1 Thessalonians 2:13-16 - The Power of the Word of God

13 And we also thank God constantly for this, that when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men but as what it really is, the word of God, which is at work in you believers. 14 For you, brothers, became imitators of the churches of God in Christ Jesus that are in Judea. For you suffered the same things from your own countrymen as they did from the Jews, 15 who killed both the Lord Jesus and the prophets, and drove us out, and displease God and oppose all mankind 16 by hindering us from speaking to the Gentiles that they might be saved—so as always to fill up the measure of their sins. But wrath has come upon them at last!

Target Date: Sunday, 3 July 2022

Word Study/ Translation Notes:

Received – παραλαμβάνω (paralabontes) – to bring near, to bring within

This word is used almost exclusively regarding teachings and traditions.

The focus is on internalizing, implanting a teaching.

God’s word is not SOLELY meant to be spread by reading, but by proclamation, teaching, and hearing.

This gives commission not only to the teachers of the church of disciples, but also compels our accurate transmission of God’s word to others.

How will they believe in Him whom they have not heard? And how will they hear without a preacher? - Romans 10:14

So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ. – Romans 10:17

Accepted – δέχομαι (dechomai) – to welcome in, to open yourself to it

Is at work - ἐνεργέω (energeō) – middle voice – to work its work

For this verb, the word of God works upon and through itself in the believers.

The power is, thus, in the word of God, not in the believers specifically.

Believe – pisteuo – participle – believing, trusting

The exact rendering of the last phrase would be:

God’s word, which works its work in you [who are] believing.

Thoughts on the Passage:

Also – looking back to 1:2 – this section we are beginning is the SECOND reason they give thanks to God.

The word of God –

“God’s word” is often used euphemistically of the Bible, and such it is.

But God’s word is so much more – it is not the mere page it is printed on, but the heart it is written on.

God’s word is the Scripture working effectually in the heart of a person.

It does not invite differing INTERPRETATIONS of the Scripture, but distinctly personal APPLICATIONS of it.

A man, were he to live all his days in perfect obedience to the Bible, would still not merit salvation – he was ruined before he ever began by Adam’s sin. Only the gospel, applied by the Holy Spirit to his dead heart by faith, can make him alive.

That word they had received was primarily the gospel of Jesus Christ.

It begins, as we see in their initial acceptance, as the gospel of justification. It continues as the gospel of sanctification and holiness; it is in this state the word continues its work.

The word of God that they received was not a meaningless idea or a doctrine to be maintained; it was a source of power in the lives of those who believed

The word of human beings, however wise in substance or eloquent in expression, cannot produce spiritual life: this is the prerogative of the word of God, which works effectually (ἐνεργεῖται) in believers.

It is unthinkable that God’s word, properly received, would not make drastic and complete changes to the person it indwells.

Look at the things it led these believers to:

Enduring the suffering of persecution from both Greeks and Jews.

Cast out of both societies;

For those who sought God through the Law would have been welcomed as proselytes into the Jewish society.

But in naming Jesus Christ as their Lord, they were rejected even from that one.

How can someone accept as God’s word the message of the gospel and live an unaltered life?

How can you, if you are tolerating sin in yourself, possibly claim to treat God’s word as the word from God?

Paul does not specify what kind of activity they have in mind, but most likely he is thinking of the conversion of the Thessalonians from idolatry (1:9–10) and the production of the fruit of the Spirit in their lives

Their initial acceptance of the message was an act of faith, and now, in the midst of their persecutions, they continued in the same faith as the word of God continued its work in them. This message was not a philosophical discourse on the means to the virtuous life (or a self-help seminar on how to overcome personal and social issues, as the gospel is frequently portrayed in our era). It was the word of God, which powerfully transformed their lives.

Therefore, let us fear if, while a promise remains of entering His rest, any one of you may seem to have come short of it. 2 For indeed we have had good news preached to us, just as they also; but the word they heard did not profit them, because it was not united by faith in those who heard. – Hebrews 4:1-2

When we speak, discuss, or argue doctrines, are we truly treating these things as God’s word, or are we arguing ABOUT Him?

Are we truly trying to discover HIS truth, or are we simply wanting to be right?

What is the difference? How can we tell which is true of us?

If we are OFFENDED by their rejection, it is not God’s word we are preaching.

That is not to say that we will not do all we can to preach the gospel to persons, and desire earnestly their salvation – we must do that.

But if we are OFFENDED if someone disagrees with us or rejects our explanation of the gospel, we are not speaking the gospel, but our own words.

