2 Thessalonians 1:1-4

Audio

Manuscript

Let’s take our Bibles today and open to the book of 2 Thessalonians. Today we begin a new series in the book of 2 Thessalonians entitled “Kingdom Come.” We are, in a sense, piggy-backing on our series from 1 Thessalonians, which we finished a few weeks ago. And we are going right into Paul’s second letter to the Thessalonians.

And as we begin, here’s the question I want to address this morning from the book of 2 Thessalonians. Here’s the question I want us to address as we start this series. Here it is: “What kind of church do we want to be?” What kind of church do we want here in San Antonio Texas? What do we want to be known for? What do we want to stake our reputation on?

Some churches stake their reputation on their awesome building facilities! Well, we’ve got a great facility here at Verse By Verse, but I don’t want to stake our church’s reputation on that. Some churches stake their reputation on their huge attendance on Sunday morning. I don’t want to stake our church’s reputation on that either. Large attendance doesn’t always equate to faithfulness. What should we focus on instead? What should we stake our reputation on instead? 

John MacArthur says this about a church’s reputation: “Churches take pride in many things: their large membership roll or attendance, the size of their campus, the design of their buildings, their wealth, their music, the social status of their members, the prominence of their pastor, their political clout, their influence in the community, or their zeal for a particular theological cause… Judged by those superficial standards… the Thessalonian church certainly had little to commend it. It had no buildings, programs, performers, or publications. It was not a large or wealthy church. The congregation lacked social and political influence; nor did they have a famous pastor… Yet they were a church to which the apostle Paul could write ‘we ought always to give thanks to God for you… We ourselves speak proudly of you among the churches of God’ (2 Thess 1:3-4).”

What made this church in Thessalonica commendable? What gave this church such a great reputation among Paul and even the other churches where Paul ministered? I’ll give you three things this morning… and these are three things that we should strive for here at Verse By Verse Fellowship.

Write these down. Here’s the first:

What Kind of Church Do We Want to Be?

1. A Church whose faith is flourishing (1:1-3a)

Here’s how Paul starts this letter of 2 Thessalonians. And it’s remarkable how almost identical it is to the way that he starts 1 Thessalonians. Paul writes,

1 Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy, To the church of the Thessalonians in God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ: 

2 Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. 

Now let’s talk about the historical background of this great book. Paul wrote this letter just a few months after he wrote 1 Thessalonians. And that was just a few months after he had planted the church in Thessalonica. So, this church is only a year or two old. It’s a really young church.

And here’s the sequence of these events and these letters. This is a quick review; I shared this already with you at the beginning of our series on 1 Thessalonians. In Acts 17, when Paul was in the midst of his second missionary journey, Paul visits the city of Thessalonica. And Paul preached the gospel in the synagogue, and some of the Jews believed and got saved. Others rejected Paul and his message. Luke even tells us that some leading women and some God-fearing Gentiles got saved too. So, this church emerged, and it was an eclectic church full of Jews, Gentiles, men, women, rich, and poor.

But some of the Jews of the city were jealous of Paul, and they built a little coalition of Jews and Gentiles to attack Paul and expel him from the city. And they even grabbed this guy Jason, who was a young convert, and dragged him before the city council. The situation got so bad, that the church sent Paul and Silas to Berea because they were afraid that Paul would get ripped apart if he stayed in Thessalonica. So, Paul left there and went to Berea and then Athens and then Corinth. And it was from Corinth that Paul wrote both 1 Thessalonians and 2 Thessalonians to this young church.

So just to summarize, Paul plants the church in Thessalonica, gets kicked out of the city, sends Timothy to visit the church because he’s worried about them, and he can’t come visit them. And then after Timothy returns, Paul writes a letter of instruction to the church (1 Thessalonians). And then just a few months later, he writes a second letter to them, which we call 2 Thessalonians. 

