First Thessalonians, 5:4-11 The Day of the Lord (Part 2)

We're going to cover verses 4 through 11. And I was looking for a volunteer that would be willing to read. Actually, how about if we read maybe 1 through 11 to get the full context? I think I'll look around and pick the person who's got it. It looks like they're almost there. I pick on you, Randy. Thank you.

Now as to the times and the epochs, brethren, you have no need of anything to be written to you. For you yourselves know full well that the day of the Lord will come just like a thief in the night. While they are saying, Peace and safety, then destruction will come upon them suddenly, like labor pains upon a woman with child, and they will not escape. But you, brethren, are not in darkness, that the day would overtake you like a thief. For you are all sons of light and sons of day.

We are not of night nor of darkness. So then let us not sleep as others do, but let us be alert and sober. For those who sleep do their sleeping at night, and those who get drunk get drunk at night. But since we are of the day, let us be sober, having put on the breastplate of faith and love, and as a helmet the hope of salvation.

For God has not destined us for wrath, but for obtaining salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, so that whether we are awake or asleep, we will live together with Therefore, encourage one another and build up one another, just as you also are doing. Thank you, Randy.

Well, on the second chart, I actually have highlighted a few things, and as we transition into verse 4, there's really a big contrast that we're going to see. In verses 1 through 4, we talked about the the Lord's return in terms of his return. And then after his return, there's this time period called the Day of the Lord. It's an extended time period that covers actually the Tribulation period, also the Millennial Kingdom, and actually the New Heavens and the New Earth. So it's quite an extended time period and it's talked about both in the Old and New Testament. But what's interesting is that day is characterized by a phrase, just like a thief in the night, and maybe with the underlying word night.

There's going to be a big contrast today between light and darkness, day and night, kind of contrasting what God has done in the believer's life in contrast to the unbeliever who is basically still in spiritual darkness. So we're going to see a big contrast.

It kind of shows up here in verse 4. It says, but you brethren are not in darkness. And we're going to go into that and examine that more carefully. And then down in verse 5 it says, we are not of the night nor of the darkness. It's kind of interesting. There's kind of this idea that it's not just the night, Darkness is one aspect, but night is like the totality of darkness. He plays on those words. Same with light and day. And we'll see that a bit more. So that's kind of where we're headed here.

But you, brethren, are not in darkness that the day would overtake you like a thief. He says you're not in darkness. And darkness is this word kind of basically implying spiritual ignorance. or error. Actually, in some cases, I think it can be translated as physical darkness. But in this context, I think it's referring to spiritual darkness.

And there's a couple of verses I'd like to look at here in terms of that. And may I get some volunteers to, can I get someone to read, they're all actually, they're all in John's writings, two in the gospel and one in the epistle. OK, John chapter 8. OK, thank you. OK, so here's a Rathabat.

Here's a contrast between darkness and light. The person who is in the Lord Jesus has the light of life, Christ's life. And that word, light, always seems to be associated with the life of Christ. His life, I'm not sure I can say it here. Anyway, light is characteristic of Jesus Christ. How about John 12, 46?

Right, okay. So we're not to be in darkness. And we're going to see it. Paul's admonition here is based upon that your position is in Christ, that you're in Him. Live out your position in your life. You don't think you're seeing much of position and condition in this, but you do. It's in here. As we look through scripture, We always have that kind of looking for that. Is this talking about our position or our condition? The believer is inherently, because he's in Christ, he's in the light.

Now he may choose in his condition to walk contrary to that, and that's another issue, but positionally he's there, and that's a wonderful thing. Whereas the unbeliever is not, and that's the contrast we're seeing here. How about the last one in 1 John?

1 John 1.5.

There is no darkness at all. Actually, it is literally not even one little bit. There is absolutely no darkness. There is no sin, no unrighteousness in God. He is totally pure. Light, if you think of it, is a very wonderful way of describing the character of God. He is light inherently in his nature. Basically, Paul is saying, you brethren are not in darkness. I think it's talking about the believer's position in Christ. And then he transitions from here, that the day would overtake you like a thief. So what's the day here referring to, do you think?

