A Week in 2 Thessalonians: Day One – Gratitude
The Introduction
It’s taken me until this small, relatively unknown corner of the Bible to admit that I need help. We’ve been on quite a journey to this point, haven’t we, but here I am admitting that I am out of my depth. So I’ve turned to Tom Wright for help and I will be sharing my thoughts on his thoughts on 2 Thessalonians in his ‘Paul for Everyone’ series. Because yes, even the most obscure bits of the Bible and the hardest to understand hold something for everyone.
Tom Wright reminds us that these letters to the Thessalonians are some of the ‘earliest documents we possess from the beginning of the church’s existence’ – how exciting is that? These letters are bursting with enthusiasm and excitement for this new thing that is happening among them, but also with questions and confusion and disagreement. This is a completely new way of life, challenging everything these people have ever believed before.
So let’s get stuck in!
The Passage: 2 Thessalonians 1:1-7a
From Paul, Silas, and Timothy—
To the people of the church in Thessalonica, who belong to God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ:
May God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ give you grace and peace.
Our friends, we must thank God at all times for you. It is right for us to do so, because your faith is growing so much and the love each of you has for the others is becoming greater. That is why we ourselves boast about you in the churches of God. We boast about the way you continue to endure and believe through all the persecutions and sufferings you are experiencing.
All of this proves that God’s judgement is just and as a result you will become worthy of his Kingdom, for which you are suffering. God will do what is right: he will bring suffering on those who make you suffer, and he will give relief to you who suffer and to us as well.
Reflections
Gratitude – this letter starts with gratitude. Gratitude for the believers who make up the church in Thessalonica. Gratitude for their faith. Gratitude for their love. Just because God’s gifts of grace and peace are free, it doesn’t mean that we should ever take them for granted. We don’t deserve all that God gives us, that’s the point of grace. It’s only right that we should say thank you to God everyday for the life that he so freely gives.
Paul knows that whatever he has done and however well he has preached in Thessalonica, it is God who has transformed lives, not him. He thanks God for the change that he can see in the lives of these believers, because it is only God who can bring about this kind of transformation. It’s not just a set of interesting ideas that Paul’s been sharing, it’s a life-changing message that causes these people to enter into a new relationship with God, to transform their relationships with others and to endure suffering as they stand up for what they believe.
Boasting – this kind of boasting isn’t showing off. It’s not Paul hoping for a pat on the back for what he has achieved. This is Paul proudly shouting – ‘Look at what God is doing here!’ These believers in Thessalonica are a wonderful living example of how God can transform lives. It’s impossible for us to understand how revolutionary this message about the risen Jesus was, because we have grown up with it and it’s now the most widely spread religion in the world. Back then, it was brand new. It was a handful of men with a radical message of a new way to live in relationship with God and with each other. The evidence of the community of believers in Thessalonica backed up Paul’s message.
Judgement – this idea of judgement is not something that sits comfortably with us, is it? If God is a God of love, how can He judge and punish people? However, without the possibility of judgement, what would be the point of grace? God is pure and holy, I get that. He has standards. And so to approach God, we need to be made holy and the only way that can happen is through His grace and love. There is therefore a level of accountability for the choices we make in this life and the way that we live. It’s far more complicated than many of us make out, because God is beyond our understanding and so this is beyond our understanding too. But the way we live now affects eternity. And so those who are challenged by God’s way and not only reject it for themselves but persecute those who do follow God’s way will be held accountable for their actions. Tom Wright makes a really interesting point here –
The world, then as now, had many ‘religions’, many cults, many ‘gods’ and ‘lords’. If Paul had simply been adding another one to this list, nobody would have minded very much. But he was clearly not doing that; he was inviting his hearers to turn away from all other loyalties and give full allegiance to Jesus, and to the God who had been made known in and through him.
This is why his message provoked such a strong reaction. This is why the early Christians were persecuted, often to death.
But the message of God cannot be silenced. It’s as revolutionary now as it was then.
