First Thessalonians, 2:9-16

OK, well today we're on class number four. And can I get a volunteer to read this passage? You can read it from the overhead or from your Bible. This is what I kind of went through, and just to kind of tell you, at the very end of this, your handout, you'll notice there's actually, it's a little bit smaller than I'd like, but it's a list of all the divisions of First Thessalonians for the rest of the period through the end of the year. And we kind of gave titles to this, and this is the gospel preaching part two, is this section. So can I get a volunteer to read this part?

Okay, Nancy, thank you. For you recall, brethren, our labor and hardship, how working night and day so as not to be a burden to any of you, we proclaim to you the gospel of God. You are witnesses, and so is God, how devoutly and uprightly and blamelessly we behave toward you only truth, just as you know how we were exhorting and encouraging and imploring each one of you as a father would his own children, so that you would walk in a manner worthy of the God who calls you into his own kingdom and glory. For this reason, we also constantly thank God that when you received the word of God which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of man, but for what it really is, the word of God, which also performs its work in you who believe.

For you, brethren, became imitators of the churches of God in Christ Jesus that are in Judea. For you also endured the same sufferings at the hands of your own countrymen, even as they did from the Jews, who both killed the Lord Jesus and the prophets, and drove us out. They are not pleasing to God, but hostile to all men, hindering us from speaking to the Gentiles, so that they may be saved. with the result that they always fill up the measure of their sins. But wrath has come upon them to the utmost. Thanks, Nancy. OK.

So in this section, we're going to continue on with what Brad started with last week. And this has been kind of titled because it talks about the gospel of God being proclaimed to Thessalonians. This is the gospel preaching part two. Actually, I have a little story to tell. Each week you get prepared and you go through the week and you lay out your plans and whatever. I usually leave the summary until last. I don't know. I just kind of have all these little details I want to go through.

It was yesterday morning and Vani said, Roger, would you take the car that we have a friend who works at a Honda dealership. He's a Christian. And I didn't actually know he was going to be there today. But anyway, I took the car in. He happened to be there. We had some work done. So I get there. I was to take all my notes with me because it's going to be a couple hours. I got there. My notes were back at home and not there. And I'm there without a car and no way to get back. So he walks in. He says, I found this for your car and that with your car. And I said, I have a Bible. You have a Bible? Wow, okay.

So I spent two hours summarizing, and this is the result of this little summary. It's not an elaborate summary, but it was neat. It was neat how the Lord provided that. I thought that it was going to be there. We were watching, and also there was a TV in the room, and the TV wasn't turned on for two hours, which was one blessing. Even though I had to encourage one person not to turn it on. And I thanked him afterwards. So it's neat. I didn't have my notes with me, which was good. So I got a chance to just look.

So here's my summary from yesterday morning. So verse 2 is talking about remembering, recalling that the gospel of God has been proclaimed. So that's kind of the message of verse 9. And this is the summary. I'm going to do the summary first, and then we're going to kind of go into the details. Kind of 10 through 12 are kind of a package. talking about the exhorting and encouraging and imploring them to walk in a manner worthy of God who calls us.

And this is kind of really neat. Look what Paul is doing. Is he encouraging them to follow a list of rules, to remember all the laws? Is he saying don't forget all these things? No. He's encouraging, exhorting and imploring them to walk. To walk in a manner which is worthy of God. to basically walk in a life that pleases God. And that is walking in who Christ is and what he's done, what he's accomplished. And that's grace. So he's encouraged them to walk in grace. I thought, wow, look at that. It's just really neat. And 13, this is one of my favorite verses. So I kind of summarize.

We constantly thank God that you accepted the preaching not as a word of men, but as a word of God. And that's just key. When we look at God's word, This is God's word, and it's not man's word. And if you don't truly believe that and trust that, it's going to be tough. It's going to be tougher. Okay. 14 through 15a, you became imitators of the churches of God in Christ Jesus. And that kind of flows out of the fact that they are walking worthy of God in the gospel. That's kind of our fruit, if you will. They became imitators.

