Talk of JESUS .com

Tag: encouragement

Paul’s unfinished encouragement of the Thessalonians
Previously on Paul’s Second Mission

Start New Second Missionary Journey

The apostles sailed to Macedonia, Greece and Achaia

Second major stop

Thessalonica

THESSILONICA where they proclaim the Gospel to the Jews for THREE WEEKS.

Paul’s unfinished business with the Thessalonians – 1

AND NOW, in ~ A.D. 50 Paul writes back to the Thessalonians

THREE WEEKS?

Hardly enough time to establish a firm foundation of faith in NEW BELIEVERS!

~A.D. 51 – Paul writes to encourage the Thessalonian Church

Certainly Paul and other apostles must have wondered how the Thessalonians had fared since opponents of the Gospel of Jesus Christ had forced them to exit to Berea, 100 miles away, and cities further south in Greece and Achaia.

Mentioned among these new believers were Jason (Acts 17:5), Gaius (Acts 19:29), Aristarchus (Acts 20:4), and Secundus (Acts 20:4). Source

.. and we sent Timothy, our brother and God’s fellow worker in the gospel of Christ, to strengthen and encourage you as to your faith..

.. But now that Timothy has come to us from you, and has brought us good news of your faith and love, and that you always remember us kindly, longing to see us just as we also long to see you..
Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians 3:2,6 LSB

Paul’s First letter to the Thessalonians 1:

We give thanks to God always for all of you, making mention of you in our prayers;remembering without ceasing your work of faith and labor of love and steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ before our God and Father..

The Apostle’s introductory points of encouragement

For our exhortation does not come from error or impurity or by way of deceit
1 Thessalonians 2:3 LSB
- [You are] brothers beloved by God
- your election [by God]
- our gospel [came] to you in power and in the Holy Spirit
- You know what kind of men we proved to be among you for your sake.
- You also became imitators of us and of the Lord [JESUS]
Even though these apostles had not remained in this city of some 200,000 Macedonians, comparable to a Common Era U.S. city of Columbus Ohio, to endure further persecution by the Judaizers, Paul and some of the other apostles would have known from their previous persecutions the afflictions of these new Thessalonian believers.
- You [Thessalonians] have had much affliction [YET] with the joy of the Holy Spirit.
.. you became a model to all the believers in Macedonia and in Achaia.

For the word of the Lord has sounded forth from you, not only in Macedonia and Achaia, but also in every place your faith toward God has gone forth..
First Letter of Paul to the Thessalonians 1:7b-8a Legacy Standard Bible

.. just as you know how we were exhorting G3870 and encouraging and bearing witness to each one of you as a father would his own children..
1 Thessalonians 2:11 LSB
```
Do you get the picture of evangelism by way of example of our Christ-like love in the community of our local church?
```
19 For who is our hope or joy or crown of boasting? Is it not even you, before our Lord Jesus at His coming?

20 For you are our glory and joy.

Roman ACHAIA (as we studied in ACTS) includes Athens of ancient Greece as an intellectual center

AND CORINTH, its capital and largest city of ~100,000 (including its rural areas).

Corinth – 1st Church Plant in ACHAIA

It is from Corinth that Paul writes back to the Thessalonians in ~ A.D. 51

Practical Christianity for NEW Christians in Thessalonica

we ask and exhort you in the Lord Jesus, that as you received from us as to how you ought to [conduct yourselves] walk and please God (just as you actually do walk), that you excel still more.

* Specific Ways to excel still more in holiness, hope and love.
```
* source
```
2 For you know what commandments we gave you through the Lord Jesus.

PAUL’s HELPFUL LIST:
- abstain from [porneia] sexual immorality
- know how to possess his own [*]vessel in sanctification and honor
  - not in lustful passion
```
* (literally or figuratively [specially, a wife as contributing to the usefulness of the husband]):—goods, sail, stuff, vessel. 
```
Paul’s extensive metaphor mentioning ‘lustful passion’ ‘and that no man transgress and defraud his brother in the matter‘ pointedly establishes the standard of a monogamous marriage to a faithful wife by the Thessalonian brothers and without any adultery or coveting another man’s ‘vessel.’

Sanctification

Sanctification is the theological term describing a refining of our holiness in Christ.

⁷For God did not call us to impurity, but in sanctification.

