Bible Guys Classics: 1 Thessalonians 5

Hey, Jeff, I just wanted to tell you you look good today. Oh that's so encouraging. Yeah, and you smell nice. Wow, don't get that close. And I like your blue shirt. So we're talking about encouragement today. I think on the podcast he's Chris, I'm Jeff, and we're the Bobba guys. So Chris, just in case you didn't know, there's a difference between encouragement and flattery, there is. Yeah, yeah, oh yeah, yeah, I see. Sometimes they're hand in hands. Yeah. I think for somebody who has wu winning others over, which is in your personality type? Yes, yeah, you might not be able to differentiate between the two. So I know you're doing the best. Tan Man. It's part of my strength and we. Love you for it. You're an encouragement to so many people. So we're going to start off today. We did this one other time. Don't know if it worked or not, but we're doing the Whisper challenge where I'm going to put headphones on of a different sort, play music real loud, You're going to whisper a phrase to try to guess. Yes, I felt unprepared last time, but I've got a good one today. Oh good good. I'm gonna change that phone. Let me grab my thing here and I'm playing my phone. Imagine dragons right now. Okay, can you hear me? Okay, here we go. Ready, One ring to rule them all, one ring to find them. Wow. Try that again. It's one ring to rule them all, one ring to find them. The whiffle ball and the fathom. I have no idea. No, no, here, one more time, One ring to rule them all, one ring to find them. Willie Mays threw the ball? No, no, what is it? One ring to rule them all, one ring to find them. Well that's a long phrase. Oh yeah, all right, you know what that's from. Yeah, it's from Lord of the Ring Ring, of course. Okay, so okay, it's my turn. Your music already playing? Yeah, no, it's not yet. Okay now it is. Whoa, that's loud. It is loud. But I have to okay, okay, here we go. Help you. I will, yes, I'm your friend. I have no idea. Dude, it looked like you said something about Charlie Brown's going to hit you in the face. Wow, one more time? Okay, help you? I will. I I'm your friend. I can't. I have no idea. Man. All right, I don't even know. I can guess in that. I literally said help you. I will. I'm your friend, Dudey. The lips are the same, just because I did the voice. Okay, I got one more. I have one more? Yeah? Wow, sure, okay, because you're really good at these. No, I'm not. I did terrible last them. Dude, be quiet, I'm trying to be terrible. I can't believe you have one more. Okay, this is an easy one. This, this should be an easy one. Ready, ready, Not all who wander are lost. Jack trainer on the hall. No, not all those who wander are lost. All those who are lost. Oh almost almost. Not all those who wander are lost. Okay, all right, but that's. Another Lord of the Rings reference. I was into the whole Tolkien thing this week. I see, so you just had to do Oh you want me to do another one? I thought you were going to. I'll come up with one. Okay, okay, one more more? Here we go. Yes, okay, this is riveting. Roads where we're going, we don't need roads. It looked like you said roses are read something something. Roads where we're going. We don't need roads. Where we're going. We don't need something. Oh wow, good job, good job, I said, Rhodes. Where we're going, we don't need roads. Okay, ye, there you go. Go back to the future. Reference. There, you go back to the future. That's excellent. Okay, all right, that's hard. It is very really difficult. Now Jimmy Fallon does those things, yes, and he has them play the market the headphones and everything, and it is but anyway, I just I enjoy watching that, so hopefully that worked. That's funny. But so today we're in First Thessalonians, chapter five. We're wrapping up, and we're wrapping it up. Yeah, this is kind of the end. And one of the things you're going to discover as we read through Paul's books his writing says he'll write four or five chapters or whenever he comes to the end of the book, and then all of a sudden, the last chapter he crammed, oh and by the way, don't forget this, don't forget this, don't forget this, don't forget this, and he just kind of dumps ten big ideas in ten verses. And so that's kind of how he wraps up all of his letters. And that's what he's doing today. In first Thessaloni, chapter five, we're going to start in verse twelve. Won't just read to the end of the chapter. He says, Dear brothers and sisters, honor those who are your leaders in the Lord's work. They work hard among you and give you spiritual guidance. Show them great respect and wholehearted love because of their work, and live peacefully, peacefully with each other. Brothers and sisters. We urge you to warn those who are lazy, encourage those who are timid, take tender care of those who are weak. Be patient with everyone. See that no one pays back evil for evil, but always try to do good to each other and to all people. Always be joyful, never stop praying, be thankful in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you, who belong to Christ Jesus. Do not stifle the Holy spirit. Do not scoff at prophecies, but test everything that is said, Hold on to what is good, stay away from every kind of evil. Now, may the God of Peace make you holy in every way, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless until our Lord Jesus Christ comes again. God will make this happen for he who call you. It's faithful. Dear brothers and sisters, pray for us. Greet all the brothers and sisters with Christian love. I command you, in the name of the Lord, read this letter to all the brothers and sisters. And may the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. Mm. So he's writing back to the Church of Thessalonika and uh and this and this is the