First Thessalonians 1:5-7 Gospel Came In Power and In The Holy Spirit

Well, I want to welcome each one this morning. I see we've got a few more people there. I've got a new computer set up here, and that's why it looks a lot different this week than it has in the past. So I'm going to be playing with it, and I apologize if I stumble, but I'm getting used to it. Okay. So one of the things that we're covering today is a section of verses in 1st and 2nd Thessalonians, lesson number 3, today's session. Let's see if I can get this to move.

There we go. Verses 5 through 7 of chapter 1. And we've titled this, The Gospel Came in Power and in the Holy Spirit. And just to give us an orientation time-wise, it's probably difficult to see those dates there. But the birth of Christ and in AD 33 he was crucified and rose again.

Approximately AD 46 and 7 Paul, in his first missionary journey, went to areas not too far from Antioch. That's in Antioch in north of Jerusalem there on the coast. And then he went back and then again he went out and arrived in Thessalonica approximately 50 AD and wrote this letter approximately 51 AD. He wrote it to the Corinthians from Corinth in his second journey.

And you got to remember now that the distances here are pretty big, you know, coming from Jerusalem And I'm going to try something, I don't know how this will work. Can you see the little red dot? I don't know if you can see it or not. There's Jerusalem, and of course, most of the time he was in this area, leaving from there, and the second missionary journey, it took about two to three months for him to get up into this area, and then go from Philippi but entering into persecution and eventually getting to Thessalonica, spending about three or four weeks, maybe as much as two months at the most, according to different people looking at it. Then on to Berea where he got kicked out again because of people following him and he ended up down here in Corinth. And it's from Corinth that after getting a report from Timothy, who he sent back to find out how it's doing there in Thessalonica, he wrote the first Thessalonian letter. That's just a little bit of an overview.

Let's see if I can... Oh, when you got the pointer on, you can't click the slide. This is, like I said, a little bit of an experiment. Okay. I'd like to now take a look with you at how these three verses fit in an outline that we got from Chet McCulley in Chapter 1.

Turning to God from Idols is the way he has titled this chapter. So far, Bob and Roger gave us an opening introduction and then we had Greetings and Thanksgiving last week from Bob. This week we're going to go into the first part of Paul's confidence in this section. We're going to talk about his confidence was really based on how God's Word came to the Thessalonians in verse 5, how God's Word was received by them in verse 6, how God's Word was handled by them. There's two parts to that in 7 and 8. We only are going to cover the first part. It was reproduced locally in verse 7. And Andrew, I guess you're covering the next part there in verse 8, that it was reproduced universally.

And then going on, you'll be covering, because Paul's confidence was also because of the way God's Word had affected the Thessalonians. And again, this is all from a perspective of Chad Nicoli, outlining 1 Thessalonians 1. I'm giving you the URL there, www.wordoftruthkc.org, if you'd like to download his... not just an outline, but actually there's a commentary, and part of that commentary is in that outline. Okay, let's take a look now at the New American Standard updated in 1995 text. I'm just going to read through Chapter 1.

Paul and Silvanus and Timothy to the Church of the Thessalonians and God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Grace to you and peace. We give thanks to God always for all of you. making mention of you in our prayers, constantly bearing in mind your work of faith and labor of love and steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ while in the presence of our God and Father.

Isn't that a packed verse section? Boy, there's so much there. Knowing brethren beloved of God, His choice of you. Note, this Thanksgiving to God of these brethren was for all of them. Not too often you can say that about a church, is it? It was based on knowing five things. Their work out of faith, their labor out of love, their steadfastness out of hope, and also knowing the facts that God loved them and chose them. Like I said, there's an awful lot in those verses. Can't dwell on it too long, can we? If we want to cover the next section. Verse 5 begins with 4, a key word.

We'll get to that. Our gospel did not come to you in word only, but also in power, and in the Holy Spirit, and with full conviction. Just as you know what kind of men we prove to be among you for your sake." And I put a little pointer there that this part in blue is covered in chapter 2 of 1 Thessalonians. So we'll be dwelling on that a little bit.

Interesting, isn't it, that it is the Word of God first, and how it came, and then it's the messengers, and what kind of men they would be. Interesting, isn't it, that it would be in that order. I'm not going to go into that, because I think we'll get into it in Chapter 2. But God, the Holy Spirit, chose to give it to us because He wanted to emphasize the Word coming. not the messengers coming.

In verse 6, you also became imitators of us and of the Lord, having received the word in much tribulation with the joy of the Holy Spirit, so that you became an example to all the believers in Macedonia and, and this is a tricky word, I remember Bob, when he got through this several years ago, he found out that it's pronounced softly, not a-kay-uh, but a-hi-uh, because he's from Ohio, he relates to that. I got a chuckle out of listening to him teach through that. Anyway, verse 8, 4, the word of the Lord was sounded forth from you, not only in Macedonia, and Ahia, but also in every place.