And the best evidence is that Paul wrote this letter from Corinth shortly after writing 1 Thessalonians. Probably he wrote 2 Thessalonians after the person who delivered 1 Thessalonians (Timothy or whoever) came back with additional issues that needed clarification from the Apostle Paul. The reason we believe that is because of these cowriters in verse 1: Silas and Timothy. The only place that Paul, Silas, and Timothy were together was in Corinth during Paul’s lengthy stay there (i.e., at least eighteen months, cf. Acts 18:1-19). Also, Paul eventually came to visit Thessalonica again (Acts 20:1-2), and this letter must have been written before that. 

And even a cursory reading of these two books will show you that the content of the two letters is very similar, not just in the opening greeting. We’ll talk about that as we work through this book, and we’ll address some of the nuanced differences between the letters.

And you might ask, why did Paul write a second letter so quickly after the first letter and so similar to the first letter? Well, some things bear repeating. And some things that Paul said in 1 Thessalonians needed clarification. And obviously the church needed some additional instruction from Paul that benefits us in our day just as much as it benefitted them in their day.

Robert Thomas, in his commentary, suggests three reasons for this letter so quickly after 1 Thessalonians. 1) The persecution of the Thessalonians had intensified. That required more encouragement and more theological reflection from the Apostle Paul, their trusted leader. 2) There was supposedly a pseudo-Pauline letter that had circulated in Thessalonica at this time. Paul talks about this in 2 Thessalonians 2:2. He says, “Now concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered together to him, we ask you, brothers, not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed, either by a spirit or a spoken word, or a letter seeming to be from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has come.” Supposedly there was a letter circulated that was causing eschatological confusion and eschatological frenzy in the church. Paul had to write this letter, 2 Thessalonians, to combat that. 3) And also, Paul had to write this letter to again combat the idleness of some within the church who had shirked their vocational responsibilities. Paul tells them, on no uncertain terms, “get to work.”

But before Paul gets to these instructions and the clarifications, he starts this letter by saying something complementary about this church. He addresses this church, once again, as a good church. A healthy church. A God-honoring church. Not a perfect church! But a commendable church.

He says in verse 3.     

3 We ought always to give thanks to God for you, brothers, as is right, because your faith is growing abundantly,

By the way, Paul begins all his epistles by thanking God for that specific local church. The only exception to that is the book of Galatians. Paul begins Galatians with no thankfulness at all; he just starts rebuking the church. Other than that book, Paul is quick to praise God for the positive things taking place in the church. And that’s especially evident in these two letters to the Thessalonians. 

But in 2 Thessalonians, this giving of thanks is especially potent. Because Paul says we “ought always to give thanks for you, brothers.” There is an “oughtness” statement here that is unique to 2 Thessalonians. Paul is obligated to give thanks to God in light of how impressive the Thessalonians have conducted themselves.

Remember what Paul said in 1 Thessalonians? “Rejoice always” (5:16). “Give thanks in all circumstances” (5:18). Well Paul is practicing what he preaches right here. He’s giving thanks for the church in Thessalonica. And why is he doing that? Why is he obligated, even, to do that? Because their faith is growing. Because their faith is flourishing! Because their faith is… here’s the Greek word, ὑπεραυξάνω.

Let me say something briefly about this Greek word ὑπεραυξάνω. This is the only time this Greek word shows up in the NT. It’s a combination of the Greek words ὑπέρ meaning “hyper” and αὐξάνω meaning “grow.” Luke said that Jesus grew up (αὐξάνω) strong, full of wisdom and grace (Luke 2:40). Well Paul says here that the faith of the Thessalonians has not just grown, αὐξάνω, but ὑπεραυξάνω. It means “grow wonderfully” or “increase abundantly.” The faith of the Thessalonians isn’t just abundant; it’s superabundant! And Paul uses a present tense conjugation for this verb, which lets us know that the growth of the Thessalonians’ faith is “an ongoing process rather than an accomplished fact.” Their faith keeps growing! Let me say it this way, the faith of the Thessalonians is flourishing like a lush garden full of tasty vegetables and ripe fruit. It’s growing with super-abundance!