⁸Consequently, he who sets this aside is not setting aside man but the God who gives His Holy Spirit to you.
1 Thessalonians 4:7-8 LSB

God has called us to live holy lives, not impure lives. – 1 Thessalonians 4:7 New Living Translation
```
IS YOUR CALL TO CHRIST NOW SANCTIFIED IN HOLINESS?
```
Now concerning love of the brothers

‘Now as to the love of the brothers and sisters..’ reads the NASB20:

φιλαδελφία

1 Thessalonians 4:9

This LOVE is NOT erotic ‘love’ with which the world is enamored and against which Paul has already cautioned, but rather a familial love of a biological brother, i.e. philadelphia.
```
How many christians, knowing better, have transgressed that line of love?

And as if to further warn believers concerning our sanctification in the loves of Christ Jesus, Paul adds:
```
“.. for you yourselves are taught by God to love one another..”

This most personal, godly LOVE is agapaō.

ἀγαπᾶν ἀλλήλους

agapaō allēlōn

you yourselves are taught by GOD [theodidaktos] to Love one another.

of persons

to welcome, to entertain, to be fond of, to love dearly

of things

to be well pleased, to be contented at or with a thing

—each other, mutual, one another, (the other), (them-
- make it your ambition to lead a quiet life
- attend to your own business
- work with your hands
- walk [peripateō – lit. ‘behave‘] properly toward outsiders
  - have need of nothing
DEATH & LIFE

The Apostle Paul closes his first letter to the Thessalonians with a contemporary issue of the A.D. 50’s an ETERNAL and timeless warning also applicable in these last days of the Common Era of the 2020’s.

TWO TIMELINES
- ~A.D. 30 – JESUS Christ crucified by a Roman Governor [Pilate]
- A.D. 50’s – Paul, an Apostle of the risen CHRIST writes to the Thessalonians as ALL still live under ROMAN rule.
- A.D. 70 (Twenty years after Paul’s letter) – ROME besieges Jerusalem, drives out the Judeans and destroys the Temple of the Herod’s.
A COMMON ERA CAUTION
9/11/2001 C.E.

~ twenty years ago
2021 of the Common Era

TODAY’s contemporary challenges to Christians
- 2044 of the Common Era
  - Twenty years from TODAY? ? ?
```
Without stepping into an apocalyptic mire of last days, let's briefly glance at Paul's exhortation for Christians living for an eternal God.
```
Therefore comfort one another with these words.
- Do not grieve for those in Christ who have died.
IF WE BELIEVE..
- Jesus died and rose again
  - (John tells us that those are still living among the 500+ men who witnessed Christ’s resurrection just 20 years earlier.)
- God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep [died] in Jesus.
- .. the Lord Himself will descend from heaven..
  - and the dead in Christ will rise first.
  - [Those] who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them [believers who have died] in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air..
    
    NOW, in these last days of the Common Era, this would now include these Thessalonians along with other saints to whom the Apostle wrote.
- and so we shall always be with the Lord.
Therefore comfort one another with these words.

.. the day of the Lord will come just like a thief in the night. While they are saying, “Peace and safety!” then destruction will come upon them suddenly..
Thessalonians 5:2b-3a LSB

4 But you, brothers, are not in darkness, that the day would overtake you like a thief..
```
Paul then reminds us once more of our obedient sanctification in Christ.
```
.. let us be awake and sober.

For God has not appointed us for wrath, but for obtaining salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, so that whether we are awake or asleep, we will live together with Him.
Paul’s First Letter to the Thessalonians 5:9-10 ~ A.D. 51

Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you entirely, and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved complete, without blame at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Faithful is He who calls you, who also will do it.

Comment on Scripture + Share the Gospel

Letters in your spare time

Letters from the Apostle Paul — To be continued… God-willing…
February 7, 2024
Talking for hours with the prophet Paul
.. when we were gathered together to break bread, Paul talked with them..
Acts 20:7b ESV

Talk of Jesus into the late night hours

Our focus on this late-night incident in Troas is Paul’s midnight talk of JESUS and its impact on the Church. My secondary focus is a role of Paul we may not have considered as today’s TITLE suggests.

Acts 20:

And upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul preached unto them, ready to depart on the morrow; and continued his speech until midnight.
Acts pf the Apostles 20:7 KJV

A.D. 52-57
```
The following 2-part post from just six verses in Acts 20 and Paul's third missionary journey focuses on two topics:

1. An extra long sermon (not so unusual for ANY pastor so it would seem) AND 
2. an extraordinary sign suggesting that Paul is also a Prophet of Almighty God.
```
a Sunday service before their Monday departure

Luke records in Acts 20 that the Apostle Paul is already on his way home.

Strategic Retreat of Paul to Troas

And we sailed from Philippi after the days of Unleavened Bread, and came to them at Troas within five days; and there we stayed seven days. – Acts of the Apostles 20:6

a weekly Sunday worship
```
Let's not miss the context and content of this day which was likely sometime in the year of our Lord 56. 
```
Call it what you like: worship, a service, gathering or mass. These Christians of Troas welcomed Paul and his missionary companions into their weekly time together as a community in Christ.

