Smoodock's Blog

Paul was comforted in knowing that the believers at Thessalonica made a choice to endure the inevitable persecution that comes with choosing Jesus as their Savior (1Thessalonians 3:6-7). They thought well of Paul and company, not ill, and they longed to see him and those with him once more. So, Timothy’s positive report had its desired effect upon Paul and everyone else with him who were burdened over knowing the spiritual state of the believers there.

Paul likened his distress and affliction at Athens to death (1Thessalonians 3:7-8; 1Corinthians 15:31). He labored there in the Gospel, but his heart was in Thessalonica. However, when Timothy returned with the good news of the believers’ faith, Paul was renewed in his mind and heart, as he labored more earnestly for the sake of the Gospel at Athens. In fact, Paul’s “for now we live” (1Thessalonians 3:8) expresses his joy in the Lord that his labor in Thessalonica was bearing fruit. He likened this experience to resurrection, and he attached this ‘resurrection life’ to **if** the Thessalonian believers remained faithful to Christ. In fact, Paul was so elated in the fact that the Thessalonian believers were faithfully following Christ in Paul’s absence, that he wondered how he could ever thank the Lord properly for the joy that had been given him in the presence of God (1Thessalonians 3:9-10; cp. Luke 15:10).

Paul prayed constantly for the believers in Thessalonica, first that he might see them again, and secondly, that he would be given the opportunity to strengthen them in the truth, as they matured in their walk in Christ (1Thessalonians 3:10). It was Paul’s manner to spend about three years in a given area (e.g. three years was spent in Damascus, three in Galatia, three in Europe, three in Asia etc.),[1] for he needed time not only to preach the Gospel to those who hadn’t heard it, but he also needed to teach all things about that Gospel, in order to not only inform new believers of the truth, but also to prepare them in hope that they stand firmly in the truth when persecution arose.

In the case of Thessalonica, Paul was able to preach the Gospel there, but he wasn’t finished teaching all things about the Gospel. For example, although he was able to teach them about the context of the return of Christ (1Thessalonians 5:1), he was unable to finish teaching about the events that surround his coming, (1Thessalonians 4:13). So, on the one hand they rejoiced in the knowledge of the Gospel, but on the other they were troubled about how far reaching the Lord’s coming would have, particularly concerning their loved ones who had only recently passed away (1Thessalonians 4:13-15).

Paul’s prayer seems to flesh out the Lord’s own desire that the believers in Thessalonica would mature in their walk with him as informed believers. He wants them to abound in love not only toward one another, but also toward all men, even their persecutors (1Thessalonians 3:11-12). The Lord works out his will for his children within the borders of the kingdoms of men. In other words, the Lord’s will is worked out without drawing attention to his power that influences the end results. Although the Lord gives power and authority to whomsoever he pleases in this world, and although no one is so powerful that he is able to keep the Lord from fulfilling his own desires (Daniel 4:17, 25, 32, 35), the Lord works out everything by using local customs and even the opposition of men to accomplish his results.

Notice how Paul finishes his prayer, which, keep in mind, expresses the heart of God. Paul prayed that the hearts of the Thessalonian believers would be established in the Lord in such a manner as to express their holiness (1Thessalonians 3:13). In other words, the Lord’s desire is to show all men that he has set his children apart from the rest of the world.

Nothing irritates or titillates the suspicion of others more than seeing something different in their presence. At first folks feel threatened by the fact that believers stand apart from them. Customs and worldviews are contrasted, and this is troubling. The **air** is brought into question[2] in the same manner in which things like racial issues had reached their explosive point during the Kennedy / Johnson era the United States and more recently during the Trump presidency. Folks feel threatened by change, and it was no different in the first century when the Gospel was preached for the first time in the Roman Empire. The Lord was changing the **air** by showing mankind another worldview. The Gospel can be seen as ‘a breath of fresh air’ in a world that stinks of cesspool of corrupt behavior. The Lord, according to Paul’s prayer for the Thessalonians, longed for change, and would enact that change at to coming of Christ in 70 AD, by ending the Old Covenant with the destruction of the Temple, and by establishing the New Covenant by vindicating believers in Christ, who for nearly a full generation had predicted that very thing would occur

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[1] See my study: Paul’s Post Council Journeys.

[2] When tensions build up we often express it as the air being so thick with tension that one could cut it with a knife. Paul spoke of the prevailing worldview as a power that filled the ‘air’ (Ephesians 2:2). The prince of this worldview might be the Jewish authorities or the Emperor or any such authority who controlled the events of an area, nation or city. The Jewish worldview of the 1^st century AD was the most obtrusive and troublesome for Jesus’ disciples. When it was taken out of the way in 70 AD, believers ‘met’ Christ in the (new) air (cp. 1Thessalonians 4:17). It was this coming of the Lord that the writers of the New Covenant scriptures preached about and longed for.