Now, I don’t know about you, but that’s how I want the Apostle Paul to describe Verse By Verse Fellowship. Forget the buildings. Forget the attendance. Forget our political influence or lack thereof. Do we have faith that is growing super-abundantly, like Paul says the Thessalonian church is growing abundantly in verse 3? Are we growing in our faith? Are we flourishing in our faith? 

By the way, can you grow in faith? Is that a thing? Isn’t it like you have faith or you don’t have faith? How do you grow in that? The well-known British writer and Anglican Pastor, John Stott said this once. He said, “We tend to speak of faith in static terms as something we either have or have not. ‘I wish I had your faith’, we say, like ‘I wish I had your complexion’, as if it were a genetic endowment. Or we complain ‘I’ve lost my faith’ like ‘I’ve lost my spectacles’, as if it were a commodity.” 

But let me be clear about this—faith, once you have it, once you are born again, is something that grows. That’s why Jesus referred to degrees of faith when he said to his disciples, “O you of little faith” (Matt 8:26, et al). And that’s why he says, “I have not found anyone in Israel with such great faith” (Matt 8:10, et al). Paul even prayed in 1 Thessalonians 3:10 that he might return to Thessalonica and strengthen their faith! And John Stott says that of course faith grows, because our faith in Christ begins a relationship with God. And that relationship, like any relationship, can grow. It’s a living and dynamic growing thing. 

By the way, one of the ways you gage a person’s spiritual maturity is by these two categories in 2 Thessalonians 1:3 of faith and love. Is a certain Christian mature? I don’t know. How’s their faith? How’s their love for others? Is it large? Is it growing? Is it increasing day by day, month by month, year by year? 

Just by way of personal testimony, I got saved around age six, when a pastor at my Christian school preached the gospel. I repented, believed, and got saved. That’s where my faith in Christ began. That was the starting point of my faith relationship with Jesus. Now is my faith in Christ the same or different today than it was 37 years ago? Well, it’s the same, but it’s different. It’s stronger. It’s more durable. It’s more fruitful, like a garden. But it’s not substantively different than when I was six years old. Quite honestly my faith is stronger in 2022 than it was in 2021. And it was stronger in 2021 than it was in 2020, etc. etc. Maybe some years I’ve taken a step back, but for the most part it grows stronger every year.

How about you, Verse By Verse Fellowship? Do you see that growth curve in your relationship with God? Is your faith growing day by day and year by year? You might say, “Yes, Tony, but how do I accelerate that? How can I strive towards that and grow more?” Well, I’ll just share with you the two most faith-building disciplines of my life. Ever since I was a teenager, I have committed to daily spending time with the Lord in prayer and Bible Study. The Bible says, “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God” (Phil 4:6). I know anxiety can be sinful and can lead to a lot of negative things, but anxiety is also a kind of blessing from God. It’s a reminder that we desperately need God and it works as a catalyst for prayer. So be anxious less and pray more, church! Turn your anxieties into prayer. You’ll be amazed how that accelerates your spiritual growth and strengthens your faith.

And secondly, spend time in God’s Word every day. In fact, let me say it stronger than that. Spend the best time of your day, every day, in God’s Word. Every day! Put your phone down. Turn your computer off. And spend time with God every day. That’ll grow your faith. That’ll cause your faith to flourish! There’s about 20 other ways that I could mention that grow our faith, but these are the most important. That’s what has grown my faith more than anything else in the last 37 years.   

Go ahead and write this down as #2 in your notes.

What Kind of Church Do We Want to Be?

We want to be…   

1. A Church whose faith is flourishing (1:1-3a)

But also, write this down in your notes as #2. We want to be…

2. A Church whose love is abounding (1:3b)

Look with me again at verse 3.

3 We ought always to give thanks to God for you, brothers, as is right, because your faith is growing abundantly, and the love of every one of you for one another is increasing.

Paul says, “your faith in God is flourishing, and your love for one another is abounding.” In this sentence, Paul goes vertical and horizontal. He talks about how their faith is growing, that is faith vertically in the God of the Universe. But he also commends the Thessalonians because their horizontal love for one another is increasing too.