And the word imitators in scripture is always in a positive sense. It's not a copycat kind of thing. It's seeing the life of Christ lived out, and you say, wow, I can trust the Lord for that. I can walk through this because of what he's done. So imitators in scripture is not a negative thing. We think, well, there's imitators. The scripture has a positive view of that, which I was kind of surprised. That's something I learned as you kind of go through this. Nancy? You could kind of compare that with imitators is the positive, hypocrites is the negative. Interesting. I had not thought of that kind of comparison.

This is a positive thing. He wants us to, Christ's life to manifest in us. If we see a brother or sister doing that, and we have many examples, like here at Holly Hills. We see a brother or sister and we say, thank you Lord. You know, I can trust the Lord for that. I can learn scripture. I can trust him through this difficulty. Like what Ben's going through. So that's a positive imitator.

And then lastly, this is a tough section. Those who are hindering the gospel, basically, that are going to be saved, they're not pleasing to God, and the wrath is going to come upon them. And one of the questions is, what is the time period for this? And one of the good news is here, this wrath is not for us. We read earlier that Christ has delivered us from wrath. So this is wrath on those who don't believe. Interesting story.

If you could spend, actually, almost our entire time on that verse, so that combination of verses. And I'm going to focus on the other ones. OK, so that's kind of my quick summary. So now we're going to kind of go through and kind of dissect each of these sections here. I want you to kind of have this overview to start with. OK.

For you recall, brethren, our labor and hardship for working day and night so as not to burden any of you, we proclaim the gospel of God to you. Actually, before I started, I actually found a good thing. I wanted Brad to read it for us here. Macaulay, from Word of Truth, back in Kansas City. He's now a bond to be with the Lord.

You look at this section and say, well, why is Paul always saying, don't forget this, what I did with you. Don't forget that. I did this and I did that. It's constantly kind of defending himself. He said, what in the world, if Paul gives us God's word and it's expired, why does he have to keep doing this? And Macaulay kind of had a little summary that he was quoting from someone else. So I'm going to ask Brad if he could read that for us.

There's probably never been such a variety of religious cults and philosophic systems as in Paul's day. East and West had united and intermingled to produce an amalgam of real piety, high moral principles, crude superstition, and gross license. Oriental mysteries Greek philosophy, and local godlings, compete for favor under the tolerant Aegeus of Roman indifference, holy men of all creeds and countries, popular philosophers, magicians, astrologers, crackpots and pranks, the sincere and spurious, the righteous and the swimmers and Saints jostled and clambered for the attention of the credulous and the skeptical So as we go through here to Paul's they'll be constantly and actually this is what you know We have a class here that Burns taught before apologetics, which is defending Defending the Christian faith.

Well, Paul is in a sense given the apologetic for why he's even in with the Thessalonians at all He's saying here's why I was here. This is why it was good. I was straightforward honest and All my motives were right. And he constantly comes back to that theme over and over, almost to the point where you think, how many more times is he going to say, I was honest and straightforward. Yeah, I believe you, Paul. Amen. But he keeps saying it.

And we're going to see some of that. So he's basically saying, for you, we call, brethren, our labor and hardship, how working night and day, so as not to burden you, be a burden to any of you, we proclaim to you the gospel of God. So I kind of went through, and I just kind of like to break into little clauses with subjects and verbs and that kind of thing, just to kind of help you see. So basically, for you recall, or you remember, recall here is to remember, like I said. It's to bring to mind, to call to mind. And to call to mind two things, their labor and their hardship.

The labor is really laborous work, resulting in toil and fatigue. And actually, earlier, he talked about, we covered earlier back in verse three, the labor of love. And in verse later on, we're going to see this labor Our labor would not be in vain. So labor was involved in bringing the gospel to them. And there was hardship. And this actually is a word that could be translated travail. And let's just look at a verse that we're going to cover here. What will be next week? It might be the next week or the following week.

