1 Thessalonians 2:1

1. For yourselves, brethren, know our entrance in unto you] entering in (R.V.), same word as in ch. 1Th_1:9; see note. And the “For” of this verse is parallel to the “for” of ch. 1Th_1:9 : what “they themselves (other people, strangers in different places) report of us” is confirmed by what “you yourselves know” of the successful entrance the Gospel had won at Thessalonica. Both these fors, and all that the Apostle has written since 1Th_2:4 of ch. 1, go to sustain his assurance of God’s loving “choice” of the Thessalonian believers. We must not allow the artificial division of chapter and verse to break the thread of the writer’s thoughts.

The appeal made to the recollections and experience of the readers is characteristic of these letters, see 1Th_2:2; 1Th_2:5; 1Th_2:10-11; ch. 1Th_1:5, &c.; and comp. Introd. p. 35.

Concerning the “entrance” of the missionaries amongst them the Thessalonians know better than anyone else, that it hath not been found vain (R. V.). The Greek perfect tense (see note on ch. 1Th_1:8) implies a settled result: not merely did the coming of Christ’s servants produce a striking impression at the time; their work has proved thoroughly successful. Its fruit is permanent.

Vain is lit. empty, void of substance and power. So the apostles’ “labour” would “turn out,” if “the Tempter” should destroy the Thessalonians’ faith (ch. 1Th_3:5); so his “preaching” and his hearers’ “faith” at Corinth, if Christ’s resurrection were not a fact (1Co_15:14). “Not empty” echoes the “power” and “much fulness” of ch. 1Th_1:5.

This verse might be rendered somewhat more freely in English idiom: For you know of yourselves, brethren, that our coming amongst you has not proved vain.

section ii

The Apostle’s Conduct at Thessalonica. Ch. 1Th_2:1-12

Analysis. The ministry of Paul and his colleagues at Thessalonica had been unmistakably genuine, 1Th_2:1. This appeared (1) by their boldness in the conflict amid which their work began, 1Th_2:2; (2) by their sincerity and freedom from personal ambition, 1Th_2:3-6; (3) by their gentleness and tender affection toward the Thessalonians, 1Th_2:7-8; (4) by their extreme and self-denying labours, 1Th_2:9; (5) by the purity of their life, 1Th_2:10; and (6) by the fidelity and high spiritual aim of their teaching, 1Th_2:11-12. Four words resume the whole: courage, purity, love, fidelity. Here is a mirror for ministers of Christ, and an ideal for all His servants. The service of Christ called into exercise in Paul and his companions the highest and finest qualities of mainly character. And this is still the case, especially on missionary fields of labour, where similar dangers are encountered and the same powers of leadership required.

This section is of the nature of a self-defence, called forth (see Introd. pp. 23, 24) by the calumnies of St Paul’s enemies at Thessalonica. But there blends with his self-defence the lofty strain of thanksgiving in which the letter commenced, and which breaks forth again distinctly in 1Th_2:13 and Is pursued to the end of ch. 3; so that this paragraph grows naturally out of the last.

The Apostle continues to identify Silas and Timothy with himself writing in the plural,—

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1Th_2:1-2

For yourselves, brethren, know our entrance in unto you, that it was not in vain

Essential elements of success in preaching: Boldness

Outsiders testified of the success of the gospel; and the apostles could confidently appeal to the converts in confirmation of the report.

For yourselves, etc. Dr. Lillie observes: Pauls entrance was no easy, random, careless matter--not at all an affair of rhetoric or ostentation--no holiday diversion or intellectual pastime; but a fact of the utmost gravity for him and for that renowned city--a crisis, an epoch in the history of both. We trace in their ministerial endeavours four essential elements that are ever found in all successful preaching--boldness, sincerity, gentleness, moral consistency. Consider, first, their boldness.

I. This boldness manifested in the earnest declaration of the truth. We are bold in our God, etc.

1. Bold in their conception of the Divine origin and vast scope of the gospel, and its adaptation to the wants of man, they were not less hold in its faithful proclamation. Their deep conviction of the supreme authority of the truth gave them unusual courage. We see the same spirit in Paul, when his fearless words roused the ire of Festus, shook the conscience of the thoughtless Felix, or swayed the heart of Agrippa. We see it in Elijah as he rebuked the sins of the wicked Ahab or threw the baffled priests of Baal into maddening hysteria--himself the while unmoved and confident. We see it conspicuously in Him whose burning words assailed every wrong, and who denounced the leaders of a corrupt Church as serpents! generation of vipers!

2. With much contention--amid much conflict and danger. This kind of preaching provoked opposition, and involved them in great inward struggles. The faithful messenger of God fears not the most violent assault from without: but the thought of the fatal issues to those who obstinately reject and fight against the gospel fills him with agonizing concern.

II. This boldness no suffering could daunt. Even after that we had suffered before, etc. They had come fresh from a city where they had been cruelly outraged. But their sufferings only deepened their love for the gospel, and inflamed the passion to make it known. A German professor has lately made experiments with chalcedony, and other quartzose minerals, and he has demonstrated that when such stones are ground on large and rapidly revolving wheels, they exhibit a brilliant phosphorescent glow throughout their entire mass. So is it with the resolute worker. The more he is ground under the strong wheel of suffering and persecution, the more intensely will his character glow.

III. This boldness was Divinely inspired. In our God. It was not presumption or bravado; but tire calm, grand heroism of a profound faith in God. The prophet Jeremiah, in a moment of despondency, decided to speak no more in the name of the Lord; but when he could say, The Lord is with me as a mighty terrible One, his courage returned, and he obeyed implicitly the Divine mandate--Thou shalt go, etc. Similarly commissioned, Paul once exclaimed, I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me. Endowed with the like spirit Luther uttered his noble protest at the Diet of Worms--Here I stand; I cannot do otherwise; God help me! Lessons:

1. Boldness is indispensable in attacking the evils of the age--not in the mass, but in detail.

2. Boldness acquired only by studious and prayerful familiarity with God and His message. (G. Barlow.)

The true pulpit

I. Its sublime courage. We were bold in our God. True pulpit courage must not be con founded with that audacity, impudence, self-assurance, which, alas! is so prevalent. It is courage in God, and springs from--

1. Love for Gods character. Love is the soul of courage. Strong love absorbs all selfish fears and makes the soul heroic. Paul loved his God so strongly that he lost all selfish feelings in the passion.

2. Confidence in Gods gospel. Paul knew that the gospel he had received and that he preached was not of men, but of God. No infidel argument could shake his faith in this. It was to him a subject beyond question and debate, settled amongst the immoveable facts of his own consciousness. Boldness in God is what the pulpit wants now. Some preachers speak as if they were bold in their theology, in their sect, in their own capacities; but Paul was bold in God. He felt himself to be nothing.

II. Its transcendent theme. The glad tidings.

1. That God loves all men, although they are sinners. Nature shows that God loves all men as creatures; but the gospel alone reveals His love to sinners (Joh_3:16).

2. That Gods love for sinners is so great that He gave His only begotten Son. This is Gods gospel; and what a transcendent theme for the preacher! This Paul preached: not theology, science, philosophy, metaphysical theories. (D. Thomas, D. D.)

True courage

is cool and calm. The bravest of men have least of a brutal bullying insolence, and in the very time of danger are found the most serene and free. Rage, we know, can make a coward forget himself, and fight. But what is done in fury or anger can never be placed to the account of courage. (Shaftesbury.)

Ministerial boldness

Archbishop Whately once said, when a friend asked him whether he did not feel nervous about preaching, that he dared not; for nervousness implied thoughts of oneself, when we ought only to be thinking of Gods message. (J. Hutchinson, D. D.)

A minister without boldness

is like a smooth file, a knife without an edge, a sentinel that is afraid to let off his gun. If men will be bold to sin, ministers must be bold to reprove. (W. Gurnal.)

Influence of character

The daily influence of Christ-like ministers streams into the character of their people as the imponderable sunlight enters into the solid substance of vegetation. (Boston Review.)

Christian devotion

Rev. Mr. Johnson, a Baptist missionary in China, relates this fact of a native convert who, when trying to persuade his countrymen to give up their idols and believe in Christ, was ridiculed and scorned, and at last pelted with mud and stones till his face was red with the blood that flowed from the cuts in his temples. Mr. Johnson meeting him said, You have had bad treatment today. He smilingly replied, They may kill me if they will love Jesus.

A courageous preacher

Mr. Moody tells us that there was a celebrated preacher in one of the Southern States of America, who went to a place where they told him if he dared to speak they would rotten-egg him. But he went right on. He said he wanted to tell them a story. A man in Texas went to town and sold a drove of cattle; he put the money in his saddlebags, got on his horse and started for home, his dog with him. He got tired after awhile, and laid down under a tree and went to sleep, laying the saddlebags by him. After awhile he awoke, took up the bags, got on his horse and rode off. But his dog kept barking and running back, and would not go along with him and keep quiet. So he finally, in his anger, took out his revolver and shot the dog, and rode on. But the more he thought about what he had done, the more he was troubled. He turned his horse and rode back, and found that the dog had dragged himself along until he had reached the tree where he had slept. There he was, dying; but by his side was his masters bundle of money, which he had dropped and was going off without, and which his faithful dog had lost his life in trying to save. Now, said the minister, I am here like that dog, to tell you of the treasure you are losing. Rotten-egg me if you want to. But they didnt; they heard him gladly.

Not in vain

A young man was engaged in teaching a class of rather wild lads in a Sabbath school: He thought that he was not qualified to make any impression upon them, and got much discouraged. By the inducements of his fellow teachers and superintendent, he was prevailed upon to keep at the work for years, till at last he absolutely refused to continue it longer. Many years afterward an eminent missionary wrote home: Is that gentleman who taught in the Sabbath school still living? If he is, please let him know that there is at least one living who dates his conversion to Christ from the lessons received in his class. So you see that, although the teacher gave up his work because he saw no fruit, yet the seed sown was not lost; one soul, if not more, was saved, and used as Gods means for saving many others.

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1Th 2:1-2. Yourselves, brethren, know, &c. — What was proposed chap. 1Th 1:5-6, is now more largely treated of; concerning Paul and his fellow- labourers, 1Th 2:1-12: concerning the Thessalonians, 1Th 2:13-16. Our entrance in unto you — With what demonstration of a divine agency it was attended; that it was not in vain — Or without success, as Dr. Heylin reads; but was attended with most important consequences and effects, which will be everlasting. The original expression, however, ου κενη γεγονεν, is rendered by Dr. Waterland, was not vain; and by Dr. Macknight, was not false, or destitute of truth, judging the apostle’s meaning to be, “that his entrance among the Thessalonians was not the entrance of a deceiver, who, with a view to draw money from his hearers, or to acquire power, or to live in pleasure among them, told them stories which he himself knew to be false. To this interpretation, the reason assigned in the following verse agrees: his sufferings for the gospel being the strongest proof that he himself believed it; whereas, of his not having preached in vain to the Thessalonians his sufferings were no proof. Besides, if the apostle had meant to say that his entrance was not in vain, the expression would have been εις κενον, as in Php 2:16; 1Th 3:5.” But after we had suffered — In several places; and were shamefully entreated at Philippi — Being there stripped and scourged by the common beadle, and thrust into prison, where our feet were made fast in the stocks. Scourging with rods was a punishment so ignominious, that the Portian law, among the Romans, forbade it to be inflicted on any Roman citizen. We were bold — Notwithstanding; in our God — Trusting in his assistance; to speak unto you the gospel — Though we are forced to do it with much contention — Meeting with much opposition, or in the midst of inward and outward conflicts of all kinds.

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

1. For—Reverting back to the entering in of 1Th_1:9, of which this section 1Th_2:1-12 is a real unfolding.

Yourselves—No empty boast of his own is this description, but a statement which their memories attest.

Entrance—When he came, wounded and forlorn, from the jail and stripes of Philippi into the synagogue of Thessalonica to preach the come Messiah to the Jews, the devout Greeks, and the eminent ladies, not a few, there.

In vain—Rather, empty, or inconsequential in its intrinsic character. It was an entrance of a momentous nature.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

CRITICAL AND EXPLANATORY NOTES

1Th_2:1. Our entrance in … was not in vain.—The word for “vain” here is the same as that in the first half of “ceno-taph.” The entrance into Thessalonica, we might say colloquially, “had something in it.”

1Th_2:2. Suffered before.—Previously, that is, to our entrance to Thessalonica. And were shamefully entreated.—The acute sense of suffering in mind shows how far St. Paul was from Stoicism. It is this same exquisite sensibility which makes possible the beautiful courtesy with which, in his letters, we are so familiar. With much contention.—All the watchfulness required by one in the arena and all the danger incident to a false movement characterised St. Paul’s work.

MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—1Th_2:1-2

Essential Elements of Success in Preaching. I. Boldness.

Outsiders testified of the success of the gospel, and the apostles could confidently appeal to the converts in confirmation of the report. “For yourselves, brethren, know our entrance in unto you that it was not in vain” (1Th_2:1). In the first twelve verses of this chapter Paul is describing the special features of their ministry, the manner and spirit of their preaching; and what he denies is, not so much that their labours had been vain, fruitless, and without result, as he denies that those labours were in themselves vain, frivolous empty of all human earnestness, and of divine truth and force. We trace in their ministerial endeavours four essential elements that are ever found in all successful preaching—boldness, sincerity, gentleness, moral consistency. Consider, first, their boldness.

I. This boldness manifested in the earnest declaration of the truth.—“We were bold in our God to speak unto you the gospel of God with much contention” (1Th_2:2). Bold in their conception of the divine origin and vast scope of the gospel, and its wondrous adaptation to the wants of universal man, they were not less bold in its faithful proclamation. Their deep conviction of the supreme authority of the truth gave them unusual courage. We see the same intrepid spirit in Paul on other occasions, when his fearless words roused the ire of Festus, shook the conscience of the thoughtless Felix, or swayed the heart of Agrippa towards a wise decision. We see it in Elijah as he rebuked the sins of the wicked Ahab with withering invectives, or threw the baffled priests of Baal into maddening hysteria—himself the while unmoved and confident. We see it conspicuously in Him, who came in the spirit and power of Elias, whose burning words assailed every form of wrong, and who did not scruple to denounce the deluded leaders of a corrupt Church in the most scathing terms—“Ye serpents! ye generation of vipers! How can ye escape the damnation of hell?” “With much contention”—amid much conflict and danger. This kind of preaching provoked opposition and involved them in great inward struggles. The faithful messenger of God fears not the most violent assault from without; but the thought of the fatal issues to those who obstinately reject and fight against the gospel fills him with agonising concern.

II. This boldness no suffering could daunt.—“Even after that we had suffered before, and were shamefully entreated, as ye know, at Philippi” (1Th_2:2). They had come fresh from a city where they had been cruelly outraged. Though Roman citizens, they had been publicly scourged and, to add to their degradation, were thrust into the inner prison, and their feet made fast in the stocks—treatment reserved for the vilest felons. But so far from being dismayed, their sufferings only deepened their love for the gospel and inflamed the passion to make it known. A German professor has lately made experiments with chalcedony and other quartzose minerals, and he has demonstrated that when such stones are ground on large and rapidly revolving wheels they exhibit a brilliant phosphorescent glow throughout their entire mass. So is it with the resolute worker. The more he is ground under the strong wheel of suffering and persecution, the more intensely will his entire character glow with the radiance of an unquenchable bravery.

III. This boldness was divinely inspired.—“We were bold in our God” (1Th_2:2). It was not the froth of a senseless presumption, not the wild, aimless effort of a reckless bravado; but the calm, grand heroism of a profound faith in the divine. They fell back completely upon God, and drew their deepest inspiration and mightiest strength from Him. The prophet Jeremiah, in a moment of despondency, decided to “speak no more in the name of the Lord”; but when he could say, “The Lord is with me as a mighty, terrible One,” his courage returned, and he obeyed implicitly the divine mandate, “Thou shalt go to all that I shall send thee, and whatsoever I command thee thou shalt speak.” Similarly commissioned, Paul once exclaimed, “I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.” Endowed with the like spirit, Luther uttered his noble protest at the Diet of Worms—“Here I stand: I cannot do otherwise: God help me!”

Lessons.—

1. Boldness is absolutely indispensable in attacking, not simply in the mass, but in detail, the crying evils of the age.

2. Boldness is acquired only by studious and prayerful familiarity with God’s message and with God.

GERM NOTES ON THE VERSES

1Th_2:1-2. The Preaching of the Gospel not in Vain.

I. It is not in vain as respects the end and object of the gospel itself.—

1. Conversion.

2. Sanctification or edification.

3. Condemnation.

II. It was not in vain as respected the objects of the apostle.—

1. His commission was to preach the gospel. He did it.

2. To gather in souls. He did so.

3. His reward was the approbation of Christ and seals to His ministry. He had both.

III. It was not in vain as respected the Thessalonians.—They were turned from idolatry; their hearts glowed with new feelings; their characters shone with new graces.—Stewart.

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1Th_2:1-12

3. a. The Thessalonians are themselves witnesses, that the Apostle’s was no vain entrance, but one of Divine power (1Th_2:1-2). As he exercises his ministry generally, with no impurity of purpose or method, but, as one put in trust by God, before the eyes of God (1Th_2:3-4), so in Thessalonica also he appeared in no flattering or selfish spirit (1Th_2:5-6), but with the most generous love (1Th_2:7-8) and self denying labor (1Th_2:9). They themselves and God are his witnesses, that he had shown himself throughout unblamable towards the believers, whilst he was careful about nothing else but, as a father, to exhort every individual to a walk worthy of God (1Th_2:10-12)

1For yourselves, brethren, know [yourselves know, brethren,][1] our entrance in [entrance, εἴσοδον] unto you, that it was not in vain [hath not been vain]2; 2but even after that we had suffered before and were shamefully entreated [but having before suffered, and been shamefully treated],3 as ye know, at [in, ἐν] Philippi, we were bold in our God to speak unto you the gospel of God with 3[in, ἐν] much contention. For our exhortation was [is],4 not of deceit [delusion]5 4nor [yet]6 of uncleanness, nor7 in guile; but as [according as, καθώς] we were allowed of God [have been approved by God]8 to be put in trust with the gospel, even so [so, οὕτω] we speak; not as pleasing men, but God,9 which trieth [who proveth]10 our hearts. 5For neither at any time used we words of flattery, as ye know; nor a cloak of covetousness, God is witness; 6nor of men sought we [sought we of men]11 glory, neither of [from, ἀπο] you, nor yet of [nor from, οὔτεἀπό] others, when we might have been burdensome [or: have used authority],12 as, the apostles of Christ [Christ’s apostles, Χριστοῦ ἀπόστολοι]; 7but we were [were found]13 gentle14 among you [in the midst of you, ἐν μέσῳ ὑμῶν], even as a nurse 8cherisheth her children [as a nurse would cherish her own children];15 so [,]16 being affectionately desirous17 of you, we were willing to have imparted [to impart] unto you not the gospel of God only [not only the gospel of God],18 but also our own souls, because ye were [became]19 dear unto us. 9For ye remember, brethren, our labor [toil, κόπον] and travail: for laboring [working]20 night and day, because we would not be chargeable [that we might not be burdensome, πρὸς τὸ μὴ ἐπιβαρῆσαι] to any of you, we preached unto you the gospel of God. 10Ye are witnesses, and God also [and God], how holily and justly [righteously, δικαίως] and unblameably we behaved ourselves among you that believe [to, or for you, 11who believed];21 as [even as, καθάπερ] ye know how we exhorted, and comforted [encouraged],22 and charged [adjured]23 [you, ὑμᾶς] every one of you, as a father 12doth his children [as a father his own children],24 that ye would walk [should walk]25 worthy [in a manner worthy, ἀξίως] of God, who hath called [calleth]26 you unto [into, εἰς] His [His own, ἑαυτοῦ] kingdom and glory.

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

1. (1Th_2:1.) For yourselves know.—For the confirmation and clearer elucidation (γάρ) of the statement of the foreign brethren regarding his entrance at Thessalonica (1Th_1:9), the Apostle now appeals at length, as he had done cursorily at 1Th_1:5, to the recollection of the Thessalonians themselves on the subject. Hence the same expressions, εἴσοδος πρὸς ὑμᾶς We might call 1Th_2:1-12 an explanation of the ὁποίαν 1Th_1:9, just as the πῶς ἐπεστρέψατε is then carried out in 1Th_2:13-16. The third testimony, that of the Thessalonians themselves, serves to establish the second, that of the strangers, just as the latter serves to establish the first (comp. on 1Th_1:8, Note 1). That 1Th_2:1 begins with the same αὐτοὶ γάρ as 1Th_1:9 is, of course, accidental; our αὐτοί does not stand opposed to that αὐτοί as such (that, indeed, has quite another reference, to ἡμᾶς of 1Th_2:8), but to strangers generally, as in the sequel καὶ ἡμεῖς of 1Th_2:13 corresponds to it.—The details that follow are, in fact, intelligible only on the supposition, that the Apostle has to confute certain aspersions on his person and ministry. Merely to strengthen the Thessalonians (Calvin, Lünemann, and most), he would not expatiate so much at large on the excellencies of his service amongst them, least of all with such solemn protestations (1Th_2:5; 1Th_2:10) and such frequent appeals to the recollection of the readers (1Th_2:2; 1Th_2:5; 1Th_2:9-11); but he enters on boasting for the same reason as in 2 Corinthians 10-13, because he must defend himself. Only it is not here in Thessalonica any factious doings that he has to contend with, but simply the insinuations whereby the unbelieving Thessalonians sought again to withdraw from the gospel their believing kindred and neighbors. In what these insinuations consisted we learn from the negative clauses, 1Th_2:1; 1Th_2:3; 1Th_2:5 sq. The very fact that nearly our entire section proceeds in clauses with οὐκ and ἀλλά (1Th_2:1-9) shows, that Paul (through Timothy) had been informed of false assertions in regard to his operations—falsehoods, to which it was necessary for him to oppose the truth. Already Rieger has remarked on 1Th_2:3 : A denial of this kind from the Apostle indicates, that such imputations had been cast on him and his preaching. And says Roos more precisely: When the Thessalonian converts reflected on the change that had taken place with them, it might possibly occur to them that an unknown man, of the name of Paul, had come to them over the sea with certain companions, had preached of one Jesus whom he called Christ, and of whom they had previously heard nothing, and had exhorted them to believe in Him, and serve Him as their Lord. So now we are Christians, they may have thought, whereas formerly we were Gentiles or Jews. But, in making this change, have we done right? Is the name, the faith, the hope of Christians not a thing of vanity? Are we not suffering for it to no purpose? Has not Paul deceived us? Is it not some falsehood that he has talked to us? And, besides, our countrymen hold his teaching to be a fable. These thoughts are now met by Paul in 1Th_2:1-16.

2. Our entrance unto you, that it hath not been vain.—This is the first of the imputations. κενή comp. 1Co_15:14,=empty, idle, without power or substance, unreal; Œcumenius: μῦθοι καὶ λῆροι; Calvin: vana ostentatio; comp. 1Th_1:5, οὐκ ἐν λόγῳ μόνον, and the antithesis there, as here in 1Th_2:2. Not, therefore,=in vain, fruitless (Luther, Flatt, &c.), nor yet at once powerless and fruitless (De Wette, [Jowett]), nor again=deceitful, fallax (Grotius). The γέγονεν, as distinguished from the simple ἦν or even ἐγένετο, expresses the secure consciousness of an accomplished, unassailable fact. In the original the subject of the dependent clause is by a Greek idiom attracted as object into the principal clause.27

3. (1Th_2:2.) But having before suffered, &c.—The cause of an idle babbler is one for which he does not submit to suffering, and still less, when he has just with difficulty surmounted one trial, does he again joyfully appear for the same cause, especially in a new conflict. A deep earnestness in suffering, and yet, along with that, an unwearied alacrity and fidelity in his calling, showed Paul to be a man whose appearance the Thessalonians needed only to recall (καθὼς οἴδατε), in order to perceive the vanity of the suspicions alleged against him. Of what sort these were, may be inferred from Act_17:6-7 : ringleaders, flatterers of the people, ambitious persons who sought their own advantage.—On the sufferings which the Apostle, immediately before (προπαθ.) his arrival in Thessalonica, had endured at Philippi, see Act_16:12 sqq. Paul adds ὑβρισθέντες, insultingly treated (comp. Mat_22:6; Luk_18:22), not so much because προπάσχειν like πάσχειν is a vox media (Lünemann), but because with his strong sense of right he had peculiarly felt the treatment received by him at Philippi to be arbitrary and unjust; see Act_16:37. To such slight features even extends the harmony between the Acts and our Epistles.

4. We were bold in our God &c.—παῤῥησιάζεσθαι, once again in Paul’s writings, Eph_6:20, and in like manner of the preaching of the gospel; frequently in the Acts, and indeed, except Act_18:26, only of Paul from his conversion onwards, Act_9:27-28; Act_13:46; Act_14:3; Act_19:8; Act_26:26. Freedom and boldness in testimony was therefore a prominent characteristic of this Apostle. Olshausen: παῤῥηαία is the outward expression of πληροφορία (1Th_1:5). Moreover, παῤῥησιάζεσθαι is not here=to speak or preach freely, so that λαλῆσαι should be an explanatory infinitive resolvable by: so that (De Wette, Koch, [Ellicott: so as to speak]), or an infinitive of the purpose: in order that (Schott); but, as in Act_3:26 [?] and Act_26:26,=to act with freedom and alacrity, and λαλῆσαι is simply an infinitive of the object (Lünemann), as in 1Th_2:4 πιστευθῆναι. [And so Alford, who translates: We were confident. Ellicott, on the other hand, comparing Eph_6:20 and Act_26:26, agrees with De Wette in thinking that “the idea of bold speech, even though reiterated in λαλῆσαι, can scarcely be excluded.”—J. L.] We had, says Paul, this παῤῥησία, not in ourselves, especially after such experiences, but in our God (in whom, as in our spiritual life-element, we live and labor; see 1Th_1:1, Doctrinal and Ethical, 1). Not merely was it no idle babbler with whom the Thessalonians had to do; it was not, speaking generally, any mere man, but God; and this God Paul dares to call his God, because God visibly owned him, and the Thessalonians perceived in their conscience (2Co_4:2; 2Co_5:11) that in the power of God Paul spoke and acted. Therefore also he purposely adds: the gospel of God; he had not brought to them any empty talk, nor any kind of man’s word whatsoever (see 1Th_2:13), but the glad tidings which God Himself will have proclaimed in the world. Comp. on τὸ εὐαγγέλιον τοῦ θεοῦ Exeg. Note 4 to 1Th_1:8, ὁ λόγος τοῦ κυρίου. Why Paul does not say: in Christ, the gospel of Christ, but in God, of God, see Doctr. and Eth., 3.

5. In much contention.—As Paul had testified of the Thessalonians, 1Th_1:6, that they received the word in much affliction with joy of the Holy Ghost, so here he can testify of himself that in much contention, with joy in God, he had published the same. Ἀγών, not outward and inward contention ([Chrysostom, Bishop Hall], Olshausen, [Jowett]), but the contention of outward suffering only, Php_1:30 (De Wette, and most).28

6. (1Th_2:3.) For our exhortation is &c.—The verb to be supplied in 1Th_2:3 is not ἦν but, as λαλοῦμεν of 1Th_2:4 shows, ἐστίν. Paul confirms (γάρ) the statement as to his entrance at Thessalonica by a statement de toto perpetuoque more suo (Bengel). But since this general witness to himself might again also be called in question, people at Thessalonica knowing nothing from their own observation of his ministry elsewhere, it was necessary for him to establish this point likewise by again enlarging, 1Th_2:5 sqq., on the spirit and method of his labors in Thessalonica. Similarly Jesus: If ye believe not me, my witness of myself, at least believe my works that are done amongst you (Joh_10:38; Joh_14:11).

