Good morning my “Walking with Jesus” friends on this Thursday,
We understand that each of us builds our personal reputation every day, right? So, when your name is mentioned, what reputation descriptive words come immediately into the minds of people? Will you be satisfied to leave your reputation as it is, or are there some changes you’d like to make in the remaining time you have to live?
Of course, none of us knows when our time will run out and we’ve written the final words of our life story, right? That is why the apostle Paul was led by the Holy Spirit to write about this issue of personal reputation in the fourth chapter of his first letter to his Christian friends in the Macedonian city of Thessalonica.
In 1 Thess. 4:3 Paul wrote: “It is God’s will that you should be sanctified: that you should avoid sexual immorality; that each of you should learn to control your own body in a way that is holy and honorable, not in passionate lust like the pagans who do not know God…” Would you agree a person’s reputation is first evaluated with words such as honesty, honorable, integrity, morality, respectful, self-disciplined, reliability? WHY are those measures applied by all people in all societies when evaluating a person’s reputation? Why do all societies in the world evaluate a person’s reputation FIRST through MORAL lenses?
Moral lenses evaluate right/wrong; good/bad; true/false; helpful/destructive. All societies assume everyone has a basic conscience and has been taught from childhood some fundamental morality. All societies assume parents and grandparents will understand and take seriously their role to raise their children to be honorable members of their society. But do we understand this is a serious problem in our world in our day? As I look around the city where I live, far too many children have fathers in prison or don’t even know who their biological father is! Many children have no home to go to after school, so they are called ‘street children’, and there are millions of them in cities around our world. What about your town?
While writing TO the Christians in Thessalonica, Paul was writing this letter from Corinth, a robust, raucous city which had a wild reputation for very low morals. “Immorality” was celebrated by many segments of Corinth society both day and night. Like in every society, the darkness of Corinth cast a very large shadow over every other town in that part of the world, including Thessalonica. What shadow does your town and mine cast?
Did you notice the statement Paul opened with: ‘It is God’s will that you should be sanctified’. Sanctif
Do you see Paul drawing a stark contrast, a major distinction, between the lifestyle of God honoring Christians and the lifestyle of ‘pagans who do not know God’? Do you see Paul’s warning of God’s judgment upon those who ‘commit such sins’? Paul warned: “Anyone who rejects this instruction does not reject a human being but God, the very God who gives you His Holy Spirit.” (1 Thess. 4:6-8) Do we understand that God expects those who receive the powerful deliverance of God from our sin bondage, and we receive the Holy Spirit of God to live within us… those people WILL from that moment on, live God honoring lives.
How does it happen? Increasingly, as our old way of thinking is changed by filling our minds with God’s Word, His truth and His morals; (1 Cor. 2) and as the old emotions driven by lust and greed are transformed to God honoring love and generosity, by the work of the Holy Spirit in us, that process is called ‘BE SANCTIFIED’. It’s the work of the Holy Spirit in transforming us.
Years later Paul wrote to these Christians in Corinth: “Therefore if anyone is IN Christ they are a new creation. The old has gone and the new has come. And all this is from God who has reconciled us to Himself…” (2 Cor. 5:17,18) Now let’s pause to be sure you understand these radical God thoughts, and I urge you to read carefully 1 Thess. 4:3-8. Look in the mirror of God’s Word. Is the Spirit showing you anything that needs to change? Are you BEING SANCTIFIED by the Holy Spirit’s ongoing work in changing you, in refining your reputation? Are you resisting that work of the Holy Spirit?
Finally today, let’s look at one other important challenge Paul gave in 1 Thess. 4:11,12 “We urge you, brothers and sisters…to make it your ambition to lead a quiet life: you should mind your own business and work with your hands…so that your daily life may win the respect of outsiders and so that you will not be dependent on anyone.”
Wow, does your life and mine bring peace or hectic craziness into the people our lives touch? Are we nosy, gossips, breeding discord and rumors about others rather than squelching the rumors and protecting people’s privacy and integrity? Are we people of high work ethic, self motivated, hard working people? Do our lives win the respect of others, especially those who may not be religious or even Christian?
Wow we have lots to think about today, don’t we my friends? And the ‘lessons learned’ notes at the link below will be very helpful, as will the worship song I’ve found for us. Yes, tomorrow, we’ll look at the last part of 1 Thessalonians 4 in which Paul talks about the return of the Lord Jesus Christ!
Today’s Scripture: 1 Thess. 4:1-12.
Choose below to read or listen.
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Bible images provided with attribution to www.LumoProject.com.
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Pastor Doug Anderson
“Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, with our eyes fixed on Jesus…” (Heb. 12:1,2)
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