Constancy (09/20/22)

None too surprisingly, my thoughts on this passage break down into approximately the same subsections as before, and this is largely a breakdown which follows the verse-to-verse flow of the passage.  That said, I shall be considering those verses out of sequence this time, I think.  Given this intent, I do want to note an observation the JFB makes in regard to the arrangement Paul has used here.  That commentary observes how there is a building of energy through these verses, as each one in essence repeats what preceded, and then adds more to it.  We give thanks constantly in prayer.  We do so because we are ever remembering those gracious virtues in evidence in your lives.  Remembering these, we are assured of your election by God, of His love for you.  You should be assured as well, knowing how the gospel exercised its power in you, how the Holy Spirit brought you to full conviction of its truth.  And in that gospel powered, Spirit-informed state of grace, you saw that we were likewise gripped by grace, and exercising this gospel power in our own lives among you.

We might say that where Paul starts is where he finishes:  In thankful prayer.  All of this passage is giving reason for its beginning, isn’t it?  “We give thanks always.  We pray constantly.”  Now, we shouldn’t try and take those claims too literally, else we will be setting ourselves up to become frustrated at our own failure to live up to this false ideal.  But while we must temper our sense of what it means to pray always, to be constantly thankful, yet there is this application we cannot miss.  Prayer was Paul’s constant habit.  Let us accept that this idea of constancy devolves to mean no more than on every appropriate occasion, and still we have a life-defining habit on display.  It is on display not only, but throughout Paul’s letters.  Clearly this was no false claim on his part.  Just as clearly, it did not so occupy every moment of his every day as to leave him no time to deal with other aspects of life, or even of ministry.

We learn then, if we have not long since learned this, that a habit of prayerfulness befits the Christian.  Indeed, it is our chief connection to the power by which we endure in godly life.  If we would minister effectually, let us learn to pray earnestly, both before and after, and to the degree possible, during as well.  Every action we would undertake for God ought rightly to be bathed in prayer, and not least as means of discerning whether said action is indeed per God’s desire, and not merely some grand idea of ours that we’re hoping He might deign to bless.  If we are concerned as to the efficacy of our weekly worship services, perhaps further time in prayer might be well.  If we are frustrated by technical aspects, or find ourselves somewhat disinterested, perhaps the proper response is prayer rather than finding those with whom we might commiserate.

For all that, if the mundanities of daily living are getting to us, perhaps the right response is not to seek a vacation or some change of life, but rather, to pray, to give over our lives to God as belonging to Him.  After all, they do.  But we have a tendency to forget that reality, to make it all about ourselves and our desires and wants again.

Let me make one observation in regard to this prayerful habit we see.  I observe that very little of it concerns the man praying.  Yes, there will come that very brief request that they pray for him at the end of this letter, but there is no shopping list of needs or concerns presented there, just the simple request.  “Brethren, pray for us” (1Th 5:25).  That’s it.  In other places, he might note some cause for prayer, but where he does, it is always related to seeing ministry effectual, with seeing the gospel advanced.  It’s not about circumstances.  It’s not about personal comforts, or illness in need of healing, or income requirements.  It’s not about Paul at all, really.  It’s about God, about the Gospel.

Likewise, the thankfulness on display here at the start is, in a sense, tangential to the Thessalonians.  It’s about God and the Gospel.  We give thanks because it is clear that God is at work among you, that the Gospel has had its effectual result in you.  Yes, we give thanks for you as the fruit of this, but our thanksgiving is to God as the author, the giver, the glory of this great work.  And this we do always, on every reasonable occasion praying prayers of thanksgiving for all those individuals we have come to know in Christ along the way.  We give thanks that you are the fruit of this ministry, of God’s ministry.  We give thanks, as well, for all those who have been the fruit of other ministers of Christ.  I have no doubt that this would hold true for Paul.  But he wasn’t of a sort to be inserting himself into the work of those other ministries.  This was not a matter of pride, but of circumspect humility.

I hadn’t thought to take that particular corner in my musings today, but as I have, let me explore it just briefly.  There is instruction given those who lead God’s local church, and that includes setting boundaries.  I am not going to be able to find the particular verse I have in mind this morning, but the general sense is that you oversee the flock in which you are set as shepherd.  You concern yourselves with your flock.  For one, that is more than enough to keep you occupied.  But then, too, you have not the familiarity and association with these other flocks which would be needful to properly shepherd them as well.  And they are under another shepherd, his charge, not yours.

Perhaps this is more readily seen in the instruction given in regard to relations between husband and wife.  “Wives, be subject to your own husbands, as to the Lord.  The husband is head of the wife, as Christ is head of the Church” (Eph 5:22-23).  This is not a call for women generally to fall into subjection to men generally.  It is a specific relationship, in which Christ as delegated specific authority.  Such is the case in the leadership of the local church, as well.  It is authority delegated within that local body, not within the spectrum of all believers everywhere.  The pastor, the elders, have authority and responsibility with regard to this specific body, and this specific body have cause to submit to their leadership, for this is the arrangement God has made.

Let us understand as well that there is no place for skipping free of such authority.  We don’t get to be autonomous, choosing to remove ourselves from the life of organized religion in the form of the local body.  We have, for better or for worse, a far wider range of options in that regard than did the early church, but ‘a church of one’ is not on that list of options.  We are called to be in the body, and where we take that lightly, or treat it as optional, we do ourselves a great disservice.  I may address it elsewhere in these second pass studies, as I tend to do so often enough, but I would simply say, at this juncture, that we do our fellow believers a great disservice as well, removing, as we do, the benefit of our gifts from that body.

But let me return to something like focus.  We have this defining feature of a healthy Christian life.  “We pray constantly, giving thanks always.”  I would return, as well, to the comments of the JFB on this passage.  Let me quote.  “Words are heaped on words, to convey some idea of his exuberant feelings toward his converts.”  Well, let me ask:  When was the last time you knew such an exuberant feeling as concerns the work of ministry, the advance of the Gospel?  When was the last time you knew cause for such exuberance of feeling in regard to your own advances in sanctification, or your own contributions of fruitful grace to the ongoing work?

When was the last time you found yourself in urgent desire of breaking out in prayer to God not over some felt need or emergency of soul, but for the simple desire to give thanks?  I’ll ask it more broadly.  Does constancy in prayer and thanksgiving define your walk?  Could you say, with any degree of legitimacy, that you pray constantly, giving thanks always?  I’m not asking if you try to do so, or if you wish you did.  I’m asking, do you?  Or do you instead wonder at the weak and febrile state of your faith?  I rather hate to confess it, but I know well enough that such prayers as I manage, particularly during these times of study, tend more towards the repent, and grant that I might try harder sort of prayer.  There is far more of, “Oh, God, help me!” than, “Oh, God, thank You!”  Perhaps, then, that would be a good place to seek change, to seek to change, not as making it a work by which to earn the favor of our Lord, but as having recognized an oversight on our part, and seeking to mature in doing that which is pleasing in His sight.  What better time than now?

Father, thank You!  Thank You for awakening faith in me.  Thank You for that initial burst of faith so many years ago, as Your voice and Your evidence broke through my indifference and my animosity to bring saving grace to bear on my heart.  Had that been the sum of Your gift to me, already it was enough cause for daily thanksgiving.  But You have never stopped, nor do You ever.  Thank You, that You have sent forth into me Your own abiding presence, a source of endless wonder to me, knowing that I am such as I am.  And yet, here You are, speaking still, informing conscience still, gently, persistently working Your marvelous change upon this man.  Thank You.  Thank You for the assurance that comes of faith, that certain hope to which faith leads.  Thank You for eyes to see what You are doing, ears to hear Your word, and a heart to respond.  Thank You that You are so willing and so working in me that I do in fact hear and respond, perhaps not so regularly as You or I would like, but still, a response; still with growth.  And thank You, as well, that You know me, that I am weak and brittle, and that knowing this, You so temper Your work in me as to avoid any damage, never breaking this bruised reed, but rather, refashioning, strengthening the good parts, and gently removing the poor and weak.  Praise be to You, Lord.  You are magnificent, and I am Yours.  Thank You.