2 Thessalonians. Actually, I'm not going to cover this at all. This is the next chapter. 2 Thessalonians chapter 3. What I noticed is that it had the same word pair about labor and hardship. 2 Thessalonians chapter 3 and verse 8. Let's go back to verse 7. Once again he's going to talk about these examples and about his work with the Thessalonians.

For you yourself know how you ought to follow our example, because we did not act in an undisciplined manner among you. nor did we eat anyone's bread without paying for it. But with labor and hardship, we kept working night and day so that we would not be a burden to any of you." Almost a parallel passage to this. Just the same kind of message. Once again, reiterating that we're not being a burden. They didn't come in, hey, we're preaching the gospel here. Make us a nice meal. They didn't do that. They tried not to do that as much as they possibly could.

And I think what's been pointed out before, Acts describes a lot of these inner workings. And I didn't really get into that. You could spend a lot of time on trying to go back and dissecting Acts and trying to link it up with all this. But it's all in there, really. And a lot more could be delved out of this.

OK. We proclaim to you the gospel of God. And this proclaiming is the idea to preach, to herald, And you know, that's something that Paul just loved to do. He proclaimed, it says in Colossians, he proclaimed to all creation that are heaven. And in Galatians, let's just look at that, Galatians 2.2. And this is something that Burns already covered back a while ago, but it's always good to go back and take a look.

Galatians 2.2. And this is kind of speaking of his encounter. I'll just go ahead and read it.

And it was because of the revelation that I went up and submitted to them the gospel which I preached among the Gentiles. But I did so in private to those who were of reputation for fear that I might be running might be running or had run in vain. So he was preaching. He was preaching the gospel among the Gentiles. That was his calling, to preach the gospel. And once again, he's working night and day, so as not to be a burden to you.

So what's the gospel? I have a reference here, but if somebody asked you what's the gospel, what would you say? Paul preached, so that was That's the most important thing you can do. The gospel message that Christ died and was buried and resurrected for our sins.

Right. Absolutely. So you need to know that in summary form and then you can go to 1 Corinthians 15, 1-4. Which maybe we should do just to make sure that we don't... It's very important that we know that and it's very important that you read it and kind of look at it again. 1 Corinthians 15, starting verse 1.

Now I make known to you, brethren, the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received, and which also you stand. by which also you are saved, if you hold fast the word which I preached to you, unless you believed in vain. For I delivered to you of first importance that which I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures. And they appeared to Cephas, and then to the twelve, and so on. So 3 and 4 are the key points that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures, he was buried, and he was raised on the third day according to the scriptures.

That's the part that we're to proclaim to men, tell men the good news of what Christ has done. What's interesting here, this is the the gospel of God. So what does that, and I have some other references, and actually those don't necessarily explain that. I kind of realized that after I put that down. Those just repeat that those are places where it uses the gospel of God. So what does the of God part do for us here? What new information does it tell us about the gospel, do you think?

It's of God and not of man. Excellent, excellent. Good work. That's exactly right. The source is from God, not from man. So it's emphasized in this gospel, it came from man. It didn't come from God. It came from God, not from man. So the source is God. The executor is God.

Roger, can you delve into a little bit If you believed in vain, what is the sense there? Would that be if you believe falsely or if you believe not in faith? Well, you know, the scripture talks about another gospel, right? Which is not the true gospel.

So, you know, man can make up gospels, can make up, well, okay, you have to do more than what it says there. You have the three things. Well, no, you got to have this or that. Is that kind of what you're talking about when a man tries to add something to it? He tries to make us a gospel, then plus this, that, plus you have to be a member of a church.

You keep adding to what God has said, rather than just saying it's of God. God performed it, and he asked us to believe it. So I think that's key, that you don't add to what God has done. You want to amplify that, explain that as best you can from scripture. the Judaizers and the Jews were attacking him and claiming that it was Paul's thing or it was a sect or cult thing.