7. Our exhortation [German: Predigt,=preaching, discourse]. Very well Lünemann: παράκλησις is a calling to, address; and, according to the different relations to which this address is applied, the word undergoes modifications of its meaning. In the case of sufferers it is consolation; directed toward a moral or intellectual need, it is exhortation and encouragement. Now, since even the first evangelical proclamation consists in exhortation and encouragement, to wit, in the summons to renounce sin and lay hold of the offered salvation (comp. 2Co_5:20), παράκλ. might also be used generally of the preaching of the gospel; whether objectively of the contents of the discourse, or subjectively of the preaching itself. So here; see 1Th_2:4. Bengel: totum præconium, evangelicum [passionum dulcedine tinctum, as Bengel adds.—J. L.]; Olshausen: the work generally of Christian teaching. Paul uses this expression and not εὐαγγέλιον (1Th_1:5), λόγος, κήρυγμα (1Co_2:4), or such like terms, because here the question is about the preaching, not in so far as it is a proclamation, but as it wins and transforms the hearers.29

8. Not of delusion, nor yet of uncleanness, nor in guile.—ἐκ marks the source from which the preaching proceeds; ἐν, the way and manner in which it is performed. The Apostle names two sources, one on the side of knowledge and doctrine, πλάνη, and one on the side of disposition, ἀκαθαρσια. He first repels the reproach, as if the Christian faith preached by him were a superstition, a chimera, and he himself an enthusiast or a babbler, like the sorcerers or magicians (Chrysost.). Opposed to this is the fact, 1Th_2:4, that he had been entrusted with the gospel by God. With an οὐδέ—a stronger disjunctive than οὔτε (δέ and τε), like our nor yet, stronger than nor (comp. Winer, p. 432)—Paul passes to the second point. Ἀκαθαρσία, impurity, commonly in the sense of unchastity (Rom_1:24; 2Co_12:21; Gal_5:19; Col_3:5), but also moral filth and uncleanness generally (Rom_6:19); here either an impure mind, foul motives in general, or perhaps it answers better to our sordid [schmutgig], specially=covetousness, selfishness (comp. 1Th_4:7; Eph_4:19; Eph_5:3). Bengel: ἀκαθ. est, ubi fructus carnis quæritur, cf. Php_1:16, οὐχ ἁγνῶς.—δόλος, craft, fraud, all kinds of dishonest tricks for cheating and ensnaring. It adds to the impure design the impure means for its accomplishment, and so lies in like manner on the practical side. Whilst, therefore, for the reading οὐδέ there may be alleged the difference of the prepositions, yet on internal grounds οὔτε is perfectly justifiable (comp. Winer, p. 436 sq. [and Critical Note 7]). In the antithesis likewise, 1Th_2:4, ἀκαθαρσία and δόλος are taken together in the sentence with οὕως, since ἀνθρώποις ἀρέσκοντες answers to δόλος and θεῷ τῷ δοκιμάζοντι τὰς καρδίας to ἀκαθαρσία. So in the confirmatory 1Th_2:5-6 the λόγος κολακείς answers to δόλος the πρόφασις πλεονεξίας and ζητοῦντες ἐξ ἀνθρώπων δόξαν to ἀκαθαρσία. The proof of 1Th_2:1, in particular, that is given in 1Th_2:3, lies in οὐκ ἐκ πλάνης answering to κενή of 1Th_2:1; but the confirmatory sentence, just like 1Th_1:8, goes beyond that which it confirms, since with οὐδέ the Apostle adds new considerations, which are then again themselves confirmed and carried further in 1Th_2:5 sqq. This view is supplementary to Note 6.

9. (1Th_2:4.) According as—so.—Καθώς, conformably to the fact that; οὕτως, according to that very rule: agreeably to the grace conferred and obligation laid upon us (Lünemann).

10. Approved.—Δοκιμάζειν means, first, to try, test, scrutinize; so at the close of our verse, and commonly in the New Testament, e.g. 1Th_5:21; 1Ti_3:10, and often; and then also of the result of the trial: to regard as tried, fit, worthy, and to choose accordingly for a position (1Co_16:3); hence in the next place generally, to value, prize.30 So here, and similarly Rom_1:28. Paul does not in this mean to assume any worthiness of his own, as the Greek interpreters (Chrysostom, Theophylact, Œcumenius) from their dogmatic standpoint characteristically explain. Rather his aim is just this, to exalt his authority as from God (similarly 1Ti_1:12). He would have it understood that, so far is he from preaching human heresy, or considering himself out of his own fancy called to be a preacher (ἐκ πλάνης, 1Th_2:3), it is rather God Himself who, according to His gracious purpose (Grotius, Pelt, Lünemann, and even Theodoret [Alford: free choice]) has vouchsafed to him the distinction of being entrusted with the glad, heavenly message to the world. So in the apodosis with οὕτως the main emphasis lies on θεῷ in opposition to ἀνθρώποις. Comp. 1Th_2:2 and note 4; observe also the impressive sonorousness of the expression. The perfect δεδοκ. marks what has happened once for all, the security of it as a matter of fact. At the close of the verse Paul purposely uses the same word once again; he knows himself to be the object of a continuous Divine δοκιμάζειν. There δοκ. is, to try, to examine; yet perhaps not without an accompanying intimation of favorable judgment. In the translation we have sought to indicate this, as well as the identity of the verbs.31 Πιστευθῆναι, infinitive of the object, denoting that which was vouchsafed to Paul. So Rom_1:28. On Paul’s frequent construction of πιστεύεσθαι, see Winer, p. 206. That Paul, moreover, here includes Silvanus and Timothy is obvious from the plurals καρδίας and ψυχάς 1Th_2:8, as Lünemann properly remarks against De Wette, who appeals to 1Th_2:7 [6], ἀπόστολοι, but see Note 16. Of course, however, Paul speaks primarily and chiefly of himself.32

11. (1Th_2:4.) Not as pleasing men.—̔Ως before the participle gives it a subjective character, that of the conception and intention: We speak not with the thought of pleasing men, and so winning them with guile (ἐν δόλῳ 1Th_2:3), but to please God who searcheth our hearts, and so knows and judges even impure designs (ἐξ ἀκαθαρσίας 1Th_2:3). Comp. Gal_1:10.—[Alford: “ἀρέσκοντες, in the strict sense of the present tense: going about to please, striving to please.”—J. L.]

12. (1Th_2:5.) For we—On the logical relation, expressed by γάρ, of 1Th_2:5 sqq. to what precedes, see Notes 6 and 8 (at the end).

13. Used we words of flattery &c.—Τίγνεσθαι ἐν, of things 1Th_1:5, here of persons (comp. 1Ti_4:15)=versari in re, to engage in any matter, be occupied therein. The flattering words thus answer to ἀνθρώποις ἀρέσκοντες, 1Th_2:4 (Calvin: Whoever will please men, must basely flatter), and to δόλος 1Th_2:3 (Chrysostom: We flattered not, as deceivers, who desire merely to draw people to themselves, and rule them). For the fact that he had not flattered them, Paul appeals to the recollection of his readers themselves: as ye know; but for what follows, that he had had no selfish aims, he can only appeal to God, who knoweth the heart: God is witness! Comp. Rom_1:9; Php_1:8. This appeal answers to θεῷ τῷ δοκιμάζοντι τὰς καρδίας ἡμῶν (1Th_2:4), as the repelling of the insinuation, that his mind had been set on earthly good and human glory (1Th_2:6), answers to θεῷ ἀρέσκειν, 1Th_2:4, and οὐκ ἐξ ἀκαθαρσίας, 1Th_2:3, Πλεονεξία corresponds to ἀκαθαρσία, as in 1Th_4:6-7; Eph_4:19; Eph_5:3. Πρόφασις (from προφαίνω, not πρόφημι), properly, what appears; hence the pretext, behind which one hides his real thought, an excuse; so here parallel with λόγος: My speech was neither a word of flattery, nor a fair pretext, a plausible form for covetous ends.

14. (1Th_2:6.) Nor sought we glory.—Ζητοῦντες likewise is dependent on ἐγενήθημεν and parallel to ἐν λόγῳ κολ., ἐν προφάσει πλεονεξίας. Such a change of structure is truly Pauline (comp. Rom_12:9 sqq.). As to the thought, there is a close connection with the latter point, as of ambition with avarice. On ἐξ ἀνθρώπων δόξαν, comp. Joh_5:41; Joh_5:44.

15. Neither from you, nor from others.—In 1Th_2:5-6 there are, first, three mutually coördinate οὔτε, then two subordinate to the clause of the last of these three, since οὔτε ἀφʼ ὑμῶν &c. distributes the ἐξ ἀνθρώπων. Ἀπό, essentially=ἐκ, brings to view the special source as distinct from the general.33 From others, with whom we might perhaps have sought honor for ourselves through your conversion (comp. 1Th_1:8-9). Erroneously Bengel: Qui nos admirati essent, si nos superbius tractassemus.

16. (1Th_2:7 [1Th_2:6].)34 When we might have used authority [or, been burdensome] as Christ’s Apostles.—The participle δυνάμενοι is subordinated to ζητοῦντες, and is resolvable by although. Ἐν βάρει εἶναι to be of weight, to appear important, dignified, to assume consequence. Against the connection, Theodoret, Ewald, and others: to be burdensome=ἐπιβαρεῖν, 1Th_2:9.35 Ἀπόστολοι, so far as it refers also to Silvanus and Timothy (see Note 10, at the end), is used in the wider sense, as in Act_14:4; Act_14:14 of Paul and Barnabas. But perhaps the old rule holds here: A potiori fit denominatio. As Christ’s Apostles, as messengers and envoys (ambassadors) of the Anointed King of the whole world, solemnly appointed by God (Act_17:3; Act_17:7), they might have stepped forth with dignity. Dicit Paulus se adeo abfuisse ab inani pompa, a jactantia, a fastu, ut legitimo etiam jure suo cesserit, quod ad vindicandam autoritatem pertinet (Calvin).

17. (1Th_2:7.) But we were found gentle in the midst of you.—Ἐγενήθημεν answers to the ἐγενήθ. of 1Th_2:5. Ἤπιος (from ἔπω, εἶπον, whence then νήπιος, infans) properly, affable, mild, kind, loving (comp. 2Ti_2:24). Suavissimum vocabulum, de parentibus præcipue et de medicis dici solitum (Bengel). [Ἐν μέσῳ ὑμῶν, in the midst of you, surrounded by you, as a teacher by his pupils, a mother by her children, a hen by her chickens (Bengel). It marks the centre of a group or society, drawing all eyes to itself (comp. Act_1:15; Luk_2:46; Mat_18:2): So that ye have all seen and experienced it (Koch). Riggenbach].36 Even this loving demeanor of the Apostle might be interpreted as flattery (1Th_2:5), and so Paul confutes this reproach by showing it to be a perversion of his virtue into a fault. Then by the fuller description, ὡς ἄν &c. of this his tender and devoted love, he at the same time confutes the other reproach (1Th_2:5-6) of his having been selfish or ambitious.

18. As a nurse would cherish her own children.—Before ὡς there should be a point with the force of our colon,37 so that ὡς answers to οὕτως of 1Th_2:8. The sentence after ὡς is an explanation attached to what precedes by asyndeton, as in 1Th_1:8; 1Th_2:9, yet so that here also again the explanatory sentence contains at the same time an advance, an enlargement of the thought. Τροφός, nourisher, she who suckles; here not a nurse, but the mother herself, as appears from τἁ ἑαυτῆς τέκνα, in which moreover, especially with this arrangement of the words (comp. 1Th_2:8; otherwise 1Th_2:11), there exists the climactic intimation, her own children (see Alex. Buttmann, Grammatik des neutestamenflichen Sprachgebrauchs, 1859, p. 97). With Stier, we have also expressed both in the version.38 The figure of the mother (comp. Gal_4:19; Isa_66:13; Isa_49:15) is still tenderer than that of the father (1Th_2:11), but is here chosen especially for this reason, because truly a nursing mother with her child seeks not profit or honor, but is wholly bent on bestowing (not receiving) love. Θάλπειν likewise is a tender expression; properly to warm, then, like fovere, to foster and cherish (Eph_5:29; comp. Deu_22:6, LXX).

19. (1Th_2:8.) So, being affectionately desirous of you, we were willing.—Ὁμειρόμενοι supported here by the best manuscripts, occurs in the New Testament only here, and but seldom elsewhere, in the LXX, &c.; in meaning it is=ἱμείρεσθαι (Recepta), and, like this, probably an enlarged form of μείρεσθαι, which should perhaps be distinguished from the ordinary μείρεσθαι (see Passow), and is used by Nicander in the sense of the common ἱμείρεσθαι (comp. Winer, p. 92)=ardently to long after any one, to love tenderly.39—Εὐδοκοῦμεν is the imperfect without augment, as frequently; Winer, p. 1Th 66: we were pleased, were cheerfully ready, took delight therein (comp. 2Co_5:8; Rom_15:26). In 1Th_2:7-8 one feels in word and figure the tender heartiness and sweet breath of a first, fresh love, such as becomes the firstling of the apostolical Epistles.

20. To impart unto you &c.—Μεταδοῦναι stands emphatically forward, in order to mark the love as one altogether giving, imparting. The two objects of μεταδοῦναι are joined to one another ascensively by not only—but also, so that the second is held up as the one of greater importance for the connection (τοῦτο μεῖζον ἐκείνου Chrysostom). Ἑαυτῶν moreover, is opposed to τοῦ θεοῦ, and the Apostle means to say: We were willing not only to fulfil our official service, entrusted to us by God, in delivering to you His gospel, but there was formed also a personal relation of the most devoted love, in consequence of which we were ready to sacrifice to you our own life.40 [Webster and Wilkinson: “ ‘not only that which you could share without loss to me, but that which I must lose in giving;’ or, ‘not only that which I held in trust for others, had in charge to give, but that which was most my own.’ ”—J. L.] The latter point was here the main thing, over against the imputations of covetousness and ambition. The comparison with the mother has reference to this personal love, which is therefore still made specially prominent in the additional clause with δίοτι (stronger and more distinctive than ὅτι), which assigns the motive. How far now Paul with his attendants willingly gave up his own life to the Thessalonians, he shows himself by an example in 1Th_2:9, which is joined to what precedes, by γάρ, and is therefore illustrative of it. At the risk of health and life, he performed along with his preaching strenuous manual labor day and night, that he might be burdensome to no one, just as a mother day and night with much labor and self-sacrifice cherishes her little child. Add to this, that the Apostle—and it is of himself that he speaks at least primarily—was probably of a weak and sickly constitution (2Co_10:10; 2Co_12:5 sqq.), and we shall the better understand how much there was here of a μεταδοῦναι τὴν ψυχήν. Μεταδοῦναι is indeed zeugmatic, since out of it only the simple δοῦναι must be supplied to τὰς ψυχὰς (comp. Mat_20:28); but such constructions are frequent enough (see Winer, p. 548). On ἑαυτῶν=ἡμῶν αὐτῶν, see Winer, p. 136. [Bengel’s paraphrase: Anima nostra cupiebat quasi immeare in animam vestram—and similarly Chrysostom: τὰς ψυχὰς εἰς ὑμᾶς κενῶσαι, eff undere—though suitable to μͅεταδοῦναι, is opposed to the γἀρ of 1Th_2:9. and perhaps also contains a thought not quite apostolic, and only in seeming accord with the figure of the mother, since not the suckling as such, but the θάλπειν is the tertium comparationis. To think of the gospel as the milk, according to 1Pe_2:2; comp. Heb_5:13 (De Wette, Lünemann, and others), is quite as little in keeping, since it is really not the Apostle’s gospel, but is expressly called the gospel of God, and since for that very reason, as has been pointed out, this consideration does not enter into the comparison with a mother. In μεταδοῦναι τὰς ψυξάς the exposure of the life in danger and persecutions is commonly thought of; nor is this excluded, since 1Th_2:9 contains merely an illustrative example, such as was required by the context, and was fitted to repel the imputation of covetousness and ambition.—Riggenbach.]

21. (1Th_2:9.) For ye remember our toil and travail.—Μνημονεύετε, more sonorous than οἴδατε (1Th_2:1-2; 1Th_2:5; 1Th_2:11); here with an accusative; 1Th_1:3, with a genitive.—On γάρ, see Note 20. [The reference of γάρ to ἤπιοι ἐγενήθημεν, 1Th_2:7, is too remote; that to ἀγαπητοὶ ἡμῖν ἐγενήθητε (Lünemann), unsuitable—Riggenbach.] Κόπος strengthened by the addition of μόχθος,41 as at 2Th_3:8 (a verse which agrees almost verbally with ours), and 2Co_11:27. The expressions in their connection denote the most strenuous bodily labor at his handicraft as σκηνοποιός (Act_18:3), a maker of tents out of leather or cloth for shepherds, travellers, soldiers, &c. (Winer, Realwörterbuch II. pp. 213, 725). This κόπος and μόχθος is now explained in a sentence appended, as in 1Th_2:7, by asyndeton (γάρ after νυκτός being spurious), in which the emphasis lies on what stands foremost, νυκτὸς καὶ ἡμέρας ἐργαζόμενοι, as in 1Th_2:8 on τὰς ἑαυτῶν ψυχάς. And now, as ἐληρύξαμεν εἰς ὑμᾶς τὸ εὐαγγέλιον τοῦ θεοῦ plainly answers to τὸ εὐαγγέλοιν τοῦ θεοῦ of 1Th_2:8, so does νυκτὸς καὶ ἡμέρας ἐργαζόμενοι to τὰς ἑαυτῶν ψυχάς, so that there accrues from this a new and more precise confirmation of our view of the γάρ and of μεταδοῦναι τὰς ἑαυτῶν ψυχάς.

22. Working night and day.—Ἐργάζεσθαι, of manual labor, as 1Th_4:11, and often. We [Germans] say day and night, as ἡμέρας καὶ νυκτός, Luk_18:7; Act_9:24, and frequently in the Apocalypse; but elsewhere, and always in Paul’s usage [both in his letters and speeches, 1Th_3:10; 2Th_3:8; 1Ti_5:5; 2Ti_1:3; Act_20:31; Act_26:7.—J. L.], νυκτὸς καὶ ημέρας or νύκτα καὶ ἡμέραν, because the Jews, as also the Athenians, begin the civil day with the evening. Here this order is emphatic,42 because night-work is the more unusual and irksome. We are not, therefore, to suppose that Paul preached all day, and performed manual labor in the night-time; on the contrary, the latter occupation filled up also a good part of the day, as on the other hand he preached likewise at night (Act_20:7); but, generally, day and night is, as with us, a vivid expression for without intermission (comp. especially Rev_20:10).

23. That we might not be burdensome to any of you, by his having to care for my support. So little did the Apostle seek any profit from the Thessalonians, that he sought not even the necessaries of life from them but earned them for himself, that his intercourse with them might on his part be altogether one of giving. In hac etiam parte jure suo obstinuit (Calvin; comp. Note 16). For the matter in question, comp. Act_18:3; Act_20:34; 1Co_4:12; 1Co_9:7 sqq.; 2Co_11:8 sqq.; Php_4:10 sqq., and Doctr. and Eth., 5.—On κηρύττειν εἰς, see Winer, p. 191.43

24. (1Th_2:10.) Ye are witnesses and God.—The Apostle having in three sentences with οὐκ—ἀλλά (1Th_2:1-5; 1Th_2:9) confuted the reproaches cast upon him, and which are summed up in the fewest words in 1Th_2:3—having shown that his doctrine is not an idle delusion, but the gospel of God, and that he himself has labored, not from selfish motives of covetousness and ambition, nor with impure methods of craft and flattery, but in the sight of God and with the most devoted love—he now at last opposes to that a brief, positive sketch of his ministry, and for this he again appeals to the Thessalonians and God as witnesses (comp. 1Th_2:5), by way of giving to his assertion so much the more of the impressive earnestness of truth. Men must witness for his manner of acting; God witnesses, in his conscience and theirs, for his inward disposition. This explanatory sentence likewise is added by asyndeton (comp. 1Th_2:7; 1Th_2:9), a construction to which in the present instance the liveliness of emotion also contributes.

25. How holily, and righteously, and unblamably, &c.—Ὁσίως with perceptible, inward reverence of God; δικαίως, with due consideration of men, leaving and giving to every one his own (comp. Eph_4:24; Tit_2:12 [Luk_1:75; Tit_1:8]);44 ἀμέμπτως, unblamably, irreproachably in the whole deportment—the negative side to the two positive ones (Lünemann), especially to δικαίως (Olshausen). This qualification Paul adds, because reproaches had been cast upon him.45 [Bengel and others: toward themselves, in order to get the three references to God, men, themselves as in Tit_2:12; but this is here inadmissible, since all is referred to ὐμῖν τοῖς πιστεύουσι—δσίως assigning merely the religious ground of the behavior toward the believers.—Riggenbach.] It is commonly not enough considered, that we have here before us, not adjectives, but adverbs (comp. Act_20:18., πῶς ἐγενόμην μεθʼ ὑμῶν); Paul is not speaking of his walk, his entire personal bearing (De Wette, Hofmann)—otherwise we must have had ὅσιοι &c. (comp. οἷοι, 1Th_1:5)—but of the manner of his dealing with the believers (Winer, p. 413).

26. To [for] you who believed.—ὑμῖν is simply the dative of direction or reference: to you, toward you (De Wette, Koch) [not a dative of interest: for your advantage,46 nor yet of judgment: appeared to you (Œcumenius and Theophylact, Calvin, Bengel, Lünemann); the adverbs in that case would scarcely be admissible.—Riggenbach.].47 The addition τοῖς πιστεύουσιν, at first view apparently superfluous [Jowett], must here as at 1Th_2:13 have its own ground and. significance. The believers were told that their faith was credulity and superstition, that they had allowed themselves to be ensnared, abused, and misled by the stranger, and that this was now called faith. A similar way of talking to that nowadays, which confounds faith with opinion, notion, dim, baseless feeling. In opposition to this Paul dwells with emphasis on the word faith in its true import, and shows how he had never abused their confidence in him and his word so as to indulge himself in impurity of any kind, but rather, honoring their faith as faith in God and His word, he had in all his proceedings kept holy what was holy, and had with all earnest men exhorted them to a walk worthy of God. [Those, who explain the dative as a dative of judgment,48 take τοῖς πιστεύουσιν restrictively: tametsi aliis non ita videremur;49 Bengel. Especially contrary to 1Th_2:13 (?).—Riggenbach.]—Ἐγενήθημεν as in 1Th_2:5; 1Th_2:7; 1Th_1:5.

27. (1Th_2:11.) Whilst we, as ye know, &c. [Even as ye know how we, &c.]—Καθἀπερ οἴδατε is a parenthetical clause similar to καθὼς οἴδατε of 1Th_2:2; 1Th_2:5; it belongs to the following participial construction. This time the Apostle puts καθάπερ for καθώς, because immediately after ὡς occurs twice. The first ὡς belongs to ἑνα ἑκαστον, and has here a strengthening force such as it carries also elsewhere in connection with ἕκαστος (see Passow under ἕκαστος), a usage very nearly akin to the connection of ὡς with superlatives. The corroboration εἷς ἕκαστος, of frequent occurrence in the New Testament, is found likewise in classic Greek (A. Buttmann, p. 105). With the double reënforcement, ὡς εἷς ἕκαστος, comp. Rev_21:21; ἀνὰ εἷς ἑκαστος; Eph_5:33 : ὑμεῖς οἱ καθʼ ἕνα ἕκαστος The participial clauses, 1Th_2:11-12, show to what extent Paul behaved holily and righteously and unblamably toward the believers (1Th_2:10), and we have therefore resolved the participles by in that.50 The main emphasis of the participial construction rests on the conclusion, εἰς τὸ περιπατεῖν ἀξἰως, &c. (Lünemann), and yet so that Paul would in connection therewith lay stress on two other considerations: 1. That he had taken pains to hold every one in particular to this worthy walk, and hence the doubly strengthened ἕκαστος; 2. That for this end he had exerted all his force of speech, and hence the combination of the three sonorous participles. The Apostle’s unblamable deportment towards the believers was shown in his exhorting every individual with the whole power of his address to nothing else but a walk worthy of God. This is simply the connection of 1Th_2:10 with 1Th_2:11-12. The comparison with a father has reference to all three points: a father keeps his children singly in his eye, and trains every one according to his individuality; he employs all the force of exhortation in kindness and severity; he would keep his children only to what is good, and to no evil of any kind. Here, where the question is not, as in 1Th_2:7-8, about devoted love, but holy earnestness, Paul compares himself, not to a mother, but to a father. Paul never writes tautologically, but, even while repeating similar thoughts, advances to new and wider points of view. [Interpreters in general do not agree with me in regarding καθάπερ οἴδατε as a parenthesis, but take οἴδατε as a governing verb, on which ὡς, apart from ἕνα ἕκαστον, is dependent. But since ὡς is followed only by participles, they are obliged to supply the verbum finitum, and then, because ὑμᾶς is afterwards added, ἠγαπήσαμεν, οὐχ [οὐκ] ἀφήκαμεν, &c., is supplied to ἕνα ἕκαστον (Pelt, Schott, and others), or to the entire clause ἦμεν (Beza, Grotius, Flatt), or ἐγενήθημεν, from the previous context (Bengel, Lünemann, [Alford, Wordsworth]), or, the supplement being left indeterminate, an anacoluthon is assumed (De Wette, [Ellicott]). With these grammatical inconveniences there is then connected also an erroneous and artificial view of the logical relation of 1Th_2:11-12 to 1Th_2:10, as that Paul speaks in 1Th_2:10 of his behavior generally; in 1Th_2:11-12, for confirmation of that, of the discharge of his duty as a teacher in particular (De Wette, Koch, similarly Hofmann); or that in proof of his own virtue he adduces the fact of his having exhorted the Thessalonians to virtue, it being here taken for granted that one, who has it so much at heart that others shall be virtuous, will be so himself (Lünemann). Independently of other objections to these views, they would require a καί after καθάπερ or after ὡς.—Riggenbach.]51

28. Exhorted and encouraged and adjured.—ὑμᾶς is superfluous52 after as ὡς ἕνα ἕκαστον ὑμῶν; similar repetitions in the classics and also in the New Testament, Col_2:13;53 Mat_8:1; and often (Winer, p. 531). Παρακαλεῖν, to exhort generally; παραμυθεῖσθαι kindly to encourage; μαρτύρεσθαι, earnestly and solemnly to obtest, like διαμαρτύρεσθαι 1Ti_5:21; 2Ti_2:14; 2Ti_4:1. Bengel: Παρα καλ. movet, ut facias aliquid (libenter); παραμυθ. ut cum gaudio; μαρτυρ, ut cum timore. The two last participles really specify the twofold style and method of the παρακαλεῖν, and may be also grammatically, subordinated to it, as, for example, δυνάμενοι of 1Th_2:7 [1Th_2:6] is subordinated to ζητοῦντες of 1Th_2:6, and κωλυόντων of 1Th_2:16 to μὴ ἀρεσκόντων καὶ ἐναντίων of 1Th_2:15 (comp. 2Ti_1:4). In favor of this are the facts, 1. that εἰς τὸ περιπατ. cannot depend on μαρτυρ., which must have either ἵνα (1Ti_5:21) or the simple infinitive (2Ti_2:14); 2. that ὑμᾶς is unsuitable to μαρτυρ., which cannot have an accusative of the person after it, except in the here inadmissible sense of taking one to witness. Perhaps the pleonastic ὑμᾶς is put after παρακαλοῦντες for the very purpose of separating the subordinate participles from the superior one. Even as to form, παραμυθ. and μαρτυρ. belong together as of the middle voice, and are jointly distinguished from the active παρακαλοῦντες. Thus: We exhorted you with kindly encouragement as well as with earnest obtestation.54 Comp., moreover, on the accumulation of participles Note. 27.—The division of verses is here very unapt.55

29. (1Th_2:12.) That ye should walk in a manner worthy, &c.—Εἰς τὸ περιπατ. is thus dependent on παρακαλ., and denotes the contents or object of the exhortation. [So also Lünemann, who thinks, indeed, that εἰς may be referred to all the three participles; but in that case εἰς must rather denote the purpose, as De Wette and Koch understand it.—Riggenbach.]