church where he ran into a little bit of trouble, right, and he fled and and he's writing back and he's giving. Them he didn't get in trouble in the church. He got in trouble in the town. In the town. That's that's actually correct, because the towns. We've been, we've been in trouble in churches and had to flee. But that's a whole different story. That's the story for another day, for another day. That's funny, you know, I get in trouble with the town, that's right. And they try to follow him, and he is this is he sort of ran and went to Athens. He's writing back to Thessalonians and uh and uh, and he's he's encouraging them and and today is just sort of like a slew of advice. Well, there's a lot of excellent advice here. So I have this thing in my life application study Bible, and it's a check list for encouragers. And what it really does is it breaks down pretty much exactly what you read, but it just breaks it down like just small phrases of advice. And this is how different the pieces of advice are that Paul read. Because so much of the second portion of this book is all about encouraging one another. That's right, right, right, So this is all about encouragers. Yeah, Basically, in verse eleven, he said, hey, build each other up. Then he said, honor your leaders, show so leaders great respect. Live in peace, Warn the lazy, encourage the timid, help the week, be patient, revisit, revenge, rejoice or excuse me, resist, thank you. Revisit is also good. Visit, revisit, and reconsider it one of these. Be joyful, pray, continually, give thanks, do not stifle the Holy spirit, do not scoff at prophecies, avoid every kind of evil, kind of God's constant help. So think about the gamut in which he has covered. It almost sounds like. The Book of Yeah, doesn't it. It's like it's like these things are sort of related to good living with Christian brothers and sisters, but they're all so different in terms of pieces of advice. Right right. This feels a lot like Romans twelve. He does that where he just unpacks all these behaviors of how to get along with each other. He does it so many different times, and I love it because there are all these little one liners, this one liner, one liner, one liner, one liner. And each one of them packs a bunch. Oh yeah, every one of them. You're like, oh, we can preach a whole message on. It, right, yeah, So tell me about this one here. The one that stands out among every single one of those that I just read is verse Noumber nineteen that says, do not stifle the Holy Spirit. Now, now when you when you read it, you memorize it says quench. Right, yeah, yeah, quench, ch quench not the Holy Spirit. And so when we grew up memorizing about that, I'm sure you've heard sermons about that. How would a person stifle or quench the Holy Spirit? What does that even mean? Well, so there's lots of different views on this. One would be resisting the Holy Spirit's work for the purpose of salvation, presenting Christ to you, and that would be quenching the Holy Spirit. The problem is he's not talking to lost people, right, So I don't believe that that's what he's talking about here. I really think he's talking about don't resist the gifts of the spirit in the church. That that's really what because he immediately pivots into prophecy from there. So he says that sentence and then the very next sentence is, you know, do not scoff at prophecies, but test everything that's said. And so I really think he's talking about making sure that all of the spiritual gifts are functioning. People who have the gift of mercy need to be merciful, that people have gift of leadership need to lead. Well, he just said that a minute ago, right, give honor to the people who are your spiritual leaders, all those kinds of things. I really feel like he's just kind of summarizing these are the ways to behave and you'd behave this way the best when the gifts of the spirit are evident in the church. Yeah. Yeah, And by the way, that's exactly what the commentator he agrees with you it should not ignore or toss aside the gifts of the Holy Spirit, because he goes right into prophecy, you know, when it says you should not ignore or stifle the gifts of the Holy Spirit. I think there's other applications to that as well, because stifle is a pretty general word, right, to quench or to stifle. You know, you quench a fire, you know, you throw water on it and it goes out. Or stifling something is to you know, muffle it, or to you know, to push it down. When you stifle a cough, or yeah. Stifle a cough. Yet I think that there are times in our lives as well where we you know, maybe even in the moment, where you know, the Holy Spirit wants to do a great work and we're so either self centered or removed from the moment. I always used to actually tell my teenagers when I was a youth pastor that when the Holy Spirit's working, you can feel like, you know, God is just capturing people's attention in the room, and then somebody you know, does something completely inappropriate selfishly, and always say, hey, man, that's kind of in the category of stifling the Holy Spirit, right, And we could. Do that you're muffling the impact of the spirit. Yeah, it's it's sort of like when babies cry in church. It's inevitable. A baby can sit there and be a darling angel for thirty three minutes and then you say, so, let me tell you how to come to faith in Jesus Christ and across that line of faith. Ah, baby, or just as bad as when that baby's darling sweet and all of a sudden wakes up and starts smiling at the people behind him. Next thing you know, there's twelve people kuchikuchiku and this baby instead of listening to the gospel. Baby, it happens. Man. I'm not saying that that the that that baby is quenching the spirit, but there's all kinds of things that I think that Satan