That is why Acts 15 is SO important to us. The apostles, out of their fierce debate, came together and sought the Holy Spirit’s will:

I would point out that this question was not one simply of opinion, but in the foundation of the gospel – must you follow the Mosaic Law to be a follower of Christ?

And the letter they sent by Silas to the Gentile believers was:

For it seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us to lay upon you no greater burden than these essentials: 29 that you abstain from things sacrificed to idols and from blood and from things strangled and from fornication; if you keep yourselves free from such things, you will do well. Farewell.” – Acts 15:28-29

These four instructions are the sum total of the Mosaic judicial law the apostles saw fit to instruct the Gentile believers to follow.

The moral law, in the form of the Ten Commandments, was left to discipleship, since it was never at issue.

God’s word changes the world by changing persons.

When they did not find them, they began dragging Jason and some brethren before the city authorities, shouting, “These men who have upset the world have come here also; - Acts 17:6

It happened that as we were going to the place of prayer, a slave-girl having a spirit of divination met us, who was bringing her masters much profit by fortune-telling. 17 Following after Paul and us, she kept crying out, saying, “These men are bond-servants of the Most High God, who are proclaiming to you the way of salvation.” 18 She continued doing this for many days. But Paul was greatly annoyed, and turned and said to the spirit, “I command you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her!” And it came out at that very moment. 19 But when her masters saw that their hope of profit was gone, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the market place before the authorities - Acts 16:16-19

Which you heard from us – hearing – akouē

We receive what Jesus did and said by hearing (cf. Mk. 4:24; Mt. 11:4; Lk. 2:20; Acts 2:33; 1 Jn. 1:1). What Jesus looked like is of no interest. Seeing is directed to his acts. Parables like that of the sower are parables of hearing.

This is not simply the sense of hearing, but the work of receiving and accepting that which is authentically from God.

The people did not reject Jesus for what He looked like, but for the message He proclaimed:

This was to fulfill the word of Isaiah the prophet which he spoke: “Lord, who has believed our report? And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?” – John 12:38

However, they did not all heed the good news; for Isaiah says, “Lord, who has believed our report?” 17 So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ. – Romans 10:16-17

When we are born to believers who are faithful in the church, we might think we have an advantage, an understanding that sets us ahead of those who are led to Christ through very rough roads.

But we run the risk of taking God’s word as the word of our parents, the word of people, the word of the preacher, and not give it the honor due to the word of God.

We get drawn into their arguments and fights, their prejudices, whether godly or not.

We might find ourselves opposing God’s word simply because we wish to oppose our parents.

Or we might find ourselves opposing God’s word because we have been taught to do so by our parents, or by the world in which we are raised.

It is the tragedy of the modern church that successive generations tend to try to make the church more comfortable rather than making the church more holy.

They would change the church rather than change themselves.

Applications:

For the Christian:

When we hear the word of God proclaimed, whether in a sermon or a lesson, how diligently do we seek opportunities to put those things into practice?

For the Backslidden:

For the Unconverted:

Primary Preaching Point:

The problem with many teachers today is that they pay too little attention to God’s word as God’s word, and thus do not see its power.

Building Points:

Sermon Text:

This morning, we enter the second section of thanks in this letter to the church at Thessalonica.

The first began immediately following the greeting in 1:2:

We give thanks to God always for all of you, making mention of you in our prayers

That first section continued through the first chapter and through verse 12 of the second.

You can see the natural flow into the second point of thanksgiving here in verse 13:

And we also thank God constantly for this, that when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men but as what it really is, the word of God, which is at work in you believers.

The word “also” at the beginning of this verse tells us that Paul and Silas are entering a new section of thanksgiving with all new reasons.

And just like in the first section, the thanksgiving is not to the Thessalonian believers, but to God on behalf of the Thessalonian believers.

We also thank GOD…

This section, for the sake of the thanksgiving sections, will extend all the way to 3:8.

For those of you who would like to keep a short outline of this letter in your notes, I would suggest the following:

1:2 – 2:12 comprise the first major section of the letter

what I will call the thanksgiving for their faithful infancy, and this contains two parts:

1:2 – 1:10 – Their imitation of the apostles.

2:1 – 2:12 – A recollection and example of their early teaching.

The second section we begin today which runs through 3:8 is what I will call the thanksgiving for their faithful maturity, which likewise contains two parts:

2:13 – 2:16 – Their mature growth in the face of persecution.

2:17 – 3:8 – The Providence that brought them that growth.

There will be one more summary section in the “thanksgiving” part of this epistle that runs from 3:9-13 that deals with the apostles’ prayer for perseverance for these believers.