And so yes, he's underscoring that repetitively just to emphasize, hey, this is seriously of God and not just some whim. Right. Well, you see that kind of in our day, you know, certain things will catch on different time periods and Like being a child, that kind of catches on. And the press, they'll run with that. Well, he's a child of God. He's a born again Christian. They'll put other things in there to kind of, it's kind of a smoke screen, not to see what's going on. They want to have these buzzwords that they're going to react to. So that's, you know, okay. All right, good.

And also he didn't, in backing, he didn't want to be a burden. He, you know, this constantly back to that thing. I don't want to be a burden. I don't want to be, placing something heavily on you. And actually, what we read in three before, not to be a burden to them, not to weigh them down. Just because he's there, he has a godly purpose, but he doesn't want the physical needs to overshadow that.

OK, questions on this verse? OK, now starting with the next one. The next three are a package deal. statements, you are witnesses, plural, plural witnesses, and God is witness. How we behave or were towards you. So he's talking to believers, and then he lists three things, devoutly, uprightly, and faithlessly. So he's going to describe, he says, you saw this, And God obviously saw that. How we behaved.

This word behaved is a really interesting word. It's one of these words that I don't know whether you folks know. It was one of Hal Beloy's favorite words. It's this word ginomai, which is a verb that means to come into a new state. So I think what it's kind of saying here is that we behaved or were towards you.

They saw Christ's life in their devout and uprightly and blamelessly attitude and actions. They saw a new state which they had not seen before toward the believers. And that happens among us today. We see Christ in other believers as they live their lives, as they go through wonderful times, as they teach or whatever, as they have trials. We have an opportunity to see Christ working through them.

So I think that's what Paul is saying. You are witnesses to that. God is a witness, so it rings true with God how we behave, how we how we were in this new state that you maybe hadn't seen before, because now we're interacting one-to-one with you. So I thought that was really neat.

And each of these words kind of has its own devoutly, uprightly, and blamelessly. Devoutly is really pure and moral cleanliness. Sometimes it's translated holy. And uprightly is righteously. It's from the core word righteous. Honestly, without injury. Faultlessly could be another word for blamelessly.

So how did these attributes, it's kind of a trick question, how did these attributes come out in Paul and his people that were with him? How did they come out? How did that happen? Did they get their list out of, let's see, devoutly, okay, time for devoutness now. Is that how they did it?

I think it's to make a contrast with all those other goons out there. Okay, good. I like all those good goons out there. This is, you know, if you read Ephesians 1, 4, it says, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him in love.

Their position was also being worked out in their condition. So they, you know, because they were walking with the Lord, because they positionally were devout, positionally were upright, that was being lived out. So they saw Christ in them. They saw his life being lived out through them. So that's what they were seeing. They were seeing, they were seeing Christ in this. They were seeing what he was doing. And that's why, and he just said, you saw this, don't forget that. He's reminding them. He wouldn't forget. And he's constantly reminding them about that.

And actually if you, basically we had a very similar thing back in verse 5, and if you have 1 Thessalonians up in here, you can look in verse 5. And we had, actually it was covered last week, about the guy being witness to these things. And it said that in verse 5, for we never came with flattering speech, as you know, nor with a pretext of greed. God is witness. So God is witnessing this. And actually, we saw earlier that this was done last week.

This, in a sense, was approved by God, because they were giving His message. Just as you know, we were exhorting, encouraging, and imploring. So we actually had before, they were devout, upright, and blameless. credentials, if you will. That's who they were. And here's their actions. They were encouraging, they were exhorting, encouraging, and imploring. And there's some interesting words here that are used. It says, we behave towards you, believers.

So actually, the previous verse in verse 10 kind of is linked to this verse. Just as you know. And this word know is this idea of full knowledge, oida in the Greek, full, complete knowledge. And it's actually in the perfect tense, which is interesting.

It says that you knew that in the past, and you continue to see that in our lives. That continues on up into the future. You continue to see that our actions were pure and upright. And so now it kind of switches, that we were exhorting, encouraging, and imploring you.

And it kind of talks about this relationship, a very personal relationship, as a father with his children. Remember before, in the earlier section, it talked about a mother, Let's just go back and look at that for a second. Back in verse 7, in chapter 2, it says, but we prove to be gentle among you as a nursing mother tenderly cares for her own children.