With ἀξίως τοῦ θεοῦ τοῦ καλοῦντος comp. Eph_4:1 : ἀξίως τῆς κλήσεως, Col_1:10 : ἀξίως τοῦ κυρίου. The two ideas are here combined. Καλοῦντος, present; because the kingdom and glory are still future, so that the call thereto, though it has already gone forth, yet continues till the coming of Christ, when the kingdom and the glory shall be revealed (Lünemann).56 The participle is even half-substantival, like ὁ ῥυόμενος, 1Th_1:10.

30. Into his own kingdom and glory.—Magnificum syntheton (Bengel). Not a hendiadys: kingdom of His glory, or glory of His kingdom (Koppe, Olshausen, &c.); nor yet: earthly kingdom (the Church) and heavenly glory (Baumgarten-Crusius); nor is δόξα the glory of the Messianic kingdom (De Wette), but, since ἑαυτοῦ belongs also to δόξα, the glory of God, Rom_5:2 (Lünemann). Comp. the closing doxology of the Lord’s Prayer. Ἑαυτοῦ is emphatic by position, as in 1Th_2:7 [Webster and Wilkinson: “implying a participation, or the most exalted fellowship and interest in the Divine blessedness,”—J. L.]. Paul would here again, at the end of the entire section as at its beginning (1Th_2:2; 1Th_2:4; see Notes 4 & 10), give prominence to the thought, that it is God with whom believers have to do, and of whom he had been the mere but honest instrument (hence the leading position of ὁσίως in 1Th_2:10;—Comp. 1Th_2:13).

Thus: God calls you to a participation in His own kingdom, which will appear at Christ’s advent, and in His own Divine glory, into which believers then enter through the change [of the living, 1Co_15:51.—J. L.] or through the (first) resurrection. It might be asked whether βασιλεία here is not to be taken in the active sense=kingly dominion; yet this signification of βασιλεία τοῦ θεοῦ does not, to my knowledge, occur in the New Testament. But certainly the participation of Christians in the βασιλεία will really be a participation in the βασιλεύειν. Their calling is indeed to be glorified (Rom_8:17), not, however, to be ruled over, but to the βασιλεύειν or συμβασιλεύειν (Rom_5:17; 1Co_4:8; 2Ti_2:12; Rev_20:4; Rev_20:6; Rev_22:5).—The motive to a holy walk is therefore a double one, which yet again is but one and the same: Christians are to walk worthily, that is, they should regulate all their proceedings and life-conduct in such a way as becomes 1. the holy majesty of God, with whom by their calling they have fellowship: and 2. their own destination, expressed in this calling, to a share in the full dignity, imperial and essential, of this same God. This pure light of glory excludes all impurity (comp. 1Ti_1:11, τὸ εὐαγγέλιον τῆς δόξης, in connection with the preceding verses, and 1Jn_3:3). This section also, like the one before it, thus closes with an eschatological outlook. And, in truth, there meets us here the high practical importance of the Christian hope. As in suffering it begets patience (1Th_1:3), so in action a holy walk.

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

1. (1Th_2:1-12.) To the Thessalonians assailed on account of their faith Paul shows that there is something real about it, both in his case (1Th_2:1-12) and in theirs (1Th_2:13-16). As proof he here cites, not miracles, as, for example, in Gal_3:5, but simply the demonstration of the spirit and of power—what of Divine, self-evidencing light they had perceived in him, and experienced in their own hearts and consciences. It is worthy of note that the Gentile Apostle, in the very first Epistle written by him for the Gentile world, insists on this. And such is still to-day the twofold evidence of Christianity in the midst of a world estranged from God, where so frequently all power, all culture, all historical life stands, or seems to stand, in opposition to the gospel: the children of light, in whom, as nowhere else in the world, we perceive a perfect and blessed life (Mat_5:14-16; Php_2:15), and the purifying and quickening Divine influences which we experience in ourselves from the gospel (2Co_13:5).

2. Our section is rich in self-praise, which, however, develops itself rather, step by step, as self-defence. A servant of Christ owes it, not so much to himself as his Master and his cause, to clear himself of unjust imputations, whenever they threaten to hinder the progress of the gospel, and prejudice the faith and love of the brethren. How in such a case one should express and demean himself may be learned from Paul, who first of all lets it be seen that he is Divinely certain of his cause, and is conscious of having acted with self-denial in the power of God and before the eyes of God, and then also he appeals freely to human testimony. The Lord knows how, by means of the oppositions of the world or other humbling experiences, so to dispose his servants inwardly, that when circumstances are, such that the ends of the Divine kingdom require it, they can and ought to speak of themselves in a way, that to the judgment of a merely natural morality appears as self-praise. Here belongs also, for example, the fact that John distinguishes himself as the disciple whom Jesus loved; here belong many expressions in the Psalms and passages of Daniel, as Dan_1:17-20; Dan_9:2-3; 2 Corinthians 10-13.

3. Our section is a true pastoral mirror.57 In the first and larger half (1Th_2:1-9) are two principal points of view, one of which concerns the cause, the doctrine; the other the individual, in respect partly of his inner motives, partly of his manner of acting and speaking. 1. For what concerns the doctrine, we must be able to testify that it is no misleading error, no idle, impotent human invention of any sort, that we preach, but the gospel of God, the glad tidings which God Himself would have to be published to men. We speak in the consciousness, and in the power, of a Divine commission, not as those who are enthusiastic for some self-contrived, human system, and such like, nor as idle babblers believing nothing. 2. For what concerns, a. the disposition and purpose in the discharge of the office, we know that we are free from impure motives of avarice and ambition, for we prosecute our work for souls in the continual presence of Him who knows the heart, and, to please whom, we have to prosecute it earnestly, and in fervent love to those entrusted to us. That we may offer no hindrance to the gospel, we willingly forego the honor and profit that we might otherwise properly claim. We are not satisfied with the faithful fulfilment of what is officially prescribed, but voluntarily undertake additional toil and trouble of every kind. We spare not our health or our life, where the honor of our Lord and the salvation of souls are concerned. In short, instead of seeking aught for ourselves, the soul of our work is self-sacrificing love. It is more blessed to give than to receive. b. As regards the means and manner of our working, we stand in no need of any sort of cunning or spurious pastoral shrewdness to draw the people to us, and secure for ourselves their respect. We never deal in flattering words. We aim not at all at pleasing men.—In the second half (1Th_2:10-12) Paul exhibits the holy and righteous behavior of a servant of Christ toward the believers, and shows how, 1. so far as concerns the Church, this consists in not merely proclaiming the word generally, but in also bringing it near to individual souls, so that in this way the special care of souls is added to preaching. 2. For what concerns the preacher himself, he should put forth all his strength, and in different ways, adapted to occasional circumstances, to individuals and spiritual conditions, point those committed to him to the right way. 3. With regard, finally, to the doctrine, it should aim at nothing else but to hold the hearers to what is good. But in Christianity that which is morally good has a thoroughly religious character. It is a walk worthy of God. Nor does even that exhaust the matter. It is not merely the relation of single souls, or even of the congregation, to God, that is to be held up to believers, but God has a kingdom, a corporate order of life, in which He really shares His glory with the creature. To this kingdom, already founded in Christ, but to be first manifested at His advent, we are called. Our walk should bear in itself the stamp of our so high destiny. We should act from motives drawn from the kingdom and the glory. The preaching, therefore, must teach what the kingdom is, and what the glory (comp. my Discourse: die biblische Lehre von Reiche Gottes in ihrer Bedeutung für die Gegenwart [The Bible Doctrine of the Kingdom of God in its importance for the present time], Basel, 1859).—Lastly, in our section there is this fact also to be particularly noticed, that the Apostle compares himself in his ministry to a father and a mother: the latter in the first half, the former in the second. The parental relation, that most original of all human relations (being preceded only by the conjugal), that image of God’s relation to men, is itself again the natural, God-given pattern for all other relations of superior and inferior, and so especially also for preachers and and pastors. A servant of Christ has in his own house a constant school for his office. What he feels and does for his own children, the same he should feel and do for his Church. Yet, not merely the earnestness of paternal love, but the tenderness and self-sacrifice likewise of the maternal, is in the Apostle. He speaks of the parental relation, not by way of making it the foundation of just claims, but with an eye to its obligations and performances.

4. (1Th_2:2.) It is worthy of remark that in 1Th_2:2. Paul does not say: we were bold in Christ, to speak unto you the gospel of Christ, but: in God, of God; and so throughout the entire section (see 1Th_2:4; 1Th_2:8-9; 1Th_2:12-13). To obviate the objections of the Gentiles and Jews, he purposely reverts to the ultimate ground, still common more or less to them and Christians. Against Jesus Christ, that historical Person, they might bring forward the same exceptions as against the Apostle himself; but God is His own immediate witness in the consciences of all men. And this Divine witness of conscience was, and is, on the side of the gospel of Jesus Christ (2Co_4:2; 2Co_5:11). To this we too, in contending with the adversaries, must always again revert. We must connect Christ with God, Christianity with religion, that is, with the religious and moral nature of man in general, the positive and historical with the ideal (comp. Joh_7:17).

5. (1Th_2:5.) Twice in our short section does Paul call God to witness, 1Th_2:5; 1Th_2:10, as he does in like manner also elsewhere, Rom_1:9; Php_1:8; 2Co_1:23; comp. 2Co_11:31; Rom_9:1; 1Ti_2:7. A servant of God may often find himself in the same position, especially when meeting assaults, and where the question is about dispositions and prayers. A parallel to this is presented by the Verily, I say unto you, which is found so frequently in the mouth of the Lord, in the Synoptists with a single, in John with a double, ἀμήν. It was necessary for Him, in opposition to the unbelief or dulness of His hearers, to corroborate the often very paradoxical truth which he had to advance. Such assertions and protestations are approaches to the oath, to which some of them come quite close, particularly 2Co_1:2-3, and therefore contributions to the Scriptural view of the doctrine of the oath, and to the correct interpretation and application of Mat_5:33-37; Jam_5:12.

6. (1Th_2:9.) Paul insists strongly on the right of ministers to live of the gospel (1Co_9:7 sqq.; 1Ti_5:17-18; Gal_6:6), and he himself also receives support from the Philippians and other churches (2Co_11:8 sq.; Php_4:10 sqq.). But in Corinth (1Co_9:12; 2Co_11:7 sqq.) and Thessalonica and apparently in Ephesus also (Act_20:33-35) he accepted nothing during his work there, but provided for his own maintenance partly by manual labor (Act_18:3; Act_20:34), partly through the gifts of other Churches (2Co_11:9; Php_4:16). He did this, that he might offer no hindrance to the gospel (1Co_9:12); at Corinth, in consideration of the false Apostles (2Co_11:12 sqq.); at Thessalonica, in consideration probably of the unbelievers, whose calumnies he forsaw, or was already even in some measure aware of. For that the Thessalonian Christians were poor, as Chrysostom and others suppose, there is nothing to indicate; indeed, according to Act_17:4, there were at any rate not a few rich persons among them. At the same time the Apostle desired also in his own person to furnish an example of fidelity in a earthly calling, of strenuous labor, of devoted love (Act_20:35; 2Th_3:7 sqq.). We have now here before us one of the cases in which, as in so many outward things—for example, in regard to usages, the times and places of Divine service, &c.—it could not be but that changes, to wit, specific regulations, should gradually be forth-coming in the Church. Soon the clerical calling could no longer be united with a secular one. It had therefore to be furnished with a regular income, and this is in accordance with Paul’s doctrine. If, then, we neither can nor should directly imitate his practice herein; if indeed, speaking generally, the exemplariness of the Lord and His Apostles does not require from us a direct, outward imitation—this were really to turn the gospel again into law and letter (comp. 1Th_1:6-7, Doctrinal and Ethical, Note 5),—it is only the more important that we enter into the meaning and spirit of the Apostle, and act on this Apostolic view of the matter. Not to the Pope alone does his worldly dominion prove to be ruin; among us also earthly good has already become the curse and snare of many clergymen. This is one of the tenderest points in the relation between the shepherd and the flock, and by it is often insensibly closed the mouth of the shepherd and the heart of the sheep. There are certain portions of income, those that partake more of the nature of perquisites, which still fall immediately under the apostolic rule, not to burden those who would thereby be burdened, and rather to undergo privations, “lest we should hinder the gospel of Christ” (1Co_9:12). It deserves also to be noticed that the Apostle (1Co_9:14) says, that the Lord hath ordained that they who preach the gospel should live of the gospel, should have wherewithal to live, and not more. With us, to be sure, and especially of late, care is commonly taken that we should not have it in our power to think of laying up treasures. The wish expressed by Schleiermacher in 1804, “that the relations of the preacher’s position should be put more and more on such a footing, that it could present no external attraction to those who did not value it for its own sake,” has already received a manifold fulfilment. Those, however, who have to struggle with want and privation, may seek and find a strong consolation in the fact, that they thus stand nearer to the apostolic model, than if they lived in abundance of everything. Comp. the flaming words of Ludwig Hofacker in his Life by A. Knapp, 1852, p. 157 sq.: “Often enough have I been offended with a certain class of ministers. To lament over their poor pay is the whole business, their main topic of conversation. Nowhere is there less of faith and contentment than among men of this sort. With them the earthly mind thoroughly predominates. In no class is there less of Divine understanding. In heaven we shall probably meet the smallest proportion of ministers; for it is well-nigh impossible that such an ease-loving, selfish minister should enter the kingdom of heaven. Is it not a real mercy that we are even kept a little short? How much money, then, must a preacher have on hand? Or how much must he have in furniture and pictures? On this absurdity I could descant for a day, and not exhaust the topic, dealing not with individual cases, but with the thing itself, nor yet out of illiberality of feeling, but from long observation. Ah, where is the imitation of Christ’s life of poverty? No doubt, there are many who suffer, but why? because they fancy that a son is not saved, unless he gets to be a gentleman at the University. The true sufferers are they who are silent and endure, looking up to God.”

[M. Henry: There is no general rule to be drawn from this instance; either that ministers may at no time work with their hands for supply of their outward necessities, or that they ought always to do so.—J. L.]

7. (1Th_2:11.) Paul emphasizes the fact that he had exhorted every single individual. Comp. Act_20:31, and especially the thrice repeated πάντα ἄνθρωπον of Col_1:28. Here, as in Rom_5:12; Rom_5:15; Rom_5:18 sq.; 1Ti_2:4 sqq., the emphasis is on ἄνθρωπος, since Paul is speaking of the spread of the Gospel among the Gentiles, of the removal of the distinction between Jews and Gentiles, of Jesus belonging as man to all mankind, and of every individual simply as a man having an interest in Him. This is that idea of humanity, of the infinite value of each individual human soul before God, which first came to light in the New Covenant, in Christianity, and of which the Gentile Apostle was preeminently the bearer. In ancient times, to which the Old Covenant still essentially belongs, mankind was as yet given up as fleshly to the forces of nature, and therefore also to national divisions. The opposition of עָם and גּוֹיִם, λαός and ἔθνη stood in force, as that of Greeks and Barbarians; for God in His revelation condescended to the στοιχεῖα τοῦ κόσμου. Not yet was the individual of any consequence in himself as a man; he came into view merely as a member of the larger natural whole, the people. A relative advance in this respect is certainly not to be mistaken within the sphere of the old world, when, for example, we think in the Old Testament of the Psalms, in Greece of the schools of philosophy, in Rome of the domestic life of a Cato and others. But even the Psalmist, who knows that in covenant with his God he is strong and secure against all the world, is ever an Israelite; the Grecian sage is always a Hellene; and so forth. First on the cross of Christ was the flesh and the whole power of nature broken in pieces; first in Christ was the one new man created, so that now there is no longer a question of Jew, Greek, Barbarian, Scythian (Eph_2:15; Col_3:11); there was born the idea at once of humanity and of man; universalism, and along with that the true subjectivity and individualism, for every one singly to lay hold in faith freely from within on the salvation of God, and so attain to the fulness of human dignity (as was already represented in the call of Abraham, Romans 4.; Galatians 3). Not only did Paul recognize and preach this great truth; he likewise at the same time made practical application of it, on the universal side in his Gentile mission, on the other in his special care of souls. The nationalists, therefore, have lost, not their significance, but merely the sting of mutual antipathy, so far as their members are in Christ; in the future kingdom of Christ the curse, the covering, will be removed from the nations as such, as from individuals at present, so that the whole life of history shall be a regenerate life, a life from the dead (Rom_11:15 : comp. Isa_25:7-8).

8. (1Th_2:12.) Glory (δόξα, כָּבוֹד; for this Luther has also sometimes Klarheit [clearness, lustre], as for δοξάζειν verklären [to illustrate]) is a radical term used in Scripture of God, which in theosophy has met with more consideration than in theology. It is the real, organic side in the conception of spirit, whereby the Absolute Personality is not a mere abstract Ego, but the Absolute Life, unfolding and shaping itself in a fulness (πλήρωμα) of powers. What in earthly phrase has been called nature or the corporeity of God finds in the word glory—with which stand connected the expressions majesty, beauty, light, &c., when used of God—its Scriptural foundation and limitation. In glory is found the reason why the whole man, even as to his body, is called the image of God. By means of glory also is brought about, agreeably to its idea, the appearance or revelation of God. Christ’s glorification consists essentially in this, that His human nature is raised into the condition of this Divine glory. He makes a real, inward communication of it to His own (unio mystica, the sacraments), so that they become partakers of the Divine nature (2Pe_1:4; Joh_14:23; Joh_17:5; Joh_17:22; Joh_17:24), till in the resurrection they are manifested in this glory, even as to their body (Col_3:3-4). Bengel (on Act_7:2) calls glory divinitas conspicua; Oetinger, the unveiled holiness,—the great word that sums up the whole New Testament: J. T. Beck, christliche Lehrwissenchaft, p. 67, the self-manifestation of the living image of God, which has for man a hidden side, but also one visible in rich forms and degrees, and for special revelations assumes special local shapes.

HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL

1Th_2:1-12.—This section and its several parts are especially appropriate for texts of inaugural and ordination sermons, and such like; happy he, who can take from its also his farewell text! The principal thought of the two main divisions, 1Th_2:1-12, are embraced in the Doctrinal and Ethical department, No. 2, and there already arranged also with reference to the Homiletic use.—J. Mich. Hahn: Our Epistle was written to such as had been awakened for about half a year; it is thus rather for such as are weaker and for beginners. For this reason Paul strengthens and animates the Thessalonians by very circumstantial arguments from his own behavior, and that of Silas, among them; considering that with inexperienced souls one must deal more largely in details, than with those who are more spiritually developed.—The same: That is it which in our days makes faith so difficult: sinful men dare to call in question the word of God, and to correct it, saying quite plainly that to a great extent it is just the word of man. This mischievous cavilling may in dark hours of temptation rack with doubts even the lovers of truth, and frequently, if they have thoughtful souls, they undergo no light struggle. But these doubts are by the lover of truth overcome, and tend to the strengthening and confirmation of faith; for as all things must work together for good to those who love God and truth, so likewise this, since it too belongs to the “all.”—Diedrich: For the Christian it is important frequently to review his previous guidance in Christ, that he may become ever more conscious of the work of the Lord, and also feel himself bound in hearty affection to those, through whom the Lord has come to us. To the calumniators of the Apostle we owe thanks to this day, for having been to him the occasion for such an exact self-portraiture. The enemies of the truth know not at all, what good service they often render to it.

1Th_2:1-2. J. Mich. Hahn: The great boldness after the contumelious suffering is a sound, valid proof of the truth of God’s word, and of faith’s real ground. How should human nature be able to act and suffer thus aimlessly? Its wont truly is, to seek and intend self in everything.—The Same: The Lord’s true messengers are for the most part prepared in the school of suffering, and not in the society of trifling, young people, who in their frivolity often do not know what to go at. If one or another from that quarter is to prosper, he too is called out of the confusion into the school of the cross, like all the rest.—The Same: While the Spirit of glory rested on us (1Pe_4:14), we had spiritual boldness, joy in God and with God, incomparable heart-joy; for the life of the spirit was so predominant, that we regarded nothing in nature.—Rieger: Suffering does not weaken faith, and so it does not even abate boldness in opening the mouth. Suffering, indeed, undergone lovingly and willingly, assures a man that he is renewed into the image of Christ, and is treading in the footsteps wherein have walked all the lovers of truth, who in the world have been reviled. Suffering makes good salt; avoidance of the cross makes the salt insipid.—The Same: When we hear of the boldness of the Apostles, we often suppose that all fear had been blown away. But the Apostles themselves commonly put the two things together; on the one side, what through grace obtained the victory, namely boldness, and, on the other side, those assaults from nature and from the aspect of the world, through which they had to fight their way with great contention.—Zwingli: The preaching of the gospel does not go forward without a struggle, and indeed many struggles; for Christ is the sign that is spoken against.

[Burkitt: The Apostle calls his boldness a boldness in God, because a boldness for God and from God.—Alford: All true confidence is in God as our God.—M. Henry: Suffering in a good cause should rather sharpen than blunt the edge of holy resolution.—J. L.]

1Th_2:3-4. Rieger: It is still at present an easy thing for the world, when the gospel is propounded, to give it sometimes the appearance of error, superstition, peculiar notions; and in other cases, where some concession must be made to any one, to impute to him impure aims and self-seeding.—The Same: In preaching the gospel, much depends on the heart and its purity tried and approved by God; only in a good conscience can the mystery of the faith be put. Not merely in the beginning and on our first reception into His service does God prove our heart, but daily and hourly.—Calvin: To please God and to please men are brought together by Paul as things mutually opposed.—Rieger: In striving to please, not men, but God, the gate is strait, and the way narrow. One should, of course commend himself to the consciences of men—should so deal with them, that, without his pleasing them after the flesh, they shall yet think favorably of him, and not in distrust turn away their heart and ear—should show to every man all gentleness, condescension, and readiness to oblige, and yet so keep himself apart in the spirit of the cross, as to be intent on pleasing, not men, but God (1Co_10:33).—Diedrich: We may well trust those, who, in their transactions with us, desire in everything only to please God; God certainly desires what is best for us. Such as would merely please us will at the least, and without their knowing it, be unfaithful to us.—Rieger: Precious operation of the Spirit of glory, who rests on the sufferers, and, in their deepest submersion in the baptism of sorrow, instructs them still to keep their head up, and to say to their God: For he knoweth the secrets of the heart (Psa_44:22).58

1Th_2:5-7. Rieger: We cannot do too much for the sake of winning men’s souls; and, if the world calls that flattery, we are to regard it as little as Jesus left off eating and drinking with publicans and sinners on account of the Pharisees. When, indeed, one’s aim with men is to steal some advantage for one’s self or one’s friends, and lull others to sleep to their own soul’s hurt, in that case there may be danger of indulging in words of flattery: and therefore the Apostle immediately disclaims covetousness also.—Calvin: Where avarice and ambition rule, there follow innumerable corruptions, and the whole man sinks into vanity; for these are the two fountains, whence flows the corruption of the entire ministry.—Chrysostom: Paul says not: We were dishonored, nor yet: We received no honor;—that were to have reproached the Thessalonians;—but: We sought it not. [Œcumenius extends the emphasis to ἐξ ἀνθρώπων: “for the glory that is from God they both sought and received: τὴν γὰρ ἐκ θεοῦ καὶ ἐζήτουν καὶ ἐλάμβανον.—J. L.] J. M. Hahn: Although as ambassadors of the sovereign Lord of the whole creation we might have used authority, yet we did not seek to extort from you any such regard as that you should look upon us with fear and awe. This is the way nowadays of those who presume on their office. But what credit have they with the people, and what hearts trust them? That is the very reason why they are universally abandoned. Not so the Lord’s ambassadors!—Rieger: Therein consists a great secret of the kingdom of Christ, that by means of love, whereby the greatest becomes as the servant of all, He effects more, maintains a more fruitful order, than is achieved in any worldly empire by ever so rigorous a distinction of ranks.—The Same: Christians, it is true, are not an abject people; they deal in large aims and hopes. They do not, however, seek honor from men, nor in the present time, but take it on credit against the resurrection of the just.

[Burkitt: Flattery in any is odious, in a minister ’tis monstrous, both because spiritual men ought to be most plain-hearted, and also because flattery about spiritual things, is most fatal and pernicious, both to the giver and receivers.—A. Clarke: They that preach the gospel should live (not riot) by the gospel. But woe to that man who entered into the labor for the sake of the hire; he knows not Christ and how can he preach Him?—J. L.]

1Th_2:7-9. The Apostle’s motherly love to those committed to his care, as shown 1. in the most intimate heart-communications to them, 2. in tender affability, 3. in indefatigable self-sacrifice.—The connection of official fidelity with personal love.—Newborn children often cry a great deal, get sick easily, give also every kind of annoyance, and need much care, and only a mother’s love and a mother’s patience can bear with them (Büchsel: Erinnerungen aus dem. Leben eines Landgeistlichen, Evangelische Kirchenzeitung, 1859).—Roos: Dost thou from hearty love undergo day and night toil and trouble, which no man imposes on thee, or repays?—Calvin: Paul’s unwillingness to have his wants supplied was in order that he might not hinder the gospel. For good pastors must be careful, not merely to run strenuously in their ministry, but of this also, that, so far as is in their power, they remove all obstacles from their course.—Rieger: Ministers of the gospel never want occasion to practise many an economy in housekeeping, in the education of children, in clothes and comforts; whereby in some cases one has rather wherewithal to give to the needy, and in other cases our income suffices, nor is there any need to trouble ourselves and others with so many complaints, or with so much striving after changes. And again, there is always reason why we should not set so high a value on what we are compelled to add from our own means, but reflect whether it is quite as much, as when Paul along with his preaching labored as a handicraftsman.—Paul made no claims on this life—desired not to have things easy in the present world; and therefore also the world could do him no harm.—J. G. Kolb: He who has the Spirit of Christ is faithful also in his earthly calling. That is, he is not too lazy to apply his powers in that direction; and neither does he do too much, so as to waste his strength in vanity. He gives his time to securing the heavenly calling in the midst of the earthly one. Such a man is then so much more effective in the kingdom of God.

[1Th_2:10. Webster and Wilkinson: Only believers can rightly estimate holiness and righteousness; and it betokens high attainments in religion to be considered, and to be, an example of holiness and righteousness to them.—J. L.]

1Th_2:10-12. Rieger: He who in Divine things seeks not his own, but serves the will of God, acts holily, he who does no wrong to his neighbor in anything, but shows him all love, acts righteously; and he who, moreover, in his behavior, speech and entire conduct, puts it in no man’s power to charge him with an offensive contrast between his teaching and his life, acts unblamably. A father has and exerts an authority, but it is that of love, not of law.—Spener says in one of his farewell discourses: I cannot say that I am pure from the blood of all men; for I cannot say that I have not ceased to warn every one.—Paul a model, not merely in preaching, but also in the care of souls, and in the union of the two. The great Apostle, who filled the whole world with the sound of the gospel, at the same time went after individual souls with all zeal. The different ways in which salvation must be brought near to different men, and even to the same men at different times. We must learn to vary our voice.—[M. Henry: We should not only be good as to our general calling as Christians, but in our particular callings and relations.—J. L.]

[1Th_2:12. Bp. Davenant, on Col_1:10 : By this form of speaking we are admonished, that Christianity consists in a perpetual journey towards the celestial country, and that no one must halt by the way.—Webster and Wilkinson: The kingdom is glorious, and the glory kingly.—J. L.]