Power (09/21/22-09/22/22)

I must recognize that I have come to have something of an immediate reaction to mention of power in Scripture, no doubt a result of my years spent in Charismatic churches.  Certainly, working through the difficult concerns of 1Corinthians has done nothing to lessen that reaction.  I don’t think it is necessarily bad to be pulled up short by the word, but it does bear watching.  That said, we have something of a common point made by Paul in this greeting.  The gospel came not only in word, but in power and in the Holy Spirit and with full conviction.  I have jumped, of course, to near the end of our passage.  But as the JFB has observed how these verses pile up and build upon one another, I wanted to get out here to the top of that pile before exploring the middle more.

We really do need to check in, I think, to ask what it is Paul means by this.  Is he in fact saying that signs and wonders were performed among them as he preached, or alongside the preaching?  It’s possible, certainly, and just as certainly, there are many who would insist that must be what he means.  Power equal miracles, don’t you know.  God said He would confirm His word by such miracles done at the hands of His ministers, and if anything, we should be shamed and saddened that these things are not a commonplace in our own church today.  Okay.  I’ll grant the possibility that this is the meaning.  But I must also observe that no such event is recorded for us by which to confirm that understanding.

Honestly, given the lengthy treatment of such signs and wonders in 1Corinthians, I would have to question to what degree Paul exercised those things we speak of as the charismata.  It would be hard not to come back to the clear declaration he makes in regard to his preaching.  “I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified” (1Co 2:2).  Combine this with his assurance that the gospel he preached to them, the instruction he gave to them was no different than that which he proclaimed to every church.  Signs and wonders have their place, and we ought not, I think, to discount the possibility of them as is the tendency in many churches.  I get the concerns, and share many of them.  But I also get that sometimes God moves in ways unexpected.  Sometimes, it seems, He has to be a bit more expressive of His presence in order for those He would call to recognize what’s going on.

How could I, after all, suppose to deny the possibility of such things given the nature of my own calling?  Were there heavenly manifestations in the air around me?  No.  That wasn’t it.  But there was that interjected conversation in my head; God, as it were, making His proposition for my consideration, and challenging me to accept the premise, observe the proofs He would then be arranging.  Hey.  It worked in my case, what can I say?  The events of the next several days, while hardly showy explosions of prophetic announcement or matters of tongues and interpretation, yet were such as demonstrated to my satisfaction that something other than those men with whom I had gone on retreat, was so arranging events as to confirm that indeed, there is no such thing as coincidence.  This was orchestrated, but not by man.  And that left God, God Who is ever in control.  And thanks be to Him that it is so!

Looking back at this, it seems to me more in keeping with what I might call my current perspective on this question of power, and that is a perspective I find not uncommon amongst those various sources to which I turn in these second-pass notes.  Some might suggest that’s because I take to the sort of commentaries that would naturally view claims of miraculous power being displayed as suspect, at least beyond those recorded in the text.  Perhaps such a bias is indeed to be found, but I have done what I could to see that there is a mix of perspectives in those commentaries I reference, and to reserve their input until I have had a chance to pursue the text on my own.

But what do I find here?  Is the general view that Paul is talking about confirming signs and wonders, or that he is talking about the Gospel itself?  The conclusion, I think, is generally that indeed, it is the Gospel itself that Paul is considering.  It came ‘not in word only’, he says, ouk en logo monon.  So, it did in fact come in word, and word of that sort that gives expression to reasoned thought.  But that wasn’t the whole of it.  Philosophers come with that much.  A fine essay will give you that much.  But it has nothing in it of power to change.  We may speak of something we read as life-changing, some new idea as revolutionizing our perspective.  But give it a week.  Give it a month or a year.  One suspects the bulk of such impacts will be in the proximity of nil.  For many a hearer, the Gospel may indeed come in similarly fruitless fashion.  It will have come in word only.  They heard.  They understood what they heard.  But it meant nothing to them.  It was nice, and all, perhaps well-written.  It was interesting from a historical perspective, much as the Odyssey or the Iliad.  But, like those texts, it is little more than a window into ancient times.  It might convey some agreeable ethics, as do so many ancient philosophical texts.  But it remains more a catalog of human thought rather than the expression of God’s own Truth.

There are, though, those to whom that message of the Gospel comes to salvific effect.  There are those for whom the message does in fact prove life-changing, as only this Word of God can.  Yes, I can recognize that there are plenty of Islamists firmly committed to their own texts, plenty of Hindus likewise committed to what they view as their gods, and that this commitment assuredly has impact on how they live and think.  But, I think we must accept that whatever impact there is has been the work of man and not of those gods they worship.  To be sure, many would say the same of Christianity, that it is but man’s ideas, having no more validity than any other purportedly religious text.  Who’s to say, after all, that your conception of God is any more accurate and meaningful than any other?  Well, at base, I should have to say that God is to say.  If indeed He has spoken, or has caused His message to be put into words comprehensible by those He has brought into being (even if He has chosen to do so through the normal, mundane processes of biology), then we must surely have cause to pay that message heed.

But we are at enmity with God.  It’s there in the very fact that we exert so much energy in trying to discount the message rather than to understand and implement it.  You want displays of God’s power?  Here it is!  You heard, in this state of opposition to Him, and it got through to you.  It proved more than words.  It came with more:  With power to change your inmost character and set you on a new course of life.  It came with the Holy Spirit, come to cleanse the temple of your body and take up residence therein.  He has come.  He has opened your ears to truly hear, and your heart to truly receive and internalize what you hear.  It came with much assurance.  It didn’t just strike you as a good idea at the time.  It wasn’t a response born of excitement or emotional manipulation.  It almost immediately became settled ground.  Here, at last, is Truth.  Here is solid rock upon which to build one’s being.

The power which Paul points out to us is not some matter of prestidigitation on his part.  It wasn’t some magnificent display of wonders such as would make Simon Magi jealous.  It was the power of the Gospel to save, the power of the Holy Spirit coming to pave the way for this message of God’s astounding grace to lay hold of lost lives and bring those who had been sitting in darkness into the marvelous Light of Christ.  Barnes, amongst many others, insists that what we have here is no reference to miracles performed, but that ‘effect of the gospel on those who heard it’, resulting in soul-conversion.  Here amongst the Thessalonians, the message was not merely heard, but ‘produced a powerful effect on the heart and life’.

Were there miracles at Thessalonica, of that sort we normally think of as miracles?  Perhaps.  But if there were, they go unrecorded, and that includes here in this passage.  The miracle we have in view here is the saving of lost souls.  Those hearers did not work themselves up into a state of saving grace.  They didn’t develop some new commitment to this new philosophy such that they worked hard and earned their ticket to heaven.  No!  The Gospel came and in the power of God, in the present work of the Spirit, it was implanted, took root, and was now in full blossom among them.  That is more what we have in evidence in the intervening verses.  One had only to hear the reports of this fledgling church to know beyond doubting that indeed, God had come among them and saved them.

I have already borrowed from Barnes a fair amount here, but let me take one further observation of his, because it sums up the point rather nicely.  Where the gospel leads its hearers to break free of sin and abandon their idols, giving their hearts to God, power has already been on display.  You want a miracle?  There it is!  What need is there for more, honestly?

The Wycliffe commentary comes to a similar point.  That they were indeed elect of God was proven by their commitment to the message of this gospel, and that commitment as well had come by the gospel’s own ‘divinely supplied power’.  This is, as I say, a fairly common point made by Paul.  We have the well-remembered claim he makes in writing to Rome.  “I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to all who believe, to the Jew first, but also to the Greek” (Ro 1:16).  We have similar claim made to the Corinthian church, in that very letter which has in its instruction rather potent corrections to the excess attention paid to the more flamboyant signs and wonders gifts that had been granted various individuals in that church.  “My message and my preaching were not merely persuasive wise words, but they came in demonstration of the Spirit and of power” (1Co 2:4).  Again, we might ask if he was indeed pointing to things like tongues and prophecy, or even healings in this case, and again, we must conclude that if such events were transpiring by his hand, we have not specific record of the event.  He doesn’t deny access to such gifts, but he gives clear priority to speaking so as to be understood.  He came to preach, not to put on a show.

