Enfleshing Love!
Sermon for October 23, 2005
1. Good Morning! Let us pray. O Lord, may the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be pleasing to You O Lord our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.
2. Opening Comments: The key verses in this morning’s reading were
in verse 8 of 1 Thessalonians chapter 1 and in Matthew’s Gospel chapter 22
verses 37 through 39.
In Matthew we hear Jesus telling us what it
takes to be a Christian: Matt. 22:37 Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord
your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all
your mind.’ 38 This is the
first and greatest commandment. 39
And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang
on these two commandments.” Love God and love our neighbors! We all hear Deacon Dave recite these words
every Sunday. It’s the summary of the
Law!
And in Paul’s first letter to the Christians
in Thessalonica we hear him writing to a congregation who are doing a pretty
good job of this. I would love
to receive a letter beginning like this from Paul to TCC.
Now I want to add here that God has a few concerns with the Thessalonians, as I’m sure He does with us but today let’s focus on the good shall we?
Let’s see what it is about these Thessalonians that God wants to encourage us to imitate.
You see, in these opening words God is revealing to us His heart’s desire for us and indeed, for all Christians everywhere. This is what He’s calling us out to become more and more like.
3. So what does a Thessalonian Christian look like? Let’s explore that together but first let me give us all some background information to set the scene, as it were.
Ancient
Thessalonica which is known today as Salonika was located on the coast of north-eastern
Paul’s arrival in Thessalonica was a momentous
occasion. For anyone who can read
between the lines the story of Paul’s coming to
Paul was on his
second Missionary journey. He had
passed through the provinces of Phrygia and
So he came to Alexandrian Troas, still uncertain where he
ought to go,; and then there came to him a vision in
the night of a man who cried, “Come over into
He landed first in
Paul was being drawn by the Holy Spirit on a quest that would not only conquer the then known world but would ultimately conquer the entire world! Paul was in fact like the Alexander of old with a much greater vision of conquest! - nothing less than world dominion!
It’s impossible to overstress the importance of the
arrival of Christianity in Thessalonica.
If Christianity was settled there, it was bound to spread east along the Egnatian route
until all Asia was conquered and west until
it stormed even the city of
Paul stayed in
Thessalonica for only three Sabbaths (Acts 17:2) which means that his stay
there could not have been much more than three weeks in length. He had
such tremendous success that the Jews were enraged and raised so much
trouble that Paul had to be smuggled out, in peril of his life to Beroea. The same
thing happened in Beroea (Acts 17:10-12) and Paul had
to leave Timothy and Silas behind and make his escape to
All of this drama was testimony to the fact that the message that Paul brought with him deeply moved people to action – those for him and his Lord and those against him and his Lord!
His fantastic
success in Thessalonica and Beroea forshadowed his success in the rest of
So when Timothy rejoined him in Athens Paul sent him back to Thessalonica to see how the Gospel was spreading in that city. When Timothy returned with his news the first and second letters to the Thessalonians were Paul’s immediate response.
4.
Focus
on Scripture. OK, now we’re ready to
focus in on 1Thessalonians chapter 1 verses 5 through
10. Remember that God wants to
reveal to us the secret of vital Christianity that was clearly operative in
Paul and all who were touched by God’s Good News through him.
Listen as Paul
ministers to this new and vital and growing Christian community in
Thessalonica. His words are for us – for
we are like this Thessalonian community in many ways.
This time I want
to read it from the “Message” translation by Eugene Peterson – he translation clarifies some of the vagueness that we find
in the more literal translations:
1Thssalonians
1:5-10:
1. When the Message we
preached came to you, it wasn’t just words. Something happened in you. The Holy
Spirit put steel in your convictions. You paid careful
attention to the way we lived among you, 6 and determined to live that
way yourselves. In imitating us, you imitated the Master. In other words, they didn’t just hear the
“Good News” they took it into themselves and began to incarnate it – they enfleshed it! (Talk about our becoming incarnational – sacramentals!)
Now let’s return
to our Scripture – verse 6:
6. Although great
trouble accompanied the Word, you were able to take great joy from the Holy
Spirit!—taking the trouble with the joy, the joy with the trouble.
1Th. 1:7 Do you know that all over the provinces of both
Ah! did you hear that? Look with me again at verse 8 – “Your very lives are echoing
the Master’s Word, not only in the provinces but all over the place. The news of your faith is out. We don’t even have to say anything more –
you’re the message!
Look at the first few words of verse 8 again:
“Your
very lives are echoing the Master’s Word!”
A more literal translation of those words
would be:
“The
Lord’s message rang out from you.” (NIV) or,
“The
word of the Lord sounded forth from you.” (ESV”
It could also be translated: The Lord’s message came “crashing out like a
roll of thunder!”
These
are words attempting to describe the Thessalonian’s
life of faith. There’s wasn’t a timid or quiet or “politically correct” faith.
Their faith was truly “faithful” – it was their belief in and their relationship with the
resurrected Jesus Christ “in real living and breathing flesh!”
It was an incarnation or sacramental faith!
As
Bible Commentator William Barclay so aptly put it,
“There’s
something tremendous about the sheer defiance of early Christianity. When all prudence would have dictated a way
of life that would escape notice and so avoid danger and persecution, these
early Christians blazoned forth their faith.
They were never ashamed to show whose they were and whom they sought to
serve!” (The Letters to the Philippians, Colossians, and Thessalonians” William
Barclay,
Did you hear that? “They were never ashamed to show whose they
were and whom they sought to serve!”
This
is what “loving the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and your neighbor as yourself” is all about!
This
is Christianity enfleshed! – not
just “understood” and held in the head but rather it’s taken into our bodies
and lived out through our arms and legs!
It’s enacted – it’s faith in action – it’s faithful!!!
5.
Application: Yes, God is calling
you and me to a higher level of faithfulness!
He’s calling us to enflesh our faith! To become more and more
“FAITH-FUL!”
Now how do you and I do this?
The key to all of their zeal – their
faithfulness, was their deep and abiding and passionate love for their Lord and
Savior Jesus Christ. Truly, they loved
the Lord their God with all their heart and with all their soul and with all their mind and with all their strength.’ (Mark 12:30)
and as a consequence of this love they loved their neighbor as themselves! And so it came to be that they enfleshed love!
Now you can love an idea but an idea is cold
comfort in the trenches of life. No, we
have to fall in love again and again with our Lord.
Clearly God is inviting us to renew that love
for Him! Let’s do it then in the best
way we know how – let’s come into His presence and pray . . .
Let’s Pray . . .