And on the first day of the week, when we were gathered together to break bread..

Holy Communion

About this same time [A.D. 55 or 56] in his first letter back to the church in Corinth Paul will also instruct worshipers to obediently partake in the remembrance of the Lord Jesus.

1 Corinthians 11:2 LSB For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus in the night in which He was being betrayed took bread, and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said,

“This is My body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of Me.”

In the same way He took the cup also after supper, saying,

“This cup is the new covenant in My blood; do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me.”

The Sermon of a Church Father
```
Note that Paul is NOT the local day-to-day Pastor and Shepherd of this church. The Apostle speaks to a large group gathered in Troas for worship. 

A crowded Christian gathering in an upper room anticipates Paul's Spirit-led exhortation [encouragement, both positive and cautionary].

AND Paul's 'talk' was not simply a one-man sermon to the flock without response but included extended additional dialogue.
```
Paul began speaking to them.. [began talking in the NASB & others]

διαλέγομαι – in the Greek – discuss (in argument or exhortation):—dispute, preach (unto), reason (with), speak.

The AV translates it “preached,” in Act 20:7, 9; this the RV corrects to “discoursed,” lit., “dialogue,” i.e., not by way of a sermon, but by a “discourse” of a more conversational character.

Source: Vine’s Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words – Strong’s G1256 – dialegomai

Paul kept talking until midnight. He prolonged his speech or message.

Luke uses the root word describing this dialogue (dialegomai) of Paul’s message lasting until midnight for these believers.

λόγος – logos – Strong’s G3056 – logos – a word, discourse, doctrine, teaching ..
- of speech
  - a word, uttered by a living voice, embodies a conception or idea
  - what someone has said
  - discourse
  - doctrine, teaching
    
    MORE –
```
Luke opens ACTS using this same word referring to his Gospel as his 'first account' [prōtos logos].
```
Scene of this late service

(for dialogue between the men of the church)

Luke does not mention the time of their regular Sunday worship.

It could have been nine or eleven in the morning. Perhaps it was an evening service planned for after the saints typically ate their evening meal at home with their families.
```
SEE Paul's mention of this in 1 Corinthians 11:17-22 THE LORD'S SUPPER
```
```
Acts of the Apostles 20:8 LSB
```
Now there were many lamps in the upper room where we were gathered together. And there was a young man named Eutychus sitting on the windowsill, sinking into a deep sleep.

Have you ever known someone to fall asleep ‘in church’ when their flesh could no longer bear another word of the pastor’s sermon or discussion of an unseen God and the Lord JESUS?

This young man, a boy likely brought by his father to the upper room of their evening service precariously perched himself in an open window where air circulated into the crowded place of worship.

BUT he just couldn’t last through all the long talk of JESUS by the Apostle Paul and others.
```
(Perhaps by midnight what little breeze had revived the boy had subsided into stillness.)
```
He FELL to his death!

DEATH! a sudden ending

Eutychus, being fallen into a deep sleep: and as Paul was long preaching, he sunk down with sleep, and fell down from the third loft, and was taken up dead.
ACTS of the Apostles 20:9 KJV

This sudden incident brought the church meeting and Paul’s talk to an abrupt end.

The boy’s father and worshipers listening to Paul’s talk must have been stunned as the young man suddenly fell to his death.

So these men rushed downstairs and then outside to witness the apparent tragedy of the young man Eutychus for themselves.

a Sign of Life and Power through Paul

But Paul went down and fell upon him..
Acts of the Apostles 20:10a
```
What Luke records NEXT in his account is both significant and perhaps largely ignored in 21st century C.E. preaching about the early history of the Church.

THEREFORE, we will leave the outcome of this evening for NEXT time and by way of comparison also look at Scripture concerning other Prophets (as I have suggested of the Apostle Paul).
```
ACTS of the Apostles – To Be Continued… in A.D. 1st c. Troas, God-willing

Comment on Scripture + Share the Gospel
December 5, 2023
Saul: Encouragement in Christ from Cypress
Now Joseph, a Levite of Cyprian birth, who was also called Barnabas by the apostles (which translated means Son of Encouragement) owned a tract of land. So he sold it, and brought the money and laid it at the apostles’ feet.
ACTS of the disciples of the Apostles 4:36-37 NASB20

Encouragement of Christ’s Apostles by Joseph of Cypress

“Just a moment,” you are likely thinking. “I remember this from That’s Not Fair! Possessions and Community, but I thought that now Luke is talking about Saul of Tarsus in Acts 9?”