The sum of it, as the Wycliffe commentary sets it before us is this simple truth in regard to the Gospel:  Men preach it, but the Spirit ratifies it.  This certainly sets out the normative means by which God brings men to salvation.  Can the Spirit move without the preacher’s involvement?  Of course, He can.  He is God, and He can do as He will.  If, for some reason, it cannot be arranged for a preacher to be present (and what, I should have to wonder, could so exert itself that God, Who arranged the events of Christ’s crucifixion down to the moment, though covenanted by the Godhead before the dawning of Creation, could so prevent Him arranging to send one to preach the gospel to those He would call?) then, certainly, He can empower the gospel message apart from it being heard, apart, if necessary, even from being read.  But that is an exception case.  The course laid out by the gospel itself is that the preacher does in fact go and preach the gospel.  The message is delivered to be heard by all whom God would call.  And, as that summation observed, the Spirit ratifies His call by rendering the heart of the hearer open to the message, the mind ready to not merely receive interesting words, but to accept that indeed, here is God Himself revealing Himself in that which He has caused to be written.

And that it was He Himself who caused the writing, who gave substance to the message, is attested both by its impact on those to whom God has issued His call, and those by whom He has caused that message to go forth and be heard.  The Spirit ratifies it, but so do the observations of our own senses.  There is power in this gospel, because it is the very Truth of God.  It is that which He has caused to have recorded as to His being and His character and His law and His love.  All that is needful for life and godliness is contained therein, open and available to all those to whom this word is given.  But to those to whom it is not given, it remains opaque, no more than mere words, interesting ideas, perhaps, but of no more import than, say, Shakespeare’s sonnets.

Ah, but where God has chosen?  There, this Truth is received to proper effect, and this is no commendation of the preacher’s skills.  The preacher may be ever so humble of talent, or he may be an exciting orator.  It matters little enough.  What matters is God.  Has He indeed sent forth the Holy Spirit to prepare the ground in those who hear?  If so, then praise God, that message will be received to eternal benefit.  If not, then praise God, it is His choice that here, the message will find no purchase.  Either way, He has done so for His glory, and has done so as is good.  We may not understand how that is so, but we must understand that it is. 

The point remains that it is not the pastor’s skill that makes for efficacious hearing.  It is God.  The pastor, to be sure, has a duty, and a weighty one.  He is charged with proclaiming this gospel truly and in full, not merely reciting the verses but given explanation of them, showing application of them to those who hear.  He is charged, as well, with discipline those who hear and receive the gospel, ‘teaching them to observe all that I commanded’, and leading them into this assurance of hope, that ‘I am with you always, even to the end of the age’ (Mt 28:20).  We share in this duty, but like it or not, it does tend to fall in primary fashion upon the shoulders of the pastor, along with those elders called to serve beside him.

What do they preach?  What do we learn?  Let us get to the fundamentals.  We learn that we are sinners, something we have perhaps known but held at distance.  We learn that our debt to God is far and away beyond our capacity to repay, that our sins have already earned a death of eternal punishment, not merely ceasing from this life, as all men must do, but removed from His presence to suffer for our sins evermore without end.  But that’s just preparing the ground.  For there’s no good news in that, is there?  No, only utter hopelessness and doom.  But into that darkness comes the Light!  We present Christ to you, and Him crucified.  Here is historical fact, on the records and fully attested.  This man, Jesus, truly lived, truly ministered, truly came to be accused by the leaders of His own people, brought before a very real magistrate in the person of Pontius Pilate, and, while no legitimate charge could be found against Him, either in the court of man or in the court of heaven, He was put to death by the most vicious means then devised, an utterly humiliating, degrading, slow and painful death.

But if we have left it there, we are but history teachers, and of no value to you.  And we don’t leave it there.  We present to you Christ risen, Christ having conquered death.  This begins to get hard to accept, doesn’t it?  Many will hear this and just turn you off, hearing no further.  It is clearly patent nonsense, and we’ll waste no more of our time with you.  It was ever thus.  It was thus among the Greeks.  Among the Jews it was even worse, for the means by which He died were clearly depicted to them by their Scriptures as indicating a most vile sinner.  Here was patent evidence of God’s rejection, and you claim this one is somehow our Savior?  You think this is Messiah?

No, we don’t think Him to be Messiah.  We know Him to be Messiah.  He rose again!  Death could not hold Him.  Had this indeed been the punishment of His sins, He would not have returned from that place of punishment.  As He Himself taught in the parable of Lazarus and the rich man, there is no coming back from that place.  Yet, there He was, meeting with His own once more, held by them, touched by them, eating with them!

A bit of an aside, but this morning’s Table Talk observed the covenant meal between God and the leaders of Israel.  We tend to miss that, I think.  I certainly had.  This was not just Moses, or Moses and Aaron, or even Moses and Joshua brought into God’s presence, but the seventy elders as well – all invited to a meal in the throne room of God, attested by the glassy sea seen beneath His throne.  There was far more to Jesus enjoying a bit of fish when He returned and came to the place where His disciples were hiding.  This, as with that covenant meal, was an attestation of peace.  As that article observed, you don’t go to an enemy’s house to dine.  You go to those with whom you are at peace, where you can let your guard down.

Returning to my thread, that this Jesus indeed arose from the grave was attested by far too many witnesses to dismiss as impossible.  Just as impossible would be the idea that these hundreds of individuals had all been convinced of what could be at best a phantasm.  But again, they had physically touched this returned Jesus.  They had conversed with Him, dined with Him, touched the wounds which had killed Him.  And, I should note, they had prior experience to build on.  For this same Jesus had already called Lazarus back from death, death attested to by length of days in the tomb, and all Jerusalem was well aware of that fact.  This was what really made Him a major problem for the Pharisees and Sadducees who saw their prestige threatened when the reality of holiness faced them.

And still, it doesn’t stop, this Gospel.  For we present to you Christ ascended, and seated upon that same throne Moses and company came to for their covenant-sealing meal (Ex 24:9-11).  Another point from that devotional:  That meal was quite likely taken from the peace offering given on the altar.  Play that into this Gospel news of Christ dead, risen, and ascended.  For He is our Peace.  This is not just some curiosity, some marker of personal piety like the case of Elijah being taken up in God’s chariot, or Enoch who walked with God until one day he simple ‘was not, for God took him’ (Ge 5:24).  Those two, for all their righteousness, never saved a soul, not on their merit, certainly.  They served well in teaching of God, but they saved nobody, not even themselves.  That work remains down to Christ Jesus, who died as the propitiation for their sins, even as He died as the propitiation for ours.

This is the power of the Gospel, friend.  Here, in Jesus Christ, the Messiah, the true Son of the living God, the very Word of God – the expression of His all-encompassing knowledge – the full and final sin offering was made, not in the blood of animals, which blood cannot hope to make recompense for our sins, even were every animal offered on the altar in hope of such outcome; but in eternal blood, the blood of God Himself, blood which speaks eternally.  For He, He alone in all the long and lurid history of mankind, lived a sinless life, a life in entire compliance to the whole of God’s Law, His Law.  He died, not as penalty for any sins He had committed, but as the willing sacrifice offered on behalf of we who had.  The Pharisees and Sadducees, for all that they pronounced guilt upon Him, had no real charge to bring.  Even with the perjured testimony they bought to bear, no real charge could be found other than that He spoke truly.  Pontius Pilate could discern no guilt in the man, but neither could he find the strength of character to judge rightly.  It could not have been otherwise, for this was the eternal plan and purpose covenanted among the Persons of the Godhead.  Yet, none involved could evade their guilt, any more than you or I can hope to evade our guilt, having sinned against all-knowing, perfectly holy God.

But God made a way.  He had arranged, from all eternity, a means by which He could be the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus and yet remain perfectly just (Ro 3:26).  The debt has been paid.  That is the marvelous, unbelievably good news of the Gospel.  You thought it hard to accept that this Jesus rose from death?  That’s established history, stunning though it may be.  Here is something far harder to accept.  Because of His death, that debt of yours, that unescapable doom of eternal torment which your sins have earned for you, has already been remitted; remitted in eternal blood, the only sacrifice capable of fitly repaying that penalty.  And because He lives, you have now this gift of life; life not spent in anxious concern for God’s avenging wrath, life not spent in hopeless waiting for death, but life with full assurance of eternity with God, God Who is now your Prince of Peace, having brought to an end the enmity that was between you.  You have entered into covenant with this Holy and Just and Loving God of Truth.  You are already seated at His table.  There is a feast to come, but you are already partaking of His goodness, if indeed, you have heard this Gospel to good and salvific effect, thanks to the presence of His Holy Spirit having come to you.

