Eschatology – a walk from Thessaloniki to the holy city

Paul has already given the Thessalonians walking instructions to please God more. So why does the Apostle to the gentiles proceed toward eschatology and their walk in the last days?

1 Thessalonians 4:

Consequently, he who sets this aside is not setting aside man but the God who gives His Holy Spirit to you.

1 Thessalonians 4:8 LSB

Sanctification and your Walk Toward Holiness

Paul actually holds the Thessalonians up as an example of brotherly love to other churches.

But we urge you, brothers, to do this more and more, 11 and to aspire to live quietly, and to mind your own affairs, and to work with your hands, as we instructed you, 12 so that you may walk properly before outsiders and be dependent on no one.

” Walk properly before outsiders.”

The Apostle’s letter commends the Thessalonian example of love that makes their witness to OTHER gentiles a genuine light of Christ Jesus.

Sanctification

Before we dig into any deep study of the nature of God’s plan for the end times, let’s recall a simple definition from last time critical to understanding why Paul and other Apostles require the GENTILES to walk in purity as faithful followers of the LORD.

1. consecration, purification,
2. the effect of consecration: sanctification of heart and life,

ἁγιασμός hagiasmos, hag-ee-as-mos’; properly, purification, i.e. (the state) purity; concretely (by Hebraism) a purifier:—holiness, sanctification.

STRONGS G38 – blueletterbible.org

Note the connection of purity traditionally associated by the JEWS with holiness.

In many strict applications of Hebrew LAW a Jew (separated to the LORD) could NOT remain pure or HOLY by contact or association with any GENTILE. The BLOOD of THE NEW COVENANT of Jesus Christ changed this!

The beginning of the last days (and fulfillment of JEWISH Scripture) began with the teaching and Sacrifice of Jesus, God the Father’s Perfect and Holy Son.

Roger@TalkofJesus.com

Eschatology

The term “eschatology” comes from two Greek terms e[scato” and lovgo” meaning (roughly speaking) “last, end, or final” and “study of,” respectively. Theologically speaking, then, the term eschatology refers to “the study of final things” in the Bible. It concerns both personal eschatological issues such as death and the intermediate state as well as themes with a more general or corporate focus. The latter would include such ideas as the return of Christ, resurrection, judgment, tribulation, the millennial kingdom, and the eternal state.

Bible.org

Even discussion of your DEATH is eschatological.

And of course any more complete study of our walk with God before and after death goes beyond the scope of this letter from the apostles to the Thessalonians.

WHAT NEXT?

Where does your body go? Does you spirit sleep, go directly to Paradise or wait somewhere this side of the highest Heaven for a Judgment of your mortal life?

HOW WAS YOUR WALK with JESUS CHRIST so far and until your inevitable DEATH?

Will HE know you?

What happens to the earth? 
Will Thessaloniki Greece (or anywhere else) burn up and those who did NOT flee our own City of Destruction face the WRATH of GOD?

 How will we escape the sin of our own disobedience to the Lord Jesus Christ and the judgment of the SON Sacrificed on a CROSS?

Paul’s warning to the Thessalonians

WALK TO THE END (even if it is unexpected).

¹³ But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope.

Like every faithful follower of Christ Jesus SOME OF YOU HAVE DIED. Do not mourn their loss.

14 For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep.

Want to talk of JESUS during this walk of these last days?

It's no different TODAY in the year of our Lord 2023 than it was in A.D. 51 for the Thessalonians. 

SOME have died AND Jesus will return for them. BUT WAIT, there's more only for you who walk with the Lord on the Day of His return... 

For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord,

that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep.

16 For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God.

And the dead in Christ will rise first.

Taken UP to the HOLY CITY!

Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air,
and so we will always be with the Lord.

1 Letter of Paul to the Thessalonians 4:17 ESV

18 Therefore encourage one another with these words.

And in THE END..

First Epistle of Paul to the Thessalonians 5:

Although the apostles to the gentiles Paul, Silas and Timothy encourage these Thessalonian believers to walk in the faith of what they know and have already been taught Paul will later write a second letter addressing these same things.

Now concerning the times and the seasons, brothers, you have no need to have anything written to you. For you yourselves are fully aware that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night. While people are saying,

“There is peace and security,” then sudden destruction will come upon them as labor pains come upon a pregnant woman, and they will not escape.

4 But you are not in darkness, brothers, for that day to surprise you like a thief.

I encourage you, even exhort you my fellow believers to READ THE REST of Paul's letter. - RH

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8 But since we belong to the day, let us be sober, having put on the breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet the hope of salvation.

9 For God has not destined us for wrath,

but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us so that whether we are awake or asleep we might live with him.

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