Your faith towards God has gone forth so that we have no need to say anything. For they themselves report about us what kind of a reception we had with you and how you turned to God from idols to serve a living and true God and to wait for his Son from heaven whom He raised from the dead, that is, Jesus, who rescues us from the wrath to come. Isn't that precious? You turned to God in faith. You are serving God in love, and you are waiting for His Son in confident hope."

Notice in verse 10 here, the message is repeated, faith, love, and confident hope, that was given to us way back there in the very beginning. In fact, I'm going to go through that just a bit here, just touch on it. In verse 10, we have, you are waiting for his son in confident hope, There are two times in the first chapter, verse 2 and 10, that this confident hope is mentioned. Plus, four more times in this letter this is mentioned.

Verse 19 of chapter 2, in the presence of our Lord Jesus at His coming. Verse 13 of chapter 3, so that He may establish your hearts without blame and holiness before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his saints. And in chapter 4 verse 16, for the Lord himself will descend from heaven and the dead in Christ will rise first and then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. and verse 23 of chapter 5, Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you entirely, and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved complete, without blame at the coming of our Lord Jesus. Faithful is He who calls you, and He also will bring it to pass.

I think there's great comfort in seeing that the Holy Spirit carefully emphasized this future hope we have of the personal parousia, the personal presence of Jesus Christ face-to-face with us in the future. Isn't that neat? Let's take a look again and review at the text 5 through 7 in this outline.

It is because of how God's Word came to them in verse 5. It is because of how God's Word was received by them in verse 6. And it is because of how God's Word was handled by them in verse 7. It's also because of the way God's Word affected them, or affected them, excuse me, in verses 9 and 10.

Let's begin here a portion of what I call the Word Study. I'm not going to spend a lot of time on this, but I'd like to give you from the Greek that it begins with this word, for. is because or since for this reason and it points to the conclusion of the action back in verse 2 goes all the way back to we give thanks for this reason it's the basis of this conclusion and notice the good news is ours he says it is it came to them not by word only.

The did come to you is in a negative form, not just by communication of words. I think that's important. He's looking back at his experience with them, recognizing that when he came and gave the message, the message came not just by the presentation of words, there was more there. I've given a literal translation, but I'm not going to spend time on that right here.

And the next phrase of verse 5 is, but also in power, and in the Holy Spirit, and with full conviction. This but also is a connected, and we're given three prepositions here. Each one is the same preposition used in slightly different ways by, or in power, by Spirit Holy with complete certainty. The literal translation is there again.

Moving to the last part of verse 5, just as you know, what kind of men we prove to be among you for your sake. The just as is that conjunction that is used here leads us into this what is called an indicative perfect verb, second person plural. The meaning here by free bird sort of helps us understand that verb. It's a perfect from an old form of Ido, which had a C or visual meaning.

So strictly using this word from that root, it's based on what you have seen, hence you know. That's the meaning behind that. And what are they knowing? What kind of men we were made to be. Notice the word there comes from the Ginnomai. We're going to get this repeated in the next verse, Ginnomai. But instead of we, in that verse, it is you. And it's terrorist indicative. It is passive in voice. It means that this is a fact that we were passively, we didn't make ourselves this way.

We were made to be among you for the sake of you. This among you, with the preposition dia gives us a purpose that they were made to be this way. It is for this reason we were made to be this way for your benefit. That's the kind of men that they were made to be. I'm going to skip my translation and pick up on it in a moment. The second reason is in this, you also. This leads us to the second reason for giving thanks, back in verse two.

Became imitators of us and of the Lord, is the phrase that we cover here. The word imitators, we get imitate from or mimic from. And it's followed by of us. That would be an objective genitive. That means that you mimicked, or the words mean here, you mimicked us. You copied us. You became followers of us. And notice the verb.

You were made to be. Second person, again, aorist and impassive voice. They didn't do this. They were made to be this. And also of the Lord, Objective Genitive. Both times you became followers or mimickers, not just of us, but passively you were made to be also of the Lord. I want to say something here real quickly and not dwell on it. I spent a couple days on it.

But if you look at this carefully, we know about positional truth and conditional truths, right? Who is the actor in our salvation, our sanctification, and our final redemption into glory? It is all of the Lord, isn't it? Easily you could take this instead of being of the Lord as being you know, the focus that we're imitators of Him, but we're imitators of Him because of Him, or from Him, that He would be the subject here, changing us to be imitators of Himself.