And there it is.  It is a simple, even a foolish message.  And it is presented by broken, damaged men of no renown, little known to the world.  But it is the power of God to save.  Matthew Henry observes, “Wherever the gospel comes in power, it is to be attributed to the operation of the Holy Ghost; and unless the Spirit of God accompany the word of God, to render it effectual by His power, it will be to us as a dead letter.”  That minister who would seek to claim credit for the efficacy of his ministry would seem to miss the point.  It’s not about him.  It’s not about his skillful preaching.  It’s not about his carefully crafted programs, or his programs or any other thing about him.  It is effectual, if it is effectual, because the Spirit of God has come to accompany that work.  It is effectual because the Gospel has been preached, and God has been pleased to ratify that message by His own power.  For that cause, and that cause alone, the Gospel has taken root.  For that cause, and that cause alone, it has been fed so as to grow, to mature, and to come to full flower in those graces which He gives.

With that, I begin my segue to the next part of this study, which I am here labeling as ‘Graces in Evidence’.  I will introduce the transition with this observation from the JFB.  It is this power of God, present in His Gospel, which produces faith.  It is the Holy Spirit, come at the request of the Son, sent by the Father, Who prepares the heart to receive that gospel, and He does so by bearing to us the very Love of God, and implanting that same love in our heart.  The two bring to us the great assurance that God is in fact for us and not against us, that He has in fact established peace with us, having loved us – however unbelievable that may be, given what we are like – and that assurance has established and built up hope in us.  That hope is not the wishful, doubtful business of human hopes and dreams.  It is the stuff of certainty.  It is the full, epignosis knowledge of God’s salvation, of God’s election, of God’s ongoing work of sanctification in us, and of His steadfastness of love, in which He has promised that He will indeed finish this work which He has begun in us.  His power produces faith, because His power, unlike our effort at compliance, does not fail.  His power produces love, because it gives us undeniable evidence of His love.  His power produces confident, expectant hope, because His power does not, cannot fail to achieve all that He has purposed.

Can I return once more to that matter of constant thanksgiving?  Father!  How can we possibly turn our consideration, even for a brief moment, to this reality of salvation into which You have brought us, and not find once again an infinite fountain of thanksgiving welling up in us?  That You have done this for us is beyond imagining.  It is, even after so many years, beyond comprehension that You would do so.  And yet, You have.  You have saved this wretched man, lifted him out of the depths of sin into which he had sunk, cleaned Him off by the water of Your word, seen to it that his due penalty was paid to Your holy court, and set him on paths of righteousness to make his way to Your door in the due course of his days.  Thank You!  What thanks could ever be enough?  What could cause me to lose the wonder of this reality into which You have called me?  I am Yours!  I had and have no reason to expect such a glorious honor, but I know it is mine.  I am Yours, made by Your choice and Your power a son in Your own household, with inheritance stored up in heaven awaiting that time You have set for my arrival.  What can man do to me?  What threatening can he bring when this is my sure and certain conclusion?  What shall I fear from You, when You have already given so much to bring me to this place?  We are at peace, unbreakable peace because it is established on Your will, Your perfect determination.  Thank You!  Oh!  That I may find it in me to walk worthy of this which You have done, that I may find myself more and more in evidence of this glorious grace You have poured out upon me.  I pray it is so, and I pray that I shall find myself growing and maturing daily under Your careful hand.  And for this, too, I give thanks, for I am assured that You will indeed do it, and I shall indeed be made every bit whole.  Glory to Your name!  Amen, and so be it.

Graces in Evidence (09/23/22-09/24/22)

I want to move back, now, to those chief graces which Paul celebrates as being on display in the lives of these Thessalonians:  Faith, hope, and love; or as they are ordered here, faith, love, and hope.  We are more familiar, of course, with the former formulation, ordered so as to emphasize the chief, most lasting virtue of love.  Faith and hope, after all, would seem to lose their value when once we are in the immediate and eternal presence of God.  But love remains.  Here, however, the point is different, and so the order is different.  One suggestion is that the ordering is more temporal in nature, faith being a response to past action, love the present response, and hope the future-focused assurance of the Christian.  However we order them, it remains the case that these are the means God has supplied by which we grow.  They are also, as Paul attests by his notice of them, the signal graces by which we evidence the work of God in us.

What have we, then?  We have active display of these graces, rendered clear and obvious by their outworking fruits.  It’s not the mere profession of faith that has the Apostle rejoicing, but faith working.  We looked, in the last section, at how the gospel comes not merely in words, but in power.  Well, here’s an evidence of that power.  Faith is not merely claims made by word, it shows forth that power of God in that there are works done in faith.  You can hear somewhat of James in that perspective, once again showing that Paul and James were by no means at odds over the place of faith and works.  It’s not that the one displaces the other.  It’s more the question of how the two relate.  Do works earn reason for our faith, or do they demonstrate the reality of faith?  The answer is, of course, the latter.  Faith is, as much as any entry on that list Paul gave in Galatians 5:22-23, the fruit of the Spirit.  It is not something we have worked up in ourselves, but something God has worked in us, a gift from His hand, in order that we might indeed know the power and the benefit of this Gospel.

Matthew Henry observes, following James’ lead, that working faith is living faith.  If faith is real, he continues, it must certainly influence both the heart and the life of the believer.   Faith that is more than empty words indeed must show by works.  It cannot be otherwise.  “This I believe” only has as much meaning as its demonstration in the daily life of the claimant.  I would also add that it only has as much value as it has validity.  People believe all manner of nonsense, and could even be said to have faith in that which they believe.  But given that the things they believe are untrue, that faith, however truly held, and even should it somehow have impact on their life and character, is of no real value.  Real faith in the real truth of the real God, however, must necessarily produce far more than mere claims of belief.  Those other aspects of Spirit fruit must follow:  Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.  I don’t know as we ought to account that a full and complete list, but it’s certainly enough to keep one fully occupied, isn’t it?

What are the works of faith?  Well, for one, they must assuredly be those things done in accordance with God’s direction and command.  Indeed, the work of faith ought not to be even begun except God has so directed.  Paul will later write to Ephesus, observing that we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ for good works (Eph 2:10).  There is purpose to our existence and purpose to our calling in Christ.  But observe:  These are works God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.  They are works undertaken in response to His direction and preparation, and pursued in full accordance with His intention and His instruction.  You were made for this, and this was made for you!  There is no meritorious result of these things, as if they were earning us a place in God’s favor.  They have been set before you as you are the object already of His favor.  Here is opportunity set before you to do that which is pleasing in His sight.  Here is opportunity, given by your Father in heaven, to be an integral part of that grand work He is doing in Creation.

This, Paul follows with the subject of love, and that particular, agape love which is the outflow of God’s own love towards us.  It is love on a sacrificial scale.  We observe that were faith works, love labors.  Different terms are applied here, and it’s more than merely an oratorical choice made for variety.  We have, in the case of faith, ergon, something to be done, and the labor performed in doing so.  It is the work of duty toward God, even if it often demonstrates in things done for our fellow man.  But, where love is involved, we are presented with kopos, toil and pain.  It derives from a sense of beatings.  It is laborious, troublesome toil, painful effort.

We don’t particularly want to hear that, do we?  We like our fluffy views of love in the more romantic or warm familial sense.  We are fine with philos, and we have a place for eros, but agape is something we have trouble with.  Our first bit of trouble is misapprehending its nature.  We’re still in that warm, fuzzy place in our thinking, and God is not.  His love, we are told, displayed to the uttermost in that He gave His only begotten Son to die for us.  You know the verse.  Most of the literate world knows the verse, whether they believe it or not.  “God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life” (Jn 3:16).  But follow John’s thought on this momentous display of God’s love.  “In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins” (1Jn 4:10).  Paul observes that, “while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son” (Ro 5:10a).