And by the way, that’s exactly what Paul had prayed for them in 1 Thessalonians. We’re actually seeing answered prayer here in 2 Thessalonians. In 1 Thessalonians 3:12, Paul prayed, “and may the Lord make you increase and abound in love for one another and for all, as we do for you.” Now in 2 Thessalonians 1:3, we have an answer to that prayer. Paul says, “the love of every one of you for one another is increasing.” Isn’t that awesome? Don’t you love seeing answered prayer?

The Greek word for “love” in both of those passages is ἀγάπη. And the Greek word for “one another” is ἀλλήλων. And that’s code in the NT for “fellow believers.” So, Paul says, “your love for fellow believers in the church is abounding. It’s increasing. It’s intensifying.” And Paul says it so deliberately too. He says, “the love of every one of you for one another is increasing.”

The Greek word here for increasing is the word πλεονάζω, and it means “to become more and more, so as to be in abundance.” Paul says here, “Thessalonians, I can’t stop giving thanks to God! Why? Because you love each other so much in the church! And your love for each other is increasing more and more.”

And to that you might say, “No, No, No. Pastor Tony. Church isn’t like that. Church is a place of backbiting and resentment. Church is a place where people are forced to get along with each other, but secretly they don’t like each other!” Is that true? Is church a place where we show up and check a box? Is church a place where we just show up to be seen? Is church a place of politicizing and backbiting and jockeying for prestige and influence? No! That’s not what God created the church to be! A church is a place where the love of Jesus is celebrated and spread to one another, like goodwill at Christmas time. And church is a place where we bask in God’s glory and God’s grace and God’s love like sun-bathers bask in the rays of the sun at the beach.

Can I just be pastoral right now for a second? I know I’m your preacher here at Verse By Verse Fellowship, but I’m also a pastor. I’m a shepherd along with the other elders here at this church. Let me ask a question as a shepherd. How’s our love for one another right now in the church? Would we be commended like Paul commends this church in Thessalonians for our love for the brothers? The great theologian from Dallas Theological Seminary, John Walvoord, said once, “Sometimes in our churches there is little evidence of heresy, but there is also little evidence of love for the brethren.” 

Look I sense brotherly love here at Verse By Verse. I do! God has given us as a church a love for one another that is beautiful and increasing. And what’s so remarkable about that is that we are all very different here at our church. We really are. We’re a hodge-podge of different people from different backgrounds. By the world’s standards, we really don’t have that much in common. And we shouldn’t love each other as much as we do. But we share Christ! And his love for us has trickled down into our hearts and cemented our affections for one another in a beautiful way… just like what I read here in 2 Thessalonians.

And I’ll be honest with you… I want more of that. I want more of that ἀγάπη love for one another. Don’t you want more of that? “How do I do that, Pastor Tony? How do I pursue that?” Well, you’ve got to be committed to that. You’ve got to be vulnerable with one another. You’ve got to care for one another and be hospitable to one another. Invite people to your homes and lavish them with food and hospitality. Love their kids. Love what they love. Be interested in them. Weep with those who weep. Rejoice with those who rejoice.

One of my great prayers for this church is that God would give us this unbreakable and unshakable love for one another. I pray for that. Join me in praying for that, would you church? Join me in praying for a church that is abounding in love for one another. Would you be willing to do that? Pray 2 Thessalonians 1:3 for our church. Pray, “God, may the love of every one of us for one another increase at our church.”

One more thing. Write this down as #3

What Kind of Church Do We Want to Be?

1. A Church whose faith is flourishing (1:1-3a)
2. A Church whose love is abounding (1:3b)
And thirdly…
3. A Church whose backbone is strengthening (1:4)

Paul says this. Look with me at verse 4.

4 Therefore we ourselves boast about you in the churches of God for your steadfastness and faith in all your persecutions and in the afflictions that you are enduring.

Paul says, “We boast about you, Thessalonica, because you’ve got guts. You’ve got a backbone. People persecute you, and you take it like a champ. You don’t cower in the face of persecution.”