Then after that, we will see a few sections of instruction for the church, probably addressing some deficiencies Timothy observed in his visit.

But we will leave that outline for when we arrive at that section, beginning in chapter 4.

So this paragraph, from verse 13 to 16 in chapter 2, is thanksgiving to God for the mature growth of the Thessalonian believers.

We can see how this maturity was demonstrated:

They suffered for the sake of the gospel.

We will look at this in the coming weeks if God is willing, but to understand what he is saying, look over to the second half of verse 14:

For you suffered the same things from your own countrymen as they [the Judean churches] did from the Jews…

These new followers of Jesus Christ, who had only the most fundamental knowledge of the Scriptures and the gospel,

Not only survived the persecution from their neighbors, but grew and thrived in that hostile atmosphere.

It is completely understandable why Paul and Silas would be so concerned about these baby Christians that they would send Timothy back to check on them, as we see in the first part of chapter 3.

They had no idea if their young, immature faith would hold out against the constant attacks from the world.

Whether they would return to their idolatry;

Return to the pagan practices they had known all their lives until they were saved in Jesus Christ only recently.

Even these apostles couldn’t see to the heart of these who had professed to follow Christ.

They couldn’t see if they would persevere through trials.

They did not know that they wouldn’t fall away.

They didn’t know that they would not be lured by the enticements of the world.

They had concerns that the Thessalonian believers might represent one of the bad soils in the parable of the soils:

When anyone hears the word of the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what has been sown in his heart. This is the one on whom seed was sown beside the road. 20 The one on whom seed was sown on the rocky places, this is the man who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy; 21 yet he has no firm root in himself, but is only temporary, and when affliction or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he falls away. 22 And the one on whom seed was sown among the thorns, this is the man who hears the word, and the worry of the world and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful. – Matthew 13:19-22

There was a risk the evil one would compromise them,

Or that persecution would burn their tiny faith up,

Or that the cares of this world would once again engulf them.

These same dangers afflict those who claim to be Christians today.

And no pastor, preacher, elder, teacher, parent, child, nor anyone else can predict anyone else’s perseverance.

The only thing that proves perseverance is to finish our lives faithfully.

To maintain our faith in God through Jesus Christ until we are separated from this body of flesh.

What they discovered about these baby Christians, as we see in the next several verses, is that the Thessalonian church was alive and well, growing in faith:

Not just the church in infancy they left,

But a church in full bloom, producing the fruit of God in abundance.

Wouldn’t we all want that testimony of our church, of our congregation, of our family, of our lives?

I daresay all we who follow Christ would love to have this testimony made about us,

But we might be have to think twice when we see what it took God to bring them to this maturity.

The first, which we will look at today, is the power of God’s word.

The second, which I plan, Lord willing, to look at in the coming weeks, is the crucible of persecution and suffering.

What Paul and Silas were counting on when they were forced to leave Thessalonica, and the very thing that brought this church to maturity, is the power of God’s word.

Now, before we go too far, I want to give us some biblical definition to this power of God’s word.

The first thing is this word “power” or “work”.

Too many believers treat this “power” as some kind of event, even a magical spell of sorts.

The power of God’s word is not magic – it is the irresistible working of God’s word to make His believers into His image.

It is not something that flies from our fingers, nor does it become effective from our tongues speaking things into existence (that is nonsense),

The word of God works powerfully in the heart of a believer to remake them from the inside out.

The word for “work” used in this 13th verse is the word we get our word “energy” from.

It is describing the consistent power from a power plant, not the uncontrolled energy of a nuclear explosion.

It is the power of a horse fit to the harness, not one that is wasting its energy in bucking and twisting.

The second is this term “God’s word” or “the word of God”.

Most of us are accustomed to referring to the Bible as “God’s word”, and it is.

But when Paul and Silas use that term here, that is not fully what they are saying.

The main reason I say that is that since this is probably the first book of the New Testament written, there is no New Testament yet.

And this word of God was taught by these apostles and accepted by the believers in Thessalonica according to our verse today:

when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men but as what it really is, the word of God…

There is no doubt that in the course of teaching these new disciples, they would have taught them God’s moral Law, what we know as the Ten Commandments.

We see Paul alluding to that instruction in 4:1ff:

Finally then, brethren, we request and exhort you in the Lord Jesus, that as you received from us instruction as to how you ought to walk and please God (just as you actually do walk), that you excel still more. 2 For you know what commandments we gave you by the authority of the Lord Jesus. 3 For this is the will of God, your sanctification

Each one of these commandments predates the Sinai covenant,

And they tell us what it means to live a godly life.

