Wednesday 25th
1 Thessalonians 1:2-3
NIV (vv2-3) – ‘We always thank God for all of you and continually mention you in our prayers. We remember before our God and Father your work produced by faith, your labour prompted by love, and your endurance inspired by hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.’
ESV (vv2-3) – ‘We give thanks to God always for all of you, constantly mentioning you in our prayers, remembering before our God and Father your work of faith and labour of love and steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.’
Today we are going to commence looking at Pauls first letter to the Church at Thessalonica. The greeting would indicate that it is from Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy and the second verse starting with ‘we’ verifies them as sending the letter together, Paul being the principal author. Silvanus is Silas who we read as being with Paul in the book of Acts. (Acts 16 & 17)
In verse 2 they commence by reminding the Church at Thessalonica that they give thanks to God for them, constantly mentioning them in their prayers.
This Church was borne out of the ministry of these three, Paul and Silas had preached there over a period of three Sabbath days, we read this in Acts 17:1-3, the message they declared was to explain and prove that it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead. They made it clear to those who heard that ‘this Jesus who I proclaim to you is the Christ’.
We will return to 1 Thessalonians 1:2 again tomorrow, but for today it is an opportunity to remind ourselves that the main message of the Church must be the Lord Jesus Christ and the very fact that it was necessary for him to suffer, die and to be raised from the dead. (1 Corinthians 15:1-6)
This is the message the world needs to hear, and it must continue to be the bedrock of us who have come to faith. In the words of a hymn, Jesus only is our message.
It continues in the report in Acts 17 to say, ‘And some of them were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas, as did a great many of the devout Greeks and not a few of the leading women.’ (v4)
I must be honest and say, as a pastor I don’t want men and women to join with me, or with us because we preach a message that is pandering to their itching ears,(not that we do) I want others to join with us because they have heard about Jesus and him crucified and that he as the one who has been raised from the dead, men and women whose lives have been touched because we have proclaimed the Christ. We must always remain Christ centred, and Christ focused.