1 Thessalonians Chapter 1 Verse 5

•Here we go, man! This is so very telling as to why Paul would be driven out of the city by the Jews! Why they would be so worried and challenged by what he was doing there in the synagogue and in the streets! Yes he was bringing the gospel and reasoning with the Jews concerning the scriptures, unpacking and breaking down for them how the entire Old Testament perfectly culminates in the Person of Jesus Christ but remember, what ethnicity of folks were becoming Christians there in Thessalonica?

•You got it! The Greeks! Were they at the Synagogue? NO way! The Jews would have had a cow, or maybe a falafel, if the gentiles were taking over their sacred meeting place! And so that means one of two things or both! One, that the Jews were so impacted by not just the clarity and simplicity of the Gospel, but also by the power of the Word, the moving of the Holy Spirit in that place and upon their hearts, and the straight up assurity of Paul, Silas and Timothy that they were telling others!

•Oh no no no no NO! The leading Jews must have thought! We can’t have this! If 12 tell 12 and those 12 tell 12 and those 12 tell 12 and those 12 tell 12 then 250,000 people will hear and how many people are in this city? 200,000! Everyone will be turned upside down!!! The Jews who believed were a bunch of squawkers! Taking it to the streets. That’s one of two things probably taking place.

•The second, is Paul, Timothy and Silas themselves! How were the Greeks hearing if they were only preaching in the Synagogue? They weren’t! And most supremely importantly, their message AND their manner was the same whether they were in the holy place or their homie’s place! He says here, “What kind of men we were among you!” The people saw something so very entirely essentially new! They saw people that claimed they followed God, and then actually DID! What a novel idea!

•And so the Greeks were astounded! The city was in an uproar! And Paul says my preaching was so good that it caused it all! Paul said that the stage lighting was so good during worship that every heart was changed! The seats were so comfortable and the volume of the teaching was so right! NO! What’s the source of all of this? Back in the beginning of verse 5! The Gospel!

•Man know this! The power is in the Gospel! As folks hear and learn and understand that man is lost to sin and religion can’t cure them, there is no cure at all to be found on earth, and so God brought heaven to earth…He Himself, perfect and wonderful and merciful, He Himself came in the likeness of sinful flesh and yet was utterly without sin…no sin nature…no earthly father to receive the inheritance of sin…God became a man, born of a virgin, conceived of the Holy Spirit and then reversed with His perfection what man had brought on himself with his sin…separation from a holy Creator God…

•Jesus gave His perfect life in exchange for any imperfect life that would be freely given to Him as He died in our place (the wages of sin are death) and yet in a stunning display of truth and power, He resurrected Himself from the grave showing that in Him truly is eternal life, the power to overcome mortality…and today His invitation is for you and I to come to Him by faith (repent and surrender your broken life to Him as He is ready to forgive you of all your sin) and learn from Him as He unlocks in our hearts understanding and meaning and purpose and peace that passes all understanding…the good news of the Savior…the Gospel…

•There is power there! Paul uses precisely that word in verse 5… Dynamis in the Greek. The Holy Spirit Himself moves upon the minds and hearts of people as the Gospel is given…it’s not just words…our culture is barraged by words…websites, billboards, newspapers, text messages, essays, articles, reports…the Gospel is logistically made up of the same elements found in a TGI-Friday’s menu…letters of the alphabet arranged specifically to form words and sentences but it is entirely different then a description of a three-layer burrito!

•It breeds assurance as it is accepted. This assurance, this comfort, this hope, this sure footing, this “everything is going to be ok” floods the hearts and minds of the willing hearers and that is precisely what happened as Paul and Silas and Timothy and the believing Jews took the Gospel to the streets and backed it up with a manner of delivery and behavior that overtly was honoring to God and in service towards others….see how Paul says there at the end, “What kind of men we were among you…for your sake?” Hear the heart of love, humility, and service in that!

•The people were moved for two reasons. First, the Gospel. Second, God’s people. To be the real deal and affect this fallen world for the kingdom of heaven…to actually help people instead of just parading our intellectual idolatry in pride…we gotta have both. Our lives must reflect what we claim to believe or we lie because truly our beliefs dictate our behaviors but man oh man, when that alignment is wired up…the city turns upside down! (But you first! When that alignment wires up…you’re the first to flip…telling folks to turn rightside up and you’re the same as them…doesn’t work!)

