Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction

Wouldn’t you like to be the kind of people that people outside the church think you are? Think about it for a moment—what is one reason outsiders like to give when you invite them to visit here?

“Oh, if I showed up there, the roof would cave in!” “Oh, I don’t belong with ‘church people...’” There’s this assumption on the part of unchurched people that they wouldn’t fit in at church because everyone there has it all together!

That “church people” have their lives all sorted out, everything works, they don’t have any bad habits or failures; church people have life figured out, and so they tend to look down on people who don’t.

Now, of course, we don’t want to be that kind of “church people”—judgmental and pompous about our spiritual perfections.

In fact, if anything, we are acutely aware of how far we are from “spiritual perfection”, aren’t we?

Over the years, this has led me to start describing our fellowship here at Bethel Baptist as “The Island Of Misfit Toys”—we’re the Charlie in the Box and grape-jelly squirt gun and train with square wheels and doll that cries ice cubes—we’re not the group to look down on anyone who has a mess of a life!

But at the same time, we aren’t a congregation that revels in being the polka-dotted elephant of churches.

We don’t want to be a church that takes some sort of weird pride in ourselves for being “misfits”—we want to be the kind of church that the Thessalonian church was.

The Apostle Paul could say about them that

1 Thessalonians 1:2 (ESV)

2 We give thanks to God always for all of you, constantly mentioning you in our prayers,

This is the kind of church that we want to be, isn’t it?

We want to be a church to thank God for!

Now, I want to say this next part carefully, because it’s typically the kind of thing that a preacher doesn’t really say out loud.

But these are days in which we can’t afford to be coy or to speak in insubstantial generalities.

We need to speak plainly.

Some of you have recently started attending here at Bethel because you are looking for something that you have not found in other churches you have attended.

And I hasten to say at this juncture what many of you have already heard me say about other congregations and other ministries and other churches that you may have been involved in— “Not my circus; not my monkeys!”

I have plenty to answer for before God someday for this church family; I certainly don’t need to be throwing my two cents in about anyone else’s pastorate or congregation or church.

So what we are about to dive into here in this passage is not about any other church that you have attended.

This is about what we want this church to be.

If you have come here recently—or if you have been a member here for decades—you want to belong to a church that you can thank God for.

And here in our text Paul lays out exactly why he thanks God for the church in Thessalonica.

And so here is the way we can say it this morning:

A church to thank God for is a church that cultivates GOSPEL-rooted VIRTUE

These virtues are spelled out in verse 3:

1 Thessalonians 1:3 (ESV)

3 remembering before our God and Father your work of faith and labor of love and steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.

For the Apostle Paul, these three virtues were the three pillars of a church to thank God for.

Over and over in the New Testament he structures his exhortations to churches around faith, hope and love:

1 Corinthians 13:13 (ESV)

13 So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

Romans 5:1-2,5 (ESV)

1 Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. 2 Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.... 5 and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.

Galatians 5:5–6 (ESV)

5 For through the Spirit, by faith, we ourselves eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness.

6 For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love.

And here in our text Paul grounds his thankfulness for the Thessalonian church on the same three virtues.

A church to thank God for is

I.

A Church with a faith that WORKS (cf.

Acts 17:4ff)

In verse 3, Paul says he and Silas and Timothy

1 Thessalonians 1:3 (ESV)

3 [remember] before our God and Father your work of faith...

Every year up at the Sykesville fairgrounds there is an exhibition of antique farm tractors.

It’s entertaining for us because one of the tractors on display is a vintage 1950’s-era John Deere Model B—it’s perfectly preserved, pristine paint job and authentic upholstered seat, shiny clutch drum, working headlamps—a beautiful specimen of a 70-year old tractor.

Well, we have a John Deere B in our barn that Dad has been using for as long as I remember.

It doesn’t look anything like the show model at the fair—because it is a tractor that works.

No shiny paint job or perfectly tuned engine—just a tractor that pulls its weight and does the job.

