I Thessalonians 5: While You Wait...

In today's episode, Crystal continues through I Thessalonians chapter five. Remember we are getting instruction on how to live while we wait for Christ’s return, growing in HOLINESS. 

This section (vs. 16-28) gives us some short and direct commands to help us live pleasing to the LORD.

• Rejoice evermore.
• Pray without ceasing.
• In every thing give thanks...
• Quench not the Spirit.
• Despise not prophesyings.
• Prove all things;
• Hold fast that which is good.
• Abstain from all appearance of evil.

Rest assured. We can't do it by ourselves. It is only by God's grace and He is faithful to do it (vs. 23-24). We just need to surrender to the process. We need to stay sensitive to the leading of the Holy Spirit and be obedient when He reveals things in our lives. That is how we will be able to stand blameless at the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ!

We will continue our study with II Thessalonians chapter one next week! Here's the link to the study guide if you'd like one to accompany your study. 

Available Bible Studies and Bible Study Guides (affiliate links):

• It's Time.
• Arise, Go.
• Pullin' Weeds, Plantin' Seeds
• There's a Fly in my Tea!
• Study Your Bible With Me Series

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Hi there, welcome to Wisdom for Wednesday, your midweek pause for truth, encouragement, and practical faith. I'm your host, Crystal Ratcliffe, author, speaker, and fellow traveler on this journey of growing in God's Word. Each week we'll dive into Scripture together and have the opportunity to be encouraged in the truth that never changes. If you're able, grab your Bible, a cup of coffee, and let's seek God's wisdom together. Hi there and welcome back to the podcast. We are going to continue 1 Thessalonians chapter 5 today. So if you did not listen to last week's episode, this was two parts. So I would just encourage you to go back and listen and then come right back here. We're going to be picking it up in verse 16. So remember, we are getting instruction on how to live while we wait for Christ's return. We are to be growing in holiness, that sanctification process that we discussed in chapter four. Yes, we are fully and wholly sanctified by Jesus Christ at the point of salvation. He has set us apart for his sacred use. But then we become more and more holy as we learn and follow Christ. We become more like him. So this section gives us some short and direct commands to help us live pleasing to the Lord. So we're just going to jump right into it. I actually just love this section of scripture. It's like boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. Here we go. Do these things. And so in the verses before, we talked about learning really how to love one another and the church body and how to help one another. And so that was all in our last uh episode. But here in verse 16, it starts out rejoice evermore. Pray without ceasing. In everything give thanks, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you. Quench not the spirit, despise not prophesyings, prove all things, hold fast that which is good, abstain from all appearance of evil. And then it says, And the very God of peace sanctify you holy, and I pray, God, your whole spirit and soul and body pre be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Faithful is he that calleth you, who also will do it. Brethren, pray for us. Greet all the brethren with a holy kiss. I charge you by the Lord that this epistle be read unto all the holy brethren. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. Amen. So this is, like I said, a powerful section of scripture, and I just love it. So starting with rejoice evermore. So let's talk for a bit about the difference between happiness and joy. Happiness is based on happenings, it's temporary, it's based on our circumstances or the events going on in our lives. Joy comes from the Lord, it's rooted in our relationship with Him, His presence, His love, His promises. We can have joy regardless of temporal circumstances and events. Why? If we have accepted Christ as our Savior, we are just passing through. This is not our home. We have a home in heaven. When you think about John 15, where it talks about abiding in Christ, when we abide in Christ, Jesus says this, these things I have spoken unto you that my joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full. And then again in verse 16, sorry, chapter 16 of John, it says, In light of Jesus' return, he says, I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice, and your joy no man taketh from you. So rejoice evermore, always at all times. Philippians 4, 4 says, Rejoice in the Lord always, and again I say, rejoice. And that means we have joy in the midst of trials as well. We may not be happy about them, but we can have joy, James tells us. Count it all joy when you fall into diverse temptations, knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing. God wants to use the trials in our life to grow us, to draw us closer to Him. We can find that in 1 Peter chapter 1, 7 through 8. It says this, that the trial of your faith being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honor and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ, whom having not seen ye love, in whom, though now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory. Jesus is coming again, and for that reason we can rejoice always and evermore. And the next one we see there is pray without ceasing. So this is an attitude of prayer. It's having an attitude of needing God and being in fellowship with Him at all times. Ephesians 6 18, that whole chapter we talk about the armor of God, putting on the armor of God, and then we get to verse 18 that says, praying always with all prayer and supplication in the spirit and watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for all saints. So put on that armor of God and then fasten it with prayer. That's what we have to do. He goes on in that section of scripture to say, and pray for me. Pray for our missionaries, our leaders. We discussed that last week. We need to be praying for one another, and we need to be praying without ceasing in our own lives. Yes, there is a time to get into your prayer closet and to get alone with God and pray, but we can be in an attitude of prayer all day long. We can be going out about our day and talking to the Lord as we do it. And I will say this: when I am doing that, I have much more