That all ties together.  This is Love:  God did for us what was most needful, though what was most needful for us was most painful for Him, and though we, the objects of this love, wanted nothing of the kind.  Go back to that first passage from John.  “And this is the judgment:  The Light is come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the light; for their deeds were evil” (Jn 3:19).  Ouch.  But you know it’s true.  And it’s not just from looking around at the failing world around us.  It’s not just those caught up in the fallout of the sexual revolution, and it’s not just those who feel themselves above the law.  It’s all of us.  We didn’t want Christ.  But He was given anyway.  We didn’t want saving, but He saved us anyway.  We didn’t love God, didn’t even care about Him, but He loved us anyway, and did that which was most necessary, that which was the only viable answer for our sin and the eternal damnation it had earned.  He shed His own, perfectly holy, eternal blood, having taken upon Himself the full guilt and measure of all our sins, those committed in ignorance before we came to know Him, those committed thereafter in the weakness of our flesh.  He was made sin on our behalf, Who knew no sin, having lived in full and perfect obedience to the whole of the Law of God.  It was done in order that we might in truth become the righteousness of God in Him (2Co 5:21).

There is your example of love’s labors.  Love doesn’t simply do that which will be reciprocated.  Love doesn’t just shower gifts on the happy recipient.  Love does what is truly needful, even when what is truly needful will be truly resented and may even lead to rejection.  Love on this level is truly sacrificial in nature, willing to see death if it will serve to preserve the best outcome for the one who is loved.  This is not, of course, to say that such labors of love are ever and always deadly, nor even that they are ever and always noisesome.  But love acts where love is needed, and that place of need is rarely pleasant to face, pleasant to endure, even from the position of the helper come alongside.  It hurts to confront the pain of sin and sickness.  It hurts to see others suffering, particularly in ways we know they needn’t be suffering.  How painful, when we know we have the medicine they need, but they will not take it.  Consider how Jesus responded when confronted with the death of Lazarus.  “Jesus wept” (Jn 11:35).  He wept in spite of the fact that He was about to defeat that death.  Consider the depths of sorrow as He observed of His people in Jerusalem that though He wanted only to gather them together as a hen her chicks, they were unwilling, and would be left desolate (Mt 23:37-38). 

Love hurts.  Truer words were perhaps never set to song in the modern age.  And yet, I rather doubt the author knew the depth of that truth.  He was still in the place of fuzzy romanticism, not the hard, onerous labor of truly loving.  Ironside observes, “Love is not genuine unless we are willing to labor earnestly for the blessing of those for whom we profess to have this deep concern.”  It is of a piece with the relation of works to faith.  And we know all too well how often the expression given to ostensibly deep concern proves an empty, hollow matter when it comes time to do something about it.  Think what you may as to the choice to send a batch of illegal aliens off to Martha’s Vineyard, but it has surely demonstrated this very principle.  It’s all well and good to preen and posture when one’s boldly stated morals are in no danger of being tested.  But when it comes time to practice those claims?  Love hurts.  Faith works and love labors, but vanity scatters with the breeze.

Let us turn to hope, and we have another often misunderstood idea.  We’re too familiar with worldly hopes, which are little more than children’s wishful thinking.  This is not that.  This is assurance.  This is certainty.  This is the view of a future so certain as to be accounted already present.  Hope has this necessary component of being focused on that which is not as yet in our full possession, or our full experience.  Such is our present experience of heaven.  We know we have an inheritance there.  We know it is our proper home, we who have been reborn in spirit.  We know, as well, that this present body is insufficient for life in that place and must be reborn even as our spirit has been reborn, and that clearly has not happened.  The effects of aging will make that plain soon enough if they have not done so already.  But our hope is not in somehow preserving this physical plant, nor even in somehow remaining on this physical plain at all.  No.  Our hope is in Christ, and Him in heaven.  Our hope is fastened with assurance to the Rock, Christ Jesus.  Our hope is well-grounded, for it is set upon His own promises.  “I go to prepare a place for you.  And if I go do that, I will most assuredly come again, to receive you to Myself, that where I am, you may be also” (Jn 14:2-3).

This hope, like faith and love, has an impact that moves beyond empty words and mere thoughts.  Paul gives it expression.  “If we hope for what we do not see, we persevere, waiting eagerly for it” (Ro 8:25).  Our hope is not in us.  It’s not in our works.  It’s not in our capacity to love.  It’s not in our care to consider in each and every circumstance, “What would Jesus do?”  If our hope is on our end of things, it is hopeless.  It is false hope built on false premises.  But that faith which is in Him, fully upon the finished work of Christ, and fully certain of God’s calling of us, His choice of us, His earnest declaration that we are the apple of His eye?  That establishes hope.  “I have called you by name, and you are Mine” (Isa 43:1).  I come to love that verse more with each passing day, I think.  This is the proclamation of our redemption, and from what have we been redeemed?  God’s own punishment, the just and due penalty for our sins.  Paid in full!  He has canceled that debt, taken it out of the way, nailing it to the cross (Col 2:14).

Hope has its own outworking demonstration, and that is seen, as Paul observes, in patient endurance.  This is more than resigned longing for the release that will be ours  As Clarke observes, such longing for release has little of grace to it.  But willingness to suffer with Christ?  Willingness to suffer in patience, knowing the assurance of our eternal home wherein to live with Christ? Yes, that assuredly gives evidence of true faith and true love.  This hope is seen in that, given our well-grounded hope for eternity, we patiently bear the present calamity, patiently wait that coming glory in His perfect time.  Hope, of necessity, looks beyond the present.  It must, for as Paul observes, why would we hope for what we already see (Ro 8:24)?  This steadfast hope, firmly anchored on that which we do not as yet see, is the power to stand fast.  This is the strength given to that faith which has been established in Christ, and confirmed by His past undertakings on our behalf.  David wrote, “I have been young, and now I am old; yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken, or his descendants begging bread” (Ps 37:25).  Faith has evidence of experience.  Hope has assurance of promise.  These go hand in hand, to empower the life of faith, to encourage the labors of love.

Calvin writes, “Intent upon the hope of the manifestation of Christ, they despise everything else, and, armed with patience, they rise superior to the wearisomeness of length of time, as well as to all the temptations of the world.”  Is this our experience?  Is our hope in Him, rather than our own compliance?  Is our faith in Him and not our powers of intellect and strength?  I tell you, if our faith is in our own capacities, it is no faith at all.  If our hope is in our ability to keep ourselves true to Christ, we have no hope.  But our faith, our hope, are not in ourselves, but in Christ.  In HIM we live, and move, and have our being.  It is no longer we who live, but Christ living in us.  And in all of this, we abide in this understanding:  The work of God is to believe in Christ whom He has sent (Jn 6:29).  And that work, dear ones, flows from us as a gift of His grace, that no man should boast.

It is not only faith, then, which is evidenced by its works, but all those graces of God which we receive are made evident in their outward works.  Man, after all, cannot see the inward work.  Only God can see the heart.  But where that heart-work has in fact transpired, and these graces have found root and grown, there will indeed by that which our brethren can see in us, in our words and deeds, which confirm to their perceptions that it is so.  Yes, it is possible that there will be those who feign appropriate actions and behaviors when at church who are devils the rest of the week.  I’d say it’s more than just possible.  It’s a reasonable certainty that some among us, in every church, are of such a nature.  But time spent in fellowship will tend to provide proof, though we ought not to be pursuing our fellowships with that as our chief goal.  At any rate, grace works.  Grace, where it is truly present, changes us, and that change must present in outward act, in outward word.  This is not a work on our part, but the natural outworking of those graces which God has given us.

It is thus that we observe Paul’s greeting does not come by way of congratulating them on their progress.  It comes by way of giving thanks to God, for what he is observing is of God’s doing.  If the graces are present, it is of God’s doing.  If they are growing, displaying the evidence of their presence, it is God’s doing.  If individuals are coming to saving faith, it is God’s doing.  If they are maturing, growing in sanctification, it is God’s doing.  It’s not our preaching skills.  It’s not our programs.  It’s not our attentiveness to the needs of community and fellowship.  All of these are reasonable pursuits, and are in fact the outworking of the grace given us.  It remains God’s doing, even where He has been so gracious as to allow us a hand in His doing.