Warren Wiersbe said once that, “A faith that cannot be tested cannot be trusted. New believers must expect their faith to be tried, because this is the way God proves whether or not their decision is genuine. This is a young church in Thessalonica with young believers. It’s only been a year or two since Paul was there preaching the gospel to them. So, they are baby Christians. But their faith, in light of their steadfastness, is legit.

John Calvin said once that “perseverance is the fruit and proof of faith.” No perseverance; no faith. This is what theologians call “perseverance of the saints.” It’s the “P” in the “TULIP” (Total Depravity, Unconditional Election, Limited Atonement, Irresistible Grace, and Perseverance of the Saints) of a reformed understanding of salvation. This doctrine assumes that believers, true believers, persevere even through trials and afflictions. False converts instead apostatize. The Apostle John says it this way, “They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us” (1 John 2:19).

But in 2 Thessalonians, Paul is not presenting this statement about perseverance as a warning against apostasy. The Bible does that elsewhere. He’s presenting this to us as a celebration. The Thessalonians have endured persecution with their faith intact, and that makes Paul boast. He boasts about them before the churches of God because of their steadfastness. 

Everyone see that word “steadfastness” in verse 4? Are you familiar with that word? That is a great English word. It derives from two Old English words “stede” and “fæst.” Before “fast” meant “quick” or “speedy,” it meant “fixed” or “secure.” And the word stede meant “place” or “position.” So, the word “steadfast” means fixed in your position or firm in your place.

Maybe because it’s an Old English term, I like to think of those guards that protect the Royal Palace in Britain as “steadfast.” You know the “Queen’s Guard” I think they are called… those guys who stand there and hold their place even when people talk to them or heckle them or even try to provoke them! They are steadfast. They are holding their position. That’s a great word picture right there of the Christian life. “I am steadfast in my faith. I am unyielding to the provocations of this world. I’m not moving from this place. I’m not surrendering this ground!” Does that describe us, Verse By Verse Fellowship? Is our commitment to Christ steadfast? And is that steadfastness growing like it was for the church in Thessalonica?

Just like in 1 Thessalonians, Paul makes a statement here about how their faith is even withstanding persecutions and afflictions. “Persecutions” (Greek: διωγμός) is a reference to the suffering that the people are enduring because of their faith in Christ. “Afflictions” or “trials” (Greek: θλῖψις) is a general reference to troubles of any kind. As a believer, you’re going to have general afflictions or trials that are part of just being human. Aging is a kind of affliction. Joblessness is a kind of affliction that comes to believers and unbeliever both. Relational conflict is a kind of affliction. Sickness and disease are a kind of affliction. COVID-19 doesn’t discriminate against believer or unbeliever.

But as Christians we also deal with persecution. This is the target that’s put on our back when we come to Christ. When we get saved, we declare war against Satan and this world, and this world comes after us. If you don’t believe that, then you’re not reading your Bible. And the Thessalonians knew all about that. 

Remember when Paul came to town and preached Christ to them? The Jews got jealous and started a riot, that just about got that guy Jason killed. They chased Paul out of town. And Paul says clearly in 1 Thessalonians that the persecution didn’t stop there. The church continued to experience persecution in the city of Thessalonica (1 Thess 2:14-16; 3:4). I don’t know exactly what that looked like, but I can imagine. In some cases, maybe people tried to intimidate them? Maybe they were ostracized from the community? Maybe they were blackballed in some professions, so they had to endure poverty and joblessness? And those are best-case scenarios, by the way, because we know that the worst-case scenarios involved physical beatings and imprisonments and even executions. None of that was unheard of for Christians in Paul’s day. Paul got a piece of that just about everywhere he went.

And Paul says here, “You are so steadfast in your faith, Thessalonians… You are so brave and courageous, even under persecution and afflictions, that I brag about you to the other churches.”
“You’re a good church!” Paul says. And you know what, church… I want that to be said about us. I want to be that kind of church. And I want to be that kind of Christian. A steadfast, unwavering, faith-filled, enduring Christian.

A lot of time it’s suffering through affliction that brings about the spiritual growth that we long for. That’s God’s purpose for a trial. That’s God’s purpose for suffering. That’s God’s purpose in our lives for affliction and persecution. Warren Wiersbe said once that, “When Christians suffer, their faith reaches upward to God, and their love reaches outward to their fellow believers.”