I don't think this is hard. Think in the context of what we've got. Maybe I should have asked these silly questions. Well, That is a possibility, but if you go back, if you look back, what do you think? Let's just go back here. I'm making this sound so easy, but... Yeah, okay. Well, see, if you look back up, if you look back up here, and actually, it's interesting. I went back and looked a little bit. Boy, verse two is really powerful.

Actually, it's in the perfect tense. It says you knew it in the past and you continue to know it. I mean, they knew it. And it's just like he's hammered that you yourselves know. And also it's you accurately know. There's actually a word that's not really translated here, but you know that. That's a fact that is unequivocally in your mind and heart. You knew it in the past, you continue to know it.

So when you come down here to verse 4, Brethren, you are not in darkness that the day would overtake you. Inherently, this day is not going to overtake you because you're not going to be there. You're not going to be there in that day of the Lord. I mean, that's how I would see it. So let's go back to here.

Well, the unbeliever, as we saw back and forth here, but he's saying peace and safety. The unbeliever is saying, hey, we got our guy here. He's making peace and safety. The Middle East is in good shape. No problem. We're going to have peace. No, we're not. It's going to be a rude awakening. Sure, go ahead. I know, isn't that amazing? But don't we see that? It breaks my heart when I see people I know.

I was praying for about four people I was thinking of today. At this time of the year, I invited this guy at work to come to our house and come to the service on Christmas Eve. At first, he was kind of excited about it, and I explained what we were going to do.

And then he said, he didn't exactly say no. He just didn't talk to me anymore. That was the end of it. The fact that we're going to come and I said, we're going to go to the service and you know, and I have explained a little bit of that. And he didn't talk to me anymore.

I hope the Lord changes his mind, but I mean, and you just, it hurts. It hurts to see men in darkness. You don't, you know, Jack, go ahead. This darkness, is that what's killing you? I see this whole world system that we are living in here as darkness. I would agree. You say you are not of the darkness, that means you are heavenly. Exactly, we are heavenly people. I mean, there's a lot.

As I look through this, I said, boy, I'm just kind of scratching the surface. I mean, if you really wanted to, you could look through the, I think that's the entire world system is in darkness. They don't know what's going on. You hear people make all kinds of claims about how we're going to do this and do that. We're going to have peace and all this kind of stuff. They really don't know.

It's a day of the Lord. The idea of to overtake is signifying to lay hold of. It's actually to appropriate and to possess. What's interesting here, I'll ask another question. Overtake, it says that the day would overtake you. Is it possible for this day to overtake the believer? It's kind of a trick question, but from what we said.

Exactly. Amen. That's good. Amen. Amen. It says you're not in the darkness, that the day would overtake you. So, not to worry. We're not to worry that the day of the Lord will overtake us. I think it will. It is going to overtake the unbeliever. And we saw it back in verse 3. It's going to come upon them when they think everything is great. All these great peace talks are going on, or whatever is happening. And I kind of have another way to phrase it. You must be of darkness for the day to overtake you. You must be inherently in the darkness, which believers are not, for the day to overtake you.

And we're not. So I think this is just really a wonderful testimony to what we have in Christ. That we're not in darkness. And we're going to see that we're in the light. The next verse is going to flip the tables and talk about how we're in the light. Again, it's like a thief. It's something that's a surprise, unknown, what is going to occur. But we don't have to worry. It says, you, brethren, are not in darkness. Okay, now he's in a state where the believer's at.

Sons of light, it's interesting, like I mentioned here before, he takes, not only in the light, the day is like, think about the day, it's the totality of all light, right? In a day, I'm not sure, this is scientific, but you have a little bit of light, you turn the light on in the morning, say it's dark, you turn the light on, that's not exactly a great analogy, but then you have an entire day full of light. you are sons of light and sons of day. In contrast, versus sons of darkness and sons of night. There's a totality, I saw there, a totality of saying light transitioning into a full day of light and darkness into a full night of darkness. That was just something that kind of... Okay, so the couple of verses here that kind of talk about More about light, and let's see, back to the gospel of John. John 12, 36, actually how about we can read 35 and 36 maybe. John 12, 35 and 36.

