2 Thessalonians 1, Where Are You Going?, Dr. John B. Carpenter

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2 Thessalonians 1 Where Are You Going?

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2 Thessalonians 3, What Do I Do?, Dr. John B. Carpenter

2 Thessalonians 3, What Do I Do?, Dr. John B. Carpenter

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2 Thessalonians chapter 1, we'll be reading the entire chapter, hear the word of the Lord. Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy, to the church of the
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Thessalonians, and God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ, grace to you and peace from God our
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Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. We ought always to give thanks to God for you, brothers, as is right, because your faith is growing abundantly and the love of every one of you for one another is increasing.
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Therefore, we ourselves boast about you in the churches of God for your steadfastness and faith in all your persecutions and in all the afflictions that you are enduring.
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This is evidence of the righteous judgment of God that you may be considered worthy of the kingdom of God for which you are also suffering, since indeed
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God considers it just to repay with affliction those who afflict you and to grant relief to you who are afflicted as well as to us.
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When the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire, inflicting vengeance on those who do not know
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God and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus, they will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction away from the presence of the
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Lord and from the glory of his might when he comes on that day to be glorified in his saints and to be marveled at among all who have believed because our testimony to you was believed.
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To this end, we always pray for you that our God may make you worthy of his calling and may fulfill every resolve for good and every work of faith by his power that the name of our
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Lord Jesus may be glorified in you and you in him according to the grace of our
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God and the Lord Jesus Christ. May the Lord add his blessings to the reading of his holy word.
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Well imagine a trip in which you didn't know where you were going. You just head out and you don't know where.
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We've set out, Mary and I sometimes have set out for Danville from Yanceyville to maybe go out to eat somewhere, not knowing exactly which restaurant we're going to but at least we know we're going to Danville.
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Probably the only reason you'd go without knowing where exactly was if you were going away from something.
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If the building is on fire, you just go. You don't care where. I know a lady who went out from abuse, didn't know where to go and so called a friend, a new friend, one of the few people in town she knew and she took her in and got her in contact with her pastor and his wife and who spent the next day with her and she started coming to church and was baptized and reconciled to her husband who stopped being abusive and a new life started with a trip she knew not where.
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We once went on a trip starting in Seattle, Washington and didn't plan it. We didn't know where we would be by the end of any day, meandering all over the
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Pacific Northwest, then across Idaho and Montana, some of Wyoming.
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Sometimes it was a pleasant surprise where we ended up. Sometimes it was a disaster like when we stopped for the night by a nice looking lake, a beautiful looking lake in Montana where the camping was free.
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Well that was great, free. Interesting that no one else was there. Well we found out why when clouds of mosquitoes attacked us.
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They seemed especially extra vicious and hungry mosquitoes so we had to sleep in the minivan to try to keep them at bay.
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We nicknamed the place Mosquito City but then we set off for our next adventure which is
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Mount Rushmore and all the way like that to the outer banks of North Carolina but even then we knew that we would be in Tennessee by the end of the summer.
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We had an ultimate destination. It's odd to go without knowing where you're going but that's the way many people live.
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You know the exact opposite of our trip across America. That is they know where they'll be by the end of the day or at least they think they'll know where they're going to be.
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They'll have another day's work in the books, another few hours studying, another day for a relationship or getting chores done or exercise or whatever, watching
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TV, another deposit in their bank account, more dollars earned but they have no idea what they're going to end up ultimately at the end of life where their destination is especially if they're infected by greed.
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If they're living for chasing dollars. They can't go to church because they've got to make a few more dollars and why are they living for money?
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Well for the family they say. The same family they aren't going to church with because they've got to make more money.
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Then when they have all this money then where will they be? Well they don't know.
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They haven't looked that far down the road. They just set out every day, head bowed, shoulders of the wheel, working, working for dollars, dollars and where they're going they can't tell you.
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They don't even have time to think about it, to discuss it. If you bring it up, if you ask them, well where are you going?
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They'll think you are distracting them for what they need to be doing right now which is making more money. They don't know where they're going because they've always been driven by getting just a little bit more.
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Just like someone walking and only looking at the few feet in front of them. Even if they do get enough money they'll never know it because greed takes you on a trip but never lets you arrive.