So this wasn't robotics. They weren't, OK, here's the gospel, and we are good Christians. This was caring. There was emotion. There was an interaction with these people. It was not just, OK, I give you the gospel, see ya. They were concerned about the people.

He says that again and again. As a father with his own children, you just don't say it one time. You say it again and again until maybe they say, I don't want to hear it anymore. And that happens. So I like some of these words here. Exhorting. This word exhort is this word Parakaleo, if that means something to you, that's great. If it doesn't, that's OK, too. It's a call to one side. Someone has called to one side, like for aid, to admonish someone. And sometimes it's translated, I urge. I urge you. I exhort you. And then the next word is encouraging. And that's to speak kindly or soothingly.

And actually it says, we're going to cover it later on. We're trying to cover chapter 5. And we'll see that it's going to say here about encouraging chapter 5 and verse 14. And it's going to say, we urge, actually it's going to be some of the same words here. And we urge you, brethren, admonish the unruly, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient with all men. So these ideas, encouraging or urging, of linked into this letter. Then imploring, sometimes it's translated charge. And this is kind of the culmination, this is where we're heading.

So that you may walk in a manner worthy of God to accomplish you into his own kingdom and glory. So that you would walk in a manner. How do you think walk is used in this passage? If someone asked you, he's talking about a walk here. What does he mean here? Does he mean you're physically walking? Another trick question. Is this about physical walking or is there something behind that?

I mean, do you remember something in scripture, this kind of ring bells, bells go off for walking or is that, you know, that's something in scripture that's a pretty common term, right? You see that word walking used a lot. Were they into walking? Were they in a walking club in the New Testament? As they were going about in their daily lives.

Right, right. Excellent, excellent. So it's a conduct, right? And once again, this just kind of really excited me, that it's a manner of life. It's the conduct of our life. And actually, I have a sort of translation. Walking is habitual ordering of your behavior by faith. By faith, you're walking in Christ. And we're to do that. It talks about that we're walking over and over again. So it doesn't talk about a list of things to do. It talks about a lifestyle. based on the person, the person of Christ. Go ahead, I'm sorry.

This is a continuation of the sentence from verse 11 where he talks about a father imploring and encouraging and exhorting his children. And the exhortation is, and I don't mean to steal anything in my own time, the exhortation is, to this walk All of the counseling alongside, the encouraging, the imploring, is to this walk, which is Galatians 5, 16, and I went over that recently on Sunday morning, where it talks about walking by the Spirit. Right, exactly, exactly what you'll see here. That's good, this is good, I like that, that's excellent, it's exactly what it's all about. You don't come to these... Scripture shows you the path. You're following the path of Scripture.

The element of the Father being there is really something significant. My parents did tend to do that. My dad told me, I remember being in junior high, he said, our goal is for you to grow up and be an adult. When you turn 18, you will be an adult and we're preparing you for that. We're going to encourage you and help you do that.

And I've talked to so many young people who have not had parents do that. They didn't encourage them, they didn't implore them, they didn't exhort them, just in everyday life, let alone spiritual things. There are Christian households that have none of these elements that Paul describes as fatherly.

That's great, that's good. So it's interesting, he adds a little thing here, in a manner worthy of God. So what do you think about that? What's that telling us? put that little qualifier, in a manner worthy of God. Exactly, exactly, right. It's that qualifier kind of qualifies the walk too. It's just not, well, hey, I'm moving along. I'm moving here with the flow. I'm out there. I'm in church. I'm moving. I'm doing stuff.

Well, no, it's consistent with who Christ is and it's his life. And actually, in these verses here in Romans 6-4 and 2 Corinthians and Galatians, it's walking in newness of life in 6-4. In 5-7, it's walking by faith. And in 5-16, as Vern has covered, it's walking by the Spirit, empowered by the Spirit. So that's the culmination of those three verses.