Anyway, nobody translates it that way, so I didn't either. And, I'm going to go on here to the following part of verse 6, having received the word in much tribulation with the joy of the Holy Spirit. You notice that that word having received is an aorist middle form. It means that we receive this as assenting to God's message. It's the basis of how God's Word was received. You received it as being the Word while in tribulation, not just tribulation or oppression and affliction, but much or large or great tribulation.

With, and I love this, with joy or delight And here we definitely have got to take this as the subjective alternative. That joy comes from the Holy Spirit. He himself has great joy. And I'd like to add a word here that maybe helps all of us understand this. It is a harmony that they had. with the Holy Spirit of joy.

Okay, that's the meaning of these words so far. The third area of because of how God's Word was handled by them, we get in verse 7, It was handled there in the form that it was reproduced locally, so that you became an example to all the believers in Macedonia and Achaia. This is, again, referring back to verse 2, the same way as the other two were, of why they were thankful, because of the results, this time, on how it was handled. Notice that now we have, not a verb, but an infinitive form of verb. You became, same kinamai as the root.

Freiberg, he puts it this way, a person or things that enter into a new condition, becoming something, you became something. Denker adds, you turn out or prove to be something. And the focus is as far as the accusative case is concerned. The object of this is, you became that. This is the result. This is why they're so great at confidence, by Paul. That the word was handled by them, and the result of it is that you became examples.

Interesting word, examples. It means, in literal form, a type, a blow mark, a trace, a pattern, a model. of all those believing, looking at in the Macedonia and the Chaia. So the specific article is used in both cases. Why? Because these were areas that were large in Greece. They were like provinces. Basically, in Macedonia, the capital was Thessalonica. And in Achaia, the capital was Corinth.

I think that's why the Holy Spirit gave us the article there. But the point is that this is the third reason for being thankful. They reproduced locally in that area. And next week Andrew will show us how they reproduce, not just locally, but in a much greater way. Now I'd like to look at a summary form. First, reading through the text again to let the Holy Spirit sink in the text.

Our gospel did not come to you in word only, but also in power and in the Holy Spirit and with full conviction, just as you know, what kind of men we prove to be among you for your sake. You also became imitators of us and of the Lord, having received the word in much tribulation with the joy of the Holy Spirit, so that you became an example to all the believers in Macedonia and Achaia. My literal translation for our gospel did not come to you by word only, but also in power, and by the Spirit holy, and with complete certainty, just as you know what kind of men we were made to be among you, for the sake of you. Also you, imitators of us you were made to be, and of the Lord, having received the word in tribulation much, with joy of the Spirit Holy, so that you became examples to all those believing in the Macedonia and the Achaia."

That's close to the original word order. Talasay's words added, if I thought it helped. Here's a real good expanded translation from Buist, from his Greek New Testament. Inasmuch as our message of good news came to you, not only in the form of discourse, but also in the sphere of power and of the Holy Spirit, and in much certainty and assurance, even as you know positively what sort of men we showed ourselves to be among you for your sakes.

And as for you, you became imitators of us and of the Lord, having welcomed the word while under much pressure of affliction, which act of welcoming was accompanied by joy and had its source in the Holy Spirit. So the you became a pattern to all those who are believers in Macedonia and Ahia. Here's a small outline, Chester McCulley wrote this in his commentary.

Covering both 1st and 2nd Thessalonians, the first three chapters are a detailed exposition of the words of how you turn to God from idols to serve a living and true God. The entire book can be divided into two parts. First, the Corinthians are reminded of how they received the Word of God. up through verse 13 of chapter 3. And then they are told of how they must live the Word of God.

Chapter 4 and chapter 5. The text 5 through 7 in this outline is because of how God's Word came to them, because of how God's Word was received by them, because of how God's Word was handled by them. I'd like to give these as way of observations. In verse 5, the word for gives us the first object for the previous action word or verb, in this case it was we give thanks, back in verse 2. They were thankful because of how God's Word came to them. and I've given you the actual text there. In verse 2, we give thanks. In verse 5, 4.

The words, Our Gospel, tells us that this Good News was personally given by all three who wrote this letter, Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy. It didn't come to you in word only, this Gospel. The Good News presented did not come as words alone communicated by men, and that's in verse 5, did not come to you in word only. The good news presented did come to you as words communicated with, notice this, the power of God the Holy Spirit and the speaker's complete certainty. Our gospel did not come to you in word only, but also in power and in the Holy Spirit with full conviction.

And this other observation, the complete certainty of the presenters was known by seeing the speakers, and I think this is important, made to give freely this good news for the hearer's benefit. These presenters have been changed. They gave, without compensation for themselves, the good news. Not for the benefit of themselves, but for the hearer's benefit.