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Where are you going? Here in 2 Thessalonians 1 we see where we're going and what it takes to get there.
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We see that in three parts. First thankfulness to God, second celebration of God's justice and finally prayer for God's power.
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What's it take to get where you're going? Well part of it is thanks, thankfulness for God's grace.
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Paul begins this letter with his usual greeting including his partners Silvanus and Timothy naming his recipient that's the church of the gathering of believers in Thessalonica, the northern
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Greek or the Macedonian. Macedonia is the area, the territory of northern Greece and the city is
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Thessalonica. The gathering of believers in that city who believe in God our Father and the Lord Jesus as he says to them and to them
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Paul gives a blessing, a peace in verse 2 from God our Father and the
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Lord Jesus Christ for those he's just blessed. We, Paul, Silvanus and Timothy, he says ought to give thanks.
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It is a moral duty to be thankful for these kind of people.
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Now we live in an age of excess flattery, of telling everyone how great they are, mediocre things like it's great, pick up three chairs, oh you're
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Hercules, that's kind of silly stuff. We can react to that. We don't want to be like that.
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There's people praising everything and so we can go to the other extreme as not being thankful enough.
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In fact there's an illusion with some like in the over the top, I'm not sure if you recommend it or not because it's so profane,
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I don't know why there's so much profanity in it, of the movie Whiplash, sort of illusion there in that movie that the high quality excellent demanding people never praise, never encourage, never express thanks unless something is just absolutely perfect.
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It has to be 10 out of 10 before the excellent person expresses approval.
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Well that's just not true. I had a coach who coached in the Olympics and a professor and a boss who won a
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Nobel Prize, obviously excellent people and both would occasionally be encouraging even to my meager efforts.
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People who are doing better than they were, who are improving or making progress, they need encouragement.
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They deserve encouragement. Indeed we ought to give it to them. We have a moral duty to encourage and to be thankful.
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We ought always, Paul says, not just rarely, to give thanks to you brothers and he says as is right.
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It's appropriate, it's fitting. Don't be sparing in thankfulness for people, especially fellow church members.
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Be thankful continually for each other. It's right. He's especially thankful for three things what he told the
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Corinthians, the famous love chapter, chapter 13, were the three main things, faith, hope, and love.
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He's thankful that they're abundant in them. Here listed is faith that is growing, love that is increasing, and in verse 4, steadfastness, which is the fruit of hope, steadfastness that is enduring.
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Now Paul and his friends ought to give thanks for them because God has been doing the work of increasing their faith.
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It's growing abundantly, literally it's super growing. They didn't used to believe that God would provide for them if they didn't work all the time or if they gave generously.
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They didn't have enough faith to believe that, but now they do have that faith.
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They've grown. Their super growing faith has grown and now they do trust God not to live just for chasing dollars or shekels,
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I guess, so they can give. We know from 2 Corinthians that these Christians from Macedonia, including
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Thessalonica, they were giving to Paul so that he could minister to the Corinthians without asking the
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Corinthians to support him. In other words, the Macedonians here, these people in Thessalonica were giving to Paul so Paul could live in Corinth ministering to the
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Corinthians. The Corinthians were weaker in faith. Their faith wasn't yet super growing, so they were less generous, a little more suspicious, probably thinking, is this guy
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Paul? Is he for real? Is he on the up and up? Maybe he's just in it for the money. I'm not going to support him.
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No, I'll wait and see. So because they were weak in faith, Paul lived partly off of these believers in Thessalonica.
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That's why he's in such good terms with them. He's praising them. He's thankful for them because their faith is super growing. He and his team said now it was their duty to be thankful for their super growing faith.
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It was also their duty to be thankful for their increasing love. That's God's work.
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And this love, it's not just kind of aimless niceness or a feeling of benevolence, a sweet smile after a church service.
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It is in verse three, the love all of you have for each other. It is a love for church members, for each other, like in our church covenant to walk together in Christian love.
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And Paul says they ought to be thankful. He and his team, they ought to be thankful because there's more of that love now for each other than there used to be.
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It's growing. It's increasing. And it's, he says, it's indiscriminate. That is just for everyone.
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It's not selective, not just for people of our race or ethnic group or just our family. Was it selective or cliquish?
