in your faith practice.

- They are to continue being active in their faith, receptive to the Lord's Word, and expectant with regard to His coming. Additionally, we know of their love which had been shown to all.

- These things are wonderful to have in any measure. Paul tells them not to be satisfied with the measure that they have, but to seek to expand it.

- There must be a strong desire to grow beyond what you are experiencing today. Our prayer must be consistent with this scripture in requesting that God move us beyond where we are today.

- That's what they accepted from the Apostles. They were given a good foundation and shown a great example. They knew that they were to progress, to walk with the Lord, seeking His pleasure.

- We please God by living in a relationship which honors His place in our lives by obeying His words, treating them as our commands! I John 5:3 tells us that we express love by obeying Him.

- Usually, our problem as Christians is not ignorance about this point, but a refusal or failure to practice. The Thessalonians were practicing and are our examples.

- Paul encourages them to seek a greater capacity to express gifts and graces from the Lord.

• I Thessalonians 4:3-6 : "For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you should abstain from sexual immorality; that each of you should know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor, not in passion of lust, like the Gentiles who do not know God; that no one should take advantage of and defraud his brother in this matter, because the Lord is the avenger of all such, as we also forewarned you and testified." : God's desire, His will for your life is your holiness!

- Salvation involves three parts, the first of which is a one time transference from darkness to light, from Satan to God, called "justification."

- It happens instantaneously, coinciding with a person's believing response to the gospel of Jesus Christ, proven true by their consequent shunning of all known sin.

- That act of repentance, turning away from sin to God, begins a life long process of like decisions as the Holy Spirit leads an individual. This is called "santification."

- God has changed my destination in justification and is changing my character in sanctification, leading me ever more toward Christ-likeness.

- You have been saved, you are being saved and you will be saved, for the final part of salvation is the best, when we are glorified and He changes my body!

- But during this life, it's a continual process which aims at our being completely set apart for His use exclusively. Is that true of your life? That's God's will for you!

- The primary area that they were to address was also likely the one most ingrained in their Roman minds: Abstain, keep out from sexual immorality. I like the Philips translation on this verse:

˚ "God's plan is to make you holy, and that entails first of all a clean cut with sexual immorality." (JB Philips)

- The word "sexual immorality" comes from the Greek word which provides us with our word for "pornography." It's very wide in it's applicability, relating to every form of illicit sexual behavior.

- We are not the first culture to have to deal with exploitive and expansive sexual material.

- The Thessalonians were to consistently and constantly refrain from behaviors that would illicit a sexually explicit response. Sadly, the church continues to have to ring the bell on this issue as well.

- The only place that sex is affirmed in scripture is within the context of a legally tendered marriage between a heterosexual man and his heterosexual wife.

- Sex inside of marriage is both encouraged and expected biblically, being created for it.

- Hebrews 13:4 says that marriage is honorable among all and the bed undefiled. But that verse continues with a tremendous warning: "But fornicators and adulterers, God will judge!"

- Engaging in any sexually arousing behavior, in any other context, is out of bounds for believers and it's practice is cause for grave concern.

- "But we love each other!" Then love God more by abstaining. "But it's natural and we're not hurting anyone." Many natural things are off limits and you are hurting each other and the church!

- There can be no other conclusion. Please heed God's Word. In spite of the world's teaching to the contrary, your body is not created for sex, but for glorifying the Lord!

- Being sanctified, being set apart, growing in holiness requires us to take possession of our own bodies. We're to occupy our bodies with a holy mindset and not allow it's desires to rule!

- The Holy Spirit takes possession of you and you acknowledge that relationship by continually yielding to His authority. The old landlord of lust has no further claim.

- A Christian is not defined by their passion and lust as the world is. They are defined by their most base desires, but the Christian moves toward a different desire.

- You and I are continually refined in and defined by a desire to be holy and honorable in the sight of God! Aside from that, Paul adds another matter involved.

- That no one should take advantage and defraud his brother. No one should cross the line and overreach into an area of sexual sin.

- By involving yourself in sexual sin with a person who is not your spouse, you are reaching into what is not yours and God will deal with that personally!

- The word "avenger" is related to the Hebrew concept for the Kinsman Redeemer, who stood to avenge wrongs within the family! You don't want to be running from Him!

- Paul has warned them before and now stands in the witness box to declare that this was true!

• I Thessalonians 4:7,8 : "For God did not call us to uncleanness, but in holiness. Therefore he who rejects this does not reject man, but God, who has also given us His Holy Spirit." : You are not called to uncleanness. You are called to holiness!

- Each time uncleanness is used in scripture, it refers to a moral impurity out of step with revealed orthodoxy.

- God has not invited you out from the world into His Kingdom so that you could live in impurity and merely tack on a little salvation! God is Lord of all or Not at all!

- He has called you into His Kingdom so that you could express a whole hearted devotion to Him! He has invited you in holiness and now you are His vessel.

- Now, Paul anticipates the possible retorts and suffices it to say that they cannot say that they have rejected man and his moralistic, legalistic opinion. They are rejecting God and His Word!

- If you are casual or dismissive regarding these words, you must do so with the knowledge that you are resisting, rejecting God's explicitly rendered command!

- Paul is saying that he has understood this message and been impelled to write it down at the behest of the Holy Spirit. Paul testifies in concert with Him and calls them to recognize that fact.

- Your response will prove your confession and His possession of you!

II. Increase In Brotherly Love (v.9-12)

• I Thessalonians 4:9-12 : "But concerning brotherly love you have no need that I should write to you, for you yourselves are taught by God to love one another; and indeed you do so toward all the brethren who are in all Macedonia. But we urge you, brethren, that you increase more and more; that you also aspire to lead a quiet life, to mind your own business, and to work with your own hands, as we commanded you, that you may walk properly toward those who are outside, and that you may lack nothing." : Paul needed to write them about sexual ethics. That was an outstanding issue that the recently converted had trouble dealing with.