Lindy? Thank you. Great. Thanks, Lindy. Isn't this neat? This is obviously looking forward. We are sons of light. We are sons of day. We have that. and the darkness may not overtake you. So I mean the same kind of phraseology is used in the Gospels that we're seeing here. And then how about in Ephesians? Ephesians chapter five. Yeah, maybe. Let me see here. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Thank you. Cross out the one there. Thanks, Ray. You were formerly darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light. Yeah. Yeah, actually I noticed, thanks for the correction.

So this should be Ephesians 5.8. There's sons of light and also children of light. Different Greek word, but I think the same concept. So you can trace some verses. There's some verses that talk about children of light and some that talk about sons of light. I think it's the same concept.

Okay. Now here's some verses that are concerning darkness. What we're going to see, they're going to basically tell us that we're not in darkness. Okay. Colossians 1.13. I'm sorry. So here's a wonderful statement about what we have in Christ. We've been delivered from the domain or the power of darkness and transferred into the kingdom of his beloved Son. little comment of light. This was in the days before these new energy-saving light bulbs. Okay. All right. Okay. All right. That's good. That's good. All right.

I have to kind of ponder that a bit. That does intensify the sense of darkness. You're out somewhere and it's an overcast night. You've got no stars or moon. If you're in a room, like at home, and there's no night light, nothing, there's no light, and you have the shades thrown on, you stumble around and crash into stuff. It's not good. That's a physical.

How about 1 Peter 2.19? I'm not sure. I may have a mistake there, too. Is that right? Okay, Roger. Oh, I'm sorry. Once again, I'm going crazy.

It's 1 Peter 2.9. I don't know why I've gotten carried away with ones here today. Randy, would you read that for us then? Thanks.

But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God's own possession, so that you may proclaim the excellence of him who has called you out of darkness Right. So we are sons of light. We've been called out of darkness. We are not of the night. So you have this contrast. Sons of light and sons of the day versus sons of darkness and sons of night. And we have no part of the darkness or the night, which is a wonderful thing. I'm not sure, this time of the year, I don't like when the day comes to an end. I get out of work and it's dark.

Somehow that just doesn't... My kids keep saying, well, let's make it more daylight savings time. I said, you have to keep cranking that more and more hours. It'd be dark until about 10 o'clock at night to get a light to be at... And actually when we were overseas for a while, that was kind of interesting, light and dark. I just want a little more analogy here.

We were in the north of England. And actually, that's the same latitude as Alaska. You would not believe this. You see the stories about the Christmas Carol? It gets dark about 3.30 in the afternoon. That just somehow doesn't go well with me. 3.30 is dark. The summers are nice, that's true. But anyway, darkness, just as a physical feeling, doesn't set well.

So I'm thankful we're in the light, and that's wonderful. Okay, let's go on. Okay, so now based upon that, it seems like we sort of had Paul talks here about our positional aspects, and now he's going to transition. Based upon that, he's going to ask us to kind of do something. So, let us not sleep as others do, but let us be alert and sober.

Sleep is this idea, and this is not the same word that we had asleep, where it said that we're asleep in the Lord. Even though it can mean, depending upon where it's translated, it can mean actually physical sleep, but it seems like this is more, you're spiritually asleep, Even though you have these wonderful blessings, you're walking around. And we see that, unfortunately. We see believers who have all these wonderful blessings, but they live as if they didn't have them. They live as if they didn't have any of these wonderful blessings. So this is saying, so let us not sleep as others do.

And one question I had, which I'm not sure I have a total answer for, who are the others? What's the possibility for the others, do you think? I would say that's certainly a good possibility. It might encompass others that are asleep. Sleeping spiritually. That could be a possibility. Because he's going to go and he says, but let us be sober. We're going to transition into that. But let us be sober. Be alert and sober.

I'm sorry, I got ahead of myself here. Exactly. and making sure that you're just, like you said, it's not the same as first lesson. Right. Nope. So I know it does get to be difficult. Actually, we're going to see a little bit later on. He's going to use this word sleep again later on. I think he actually means more like being asleep in the Lord, even though he uses the same word. So it's really, like I say, it's very hard. You have to be very careful what you do here.