peace, I have much more quiet and calm. And it leads me to the next one because I am very quick then to give thanks. The next one we see here is in everything, give thanks. So important. We can see Colossians 3 17 says, and whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by Him. Philippians 4 6, be careful for nothing but in everything by prayer and supplic supplication with thanksgiving, let your request be made known unto God. Ephesians 5 20 says, Giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. So giving thanks and prayer goes together, and it also goes with praise. Those things will lead to praise. Psalm 100 says, Make a joyful noise unto the Lord, all ye lands. Serve the Lord with gladness, come before his presence with singing. Know ye that the Lord He is God, it is He that hath made us, and not we ourselves. We are his people and the sheep of his pasture. Enter into his gates with thanksgiving and into his courts with praise. Be thankful unto him and bless his name, for the Lord is good, his mercy is everlasting, and his truth endureth to all generations. When we are thankful and we are giving praise to the Lord, it keeps us from being discontent, it keeps us from murmuring and complaining, it keeps us in a right spirit and a right heart toward the Lord and toward others. And then we see this next one quench not the spirit. Now, quench is to suppress or to stifle, it could be to extinguish because it's kind of like a fire here. Fire represents zeal, passion, enthusiasm. And in scripture, we know the Lord's presence is a consuming fire. But the Holy Spirit cannot be completely snuffed out in the lives of Christians, but it can be suppressed when we ignore his promptings, his convictions, and his leading. When we say no, when he asks us to do something, like some of you know my writing testimony and how many years ago I was writing fiction and the Lord laid on my heart to write my first devotional book, and I said no. I did not feel qualified or able to do such a thing, and I said no. And I can tell you that for a few years I didn't write anything. All of that was taken away from me. So we can quench the Holy Spirit when we say no to the Lord. Okay, I want you to think about this one. Uh, we can quench the Holy Spirit in our church services by the spirit that we're bringing in. You know, is our mind too full, our heart too full of this world and the things going on, it's cluttered and we are not prepared to hear from the Lord. I'm gonna just say that that can quench the working of the Holy Spirit. We need to be careful to take time to be prepared to sit under the preaching and teaching of God's word and ask the Lord to speak to us and then to respond. You know, so often I think, and it I think it is probably different by region, possibly, because I have traveled to different parts of the country where things are a little different. But if the Lord speaks to you in a service and prompts you to step out and pray about something, do that. People need to see others responding to the Lord, and there is no place more evident of this to me than when I go to youth camp. And it just seems like kids are much more willing to go forward there and take care of business with the Lord because that's what we're doing. That's like our purpose, that's why we're there. And so I just would love that heart to be in every church service where we've come to hear from the Lord and we're gonna respond to him. And as people see you respond, I'm not saying you're working up something emotional response or others seeing you go forward at the altar or whatever to be an emotional response, but perhaps to give them the confidence and the courage to step out on their own if they need to go forward and pray about something. And I'm not saying you just do it to do it, but if the Lord puts on your heart to pray about something, go forward and pray about it. You know, I know for me, oftentimes I am going forward and I'm praying for my church that we would see people saved, that the people in the services would be sensitive to the leading of the Holy Spirit and they would respond. And so I would just encourage you in that way. Let's not quench the working of the Holy Spirit in our church services as well, whether that's from distraction or, like I said, just bringing in all the things of the world with us. Um, but also quenching is like grieving. We know in Ephesians 4 30 it says, grieve not the Holy Spirit. Well, that happens through rebellion and following our fleshly or worldly desires. So once again, you could go back to our church services. Are we sitting there and the Lord is prompting us and working in our heart about something, and we're just saying no? Well, we're grieving the Holy Spirit, we're quenching the work of the Holy Spirit. And remember, our goal while we wait for Jesus is to grow in holiness. And this can't be done if we're not being sensitive to the leading of the Holy Spirit. It cannot be done if we're grieving the Holy Spirit or quenching the work of the Holy Spirit. So I would just encourage you, quench not the spirit. And then we see that despise not prophesyings. So that's the teachings, the truth of God's word. And we've had that word despise too. We brought that up in chapter four as well, is to make of no account, to disregard or to reject. So we shouldn't despise the truth of God's word and the teachings of his word. And we might say, Oh, I would never do that. But 2 Timothy 4, verse 3 and 4 tells us, for the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but after their own lusts, they shall heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears, and they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables. So we need to be very careful that we don't despise the truth of God's word. And we're not out there looking for an easier message. We need to be very careful, and this goes long with the next one: prove all things. So that means to test, examine, scrutinize. You're gonna see if it's genuine or not. So think about practicing discernment. I've shared before, discernment is not knowing the difference between right and wrong. That's easy to see, but discernment is knowing the difference between what's right and almost right. And then we need to have wisdom. We need to take everything through the filter of God's word, not our feelings. We have to beware of false teachers because they are everywhere. Social media, YouTube, podcasts, anyone can have a platform. I've said this