Footnotes:

[1]1Th_2:1.—[The Greek order, retained by most of the old English versions.—J. L.]

[2]1Th_2:1.—[κενή γέγονεν German: eitel gewesen ist. The reference is not to the results (Robinson and many others: fruitless, useless, &c., as in 1Th_3:5, εἰς κενόν), but, like the rest of this section, to the character of the Apostle’s ministry. This is one of the cases in which Wiclif and Rheims are kept light by the Vulgate.—J. L.]

[3]1Th_2:2.—καί before προπαθόντες must be erased. [All the late critical editions omit it, on overwhelming evidence, including Sin.—J. L.]

[4]1Th_2:3.—[ λαλοῦμεν of 1Th_2:4 shows that in this sentence the writer characterizes his ordinary preaching, and not particularly that at Thessalonica.—J. L.]

[5]1Th_2:3.—[πλάνης error, as it is here rendered by many, and always elsewhere in our Common Version, except at 2Th_2:11, delusion. Auberlen, after De Wette, Lünemann, Koch: Irrwahn.—J. L.]

[6]1Th_2:3.—[See Ellicott’s note, p. 149 sq., on “the appropriate rendering in the different cases of continued negation.”—J. L.]

[7]1Th_2:3.—Instead of οὔτε, A. B. C. D. F. G. [Sin.] and some minuscules have here also οὔδε, which Lachmann, De Wette, Lünemann [Hahn, Winer, Olshausen, Koch, Wordsworth, Alford’s last edition, Ellicott, who admits, however, that the reading is very doubtful.—J. L.] prefer; comp. Winer, p. 437. Yet the correspondent οὔδε may be also a correction, and accordingly Tischendorf has in the seventh edition gone back to οὔτε.

[8]1Th_2:4.—[ δεδοκιμάσμεθα ὑπὸ τοῦ Θεοῦ. For the rendering of the verb, comp. Rom_2:18; 1Co_16:3; Php_1:10. the tense also should be allowed its full force as a perfect.—J. L.]

[9]1Th_2:4.—[The τῷ before Θεῷ is bracketed by Lachmann, and cancelled by Tischendorf, Alford, Ellicott, after B. C. D.¹ Sin., &c.—J. L.]

[10]1Th_2:4.—[τῷ δοκιμάζοντι, a repetition of the previous verb, in a modified sense; comp. E. V. at 1Th_5:21, and often elsewhere. In 1Th_2:5 κολακείας is in Sin. κολακίας—J.L.]

[11]1Th_2:6.—οὔτε ζητοῦντες ἐξ ἀνθρώπων δόξαν. The Greek order is here followed by nearly all versions, English and foreign.—J. L.]

[12]1Th_2:6.—[This marginal rendering of E. V. is substantially that adopted by the majority of interpreters from Ambrosiaster to Alford, Ellicott, and Auberlen: uns ein Ansehen geben. Ellicott quotes Chrysostom as decidedly in favor of the same interpretation, whereas Chrysostom expressly includes the other reference also (preferred by many from Theodoret to Webster and Wilkinson): ἐνταυθα δὲ καὶ περὶ χρημάτων φησὶ τὸ, δυνάμενοι ἐν βάρει εἶναι κτλ. Others in like manner allow either interpretation, or combine the two. See Revision.—J. L.]

[13]1Th_2:7.—[ ἀλλ̓ (B. Sin. ἀλλὰ) ἐγενήθημεν. See 1Th_1:5, Critical Note 6.—J. L.]

[14]1Th_2:7.—Lachmann’s νήπιος [νήπιοι], childlike, which arose from drawing over the ν from the preceding word, and as destroying the unity of the figure, must be rejected. [It has, however, very considerable support from manuscripts (B. C.¹ D.¹ F. G. Sin.¹), versions, and Fathers.—J. L.]

[15]1Th_2:7.—[ὡς ἄν τροφὸς θάλπῃ τὰ ἑαυτῆς τέκνα. Webster and Wilkinson: “as a nurse (any nurse) would.”—Lachmann, Tischendorf, Alford, Ellicott: ἐάν, after B. C. D. E. F. G. &c., but not Sin.1 Many; including Auberlen, have a colon or a period after ἐν μέσῳ ὑμῶν, and attach this clause as protasis to what follows in 1Th_2:8. Erasmus, Lachmann, Tischendorf, Alford, Wordsworth, Ellicott, place a comma before and after it, Ellicott regarding the clause “both as an illustration of the preceding words, and as the protasis to the following.” But this divided duty is somewhat distracting. The simile of the nursing mother no doubt suggests what is said in 1Th_2:8, but can scarcely be a grammatical protasis to it, and yet maintain a structural connection with what precedes. On the whole, I prefer the arrangement of our English Version, and would close 1Th_2:7 with at least a semicolon.—J. L.]

[16]1Th_2:8—[οὕτως qualifies εὐδοκοῦμεν, not ὁμειρόμενοι—J. L.]

[17]1Th_2:8—Instead of ἱμειρόμενοι the common reading now is ομειρόμενοι [all the uncials, and many cursives.—J. L.]

[18]1Th_2:8.—[The Greek order, followed by Wiclif and Rheims, and later versions generally.—J. L.]

[19]1Th_2:8.—[ ἐγενήθητε, the reading of recent critical editions, is sustained by abundant uncial authority, including Sin. The recepta γεγένησθε may have been an accommodation to the supposed present time of εὐδοκοῦμεν—J. L.]

[20]1Th_2:9.—[ ἐργαζόμενοι].—γάρ after νυκτός should be cancelled [as it now is in nearly all critical editions. It is wanting in A. B. D¹. F. G. Sin.—J. L.].

[21]1Th_2:10.—[ὑμῖν τοῖς πιστεύουσιν participle of the imperfect, not, as English Version, Ellicott, &c., of the present. German: euch, den Glaubenden; and similarly many others, from the Syriac to Lünemann. Comp. 1Th_1:7.—For the import of the dative, see Exeget. Notes.—J. L.]

[22]1Th_2:11.—παραμυθούμενοι must have the same relation to 1Th_2:12 as the other two participles between which it stands.—J. L.]

[23]1Th_2:11.—The reading μαρτυρούμενοι is indeed better attested than -όμενοι [this, which was doubtful before, can no longer be allowed, now that -όμενοι is sustained by Sin.—J. L.], and was therefore at first favored by Lachmann and Tischendorf. But by the latter, with De Wette, Lünemann [Bengel, Schott, Bloomfield, Alford, Ellicott], &c., it has again been abandoned with reason, since μαρτυρεῖσθαι is only used passively [some reading μαρτυρόμενος also at Act_26:22.—J. L.], and the mistake might easily occur in copying, from the similarity in sound to παραμυθούμενοι [Latin versions generally use obtestor; German versions, beschwören. or bezeugen; Rhemish and Conybeare, to adjure; Alford, to conjure, &c. J. L.]

[24]1Th_2:11.—[ὡς πατὴρ τέκνα ἐαυτοῦ In Greek the verse is arranged thus: “Even as ye know how every one of you, as a father his own children, we exhorted you, and encouraged, and adjured.” All the accusatives are dependent on the participles, and therefore Ellicott’s translation: “Even as ye know how in regard of every one of you we did so, as a father toward his own children, exhorting you and encouraging you, and charging you,” is wanting in his usual exactness.—J. L.]

[25]1Th_2:12.—[For περιπατῆσαι of the textus receptus, Scholz, Lachmann, Tischendorf, Alford, Wordsworth, Ellicott, read περιπατεῖν, on large authority of manuscripts uncial (including Sin.) and cursive.—J. L.]

[26]1Th_2:12.—[ καλοῦντος A. and Sin., with a few cursive manuscripts, read καλέσαντος.—J. L.]

[27][And so in our English Version; whereas the German thus: Ye know that our entrance hath, &c.—J. L.]

[28][Including Lünemann, Alford, Ellicott, Vaughan. Yet, since there seems to have been no violent resistance to the preachers at Thessalonica, prior to the sudden outbreak which led to their immediate departure from the city (Act_17:5-10), it is not well thus to restrict the reference. Comp. Paul’s use of the word at Col_2:1; 1Ti_6:12; 2Ti_4:7. Fritzsche and many (Lünemann says, most) understand the word here of the Apostle’s cares and sorrows. Why not take in both the inward experience, and the outward?—J. L.]

[29][Ellicott: παράκλησις is “perhaps distinguishable” from διδαχή and διδασκαλία, “as directed more to the feelings than the understanding.” Jowett: “The two senses of παράκλησις, exhortation and consolation, so easily passing into one another (compare 1Th_2:11), are suggestive of the external state of the early Church, sorrowing amid the evils of the world, and needing as its first lesson to be comforted; and not less suggestive of the first lesson of the Gospel to the individual soul, of peace in believing.”—J. L.]

[30][Ellicott states the gradation thus: (a) to put to the test; (b) to choose after testing; (c) to approve of what is so tested. This might perhaps be improved by transposing (b) and (c).—J. L.]

[31][German: von Gott werth geachtet—der unsere Herzen werthet (prüfet).—J. L.]

[32][And, at most, he for them, not they of themselves.—J. L.]

[33][So Lünemann, and similarly Alford (ἐκ, the abstract ground; ἀπό, the concrete object;—a distinction on which he insists against Ellicott, who pronounces it “artificial and precarious.”) That of Schott, assented to by Olshausen and Bloomfield, that ἐκ marks the immediate source, ἀπό the mediate, is rejected by Lünemann as here impossible. But, even if the two prepositions must be regarded in this place as synonymous, it is desirable that the translation should indicate the change. Webster and Wilkinson: “derived from men, whether tendered on your part or on the part of others.”—J. L.]

[34][The latter half of 1Th_2:6 in our English Version is in Luther’s Bible attached to 1Th_2:7.—J. L.]

[35][Macknight adopts the rendering of the English margin, but understands the Apostle to speak of his right to exact both obedience and maintenance. Perhaps, however, the other phrase, to be burdensome, no less admits of either reference, and it has the advantage of preserving—somewhat too strongly, indeed—the verbal affinity between 1Th_2:6; 1Th_2:9. Comp. Critical Note 12.—J. L.]

[36][Alford and Ellicott find in ἐν μέσῳ ὑμῷν “a hint at the absence of all assumption of authority, ‘as one of yourselves,’ ” and cite Chrysostom, Œcumenius, and Zanchius to the same effect.—J. L.]

[37][But see Critical Note 15.—J. L.]

[38][wie eine säugende Mutter ihre eigenen Kinder pfleget. It is obvious, however, that the maternal relation is indicated solely by the ἑαυτῆς τέκνα, and is not at all necessarily implied in τροφός. Augustine, Serm. de Ps. 72:24 (Psa_73:23): “Apostolus vero, germano et pio caritatis affectu, et nutricis personam suscepit, dicendo, fovet; et matris, addendo, filios suos. Sunt enim nutrices foventes quidem, sed non filios suos: item sunt matres nutricibus dantes, non foventes filios suos.”—J. L.]

[39][Ellicott prefers to regard μείρομαι as an apocopated, and ὁμείρομαι as a late and perhaps strengthened, form of ἱμείρομαι To the derivation from μείρομαἱ, Wordsworth objects the aspirated ὁ, and he adheres strongly to Theophylact’s account of the word as from ὁμοῦ and εἴρω,=προσδεδεμένοι, bound to, twined together with you, and clinging to you.”—J. L.]

[40][Our German, after Luther, gives Leben for ψυχάς; and this interpretation is given by very many, including the English margin; comp. 1Jn_3:16, &c. But says Ellicott: There is “perhaps a faint reference to the deeper meaning of ψυχή, as pointing to the centre of the personality—our lives and souls (Fell), our very existences, and all things pertaining to them.”—J. L.]

[41][Ellicott: “The former perhaps marks the toil on the side of the suffering it involves (see on 1Ti_4:10), the latter, as derivation seems to suggest (connected with μόγις, and perhaps allied to μέγας, see Pott, Etym. Forsch. Vol. I. p. 283), on the side of the magnitude of the obstacles it has to overcome.” Nearly opposite to this is Wordsworth: “The former word expresses energy of action, the other indicates patience in bearing.” Alford: “No distinction can be established.”—J. L.]

[42][So Alford. But the correctness of the remark may be questioned, since Paul, as is mentioned above, observes the same order everywhere else.—J. L.]

[43][But Winer there reverts to Luther’s unter euch, instead of the preferable an of previous editions; and Auberlen’s own version has simply the dative: verkündigten wir euch. It may also he noted, here that, for εἰς ὑμᾶς, the Cod. Sin. a prima manu reads ὑμῖν.—J. L.]

[44][Bengel: Sancte in rebus divinis, juste erga homines—the classical distinction between ὁσίως and δικαίως, but not always to be pressed in the N. T.—J. L.]

[45][Ellicott: “Perhaps it is safer to say that ὁσίως and δικαίως form on the positive side a compound idea of holy purity and righteousness, whether towards God or towards men, while ἀμέμπτως states on the negative side the general blamelessness in both aspect is and relations.”—J. L.]

[46][An interpretation suggested by Musculus, allowed by Baumgarten, and adopted by Ellicott (whose version, however, to you that believe, does not convey that idea).—J. L.]

[47][The objection drawn from the adverbs to the construction of ὑμῖν as a dat. judicii—a construction followed also by Alford, who cites 2Pe_3:14—is plausible only when, by an arbitrary rendering of the verb, as=appeared, were thought, the idea of judgment is transferred to it from the dative.—J. L.]

[48][German: als Dativ des Vortheils=as a dative of interest. But this must be a misprint for Urtheils.—J. L.]

[49][Sometimes also they restrict ὑμῖν τοῖς πιστ, to ἀμέμπτως (Syriac, Theoderet, Œcumenius, Calvin, &c.). The Greek order is this: “Ye are witnesses, and God, how holily and righteously and unblamably to (for) you who believed we behaved.” Probably the precise import of the dative in this case must be left doubtful. Ellicott’s objection to it as a dative of judgment, that “the Apostle would scarcely have appealed to God in reference to the judgment of the Thessalonians,” is by no means decisive. Solemnly to remind converts of their earliest convictions and first love is a Scripture means of guarding them, or recovering them, from declension and apostasy. Comp. Gal_4:14-15; Rev_2:3; Rev_2:5; &c.—J. L.]

[50][in dem wir, wie ihr ja wisset, &c.—J. L.]

[51][Notwithstanding the above remarks, I adhere still to the ordinary construction of καθάπερ ὄιδατε, ὡς ἔνα ἔκαστον, &c. The objections to it are more than counterbalanced by the exceeding awkwardness of the new arrangement proposed. As a parenthesis belonging to what follows it, καθάτερ αἴδατε would be strangely misplaced. It is also very improbable that any considerations of euphony determined the use of καθάπερ here, instead of καθώς (1Th_2:2; 1Th_2:5; 1Th_1:5. See 1Th_2:13, καθώς ἐστιν ἀληθῶς). Perhaps it might rather be said, that the former was selected for the sake of still more strongly emphasizing the exactness of the correspondence between the personal and the official conduct of the Apostle.—J. L.]

[52][It is wanting in Cod. Sin.—Ellicott speaks of it as a “collective ὑμᾶς serving still more clearly to define all that were included—a defining and supplementary accusative, somewhat allied to the use of that case in the σχῆμα καθ̓ ὅλον καὶ μέρος.”—J. L.]

[53][Some editions repeating ὑμᾶς after συνεξωοποίησε.—J. L.]

[54][Similarly Peile: “in words both of encouragement and solemn admonition.”—It is quite probable that παρακαλοῦντες may draw the ὑμᾶς to itself as being the generic word. But what is said above more than that is too confidently stated. Certainly there is not another instance in the New Testament of παρακαλέω (in the sense of exhorting) being followed, any more than μαρτύρομαι, by είς τό. The prevailing construction of the former also is with ἴνα or an infinitive.—J. L.]

[55][The Greek Testament begins 1Th_2:12 with καὶ μαρτυρόμενοι.—J. L.]

[56][Vaughan: “A reiterated sound, continued through the individual life.”—J. L.]

[57]Comp. Lehrer- und Predigerspiegel 1Th_2:1-12 in Zeller’s Monatsblatt von Beuggen, 1860, No. 10 sqq.

[58][Psa_44:21 of the English version. Luther’s version, followed in our text: nun kennet er ja unsers Herzens Grund.—J. L.]

Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

II. TRUE SERVICE,

AS MANIFESTED IN APOSTOLIC MINISTRY

CHAPTER 2

1. Apostolic conduct and service 1Th 2:1-12)

2. Thanksgiving for the reception of the message and the opposition 1Th 2:13-16)

3. Looking forward to His coming 1Th 2:17-19)

1Th 2:1-12

The apostle now enlarges upon the brief statement in the previous chapter “Ye know what manner of men we were among you for your sakes.” His conduct and character, as well as that of his fellow laborers, corresponded fully with the holy character of the truth they preached. They walked worthy of the gospel and worthy of the Lord. First he makes mention of the sufferings he and Silas endured in Philippi. They had been shamefully treated. They had been stripped and scourged cruelly with the lictor’s rods and cast into prison with their feet secured to the stocks. The physical discomfort resulting from such a punishment must have lasted for many days, but it did not hinder their going to Thessalonica with confidence in God to speak the gospel there, where they also had much conflict. And what a witness he bore of their unselfish conduct while they were among them! This exhortation was not a deceit, that is, out of error; nor was it in uncleanness, emanating from any low motives of self-interest; nor in guile. God had approved them; their ministry was God-given and they were fully conscious of this fact. Being intrusted with the gospel (and what a trust it is!) so they spoke. They had no need to employ different schemes to be successful; they had full confidence in God and in the message He had given to them to proclaim. Therefore their whole aim was to please God who trieth the hearts and not men. Nor had they used flattery to win them; nor did they resort to flattering words as a cloak of covetousness using sweet phrases to get money out of them; not alone were they witnesses of all this, but he could say, “God is witness.” They had sought nothing of men, neither money nor glory. They might have been burdensome to them as the apostles of Christ. They did not use their authority, which they might have used, asserting their dignity and demanding something from them. Their whole conduct was in true humility and in great self denial. (Many a “leading” evangelist of our day stands condemned by this beautiful example of a true servant of God. What God and gospel dishonoring schemes are used! What flatteries as a cloak of covetousness! How much man-pleasing!)

This is the negative side. On the other hand they were full of tenderness and kindness. A boisterous, unkind, impatient spirit was completely absent in their ministry. “But we were gentle among you, even as a nurse cherisheth her children. So being affectionately desirous of you, we were willing to have imparted unto you, not the gospel of God only, but also our own souls, because ye were dear unto us.” What blessed fragrance is, and will ever be, in these precious words! How little of this gracious, loving interest in souls is manifested today among the Lord’s servants! Then he reminds them what he had done so as not to be a burden to any one when he preached the gospel of God unto them. He and his companion had worked day and night with their own hands. Paul was a tent-maker and worked with his own hands in Thessalonica and elsewhere (Act 18:2; 1Co 4:12). And again he appeals to them as witnesses as well as to God, “how holily and justly and unblamably we behaved ourselves among you that believe; as ye know we exhorted and charged every one of you, as a father his children, that ye would walk worthy of God, who hath called you unto His own kingdom and glory.” Having such a portion in the coming kingdom and being an heir of glory, the walk of every believer should indeed be worthy of God.

1Th 2:13-16

He thanked God without ceasing for the reception of the message which they heard from his lips. It was the Word of God, which Paul had preached, and hearing the message, they had received it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the Word of God. This Word received in faith saved them and also effectually worked in them that believed. It is still the same. Faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the Word of God. The believer is constantly dependent upon the Word of God; it worketh in him effectually through the power of the Holy Spirit. The believer’s practical sanctification in the daily life is by the Word (Joh 17:17).

They also knew what suffering meant. They became followers (imitators) of the churches of God in Judea in Christ Jesus. Those churches suffered persecutions from the Jews, but the Thessalonians suffered from their own countrymen. And what a solemn charge is brought here through Paul against his kinsmen, the Jews! They had killed the Lord Jesus and their own prophets; they persecuted the apostles. And not satisfied with this, they tried to keep the gospel they hated from reaching the Gentiles that they might be saved. The measure of sins was now filled up “and wrath is come upon them to the uttermost.” The great apostle of the Gentiles, called to go far hence to the Gentiles, in this his first Epistle is used to pronounce sentence upon his own nation, which has been set aside until the fulness of the Gentiles is come in (Rom 11:25-26).

1Th 2:17-19

He had an affectionate desire for them. Separated and bereaved of them (the more correct rendering) for a little season in person, but not in heart, he had great longing to see their face. Once and again he wanted to visit them, but Satan had hindered him. How the enemy hindered him in carrying out his desire, whether by attacks upon his body (2Co 12:7) or by wicked men, we do not know. He then speaks of that blessed time when all hindrances will cease, when God’s people are no longer separated, when those who ministered the Word and the fruits of their labors are gathered in the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ at His coming. “For what is our hope, or joy, or crown of glorying? Are not even ye before our Lord Jesus Christ at His coming? for ye are our glory and joy.” Here again the apostle mentions the coming of the Lord. The gathered saints before the Lord Jesus Christ will be the crown of glorying and the joy for the faithful servant, who then finds in the presence of the Lord, in the day of Christ, the fruit of his labors. To this consummation in glory Paul directed the attention of the Thessalonians and he speaks of them as his glory and joy, “for ye are our glory and our joy.”

“it should be observed here, that the special fruits of our labors are not lost; they are found again at the coming of Christ. Our chief personal joy is to see the Lord Himself and to be like Him. This is the portion of all saints; but there are particular fruits in connection with the work of the Spirit in us and by us. At Thessalonica the spiritual energy of the apostle had brought a number of souls to God and to wait for His Son, and into a close union in the truth with Himself. This energy would be crowned at the coming of Christ by the presence of these believers in the glory as the fruit of his labors. God would thus crown the apostle’s work by bearing a striking testimony to its faithfulness in the presence of all these saints in glory; and the love which had wrought in Paul’s heart would be satisfied by seeing its object in glory and in the presence of the Lord Jesus. They would be his glory and joy. This thought drew yet closer the bonds that united them, and comforted the apostle in the midst of his toils and sufferings” (Synopsis of the Bible).

Arno C. Gaebelein, The Annotated Bible (1913–1922) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Paul’s Manner of Working in Thessalonica. 1Th 2:1-12

He came with the humble desire to serve God:

v. 1. For yourselves, brethren, know our entrance in unto you that it was not in vain;

v. 2. but even after that we had suffered before, and were shamefully entreated, as you know, at Philippi, we were bold in our God to speak unto you the Gospel of God with much contention.

v. 3. For our exhortation was not of deceit, nor of uncleanness, nor in guile;

v. 4. but as we were allowed of God to be put in trust with the Gospel, even so we speak; not as pleasing men, but God, which trieth our hearts.

v. 5. For neither at any time used we flattering words, as ye know, nor a cloak of covetousness; God is witness;

v. 6. nor of men sought we glory, neither of you, nor yet of others, when we might have been burdensome, as the apostles of Christ.

The apostle here takes up the thought which he had broached in chap. 1:9, of his first coming to Thessalonica: For yourselves know, brethren, our entrance to you, that it was not vain. He had, in the first chapter, spoken of the voluntary testimony which he heard from others as he continued his work in Achaia. Here he appeals to their knowledge of the situation, at the same time forestalling or removing any doubts that may meanwhile have arisen in the minds of the Thessalonians as to the soundness of the teaching which they had accepted and as to the wisdom of their having accepted the new doctrine so quickly. The thought may have been suggested to them that, after all, the name, the faith, the hope of the Christians was a thing of vanity, and that they, therefore, were suffering for it to no purpose. So Paul emphasizes that his visit to them was not a matter of foolishness and vanity, but a mission of vital success.

To drive this thought home, Paul now goes into historical details: But having before suffered and been insulted, as you know, in Philippi, we took bold confidence in our God to speak to you the Gospel of God with intense earnestness. These words of Paul substantiate the account of Luke in Act 16:1-40. Paul and Silas, although Roman citizens, had been grossly ill-treated by the rulers at Philippi, the so-called praetors, being both scourged and thrown into prison in opposition to Roman law. Of this insulting treatment the Thessalonians knew, the wounds of Paul and Silas having probably not yet been healed when they reached their city. In spite of this outrage, however, Paul had pushed forward, according to the command of the Lord, Mat 10:23, bringing the Gospel to other cities and to Thessalonica first of all. In doing so, Paul had made use of all boldness and courage in proclaiming the Gospel, relying, as he did, upon the power of God, not upon his own natural talents and fearlessness. With the most intense earnestness and zeal had he labored among them, even at the peril of his life. This is the spirit which should at all times actuate the ministers of the Gospel, making them willing to do all and bear all for the sake of the Master and His precious news of salvation.

There had not been so much as a tinge of selfishness in Paul’s ministry: For our appeal is not from fraud, nor out of uncleanness, nor in guile, but even as we have been tested by God to be entrusted with the Gospel, so we speak, not as pleasing men, but God, who proves our hearts. Paul’s appeal to men in the work of his ministry, his exhortation, his admonition, was free from impure, sinister motives. He himself was not the victim of fraud and error; he had not been deceived into becoming a servant of Christ; he was not the victim of a superstition, of a delusion. He was, moreover, not engaged in the work of the ministry from foul, impure motives, including covetousness and selfishness. Nor had he, in turn, made use of guile and cunning with the object of deceiving his hearers; all dishonest tricks of cheating and ensnaring were far from him. His mission was very emphatically not the outcome of self-seeking. But the situation was rather this: As God, who tests the hearts, had attested his fitness to be entrusted with the Gospel, so he was speaking the news of salvation, so he was preaching sin and grace, with no thought of pleasing men. It was God, who knows the hearts of men, that had chosen the apostle for his office. Paul did not assume any worthiness of his own, but he exalted the authority of God. See 1Ti 1:12. By reason of this commission he considered himself under obligations not to engage men’s minds by flattering proposals nor to adapt his preaching to their tastes, but to consult only the pleasure of God, who, as the Judge of hearts, would soon expose and judge impure motives and selfish objects.

The apostle enlarges upon this thought still more fully: For neither at any time did we indulge in talk of flattery, as you know, nor in pretense of self-seeking, God is witness, nor seeking praise from men, neither from you nor from others, although we might have been burdensome as the apostles of Christ. Flattering talk invariably indicates selfishness and a striving to gain private ends. In this respect he called upon the Thessalonians as witnesses; they knew that he had not used flattery, that he had not attempted to please them by such methods. For the other fact, in turn, that he made use of no pretense for the purpose of self-seeking, that he had no selfish aims in his heart, he calls upon God as witness, appealing to Him who tests hearts and minds. That there was no selfish ambition in his heart appeared finally from the fact that he did not seek praise and honor from men, as he pointedly says, neither from the Thessalonians nor from anybody else. This disinterestedness stands out all the more strongly, since Paul might well have been burdensome to the Thessalonians, he might have used his authority, he might have assumed the dignity which was his as the apostle of Christ, and demanded honoring recognition of his position, and that of Silas, from them. Note: All persons that hold positions of authority in the Church will do well to pattern after St. Paul in this respect, since it is only in exceptional cases that the dignity of their office receives the recognition which it deserves in the estimation of men.

Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

1Th 2:1-4

I. In view of what he had already undergone, and in anticipation of renewed suffering, St. Paul was "bold" in declaring in Thessalonica the whole counsel of God, keeping nothing back. He was all this, too, in the midst of "much contention"—that is, much external conflict and danger from his Jewish and Gentile opponents, and also internal struggles. The secret of this boldness was his realising his message as the Gospel of God,—good news from God Himself, a message from God. Hence, even in the presence of this world’s potentates, as God’s ambassador, "a legate of the skies," he was bold. He relied on his credentials. He was emboldened by the thought of the trust committed to him. Self-reliance is found in relying upon God.