Well, when he's talking about the thief in the night, being overtaken like a thief in the night, If you're asleep, that's what the beep is counting on. Right, exactly. The beep is like, eh, they're asleep, I'm gonna go in. Right. But instead he's saying, don't be asleep, like other people might want you to be aware. Exactly. Because it's coming. Right. And isn't it interesting is that if you're, I was thinking about the snowstorms we have occasionally. If we know a snowstorm is coming, we get ready for it. Like the one we had starting Friday afternoon.

I thought it was going to come earlier, so I got all dressed Friday morning and went to work with all this stuff on. And I'm thinking about noon, and I'm saying, why did I wear all this stuff, boots, and the whole way? I said, this is crazy. There's not going to be any snow. And then, of course, by about 2 o'clock, it started snowing. I said, OK, at least I have all the gear on. So I was ready for it. So he's going to tell us two things about being alert and being sober. The alert is to watch, actually to refrain from sleep. Maybe better, to keep awake, to be spiritually awake, spiritually alert.

And I have a couple of verses, I didn't put them down, that I wanted to kind of share here. Let's look at Colossians chapter 4. So you can write down a couple of verses that I didn't put down here. Colossians chapter 4 and verse 2. OK. Right. And actually keeping alert, keeping alert basically is the same word as here. And then the other one I had was First Corinthians 613. I'm sorry. Let's just retrace. I'm a loser here. 1 Corinthians 16, verse 13. Actually, I'll just go ahead and read it. I don't want to wear you guys out here. Be on the alert. Stand firm in the faith. Act like men. Be strong.

I think it could be Anthropos. You're supposed to act like a woman too. I know what you're going to say. I didn't look it up, but a lot of times it is. It means mankind. Actually, the idea of acting like men is not a bad idea either. So the idea is to be alert, be watchful. So let's look at the next admonition here is be sober. Be sober-minded, watchful, circumspect. I don't think that the emphasis is so much on, even though maybe it's implied, on drinking. It's more, once again, being with it. Being spiritually, almost a synonym for the previous, alertness. And I have a few verses for this one. Let's look at... Okay, okay. Could, yeah. Well, I don't think the main emphasis is on not drinking. Obviously, if you are drinking, you could be not with it. That's for sure. But I don't think that's the main.

1 Peter uses this quite a few times. 1 Peter 1. 1 Peter 1. And verse 13. I'll go ahead and read this one. Therefore, gird your minds for action, keep sober in spirit, or be sober in spirit, fixing your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Well, that's a neat one. That kind of says it all together. We're to be sober. Then in chapter 4 of 1 Peter, In verse 7, and this is kind of appropriate for today's lesson, the end of all things is at hand. Therefore, be of sound judgment, sober spirit, for the purpose of prayer.

Oh, I'm sorry, 1 Peter 4.7? Sure.

Okay, why don't we kind of hold that thought? It relates back to a question that was asked last week. This verse right here, are you thinking about? I understand what you're saying. Okay. Yeah, yeah. I wish I could easily go back to all the verses here. Let me just see here for a second. Well, I agree. The previous verse, right, told us about the wonderful place a believer has.

He's in the light. I think he's saying, act in accordance with that. Because he's going to go into this thing about getting drunk and stuff. And believers who are in the light shouldn't be there, right? So he's, I don't know, it seems to me that he's referring back to the previous verse. Right. I think that seems to me as what he's giving them. He told them their position, and he says, here's how that kind of position lives itself out. It's a person who's alert and sober. In your condition, live out your position. I don't know if that... Right, I know he does. Okay, right, right. Yeah, well, we're gonna see later on. It doesn't matter if you're asleep or actually it has a couple of meetings that I saw you could be. That's a good point.

That's going to relate back to the question that was asked. We have the day of the Lord and then we have the day of Christ. Keep the day of Christ in mind. We're looking for the day of Christ. That's what we're looking for. The day of Christ is a rapture. We'll see some verses So now he's told us that we're not to sleep as others do, let us be alert and sober. And then he kind of explains the ones sleeping, sleep at night. Seems pretty obvious. And the ones being drunk are drunk at night. All kinds of bad things happen at night time. Have you ever noticed that? If you're on night shift for the police, that's got to be the worst shift there is. I'd hate to have that job. It just can't be any fun. Because man's at his worst. And this verse is kind of pointing to that. And he has more free time. More free time. That's a good point. More free time.