before, even me. I don't want you to take my word for it. I want you to prove all things. Go to the word of God and test it for yourself because it's so important that we are careful with what we're listening to. There are so many feel-good messages that are being put out by people who love Jesus but they don't know their Bibles. And we need to be careful about that. And then it says, hold fast that which is good. That means to keep secure, keep firm possession of, and to take hold of. And then, of course, things that are good, that's virtuous things, praiseworthy things, you know, honorable and excellent in nature and characteristics. And it reminds me of Philippians 4.8, where we're told what to think upon. It says, Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report, if there be any virtue and if there be any praise, think on these things. And then it tells us those things which ye have both learned and received and heard and seen in me, do, and the God of peace shall be with you. So it's not just hearing things, hearing good messages, hearing the good, but it's doing them. You know, I go back to the quenching of the Holy Spirit. I forgot to mention this, but uh I something was brought to my attention because I like to listen to sermons a lot. I like to listen to messages and I think, well, that's better than other things I could be listening to, right? Well, someone pointed out, and I I can't remember where I heard it, but they said, if you're just listening and you're never responding or applying that, what you're hearing, you know, because I listen while I'm doing the laundry, I listen while I'm walking, I listen while I'm doing this. But am I taking time to truly respond to what the Lord has spoken to me about? Am I am I changing? Am I doing, as it says here, the things that we've learned, received, and heard? Are we doing those things? Because we can't just be hearers only, we have to be doers. And so holding fast to that which is good, and then we go right into abstain from all appearance of evil. Now, this one, my husband and I just talked about this verse not long ago, because there are certain things that um people will use the excuse, well, that's not in the New Testament, or that's a gray area. And truly, this verse covers all of that because abstain means to refrain and to keep from. And I will say, one of the definitions I found says to voluntarily refrain from something. So no one's going to force you or should be legislating on you what is the appearance of evil. We we choose that for ourselves and we learn that for ourselves. And remember, we talked about the growing process is different for people. In this book, we've talked about how new believers we need to take time to help them learn and grow, not expect them to know everything as soon as they get saved. But when we have this verse, abstain from all appearance of evil. So appearance is a semblance, an apparent likeness. And then I also saw this, it's the likelihood of or the probability of. So think about something that you're doing, something you're watching, something you're wearing, some somewhere you're going. I you you fill in the blank, okay? But is it showing, is it looking more like the world, or is it showing that you have a likelihood of following after the world or a probability of turning to the world rather than following God? And of course, evil, we know that that is wicked, corrupt, perverse, wrong, anything that would be against what God would want for us. So our goal, remember, is to grow in holiness. And we get caught up in these things and we start debating things about, well, can I do this or can I do that or should I do this or should I do that? And the answer should be asking yourself, does it have the appearance of evil? Does it make me look like the world? That's the question. If if I do this thing, if I go to this place, if I wear this, if I watch this, what is it saying to the lost world? Are they able to look at me and see that there's a difference? Because they should be. We're called to be separate. We're called to be holy. There should be a difference between us and the world. So you fill in the blank. It's personal for everyone. I'm not going to tell you what you should and should not be doing because as you draw closer to the Lord, I guarantee you he will shine a light on the things that he wants you to work on. If you have come to him with a humble heart and you're truly seeking to please him. As we draw closer to God, he will reveal more things that we need to grow in so that we can grow in holiness. Now, I want to go back and read in verse 23. It says, And the very God of peace sanctify you holy. And I pray, God, your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Remember, that's what we're talking about, is what we should be doing while we're waiting for Jesus. And then verse 24 says, Faithful is he that called you, who also will do it. So remember, God sanctifies you wholly at the time of salvation. He's set us apart. And even in that definition of sanctification that I shared from chapter four, with it being a process that it's by God's grace, I can't do it by myself. I need the help of the Holy Spirit. But how encouraging is it to see there in verse 24? He is faithful to do it. He's faithful to do the work. We just need to surrender to the process. We need to stay sensitive to the leading of the Holy Spirit. We need to be obedient when he reveals things into our lives. And that is how we will be able to stand blameless at the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. So I'm going to stop right there. It's full. This chapter is so full, and that's why we had to divide it into two. But I do hope that there has been something that has been an encouragement to you today. And if so, would you share it with a friend? I appreciate you listening. I'm thankful for you. Thankful for those of you that come back week after week and support me and pray for my writing ministry. I am currently recording these and trying to record ahead of time because we do have a trip planned later this month. I'm trying to get ahead. We're going to get to go see my daughter in Tampa, Florida. Um, my husband has actually not been back since we moved her almost two years ago. So we're excited to go back and visit her. We will be continuing our study next week. We'll go right into Second Thessalonians. So I hope you'll come back and join me for that. Thank you for listening, and we'll see you next week.