- To write them regarding their love for each other and for the world however, was virtually unnecessary. They were taught by God.

- It's likely that they were meeting together without a Pastor, but with a working rudimentary knowledge of how to discern the Lord's will together and it was working!

- They loved everyone who came into their view! This was evident and was testified to by everyone who reported to Paul in that region!

- But notice this: He didn't need to write them about initiating or even maintaining a love. He wrote them so that they would seek to further excel in it!

- They were already gifted and expressive in this area, but Paul's heart was to push them onto greater heights. Increase more and more! We encountered these words last week.

- He prays that they would have a superabundance and an overflow of love practically! What would that love look like? First, it would be discerning.

- Paul calls them to "aspire," or to be ambitious and determine to find ways to lead a quiet life. Don't overreach in your love. Mind your own business. Be busy with what pertains to you.

- When you have the opportunity to speak into another person's life, do so at their invitation. Don't seek to meddle where you have not been invited.

- Do what your hands find to do in this life. Be about the business that God has set you in! Why? Look at verse 12.

- We're to live this way so that we behave properly, the word speaks of an honest, decent manner, toward the people who live in this world, literally, those who are without God.

- How honest and decent is it of you to expect the world to make moral changes without first calling them to receive the Holy Spirit that makes their change a possibility!

- We are not to impose what a Christian believes and lives by upon them before they know the power of God's converting work and the enabling of God's Holy Spirit!

- A Christian has one message for the unbelieving world: Trust in Christ and repent from sin! Once that is said and agreed upon, if ever, then we have the basis to talk Bible.

- Until then, it's proper for us to work and accept them for what they are. When we are asked or invited into a conversation, let us be ready with the gospel.

- Too often we are walking improperly, asking them to consider making changes that their heart can neither fathom, nor desire.

- On the other side of the coin, Paul mentions that we are to work this way for our own independance, that we might have our needs met and not have to lean on our spiritual family.

III. Informed On Last Things (v.13-18)

• I Thessalonians 4:13-15 : "But I do not want you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning those who have fallen asleep, lest you sorrow as others who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with Him those who sleep in Jesus. For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord will by no means precede those who are asleep. " : Paul turns now to another subject that came to his attention upon Timothy's return. There are some who had died and not seen Christ's return.

- What about them? Paul says, "I don't want you to be ignorant about those who have died," employing a uniquely Christian euphemism adopted from Christ in the term "sleep."

- If they were to be ignorant, they would sorrow as others. All will sorrow, but there is a difference between a Christian in sorrow and a non-Christian in sorrow.

- A non-Christian has no genuine hope of seeing that person who has gone again. Even if they do have a belief, it is only founded at that level of personal belief.

- As Christians, we are told an abject truth that firmly grounds our sorrowing in hope. What is that truth? It's the truth that Jesus died and rose again!

- He changed the game! He broke the rule of death having the final say! He rose and God will bring with Him those who sleep in Jesus.

- Please underscore that. When Christ comes at His second coming, He will be accompanied to the Earth by those who have died believing in Him.

- Those outside of that group will never see this earth again after their death! But there are truths related to those who die in faith and those which remain.

- Before he says this, notice that he says this to them by the word of the Lord. God wants His people to be clear about this.

- There is a group of people who will live until the coming, the Parousia, of the Lord. His second advent, when He comes to establish His Kingdom fully and finally.

- Paul expected to be in that group! He believed that Christ would come in his lifetime! He believed he'd be alive and expecting Christ's return!

- But those who have died in Christ won't be robbed. They won't be left out. In fact, they will have their blessedness before those who are living!

• I Thessalonians 4:16-18 : "For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with the Lord. Therefore comfort one another with these words." : Jesus will descend from heaven and there will be a shout, a word related to a command given by a commanding officer, with the voice or sound of an archangel.

- Finally, there will be a trumpet blast and in that moment, those who have died in Christ will rise being reunited with their bodies.

- People have wondered about cremation or other unnatural occurences having to do with the end of our bodies. How can the dead be re-assembled?

- We forget that this is the case with every human body anyway, as our bodies return to dust. God is able to deal with that difficulty.

- After those who have died in Christ rise, then, those who are alive and remain, in Paul's mind, the Thessalonians and himself, will be caught up with them, the resurrected saints, to be with Jesus.

- This word "caught up" comes from the Greek word "Harpazo" which means to catch up and away. Every time it is mentioned in scripture, it speaks to abrupt seizing out of place.

- The Latin Vulgate translation of the Bible employs the word "rapturos" thus our English equivalent. This is the rapture of the church. A few notes of clarity now that we are here.

- First, for those who object that the rapture is a relative new comer in the field of eschatology, let me retort that this is very likely Paul's earliest letter and thus, this is actually an old doctrine.

- Second, for those who call this the Second Coming, please recall that that event is punctuated by Christ's putting His foot upon the Mount of Olives. He doesn't do that here.

- Third, for those that can't stomach the thought of a rapture happening, remember that this will not be the first rapture.

- In Genesis 5:24, Enoch is raptured. In II Kings 2:11, Elijah was raptured via a flaming chariot. It's happened before, but has not happened since, making this a yet future event!

- The encouraging part is that both the ones who have died and the ones who have been left behind will be reunited to Christ and we will always be with the Lord together!

- Do you see why these words would be an encouragement? Nobody who dies in Christ is ever truly lost! What a joy it would have been to hear this from Paul

Conclusion

- Let's pray!