And this is what Paul was there, he showed them the gospel, but he didn't stop there. He's showing them the rest of the story. So he wants them to be saved, but he's showing them, I want you to see Christ's life. I want you to walk in that life. Just being saved is not the end of the picture. I'm saved and I can do what I want from now on. No. Your life is to be worthy of God. It's to be His life, not my life. So he gave them the complete gospel. He didn't give them the salvation message.

It continued on into a lifestyle. In verse 10 we saw that they lived devoutly, uprightly, and blamelessly in front of God. That manner that we worthy of how they walk before God is in pattern before them. They saw Christ in them? Yeah. And we're going to see actually that that's where the imitation is going to be cool. Because see, it's not, well I imitated Paul. No, what I saw was Christ. And by faith I can be an imitator. It's not this, you know, the negative way of thinking of imitation. You go to church, I go to church. You say a prayer, I say a prayer. It's not that. So now,

13. So this is neat.

Paul's going to kind of reflect, and he's going to give God thanks for what he saw happening among these believers. I'll cover the first part of the verse in this chart. For this reason, and I put in kind of an expanded part of this using Wiest. heavily for this reason or because of this. So basically, and I'm going to answer the question here, this seems to be referring back to what's said because of what he saw working in these believers. For this reason, we constantly thank God. Or it could be rendered we also unceasingly give thanks to God. that when you receive the word of God, which you heard from us, or because you appropriated to yourselves the word of the message which came from us, even the word of God.

So we're going to see two words here. Actually, let me get my pointer here. There's two words that are kind of... We have the idea here, receive the word of God, and then we're going to see you accepted it. So there's the receiving and the accepting. It took me a little while to kind of work through that. They're very similar words. I thought, well, is he just reiterating that point or is there some message here? So this receiving here is a word that is to receive to oneself, to in essence gather the facts, to take the facts in.

So that's one part of it. So for this reason, we also constantly thank God that when you receive the word of God, which you heard from us, So they took in the word they heard from us. Let's go on. In the second part, you accepted it. Another kind of receiving idea. You accepted it, not as the word of men, or better, you welcomed it. And this one is the idea that you believed it. By accepting it, you believed it. So they gathered the word in. Here's what Paul is telling us. This is God's word. Well, I've got this. What do I do with that? This is saying, I accepted it, I believed it.

And they believed it, not as a word of men, this is really cool, not as a word of men, not finding a source in men, but for what it really is, the word of God, which also performs its work in you who believe. So when you believe it, God's work is going to perform a work. And this performs is one of Vern's favorite words, I think. This is energeo, to energize, and it's used in a lot of places. talks about God energizing us, the Holy Spirit energizing us.

But this says God's Word is going to energize us. I think that's just really fantastic. Bernie has a little Energizer bunny up there. I don't have all my things to do here. So God's Word is going to energize us. And actually, to me that rings so true.

Just think about that. As you learn some new and wonderful truth about who Christ is and who you are in Him, I mean, That's life-changing. That's like, well, wait a minute. I don't have to do this or that. Christ has done it, or whatever it might be. So that energizing is through God's Word. I think that's just really exciting.

There's a point that came in my Christian life. This is back quite a few years ago. This is really God's Word. I mean, this is really God's Word. And if you really believe that, it's a whole different thing. It really is. You say, well, that's the Bible. That's God's Word. This is God's word, and it's to you personally. And it's to energize you. It's to cause you to change. That's incredible. Yes? Well, actually... Right. Exactly. They believed that they made it... Right, exactly. Exactly. And that's good.

Well, I think that's why, you know, actually, some translations, I'm not sure, some have welcome for that, for the second one, for accepted, some have welcomed rather than accepted. Accepted to me, I kind of liked because, you know, I believe it. It's mine. And then it's going to do something. If I believe it, it's going to do something. It's going to make a difference in my life.

I know. Interesting, interesting. I know this is, it is kind of mind-boggling. I'm not sure I can explain every part of it, but it's certainly, I think we can see an aspect of when we see a truth in God's word, how it's liberating, it's freeing. I'm not under law, I'm under grace. I don't have to do all these things. I don't have to keep a list of things. It's by grace. Grace is how God operates.