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The Jewish believers there loved the Gentile believers and vice versa. The older believers loved the younger believers and vice versa.
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No one was left out of the Thessalonians love. And for that,
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Paul says, they ought to be thankful. They ought also to be thankful in verse four for God's work of making them steadfast, tough, resilient, which is the fruit of hope.
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If you have hope for the future, you really believe there's a great destination and you are heading there, you know where you're going, then you can put up with the long road, the long journey.
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You can put up with clouds of mosquitoes, sleeping in the minivan, whatever disappointment, because you know your destination.
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You can be steadfast and enduring. He's thankful for them. He says in verse four, he boasts, so thankful, he boasts about them to other churches.
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You should see, saying something like that to the Corinthians, you Corinthians, you should see how those
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Thessalonians joyfully put up with persecutions. They get their goods confiscated for being Christians, but they still believe.
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They still meet together and praise God. They get their church building destroyed, like in China, happens sometimes now.
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They just meet together outside and praise God. They rejoice to be counted worthy to suffer persecution for the name of Jesus.
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They are steadfast under persecution, which is suffering, especially for being
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Christians, what persecution is, right? Suffering, especially you get criticism. Maybe you get scolding for putting the church ahead of the family business.
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That's some persecution. And you should be thankful if that leads to your steadfastness.
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Here, the Thessalonians are also steadfast in affliction. Affliction is broader.
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Persecution is suffering specifically for being a Christian. Affliction is any suffering for any reason.
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Affliction is the death in the family, the cancer you get, the struggling business, the unemployment, the debt, the broken leg, the unsupportive spouse, the troublesome co -workers or boss or kids at school.
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Paul said that they were good, so good at enduring all that. They're so good at enduring all those afflictions and not being bitter, not complaining about, why has life turned out so badly for me?
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All these afflictions I have to bear. They just kept enduring it. Those Thessalonians, all you
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Corinthians, you should see those Thessalonians. They know where they're going and so they put up with all the hardships of their journey.
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Do you know where you're going? To get where you're going, you need second to celebrate
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God's justice, the celebration of God's justice. The growing faith, increasing love, the enduring steadfastness is, at verse 5, it is evidence of where you're going, where God is taking you.
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He's taking you, Paul says at verse 5, to His righteous judgment.
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And when you get there, when you get to His righteous judgment, two things will happen.
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First, you'll be counted worthy. And second, those who do not know
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God will be punished. We are going to God's righteous judgment.
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That's why it's so foolish to live every day just for making money. What are you going to do with all that money you made when you get to the righteous judgment?
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If all you had at the end of your life is cash, that's the only thing you can bring to the judgment, except you won't be able to bring it to the judgment.
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The best you could do is boast of all the money you made. Maybe you even got rich, but you're going to a judge who won't care about that.
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He's not going to be impressed with your bank account. You're going to a judge who will decide whether you are entering, whether you're worthy to enter the kingdom of God.
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Are you going to the kingdom of God? Is that your destination?
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How do you get there? Well, the apostles tell us in Acts chapter 14, verse 22, that is through many tribulations, afflictions, things that test our steadfastness, we must enter the kingdom of God.
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So the Thessalonians, endurance of affliction in verse 5, he says is evidence, literally the word there, it's a token.
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A token, it represents something else. Your endurance of affliction is evidence, it's a token that you may be counted worthy of entering the kingdom of God.
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Do you understand? You need evidence, right? Your evidence is this token of your endurance that you may be counted worthy.
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So you think, well, okay, if you pass over that really superficially, you might think many, well, many tribulations we must enter, the afflictions are evidence or tokens of being counted worthy.
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Then does that mean, hmm, that is through suffering that we earn our way in?
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Just like through a lot of hard work every day that people do, earn their money, how they get rich.
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Is it like that? Is it my afflictions earn, my giving up stuff?
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Is that what it's about? Is that what he's saying here? No, we must go through tribulation, but tribulation is not how we work our way in.
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He tells us here how we get to our destination in verse 5 in the verb. The verb tells us we are considered in the
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SV literally, literally is counted in Greek or accounted like an accountant, right?
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The accountant's going through your books, see if you're in the black or in the red, see whether you have credit or debits.