That’s the thing with graces.  They are received, not worked up.  These Christian virtues which Paul so appreciates and encourages are graces, received of God and empowered by God.  They are in action because God is in action.  The fruitful life of godliness, worthy of notice though it is, remains cause not for praising the man, but for praising God Who is thus at work in the man.

These things serve as something of a reciprocal force in the life of the Christian body.  Those workers whom God has been pleased to set over us for our edification are able to perceive the progress of the Gospel in our lives by these graces producing the evidence of truly changed lives in us.  We, on the other end of things, can perceive the work of God in these leaders, these pastors and elders, not just in their skillful presenting of the Gospel both in preaching and in practice, but in lives that accord with their message.  The preacher whose preaching is not matched by life and character must be found, in the end, suspect.  However true his words may be, they bear not the power of God in them, because they are not preached truly.  Now, I must be careful of thought here, for the power of the Gospel, as I have said, is not in the arts of the preacher, but in the message.  To be sure, it is within God’s power to use even such a poor messenger as has not himself received the message to convey His truth.  But it can hardly be thought the norm.  Indeed, it must stand out as a rather sad and sorry exception.

Ironside comments on the sorry state of things when our character gives loud evidence as to the falsity of our words.  It is indeed a sad thing, though sadly not uncommon.  Many can talk a good game, but few can actually play it.  Many will nod along with the sermon of a Sunday and deny its message by their actions before lunch is out.  Many a day, if I’m honest – and I do try to be – having spent this happy hour in pursuit of the things God is showing me in Scripture, it will have dropped by the wayside, all but forgotten, before I’m out of the shower.  The cares of life tend to do this to us, don’t they?  Perhaps it’s a male thing.  Perhaps it’s a human thing.  But we tend to compartmentalized living.  Bible time is the time for pious thought.  Work is the time for work-related thought, and honestly, even matters of the household tend to drop away as we focus on the tasks for which we are paid.

This may be one of the biggest detriments of the Internet, for though it renders it so easy to dig up needed information, and empowers the sort of work experience I have had these last many years, working from the comfort of home, with teams scattered cross-country, and on occasion around the globe, it has the negative consequence of rendering distraction almost inevitable.  All that has been made available and at our fingertips includes not only that needful information for the pursuit of our employments, but also a wealth of entertainments, whether it be news and current events, or games and puzzles, or movies or what have you. 

It can infect our times with God as readily as our time at work.  It is arguably one of the chief applications of this technology anymore that it distracts us from doing and dealing with those things that truly matter.  And we wonder why most everybody seems to have a sort of ADHD these days.  We’re all squirrels and dogs facing a never ending cascade of things to chase.  And the end result can be that sad state to which Ironside draws our attention; that our character loudly shouts out that our professed faith has become to us little more than empty words.

Let me consider just briefly an aspect of this which may not naturally come to mind.  When we think of such a vain and empty confession of faith, we likely have in mind what we may refer to as social Christians; those who will happily enough self-identify as Christians if asked, but whose lives continue to be much as before, old and sinful habits still intact.  It is such as these that cause such a negative response to news of assured salvation, for they can be seen to be abusing any such assurance.  They are of that ilk that seem to think that such saving grace means they can just get on with life, sin as they please, and be confident that God will forgive them in the end.  But that is not the mindset of saving grace, is it?  Paul leaves no space for such thinking, even as he makes the strongest proclamations in regard to the absolute security of the salvation that has come to the true believer.

But I have in mind a different aspect of behavior giving demonstration of a perilous falsity in our professed beliefs, and that is the case of those who loudly declare their trust in God as to their future, but then face life in constant fear and dread of the events that may come in this life.  Such as these will, almost assuredly, insist that they are not in fact fearful and dreading as to those things to come, but with these as their focus, rather than that which such events announce and usher in, it does not proclaim trust in God, certainly.  It does not, at least to my eyes, demonstrate a faith that has its eyes turned to Jesus and His kingdom.  It remains too fully focused on the things of earth to rise above them.  Indeed, in some cases, it seems such a mindset is not satisfied unless it can find cause for dread in the events of the day, or will chase down those who can warn of coming events of a cataclysmic nature.  Why?  How is this trusting God?  Where is steadfastness of hope in this wailing despair and dread?  Oh, I’m sure it gives one a feeling of purpose to take this supposed news and broadcast it to others.  But it’s also rather telling to see the response when those others refuse to be drawn into the dread.

It's not for me to say who has the right or the wrong of it, honestly.  But I shall hold to this:  If God is in control, and He has my eternal outcome well in hand, then surely His instruction ought to guide, oughtn’t it?  “Do not fear those who kill the body, but are unable to kill the soul.  Rather, fear Him who is able to destroy both body and soul in hell” (Mt 10:28).  Do you hear your Savior?  All of these earthly calamities that have you so worked up are but those deeds of man as can destroy the body.  They cannot touch the soul.  Your soul, dear one, is firmly ensconced in the hands of God, those hands from which no power in heaven, on earth, or in hell, is able to snatch you.  And that includes you yourself.  Consider where that message is set.  Jesus proceeds to observe that not even a sparrow passes from this life except as the Father ordains.  He observes that God knows you intimately, perfectly familiar with every hair on your head.  Not even those hairs fall out without His will.  Can you imagine?  Do you get it?  Oh, how we fret to see the hair thinning.  How we alarm ourselves over so little a thing.  And yet, here is God saying, even this bit of minutia in our day is well in hand for Him.  It has not only failed to escape His notice, it has come about – as it must – by His will.  “Therefore do not fear!  You are more valuable than many sparrows” (Mt 10:31).  Confess your Christ.  This fear of Him is not the dread of the heathen, seeking to appease an angry deity, lest he be struck down in anger.  It is reverence for the One Who has already saved us, already poured out these graces into us, and is already causing grace to flower in us by His power.

If, on either end of the spectrum, we should discover in ourselves that character which is not in keeping with our professed belief, let us avail ourselves of that greatest benefit our Lord has given us, the benefit of access to His very throne, to come before Him in prayers of thanksgiving for that which He has been doing in us, thanksgiving, even, for having brought these issues to our attention, and thanksgiving, as well, for the assurance that as we bring such petitions before Him as would seek to amend our failed ways, to truly repent and find strength in Him to set forth on a new course of life and practice, He is faithful both to forgive that which we have confessed, and to supply all that is needful for us to return to that course of life and godliness.  He is able to bring character and confession into harmony in us.  We are only going to produce further discord if we seek to bring that about by main strength.

Father, You’ve taken my thoughts down some unexpected pathways this morning, and I thank You for that.  I must accept that there is that in what You have led me to explore that needs application to me.  Yes, I recognize others in some of what I have considered, and I will in fact pray that You help those others in their weakness.  But I must also recognize and confess my own failures, my own weakness.  There are too many ways in which my own character yet proclaims a different belief than I profess.  The old man shows through yet too easily, and is not as yet as dead as he should be.  This I confess, and for this truth I ask forgiveness.  I ask that You would indeed bring repentance to fruitful effect in me, that I might indeed avail myself the more of those graces which You have given me, practicing more of what I would preach, and doing so not in my vain illusions of strength, but in the strength of Your Spirit abiding in me.  May You be pleased to answer, and may I be pleased to recognize and avail myself of the answer You give.  Amen.

God's Work (09/25/22-09/26/22)

Recall that observation that these verses build one upon the other, piling up the excitement Paul experiences in regard to what has been developing in Thessalonica.  It is cause for thanks to God.  It is so because the outworkings of grace are now evident in those who are the church there.  And why do these evidences of grace matter so much?  Because by them Paul has certain knowledge of God’s choice of them.  He has evidence that his preaching wasn’t heard as mere words, but was attended with the power, ushered along by the Holy Spirit, apart from which there could not have been such full conviction of its truth on their part, nor this fruitful grace in their lives.