Just as you know what kind of men we prove to be among you, for your sake. In verse 6, we have some observations. The words, you also give us the second object of that previous action word or verb, we give thanks, back in verse 2. Because of how God's word was received by them, we gave thanks that you also became imitators of us and of the Lord.

That's how they received it. How did they do it? You were made imitators. You became imitators of us and of the Lord because you were made that way. Just like the messengers who gave you the message were made the way they were. Isn't that interesting? Notice the parallel. They became imitators passively and the presenters were made a certain way as gospel givers. We get that in those two verses from verse six and verse five. And having received shows the reason that they were made imitators. They received the good news by faith, believing and depending on it. having received the word. This basis was total dependence upon God, so that even in much tribulation, penance is revealed here, they had a relationship with God of harmony and of joy that came from the Holy Spirit.

And I'll tell you, there's a lot in these verses, isn't there? Yeah, Roy, before you go on, that's totally opposite to the way the world uses imitators. You know, trying to copy somebody or be a mimic of somebody. This is the exact opposite of that. They were made to be imitators and they were made by knowing the Word of God. That's exactly right. You got it. Isn't it wonderful that God does this to us? Verse 7 says, the words, so that gives us this third object to that word. We give thanks back in verse 2.

They were thankful because of how God's word was not just perceived, but because of how it was handled by them. And here we get that from, you became an example to all the believers in Macedonia and Achaia. It was a reaching out result. the words became an example tell us that those who believe the good news were changed into an example and the words to all in the next observation areas tell us that those who believe the good news were changed that's something for all the believers locally in these two provinces both Macedonia area and Achaia area. And I just made a little summary repeat here that Thessalonica was the capital of that province in Greek of Macedonia Corinth was the capital city for the province of Achaia.

Now we've looked at some observations what I'd like to do here is here's God's good news message and its power illustrated from God's Word in other verses. 1 Corinthians 15, 3 and 4 says, I delivered unto you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures. Following up on that, a little bit different reference in 1 Corinthians, tells us about the power.

For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not come to know God, God was well pleased through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe. Who does the work? He saves through the foolishness of those words delivered.

Christ's work of dying on the cross paid the penalty for all of our sin. His death was verified by his body being buried in the tomb and his death has been accepted as payment in full for our sin, because he has been raised from that one death to everlasting life. And here is another example of, while in much tribulation, harmonizing with joy from the Holy Spirit.

I got this from John 4.14. Whoever, this is our Lord talking to the disciple, whoever drinks to the water that I will give him shall never thirst. The water that I will give him will become in him a well of water, springing up to eternal life.

Remember we covered that in 2 Peter 2.17, that fountain. In chapter 7 of John, verses 38-39, it says, He who believes in me As the scripture said, from his innermost being will flow rivers of living water. Notice here, this he spoke of the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were to receive, for the Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.

That innermost being is a description of our heart, the essence of who we are. We and whoever drinks or trusts the water Christ Jesus has given are now fountains of God's living water of life. Here's another example of love and tribulation harmonizing with joy from the Holy Spirit. How personal this is.

John 16, 12 through 15 says, I have Many more things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. But when He, the Spirit of Truth, comes, He will guide you into all truth, for He will not speak of His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak, and He will disclose to you what is to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of Mine and will disclose it to you, all things that the Father has are mine and therefore I said that he takes of mine and will disclose it to you. God the Son gave us God the Holy Spirit to share his living water the things of the Father and Christ to and through us.

So it's God who is using us as his own fountains of these things of God, the living water of life. That's so personal, isn't it? Finally, here's an exhortation to fix our eyes on the example of our Lord, who saw the harmonious joy set before him and gave himself as the perfect sacrifice for our sins.

Look in Hebrews 12.1. Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us. And I believe in parenthesis here that that is unbelief. Let us run with endurance the race that's set before us.

Fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who, for the joy set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who has endured such hostility by sinners against himself, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. You have not resisted to the point of shedding blood in your striving against sin.

Are you watching your time? My daughter says, are you watching your time? Yes, sweetheart, I am. I believe that is about the end of this particular session. though the questions quickly, maybe we could cover something if I've missed it. Anybody? I trust the Holy Spirit will apply this in the way he chooses to each of us. All right, let's close in a word of prayer then.

Our Father, thank you for this such a vivid presentation of your work not only in the believers that were there in Thessalonica, so that they were so exceedingly thankful as your apostles to them. But now in our lives, we have the same experience, Lord, of the wonderful harmony with your joy in knowing, Lord, that you are at work and forming us into your image. Thank you for that in Christ's name.