uses to distract us from the from the magnified power of the Holy Spirit, and that that idea of don't stifle or don't quench he's talking about, don't muffle the impact of the spirit. Yeah, And I think that sometimes we need to just pay attention to that and just make sure that we need you know, whenever we recognize God doing a good thing, we need to make sure that we're out of the way, and that we let God do his thing. Well. I think so often as pastors, both of us are creatives. Right. You help at the church that we serve at. You help lead the weekend strategy and planning and all the creative elements. I was a worship leader for fifteen years, and I know God blesses us in spite of us, right, but because of us, Yes, in spite of us, God blesses the ministry. God blesses the furtherance of His gospel in spite of us. But there are times, you know, we're also co laborers with Christ, the Bible says, so we're also supposed to be doing our part. And there's times when we bring problems or we bring distractions on ourselves that weren't needed, right, and then we can take some of the brunt of that and we distract away from the gospel. It can happen sometimes, That happens anytime you're trying to be creative or any time that you're trying to capture people's attention. There's always that risk, and so it's this balance. Sometimes we get it right, sometimes we don't. But this is one of those passages that keeps reminding us over and over again. Don't get in the way of the work of the spirit, don't muffle the impact of the spirit. Don't hold back or resist the work of the Spirit in the church. Yeah, there's another comment that Paul makes that is so massive, and yet he just sort of tosses it out there. He says, see that no one. First of all, he doesn't say most. He says, sees that no one pays back evil for evil, but always not some of the time. Always try to do good at least. The word tries in there. Yeah, right, to each other and to all people. You know. One of my favorite comedians is Brian Reagan, and he says that he says he was on the way off the door, you know, he sort of sort of makes fun of how you pay a doctor for. Him to insult you. Yes, hey, Brian, those moles are looking kind of weird and you need. To lose weight. He's like, thanks, doc. But then he says he's walking out, and he says, and just as he's walking out the door, just nonchalantly, he goes, oh, by the way, layoff all dry, and he's like what, He's like, you just gonna nonchalantly toss it out there. It's like, no more happiness. Right, it's right. So it's so Paul just throws it out there and says, oh, by the way, see that no one pays back evil for evil. And I think to myself and on large scales but also on small scales, that is so incredibly difficult to do. And yet Paul is really inferring that we are to pay back good when evil is given to us. Well, Jesus taught it right. So in the Sermon on the Mount he talks about that, Jesus says, love your enemies, And that's an easy one. If he just stopped there for me and you, we'd be like, oh, yeah, I do I love my enemies, right, because there's no proof. There's no proof when if it's an emotion, yeah, I just oh, I love my enemies. I don't like them, but I love them, you know, right. And then he says, pray for your enemies. Well now that, well, shoot, it's a little harder, yeah, because he doesn't mean pray that God brings judgment on them. He's he's saying pray for their benefit, right, right, es, that's what he's saying. That one now is measurable. Do I pray? Okay, you know you make me mad, but God bless Chris sar, you know I don't have to be happy about it. Back do it. But then he says, Jesus says, love your enemies, pray for your enemies. Then he says, do good to your enemies. Right well, now that's a whole other love. Come on, Jesus. There's a couple things that wish Jesus had and said, that's one of them right there, because now he pushes us beyond just being able to make some kind of mental assent or grudgingly pray for somebody, and now we have to do good. Paul keys off of that concept and multiple times again I already mentioned Romes twelve, but in Romes twelve he says that too, and he in matter of fact, in Romes twelve he piggybacks off the same idea, and he says, don't be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. That's what he says. Right after he says, don't get you know, don't pay back for revenge, because vengeance's mind, says the Lord God says, I'll get revenge. Right well, ultimately there's a little bit of satisfaction in that. Would I rather have my enemy get revenge from me or have to stand in front of God and God's going to get his right? Okay, well I can hand him over to God and let God deal with that. But the idea of don't be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good is really what is This is a very similar phrase to what he's saying here, right, that Christians should be famous not for getting revenge but for shocking kindness and generosity in the face of attacking. And so there are so many of our listeners, I'm sure. That, and so I just want to say, you should work really hard on that. Thank you, sir. I appreciate that. I'm trying to encourage you. I mean, I mean treating you kindly now, So I earned that. So that's right. So many of our listeners probably have a hard time with you know, snapping back at somebody or you know, somebody is mean, so then they say a remark. So we don't have to necessarily treat others poorly. In action, we can we can, you know, strike them with our words. So sharp and harsh words, hateful words, those are the same thing as doing evil to somebody, and you think about this, We always say this if you come to any of our worship services or weekend services, we always say that art is a reflection of the heart, right, and that's why we