Don’t be taken aback by Paul’s speaking of the gospel as ‘our gospel’.  He is not laying claim to some unique formulation of truth which is somehow superior to that of the other Apostles.  At the very least, we must hear that ‘our’ as far more inclusive than merely Paul and his companions.  More basically, all that is being claimed here is that it was the gospel he preached.  The gospel is, by its very definition good news.  But good news which is not proclaimed is no news at all, is it?  It is the preacher’s function to proclaim this good news – in full.  It is the evangelist’s function to serve as ambassadors who bear this good news into foreign lands, that it might be heard there as well.  It is our gospel, as well.  It is the thing we give voice to in our own turn, one hopes.  It is the thing to which our lives give evidence, if indeed, this gospel has come to us in power and in the Holy Spirit.

Ironside observes, as I believe I have done as well, that God being sovereign can assuredly use whomever He pleases to proclaim this gospel of His.  He can, should He find it advisable in some cases, save the individual through no more than reading it silently to himself.  I suppose we must take a step further, God being sovereign and all, and insist that if it proves needful and beneficial in His view, He can quite as readily save with no access whatsoever to the gospel, either in written form or orally transmitted.  I will not go so far as to suggest He could save apart from the gospel entirely, for it is the one means by which He has determined to convey this glorious good news.  Even if the text is not present or transmissible by the arts of man, I dare say He will find a way to make that news known apart from man, if that’s the path that’s needed.  But the key factor here is that indeed, God is sovereign.  What He determines is what is.  What He decrees shall be shall most certainly be.

By corollary, what He has determined shall not be, shall in no wise come to pass.  He has decreed our proclaiming of this gospel, both in word and in deed, and so it must be with us, that we who know ourselves His own do just that.  Experience must surely inform us that our compliance is yet partial, and our failures many.  But this changes neither the power and content of God’s decree, nor our assured participation in its demands.  What is not ours to insist is that so often as we preach this gospel, it must assuredly take root.  Certainly, if we get down to individual cases, we have no basis for such insistence upon success.  That, as in our own case, remains God’s sovereign’s choice.  He has chosen us to be devoted men of God, preaching the Gospel ‘in the energy of the Holy Spirit’, as Ironside phrases it.  Well, we can devote ourselves to that pursuit, but as concerns the Holy Spirit, and His energy or power, that is not ours to command, only to welcome when God inclines to supply it.  Then and only then, can I concur with Ironside’s conclusion that ‘results are assured’.  It’s not the devotion of the preacher to his task.  It’s the sovereign choice of God in saying, on this occasion and in regard to this individual, your preaching shall indeed implant the seed of the gospel in efficacious manner.  This one will hear and receive.

Paul was no less earnest in proclaiming the gospel in Athens than in Thessalonica.  He was not somehow more persuasive standing in Corinth than he had been in Athens.  Yet the results were quite different, weren’t they?  I know I have posited before that Paul was trying a different approach in Athens, but I’m not so sure that’s a reasonable conclusion.  It’s possible, certainly, but given his testimony that the gospel he preached to Corinth, and the instruction he gave them was the same as he gave in every church, perhaps I should question that theory.  The difference wasn’t in Paul’s methods, necessarily.  Far more necessarily, it was God’s determination that his efforts should not bear fruit in that place.  As to why it should be so, well, God knows.

I know how much we wish to believe that all will be saved, God being, as He says in this same gospel message, unwilling that any should perish, preferring that all should have eternal life.  Yet it is equally clear that not all shall indeed come to possession of eternal life.  “His own rejected Him.”  “You were not willing.”  There is far too much that declares that He will in no wise leave the reprobate sinner unpunished.  There can be no doubt but that there are many, a vast majority, even, who will have committed that unpardonable sin of rejecting Christ and His proffered gift of salvation.  There will be those to whom God has said, “Very well, then.  Your will be done, not Mine.”  And we must surely recognize that even in this, God’s will is ultimately what has been done.  He is sovereign, and no mere reticence of man is able to deter Him from His determined course.  If Satan, with so many thousands of years in which to work, could not defer the course of Christ to the cross on behalf of all whom the Father has called, do you really think yourself able to do so in the short span of your years, and in the weak power of your flesh?

Of course, that cuts the other way, as well.  If God has determined that, no, this one is a vessel for common use, prepared for destruction, the greatest efforts of the minister, or even of the body as a whole, shall never succeed in causing the gospel to take root in that one.  We may pray so much as we please.  We may reason and preach and argue and beg and seek by every means we know to make God’s rich grace clear to that poor soul, and still, he shall not have it.  God is sovereign.  To shorten Ironside’s proposal somewhat, where He has sovereignly chosen that it shall be so, “then the results are assured.”  It is His gospel which has the power to save.  It is His will, His choice, as to whether that power shall be exercised in any individual case on any given occasion.  Be that as it may, our call is not to await His assurance of results, but to preach freely to all.  The harvest is His business.  Ours is sowing.

So, we have Paul giving excited praise here, not that they had managed to bring forth fruit, but of this:  God’s choice of them.  Here was, in the active outworking of grace in their lives, evidence of God’s election of them.  We know His choice of you.  How?  Because it’s clear by your active faith, your evident love, your steadfast hope in spite of the trials you face.  It’s so clear, that report of it comes to us here in Corinth quite apart from Timothy’s report.  It comes by ship.  It comes by caravan.  Corinth knew of your faith before even I got here to speak the gospel.  It has paved the way, this news of you, this news of God’s work in you.  And so, election comes by the gospel, in that it comes ‘in power, and in the Holy Spirit’.  As Calvin observes, these are not two ideas, but one.  The power is that of the Holy Spirit.  If He is not there, accompanying the word of the gospel, then there is no power in it.  It is merely words.

Ah, but where He is present?  Then, indeed, this gospel, this choosing of us by God, is become the fountain from which all grace flows to us.  Here is where Matthew Henry finds the source.  His choice of us is that fountain.  The gospel is His conveyance of that choice to our ears.  His Spirit is the digger of the well, if you will, such that faith may rise up in us, receiving this joyous good news, preparing the soil of our souls to receive the implanted seed to good result.  And, dear ones, God’s choice is as eternal as He is eternal.  (And again, thanks to Mr. Henry for this reminder.)  His choice does not fail because God does not fail.  Blessed assurance!  Jesus is mine.  Nay, lad, but I am His.  Father has chosen.  He has made of me a gift to His Son.  And yes, you know it’s coming by now, He has called me by name, and I am His.  Forever.

I must stop for today, but how can I stop without shouting, as it were, my thankful rejoicing that this is so?  You have indeed called me, Father.  This I know beyond doubt, for You chose such means as left no room for doubt.  It was no clever preaching that brought me to Yourself, no, not directly any preaching at all.  And yet, through the preceding years, You had so arranged that I would see the evidence of Your working, even if I had dismissed it.  And You so arranged as to present Your case to me rather directly, by means I would not have believed possible, and yet, there You were, and that it was You and that You were true, You made abundantly clear, granting me to see, at least in part, those many occasions in the past when You had been there to save me from myself, that You had been carefully preserving and directing me to this moment.  You called me.  You called me by name.  No, I don’t recall if You spoke my name in those private moments, but You laid claim to me nonetheless, and assuredly, I am Yours.  Forever.  Thank You, Father.  Oh, thank You, Jesus!  And, thank You, Holy Spirit, for taking part in this work, such that I am found among the redeemed, and by Your grace and power, continue to grow, day by day, even though I stumble so often.  May my service to You this day, Your day, be such as is indeed pleasing in Your sight, and evidence of Your choice of me.

It’s interesting, isn’t it, how Paul arranges this greeting?  You are cause for thanksgiving, but to God.  You are cause because the impact of the gospel, of God the Holy Spirit moving in power, has made demonstrable change in your lives.  This is ever the case, isn’t it?  God’s choice is evident in those whom He has chosen.  It is not immediately evident in perfection, but it is evident.  The trendlines of life have altered.  Great change has come about, and not the sort that can be readily mimicked for more than a brief few hours.  When circumstances arise, as circumstances will, they do not throw us as they once did.  They do not cause the old man to rear up.  The enticements that used to so readily captivate us no longer prove a draw.  Now, be careful!  The old man may be weakening, but he’s not dead, and if you insist on testing the limits of his presence, he will assuredly make himself known.  You prove nothing by constantly setting yourself in the path of those things which used to be your favored sins.  That’s a foolish course of action to undertake, and supplies nothing toward holiness.  But should you come to face those temptations again, you will indeed discover a new character in yourself.