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Do you have more credits? Do you have debits? Can he account some credit to you if you're in debt?
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We are accounted, Paul says, worthy. That is the worthiness to enter the kingdom of God, to enter
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God's kingdom. If that's our destination, it's a destination one, to enter God's kingdom, to enter it, you need worthiness.
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You need to be worthy of it. Where does that worthiness come from? You earn it.
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You earn it by afflictions. If you don't have enough in your life, you choose some, some extra ones, like through Lent to afflict yourself so you can earn more worthiness.
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Is that how it works? No. Paul's saying here it is counted to you. It's not earned by us.
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It's attributed or in theological terms, imputed, counted.
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Like back, remember in Genesis chapter 15, verse 6, Abraham believed God and God counted it to him, counted that faith to him as righteousness, counted him as being right with God.
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How are we to get where we're going? The kingdom of God. Is it by suffering, the school of paying our dues?
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No. By being counted worthy, having worthiness that we did not earn attributed to us as if we had earned it.
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It was earned by someone else, but we get it accounted to our record so that when we come to the righteous judgment where everyone is going, our ledger will be opened and there on the credit side will be all the credit we need.
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So our ledger gets stamped worthy. We have the credit. We have the worthiness.
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Where'd it come from? It's counted to us. Does that mean then, well, okay, if that's the case, then we don't have to do anything.
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We don't have to suffer anything. No afflictions, no persecutions. Is that, is that what it means?
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No. If we have that worthiness credited to us, then
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God will let us, it's a blessing, God will let us share just a small taste of the same sufferings
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Christ drank to the full to earn our worthiness. And if we have that, the afflictions that we've endured them, that endurance, that steadfastness that we went through that things with persevering faith, that is evidence.
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That is a token that we had worthiness counted to us.
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So our sharing his afflictions with his spirit is evidence.
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It's an exhibit in court. Here, your honor, here's this exhibit. This proves something that we may be counted worthy.
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Now it says, maybe we may be accounted worthy. I think that sounds kind of weak. Well, that's because people can suffer for other reasons, not just because they're accounted worthy to enter the kingdom of God.
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Some people suffer for their foolishness, for their sin, for the God's providence, or maybe for reasons we shouldn't even speculate about, you know, like Job.
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Don't be like Job's friends and think you know the answer. But afflictions may be evidence of your having worthiness counted to you.
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Or I should say your enduring steadfastness under afflictions is maybe evidence of your having worthiness counted to you.
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And definitely, if you have worthiness counted to you, you will share some, just a small taste, of the suffering
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Christ drank down to its dregs to get that worthiness for you.
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The afflictions may be evidence of worthiness. It's not what earns the worthiness.
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The second thing that happens at judgment, where we're all going, whether we know it or not, is that God will repay with affliction those who afflicted us.
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In verse 6, Paul says, God considers it just. Okay, and if God considers it just, it's just, right?
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You understand, God is the standard of what is right, what is wrong, what is just, what's unjust. So if God considers it just to repay the afflictions of those who afflict you, someone's afflicted you unjustly, they're going to get repaid.
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There will be payback. Now, some people think that whole attitude is unchristian. Well, they're wrong. I shouldn't go into all the reasons they're wrong.
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There's wrong. This is correcting us. They're wrong. But some of them will be bitter. I hope
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God will give them back. Well, we don't have to do that because God will give them back what they deserve. So because of that, if we're treated unjustly, if we're slandered, if we're betrayed, whatever, we suffer from someone unjustly, we can be free of bitterness at that person because we believe
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God will pay them back. So we don't have to worry about it. God will take care of it, right?
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So we're not eaten up with anger and vengeance if we are fired for being a Christian, if we're excluded being a
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Christian, if whatever, someone in our family treats us badly for that. Now, we don't ignore or whitewash those sins either.
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We don't say, well, they just have a different view than me about whether to feed me to lions. I don't like,
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I don't want to be fed to a lion, but this other guy says, well, bless his heart. I'll let him feed me to a lion. That's his thing.
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Now, you don't do it like that. That's unjust. What you're doing, feeding me to lions, that's wrong.