II. "Our exhortation." There is much implied in the choice of this term to represent the apostolic ministry of the word. It means more than simple teaching. It is teaching tinged with emotion. The word thus suggested, as it is, of affectionate comfort and counsel, is specially adapted to the circumstances of the Thessalonian believers. The Apostle in the tenderness of his heart yearns over them in their dangers and trials. His sympathy breathes forth even from the very words he employs.

III. After disclaiming all wrong, corrupt elements in his "exhortation," the Apostle proceeds to describe positively the nature, the manner of his teaching. "But as we were allowed"—i.e., approved—"of God, to be put in trust with the gospel, even so we speak." He claims for himself in these words a Divine commission. Not that he or any one can ever be chosen of God to salvation and honour because of ability to stand the test of Divine scrutiny. No: that scrutiny, that testing, can reveal nothing but unworthiness. Yet there is a sense in which God does scrutinise His own people, setting aside some and approving others for special work. There are those who, having been proved faithful in little, are exalted to higher posts of service, and also to greater exposure to danger. Thus it was with Paul; first proved, then approved, and so entrusted with the Gospel. The reward of past labour and suffering is simply renewed opportunity for labouring and suffering more.

J. Hutchison, Lectures on Thessalonians, p. 50.

References: 1Th 2:4.—R. Thomas, Christian World Pulpit, vol. viii., p. 33. 1Th 2:5.—Church of England Pulpit, vol. xviii., p. 193.

1Th 2:5-9

The Apostle is very careful in describing the relation in which his ministry stood to the Thessalonians, to defend himself against all false charges, all insinuations or suspicions of insincerity or impurity of motive. There was no element of imposture or covetousness or guile in his ministry. Accredited from on high, he pleased not men, but God. It was enough for him, in seeking the good of his fellow-men, to be approved by Him who proveth His servants’ hearts.

I. He disdains the use of flattery. His exhortation was rather the word of simple unadulterated truth. Had his designs been self-seeking, he would have made use of flattery as one of the easiest keys for opening the door of the weak human heart. His teaching had for its aim first to wound, that, like Ithuriel’s spear, it might afterwards heal.

II. It is a short and natural step for the Apostle’s thought to pass from flattery to that which is the essence, the very soul of all flattery, covetousness: that form of self-interest which is sure to show itself in flattering words. He appeals to God, as if he had said, God knows, and what He knows He will at length testify, so that you too may know that with no plausible words, but in words of sincerity and simplicity, I have preached unto you.

III. He passes by with disdain as an element of his exhortation aught of ambition, desire for glory. "Not of men sought we glory." His aim was not the honour of men, but the approval of God. The scroll on the shield of the man of the world is, "I follow fame." On that of Paul it was "Rather use than fame."

IV. But the Apostle’s yearning towards his Thessalonian friends showed itself further in self-abnegation, in willingness to impart "also our own souls." That heart of his, which was restless till it rested in Christ, ceaselessly sent forth its love, henceforth sanctified in Christ’s love, towards others. He illustrated in himself the truth of the old Italian proverb, "The teacher is like the candle which gives light to others by consuming itself."

J.. Hutchison, Lectures on Thessalonians, p. 62.

1Th 2:10-12

There are two points to be noted here in this comparison instituted by Paul between his conduct and that of a father.

I. He could say, as a wise father suits his dealings, both in training and teaching, to the case, the requirements of each child, so he acted towards his converts, "every one of you." It was no general relation in which he stood to them. He dealt with each individual soul. He adapted his teaching to each case, giving to each a portion in due season. The religion of Jesus Christ takes account of each, tenderly deals with each, and thus advances till the number of His people be gathered in. Its foundation rests on individual conviction. Individualism, not multitudinism, is the word that represents the law of its growth. It makes its appeal to each separate conscience, and it is only in so far as it does so, that it comes to leaven the whole mass of human society.

II. But the other point in the comparison here made is, as a father is eager, intensely earnest, in giving his children right guidance and instruction, so was Paul in his yearning care of his converts. As he had described his general behaviour in three terms, so he describes his ministry in a threefold way. He says—exhorted and comforted and charged. Each one brought under the range of his influence was dealt with in the way most suited to his case; that so all might walk worthy of God, who hath called them unto His own kingdom and glory: one member of the Church needing exhortation, a second comfort, and a third solid charging. But the end aimed at in them all is one and the same, a walking worthy of their calling from on high. Believers walk worthy of their destiny and glory when they lovingly look forward to it, when they are longing of heart,

"Send hope before to grasp it

Till hope be lost in sight."

And we can rightly look forward to it only when we strive in Divine strength to prepare for it.

J. Hutchison, Lectures on Thessalonians, p. 75.

Reference: 1Th 2:13.—E. Cooper, Practical Sermons, vol. i., p. 1.

1Th 2:13-16

I. In this passage the Apostle states the evidence of the effectual working of the word in the Thessalonian converts. The change it had wrought in them was genuine, for it withstood trial. This is the test of a right acceptance of the truth. The Thessalonian Church was one of the earliest in Palestine to testify their faithfulness in the furnace of affection. They were being exercised in what Melanchthon used to say was the best of the three schools in which a Christian must be trained—the school of suffering. Those of prayer and meditation, he said, were good, but that of trial was the most fruitful of them all. It was so in apostolic times. It was so in the times of the Reformation. It is so still. The way of cross-bearing is the way of light. Christ’s people need to be taught how noble a thing it is to suffer and be strong.

II. The Apostle now turns aside from his theme. He makes a digression. He "goes off" (Jowett) upon the word "Jews" to describe the evil deeds and the merited doom of his own countrymen. The culminating point in Jewish wickedness is the casting out and murder of their Messiah, the Son of God. With fearful perseverance, "alway," alike before Christ came, when He had come, and after He was gone, they had been filling up the measure of their guilt. The archangel of judgment, with his sword-arm free, was already approaching,—so near indeed, that in anticipation the Apostle could say, "For the wrath is come upon them to the uttermost." Hardly fourteen years after the date of this epistle, it overtook them with a sudden surprise—it descended in the doom of fire upon the once sacred city, the entire overthrow and extinction of the Jewish state, the dispersion of the race, and the centuries of weary wandering appointed them, which are not yet closed. That was the dies irae for the Jews, and foreshadowing of the wrath to come. They who belong to God’s own kingdom and glory, on the other hand, while they see in the fearful judgment which befell the Jews a distinct and manifest type of another and final judgment, wait for Jesus, who is delivering them from the wrath to come.

J. Hutchison, Lectures on Thessalonians, p. 84.

References: 1Th 2:14.—Homilist, 3rd series, vol. iii., p 301. 1Th 2:16. Spurgeon, Evening by Evening, p. 225.

1Th 2:17-20

I. The Thessalonian Christians were peculiarly the Apostle’s hope, being regarded by him, not simply as a conspicuous part of the reward in glory which was in store for him, but also his hope in connection with his present earthly work. Their conversion, their steadfastness in the faith, was largely that on which he built his hopes, under God, of the further progress of the Gospel in Europe. He hoped that yet increasingly from them would sound out the word of the Lord. They were, further, his joy, inasmuch as in their conversion and consistent Christian conduct he saw the evidence that his own labour had not been in vain in the Lord. They were a credit to him in the sight of God and men. Hence, amid all his sorrows, he felt that in them he could find his joy. They were even more to him. They were his crown of holy boasting, for they would prove at last his wreath of victory, his chaplet of ceaseless rejoicing.

II. In the presence of our Lord Jesus at His coming, Paul’s crown of a good name in the presence of Christ Jesus was his converts—those who by his instrumentality had been brought to a knowledge of the truth. The same crown is offered to us all, and is in keeping for us all, if we be but faithful. History tells us that when in Philip II’s reign a rebel claimed and gained the crown of Granada, he bore at the ceremony of coronation in his right hand a banner bearing the inscription: "More I could not desire, less would not have contented me." These words cease to be presumptuous and become the utterance of truest wisdom only when they are the Christian’s, and refer to the crown of heavenly rejoicing, and when they are the legend of the banner under which he fights, in "the sacramental host of God’s elect."

J. Hutchison, Lectures on Thessalonians, p. 94.

1Th 2:18

I. There is a hinderer. Not only are there hindrances, there is a personal hinderer. He is not visible, he is not persuadable, he must be resisted.

II. This hinderer assails the most eminent workers in the Church. He assailed the Saviour Himself. In this case he hindered Paul. We are apt to think that the greatest men in the Church escape temptations which fall to the lot of others. The greater the man, the greater the temptation. (1) Our temptations show our unity as members of a common race. (2) Our temptations should awaken our sympathies as partakers of a common suffering.

III. The hinderer seeks to foil the aggressive intentions of the Christian. In being a hinderer the enemy has a decided advantage. (1) It is easy to hinder, that is, to do mischief, to suggest difficulties, to magnify obstacles, etc. (2) It is easier to hinder than to counteract.

Application: Satan comes to us sometimes through the medium of bad men; (2) sometimes through the gratification of apparently harmless wishes; (3) sometimes through friendly but incapable advisers—men who are so far below our level as utterly to miscalculate and misunderstand us.

Parker, City Temple, vol. ii., p. 23.

References: 1Th 2:18.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xi., No. 657; Ibid., Evening by Evening, p. 221; Parker, Hidden Springs, p. 203.

1Th 2:19-20

I. The text points to the future. Paul loved the Thessalonians; he made mention of them in his prayers. He remembered without ceasing their work of faith, their labour of love, their patience and hope. Instead of indulging in fond regrets, and lamenting the severance of old ties, and giving himself up to the fascination of sentimental reminiscences, he looks onward to the future cheerfully, anticipating renewed fellowship, calculating upon continued usefulness. His view extends to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The death of Christ, the resurrection of Christ, the ascension of Christ—these facts threw majestic shadows over the life path of believers, and were to them fountains of enthusiastic inspiration; but the coming of the Lord Jesus was the bright hope which fixed their eyes and filled their hearts.

II. The text recognises an everlasting bond of union between a Christian pastor and his flock. What is said here implies a mutual recognition at the last day. The true minister toils for eternity. The result of his employment will not appear till time shall end. Many kinds of effort in this life produce immediate results; they can be at once detected and recorded. But not so with what comes of our sacred occupation. The harvest is the end of the world; the reapers are the angels.

III. The text suggests the conditions on which the Apostolic hope may be fulfilled. (1) The conversion of men to Christ through their repentance and faith, through their experience of the change which the Gospel alone describes, which the Gospel alone effects,—that is, the new birth. (2) A second ground on which such felicity rests is the edification, the improvement, the growth in holiness of those so converted. (3) The consolation of the afflicted in this world of trial will add to the crown of rejoicing. The strongest of all ministerial power is sympathy in sorrow.

J. Stoughton, Penny Pulpit, New Series, No. 792.

References: 1Th 2:19, 1Th 2:20.—Christian World Pulpit, vol. vii., p. 241; R. Davey, Ibid., vol. xi., p. 282; Preacher’s Monthly, vol. ii., p. 452; J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons, 6th series, p. 81.

The Sermon Bible, ed. William Robertson Nicoll (1888–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

[In this section, Paul amplifies two statements made in the previous section. In 1Th_2:1-13 ; he enlarges upon the facts set forth in 1Th_1:5 ; and 1Th_2:13-16 are a similar enlargement of the matter contained in 1Th_2:6 ] For yourselves [as distinguished from those above mentioned who carried or repeated the news of the work at Thessalonica], brethren, know our entering in unto you, that it hath not been found vain [that Paul's coming to Thessalonica had not been vain or fruitless was proved by the fact that in this pagan city a church of Christ was now found]:

J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Division 2. (1Th 2:1-20; 1Th 3:1-13; 1Th 4:1-12.)

The witness in which God bears witness.

The second division shows us by the example of the apostle himself, and those who with him had been laboring among them, the character of the instruments with which God works. He may, of course, overrule in any case, and bless the word of truth even from ungodly lips; and so Paul could rejoice if Christ were preached, even though it were of envy and strife. One’s responsibility to the truth is because it is the truth. So that in any question as to this we may dismiss the speaker from our thoughts. Nay, were the speaker, as fully as Paul was, the minister of Christ, he would all the more recognize the very real danger of one receiving the Word as sanctioned by, rather than sanctioning, the utterer of it. For indeed how common a thing is it, thus to make the word of man of what is even owned to be the word of God! The true effect of it is in this way lost for the soul; and as this may be with the truth as a whole, so that the result is mere orthodoxy -a Christianity of only human making, -so it may be with regard to every separate truth -each item of the wondrous whole. How jealous need we to be over ourselves in these things.

Here, however, the apostle is dwelling upon the truth which is thus perverted, but which is no less the truth because of its perversion. The God of holiness is holy in His ways; and His instruments must be suited to this in character. The truth itself is holy; and those who make it known must do so in the effect manifested in their own lives and ways. And Satan, the great opposer of truth, shows his perfect knowledge of this when, as Paul says, he is transformed for his purpose into an angel of light. "Therefore," he goes on to say, "it is no small thing if also his ministers be transformed as the ministers of righteousness:" even he recognizes the need of suitability morally of end and ways.

1. He can appeal to what himself and his fellow-laborers were, as they went in and out amongst them. The main insistence is upon their manifest unselfishness. They had come from scourging and imprisonment at Philippi; and with the consciousness, as the apostle says elsewhere, that in every city bonds and afflictions awaited them. Certainly it was not their own things that they could find or seek, in pursuing a course which involved such things for them. Yet they did steadfastly pursue it. As bold as ever in their confidence in God, they made known still, amid much affliction, what was none the less God’s good news of joy. They had modified nothing, they had used no flattery, they had sought to please God, not man; Him whose omniscience searched the hearts of those who had to do with Him. From men they had sought nothing -had not insisted on undoubted rights -but found delight in giving what they had to give, yea, and their own souls with it. It was not simply righteousness, but love that sought not its own, and in which they labored, enforcing all their precept by example. And this that the recipients of the gospel might walk worthy of the God declared in it, who was calling men to His own Kingdom and glory.

2. They had not been disappointed at the result among the Thessalonians. The word of God had been received by them as what indeed it was, and, so received, it wrought its divine work. It took them out of their natural place in a world fallen away from God, to make them companions of those rejected by the world, but of whom the world was not worthy. Thus, says the apostle, "ye became imitators of the assemblies of God which are in Judea in Christ Jesus; for ye also suffered the same things of your own countrymen. even as they of the Jews." Nor need they think this strange who were followers of the Crucified One. Israel, alas! the first in privilege among the nations, had only by this become the guiltiest of all. The Lord Jesus Himself was among them the Head of a long line of martyrs, the prophets, of whom Stephen asks, "Which of the prophets have not your fathers persecuted? and they have slain them who showed before of the coming of the Righteous One; of whom ye have been now the betrayers and the murderers." Thus the nation chosen out of the world for the blessing of the world became the great opposers and hinderers of blessing. "They please not God and are contrary to all men, forbidding us to speak to the nations, that they might be saved." Israel are, therefore, for the present, rejected and set aside; they have filled up the measure of their sins, and wrath is come upon them to the uttermost.

Such was God’s heart towards the Gentiles; of which they, His laborers in the gospel, were witnesses and exponents. Bereaved of them for a moment, and having to leave them in the midst of a contrary world, their hearts unchangeably were with them, and desiring to come to them again; yea, Paul himself did, as he assures them; having been hindered, not by lack of heart, but by the great adversary of Christ and His people. And in the meantime he might seem thus to prevail; but faith contemplated another scene when the evil with which we are now in conflict shall have been put down, and, in the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ Himself at His coming, these now afflicted and despised Thessalonians would become indeed, what already faith held them for, the glory and joy of those of whom they were the fruit of love’s sweet labor.

Paul proceeds to show how far from indifferent he had been with regard to the afflictions they had been passing through. These had been foretold them from the first, so that they might not be taken by them unawares; nevertheless he could not leave them to the actual experience of them -so different from the looking forward merely to what had not yet come -without seeking to minister to the need which he, acquainted with suffering of this kind, knew so well. Timothy, therefore, had been sent to confirm their faith; and his return with the news of their constancy had filled with joy and comfort the apostle’s heart. "For now," he says, "we live, if ye stand fast in the Lord." It is evident that here is the soul of the true worker manifest, and that this is the object throughout this part of the epistle, to show as illustrated by experience the instruments by which God works in His spiritual harvest-fields. There is no need to dwell upon it, by reason of its being so plain; while the lesson conveyed is of the utmost importance. The apostle uses the most forcible expressions to declare the thorough identification of his heart with them in all their joy and sorrow, -his realization of, and longing in regard to their need, which expressed itself in constant and earnest supplication to God that he might again be with them, and that they might have spiritual increase and establishment in holiness such as might meet approval, in the day of approval, at the coming of the Lord Jesus with all His saints.

3. He passes hereupon into exhortation. Never satisfied with any attainment, he urges upon them still more to abound in that which would please God. Two things he presses; the one complementary to the other: abstention from lust, and abounding in love. The one was even a part of the religion of the heathen; as, in the broader sense of it, it was that out of which sprang idolatry, and through which comes the corruption of the world. In the narrower and grosser sense it was indulged in the very temples of their gods. It is a proof of the moral atmosphere in which they had been brought up, that to Christians so commended as are those here it should be necessary to warn them against the gross immoralities which, however, we find later invading Corinth. For us all, moreover, it is written, "Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall." We must not, therefore, pass lightly over what is left for our instruction also in the never-failing wisdom of One who knows the hearts of men.

But the remedy is also here, love which is the opposite of lust: the one the dominance and tyranny of self; the other that which seeketh not its own, -the spirit of service and self-denial. True, it is the love of brethren that the apostle here exhorts to, and not love in its universal aspect; but although these are separable, they will not be found, in fact, separate. The love to one another, which Paul reminds them they have been taught of God, cannot exist without flowing out to those who still are what we all once were, when divine grace met and brought us into the circle in which alone God’s love can reflect itself, as being enjoyed. Here the satisfied heart finds deliverance from the lusts of other things, covets but what is its own, and what is secured to it, and that which drives out lust puts in love in its place, to hold the citadel. Love is the bond of perfectness, the active energy of the divine life in the saint, and victorious in every field of conflict. The quiet occupation with one’s own work, and the maintenance by this means of a proper and healthful independence of others, naturally unite with such a care for others as love ensures.

F. W. Grant, The Numerical Bible (4th ed., 1903) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Chapter 5

APOLOGIA PRO VITA SUA

1Th_2:1-12 (R.V.)

OUR first impression, as we read these verses, is that they contain little that is new. They simply expand the statement of chap. 1, ver. 5 (1Th_1:5): "Our gospel came not unto you in word only, but in power, and in the Holy Ghost, and in much assurance; even as ye know what manner of men we showed ourselves toward you for your sake." But if their substance is the same, their tone is very different. It is obvious at a glance that the Apostle has a definite purpose in view in appealing so pointedly as he does here to facts with which his readers were familiar. The truth is, he is standing upon his defence. Unless it were so, he would not think of writing, as he does in 1Th_2:5, that he had never had recourse to flattery, nor sought to make gain out of his apostleship; nor as he does in 1Th_2:10, that God knows the entire purity of his life among them. Although he does not name them, it is quite plain that he was already suffering from those enemies who never ceased to vex him while he lived. As we learn afterwards, these enemies were the Jews. When they had opportunity, they used open violence; they roused the Gentile mob against him; they had him scourged and stoned. When his body was out of their reach, they assailed him through his character and affections. They crept into the churches which his love and zeal had gathered here and there, and scattered injurious suspicions against him among his disciples. He was not, they hinted, all that he seemed to be. They could tell stories about his early days, and advised those who did not know him so well to be on their guard. Evangelising paid him quite as well as harder work, and his paltry ambition was gratified by lording it over his ignorant converts. Such messengers of Satan had apparently made their appearance in Thessalonica since Paul left, and this chapter is his reply to their insinuations.

There is something exquisitely painful in the situation thus created. It would have been like a sword piercing the Apostles heart, had his enemies succeeded in their attempt to breed distrust in the Thessalonians toward him. He could not have borne to think that those whom he loved so utterly should entertain the faintest suspicion of the integrity, of his love. But happily he is spared that pain. He writes, indeed, as one who has felt the indignity of the charges brought against him, but with the frankness and heartiness of a man who is confident that his defence will be well received. From baseless insinuations he can appeal to facts which are well known to all. From the false character in which he has been dressed by his adversaries he can appeal to the true, in which he lived and moved familiarly among them.

The first point in his favour is found in the circumstances under which he had preached the gospel in Thessalonica. Had he been an insincere man, with by-ends of his own to serve, he would never have faced the career of an apostle. He had been scourged and put in the stocks at Philippi; and when he left that city for Thessalonica, he brought his troubles with him. Here also he had much conflict; he was beset on every hand with difficulties; it was only in the strength of God that he had courage to preach at all. You yourselves, he says, know that; and how, in spite of that, our coming to you was not vain, but full of power; surely it needs no more to prove the disinterestedness of our mission.

From this point onward, the apology falls into two parts, a negative and a positive: the Apostle tells us what his gospel and the proclamation of it are not; and then he tells us what, at Thessalonica, it had been.

In the first place, it is not of error. It does not rest on mistakes, or imaginations, or cunningly devised fables; in the fullest sense it is the truth. It would have taken the heart out of the Apostle, and made him incapable of braving anything for its sake, had he been in doubt of this. If the gospel were a device of man, then men might take liberties with it, handle it deceitfully, make their own account out of it; but resting as it does on facts and truth, it demands honest dealing in all its ministers. Paul claims here a character in agreement with the dispensation which he serves: can a minister of the truth, he asks, be other than a true man?

In the next place, it is not of uncleanness; that is, it is not prompted by any impure motive. The force of the word here must be determined by the context; and we see that the impure motives specially laid to the charge of Paul were avarice and ambition; or, to use the words of the Apostle himself, covetousness, and the seeking of honour from men. The first of these is so manifestly inconsistent with any degree of spirituality that Paul writes instinctively "a cloke of covetousness"; he did not make his apostolic labour a veil, under cover of which he could gratify his love of gain. It is impossible to exaggerate the subtle and clinging character of this vice. It owes its strength to the fact that it can be so easily cloked. We seek money, so we tell ourselves, not because we are covetous, but because it is a power for all good purposes. Piety, charity, humanity, refinement, art, science-it can minister to them all; but when we obtain it, it is too easily hoarded, or spent in indulgence, display, and conformity to the world. The pursuit of wealth, except in an utterly materialised society, is always cloked by some ideal end to which it is to minister; but how few there are in whose hands wealth is merely an instrument for the furtherance of such ends. In many men the desire for it is naked selfishness, an idolatry as undisguised as that of Israel at Sinai. Yet all men feel how bad and mean it is to have the heart set on money. All men see how base and incongruous it is to make godliness a source of gain. All men see the peculiar ugliness of a character which associates piety and avarice-of a Balaam, for instance, a Gehazi, or an Ananias. It is not ministers of the gospel only, but all to whom. the credit of the gospel is entrusted, who have to be on their guard here. Our enemies are entitled to question our sincerity when we can be shown to be lovers of money. At Thessalonica, as elsewhere, Paul had been at pains to make such calumny impossible. Although entitled to claim support from the Church in accordance with the law of Christ that they who preach the gospel should live by the gospel, he had wrought night and day with his own hands that he might not burden any of them. As a precaution, this self-denial was vain; there can be no security against malice; but it gave him a triumphant vindication when the charge of covetousness was actually made.

The other impure motive contemplated is ambition. Some modern students of Pauls character-devils advocates, no doubt-hint at this as his most obvious fault. It was necessary for him, we are told, to be first; to be the leader of a party; to have a following of his own. But he disclaims ambition as explicitly as avarice. He never sought glory from men, at Thessalonica or elsewhere. He used none of the arts which obtain it. As apostles of Christ-he includes his friends-they had, indeed, a rank of their own; the greatness of the Prince whom they represented was reflected on them as His ambassadors; they might have "stood upon their dignity" had they chosen to do so. Their very self-denial in the matter of money formed a new temptation for them here. They might well feel that their disinterested service of the Thessalonians entitled them to a spiritual preeminence; and indeed there is no pride like that which bases on ascetic austerities the claim to direct with authority the life and conduct of others. Paul escaped this snare. He did not compensate himself for renouncing gain, with any lordship over souls. In all things he was the servant of those to whom he preached.

And as his motives were pure, so were the means he used. His exhortation was not in guile. He did not manipulate his message; he was never found using words of flattery. The gospel was not his own to do what he pleased with: it was Gods; God had approved him. so far as to entrust it to him; yet every moment, in the discharge of his trust, that same God was proving his heart still, so that false dealing was impossible. He did not make his message other than it was; he did not hide any part of the counsel of God; he did not inveigle the Thessalonians by any false pretences into responsibilities which would not have been accepted could they have been foreseen.

All these denials-not of error, not of uncleanness, not of guile; not pleasing men, not using words of flattery, not cloaking over covetousness - all these denials presuppose the contrary affirmations. Paul does notindulge in boasting but on compulsion; he would never have sought to justify himself, unless he had first been accused. And now, over against this picture, drawn by his enemies, let us look at the true likeness which is held up before God and man.

Instead of selfishness there is love, and nothing but love. We are all familiar with the great passage in the epistle to the Philippians where the Apostle depicts the mind which was in Christ Jesus. The contrast in that passage between the disposition which grasps at eminence and that which makes itself of no reputation, between αρπαγμος and κενωσις, is reproduced here. Paul had learned of Christ; and instead of seeking in his apostolic work opportunities for self-exaltation, he shrank from no service imposed by love. "We were gentle in the midst of you, as when a nurse cherisheth her own children." "Her own" is to be emphasised. The tenderness of the Apostle was that of a mother warming her babe at her breast. Most of the ancient authorities, the R.V tells us in the margin, read "We were babes in the midst of you." If this were correct, the thought would be that Paul stooped to the level of these infant disciples, speaking to them, as it were, in the language of childhood, and accommodating himself to their immaturity. But though this is appropriate enough, the word νηπιοι is not proper to express it. Gentleness is really what is meant. But his love went further than this in its yearning over the Thessalonians. He had been accused of seeking gain and glory when he came among them; but his sole desire had been not to get but to give. As his stay was prolonged, the disciples became very dear to their teachers; "we were well pleased to impart unto you, not the gospel of God only, but also our own souls." That is the true standard of pastoral care. The Apostle lived up to it always "Now we live," he writes in the next chapter, "if ye stand fast in the Lord." "Ye are in our hearts," he cries to the Corinthians, "to live together and to die together." He not only kept back from them nothing of the whole purpose of God; he kept back no part of himself. His daily toil, his toil by night, his prayers, his preaching, his spiritual ardour, his very soul, were theirs. They knew his labour and travail; they were witnesses, and God also, how holily and righteously and unblamably he had behaved toward them.

As the Apostle recalls these recent memories, he dwells for a moment on another aspect of his love. It had not only the tender fondness of a mothers, but the educative wisdom of a fathers. One by one he dealt with the disciples-which is not the way to gain glory-exhorting, encouraging, bearing solemn testimony to the truth of God. And his end in all this, as they knew, was ideal and spiritual, an end as remote as possible from any worldly interest of his own, that they might walk worthily of God who was calling them into His own kingdom and glory. How far from the rewards and distinctions of the present must that mans mind be who sees, as Paul saw steadily, the things that are invisible. If he who is blind to the golden crown above his head grasps the muck rake tightly and clutches eagerly all it brings within his reach, surely he whose eye is set upon the crown must be superior alike to the gain and the glory of the world. That, at least, is the claim which the Apostle makes here. Nothing could be more incongruous than that a man to whom the visible world was transitory and unreal, and the visible kingdom of God real and eternal, should be eager for money and applause and forget the high calling with which he himself was calling men in Christ. So far the apology of the Apostle.