Last time, Luke’s account included not only Saul of Tarsus on the road to Damascus, CALLED BY THE RISEN CHRIST JESUS, but also a two disciples of The Way: Ananias, to whom the Lord spoke in a vision, and Judas of Damascus (in the house on Straight Street where BOTH encouraged the blinded and FEARED Saul of Tarsus.)

παράκλησις – more than just Encouragement
```
click here for more encouragement
```
Of course if the Lord had appeared to you directly, as was the case with both Ananias and Saul, YOU too would obey. But just as Jesus had called James and John a descriptive nickname, “the Sons of Thunder,” and called “Simon son of John, Peter or ‘the Rock,’ so have Peter and the Apostles had named Joseph, Barnabas, or Son of Encouragement.
- paraklēsis Outline of Biblical Usage
  - a calling near, summons, (esp. for help)
  - importation, supplication, entreaty
  - exhortation, admonition, encouragement
  - consolation (14x), comfort, solace; that which affords comfort or refreshment
- thus of the Messianic salvation (so the Rabbis call the Messiah (or Christ, in Greek) the consoler, the comforter)
  - persuasive discourse, stirring address
    (the speech of Stephen to the sanhedrin?)
  - instructive, admonitory, conciliatory, powerful hortatory discourse
- (much of the preaching of Paul we are about to hear on his missionary journeys in Acts of the Apostles and his letters to the Churches.)
נַחֲמ֥וּ נַחֲמ֖וּ עַמִּ֑י יֹאמַ֖ר אֱלֹהֵיכֶֽם׃
2 דַּבְּר֞וּ עַל־לֵ֤ב יְרֽוּשָׁלִַ֙ם֙ וְקִרְא֣וּ אֵלֶ֔יהָ כִּ֤י מָֽלְאָה֙ צְבָאָ֔הּ כִּ֥י נִרְצָ֖ה עֲוֺנָ֑הּ כִּ֤י לָקְחָה֙ מִיַּ֣ד יְהוָ֔ה כִּפְלַ֖יִם בְּכָל־חַטֹּאתֶֽיהָ׃ ס
3 ק֣וֹל קוֹרֵ֔א בַּמִּדְבָּ֕ר פַּנּ֖וּ דֶּ֣רֶךְ יְהוָ֑ה יַשְּׁרוּ֙ בָּעֲרָבָ֔ה מְסִלָּ֖ה לֵאלֹהֵֽינוּ׃
Isaiah 40:1-3 “Comfort, comfort my people,” says your God.

Encouragement & Comfort

Encouragement and comfort become the Gospel Good NEWS to a God-pursued people. And let’s not forget the context of persecution of both Jews and Christians not only in Acts of the Apostles, but throughout the history of the world.

Skipping ahead just a bit in Luke’s account before we proceed with Saul of Tarsus:

ACTS 9:31

So the church throughout Judea, Galilee, and Samaria enjoyed peace, as it was being built up; and as it continued in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort G3874 of the Holy Spirit, it kept increasing.

And later in ACTS 11:19 Luke gives us the present context of Saul in Jerusalem in Acts 9:

So then those who were scattered because of the persecution that occurred in connection with Stephen made their way to Phoenicia, Cyprus, and Antioch, speaking the word to no one except to Jews alone.
Acts 11:19 NASB20

Tarsus of Saul, Cypress of Joseph, Damascus of Ananias, Phoenicia (Lebanon) Antioch is in Syria – God into all the world…

Escape from Damascus
```
Previously..
```
Who is this Saul, Apostle to the Gentiles?

I went away to Arabia, and returned once more to Damascus.

ACTS 9: of Saul in Damascus

Saul was with the disciples in Damascus for some time.

20 Immediately he began proclaiming Jesus in the synagogues: “He is the Son of God.”

21 All who heard him were astounded and said, “Isn’t this the man in Jerusalem who was causing havoc for those who called on this name and came here for the purpose of taking them as prisoners to the chief priests?”

22 But Saul grew stronger and kept confounding the Jews who lived in Damascus by proving that Jesus is the Messiah.
```
Saul leaves Damascus, spends three years in the wilderness of Arabia, THEN returns.
```
23 After many days had passed, the Jews conspired to kill him, but Saul learned of their plot. So they were watching the gates day and night intending to kill him, but his disciples..

[NOTE Luke’s description, that these are now disciples of the Apostle Saul of Tarsus!]

..took him by night and lowered him in a large basket through an opening in the wall.
```
ACTS of SAUL OF TARSUS to be continued in Jerusalem...
```
March 9, 2022