And he has to cover his actions. Exactly. It's interesting. Isn't it interesting, we're all kind of the same way, even though we have Christ's life, we're all kind of, you know, if the policeman isn't there, you say, I got past that when I was going faster than I should have been. We have the same... The same kind of mentality too. If it's not seen, somehow I got by. Unfortunately, that's our old nature showing up. We believers are not sons of night. The wonderful part is that this is not characterizing us. I really didn't spend a lot of time on I'm looking up stuff like that. So now let's go on to the next part. So now it says, now it's going to come back to the positive, if you will. And it's going to talk more about being sober. And also talking about our wonderful clothing we have.

But since we are of the day, let us be sober, having put on the breastplate of faith and love, and as a helmet, the hope of salvation. So we are of the day, let us be sober, having put on, and that's the idea of the clothe here, the breastplate of faith and love. Now if you go back and look at in Ephesians chapter 6, you have the armor and we see the same two items show up. We see the breastplate And there it talks about the breastplate of righteousness. And here it's talking about the breastplate of faith and love. So I kind of wanted to focus on faith and love here for a second. There's a couple of other verses here. Actually, one of them is just back in our same book, First Thessalonians. It's in chapter 3. First Thessalonians chapter 3 and verse 6. But now that Timothy has come to us from you and brought to us the good news of your faith and love that you always think kindly of us longing to see us just as we also long to see you.

So that faith and love is a characteristic of the believer. And that's described as a breastplate. And there's another verse that talks about the source of faith and love. And what's the source of faith and love? You guys already know this. It's Christ, right? And this verse just tells us that.

In 1 Timothy 1.14, faith and love which are found in Christ Jesus. So the source of the source of all our riches are in Christ Jesus. And then it goes on to a helmet, the hope of salvation. Let's look at Titus. Titus chapter 1. And could someone read verses 1 and 2, in Titus chapter 1? Okay, thank you.

Okay, so what we see here, it seems like the The hope of salvation and the hope of eternal life are kind of parallel statements, and actually the one of hope of eternal life actually shows up a fair amount of times. Hope of salvation I think is maybe the only occurrence in scripture, but the hope of eternal life, which is I think a somewhat synonymous term. So we have the helmet, and it's also described in the Ephesians passage about the clothing of the Christian as a helmet, the hope of salvation or the hope of eternal life. So that's our hope. In verse 9, God has, and this is a wonderful, wonderful verse. It ties into another verse we had earlier.

For God has not destined us for wrath. I actually didn't look to see if that had the definite article or not, but anyway. This idea of destined is the idea of appointment. We have not been appointed for wrath. And in other places in scripture it talks about, actually I have, appointment is, it's used of appointment for a service. It says Paul was appointed as a preacher and apostle, and it says Christ was appointed heir of all things. So God does the appointing, and we're not appointed or destined for wrath. That's a possession that we have in Christ, which is a wonderful possession. And wrath is this word that implies It's really the strongest word for anger, strongest of all passions.

It refers back to the verse we had earlier in 1 Thessalonians 1.10, who rescues us from the wrath to come. We're not appointed for wrath, and what's even more wonderful is he rescues us from the wrath to come. That word rescue is the idea to to snatch from danger. Just really a wonderful statement here. I have a chart following this that traces through this word wrath that I got from Vern.

God has destined us for obtaining salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ. So our appointment, if you will, we have two kinds of appointments. We're not appointed for wrath, but we are appointed for salvation. The believer is appointed for obtaining salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ. So a wonderful, wonderful message of what we have in our Savior.

And then here's a Verne chart. And I colored in the wrath line. This is his word patterns in Revelation for a pre-tribulation rapture. And if you were to trace through that, this one in 19 right here, this guy right here is the one that talks about the nations tread upon the fierce wrath of God. Nations are treaded by the fierce wrath of God. And also in here, you'll see the wrath of the lamb appears in here as well.