The practical application of this passage is different, according as we look at it in detail, or as a whole. It exhibits to us, in the charges brought against Paul, those vices which even bad men can see to be rankly inconsistent with the Christian character. Covetousness is the foremost. No matter how we cloak it-and we always cloak it somehow-it is incurably unchristian. Christ had no money. He never wished to have any. The one perfect life that has been lived in this world, is the life of Him who owned nothing, and who left nothing but the clothes he wore. Whoever names the name of Christ, and professes to follow Him, must learn of Him, indifference to gain. The mere suspicion of avarice will discredit, and ought to discredit, the most pious pretensions. The second vice I have spoken of as ambition. It is the desire to use others for ones own exaltation, to make them the stepping stones on which we rise to eminence, the ministers of our vanity, the sphere for the display of our own abilities as leaders, masters, organisers, preachers. To put ourselves in that relation to others is to do an essentially unchristian thing. A minister whose congregation is the theatre on which he displays his talents or his eloquence is not a Christian. A clever man, to whom the men and women with whom he meets in society are merely specimens of human nature on whom he can make shrewd observations, sharpening his wits on them as on a grindstone, is not a Christian. A man of business, who looks at the labourers whom he employs as only so many instruments for rearing the fabric of his prosperity, is not a Christian. Everybody in the world knows that; and such men, if they profess Christianity, give a handle to slander, and bring disgrace on the religion which they wear merely as a blind. True Christianity is love, and the nature of love is not to take but to give. There is no limit to the Christians beneficence; he counts nothing his own; he gives his very soul with every separate gift. He is as tender as the mother to her infant; as wise, as manly, as earnest as the father with his growing boy.

Looked at as a whole this passage warns us against slander. It must needs be that slander is spoken and believed; but woe to the man or woman by whom it is either believed or spoken! None are good enough to escape it. Christ was slandered; they called Him a glutton and a drunkard, and said He was in league with the devil. Paul was slandered; they said he was a very smart man, who looked well to his own interest, and made dupes of simple people. The deliberate wickedness of such falsehoods is diabolical, but it is not so very rare. Numbers of people who would not invent such stories are glad to hear them. They are not very particular whether they are true or false; it pleases them to think that an evangelist, eminent in profession, gets a royalty on hymn books; or that a priest, famous for devotion, was really no better than he should have been; or that a preacher, whose words regenerated a whole church, sometimes despised his audience, and talked nonsense impromptu. To sympathise with detraction is to have the spirit of the devil, not of Christ. Be on your guard against such sympathy; you are human, and therefore need to. Never give utterance to a suspicious thought. Never repeat what would discredit a man, if you have only heard it and are not sure it is true; even it you are sure of its truth, be afraid of yourself if it gives you any pleasure to think of it. Love thinketh no evil; love rejoiceth not in iniquity.

William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.

2:1–3:13 The body of this letter begins by discussing Paul’s and his associates’ character (2:1-12) and the way the Thessalonians received the Good News (2:13-16). It then emphasizes Paul’s sincere care for the church, telling of his attempts to return to visit them (2:17-20) and his decision to send Timothy to them when he himself could not come (3:1-5). Finally, it tells of Paul’s joy over Timothy’s good report (3:6-9) and his prayers to get back to the church himself (3:10-13). This lengthy defense is Paul’s response to criticisms of his abrupt departure and prolonged absence.

2:1 The Greek word translated visit often refers to entry into a city. Ancient orators were known for their grand entrances into a town. Paul’s entrance to Thessalonica should be judged by its credible results rather than its lack of pomp or ceremony.

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

1Th 2:1. Γὰρ, for) This refers to ch. 1Th 1:5-6; for what was there laid down as the proposition, is now taken up again to be discussed, and that, too, regarding Paul and his companions, 1Th 2:1-12; regarding the Thessalonians, 1Th 2:13-16.—οὐ κενὴ, not vain) but full of power.

Bengel's Gnomon of the New Testament — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1860) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

1Th_2:1 is referred by Grotius to a thought to be supplied after 1Th_1:10 : Merito illam spem vitae aeternae retinetis. Vera enim sunt, quae vobis annuntiavimus. Arbitrarily, as αὐτοὶ γάρ, emphatically placed first, yea, you yourselves, must contain a contrast of the readers to other persons; and, besides, this view is founded on a false interpretation of οὐ κενὴ γέγονεν (see below). Also 1Th_2:1 cannot, with Bengel, Flatt (who, besides, will consider 1Th_1:8-10 as a parenthesis), Pelt, Schott, and others, be referred to 1Th_1:5-6; nor, with Hofmann, extending over εἰδότες τὴν ἐκλογὴν ὑμῶν (1Th_1:4) to εὐχαριστοῦμεν τῷ Θεῷ (1Th_1:2), the thought being now developed, what justification the apostle had for making the election of his readers the special object of thanksgiving to God. But must, with Zanchius, Balduin, Turretin, de Wette, Bloomfield, Alford, and others, be referred back to 1Th_1:9. For to 1Th_1:9 points(1) αὐτοὶ γὰρ οἴδατε, by which the Thessalonians themselves are contrasted to the strangers who reported their praise; (2) τὴν εἴσοδον ἡμῶν τὴν πρὸς ὑμᾶς, even by its similarity of sound refers to ὁποίαν εἴσοδον ἔσχομεν πρὸς ὑμᾶς (1Th_1:9); (3) the greater naturalness of referring γάρ (1Th_2:1) to the preceding last independent sentence. The relation of this reference is as follows: in chap. 1Th_2:1 the apostle refers to 1Th_1:9, in order to develope the thought expressed therewhich certainly was already contained in 1Th_1:5-6by an appeal to the consciousness of the readers. But the thought expressed in 1Th_1:9 was twofold(1) a statement concerning Paul and his assistants, namely, with what energy they preached the gospel at Thessalonica (ὁποίαν εἴσοδον ἔσχομεν πρὸς ὑμᾶς); and (2) a statement concerning the Thessalonians, namely, with what eagerness they received the gospel (καὶ πῶς κ.τ.λ.). Both circumstances the apostle further developes in chap. 2.: first, and most circumstantially, the manner in which he and his assistants appeared in Thessalonica (1Th_2:1-12); and, secondly, the corresponding conduct of his readers (1Th_2:13-16). But the description of himself (1Th_2:1-12) was not occasioned by the calumniations of the apostle, and a diminution of confidence in him occasioned thereby (Benson, Ritschl, Hall. A. Lit. Z. 1847, No. 125; Auberlen); also, not so much by the heartfelt gratitude for the great blessings which God had conferred on his ministry at Thessalonica, as by the definite design of strengthening and confirming, in the way of life on which they had entered, the Christian church at Thessalonica,which, notwithstanding their exemplary faith, yet consisted only of novices,by a vivid representation of the circumstances of their conversion. How entirely appropriate was the courageous, unselfish, self-sacrificing, and unwearied preaching of the apostle to exhibit the high value of the gospel itself, seeing it was capable of inspiring such a conduct as Paul and his companions had exhibited!

γάρ] yea, or indeed. See Hartung, Partikellehre, I. p. 463 ff.

The construction: οἴδατε τὴν εἴσοδον, ὅτιwhere we, according to our idiom, would expect οἴδατε, ὅτι ἡ εἴσοδος κ.τ.λ.is not only, as Schott and others say, not unknown to classical writers, but is a regular construction among the Greeks. See Bernhardy, Syntax, p. 466.

ἡ εἴσοδος ἡ πρὸς ὑμᾶς] denotes here nothing more than our entrance among you.

κενός] is the opposite of πλήρης, and denotes empty, void of contents, null.

οὐ κενὴ γέγονεν] Grotius (whom Hammond follows) translates this by mendax, fallax (שָׁוְא), and gives the sense: non decepturi ad vos venimus. But although κενὸς often forms the contrast to ἀληθὴς (see also Eph_5:6), yet it obtains only thereby the meaning falsus, never the meaning fallax; also 1Th_2:2 would not suit to the meaning fallax, because then the idea of uprightness would be expected as a contrast. Oecumenius finds in 1Th_2:1-2 the contrast of truth and falsehood: οὐ κενὴ γέγονεν· τουτέστιν οὐ ματαία οὐ μῦθοι γὰρ ψευδεῖς καὶ λῆροι τὰ ἡμέτερα κηρύγματα. But he obtains this meaning only by incorrectly laying the chief stress in 1Th_2:2 on τὸ εὐαγγέλιον τοῦ Θεοῦ (οὐδὲ ἡμεῖς ἀνθρώπινόν τι ἐκηρύξαμεν εἰς ὑμᾶς ἀλλὰ Θεοῦ λόγους). Similarly to Grotius, but equally erroneously, Koppe (veni ad vos eo consilio et studio, ut vobis prodessem, non ut otiose inter vos viverem) and Rosenmüller (vani honoris vel opum acquirendarum studio) refer οὐ κενὴ γέγονεν to the design of the apostle, interpretations which are rendered impossible by the perfect γέγονεν. With a more correct appreciation of γέγονεν, Estius, Piscator, Vorstius, Turretin, Flatt, and others give the meaning inutilis, fructu carens, appealing to the Hebrew רִיק. This meaning is in itself not untenable, but it becomes so in our passage by the contrast in 1Th_2:2; for 1Th_2:2 does not speak of the result or effect of the apostles preaching at Thessalonica, but of the character of that preaching itself. For the sake of this contrast, therefore, οὐ κενή is equivalent to δυνατή, δεινή (Chrys.: οὐκ ἀνθρωπίνη οὐδὲ ἡ τυχοῦσα), and the meaning is: the apostles εἴσοδος, entrance, among the Thessalonians was not weak, powerless, but mighty and energetic. Pelt, Schott, Olshausen, de Wette, and Bloomfield erroneously unite with this idea of οὐ κενὴ the idea of the success of the apostles εἴσοδος, which is first spoken of in 1Th_2:13 ff.

Meyer — Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament — English translation by Peter Christie, edited by Frederick Crombie (T&T Clark, 1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

1Th 2:1-12 . An apologia pro vita et labors suo .

1Th 2:1 . αὐτοί , as opposed to the α . of 1Th 1:9 . γέγονεν κ . τ . λ ., our mission was a vital success, as its results still show. For its motives and methods were genuine (1Th 2:2-12 ).

The Expositor's Greek Testament, edited by W. Robertson Nicoll (1897–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

§ 3. 1Th 2:1-12. The Conduct of the Apostles at Thessalonica

The thanksgiving just offered to God for the conspicuous Christian worth of the Thessalonians reflects upon the work of the writers as the instruments of their conversion. The whole heart and interest of St Paul and his companions are bound up with the welfare of this Church (1Th 3:8); their thoughts in the previous paragraph (1Th 2:4-9) were constantly vibrating between “you” and “us,” as in the ensuing paragraph between “us” and “you.” This section is, in truth, an expansion of 1Th 2:5 b in chap. 1: οἴδατε οἶοι ἐγενήθημεν [ἐν] ὑμῖν διʼ ὑμᾶς. Starting from the εἴσοδος referred to in 1Th 1:9, the train of reflexion on the spirit and character of the past ministry of the writers amongst the Thessalonians, pursued through twelve verses with emphasis and relish, brings them back in 1Th 2:13 into the vein of thanksgiving from which they set out. The Introd., pp. xxxiv. f., suggested some reasons for the writers’ dwelling thus on themselves and their own behaviour. The section may be analysed as follows:—The mission of St Paul and his comrades at Thessalonica exhibited the true power of the Gospel (1Th 2:1); which was manifest (1) by the boldness they showed on its behalf in the face of persecution (1Th 2:2)—(2) the boldness of religious sincerity untainted with personal ambition (1Th 2:3-6), (3) united in their case with a tender parental devotion toward their charge (1Th 2:7-9), and with (4) a solicitous fidelity to the high aims of the Christian calling (1Th 2:11-12). Four words resume the whole—courage, purity, tenderness, fidelity; cf. 2Co 5:20 to 2Co 6:10.

1. Αὐτοὶ γὰρ οἴδατε, ἀδελφοί, τὴν εἴσοδον ἡμῶν τὴν πρὸς ὑμᾶς. For yourselves know, brothers, that entrance of ours unto you—resuming the thread of 1Th 1:9. This αὐτοὶ γάρ is antithetical to that of 1Th 1:9—“you know on your own part” what “they report upon theirs”; the indefinite εἴσοδον of the former sentence is now recalled to be defined, τὴν … τὴν πρὸς ὑμᾶς; and the historical (aorist) ἔσχομεν becomes the perfect γέγονεν, of the abiding effect. For the sense of εἴσοδος, see the previous note; for the ordo verborum, cf. τὴν πίστιν ὑμῶν τὴν πρὸς τὸν θεόν of 1Th 1:8. Here πρός has its primary local meaning; there it carried an ethical sense.

οἴδατε … τὴν εἴσοδον … ὅτι οὐ κενὴ γέγονεν. You know … our entrance … that it has proved no vain (entrance)—i.e. far from vain. Οὐ negatives the whole predicate κενὴ γέγονεν, making it synonymous with ἐν δυνάμει ἐγενήθη (1Th 1:5) or ἐνεργουμένη (-εῖται) of 1Th 2:13; cf. 1Co 15:10; 1Co 15:58; Php 2:16. Κενός (empty, hollow) signifies in this context “void” of reality and power, as the entry of the Apostles would have proved had they “come in word” (1Th 1:5), with hollow assumptions and κενοφωνία (1Ti 6:20; 2Ti 2:16), like “wind-bags” (cf. 1Co 2:1; 1Co 2:4; 1Co 4:19 f.).

Οἴδατε claims beforehand the subject of γέγονεν for its object, according to the Greek idiom which extends to all dependent sentences, but prevails with verbs of knowing: see Winer-Moulton, p. 781, Rutherford’s Syntax, § 244; and cf. 2Th 2:4, ἀποδεικνύντα ἑαυτόν, κ.τ.λ.; 1Co 3:20; 2Co 12:3 f.; Luk 4:34.

Cambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges (Cambridge University Press, 1896; 21 vols, various authors incl. Carr, Maclear, Plummer, Farrar, Lumby, Moule, M. R. James, Simcox) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Ch.

2:1-16.] He reminds the Thessalonians of his manner of preaching among them (1-12, answering to ch. 1:9 a): praises them for their reception of the Gospel, and firmness in persecution (13-16, answering to ch. 1:9 b).

1.] γάρ refers back to ὁποίαν, ch. 1:9: ‘not only do strangers report it, but you know it to be true.’ He makes use now of that knowledge to carry out the description of his preaching among them, with a view, by recapitulating these details, to confirm them, who were as yet but novices, in the faith.

κενή] It is evident from vv. 2 ff., that this does not here apply to the fruits, but to the character of his preaching: the result does not appear till ver. 13. And within this limitation, we may observe that the verb is γέγονεν, not ἐγένετο; to be understood therefore not of any mere intent of the Apostle at the time of his coming among them, but of some abiding character of his preaching. It cannot then be understood as Koppe,—‘veni ad vos eo consilio … ut vobis prodessem, non ut otiose inter vos viverem:’ and nearly so Rosenm. It probably expresses, that his εἴσοδος was and continued ‘no empty scheme’ (‘no light matter,’ as we say; οὐχ ἡ τυχοῦσα, Chrys.), but an earnest, bold, self-denying endeavour for their good. This he proceeds to prove.

Henry Alford, The Greek Testament (1849–1861) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

(2) The Visit of the Missionaries (2:1-12)

The account of the visit (2:1-12; cf. 1:5, 8a, 9a) takes the form of a self-defence against insinuations made by Jews. With the same subtlety that led them to accuse the missionaries of preaching another king, namely, Jesus (Act 17:7), the Jews were insinuating that the renegade Paul, like many a pagan itinerant preacher, was self-deluded, sensual, and deceiving, delivering his message in flattering words as a foil to cover selfish greed and requiring honour to be paid him. Paul’s failure to return lent some colour to these assertions, and the converts became anxious. In his defence, Paul, speaking mainly for himself but including his associates, conscious both of the integrity of his motives and of the unselfishness of his love, and aware of the straightforwardness of his religious appeal, reminds his readers that he came not empt-yhanded but with a gospel and a courageous power inspired by God (vv. 1-2). Wherever he goes, he preaches as one with no delusion about the truth, for his gospel is of God; with no consciousness of moral aberration, for God had tested him and commissioned him to preach; with no intention to deceive, for he is responsible to God who knows his motives (vv. 3-4). Furthermore, when he was in Thessalonica, he never used cajoling speech, as the readers know, never used the gospel to exploit his ambitions, and never required honour to be given him, although he had the right to receive it as an apostle of Christ (vv. 5-6). On the contrary, he waived his right, becoming just one of them, not an apostle but a babe, and waived it in love for his dear children. Instead of demanding honour, he worked incessantly to support himself while he preached, in order to save the readers from any expense on his account (vv. 7-9). His sincerity is evident from the pious, righteous, and blameless conduct which they saw in him (v. 10). Not as a flatterer but as a father, he urged them one and all, by encouragement and by solemn appeal, to behave as those who are called of God into his kingdom and glory (vv. 11-12).

The disposition of 2:1-12 is clearly marked by γά (vv. 1, 3, 5-6) and ἀλλα (vv. 2, 4, 7-12) and by the parallel comparisons attached to λαλοῦμε (v. 4) and ὑμῶ (v. 8). The three points of v. 3 are met in the clause with ἀλλα (v. 4); and the three points of vv. 5-6 are met in vv. 7-12, the γά (v. 9) resuming and further elucidating ἀλλα (v. 7); thus ζητοῦντες δόξα is considered in vv. 7-9, πλεονεξί in v. 10, and κολακί in vv. 11-12.—A careful exegesis of 2:3-8 is given by Zimmer in Theol. Studien B. Weiss dargebracht, 1897, 248-273.

1Indeed you yourselves know, brothers, that the visit we paid you has not proved to be void of power. 2On the contrary, although we had previously undergone suffering and insult in Philippi, as you know, still we in the power of our God took courage to tell you the gospel of God in the midst of much opposition.

3Indeed the appeal we are wont to make comes not from delusion nor from impurity nor with any purpose to deceive. 4On the contrary, as we stand approved by God to be intrusted with the gospel, so we are wont to tell it, concerned not with pleasing men but God who tests our hearts.

5Indeed, we never once came before you with cajoling address, as you know, or with a pretext inspired by greed, God is witness, 6or requiring honour of men—from you or from others, although we were ever able to be in a position of honour as Christ’s apostles. 7On the contrary, we became babes in the midst of you—as a nurse cherishes her own children 8so we yearned after you, glad to share with you not only the gospel of God but our very selves as well, for you had become dear to us. 9You remember of course, brothers, our toil and hardship; night and day we worked for our living rather than put a burden on any of you while we preached to you the gospel of God. 10You are witnesses and God as well how piously and righteously and blamelessly we behaved in the sight of you believers. 11As you know, we were urging you individually, as a father his own children, both by encouragement 12and by solemn appeal, to walk worthily of God who calls you into his own kingdom and glory.

1. αὐτοὶ γὰρ οἴδατε κτλ. With an explanatory γά, Paul resumes ὁποίαν εἴσοδον ἔσχομε (1:9) and takes up explicitly the defence already touched upon in 1:5 (which is strikingly parallel to 2:1-2). Addressing the readers affectionately as (ἀδελφοι in 1:4), he recalls to their knowledge that the visit which he paid them was not empty (κενη), meaning not that it was fruitless, for the welcome by the converts (1:6) is not resumed until v. 13; but that, as the ἀλλα cause certifies, the visit was not empty-handed, was not, as 1:5 says, “in word only but also in power,” for he came with a gospel of which God is the author, and preached with a courage (cf. 1:5 πληροφορίᾳ) which was due to the power of God operating in him (cf. 1:5 ἐν δυνάμει καὶ ἐν πνεύματι ἁγίῳ). That he thus preached, notwithstanding recent experiences of persecution and insult in Philippi and great opposition in Thessalonica, is further proof of the divine inspiration both of his message and of his power in proclaiming it.

γά resumes and explains 1:5 (Bengel) by way of 1:9 where περὶ ἡμῶ is put significantly at the beginning. On αὐτοὶ γὰρ οἴδατ, see 1:5; and on the construction οἴδατε τὴ … ὅτ cf. 1Co 3:20. The article (τή) is repeated as in 1:8 (ἡ πρός κτλ). The perfect γέγονε with which the aorists (1:5, 2:5, 7, 10) are to be contrasted denotes completed action; the facts of the visit are all in, and the readers may estimate it at its full value. ἡμῶ shows that Paul includes Silas and Timothy with him in the defence.

International Critical Commentary — older volumes (1896–1929), various authors — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

That which he touched before shortly concerning his Apostleship, he handleth now more at large, and to that end and purpose which we spake of.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

Here we have an account of Paul's manner of preaching, and his comfortable reflection upon his entrance in among the Thessalonians. As he had the testimony of his own conscience witnessing to his integrity, so he could appeal to the Thessalonians how faithful he, and Silas, and Timotheus, his helpers in the work of the Lord, had discharged their office: You yourselves, brethren, know our entrance in unto you. Note, It is a great comfort to a minister to have his own conscience and the consciences of others witnessing for him that he set out well, with good designs and from good principles; and that his preaching was not in vain, or, as some read it, was not fain. The apostle here comforts himself either in the success of his ministry, that it was not fruitless or in vain (according to our translation), or as others think, reflecting upon the sincerity of his preaching, that it was not vain and empty, or deceitful and treacherous. The subject-matter of the apostle's preaching was not vain and idle speculations about useless niceties and foolish questions, but sound and solid truth, such as was most likely to profit his hearers. A good example this is, to be imitated by all the ministers of the gospel. Much less was the apostle's preaching vain or deceitful. He could say to these Thessalonians what he told the Corinthians (Co2 4:2): We have renounced the hidden things of dishonesty, not walking in craftiness, nor handling the word of God deceitfully. He had no sinister or worldly design in his preaching, which he puts them in mind to have been,

I. With courage and resolution: We were bold in our God to speak unto you the gospel of God, Th1 2:2. The apostle was inspired with a holy boldness, nor was he discouraged at the afflictions he met with, or the opposition that was made against him. He had met with ill usage at Philippi, as these Thessalonians well knew. There it was that he and Silas were shamefully treated, being put in the stocks; yet no sooner were they set at liberty than they went to Thessalonica, and preached the gospel with as much boldness as ever. Note, Suffering in a good cause should rather sharpen than blunt the edge of holy resolution. The gospel of Christ, at its first setting out in the world, met with much opposition; and those who preached it preached it with contention, with great agony, which denoted either the apostles' striving in their preaching or their striving against the opposition they met with. This was Paul's comfort; he was neither daunted in his work, nor driven from it.

II. With great simplicity and godly sincerity: Our exhortation was not of deceit, nor of uncleanness, nor in guile, Th1 2:3. This, no doubt, was matter of the greatest comfort to the apostle - the consciousness of his own sincerity; and was one reason of his success. It was the sincere and uncorrupted gospel that he preached and exhorted them to believe and obey. His design was not to set up a faction, to draw men over to a party, but to promote pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father. The gospel he preached was without deceit, it was true and faithful; it was not fallacious, nor a cunningly-devised fable. Nor was it of uncleanness. His gospel was pure and holy, worthy of its holy author, tending to discountenance all manner of impurity. The word of God is pure. There should be no corrupt mixtures therewith; and, as the matter of the apostle's exhortation was thus true and pure, the manner of his speaking was without guile. He did not pretend one thing and intend another. He believed, and therefore he spoke. He had no sinister and secular aims and views, but was in reality what he seemed to be. The apostle not only asserts his sincerity, but subjoins the reasons and evidences thereof. The reasons are contained, Th1 2:4.

1. They were stewards, put in trust with the gospel: and it is required of a steward that he be faithful. The gospel which Paul preached was not his own, but the gospel of God. Note, Ministers have a great favour shown them, and honour put upon them, and trust committed to them. They must not dare to corrupt the word of God: they must diligently make use of what is entrusted with them, so as God hath allowed and commanded, knowing they shall be called to an account, when they must be no longer stewards.

2. Their design was to please God and not men. God is a God of truth, and requires truth in the inward parts; and, if sincerity be wanting, all that we do cannot please God. The gospel of Christ is not accommodated to the fain fancies and lusts of men, to gratify their appetites and passions; but, on the contrary, it was designed for the mortifying of their corrupt affections, and delivering them from the power of fancy, that they might be brought under the power of faith. If I yet pleased men, I should not be the servant of Christ, Gal 1:10.

3. They acted under the consideration of God's omniscience, as in the sight of him who tries our hearts. This is indeed the great motive to sincerity, to consider that God not only seeth all that we do, but knoweth our thoughts afar off, and searcheth the heart. He is well acquainted with all our aims and designs, as well as our actions. And it is from this God who trieth our hearts that we must receive our reward. The evidences of the apostle's sincerity follow; and they are these: - (1.) He avoided flattery: Neither at any time used we flattering words, as you know, Th1 2:5. He and his fellow-labourers preached Christ and him crucified, and did not aim to gain an interest in men's affections for themselves, by glorying, and fawning and wheedling them. No, he was far from this; nor did he flatter men in their sins; nor tell them, if they would be of his party, they might live as they listed. He did not flatter them with fain hopes, nor indulge them in any evil work or way, promising them life, and so daubing with untempered mortar. (2.) He avoided covetousness. He did not make the ministry a cloak, or a covering, for covetousness, as God was witness, Th1 2:5. His design was not to enrich himself by preaching the gospel; so far from this, he did not stipulate with them for bread. He was not like the false apostles, who, through covetousness, with feigned words made merchandise of the people, Pe2 2:3. (3.) He avoided ambition and vain-glory: Nor of men sought we glory, neither of you nor yet of others, Th1 2:6. They expected neither people's purses nor their caps, neither to be enriched by them nor caressed, and adored, and called Rabbi by them. This apostle exhorts the Galatians (Gal 5:26) not to be desirous of vain glory; his ambition was to obtain that honour which comes from God, Joh 5:44. He tells them that they might have used greater authority as apostles, and expected greater esteem, and demanded maintenance, which is meant by the phrase of being burdensome, because perhaps some would have thought this too great a burden for them to bear.

Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

CHAPTER II.

The apostle sets forth how the Gospel was brought and preached

to the Thessalonians, in consequence of his being persecuted at

Philippi, 1, 2.

The manner in which the apostles preached, the matter of their

doctrine, and the tenor of their lives, 3-11.

He exhorts them to walk worthy of God, 12.

And commends them for the manner in which they received the

Gospel, 13.

How they suffered from their own countrymen, as the first

believers did from the Jews, who endeavoured to prevent the

apostles from preaching the Gospel to the Gentiles, 14-16.

St. Paul's apology for his absence from them; and his earnest

desire to see them, founded on his great affection for them,

17-20.

NOTES ON CHAP. II.

Verse 1. Our entrance in unto you] His first coming to preach the Gospel was particularly owned of the Lord, many of them having been converted under his ministry. This consideration gave him a right to deliver all the following exhortations.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

He now, leaving out of view the testimony of other Churches, reminds the Thessalonians of what they had themselves experienced, and explains at large in what way he, and in like manner the two others, his associates, had conducted themselves among them, inasmuch as this was of the greatest importance for confirming their faith. For it is with this view that he declares his integrity — that the Thessalonians may perceive that they had been called to the faith, not so much by a mortal man, as by God himself. He says, therefore, that his entering in unto them had not been vain, as ambitious persons manifest much show, while they have nothing of solidity; for he employs the word vain here as contrasted with efficacious

He proves this by two arguments. The first is, that he had suffered persecution and ignominy at Philippi; the second is, that there was a great conflict prepared at Thessalonica. We know that the minds of men are weakened, nay, are altogether broken down by means of ignominy and persecutions. It was therefore an evidence of a Divine work that Paul, after having been subjected to evils of various kinds and to ignominy, did, as if in a perfectly sound state, shew no hesitation in making an attempt upon a large and opulent city, with the view of subjecting the inhabitants of it to Christ. In this entering in, nothing is seen that savors of vain ostentation. In the second department the same Divine power is beheld, for he does not discharge his duty with applause and favor, but required to maintain a keen conflict. In the mean time he stood firm and undaunted, from which it appears that he was held up by the hand of God; for this is what he means when he says that he was emboldened. And, unquestionably, if all these circumstances are carefully considered, it cannot be denied that God there magnificently displayed his power. As to the history, it is to be found in the sixteenth and seventeenth chapters of the Acts. [Acts 16 17.]