And he wants us to operate too. at least in my own life, I've seen that where the Lord opens my eyes to how something applies to my life in an area that I've never seen that before. It wasn't that it wasn't true before, it was I just never realized, oh, this applies here. You know, abiding, I find areas that abiding applies in my life. You know, every day it seems like, oh, man, this applies to work, and this applies to my relationship with my wife, and this applies to my relationship with my children. It's performing its work in me, even though I wasn't pursuing it. It's just doing it in its nature. Right. And it just does that.

When you see some truth about what you have in Christ, like prayer, it changes your prayer life. Well, if I'm seated in heavenly places and I have every spiritual blessing, why am I praying for all these spiritual blessings? So that's going to change your prayer life. You're not going to pray for that.

Help me to believe it. I want to believe that I have these. I want to believe that. I already have them. Roger, I think what Randy is speaking of is the result of all of us that we have that we're growing in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior. Amen. No, I agree. That's what it's all about. That's why you say the word.

That's why you have notebook after notebook. You think, after a while, the church of the notebooks. Why do we have so many notebooks? Why do we have so many notebooks here? Why are you always going through... Why are you going through this? I don't know. Why do you have to spend all this time going through every every line, every word. Because when you understand it, it can perform its work. If you don't dig into it, it can't perform its work. So you want it to perform its work.

For you, brethren, became imitators of the churches of God and Christ Jesus that are in Judea. So what's What did they imitate? From this verse, just look at the verse and read the verse and see if you can tell me what were they imitating. It's in that verse, I believe. What did they see in the Judean church, that they imitated by faith in Christ?

You get a gold star. Right. I mean, from the context, you think, they were suffering, they were being, you know, and we're going to see, you know, the people, the Jews who were not believers, they were all over Paul. I mean, do you look at Acts? I mean, they were on his case night and day. They just hounded him. They drove him out of cities. They just, you know, he didn't have a moment's rest. They were on him all the time. So what he's saying, you saw the suffering in the Judean church. Some of your own countrymen are going to do the same thing to you. Don't get rattled. Be an imitator. Trust Christ that he will take you through that suffering. So that's the positive way of imitation, which I think is really cool. And basically it says, for you also endured the same suffering at the hands of your own countrymen, even as they did from the Jews.

And then actually I didn't put the last part of the verse. both killed the Lord Jesus and the prophets and drove us out. So now it seems like he almost kind of almost goes back, he kind of backs up and says, well don't forget who killed the Lord Jesus. He kind of goes back to the crucifixion and they killed the Lord Jesus and then being back farther, the Old Testament, they killed the prophets, God sent prophet after prophet and they killed them too. And so he's kind of saying that my countrymen, the Jewish countrymen had a history of against God.

And then he's going to make a declaration. And this is the part that really, like I said, he makes a declaration about these folks. A pretty condemning declaration. They are not pleasing to God. And he says they're hostile to all men. And the reason they're hostile to all men is because they hinder us. They're hindering us from speaking to the Gentiles so that they may be saved. So he's saying, if you're hindering what God is doing, showing people how to be saved, that is really a serious issue. And he says, with the result that they are filled up to the measure of their sins, and wrath has come upon them. I should have done it this way. Sure, go ahead. I hope I can answer the question. When he says, even as they did from the Jews, Let's go back up farther. Let's take the first part.

For you brethren became imitators of churches of God in Christ Jesus that are in Judea. So he's talking to the Thessalonians, right? They saw that in Judea churches that were believed in God were suffering, right? We kind of said that. Then he goes on, for you endured, the Thessalonians endured the same suffering at the hands of your countrymen. So he's kind of saying, you're in Thessalonica, your countrymen are coming at you and they're causing you to suffer, right? They're impacting you, I'm just trying to go through it. Just walk through it here. Okay. Even as they did from the Jews. That last part is a little bit tough. Go ahead. Go ahead. Okay. Okay, Nancy.

