After the Jewish authorities stirred up trouble for Paul at Thessalonica, he was cast out of that city (cp. Acts 17:6-9), and the brethren sent him to Berea (Acts 17:10), which is just south of Thessalonica on the Macedonian peninsula. Once the rulers of a city cast a person out of their district, it was unlawful for that one to return, while the same rulers held their respective offices, which in most cases were annual appointments. So, when Paul said he would have returned to Thessalonica once and again but couldn’t (1Thessalonians 2:18), he was referring to that law that prevented his doing so (cp. Acts 18:1-2). In such a case, the “satan” or adversary which prevented Paul from doing so would have been the Jewish authorities at Thessalonica, who had accused him of evil intent to the rulers. The Scriptures often point to powerful human entities as being satan, and I believe Paul, as interpreted by Luke, clearly indicates that it was men, namely the Jewish rulers at Thessalonica who influenced the gentile city authorities to take action against Paul.
The civil ruling that restricted Paul from returning to Thessalonica caused him some anguish over the condition of believers in that city. Therefore, while he preached the Gospel in Athens, he sent Timothy (1Thessalonians 3:1-2), and possibly Silas with him, to Thessalonica (cp. Acts 18:3) to understand the condition of the believers’ faith, hoping his labor there wasn’t in vain (1Thessalonians 3:5). Another point of view might be that Paul originally sent Timothy alone to Thessalonica, with what is labeled: Paul’s second epistle to the Thessalonians. The content of that epistle seems to indicate it was probably written before what we call his first epistle to Thessalonica .[1] Sometime after Timothy returned to Paul, and while he was still in Athens (1Thessalonians 3:6), he sent both Timothy and Silas once more to Thessalonica, this time with what we often suppose was Paul’s first epistle to the Thessalonians. If my understanding of the chronology of Paul’s writing is logical and true, it offers the reader a definite timeframe, not only for both epistles, but also the times when Paul would have gone to visit them. Finally, after completing their mission in Thessalonica, both Silas and Timothy returned and met up with Paul at Corinth (1Corinthians 18:2).
As a result of Paul’s writing both epistles, coupled with the visits of both Timothy and Silas, the believers in Thessalonica were both encouraged and strengthened in their faith. During Paul’s original visit to the city, he had told the believers of Thessalonica that anyone who chose to live godly, while believing in Christ, would suffer opposition and persecution, and in this letter Paul called upon them to witness to that fact (1Thessalonians 3:3-4; cp. 2Timothy 3:12). Moreover, it was for this very reason that Paul couldn’t contain himself any longer. He simply had to know the truth about their faith in Christ. Were they walking with the Lord as Paul encouraged them to do, or did they succumb to the persecution that was an inevitable response to their embracing Christ as their Messiah and Savior? If the latter were true, Paul’s labor there would have been in vain (1Thessalonians 3:5).
Although Paul mentioned how he longed to know the faithfulness of the believers at Thessalonica (1Thessalonians 3:1, 5), his love for them should not be understood as his own personal emotional feeling. Rather, as he had stated elsewhere, he longed to know the condition of the believers’ faith through the bowels of Christ (Philippians 1:8). Paul admitted that his great success in preaching the Gospel was not his own doing, but the labor of Christ in him (1Corinthians 15:10). Moreover, the very life he lived was the life of Christ in him. So, in reality, Paul spoke of how his spirit was affected by the outward circumstances of life (cp. Galatians 2:20), which in this case concerned the faith and well being of the believers he had left behind in Thessalonica. Therefore, when Paul says he could endure no longer, his concern was born out of the heart of Christ, which he tells his readers must be put on (Colossians 3:12), as though such qualities ‘clothed’ the new man in the believer (Colossians 3:10; cp. 1:27).
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[1] Paul’s epistles are arranged according to size, not chronology, with Hebrews connected with the catholic epistles, not Paul’s epistles to the gentiles
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