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And you're going to be paid back for it. I can't judge about them imprisoning me, beating me because I'm a
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Christian. No, no, you can that, and God will repay them back or whatever excuse.
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We don't fall for these excuses to fail to call evil, evil. Call evil, evil. But we say that God will afflict the afflictors and give me, he says, relief.
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God considers it just, in verse 7, not only to repay the inflictors, but also to grant relief to you who are afflicted.
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And the relief there is like the relief of a, think of a bow string, a bow, bow and arrow, a bow being released.
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It was tight and was pulled back. Now it's relaxed. Affliction had you uptight, had you pulled back, but God granted you relief.
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You, if you're counted worthy, are given relief. And those who don't know
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God are given payback. And that's God's justice. We should celebrate it.
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That's where we're going at God's righteous judgment. Now, Paul answers three questions about this final destination in verses 7 to 10.
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First, when, when is it? Second, who, who gets it? And third, what, what do they get?
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Well, first, when is this final destination where we're all heading, whether we know it or not?
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Some people know they're going there and so live for being worthy of the kingdom and others don't and so live for money or thrills or their belly or their ego, trying to be somebody big in this world.
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But they'll all arrive at God's righteous judgment. But when?
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Well, in the middle of verse 7, he explains when, when the Lord Jesus is revealed, what we would call the second coming.
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Paul here calls that the revelation, the revelation of Jesus.
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Now he's already been raised. He's been ascended. He is now reigning. He's in heaven.
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He just hasn't yet been revealed to unbelievers, to those who don't know him, who sometimes persecute us or afflict us.
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When he is revealed, then when that revelation comes, they won't be able to deny him.
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It'll just be obvious. He will be revealed from heaven. That's where he's now reigning, in heaven.
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He's putting his enemies under his feet. He will come from heaven to be revealed as to be physically seen.
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He will come, he says, with his powerful angels, the angels of his might, like a conquering general, right?
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The general just doesn't come by himself into a city he's conquered, right? He comes with his army. Christ is coming with his powerful angels.
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He's coming with an entourage. And it says in verse 8, he's coming in flaming fire. That's the fire of judgment, the fire that burns away the wood, the hay, and the straw, everything that's impure and impermanent, the cash so many people live all their life for, every day for.
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All of it is up in smoke. This coming revelation is not and cannot be secret, can it?
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Powerful angels, this entourage like an army, flaming fire. It's not a secret, mystical thing that you can't discern.
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It can't be some obscure guy out in South Korea or Texas saying that he is the second coming of Christ, hidden away in the mountains or some remote compound outside Waco.
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Don't ever believe anyone who tells you that Christ has already come, okay? You don't have to believe someone tell you that Christ has already come, because when he comes, you'll see it yourself.
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His actual coming will be so grand and amazing and undeniable. It's a revelation. It's with fire.
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It's with powerful angels. You won't be able to miss it, so don't worry about missing it.
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Second, who gets what? We've already seen that you, the church, get counted worthy.
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You get worthiness credited to you. The other people who don't get it credited to them, well, they get something different.
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They are afflictors, in verse 6. They're people who try to pull you away, who discourage rather than encourage you to endure affliction.
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In verse 8, they are those who do not know God. Oh, they can see God, like Paul says in Romans chapter 1.
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They can see that there is a God. They know of God. Doesn't mean they're atheists. They probably say there's
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God. They say they believe in God. They just suppress that knowledge, so they live for dollar chasing or skirt chasing or trophy chasing.
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They also, he says, do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. That sounds odd to some people today.
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Think of the way that's put. They do not obey the gospel. Some will say, no, we don't obey the gospel.
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We believe it, and so once we believe it, we don't have to obey anything. That's their attitude, but that's wrong.
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To believe is to obey. To obey is to believe. We're commanded to believe.
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There's the command. Do you obey it? If we don't, well, we've disobeyed.
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Even if outwardly with our life, we've kept all the commandments, but if in our heart we're not really believing, we're just trying to look good, we've still disobeyed.
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We always obey or at least try to the one we believe in.
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If after the service, you're starving, you go out to eat at some nice place, you order a steak, and as soon as it comes out, you're just about to take the first bite, looks so good, you're so hungry.
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I come running up to you and wave my hands, say, don't eat of that steak. It's poisoned. If you believe me, you'll obey.
