Sermon Tone Analysis

1 Thessalonians 2

Good morning Church!

We are going to be in 1 Thessalonians 2 this morning.

As you can see on our opening slide this morning, our message is titled earning the right to be heard…but as the week went on and I considered more and more of the context of our passage… the title is also...

1 Thessalonians 2

What about when things go wrong?

Let me clarify a little bit on what I mean by that.

I guess I would give two qualifying statements… The first being you’re doing everything right.

Meaning you’re not in rebellion against the Lord.

Obviously, if you are actively engaged in ongoing sin, the wages of sin is death, so you should expect things to go very wrong.

But you’re in a right relationship with the Lord and seeking to please Him with your life.

Not perfect in practice, but right in your heart before God.

Second, you are seeking to do His will.

So not, you’re trying to win your fantasy football pool so you can rub it in those schmucks faces that you work with.

Or you think you’re supposed to marry the prettiest girl in church,…but she’s already married, has three kids, and a restraining order against you.

But what about when things go wrong, when you are trying to live a life that honors God…and you’re seeking to do His will and serve Him in a way that will give Him glory and it doesn’t end up looking like you think it should?

Then what?

Let’s pray...

Now I began last week trying to give you a little bit of context to this book, and told you that the story that Joe Bailey shared with us about Paul and Silas being in jail happened just before Paul came to Thessalonica.

Both Joe and I talked about the people around Paul being able to see that his faith was real when it mattered.

But I want to go back a little bit further, and I think it will give us more application to our passage this morning.

Saul of Tarsus was a highly educated religious teacher in Judaism.

When Jesus came and people started saying that He was the promised Messiah of the Old Testament, Paul did everything he could to shut them up.

He threatened them, began rounding them up, and incarcerating them for blasphemy.

Long story short, Saul of Tarsus has a life changing, radical encounter with the risen Lord on the road to Damascus.

I say a radical encounter, but really as my Bible describes it, we all should have a Damascus road experience, where surrendering to Jesus changes everything.

It sure did for Saul, his name is changed to Paul, and he becomes and Apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ.

If there was ever anyone that could say that they were “all in” I think Paul would qualify.

Paul becomes a missionary, where he travels around and begins to plant churches, telling everyone about Jesus.

He has a partner in ministry named Barnabas.

Paul and Barnabas strengthen and educate these little churches, they establish elders in each of the churches.

Things don’t go perfect however, on this first missionary journey, threats are made against Paul, he gets stoned nearly to death in one place, but people are getting saved and people are following Jesus.

Fast forward…the church is growing.

Paul now has other guys traveling with him as well and things are looking up.

Acts 15:36

I know this is super hard for us to do, but I want to ask you to really try to put yourself in Paul’s shoes, and think about what he might have been thinking about.

How might have Paul, in his mind visualized this as going?

What would his expectations have been?

I surrendered my life to Jesus, I sacrificed to serve Him, I travelled in areas that opposed me, often at my own expense.

Churches were planted, elders established, now it’s time to do a wellness check to encourage, and to see some of the fruit that God has done through us.

What would your expectations be?

How do you think things should go?

You are all in serving the Lord and maybe for the first time in you’re life, you really are all in, and you have some expectations on what that should look like.

Fast forward a little bit more....before they even leave, Paul and his partner in ministry get into a fight, a disagreement on who should travel with them.

And these Godly men can’t work it out, the contention is so great that they actually separate and go their separate ways.

How does that make sense?

So this ministry trip begins with contention, that leads to division, and then Paul gets on with the Lord’s work with difficulty.

I don’t know what you’re expectations would be.

But, in my rational mind, it seems like the Lord’s work, should bring the Lord’s favor.

I mean if you’re doing your own thing, I get it, but this is the Apostle Paul who over and over and over again has shown that he wants the Lord’s will at any cost.

And to start, he and another brother (that he knows loves Jesus) see things very differently.

So Paul takes off to strengthen the churches and they did, and the numbers grew that were being saved.

So they decided to go to Asia…but the Bible says, ”they were forbidden by the Holy Spirit to preach the word in Asia.”

Probably not expecting that, probably didn’t think that was the way that things should go, so what do they do when things go wrong?

They keep trying to please the Lord.

But Acts 16 tells us they they tried to go into Bithynia, but the Spirit did not permit them.

I guessing that wasn’t what Paul expected, if it was, he never would have tried to go.

This part of the Bible actually gives me some solace, some comfort.

Because as much as I desperately seek the Lord, and truly want to do the right thing and please Him with my service, things don’t always work out they way I thought they would or the way I think they should, sometimes things go very wrong.

And I can get discourage and quit, or I can keep seeking to please God.

Wanting to please God, Paul continues to seek God and has a vision in the night where a man from Macedonia appears to him saying, come over here and help us!

What do you think Paul’s expectations were at this point?

Even if he might be getting a little gun shy, I’m guessing he expected to find a man in Macedonia that he could share the gospel with, or at least help in some way.

Seems reasonable doesn’t it?

I’m actually not guessing here.

The Bible says Paul immediately sought to go to Macedonia concluding that the Lord had called them to preach the gospel to them.

They take off and go to the prominent city there, Philippi.

There’s no temple, so they go down to the river where people pray and there’s no guys there looking for help.

There are some women, one of them named Lydia becomes a Christian.

If you read on, they have this really strange encounter with a women that is possessed by an evil spirit.

Apparently she is given the power to tell the future and the men in the community, abuse her, exploit her, and profit from her.

But she won’t stop following Paul around and shouting that Paul and Silas are men of God speaking forth the way of salvation.

Paul commands this demon to leave her, she is no longer making money for these guys, so they attack Paul and Silas and beat them with rods and throw them in prison.

These aren’t guys restricted by Jewish law beating them that can only do 39 lashes, I’m guessing they get beat nearly to death.

Paul loves Jesus, he’s serving Jesus, but things go really wrong.

What do you do when things go wrong?

You keep trying to please God.

Can you please God if you get beaten and thrown in prison?

I think Paul did.

I told you about it last week, Joe shared with us about it the week before.

Paul and Silas are singing hymns at midnight in jail, an earthquake happens, the doors all open, and they stay, the jailer is in shock.

They share Jesus with him, he gets saved, everyone in his household gets saved, and it says he washed their wounds.

Have you ever thought about that?

How bad were they wounded?

How bad would you have to be wounded men to let another man wash your wounds?

Not to be gross but what were their wounds like?

Were they infected at this point?

I mean, they didn’t get beaten with rods, jump in the ambulance and go to walk-in care for some pain-meds, antibiotics, and stitches.

Fast forward, their wounds are clean, the magistrates authorize their release.

Paul says no, you just beat and held a couple of Roman citizens without a trial, we’re not going anywhere.

The magistrates come and person and beg them to leave.

Not knowing they were Romans at the time, didn’t make it any less of an offense.

Paul and Silas then go to Thessalonica.

Back on track.

Ready to do the Lord’s work.

I wonder how they thought that was going to go? Days after a beating, several of you know what it’s like a few days after a major injury, you feel worse, not better.

They begin to share the gospel and after three Sabbaths of doing exactly what they thought the Lord wanted them to do, they are some are getting saved, but those that oppose them run them out of town.

They go to Berea, and their opposers follow them, and run them out of there, they end of in Corinth, where Paul rights this letter to the Thessalonians.

Chapter 2 verse 1. 1 Thes 2:1-4

Vs. 1, Not in vain.