What's interesting is it doesn't start until the seals, the first seal is open. There's no mention of it. for the first five books in Revelation. There's a lot more that can be said about that. I'm not actually prepared to go through all the rest of them, but as far as wrath is concerned, the believer is not destined or appointed to wrath. Any other thoughts about wrath or questions?

It's a wonderful thing. We're not destined or appointed. It's a good thing. It's interesting. Some people will make a big deal about this. They have their views on why believers should go through God's wrath. But scripture, I didn't have a hard time supporting that. I mean, I guess they could do it.

Oh, I know. Well, actually, the footnote, there's actually two footnotes and there's this footnote for up there and there's a footnote over here for drawers on the earth. The one who. OK, good point. Good point. Our testing. Yeah, that is good. Right.

And he comes back to it multiple times. And he tells him, you know this. You knew it in the past. Keep remembering it. You're sons of light. Don't forget where you are, who you are. Your hope has come. Right. And our hope is salvation in our Lord Jesus Christ. Our destiny, our appointment is that. Wrath is not in the picture. So basically, Christ died for us so that we shall live together with him. I thought that was neat. We live in him now, and so this is talking about that we'll live together with him, which I thought was neat. Here's the part about... It's an interesting thing here. Whether we are awake or asleep. And the word awake is the word we've been seeing all along here to be spiritually alert. So whether we're awake at his coming or asleep. And this word asleep is the word that we used previously for spiritual sleep.

So I went back and forth on this. At first I thought, and that's what I labeled it, those dead in Christ. I thought it could mean that, but it's not exactly the same word. And here's where, as Randy pointed out, Paul kind of goes through and you have to be careful. I think it could be either. I could either be the person, if the person has died in the Lord Jesus, the Lord will come for him, he will be with him, or whether he's spiritually asleep.

Either case. Right. Right. Well, what's wonderful is the Lord is the one in control. He's the one taking care of it. You know, so many people I meet sometimes they'll say, well, I got to be awake. I got to be awake because if I'm asleep, I'm going to miss him. Scripture says just the opposite of that. It says you can be asleep spiritually. That's not the desired place for the believer, but the Lord is faithful.

Lastly, therefore encourage one another, build up one another. Encourage is to call to one's side, parakaleo, to one's aid. Build up is to confirm or establish just as you're doing. The Thessalonians, many times Paul says, just as you're doing. You're already doing this. I'd just like to end on, let's turn to Philippians.

This is the last verse for today. You'll be thankful for that. The last verse. The last verse is plural. Philippians. Okay. And actually, I'd like to have someone versus chapter 1, Philippians chapter 1, verses 6 through 10. If I can pick on another volunteer for that.

I have you in my heart, inasmuch as those in my chains, and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel, and in all our contemporary life, with me in praise. For God is my witness, how greatly I long for you, all with the affection of Jesus Christ. And this I pray, that your love may abound still more and more in knowledge, and all the Right well there's several neat things in this this verse like verse 9 talks about this idea of Your love may abound still more and more in real knowledge and discernment you know talking about we're talking that they had real knowledge of the Lord's coming and they had discernment they were sober and And it's interesting, it says down in verse 10, in order to be sincere and blameless until the day of Christ.

It seems like the day of Christ is referring to when Christ comes for us at the rapture. So we kind of have a contrast, I thought, between the day of Christ and the day of the Lord. Different events for different people. So that's a wonderful thing. We're looking forward to the day of Christ. And the world, unfortunately, will have the day of the Lord. The Lord will be righteous in what he does, and many will be saved during that day. But his bride, his church, will be with him, which is wonderful.

Any last thoughts or questions? Well, let's close then. Dear Father, we just thank you, Lord, for this day. We thank you for your word. We have the blessed hope, our Lord Jesus, that we're not destined for wrath. We're destined for salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ. We're destined for our time with you, Lord. And we just thank you that we can physically be with you, Lord. And we thank you for those who are asleep in the Lord Jesus. And we thank you that we will see them and they will be together with you. We thank you in Christ's name. Amen.