You may also recall the result of the so-called Jerusalem council in Acts 15, where, when deciding how far Gentiles would be required to go into the Mosaic Law,

The results were sent in a letter by Silas:

For it seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us to lay upon you no greater burden than these essentials: 29 that you abstain from things sacrificed to idols and from blood and from things strangled and from fornication; if you keep yourselves free from such things, you will do well. Farewell.” – Acts 15:28-29

And we see part of this very instruction in 4:3-8:

that you abstain from sexual immorality; 4 that each of you know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor, 5 not in lustful passion, like the Gentiles who do not know God; 6 and that no man transgress and defraud his brother in the matter because the Lord is the avenger in all these things, just as we also told you before and solemnly warned you. 7 For God has not called us for the purpose of impurity, but in sanctification. 8 So, he who rejects this is not rejecting man but the God who gives His Holy Spirit to you.

I will not go deeply into this commandment today except to suggest we are in desperate need of heeding this teaching today in the church.

Sexual immorality, in so many ways, has thoroughly infected and infested churches.

We live in a lust-saturated culture, and we don’t defend ourselves against it nearly enough.

I think much of this is because we consider these prohibitions “God’s word” in general, not “the word of the God of the Universe to ME”.

But before we get to that point, this word of God includes, of first importance, the gospel of Jesus Christ, and His commandments – the Law of Love.

In 4:9ff, Paul and Silas tell these believers:

Now as to the love of the brethren, you have no need for anyone to write to you, for you yourselves are taught by God to love one another;

That word of God that is working in these believers is accomplishing this: that they love one another.

So much so that Paul and Silas offer no instruction in this matter, only encouragement to excel still more.

These believers, armed with the gospel of Jesus Christ, the rudimentary doctrines of the faith, and love for one another GREW into maturity by the work of God’s word.

Not even the Corinthians, who pondered great doctrines and argued many things, approached this simple faithfulness where the word of God proves its power in the church’s life.

So, to put a cap on this, God’s word is indeed the Scripture, but the work of God’s word is the Scripture applied to a person’s heart.

Faithful teaching is necessary, but so is faithful doing and faithful loving.

That is where we see the power of God’s word – in the transformation of the hearts of people.

Lastly, I would like to look at why these believers experienced the power of God’s word where so many others do not.

Why these successfully grew in the midst of severe persecution and trouble where others did not.

How many people speaking in the name of Jesus Christ today endorse sin simply because they don’t want to be thought unkind or unloving or, horror of horrors, intolerant?

Christian – never wink at grievous sin and tell the sinner that their sin isn’t all that bad.

Have the guts, have the love, enough to tell them their sin separates them from God, but He calls on them to turn from their sin and trust in Him. If they do that, they will be saved.

If you do that, you will be saved.

This is not just my opinion, my belief, or my worldview – this is the word of God to YOU!

That is why the Thessalonian believers were able to withstand the crushing ordeal –

when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men but as what it really is, the word of God

When they received the teachings of the apostles, from the first gospel presentation to the teachings on holiness and sanctification,

They NEVER said to themselves “Well, that is THEIR opinion.”

They never set their opinion over what the Scripture said.

They never set their lusts or pride over their thirst to obey God.

They never trusted their own wisdom where it disagreed in a single degree from the gospel of Jesus Christ and the law of Love.

Because when they received God’s word, they took it for what it was – GOD’s WORD.

Not the word of man,

Not an opinion,

Not a philosophy,

Not an alternative view.

It was God’s word.

Too many Christians today sit Sunday after Sunday, study after study,

And rather submitting themselves to the word of God, to be examined by God’s holy standard,

They sit in quiet judgment of the teacher.

Brothers and sisters, no matter what you think of the teacher or the preacher,

If they are preaching the Scripture, even imperfectly, NEVER FAIL to measure yourself by the Scripture.

It is sinful to play the game of “I agree with that” or “I don’t agree with that.”

“I like that” or “I don’t think he should have said that.”

The question that should resound in our minds at every point is “What is God telling ME in His word?”

“How may I apply this teaching toward holiness?”

Because if you are a follower of Jesus Christ, the word coming from the Scripture is GOD’s word to you, not the teacher’s.

If you are judging the teacher, the lesson, or even the sermon, rather than allowing the word of God to measure you, you are wasting your time.

And worse, you will not see the word of God effectually working in you.

Because the word of God works effectually only when you accept it, welcome it, open yourself to it, and allow the word of God to do its sanctifying work in you.

That is the power of God’s word:

To change hearts,

Which changes lives,

Which increases love for one another,

Which draws more people to Christ,

And changes entire peoples one corner at a time.