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If not, you'll take a bite. John chapter three, verse 36 says, whoever believes in the
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Son has eternal life. Whoever does not, you expect believe now next, don't you?
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Whoever does not believe, it's not what it says. It says, whoever does not obey the
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Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him. Third, what is the judgment?
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What we've seen already for the afflictors is payback. They get dealt what they dealt out.
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Will the Roman persecutors who fed Christians to lions be fed to lions at God's righteous judgment?
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Maybe. In North Korea today, if Christians are caught with a Bible or singing a hymn or praying, they get sent to a harsh labor camp for years on end where they work 12 hours a day and get beatings or execution if they step out of line.
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According to one report, a two -year -old was sentenced to life in prison when the government found a
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Bible in his parents' possession. Now, with the persecutors, those North Korean persecutors, those prison guards there, the judges and all of that system, will they be sent to an eternity of harsh labor?
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Probably or something worse. They'll get payback. They'll get justice.
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And we should celebrate the justice of God. They will also, in verse 9, suffer the punishment of eternal destruction.
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That's what he says. Suffer the punishment of eternal destruction.
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Now, the key word there, I think, is probably all the words are key, but particularly eternal, which literally in Greek means of the ages.
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It's plural. It's a punishment that lasts through the ages, not just for this age, but to the next age and the next age and on and on through all the ages.
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Now, if it just said, suffer the punishment of destruction, just said destruction, think how that changes it.
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Suffer the punishment of destruction. We could think legitimately, I guess, that, well, that must mean that the afflictors, the people who don't know
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God, the disobedient, they will be destroyed, right? They will be annihilated so that they don't exist anymore.
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But he says eternal destruction. Why would you say eternal destruction? If I said,
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I'm going to go out and destroy your car, right? You would think, well, wow. Okay. After it's destroyed, it's destroyed.
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It's eternally destroyed. It's kind of in the definition of destroyed. You can't destroy it anymore. It's done. But here he says they will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction.
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What he's implying is that they will be destroyed forever. Not just that the result of their destruction lasts forever.
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Again, merely saying they will suffer the punishment of destruction says that eternal suggests the act of being destroyed goes on forever.
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Not just the result, but the actual destroying. This is an ongoing, everlasting destruction.
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The punishment they suffer is to be destroyed by a destruction that never ends.
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It's not that you get to a point where you're dead and you can't be destroyed anymore. No, it just keeps, the destruction keeps on going.
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It's like being eaten by a lion that keeps mauling you, keeps slashing with its teeth and claws and biting chunks of flesh off of you, but it never kills you somehow so that the mauling never ends.
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What a horrendous thought. That's eternal destruction. This punishment will be, he says, away from the presence of the
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Lord and the glory of his might. They don't get God's presence. They don't get his glory anymore, which is what makes it so horrendous.
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Now, this doesn't mean that God isn't present. He's present everywhere, but there's none of his approval, of his blessings, which brings us everything that's good and glorious in life.
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Notice at the end of verse 9, they're away from the glory of his might. In other words, they're in a place, that's their destination.
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Their destination is where there's no glory. There's no majesty. There's no beauty. There's no light.
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And there's none of his people. They're separate. They have a different destination. Those who don't know
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God, who knew of God but suppressed that knowledge to live for money, who didn't obey the gospel by believing it, they have a destination.
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It's void of everything and anything that's good.
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It's a night with no dawn. And this punishment comes at God's righteous judgment.
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It comes again, ending in verse 10, like we began in verse 7, with when.
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When it comes. This punishment comes when he comes on that day to be glorified in his saints.
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When Jesus comes on that day to be glorified.
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It says glorified in his saints, that is the holy ones.
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How is Jesus going to be glorified? Well, one way is in his saints. You'll be able to look at his saints, his holy ones, his believers, those who did know him, those who heard the gospel, who believed it, who obeyed it.
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Jesus is glorified by them growing in faith, increasing in love, enduring in steadfastness, even under pressure or disappointment and opposition or betrayal, thus giving evidence that God had counted them worthy.
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Jesus is glorified in that. He's glorified in their lives. And so he is marveled at, that is, he's admired by.