I don’t know about you, but I do know I have encountered this change head on.  I think, probably more than most things, of that time we got rear-ended waiting to pull into my dad’s driveway.  I’m not going to suggest my response was pitch perfect, nor that my thoughts did not include a few things that probably ought not to have been there.  But overall, my response surprised me.  There had been a change.  How I would have responded some years prior was no longer how I inclined to respond.  I’d have to say my wife was miles ahead of me in that regard, but then, she’s always had the advantage of longer acquaintance with this life of salvation, and it shows.

But my basic point is this:  Where God has chosen, great change has come, and where great change has come, it will be evident.  That, however, is no cause for celebrations of self.  There is nothing here of, “Look at me!  Ain’t I something?”  No.  It’s all God.  Whatever good is found in us, it is God’s doing.  The evidence here is not of their skill or adeptness at laying hold of these new doctrines.  The evidence is in those graces which God has given, because where He has given grace, grace cannot but work.  So, we find this celebration continuing in the second epistle Paul writes to this young church.  “We should always give thanks for you, brothers beloved by the Lord, for God has chosen you from the beginning for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and faith in the truth” (2Th 2:13).  From the beginning!  And observe that both that first flush of salvation and the ongoing labor of sanctification are by the Spirit, by God’s choosing and God’s doing.  This doesn’t leave you a dumb object in the hands of God.  You have your part in it, to be sure, and you have responsibility for your choices and your outcomes.  But God is doing it!  Who can be against you?  How can you fail?

This, as I wrote in my early notes, is truly life-changing, this gospel come in the power of the Holy Spirit.  I mean, how could it not be?  God Himself is present in it, shaping for Himself a temple in your inmost being.  And you think this won’t be life-changing?  Of course it is!  It is, I would argue, the only truly life-changing event that can ever transpire in the course of our days.  Yes, we have other events that bring about a somewhat sudden shift of conditions.  To be sure, getting married, or having a child, will bring a certain newness to life, new responsibilities, new loves, and also new rewards.  But these have nothing on the change that comes of discovering oneself indwelt by the Holy Spirit of God, of God Who has chosen you for His own.  I dare say, in spite of all those new entanglements that come with marriage and family, it’s entirely possible – sadly possible – that one may very well proceed into these new life conditions unchanged, the same character, the same flaws and strengths, the same habits, for better or for worse.  But comes the call of election?  No.  There can be no continuing as before.  You are still very much recognizably you, but something’s different now.  Those who knew you when will most readily note the change, and may very well not approve.  After all, you’ve gone from sharing in their peccadillos to being somewhat of a living rebuke of those same pursuits, and those who have not been called will not much appreciate that rebuke.

Life-changing?  Absolutely!  The Gospel has come.  The great good news of peace with God has been made clear in your thinking, and your heart could hardly do otherwise than to respond with a joyous, “Yes, Lord!  Let it be for me as You have said.”  The Holy Spirit has taken up permanent residence in the hall of your heart.  He has sown His seeds of grace; of faith, hope, and love, and He has tended to them.  They grow well, and as they grow, they must bear fruit in word and deed.  It is no longer I who liveth, as Paul wrote, but Christ living in me (Gal 2:20).  For our God, Father, Son and Spirit, is One.  Where the Spirit abide, Christ lives.  Where Christ lives, the Spirit abides.  And this Christ has said, “I and the Father are One” (Jn 10:30).

He Who made you has made you, by His choosing, a true son, a true daughter of God.  No longer do we stand condemned, but now, changed by His love, we are family.  Now, we are truly, identifiably of His household.  We may remain in the world, but no longer are we of it.  Our priorities have changed.  Our tastes have changed.  Our pursuits have changed.  Our love has changed.

And, to be clear, it is no blind faith.  Faith has reason to abide.  If Paul could be assured of God’s choice of them by their evident faith, love, and hope, so, too, had they been assured of God’s abiding presence in the Apostle.  Paul knew His choice of them.  They knew God’s choice of Paul.  “You know what kind of men we proved to be among you for your sake.”  In both cases, we’re looking at oida, that knowledge that comes of perception.  You have seen the evidence, weighed it, and found its truth.  On Christ the Solid Rock, we stand.  He is proven.  As such, faith is assured, because it knows.  It knows what He has done, what He is doing, and on that firm foundation, rests in the assurance of that which He will yet do to see His work in us finished and perfected.

Have you ever encountered one who, in spite of you never knowing them previously, are clearly brothers in Christ?  It is a chance meeting, perhaps.  It may well be a one-time encounter with no least likelihood of any further fellowship.  But there’s something in this individual, something different.  I confess, I am not anywhere near so adept at picking up on this as is my beloved wife.  She seems able to spot it of an instant.  But it’s there.  We know those ones whose faith rings true.  We no doubt know many others whose faith strikes us more as a possibility than a certainty, even if we have known them and been with them in church lo, these many years.  Change has come, and it has come, dear ones, by God’s choosing and God’s acting.

So, as Barnes observes, any true church, whether we consider the gathered body, or the individual members from which it is composed, owes its existence to God’s election.  God chooses whom He will call out of the world.  God chooses those He will call to come together in this fellowship of faith at this location and in this day.  He endows this church, making it a true church.  He alone.  Our elders and our pastors can and should be seeking to discern His leading and to come alongside to guide us as our Father leads.  But it remains Him alone who makes the church true.  It was His call to have the body established, and it is His power which will keep it.  Where His presence has departed, can there be any doubt but that whatever that church had been before, it is church no more?  But where God abides?  Where faith remains by His choosing?  Let me take Mr. Henry’s thought to draw this towards a close.  “We are all beloved of God, and were beloved of Him in His counsels when there was not any thing in us to merit His love.”  Indeed, I might suggest that if there is now anything truly lovable in us, that, too, is by His love working in and through us.

The old hymn says, “Jesus paid it all, all to Him I owe.”  Yes, indeed!  And we may also proclaim that Jesus has done it all.  All I am is His.  Father has called, and by the power of His Spirit working in us, we have answered.  But He hasn’t called us to idle enjoyment of His good pleasure.  He has called us to be living testimonies of His work in us.  Where He has chosen, there will be evidence of His choice, because where He has chosen, He is at work.  Great change has come, and that change is not to be hidden away lest it offend.  Far be it from us!  No, that great change is to be displayed with great joy and great pride.  I am my Beloved’s, and He is mine.

Listen, would you ever think to deny that your wife was in fact your wife, and the joy of your heart?  Would you ever consider claiming that your beloved child was in fact your child, or that your mother had been your mother?  I suppose it’s not out of the question.  In our perverseness, human relations do fracture to such degree as to become irreparable by the arts of mankind.  But it’s an aberration, and we recognize this to be the case.  But if it is so nearly unthinkable that these subjects of our earthly love would ever be denied by us, how could we deny the love we have for our God, Who loved us so richly as to give His own, dearly beloved Son that we might live in and with Him forever?  How can we accept it, if our lives are not living testimony to His work in us?  How can we but set ourselves to this great purpose for which we have been both created and re-created?

Our lives are renewed, and serve as evidence of His choice of us.  How’s your evidence?  Does anybody outside the family have reason to suspect He is in you?  If not, why not?  I don’t suppose we need to find this a call to be obnoxious and in your face with our faith.  But faith shows in character.  Love shows in deed.  Hope shows in steadfast perseverance.  The fruit of the Spirit must surely grow where the Spirit resides.  That, in itself, is testimony, living testimony of what He is doing.   And, should it lead someone to ask after this hope that is in you (and it surely should!) be ready – in season and out, be ready – to give voice to this Gospel which is the reason for your being.

Father, let it be so!  Let me, as I prayed to close the early notes on this passage, be such a living testimony to Your majesty and Your goodness.  Let me be that which You created me to be.  Let me be diligent to observe and pursue those works You have prepared beforehand that I might do them, and let them be done in such fashion as will bring You glory.  For You alone are worthy, and I love You dearly.