John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.

II.

(1) For yourselves brethren, know.—The writers’ purpose is practical, not didactic; they there-fore animate their converts with the stirring memories of their conversion. “We need not go to these foreign witnesses for the tale of how we came to you; for you recollect it as if it were yesterday.” The “for” (as in 1Th_1:8) implies “for in fact,” “for after all.” The thought of 1Th_1:5; 1Th_1:9. is here resumed, but with a different purpose: there it was to prove that the work was God’s work; here, “to stir up their pure minds by way of remembrance.”

Not in vain draws a little too much attention to the result of their coming. It should be, not vain—i.e., not purposeless and idle. This may be seen from the contrast drawn in the following words.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

For yourselves, brethren, know our entrance in unto you,.... The apostle having observed in Th1 1:9 that those persons to whom the report of the Gospel being preached at Thessalonica, and the success of it there was made, showed everywhere both what manner of entrance he and his fellow ministers had in that place, and the conversion of many souls there; he enlarges upon the latter, and here reassumes the former, and appeals to the Thessalonians themselves, who must know full well, and better than others, what an entrance it was; and which is to be understood not merely of a corporeal entrance into their city and synagogue, but of their coming among them, by the preaching of the Gospel, as the ministers of the word and ambassadors of Christ:

that it was not in vain; it was not a vain show with outward pomp and splendour, as the public entrances of ambassadors into cities usually are; but with great meanness, poverty, reproach, and persecution, having been lately beaten and ill used at Philippi; nor was it with great swelling words of vanity, with the enticing words of man's wisdom, to tickle the ear, please the fancy, and work upon the passions of natural men, in which manner the false teachers came: but the apostle came not with deceit and guile, with flattering words or a cloak of covetousness, or with a view to vain glory and worldly advantage; nor was the message they came with, from the King of kings, a vain, light, empty, and trifling one; but solid and substantial, and of the greatest importance; the doctrine they taught was not comparable to chaff and wind; it was not corrupt philosophy and vain deceit, the traditions and commandments of men, but sound doctrine, the wholesome words of our Lord Jesus Christ: nor was it fruitless and without effect; the word did not return void and empty; but was powerful and efficacious to the conversion of many souls. Christ was with them both to assist them in their ministry, and to bless it to the salvation of men; nor was their coming to Thessalonica an human scheme, a rash enterprise, engaged in on their own heads, on a slight and empty foundation; but upon good and solid grounds, by divine direction and counsel; see Act 16:9.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

1 For yourselves, brethren, know our entrance in unto you, that it was not in vain:

Ver. 1. Our entrance in unto you] The word preached in any place doth usually work best at first. After a while men become like unto birds in a belfry, that can well enough bear the noise of the bells and not be frightened.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

For yourselves, brethren, know our entrance in unto you - notes, 1Th 1:9. Paul appeals to themselves for proof that they had not come among them as impostors. They had had a full opportunity to see them, and to know what influenced them. Paul frequently appeals to his own life, and to what they, among whom he labored, knew of it, as a full refutation of the slanderous accusations of his enemies; compare notes, 1Co 4:10-16; 1Co 9:19-27; 2Co 6:3-10. Every minister of the gospel ought so to live as to be able, when slanderously attacked, to make such an appeal to his people.

That it was not in vain - κενὴ kenē This word means:

(1)Empty, vain, fruitless,” or without success;

(2)That in which there is no truth or reality - “false, fallacious;” Eph 5:6; Col 2:8.

Here it seems, from the connection 1Th 2:3-5, to be used in the latter sense, as denoting that they were not deceivers. The object does not appear to be so much to show that their ministry was successful, as to meet a charge of their adversaries that they were impostors. Paul tells them that from their own observation they knew that this was not so.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Vain. Our entrance among you was not in vain fables, or lies; our preaching was not in trifles: (Œcumenius) or rather was not without fruit. Others have spoken of it every where; but why refer you to others when yourselves know that it was every where followed by abundance of good works, faith, patience? &c. (Estius)

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

For yourselves; autoi, which some read, they themselves, &c.; and then the words refer to the believers in Macedonia and Achaia, mentioned before, 1Th 1:9,10. Or, if we read, ye yourselves, he appeals to their own experience and knowledge.

Know our entrance in unto you, that it was not in vain; kenh, was not vain, or empty, without fruit; our very first preaching had great success. Though the gospel is always either the savour of life unto life, or of death unto death, yet if no good fruit spring from a man’s ministry, it may be said to be vain; as the prophet complains: I have laboured in vain, Isa 49:4. Or, as some, our preaching was not about things vain and unprofitable.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

The Nature of St. Paul's Life and Work at Thessalonica

2. The persecution at the Roman garrison-town of Philippi made a deep impression on St. Paul the Roman citizen (Act_16:19-40; Php_1:30). It was the indignity that hurt him.

Contention] better, 'conflict.'

3. It would seem that St. Paul was at first looked upon by some as an impostor, seeking his own ends. He declares that he came with a sincere desire for their salvation only. Deceit] better, 'error.' Uncleanness] Impurity was often associated with heathen worship, and this was especially the case at Thessalonica and Corinth.

4. Allowed] better, 'approved.'

5. Cloke of covetousness] i.e. covering to conceal avarice.

6-11. St. Paul says that he might have made a display of apostolic authority and have demanded pecuniary support: see 1 Corinthians 9. But he was like a babe (better than 'gentle'), or like a mother who nurses her own children, or a father who guides and directs his son. At the same time he supported himself by tentmaking (Act_18:3; Act_20:34).

13-16. A second thanksgiving for their faith and patience under persecution.

14. The (Gentile) Thessalonian Church had suffered much at the hands of their fellow-countrymen, just as the Jewish Church had suffered from the unbelieving Jews. Here was a bond of union and sympathy between the two.

15, 16. A characteristic outburst. The Jews had followed St. Paul with unceasing hostility in Europe as well as in Asia. They have driven him from Thessalonica and Berœa, and were doing their utmost against him at Corinth. Theirnarrow exclusiveness (forbidding us to speak to the Gentiles) and hatred of other nations (contrary to all men) were a bitter trial to a patriot like St. Paul. To the uttermost] i.e. there was no longer any hope of their repentance or escape from their doom (Mat_23:32). The end was close at hand.

17. 'Till Timothy's good report of you reached us, we were anxious about you, but now we rejoice and bless God for the news he brings, that you have stood firm under persecution.'

18. St. Paul generally uses the 1st person plural in these Epistles, including Silvanus and Timothy with himself. Here, however, he speaks for himself. The hindrance may have been an illness—probably malarial fever (2Co_12:7), or Jewish hostility. To St. Paul Satan is a real person (Rom_16:20; 2Co_11:14; 1Ti_1:20).

19. The prospect of presenting his converts to Christ fills the Apostle with joy.

J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

CONTENTS. Paul turns from the reports of others to the experience of the readers. They themselves knew that his entrance was not powerless; although maltreated in Philippi, he was emboldened to preach the gospel at Thessalonica. His preaching did not proceed either from delusion on his part or from a desire to delude others. He felt approved by God, and was actuated by no improper motives: he sought neither their praise nor their money; so far from insisting on his apostolic rights, he was gentle among them, and conducted himself with the tenderness of a nursing mother toward her children; and so far from his ministry being a pretext for covetousness, he had labored for his own support; and thus he could confidently appeal to the Thessalonians as witnesses of the blamelessness of his conduct And as his entrance among them was not powerless, so he thanked God that it resulted in their reception of the gospel; they had embraced it as the word of God, and had not shunned persecution for its sake; they had in" this become the imitators of the Churches in Judaea. The apostle then alludes to his earnest desires to see them; twice he had attempted to come to Thessalonica, and twice he had been prevented by the machinations of Satan. They were very dear to him the objects of his tender affections, and the source of his rejoicing before the Lord Jesus Christ at his coming.

For yourselves, brethren; in contrast to other persons. Not only do strangers report the power and efficacy of our preaching among you, but you yourselves arc experimentally acquainted with it. Know our entrance in unto you; referring, not merely to the mere preaching of the gospel to the Thessalonians, but to the entrance which the gospel found into their hearts to its coming, not in word only, but also in power. (1Th_1:5) That it was not in vain; not empty, useless, to no purpose, descriptive of the character of the apostolic entrance among them. Our entrance among you was not powerless, unreal; on the contrary, it was mighty, energetic, powerful. The reference is chiefly to the manner or mode in which Paul and his companions preached the gospel, though not entirely excluding the success of the gospel among the Thessalonians. (comp. 1Co_15:14, "And if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain

HOMILIES BY T. CROSKERY.

Vers. 1-4.

Effectiveness of the gospel.

Entrance into Thessalonica. It was not necessary, however, to depend upon foreign testimony for the facts of the case, for the Thessalonians themselves were the best witnesses. "For yourselves, brethren, know our entrance in unto you, that it was not in vain," but an effective living reality, a great and gracious success. The proof of the fact is contained in two circumstances.

I THE BOLDNESS OF THE THREE PREACHERS, "But even after that we bad suffered before, and were shamefully entreated, as ye know, at Philippi, we were bold in our God to speak unto you the gospel of God with much conflict." The insulting treatment the apostle had received at Philippi had not the effect of scaring him away, or of leading him to withdraw into Asia, leaving Europe to its fate. Such treatment would have deterred men of a different stamp. His boldness was not mere stoical courage, but based on faith, for he was "bold in our God," and was equal to present perils as well as to past persecutions; for he spoke the gospel of God in much conflict," caused, as we know, by the league of violence which the Jews of Thessaionica formed with "lewd fellows of the baser sort" against the gospel.

II THE SPIRIT AND METHOD OF THEIR MINISTRY. "For our exhortation was not of deceit, nor of uncleanness, nor in guile." The matter is exhibited first negatively, and then positively.

1. Negatively. His persuasive exhibition of the truth was not

(1) "of deceit." He was not deceived himself be had not followed cunningly devised fables neither did he design to deceive others, for he preached the truth as it is in Jesus. Therefore there was all the greater force and fervent and directness in his teaching.

(2) "Nor of uncleanness." There were no impure or sinister ends in his teaching, implying love of gain; nor any disposition to tolerate those subtle forms of temptation which sometimes manifest themselves even under the guise of piety.

(3) "Nor in guile," for he was straightforward and sincere in his methods, with no cunning craftiness," no maneuvers, no strategy; for they had "renounced the hidden things of dishonesty, not walking in craftiness, nor handling the Word of God deceitfully". (2Co_4:2)

2. Positively. The method of his preaching met with the Divine approval. "But as we were approved of God to be put in trust with the gospel, even so we speak; not as pleasing men, but God, who trieth our hearts.

(1) The gospel is a solemn trust, a rich treasure. There are many human trusts which men would rather shirk, but the apostle is not unwilling to accept this trust for the good of the world.

(2) He claims no independent worthiness for so sacred a trust. God gave him any worthiness or sufficiency he possessed. "Our sufficiency is of God, who also hath made us able ministers of the New Testament". (2Co_3:5, 2Co_3:6)

(3) He discharged his trust

(a) with a perfect disregard for men"s opinions about him; (1Co_4:3)

(b) and with no desire to catch the favor of men. "Not as pleasing men; "for" as of sincerity, as of God, in the sight of God, speak we in Christ". (2Co_2:17) Not sacrificing truth o the fancies or prejudices of men in order to secure their favor. If "he pleased men, he should not be the servant of God". (Gal_1:10)

(4) He had supreme and final regard to the all-seeing God, "who trieth the hearts," who knows the springs of all actions, discovers all artifices, and brings all hidden things to light, lien look on the outward appearance. God "spares all beings but himself that awful sight a naked human heart." He "seeth not as man seeth." It is vain, therefore, to appear other than we are. T.C.

HOMILIES BY B.C. CAFFIN Vers. 1-12.

The characteristics of St. Paul"s preaching at Thessalonica.

I APPEAL TO THE RECOLLECTION OF THE THESSALONIANS.

1. His first appearance among them had not been in vain. Others had borne witness to its results. That testimony was true; the Thessalonians knew it themselves. The apostle appeals to them in all the confidence of Christian simplicity. Perfectly sincere and single-hearted himself, he knew that as a body they had appreciated the purity of his motives. They could bear testimony (he knew that they would gladly do so) that his preaching from the beginning had not been empty talk, but full of energy and life and fire. It is a blessed thing, this mutual confidence between a pastor and his flock.

1. His previous sufferings had not abated his zeal He had been cruelly treated at Philippi; he bore the marks of the lictors" rods when he entered Thessalonica. It did not damp his ardor. His Lord had endured the cross,

2. despising the shame, for the joy that was set before him. For the same joy, the great joy of saving souls, St. Paul was content to suffer, and, if need be, to die. Troubles soon came upon him in Thessalonica. He preached amid much conflict, but he was full of courage.

3. His courage was of God. We were bold in our God. It was he who gave them boldness, he who taught them what to speak; they felt that it was not they, but the Spirit of God who spoke in them. They abode in him, in his encompassing, irradiating presence, within the sphere of his gracious influence; hence came their utterance, their boldness of speech.

4. For their gospel (our gospel, he calls it in 1Th_1:5 was the gospel of God. They were the messengers, but he had given the message. It was his glad tidings; it came from him, and it brought tidings of him, of his will, of his justice, of his love; it told men of a Creator, a Savior, a Sanctifier. It was a high mission to preach that blessed gospel; the sense of its unspeakable preciousness inspired their burning words.

II WHAT THEIR PREACHING WAS NOT. The Jews had tried to poison the minds of the Thessalonians against the apostle; they imputed low, earthly motives to him. St. Paul repudiates their insinuations.

1. There was no mixture of selfish motive. Their preaching was not of error or of deceit. They were not deceived themselves, they did not deceive others. They did not belong to the crowd of wandering impostors like Simon Magus, or Elymas the sorcerer. They knew certainly the truth of their mission. St. Paul had seen the Lord; what he delivered to the Thessalonians he had first received of the Lord. He knew this from the sure evidence of experience. His own truthfulness was manifest; the mighty change that had come over his life, the greatness of his sacrifices proved it. There was no uncleanness (as, perhaps, some of his enemies maliciously suggested), no impurity of any kind, attaching to his exhortation or his conduct. None who knew him could charge him with such things. But a life of self-sacrifice for the sake of souls was unexampled. He was the first missionary who had traversed Asia Minor, and now came to Europe for that lofty purpose. The mass of men, whether Jews or heathens, could not understand his noble character; it was high above them. They judged him by themselves. They were incapable of such self-denial for the sake of others; they could not believe in it; they had- no faith in love, in purity, in high religious motive. Such a life, too, if real, if genuine, was a rebuke to them. It angered them. They could not bear to think of its contrast with their own life; it was like light and darkness. And so they believed, or

2. forced themselves to believe, that it was not genuine. A true life like St. Paul"s seemed to them above human nature impossible, inexplicable. And they said that it was not true; they attributed his actions to vulgar motives, to low selfish designs.

3. There was no covetousness. His life was not one of pretences, fair words serving to conceal the covetousness which (so said his enemies) was his real motive. But his treasure was in heaven. He had suffered the loss of all things for Christ. He had in him a hidden treasure, a pearl of great price, for which he was content to count all else as loss. He could not covet earthly gold who had the true riches. But he had to endure this among other slanders. It was said of him at Corinth. (2Co_12:17 2Co_7:2) He was obliged to take with him delegates of the Churches to assist him in the administration of alms, that he might avoid blame. (2Co_8:20, 2Co_8:21) What a sad proof of the meanness of human nature that such a motive should be attributed to such a man!

4. There was no desire of glory. They did not seek to please men, but God. They knew that God tried the hearts, and, knowing that, they sought only to approve their inner and outer life to him. We labor, said St. Paul, (2Co_5:9) it is our ambition to be well pleasing unto him. God had proved them; he had entrusted them with the gospel.

It was a high privilege. St. Paul counted it so; he magnified his office. He sought for nothing else. The great work of winning souls was, he well knew, of all works the highest and the noblest. God was proving their hearts now. He, the Searcher of hearts, knew their work through and through. He knew the inner Ere of thought and motive, as well as the outer life of word and action. They fully recognized this great truth. They knew that their motives were pure and unselfish. God knew it too. It was all they wanted. They sought not praise of men. They had no pleasure in flattery; they did not flatter others. That the Thessalonians knew. God knew the purity of their motives. "God is witness," they could say. How blessed that life must be which could thus appeal to his all-seeing eye! They were apostles of Christ; St. Paul in the highest sense, Silvanus and Timotheus in the more extended meaning of the word. St. Paul may, indeed, be using the plural number of himself only; more probably in this place he includes his companions. They might have claimed honor for themselves; they might have made men feel the weight of their apostolic dignity. But they sought not glory from men. They had overcome that temptation which is so strong in most men, the "last infirmity of noble minds," the desire of earthly glory.

III WHAT THEIR PREACHING WAS.

1. They were gentle. There is very strong manuscript evidence for nhpioi, babes. If that is the true reading, St. Paul means that their character was one of childlike simplicity, free from selfish motives; they were babes in malice, but men in understanding. (1Co_14:20) But "gentle" suits the context better. "The servant of the Lord must not strive, but be gentle unto all men." St. Paul adduces the most touching type of human tenderness the nursing mother cherishing her own children, warming them in her bosom. Such had been his gentleness among his children after the faith. He had sought to win them by gentle words. He had told them of the gentleness of Christ. He had set before them the attractive picture of the Savior"s tender love. Gentleness wins more hearts than sternness. The apostle knew the terrors of the Lord. He could remind his converts of the awful things beyond the grave. "We must all appear before the judgment-seat of Christ." But he knew that love is a more powerful motive than fear. "Perfect love casteth out fear." The cross of Jesus Christ draweth all men to the Savior, because it is the manifestation of that love that passeth knowledge the love of Jesus Christ.

2. They were actuated by the strong love of souls. The Thessalonians had become very dear to them. They had not known them long, but they recognized them as sheep of that little flock which the Lord Jesus bids those who love him to feed for his love"s sake. Thus loving them, they were affectionately desirous of their salvation. They were ready to give them not only the blessed gospel, but their own selves, their own lives, in humble imitation of the good Shepherd who laid down his life for the sheep. They had exposed themselves to the greatest dangers for the work"s sake; for that work they were ready, if need be, to die. The love of souls is the essential requisite for real success in the sacred work of the ministry. Other qualifications may win the praise of men; but the true work of winning souls can be wrought only by those who have learned from the blessed Savior something of that holy love which burned in the sacred heart of Jesus.

1. They were absolutely disinterested. They would not be burdensome to their new converts. The Philippian Church had twice sent help to the apostle during his residence at Thessalonica. (Php_4:16) That help he had accepted; it was unasked, freely given. He welcomed it for the sake of the givers, as an evidence of their love. But the gifts, though very precious as a proof of Christian charity, were probably small in themselves;

2. the Philippian Church was very poor. It seems also to have been a season of scarcity; times were bad. The missionaries had to labor for their livelihood. St. Paul"s craft, weaving tent-cloth of goats" hair, was hard, wearisome, ill-paid work. He had to labor night and day. Yet he achieved those great results. He had but the sabbath to himself. Three sabbath days he spent in reasoning with the Jews, and preaching Jesus in the synagogue at Thessalonica; other days he had to work, to work hard and long, for his daily bread. The Greeks despised manual labor; they called it vulgar; they left such work to slaves. The apostle teaches by his own example the dignity of honest labor, the dignity of true Christian independence. Probably the Thessalonians could have helped him. "Not a few of the chief" women" had become Christians. They must, one thinks, have been willing. St. Paul must have had reasons for declining their aid, as he afterwards declined the aid of the Corinthians. (2Co_11:9, 2Co_11:10) How these thoughts increase our admiration of the great apostle! Amid all these difficulties, all these cares, all this engrossing labor, he preached with power, with perseverance, with success such as only an ardent love of souls, only the presence of God the Holy Ghost, could give.

3. They set a high example. The Thessalonians saw their outward life; God could read the secrets of their hearts. That life was pure and holy towards God, just and righteous in its relations to men. The Christians of Thessalonica knew that they were blameless. Others might, perhaps, be busy with their insinuations; unbelievers might suggest this or that unworthy motive. The Christians had learned to know St. Paul and his companions. They knew the sincerity, the purity of their lives. Nay, St. Paul could fearlessly appeal to a higher Witness to the all-seeing God. Example is a mighty aid in preaching the gospel. Deeds are more persuasive than words. A holy life is an evidence of the reality of those spiritual facts which the preacher describes in words.

1. They taught their converts individually. They were not contented with preaching in the synagogues every sabbath day; they taught from house to house. The converts were many, we read in the Acts of the Apostles. Chrysostom wonders at their zeal in omitting no one in so great a multitude. They sought out each, caring for each separate soul, sharing the angels" joy over one sinner that repenteth. They tried all means of winning souls. They exhorted, stirring the souls of men with burning words, suggesting nobler views of human life and destiny; they comforted, encouraging the afflicted, the despondent, the penitent, by the glad tidings of pardon, peace, and hope; they testified, urging their converts by every

2. constraining motive to persevere in the Christian life. And all this they did with such earnestness, with such affectionate interest, with such love as a father shows towards his own children. A bright example of the pastor"s work.

3. The purport of their exhortation. God was calling them; they must walk worthily of that high calling. He was calling them into his kingdom now, into the kingdom which Christ had come to found his Church. They had become children of the kingdom. He was calling them higher yet, to his glory, to the beatific vision, that the Savior"s prayer might be fulfilled, "I will that they whom thou hast given me be with me where I am, that they may behold my glory which thou hast given me." Their walk in life must show the reality of their hope. Walk implies movement, change of place and scene. As they move hither and thither in the course of their daily lives, in their business, in their amusements, they must ever think of that high calling, and live according to their hopes. Their religion was not to be confined to the sabbath, to the synagogue, to the hours spent on their knees in private prayer; they must carry it everywhere with them; it must guide, stimulate, comfort, encourage in all the varying circumstances of daily life. Their life must be worthy of their calling. They must show its influence; they must adorn the doctrine of God their Savior in all things.

LESSONS.

1. Study the lives of St. Paul and other holy men.

2. Let not that study end in admiration; act upon it.

3. In such lives is seen the manifest workings of the grace of God.

4. The sight of such lives confirms the faith of the wavering, kindles the desire of the lukewarm.

5. True Christians are the light of the world; they must let their light shine before men.

6. But not for their own glory; they must seek only the glory of God. B.C.C. HOMILIES BY R. FINLAYSON Vers. 1-12.

The manner of the preachers; or, self-portraiture.

I WHAT THE THESSALONIANS HAD FOUND THEIR PREACHING TO BE.

1. Not void of power. "For yourselves, brethren, know our entering in unto you, that it hath not been found vain." "For" goes back to the first of the two divisions given at the close of the previous chapter. This is indicated by the recurrence of the leading Greek word translated "entering in." It was said, "For they themselves report concerning us what manner of entering in we had unto you." There is an advance to a further point. Not only did the people in the various places report, but they themselves had the evidences in their possession. The evidences are regarded as extending down to the time of the Thessalonian letter being received. Taken hold of at that moment, and addressed as brethren, they are asked this question, "What has the entering in of us preachers been found to be?" And, having had ample time to estimate the entering in, they are confidently expected to give this testimony, "It hath not been found vain." The epithet "vain" might mean empty of result; but that thought falls under the second division, which is taken up at ver. 13. It must, therefore, mean empty of all that it ought causally to contain empty of purpose, and earnestness, in a word, of evangelical power.

2. Characterized by fortitude. "But having suffered before, and been shamefully entreated, as ye know, at Philippi, we waxed bold in our God to speak unto you the gospel of God in much conflict." This is so far confirmed by the Acts of the Apostles, where the narrative of the entering in to Thessalonica is immediately preceded by the narrative of the rough treatment received at Philippi. The feature of the suffering before referred to here is there presented as imprisonment. It was imprisonment with aggravated circumstances. Paul and Silas were dragged into the marketplace before the magistrates, by whose orders they were beaten with rods.

After many stripes had been laid on them they were cast into the inner prison, and their feet made fast in the stocks. This was shameful treatment, not because they were there in Philippi on an errand of mercy, which heathen magistrates could not appreciate, but because their rights were not respected. It was an irregularity to lay stripes on them at all as Roman citizens. It was a further irregularity to punish so hastily in obedience to clamor, and without an opportunity of defense being granted. All this was known to the Thessalonians. So far the statement here supplements the narrative in the Acts of the Apostles. We read, further, that Timothy accompanied Paul from Lystra, and again that he was left behind at Beraea, but there is nothing said of him in the interval. We learn from this notice that he was co-operating with Paul and Silas both in Philippi and in Thessalonica, although, we may understand, not so prominent an object of attack as the others, who were his seniors both in age and in service. The three were not intimidated by this treatment in Philippi. On the contrary, proceeding to Thessalonica, they waxed bold in their God to speak unto the Thessalonians the gospel of God. It was the gospel of God, inasmuch as it came as a glad message from God. They looked to God as their God, who had commissioned them to deliver his message. As commissioned by God to deliver his message, they did not flee, like Jonah, through fear, but they emboldened themselves in their God, that he would give them his protection and support. It did not fare with them in Thessalonica differently from what it did in Philippi. Their message brought them into conflict with the powers of unbelief. It was a conflict of a formidable nature. But the fact that they were able to stand forth and speak the gospel of God in the face of strong opposition was evidence of the very highest value that their entering in to Thessalonica was not vain.

II THEIR GENERAL HABIT AS PREACHERS.

1. They were not like the idolatrous priests.

(1) They did not preach out of error. "For our exhortation is not of error." There was not much of what is here called exhortation in the ministrations of the idolatrous priests. They did not lay themselves out to influence men by suasion to what was considered to be the right belief and the right life. The old translation in this place, "deceit," was objectionable. Such men were not impostors to begin with. They believed in their system. It was what they had received by tradition from their fathers. Nevertheless it was a system of error, literally, "wandering." Heathenism was a wandering from God, whether objects of worship were sought in the stony world, in the silence of vegetable life, behind the hieroglyphics of the brute creation, or behind the human form. Out of such error they ministered to man. Paul and his companions, on the other hand, ministered out of truth. They had the true conception of God and of human life. Their exhortation had its inspiring cause in Christianity. As moved themselves by its soul-cheering truth, they sought to move others.

(2) They did not preach out of uncleanness. "Nor of uncleanness." This was the general character of heathen ministrations, but, as denied here, it would seem, from the context, to refer more particularly to the impure love of gain. Those who ministered in heathen temples were in the habit of receiving gifts from the worshippers. And there was the danger, and, in the absence of better influences, the likelihood of gain becoming the end, in which their ministrations had motive power. This was not the end in which the apostle and his companions found motive for their way of exhortation.

(3) They did not resort to unworthy methods in preaching. "Nor in guile." Heathen priests could not but be conscious of much imposture. Conscious of no inflatus, of no extraordinary knowledge possessed by them, they yet professed to tell the future from the position of the stars, from the flight of birds, from the entrails of animals. They had to do with unrealities in many forms, in order to keep up their influence with the worshippers. The apostle and his companions, as their end was the salvation of souls, so they only sought it by the use of means which their conscience could approve.

