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I
Thessalonians 5:23-28
Recently we took a quick trip to a small town in Pennsylvania where we
picked up David, Kelly, and Kieran who were flying into one of the smallest
airports I’ve ever seen. We had
carefully planned our trip but didn’t know about all the construction we’d find
on the way. It seemed next to impossible
to figure out what the speed limit was.
It kept bouncing from 45 to 65, then 55, then 40, without clear
indications of where one zone ended and the next began. Such delays can play havoc with your plans.
The Thessalonians certainly knew about delays and detours. Many of them had apparently expected Jesus to
return within a relatively short time after the founding of the church. It didn’t happen. Instead, detours and delays happened. Friends and loved ones died. The church faced trial. Economic pressures, due in part to the
refusal of some to work, were making it hard to take care of the truly
needy. It was as if they were facing one
cluster of orange barrels after another.
Detours took them on unexpected trips through country that made them
uneasy.
Paul’s words remind us of what we should do when we find ourselves
facing such detours and delays.
Remembering God’s faithfulness allows us to survive the changes and
challenges of life. The counsel Paul
gives applies to a church, a family, an individual, and the workplace.
When We Face Delays on the Road, We
Should Remember to Pray for Others. (25)
Earlier in the letter (1:2f),
Paul mentioned the concerted prayers he and his associates were offering for
the Thessalonians. A few verses before
this offered another beautiful prayer for the Thessalonians and, now, he asks
for their prayers. It was a quiet
reminder that he considered them his spiritual peers.
They were relatively new believers.
They had much to learn. They had
made some errors of judgment in the past.
Still, he believed their prayers could make a difference. William Barclay commented, “It is a wonderful
thing that the greatest saint of them all should feel that he was strengthened
by the prayers of the humblest Christians.”
Paul did not believe he was
spiritually self-sufficient; he treasured the prayers of others. He was aware of his own shortcomings and knew
he needed God’s grace to do his work. If
Paul thought that about himself, we’d better not think otherwise about
ourselves.
When the Thessalonians prayed for Paul, he would be blessed. At the same time, when the Thessalonians
prayed for Paul, they would be blessed.
When we face those detours and delays, there’s a great danger of
becoming self-centered, of thinking only of ourselves. That’s true for both a church and for an
individual. We become ingrown.
Learning to pray for others helps us break out of the narrow world
bounded by our own concerns.
Robert L. Kahn expressed this idea, “Prayer is a way of lifting
ourselves, of getting a higher look, of transcending self. In prayer one sees life as God sees it, and
relates his own little life and his own little needs to the needs and life of
humanity.”
When we pray for others we remind ourselves that we are linked to what
God is doing in the larger world. A
church may see itself as small, without influence, and, from one perspective
that may be perfectly correct, but when that church prays for others who are
doing God’s work in distant places, that church becomes a partner in whatever
God-given success they enjoy.
When We Face Delays on the Road, We
Should Remember to be Civil to Others.
(26)
Here's a verse which calls on us to understand cultural
differences. This command made complete
sense to the Greeks and Jews hearing Paul’s words. In their culture, a greeting often included a
kiss. That this was a "holy"
kiss was not to suggest any of the believers were taking the practice too far
but to distinguish it from mere social ritual.
The gesture was to be sincere and warm.
By the mid-second century the “kiss of peace,” as it was called had
become a regular feature of Christian worship.
It preceded the Lord’s Supper.
Apparently, both sexes originally shared this kiss on the cheek. Men kissed men and women; women kissed women
and men. But by the fourth century,
church authorities enacted rules which said men must kiss only men and women
must kiss only women.
Some translations have tried to
place the command into a contemporary Western culture. NLT translates the verse without reference to
any action, "Greet all the brothers and sisters in Christian
love." Others, like J. B. Phillips
translates it, "Give a handshake all round.” The older Living Bible does much the same
with, "Shake hands for me with all the brothers there."
Michael Holmes comments, “Any culturally accepted form of greeting,
whether a kiss on each cheek, a hug, a hearty handshake, or whatever, that
conveys warmth and symbolizes unity would likely be acceptable to Paul.” Many of my books are used and their former
owners have sometimes written in the margins.
Next to that comment by Holmes the former owner wrote, “people don’t
like hugs.” Of course, that former owner
meant, “I don’t like hugs.”
I’m pretty sure that even though the former owner of my book might not
like hugs, he would want to be treated civilly.
And that’s become a problem in our culture.
The Dispatch recently carried
an article about a local community where some of its leaders feel there needs
to be a program reminding people to be civil to one another, especially in
public settings. Sometimes the church
may need that kind of reminder. In the
church where I grew up, everyone knew Brother Roberts was a Republican and
Brother Lewis was a Democrat, yet they got along; they could work side by side
on various projects without conflict.
We’ve come a long way from that and I’m afraid it’s been in the wrong
direction. I have a friend who regularly
opines, “No Christian can be a ...” (I’ll let you insert a political party
name). With the echoes of Independence
Day fireworks still in our ears, le t me say we need to return to civility.
Civility is simple courtesy. It
is treating other with basic respect.
I think Paul would agree.
Paul was asking the Thessalonians to demonstrate simple civility. Sometimes, when believers have been associated
with each other a long time, they forget that.
We overstep our bounds. We don’t
treat others with the respect they deserve.
We may push someone rather than allow him or her to make his or her own
minds us about something. We refuse to
take “no” for an answer. We become
pushy.
On other occasions, we may start thinking that our opinion is the only
one with any weight or value.
Paul would have us treat one another with simple decency and respect.
When We Face Delays on the Road, We
Should Remember to Nurture Others. (27)
Here's a simple reminder about how Christian leaders communicated with
congregations. Letters had to be read to
the people, perhaps more than once since some might not be present for the
first reading.
Paul’s reference to reading the
letter to all the Christians ahs caused some to wonder if there was a division
in the church. More likely, he’s simply
calling on the leaders to make sure the greatest number of people hears the
letter. This was so important to the
Apostle that he took the pen from the scribe’s hand to write the final
sentences himself.
Paul wanted to make sure all the believers in the church heard his
instructions. E. J. Richard says that
[in the letter there is] “something for everyone, something which troubled,
doubtful, working, and attentive members need to hear and to repeat to one
another as exhortation…. Public reading
of the letter in the presence of every brother and sister assures that each
member of the community is either admonished, encouraged, or assisted with
patience, love and concord.”
Centuries later, many Christian churches would establish times for the
public reading of Scripture. These
occasions were not the regular services but times when someone would simply
read the Bible aloud to the gathered believers.
There was a reason for this. Unlike
today, Bibles were not plentiful and cheap; many could not hope to afford
one. At the same time, many believers
were illiterate; they couldn’t have read a Bible if they owned one. Yet, the church recognized such people needed
the nurture of God’s Word. Things have
changed but not the need for nurture.
Even when things are tough, perhaps, especially when things are tough,
the church has something to say. Even
when were on a detour or stuck in a delay, we need to hear and reflect on what
God’s Word has to say to us and we need to continue to share our world-view, to
challenge those who don’t know Christ and to encourage those who do.
When We Face Delays on the Road, We
Should Remember We All Need God’s Grace. (28)
The sentence is something of a standard closing, but still not a mere
formality.
Individual churches and congregations must depend upon the grace of the
Lord to survive and thrive.
Grace enables us to enter the
church; grace enables us to be the church.
Conclusion
Things hadn’t worked out the way
the Thessalonians had planned. Detours and delays abounded. Paul doesn’t mock or berate them. He reminds them to recall the faithfulness of
God and to keep praying for one another, to keep loving one another, to keep
encouraging each other.
