Sermon Tone Analysis

Lyle Shelton vs John Dickson

Most of you will have heard of Lyle Shelton

Former head of the Australian Christian Lobby.

Famous for leading the opposition to Same Sex Marriage a few years ago.

A Christian.

I’ve met him.

He seems like a genuine guy.

And here’s John Dickson.

Maybe less of you have heard of him.

He’s also a Christian.

Also a public figure.

I’ve also met him.

He also seems like a good dude.

Dickson believes all the same things about marraige that Lyle Shelton does.

Is a public Australian Christian.

Goes on things like Q&A.

Spoke publically about same sex marraige during the debate.

But interestingly enough, it seems to me that people hate Shelton, and respect Dickson.

Now on the day the yes vote was annouced a hashtag trended on twitter that’s not appropriate to repeat in church regarding Lyle Shelton.

Not so for Dickson.

Now yes there’s complexity about this and why this is and the nature of politics and the media.

And I don’t mean to be making comments about these two men as individual Christians and how they’re going with Jesus.

That’s up to their own pastors and people who actually know them to do.

But nonetheless I think these two men are a useful cultural illustration of what Paul is talking about today.

Live holy lives in a way that might win respect in an unholy world.

Or if not respect at the very least not outright derision.

From History to Holy Living

So far we’ve had a personal and historical account of Paul and the Thessalonians relationship and ministry.

Paul as we saw last week in Ch 3, has been overjoyed to hear of the Thessalonians faith:

But it seems that perhaps Timothy also might have said that the Thessalonians needed to be encouraged to keep striving to live holy lives.

They may have had the tendency to give in to and conform to some of the ways of the society around them.

Paul moves now to address these concerns and to encourage them, to live holy lives in order to please God (4:1).

It’s an encouragement to strive for more, not a rebuke to the ungodly.

You are living to please God, do this more.

Every Christian needs to be on a growth trajectory.

Every Christian needs to be reminded what it is to live a holy life in response to what God has done for us in Jesus Christ.

Every Christian needs to be humble and teachable and seek feedback from God’s word as to what areas of their life they need to keep working on.

This is all in respone to what God has done.

Remember:

God has caused them, and us to see respond positively to the good news about Jesus.

Now they and us if we’ve put our faith and trust in Jesus need to keep working on our lives so that they reflect our faith in God.

So what are the areas Paul encourages the Thessalonians to continue to work on?

Sexuality (1 Thes 4:3-8)

Paul is writing from Corinth to Thessalonica.

Both cities were famous in the Graeco-Roman world for their immorality.

Thessalonica was associated with the worship of deities called the Cabiri who had some fairly shady and immoral sexual practices associated with their worship.

Professor F.F. Bruce says of the world at the time Paul was writing to the church in Thessalonica:

A man might have a mistress (hetaira) who could provide him also with intellectual companionship; the institution of slavery made it easy for him to have a concubine (pallakē), while casual gratification was readily available from a harlot (pornē).

The function of his wife was to manage his household and to be the mother of his legitimate children and heirs.

Likewise, another scholar William Lecky talks about during this early period of the Roman Empire the cities of Greece and Asia Minor were known for their sexual licence.

He writhes that these cities, places like Thessalonica, “had become centres of the wildest corruption”.

And again he says, “There has probably never been a period when vice was more extravagant or uncontrolled”.

So as you can see, the Christian lived in a world where societies view of sex was a lot different to God’s good design.

And that meant the pressure was on to conform.

What is God’s good design?

Laid out in creation Gen 2:18-24:

Male and female created for each other.

To complement each other.

From the very beginning the bible pictures marraige as a monogamous, hetrosexual relationship.

Jesus picks up on the creation story in his own teaching on marraige in Matthew 19:

Paul also picks up on the teachings of Jesus and the OT in Ephesians 5 when he teaches on marraige

Man and woman in monogamus sexual relationship for life.

This reflects something of the realtionship between Christ and the church.

What if you’re not married?

The bbile is fairly clear on that too: You’re called to celibacy.

Not having sex.

In fact, Jesus commends celibacy as a way of life when teaching on marraige in Matthew 19:

“there are those who choose to live like eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven” (v12).

And Paul likewise talks up the life of celibacy:

Celibacy is good!

Say Paul and Jesus.

But if you want to have sex… hetrosexual marriage is the place for sex.

The bible in fact encourages a healthy sex life for married couples in 1 Cor 7:5 - “don’t deprive each other”.

But if you’re not married then you are called to celibacy.

But this isn’t second best.

This is a gift from God that allows you to focus fully on the kingdom.

Now just like in Paul’s day, the pressure is on for us as Christians, to not live out our sexual ethics.

This is important to note.

Because sometimes we can think oh, Paul or Jesus or those Old Testasment people they were just prudes, and we know better now.

But in fact, they lived in a culture that was just as if not more sexually permissive and peverse as we do and they preached and taught a conservative sexual ethic as the way to live a holy life.

And in fact I think ultimately Paul’s teaching on living out Godly sexual ethics is good news in our #metoo world.

Let me read again from our reading today:

Don’t be like Harvey Weinsten and use others for your own advantage.

Don’t do whatever you want in terms of sex and risk hurting others.

Rather be holy and honourable and seek to respect your fellow human beings by treating them not as sexual objects, but as brothers and sisters.

Keep sex out of all your relationships except with your spouse and things will go much better for you.

Men don’t treat women as sex objects.

Women don’t treat men as sex objects.

Rather control your bodies.

And express the gift of your sexuality in ways that are pleasing to God.

This actually will bring you the greatest joy.

Sadly many in the church reject God’s teaching about what it means to avoid sexual immorality.

They say it doesn’t matter if you have sex before marriage.

They say it’s ok to have sex with people of the same gender.

But what does the bible tell us about people who say these things?

If you love God.

If you truly believe in him.

If you are allowing His Holy Spirit to mould you and shape you, you will do what he says.

And he calls us to holy living in all areas of life including in how we express our sexuality.

Check out: https://www.gafcon.org/resources/the-gift-of-marriage-biblical-foundations - for a fuller expalantion of what the bible teaches about marraige.