1 Thessalonians Chapter 1 Verses 6 – 9

•Disciple cycles were happening there in the city of Thessalonica as believers were making believers but Paul had heard that the aggression of the leading Jews was intensifying and yet he speaks of their joy and their potency that the message was even spreading to neighboring cities and regions! And what a huge compliment he lavishes upon them! Do you see it? Where does he say their message has spread to? To Macedonia, to Achaia and to…every place! He is crediting them with it all! Saying you guys are killing it to the point that I’m going places and they’ve already heard because of you! That’s huge!

•And interesting he says that the message that is carried is the Gospel but it’s also the testimony that it was matched with action! See that? “How you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God!” Have you done that? Have you received the gospel intellectually or have you received it in power? Have you been born again? It’s the same question, really. Receiving the gospel as truth doesn’t bring with it the power of salvation because although you’re a believer, you’re not a new creation.

•Satan is a believer. Ever consider that? He is quite sure Jesus is alive. He is quite sure that Jesus gave His life to save sinful men unto eternal life. Is Satan saved? No way. Why? Well one, we have no indication in the Bible that angels can repent…doctrinally and biblically we must conclude that they cannot because they are incapable of faith…all have seen God and know Him person to person, face to face, they are not men nor are they like men…and if he can’t repent, and if he’s incapable of faith, then he can’t be born again…

•Do you believe only or are you born again? Are you saved? Does the Holy Spirit dwell within you? If so, you yearn…and you learn to turn to God from idols. Maybe you’re thinking right now about those things you struggle most with thinking that they are so hard to turn from…I want to encourage you today…

•In 1971 a man moved a 33 thousand ton item 10,000 miles. You know what it was? The London Bridge! He moved it clear from London, England to Lake Havasu City, Arizona! If that can be done…I mean…COME ON! HA! If I man can move the London Bridge 10,000 miles then how much more can All Mighty God help you to move your 33 thousand ton laziness! Or anger! Or addiction! Or attitude!

1 Thessalonians Chapter 1 Verse 10

•This is a huge statement! What is the, “Wrath to come?” Revelation 6:16, the men of the earth cry out to the mountains and rocks, “Fall on us and hide us from the face of Him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb!” Revelation 6:17, “For the great day of His wrath has come, and who is able to stand?” Revelation 11:18, “For nations were angry and Your wrath has come…” Throughout the Bible the wrath of God is foretold to be an intense time of purification upon the world called the Great Tribulation. The seven year period prior to the Second Coming of the Messiah, beginning after the rapture of the church.

•How do we know that…many verses, but this one and one other one in particular, 1 Thessalonians 5:9, “For God did not appoint us to wrath, but to obtain salvation through or Lord Jesus Christ.” So the true church is gone and this one verse back in Chapter 1 makes me lean almost entirely to the fact the church is not protected, not covered…but gone.

•Eschatology buffs, Bible scholars, you’re going to love this. It’s that one very very very specific word in the Greek, “deliver.” It’s the word, “rhyomai.” It indeed means deliver but it’s the cross-reference (pun) that is eternally revealing. Matthew 27. Jesus is there on the cross…the Chief Priests are there and one of them says, “He trusted in God (mocking Him); let Him deliver Him now if He will have Him; for He said, ‘I am the Son of God.’” Same word.

•Is there even a 1% chance that they mean let God sustain Jesus there on the cross so that Jesus could live a good life nailed to it? Is there even a 1% chance that they mean let God cover Jesus and protect Him from harm while He is there upon the cross? Not even 1%. Let Jesus come OFF of the cross was their meaning and it is clear. But the fact is He could not, because if He did, then we would not be able to come out of the Great Tribulation.

•Look this word up. Study it. In no circumstance does it mean to be delivered In every circumstance (Lot delivered from Sodom and Gamora, Jesus prayed, “And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil), in every circumstance this word means to deliver out of…not to deliver within…Paul writes verse 10, the Holy Spirit reveals clearly through this one word that is so very specific, that Jesus has delivered us from, out of, taken out of the way…from the Great Tribulation. The wrath to come…

•He can deliver you today…I want you to know that! You might say or think or feel that your sin weighs 33 thousand tons…no problem for God…He is ready to forgive your sin and create in you something new and eternally redeemed!