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He's awe -inspired. The revelation of him inspires awe in those who have believed.
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That's where they're heading, a revelation that leaves us marveling in awe, amazed in wonder.
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If you believe the gospel in verse 10, that's where you're going.
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Where are you going? Well, to get there, to that revelation that leaves you marveling, you need, third, prayer for God's power.
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Prayer for God's power in those last two verses. Verse 11, to this end, that is, for this purpose, to get to that destination, that's what
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I'm concerned about, Paul says, to get there, we, Paul, Sabinus, Timothy, we, covenant, always pray,
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Paul says, always pray for you, Thessalonians, always pray for you, people of covenant.
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We pray that you'll get where you're going, to that place where you're marveling and glorified.
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We might not always pray that you get relieved from affliction, that you be comfortable and healthy and wealthy and successful.
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Notice here, Paul knows, think about this, because this is very different from what many churches put up there as prayer requests today.
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Paul knows that they're persecuted, they're afflicted, they have all these problems going on. Now, they're bearing through them, but he knows what the problems are.
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You know, they have the local Roman government suppressing them, they have the Jewish synagogue harassing them, they have the temptations they have to flee, and the pleasures they have to deny themselves, they have the complaints of unbelieving family members scolding them, you know, it's the first day of the week, why are you going off to that meeting again with those
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Christians instead of staying here and working with us? They have all this going on, all these problems they have to deal with, the mockery of pagans telling them that, you know, their pagan idols gives us better luck than Jesus does.
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They would say, well, I offered incense to Zeus last week, and look, we had good business this week, he's doing better than your
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Jesus. They would hear stuff like that. They have all this going on, common afflictions of life, they have the sicknesses and tragedies,
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Paul knows they have all that. He's boasting their perseverance of it to other churches, like to those
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Corinthians, you should see those Thessalonians, they're enduring all these things. But here, when he says he prays for them,
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I pray, what's he pray for? He doesn't pray that they'd be relieved of it, at least that's not his primary prayer.
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He doesn't pray for their protection, for their health, for prosperity, that the Roman governor would let up on them, that the
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Jewish neighbors would stop insulting them. He doesn't pray for that, at least not primarily.
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He prays instead in verses 11 and 12 for three things. First, that our God may, first again, count you worthy, his constant prayer that you may be counted.
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God may count, and it's not make, sorry ESV is usually good, but here the ESV translates it as make you worthy, but it's the same word back in verse five.
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God may count you worthy of his calling. May your endurance prove that you've had worthiness counted to you.
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That's his first prayer. Second prayer, he prays that our God may fulfill your, talking to Thessalonians, your, talking to you, your resolve, resolve, that is your enduring steadfastness that he's been boasting about.
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May that resolve, that steadfastness lead to good. May it produce good fruit in you.
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It keep growing your faith, increasing your love, and deepening your hope. And third, he prays that our
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God may fulfill their, your, your faith.
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May he fulfill, that is fill up, your faith so that it leads to powerful works.
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May he give you a belief that leads to inspired obedience.
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So it's a living faith that saves. And the purpose of all that, so that, in verse 12, he's praying for all these things.
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The final result, the destination, where you're going, so that the name of our
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Lord Jesus may be glorified in you because you have the power of a living faith, giving you something more to live for than just dollars and just thrills, things, the newest gadget that Apple puts out, ego trips.
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You live differently. And so you glorify the name of Jesus. So you, your final destination, you are glorified.
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You are transformed. You're immortal. And you are this glorified in him.
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All this happens according to the grace of our God and the
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Lord Jesus Christ. Or it could be, this is well translated, according to the grace of our God and Lord Jesus Christ, calling
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Jesus God. Either way, it happens. You are glorified by grace alone.
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So where are you going? Hopefully not to eternal destruction.
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You have the evidence in your life, the little tokens of persevering faith, tokens that show, that prove that you'll be able to present as exhibits at God's righteous judgment.
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You have that evidence that you've been counted worthy. You can't earn the worthiness as if by paying your dues, by going to church so many times or giving you the offering or whatever, you can't earn it.
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You deserve it. Earned your way in. No, it must be counted to you. But if it is, it will show.
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It'll produce evidence. Do you have the evidence that shows where you're going?