The Gospel According to Paul # 21

The Gospel According to Paul # 21

Mutuality and Maturity

The next thing that we notice about them, after their realism in reception, was their mutuality and maturity - two things which always go together. In both these letters, that which the Apostle speaks about perhaps more than anything else is the wonderful love between these believers. "The love of each one of you all toward one another aboundeth" (2 Thess. 1:3). He is speaking all the way through about their mutual love. And going alongside of that was their spiritual growth. You see, love always builds up (1 Cor. 8:1). This kind of love, mutual love, always means spiritual increase. We can see how true that is if we view it from the opposite standpoint. Little, personal, petty,selfish, separated, individual Christians, or companies or bodies of Christians who are exclusive and closed, and have not a wide open heart of love to all saints - how small they are, how cramped they are. It is true. And it is in this mutual love one for another, and growing and increasing love one for another, that spiritual growth takes place. Do not forget that. If you are concerned about the spiritual growth of your own heart, your own life, and that of others, it will be along the line of love, mutual love, and you are the one to begin it. Mutuality and maturity always go together.

Suffering and Service

And then, in the third place, you will find that they were characterized by suffering and service, and this is a wonderful Divine combination. It is something that is not natural. The Apostle had much to say about it, as you will see if you underline the word "suffering" in these letters, and note his references to their sufferings and their afflictions. They "received the word in much affliction" (1 Thess. 1:6). He speaks about their sufferings, and he describes those sufferings. They in Thessalonica were suffering along the same lines and for the same causes as their brethren in Judaea, he said (2:14).

Now, in Judaea, that is, in the country of the Jews, you know how the Christians suffered. Christ Himself suffered at the hands of the Jews; Stephen was martyred at the hands of the Jews; the Church met its first persecutions in Judaea, in Jerusalem, and they were scattered abroad by the persecutions that arose there over Stephen; and Paul says, 'Now you are suffering in that way'. Evidently there was in Thessalonica much persecution, much opposition; threats and all sorts of difficulties - the kind of thing, perhaps, where it was very difficult for them to do business and get jobs, all because the business was in the hands of those who had no room for this Christianity and for these Christians.

But with all that severe suffering, and with all their much affliction, they did not become introspective. That is the peril of suffering. If you are suffering frustration, opposition, persecution, or if the best jobs are given to someone else, and so on, the natural thing is to turn in upon yourself, to be very sorry for yourself, to begin to nurse your trouble and be wholly occupied with yourself. But here, suffering led to service.

The Apostle says that the Word went forth from them, not only through all the region of Macedonia and Achaia, but throughout the whole country (1:8). Their suffering - what did it do? It made them turn outwards, and say, 'There are others everywhere in need, in suffering, as we: let us see what we can do for them'. That is the way to respond to the gospel, is it not? That speaks of the glorious gospel! The gospel had become to them such good news that it had the effect upon them of delivering them entirely from all self-pity in the deepest affliction. Let us take that to heart.

Patience And Hope

Furthermore the Apostle speaks of their "patience of hope" (1:3), and that simply means that they did not easily give up. That counts for something, you know. You are having a difficult time; everything and everybody is against you. It is so easy to give up - just to give up; to draw out of the race, or drop your hands in the fight, and say, 'It is no use - better give it all up.' But no: these Christians had patience and hope. They did not easily give up, they stuck to it, and we shall see that they had a hope that kept them sticking to it.

Such were these who were 'an example to all that believe.' In them we see the constituents of exemplary Christians, and they are the true features of the gospel. You see, the gospel is for Christians in difficulty! It is not only for the unsaved, but for Christians when they are in difficulty or in suffering. It is still good news. If we lose the good news element in the gospel,if it loses for us its keen edge as "good tidings", we become stale; we come to the place where we "know it all." If we lose that sense, then when trouble comes we give up, we let go; but if to have come to a saving knowledge of the Lord Jesus is still for us the greatest thing in all the world and all the universe, then we get through.

Difficulties Because Of Temperament

Now, because difficulties always correspond to our dispositions, that is, what we are always gives rise to the nature of our trials, so it was with the Thessalonians. Nothing is a trial to you unless you are made in a certain way. Something that is a trial to you might never be a trial to me at all. Or it might be the other way round. What might be a terrible thing to me and knock me right off my balance, other people could go through quite calmly, and wonder what I am making such a fuss about. Our troubles and our trials very largely take their rise from the way we are made.

Now I want you to follow this. The thoroughness of these Thessalonian believers led them into peculiar testings. And that is always the case. If you are not thorough-going, you will not have thorough-going difficulties. You will get through more or less easily. If you are thorough-going, you are going to meet thorough-going testings. They arise quite naturally out of your own attitude or your own disposition.

~T. Austin-Sparks~

(continued with # 22)