Now here’s what some of you might say about that. You might say, “Pastor Tony, nobody’s persecuting us here in San Antonio. We’ve got freedom of religion here in America! We’ll never experience persecution and suffering like the Thessalonians.” Maybe so? I don’t disagree with that necessarily. And what’s interesting in 2022 is that where some of our religious freedoms were under attack in America, we had some victories. I’m thankful for that. I don’t know if that’s going to continue in the years to come or not. But I would just caution you, don’t be fooled by that. Following Christ in America in 2022 is not easy. It might be easier than following Christ in Thessalonica in the first century; but that doesn’t mean it’s easy. I’ll give you an example of why I say that and an example of an area where we need to be steadfast in our commitment to Jesus Christ and the Scriptures.

I learned recently that the American Psychological Association (APA) just released its first ever guidelines for practice with men and boys. And in these guidelines, they have now determined that traditional masculinity is “psychologically harmful.” I’m not making this up. This really happened just a few years ago. This is what’s now referred to in our culture as “toxic masculinity.”

Now are there some trials coming our way because of this? Is there maybe even persecution for those who pursue Biblical truth about gender? I think so. It is now more acceptable in the American psychological community for your boys to act like girls than it is for them to act like boys or more precisely like males. And that is just another assault on the traditional, biblical distinction between males and females, boys and girls, biblical masculinity and biblical femininity. What’s a Christian to do in a world like that?

Here’s what you do. You remain steadfast. We as a church… we remain steadfast. We teach our boys how to be boys and grow to be strong, God-honoring men. And we teach our girls how to be girls and grow up to be strong, God-honoring women.

And for the record, I’m not afraid. I’m not concerned about the state of my son or of the children here at Verse By Verse. I’m concerned about boys and girls in America and the confusion that they are experiencing in the world. But I’m not afraid here. Because we are going to teach our kids to love Jesus and follow Jesus and stand fast on his Word. And we’re going to pray that God would help us to be a church whose endurance is strengthening and steadfastness is strengthening, even in the midst of trials, opposition, affliction, suffering. 

And here’s what we’re going to do too. We’re going to pray like crazy. We’re going to pray for our kids. We’re going to pray for our country. And we’re going to pray that God would give us the strength to endure and represent him well before the watching and confused world. And we’re going to ask God to make us…

1. A Church whose faith is flourishing (1:1-3a)
2. A Church whose love is abounding (1:3b)
3. A Church whose endurance is strengthening (1:4)

Let me close with this. I want to show you something briefly as we close out this text and close out this introduction to 2 Thessalonians. You might notice that Paul mentions “faith” and “love” in these first few verses. He actually mentions “faith” twice; once in verse 3 and once in verse 4. And usually when Paul mentions faith and love, he also mentions something else: hope. In fact that’s exactly what he does in 1 Thessalonians 1:2-3: “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 labor of love and steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.” Why would Paul mention their hope in 1 Thessalonians, but not in 2 Thessalonians? Did he just forget to say that? Is the old man Paul getting forgetful?

No, I think this absence is purposeful. Because what was Paul doing in both 1 and 2 Thessalonians at the beginning of those books? He was thanking God for the good things happening in the church. And Paul was able to thank God in 1 Thessalonians for their faith, love, and hope. But he’s only able to thank God for their faith and love a few months later in 2 Thessalonians. Why is that? Well, I think it’s because they have lost sight of their hope. In 2 Thessalonians 2, Paul addresses that some of the church has been duped into thinking that Jesus has already returned. So, they’ve become hopeless. And that’s part of the reason that he wrote this letter. He’s writing to restore their hope.   

You might say, “how did Paul restore their hope?” “How did he battle this false teaching?” “How did Paul fix this theological error that was running rampant in this church?” Good questions. Come back next week and we’ll talk about it.

Taught by Dr. Tony Caffey

Senior Pastor of Verse By Verse Fellowship

2 Thessalonians Series