Beloved, there are far too many people who go to church every Sunday with the equivalent of a show tractor—they polish up their faith and put it on display on Sunday, but other than that it is sitting in the shed, ignored and unnecessary until the next time there is a show to take it to.

A church full of that kind of “faith” is not a church to thank God for.

A church to thank God for is a church full of people who aren’t just coming to show off their “faith” once a week—a church to thank God for is a church full of people whose faith has been at work all week!

A working faith isn’t just for show--

It TRANSFORMS your heart (cp.

Acts 17:4; 1 Thess.

2:14)

Paul is rejoicing at how the Thessalonians have been changed by their faith in Christ—when Paul went into the synagogue and presented the Good News of the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus the Messiah,

Acts 17:3–4 (ESV)

3 explaining and proving that it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead, and saying, “This Jesus, whom I proclaim to you, is the Christ.” 4 And some of them were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas, as did a great many of the devout Greeks and not a few of the leading women.

—it changed their lives.

They could not go back to their previous way of life; they had been transformed from the inside out.

Instead of being conformed to the world, they were transformed by the renewal of their minds and hearts.

Their faith was not just for “show”; as we’ll see in a moment, their faith worked in them to produce changes that set them at odds with the rest of the city:

1 Thessalonians 2:14 (ESV)

14 For you, brothers, became imitators of the churches of God in Christ Jesus that are in Judea.

For you suffered the same things from your own countrymen as they did from the Jews,

Paul rejoiced that the Thessalonians had a working faith, because he could see the way it transformed their hearts.

And consider also how Paul was gladdened by the Thessalonians’ working faith—that transformation of their hearts was a great comfort to him.

This is another characteristic of a working faith;

It ENCOURAGES one another

Paul was greatly encouraged to see the Thessalonian church’s living and active faith.

This is due in part to the fact that he had to leave town in a hurry, being driven out by enemies of the Gospel.

But seeing their perseverance and working faith was a great joy and comfort for him:

1 Thessalonians 2:17, 19-20 (ESV)

17 But since we were torn away from you, brothers, for a short time, in person not in heart, we endeavored the more eagerly and with great desire to see you face to face… 19 For what is our hope or joy or crown of boasting before our Lord Jesus at his coming?

Is it not you?

20 For you are our glory and joy.

A church family that exhibits this kind of living, active, working faith—faith that they clearly live in every day, faith that transforms their every day lives—is faith that greatly encourages everyone who sees it.

A church with faith that works is a church to thank God for.

A church to thank God for is a church that cultivates Gospel-rooted virtue.

It is a church with a faith that works, and see also in our text that it is

II.

A Church with a love that LABORS (cf.

Acts 17:9)

1 Thessalonians 1:3 (ESV)

3 remembering before our God and Father your work of faith and labor of love...

A working faith—follow me closely here—produces work!

This is the point of the book of James, that “faith without works is dead”—when your faith is a working faith, it will put you to work!

As we like to say, we are saved by faith alone, but the faith that saves is never alone—the sign of a living, working faith in your life is that it produces loving labor.

The Greek word for “labor” here indicates troublesome labor, hard work, sacrificial work on behalf of the one you love.

A church to thank God for is a church that will

Strive in our love for ONE ANOTHER

Paul thanks God for the sacrificial labor that the Thessalonian church carried out on his behalf: When the city broke out in a riot over the accusations of treason leveled against Paul, Silas and Timothy, the city magistrates made the church pay an indemnity against any further trouble Paul and his friends might cause~

Acts 17:9 (ESV)

9 And when they had taken money as security from Jason and the rest, they let them go.

See how the Thessalonian’s love for Paul and his associates caused them to sacrifice—they paid a fine in order to allow them to leave the city.

They didn’t hesitate to put their resources, their money, their energy to the aid of their brothers.

Their working faith led them to sacrifice for each other out of their love for one another.

That is a church to thank God for, isn’t it?