believe it's powerful. Some people don't understand that because they grew up at a traditional church or something, and they're like, what what place does a movie clip have in a church service? You know, that's not godly or holy because we're not praise and worshiping or whatever. But it's like, no, no, no, no, that is just as godly, I would argue, and I'm dead serious when I say this, that is just as powerful as any godly principle that we just read here. Now. Of course, God's word, because it's God's commandment. In God's Word trumps everything. That's not as powerful as a movie clips, right, But what I'm saying is somebody acting out godly principle. A movie clip that is equal to your comments. Yeah right, So it's not equal to God's word, but your comments about God's words or a movie clip that drives home that same point in an artistic way, those would have equal weight in your mind. Yeah. Well, no, I would say this, I would say, like, okay, if you see me, give you the example. I was thinking of. Every movie, which you could probably name a million of them, every movie where the hero wins and the and the the enemy is about to be killed and then the hero stops. And helps them. Yes, right, you know they pull them up off the cliff, or you know, you know, you know, or you know the Spider Man jumps in front of the Green Goblin. You know that the Green Goblin stabs in the back. No, you know, Spider Man, no way home. Whatever it is. What I'm saying is there's a reason why that resonates with public. There's a reason why. It's like when you see the hero not give judgment to the end and says, hey, they'll make us just like them, and so therefore they treat they treat You know, when when Harry Potter grabs Malfoy and and saves him and he goes back for him and he risks his own life. Right, these are these are all the movies that we're familiar with. What I'm saying is there is something deep down in the soul. Of every human way won't kill Gullum. Right. What I'm saying is down deep down in the soul. That is a godly thing that God has placed in your heart. And the reason why is because we are made in the image of God. We are image bearers. And the reason why that resonates so heavily, even though it's just goofy silly art, it's because God has placed that in you. Yes to actually you know, to resonate and be inspired. When somebody owes somebody something they deserve, to be treated evil, and yet they give them love or salvation or forgiveness, it's because listen, that's what I'm saying. Yes, what I'm saying is that is God in me. Yes right, Yes, So I'm not talking. About the movie clip being equal to the principle. I'm saying that's the godly principle of being lived in. But it's why that becomes a part of our cultural art. It is because we recognize there's a certain nobility in living the way that Jesus says to live. Yeah, right, and we're inspired by that. It captures our attension, and I think it's one of the great opportunities for us to have a strong witness in our workplace at our school when you know other people are having bad days. Other people are miserable, other people are going through difficulties, and they might bite their head off. They might cause us trouble for no reason. And the single greatest thing we can do for the cause of Christ and in that person's life is not to repay evil for evil, instead to turn around and do good for them. And by the way, the Book of Proverbs says that a man's gift makes room for him in front of kings. Right, the Book of Proverb says that a soft answer turns away anger. You can just go on and on and on. So when we go Jesus way, there is an opportunity, perhaps to flip the script and change the entire storyline of the future in that relationship. But there's no hope of that if you go back and give them back for what they gave to you. Right, right, And so instead of us being the moon reflecting the energy coming to us, we need to be the sun right where we're generating good instead of just reflecting the evil that's sent to us. Yeah, hey, let's talk about one more real quick. Oh we really don't have time, but let gonna get your comments on it, okay, Where it basically says build each other up, especially those who are providing spiritual guidance, give them respect and all hearted love. Yeah, you know, and then just live peacefully. So just the idea of encouraging one another in the work of the Lord and the ministry together. Give us a phrase about that. Twenty something times in the Paul's writings he says one another. And so alls I would say, is you cannot grow into the Christian God designed you to be by yourself. You need the other people so that you can learn to take the focus off of you and put it on one another. Right, So it's us, not me, and that that really is. It's about you. And I can't grow spiritually unless I choose to build you up. That's a big part of the writings that Paul makes you here throughout all of his epistles. Yeah, and I'm also reminded that when it comes to actually encouraging one another, you know, the Book of I Think It's proverb says, an encouraging word when it's given, when it's in due season, how. Good it is. Oh yeah, it's so refreshing. Yes. Yes, And even though that my gift doesn't isn't necessarily encouragement like my spiritual gifts is not on the top of the list. I have to work hard at it. But I have to tell you, the people who are actually so encouraging are some of the best people to be around. Yes, absolutely, yep, that's good. Yeah. So those are just little titbits. That's a good place to end, and there's a lot more information in there, a lot of great stuff to ponder on. But what an encouraging day. Thanks Chris. Yeah, you're welcome, Jeff, I like that blue shirt. All right, all right, we'll see you next time on the Daily Battle. Guys,