Even as they, referring to the churches in Judea, did from the Jews, it would seem to me that these are probably the same Jews that were hostile to the Lord Jesus Christ. that same ilk, not the Jews that believed, because they were the ones who had become the church. Exactly. The Jews who didn't believe. Exactly. That's what I thought too. I thought that was the case. Help me with your question again. I just want to make sure that it's emphasized that it's the non-believing Jews. Exactly.

Then starting in 15a, which I didn't put down here, I apologize. 15a kind of turns the corner and he says, okay, now we're going to step back. And now he turns the corner. So between the end of 14 and 15a, things change. And I agree with you. He's going back. Those right there didn't kill the Lord Jesus. Round and round. I agree with you. He's referring back. And then he talks about the prophets. He's even going farther back. It's religious people who hate the truth. but we're still ethnically Jewish. Right, right, right, right, right. Okay. I agree. Absolutely. Right. I know, I know. Exterior. Exactly.

And this is so condemning. I mean, this is just, I mean, you look at, you read that, that is so harsh, you think, my goodness. You know, the wonderful thing is that we know, when we just read it earlier, in the first chapter here, about wrath, you know, it talks about this wrath has come upon them. So it almost seems like, I thought, when did that happen? When did that wrath come upon them? I had a hard time. And then I read some commentaries that said, well, that's speaking of a future. But the tense of that, I don't know, like I said, this is a study unto itself, the whole meaning of that.

But the wonderful news is, as it says in 1 Thessalonians 1.10, And to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, that is Jesus, who delivers us from the wrath to come. So there's no wrath for the believer. He's speaking of ones who didn't believe, who opposed people being saved.

And that's happening today. No, I agree with you. It is happening today. People are, they don't want that to go forward. No, no, I don't know today. Not well. boy, I know, I know, I don't know. I mean, there are those who are deceived that they won't listen to what is true. Those are the people that Paul says you guys need to shun. They refuse to listen and respond to God's teaching.

They may have believed the gospel at first, but they've latched on to some new doctrine. It is interesting how, in popular Christianity, we have kind of waves. New things come along. Here's the prayer of Jabez. Then we got the purpose-driven church. It's just one wave after another. Just all kind of getting our focus off who Christ is, off the gospel, onto something else. This constant wave after wave. The problem is some people, you guys don't do that? What are you doing there? You should be over here doing this. Right, exactly. Sure. Right, that's an excellent point. In the context of what we're reading. I think 13 is kind of a key vert in this little passage. 13 is kind of the key. This is God's word and you're to accept it and live by it and it will energize you. That's kind of the key around these verses.

Now that's good. That's really good. Okay, let's just quickly here. Let me just go to the very last. Okay, so here we're right here. I should have given this to Randy when we first started, but this is mine. I should have just emailed. Anyway, okay, so right here. So now we're going to We're going to finish off the rest of chapter 2 here and go into chapter 3.

Paul's joy, hope, and crown. And then we're going to more good news. And then we're going to start into some things on Christian conduct. And then a bunch of things on the Lord's return. This is the part that's really going to be neat. It's a neat part on that. Actually, I chopped it up into small little sections, but I thought we should spend some time on it. So that's where we're headed. So any other questions or thoughts? Yeah, thanks for your questions. It was great. I appreciate all the good thoughts.

Okay, well, let's close it. Oh yeah, actually, we're supposed to get in. Wayne, help me out here. John Blackwell has prepared a very good this morning church service. So we kind of like to ask everyone if they get in there and he holds it down level a little bit. And then there's a special view Okay, thanks, Wayne. That's good. Okay, well let's close in prayer then.

Dear Father, we just thank you, Lord. We thank you for your word, Father. We just thank you, Lord, that you have a purpose in that, Lord, is to show us Christ, Lord, to and that his life would live through us, to energize us with his life, Father. We thank you so much for the clarity of your word, Lord, how each sentence, each word is important, Lord, and we pray that we would be diligent, Lord, in seeking the truth in your word, Father. We thank you for that. In Christ's name, Amen.