2. They realized their responsibility. "But even as we have been approved of God to be entrusted with the gospel, so we speak; not as pleasing men, but God which proveth our hearts." There are two ideas in a trust. The first is acting for another. He who makes over the trust does not act himself by reason of death, or by reason of infirmity, or by reason of absence (as in the analogy that is made use of in Luk_19:12. The trustee he to whom the trust is made over acts in his name and for his interest. The second idea is acting apart by ones self. The trustee may have directions to guide him, and ample resources to draw upon in the management of the trust. But otherwise he acts independently. He is left there alone with the trust; in responsibility it is his and not another"s if it is managed well; it is his and not another"s if it is mismanaged.

(1) What their trust was. So we speak." A minister must not be devoid of thoughts, and must also be able to give clear expression to them. He has also to stand up before his fellow-men, and to speak to them face to face with a practical aim. That, with the speaking of which he is entrusted, is the gospel. "The gospel of the glory of the blessed God, which was committed to my trust." The gospel is properly the glad tidings of salvation to all people. It begins with the message of pardon to the guilty, of adoption into the family of God of the disowned and disinherited. It is, in its gladsome breadth, the promise of the communication of the Divine life and happiness to our being. It is this which the minister has to speak with a view to its accept ance. It is not meant that he is only to speak this. For he has the whole Bible to open up as he can. He has other important truth to present, even the terrors of the Law in its bearing on the gospel. Neither is he to confine himself in his illustrations to the Bible. For as all roads led to Rome, so all things can legitimately and usefully be made to lead to the gospel. Only nothing is to be dilated upon or brought in which has not the effect of making prominent the gospel proper, or the glad message from God to man.

(2) Their being chosen for the trust. As we have been approved of God." "It was requisite," it has been said of the Athenian priesthoods, "that all priests should be of legitimate birth, without bodily defect, and of unblamable life and conversation. These particulars were ascertained by a dokimasia." It cannot be said of all who are in the office of the ministry that they have received the Divine approval There must be a certain aptitude in natural gifts for preaching the gospel. There must especially be aptitude in the moral state of the preacher. God has seen fit, by saved men, to save men. He employs, in the preaching of the gospel, those who have sympathy with the gospel. In this light Paul and Silas and Timothy were no pretenders, but had received the Divine stamp had been pronounced fit, from their gifts and experiences, to be employed in the saving of souls.

(3) The spirit in which they fulfilled their trust. Danger they avoided. This was man-pleasing. There is a certain pleasing of men which is not to be avoided by the preacher of the gospel. He is to seek to interest men by all legitimate methods. But this pleasing cannot be exalted into a law universal. We are not to please men as though we were responsible to them. We are not to please men as though we had to consult their false tastes, their natural dislike to the gospel. On the contrary, all man-pleasing is to be repudiated where it interferes with the main design of the gospel, which is to effect a change upon the heart. Excellence they cultivated. This was God-pleasing. This is a safe rule to follow in every case. For he is infinite excellence, and he who seeks to please him follows no low or variable standard. It is the fit thing to do in the position in which we are placed. He has entrusted us preachers with the gospel; it is therefore simply our duty to please him who has given us so solemn a trust. If we have been approved of God to be entrusted with the gospel, that is so far well. But there is an approval that we have to look forward to at the end of our labors. And shall it then be seen that we have stood the test? Shall we then receive the word of approval, "Well done, good and faithful servant"? Paul and Silas and Timothy claimed that, in accordance with the fact of their having been approved, they spake pleasing God. And this is heightened by the consideration that God is regarded as proving their hearts. They preached as under the eye of the heart-trying God. They preached as if asking God to remove from their hearts all that unfitted them for dealing with the gospel. They preached with some consciousness in the depth of their being that their single aim was to find acceptance for the good message.

III THEIR HABIT TOWARD THE THESSALONIANS.

1. Denial of selfishness.

(1) In the form of flattery. "For neither at any time were we found using words of flattery, as ye know." In proof of what was their general habit, an appeal is made to what their habit was particularly toward the Thessalonians. At no time were they found using speech whose contents were flattery. Having denied generally the method of deceit, they now deny, toward the Thessalonians, the method of flattery. It is a method commonly resorted to by deceivers . It may seem removed from selfishness, inasmuch as it is a way of pleasing men. In that respect it is not so odious as a habit of detraction. But the flatterer is essentially selfish. He professes affection he does not feel; he bestows praises beyond what he considers to be deserved. He thus goes against the person he seeks to flatter, who has a right to have presented to him what a man really is, and not what he assumes to be a true face, and not a mask. And be further goes against him, inasmuch as he would have him think of himself as different from what he really is. Paul and his companions were not slow to let the real affection of their heart be known, and to bestow praises where they were deserved. But they disclaimed flattery, appealing, in support of their truthfulness in doing so, to the experience of the Thessalonians.

(2) In the form of covetousness. "Nor a cloak of covetousness, God is witness." The idea of deceit is carried forward in the word "cloak." It is something worn under which, or, to keep nearer to the Greek word, "woven before" ("pretext"), behind which the real design is concealed. Covetousness is doubly degrading in connection with sacred service. It is laid down as one of the qualifications of a minister that he is not to be greedy of filthy lucre. Paul and his companions did not use great profession of godliness, or of affection and esteem for the Thessalonians, as a pretext fur getting their money. They were conscious to their own minds of purity in this matter, and, feeling the vast importance of being thoroughly cleared from such an imputation, they solemnly call God to witness that they were stating the truth. This form of confirmation is witness" approaching to the oath, is only to be used in a matter of great moment, and especially where hidden motive is concerned.

(3) In the form of a desire for honor. "Nor seeking glory of men, neither from you, nor from others, when we might have been burdensome, as apostles of Christ." This is an alternative to covetousness. Following the method of deceit, they might have been seeking, not money, but glory. Christ says, "I receive not glory from men." And he declares this to be an obstacle to believing. "How can ye believe, which receive glory one of another, and the glory that cometh from the only God ye seek not?" Paul and his companions had not sought glory which had its origin in men, neither more immediately from them nor from others. They had not done this when, as the meaning would seem to be, they might have claimed honor as the apostles of Christ. The idea of "burdensomeness" seems out of keeping with the immediate context, the preceding thought being "glory," and the succeeding thought being "gentleness." It seems better, then, to adopt the other meaning which the words equally well bear: "When we might have claimed dignity, assumed consequence." They had an honorable status as apostles of Christ, that designation being taken widely. The honor connected with it came, not from men, but from Christ. It was a great honor to hold a commission from Christ. But they did not put forward their official position; they did not exact a recognition of it from men.

1. On the positive side their motherly unselfishness. "But we were gentle in the midst of you, as when a nurse cherisheth her own children: even so, being affectionately desirous of you, we were well pleased to impart unto you, not the gospel of God only, but also our own souls, because ye were become very dear to us." So far from being mere officials taken up with their dignity, they were gentle in the midst of them. Their whole bearing in the midst of the Thessalonians was like that of a parent in the midst of his children. Nay, that does not suffice to bring out the nature of the gentleness. It is not the father who is taken; but, as expressing greater tenderness, the mother. In another place (Gal_4:19) Paul also

2. makes use of the motherly: "My little children, of whom I am again in travail until Christ be formed in you." Here he not only takes the mother, but the mother at the time when she is nursing. As when a nurse cherisheth her own children. It is then that the motherly feeling is most active in her. It is then that she uses the sweetest expressions, holds her child with the greatest fondness and solicitude. But the nursing mother is not only the picture of gentleness; she is also the picture of unselfishness. She does not think of receiving from her child; she thinks only of giving. She gives from herself, and, if that child"s life were in danger, she would not hesitate to give her own life. So the motherly was very active in them at Thessalonica. They were affectionately desirous of the Thessalonians. Desire has a certain contrary nature to affection. Desire draws in; affection gives out. It is giving out that is referred to here. It would seem, therefore, better to translate, "Having a fond affection for you." In the working of this affection they gave to the Thessalonians the milk of the Word here called the gospel of God what was given them by the great and tender Giver to give to the new-born. And such was the unselfishness of their affection that they had the willingness, if it had been necessary, to give their very lives for the Thessalonians, because, in their craving for the Word, they were felt to be very clear.

3. Striking exemplification of unselfishness. "For ye remember, brethren, our labor and travail: working night and day, that we might not burden any of you, we preached unto you the gospel of God." The apostle and his companions "practically gave up their existence" to the Thessalonians. Those addressed as brethren are called upon to call to mind the labor and travail undergone for them. The second word serves the purpose of intensification. There was giving out of strength in "heralding" the gospel of God. A herald does not spare himself; as gospel heralds they did not spare themselves in soul or body. This work of heralding was by itself labor and travail; but it was added to by the circumstances under which they heralded. They felt themselves under the necessity of working Paul, no doubt, at the work of tent-making. That also was labor and travail; for it was night and day as we would say, day and night; not completed with daylight, but extending into the night. There was no reason for his not receiving from the Philippians as he did at Thessalonica. There was reason for his not receiving from the Thessalonians. The reason given is, the desire not to burden any of them. His not feeling free to burden any of them, whatever determined it, raised him now above the suspicion of being covetous among them. He had only been a giver, like a nursing mother.

1. What their behavior generally was toward the Thessalonians. "Ye are witnesses, and God also, how holily and righteously and unblamably we behaved ourselves toward you that believe." Their behavior is defined as being toward the Thessalonians as believers. We may think of Paul as speaking for himself and his companions. How did he bear himself toward these believers?

(1) Holily, i.e. with love and reverence toward God in them.

(2) Righteously, i.e. with due consideration for their position. This must be taken to include their position as believers. There was what was suitable for them, as adopted into the family of God through faith.

(3) Unblamably, a strong word which is used not infrequently by the apostle. It is the negative side of the two positions that have been given. Here there is a concentration of the self-praise, as it may seem, that pervades the paragraph. How could he act so holily and righteously toward the Thessalonians as to incur no blame from them or from God? But that is not all: he makes an appeal to them as witnesses, and, the second time in the paragraph, he makes a solemn appeal to God as Witness even of his inward disposition. It cannot be understood that he lays claim to perfection; for it is he who says in another place, "Not that I have already obtained, or am already made perfect." But it must be understood that he claimed to be sincere, and sincere in no ordinary degree, in seeking the good of the Thessalonians. In claiming this he was not really praising himself; but he was making clear what was fitted to influence powerfully the Thessalonians in their fidelity to the gospel. He points to them as believers, because, it may be, they were fitted to appreciate the spirituality of his bearing. He points to them as believers, chiefly as showing that they worthily responded to what his bearing was.

2. Their fatherly dealing. There are frequent allusions to fatherhood in God in Scripture. One of the allusions to motherhood in God is in Isa_66:13, "As one whom his mother comforteth, so will I comfort you." Both meet in God, forming a complete conception.

No earthly father loves like thee, No mother e"er so mild.

So they must meet in the servant of God. Paul has already in this paragraph referred to himself as acting the motherly part; he now supplements it by referring to himself as acting the fatherly part.

(1) Individual dealing. "As ye know how we dealt with each one of you, as a father dealeth with his own children." It is the part of a father to have his children under his eye. He is acquainted with their little histories and peculiar dispositions. And he does not deal with all alike, but studies their various ways, and deals with them accordingly. So it is the part of a minister not only to make a general declaration of the gospel, but also, father-like, to deal with his people individually, according to what he knows of their circumstances and needs.

(2) Three words descriptive of the nature of fatherly dealing. "Exhorting you." It is the part of a father not merely to tell his children their duty, but also to exhort them, to urge them warmly to duty, especially from his own experiences of life. So it is the part of a minister not only to hold up Scripture precept for instruction, but also, father-like, warmly to recommend its observance, especially from his own spiritual experiences. "And encouraging you." It is the part of a father to hold out encouragement to the performance of duty. Nothing can be more fatal to the young than a discouraging tone. So it is the part of a minister not to be harsh, censorious, despondent, but, father-like, to catch a geniality and hopefulness from his message which may be said to have come from the fatherhood of God. "And testifying." The word can bear a stronger meaning charging, conjuring. There are times when a father addresses his children as with his dying breath, conjures them by all that he counts dear and sacred, by a consideration of their best interests, not to give way to temptation, but to follow in the path of duty. So there are times when it is becoming for a minister to concentrate his earnestness and to address his people as with his dying breath, conjuring them by the authority of God, by the love of the Spirit, by the blood of Christ, by the dreadful issues at stake, by the solemnity of judgment, not to allow themselves to be cheated out of happiness, but to make sure of Christ as their everlasting Portion.

(3) To what the fatherly dealing is to be directed. "To the end that ye should walk worthily of God, who calleth you into his own kingdom and glory." It is the part of a father to endeavor to hold the children to what is noble. For this purpose he loves to tell them of the good name their family has borne, of the call which that addresses to them to follow out a good career. And so he exhorts, encourages, conjures them. Let them not stain that noble name, let them not stop short of that noble career. So it is the part of a minister, father-like, to tell his people of their high dignity and destiny, of their being called by God into his own kingdom, of their being called in that kingdom to share with God in his glory. And so he exhorts, encourages, conjures them. Let them prove worthy of having place and honor in God"s kingdom. Let the royal stamp be on all their conduct. R.F.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

What was proposed, chap. i, 5, 6, is now more largely treated of: concerning Paul and his fellowlabourers, ver. 1-12; concerning the Thessalonians, ver. 13-16.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

Observe here, how our apostle did and durst appeal to the Thessalonians themselves, as touching the sincerity and success of his public ministry among them:

Ye yourselves know. It is not sufficient to a minister’s comfort, that he be well reported of amongst strangers, for his zeal and diligence, for his sincerity and faithfulness, unless he can and dare appeal to the consciences of his own people, and call them to vouch and bear witness to his integrity: Ye yourselves know that our entrance in unto you, was not in vain.

Our entrance in unto you; that is, our first preaching amongst you, was not in vain; that is, say some, it was not in vain in the matter, we did not preach about vain, useless and unprofitable niceties and speculations; but our preaching was substantial, sound and solid: It was not vain in the manner, say others; it was not undertaken rashly, and without a call, nor managed in a slight and vain manner; but the word in vain here, seems to point at these two things;

1. That it did not want power and energy, but had the demonstration of divine assistance to confirm them in the faith that heard it, and also those that preached it, in expectation of success.

2. It was not in vain; that is, it did not want fruit, it was not without a great and gracious success: For the word vain, when it is applied to the message which the ministers of God bring, signifies the not accomplishing the great ends for which it was designed. The word that goeth out of my mouth, shall not return unto me in vain Isa 55:11, but prosper, &c.

Hence learn, that where a minister is regularly called to, and faihfully discharges his duty amongst a people, both by public preaching and private instruction, his labours seldom if ever, want fruit, in some degree or measure, either sooner or later, either manifest or secret, either for conversion or edification.

We have the promise of Christ’s presence with us, Mat 28:20. And if the fault be not ours, we shall certainly experience it; both the presence of his power to strengthen us, and the presence of his gracious Spirit to succeed us. Possibly we do not see any visible success at present; but this may comfort us, there is more good done by the ministry of the word, than we are aware of; and if we reap not the fruit of the seed we sow, they who come after us may; but if neither they nor we reap fruit, our ministry shall not be in vain, with reference to ourselves; yet shall we be glorious, though Israel be not gathered.

But, O! that our people might share in that glory with us, and also shine as the stars, for ever and ever! God grant we may never be called forth by Christ to give a judicial testimony against any of them at the bar of God, for not believing our report.

Observe here, how our apostle did and durst appeal to the Thessalonians themselves, as touching the sincerity and success of his public ministry among them: Ye yourselves know. It is not sufficient to a minister’s comfort, that he be well reported of amongst strangers, for his zeal and diligence, for his sincerity and faithfulness, unless he can and dare appeal to the consciences of his own people, and call them to vouch and bear witness to his integrity: Ye yourselves know that our entrance in unto you, was not in vain. Our entrance in unto you; that is, our first preaching amongst you, was not in vain; that is, say some, it was not in vain in the matter, we did not preach about vain, useless and unprofitable niceties and speculations; but our preaching was substantial, sound and solid: It was not vain in the manner, say others; it was not undertaken rashly, and without a call, nor managed in a slight and vain manner; but the word in vain here, seems to point at these two things; 1. That it did not want power and energy, but had the demonstration of divine assistance to confirm them in the faith that heard it, and also those that preached it, in expectation of success. 2. It was not in vain; that is, it did not want fruit, it was not without a great and gracious success: For the word vain, when it is applied to the message which the ministers of God bring, signifies the not accomplishing the great ends for which it was designed. Isa 55:11. The word that goeth out of my mouth, shall not return unto me in vain, but prosper, &c. Hence learn, that where a minister is regularly called to, and faihfully discharges his duty amongst a people, both by public preaching and private instruction, his labours seldom if ever, want fruit, in some degree or measure, either sooner or later, either manifest or secret, either for conversion or edification. We have the promise of Christ’s presence with us, Mat 28:20. And if the fault be not ours, we shall certainly experience it; both the presence of his power to strengthen us, and the presence of his gracious Spirit to succeed us. Possibly we do not see any visible success at present; but this may comfort us, there is more good done by the ministry of the word, than we are aware of; and if we reap not the fruit of the seed we sow, they who come after us may; but if neither they nor we reap fruit, our ministry shall not be in vain, with reference to ourselves; yet shall we be glorious, though Israel be not gathered. But, O! that our people might share in that glory with us, and also shine as the stars, for ever and ever! God grant we may never be called forth by Christ to give a judicial testimony against any of them at the bar of God, for not believing our report.

William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

1 Thessalonians Chapter 2

Having established these great principles, the apostle, with an open and overflowing heart, appeals to his whole walk among them as a proof of his having walked in the same spirit as in their own case he was rejoicing in. It was not that he exhorted others, while availing himself of their affection, for his own advantage. It was not that he encouraged them to endure afflictions, without having courage himself to undergo the same. Ill-treated and insulted at Philippi, he was bold in God to renew his attacks on the kingdom of darkness at Thessalonica, and that with great energy. He had not used flattering words to win them; he had set the truth before them, as being himself the servant of God. He had worked with his own hands, that he might not be burdensome to them. All was before God in the light and by the energy of the Holy Ghost, and in a spirit of devotedness; even as he desired that they should walk as they knew he had walked among them, as holily, justly, and unblamably; as also he had exhorted them, with all affection and tenderness, to walk worthy of God, who had called them unto His own kingdom and glory.

We see again in this expression the close relationship of the Christian, in his individual character, with God. He has his portion in God’s own kingdom and glory, and his conduct should become such a position. Here it is his own position in relationship with God, as before it was his relationship with God and the Lord Jesus.

The apostle then speaks of the means by which this world of new thoughts was acquired by the Christian. It was that God had spoken to reveal Himself and His counsels. God had committed the gospel to Paul (1Th 2:4), and he had acted as being in the presence of God, and responsible to Him.

The Thessalonians also, on their part, had received the word, not as the word of Paul, but as the word of God Himself addressed to them by the mouth of Paul. It is interesting, as for us also a serious thought, to observe that (with regard to the manifestation of the power of God down here), although the work is of God, the fruit of His servants’ labors answers to the character and depth of that labour itself Thus the bonds of grace are established, and communion; there is mutual understanding. The work manifests the workman. The labourer rejoices in that which his heart had desired for the souls that are the fruit of his labour; and these know how to appreciate the walk and the work of the labourer, acknowledging the power of grace in him who was the means of bringing them into this position; and the one and the others, knowing God, rejoice in the fellowship of His grace.

Paul was very largely with God in his own soul and in his work. The Thessalonians had in consequence received the word in the same power; and they with him, were thus in communion with God according to that power and that intimacy.

We see here, in passing, the Jews deprived of this relationship with God, the remnant of that people received, and suffering from the enmity of the mass. The elect from among the Gentiles awakened, on their part, the hostility of their fellow-countrymen by the testimony which they bore against the prince of this world in their Christian walk, and by their confession of a heavenly Christ-a Christ whom the world had rejected.

The religion of the Jews had become pure jealousy of others. The pretension to the exclusive possession of religious privileges-very precious when they enjoyed it with God as a testimony of His favour-was nothing but a spring of hatred, when God in the fullness of His sovereign grace chose to bless others who had a right to nothing. By this exclusive pretension they denied the rights of God, who had formerly chosen them as a people; they denied His grace, according to which He acted towards sinners, and which would have been the source of better blessings for themselves. But meantime their refusal to come in had transferred the scene of our hopes and our joys from earth to heaven, where we know the Lord, and where He will remain until He comes to assert His claims over the earth. Before He asserts them, He will take us to Himself.

Meanwhile the word of God is the source of our confidence-the revelation of glory, of truth, and of love. It is mighty in them that believe. The Jews are set aside. By their opposition to grace towards the Gentiles, they had taken the position of enmity against God in grace, and wrath was come upon them to the uttermost. It was not yet executed; but they had put themselves in this position. It was not only that they had broken the law, they had already killed their prophets who were sent to them in grace; they had already slain the Christ, Jesus the Lord. Sovereign grace alone could bring in a remedy. This they resisted; because, according to that grace, God was good to the Gentiles, and granted to them, at the same time as to themselves, better privileges than those which they had forfeited. Wrath therefore was finally come upon them as a nation. Christians were now in the enjoyment of better privileges in place of the Jews.

It is not here the moment for explaining the future dealings of God with the remnant of that people. The apostle speaks here of the people, in order to shew that the only ones in relation with God were Christians-those who had received the word. It was the reception of the word by faith, and nothing else, which brought souls really into relationship with God. Hereditary privileges were found to be , in their nature, opposition to grace and sovereignty, and thus to the character and rights of God Himself; for God is sovereign, and God is love.

The word reveals grace; it is obeyed by believing it. And, brought into relationship with God, the Christian walks in His communion and in His ways, and waits for the Son, in whom He has revealed Himself to men. This is the fruit of that which the Christian has received through believing-an efficacious principle of life, and a light from God for the way.

The apostle blessed God that it was thus with the Thessalonians; and, having made this point clear, he returns to the joy of his communion with them in the positive blessing which the revelation of God in their hearts by the word had brought them, He would gladly have seen them to enjoy this communion in intercourse with them face to face; but as long as it was by the word only that the knowledge of God was obtained- in a word by faith-as long as the Lord was absent, another result flowed from this fact; namely, that these joys were mingled with conflict-conflict however, which, although to the eye of man interrupting enjoyment, made it more sweet, more real, preserved its heavenly character, and made the Lord Himself, from whom they could not be separated, the center,m the common point in which hearts were united, with the consciousness that they were in the wilderness, and that they were awaiting a scene and a time in which evil and the enemy’s power would no longer be, but where Christ would be all. Joyful hope, holy happiness, powerful link of the heart to Christ! When He shall be all, our joy will be complete, and all saints will possess it. Paul wished to have seen them again, and had so even twice, but Satan hindered it. The time should come when he would fully enjoy both them and his labour among them, by seeing them in full possession of glory at the coming of Christ.

In the apostle himself, when at Thessalonica, Christian life was fully developed in love and in holiness. He had been among them in tenderness, as a mother cherishes her children; ready to impart not only the gospel to them but even his own life, so dear were they to him. He had been at the same time holy and without blame in all his conduct. What energy of life and love springing up by the power of God, regardless of all the consequences save the blessing of the elect and the glory of God! This is true Christian life. The heart, not filled with questionings through unbelief but strong in faith, counts on God in order to serve God. Thus love is free, beside oneself for God, prudent and full of consideration only for the good of others. And what bonds this creates! Persecution only hastens the work by compelling to go elsewhere, when perhaps the labourer would be tempted to enjoy the fruits of his labour in the society of those who had been blessed through him. (Compare 1Th 2:2) Though absent, the apostle’s heart was still bound to them; he remembered his beloved ones; he prayed for them; he blessed God for the grace bestowed on them; assuring himself with joy, when he thought of it, of their portion in glory as the elect of God. (1Th 1:3-4;1Th 2:13)

The bond remained firm; and, the way to present enjoyment of personal communion being obstructed by the devices of Satan (by permission of God), his heart rose higher, and sought the full satisfaction of the want produced in it by love, in the moment when a Christ present in His power should have removed all obstacles and accomplished the purposes of God with respect to the saints; when His love should have borne all its precious fruits in them; and when Paul and his dear children in the faith should enjoy together all that grace and the power of the Spirit should have wrought in them. Unable for the moment to satisfy the desires of his heart by seeing them, it was to that hour that Paul looked. And observe that, if he does so, it is because his heart was already filled with it for himself. The power of the Spirit, acting in accordance with the truth, always leads the heart to that hour. It impels the heart to labour in love in the midst of this world, causes thus the opposition of the darkness of this world to the light (whether on the part of man or of the prince of darkness) to be realised, and makes us always feel the need of that day of light, when evil shall no longer be present to hinder the happiness of the new man in his enjoyment of that which is good, in his communion with those dear to God, and above all, in the enjoyment of the presence of his glorified Saviour, who has loved him, and who (for the exercise of his faith) is at present hidden from him.

It is He who is the source and object of all these affections, who sustains and nourishes them, who attracts them ever to Himself by His perfections and by His love, and, in the sorrows of the Christian life, carries the heart onward thus to the day of our being with Himself, to the day of His coming, when the heart will be free to occupy itself with all that binds us to Him without interruption. This thought of His presence has the mastery, when the heart is fresh in the divine joy of redemption. We find this here. We are converted to wait for Him (chap 1); we shall enjoy the communion of saints, and the fruit of our labors when He returns (chap 2); that day gives its force and its measure to our thoughts respecting holiness (chap 3); it destroys the anguish of heart which would otherwise accompany the death of the saints (chap 4); it is for that day we are kept. (chap 5) The coming of the Lord, the presence of Jesus, fills therefore the believer’s heart, when life is springing up in its freshness-fills it with a joyous hope, the fulfillment of which shines bright before our eyes, there where all our desires will be accomplished.

To return to the end of chapter 2, the link which Satan sought to break by interrupting its enjoyment was but the rather strengthened by bring connected with the coming of the Lord. The current of the Spirit, against which he had been allowed to set up this dike, though turned from its natural bed, could not be stopped, for its waters ever flow; they gushed out in waves that enriched all around them, taking their course towards that sea which contained the fullness of those waters and fed the source from which they sprang.

It should be observed here, that the special fruits of our labors are not lost; they are found again at the coming of Christ. Our chief personal joy is to see the Lord Himself and to be like Him. This is the portion of all saints; but there are particular fruits in connection with the work of the Spirit in us and by us. At Thessalonica the spiritual energy of the apostle had brought a number of souls to God and to wait for Jesus, and into a close union in the truth with Himself. This energy would be crowned at the coming of Christ by the presence of these believers in the glory as the fruit of his labors. God would thus crown the apostle’s work by bearing a striking testimony to its faithfulness in the presence of all these saints in glory; and the love which had wrought in Paul’s heart would be satisfied by seeing its object in glory and in the presence of Jesus. They would be his glory and joy. This thought drew yet closer the bonds that united them, and comforted the apostle in the midst of his toils and sufferings.

John Nelson Darby — Synopsis of the Books of the Bible: the New Testament (c. 1857–1862) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

1–4. Our entrance … was not in vain. The existence of the flourishing church, where none had before existed, was proof of that fact.

B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.

Connecting Statement:

Paul defines the believers' service and reward.

you yourselves

The words "you" and "yourselves" refer to the Thessalonian believers. (See: Reflexive Pronouns)

brothers

Here this means fellow Christians, including both men and women.

our coming

The word "our" refers to Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy but not the Thessalonian believers. (See: Exclusive and Inclusive "We")

was not useless

This can be expressed in a positive manner. AT: "was very worthwhile" (See: Double Negatives)

previously suffered and were shamefully treated

"were mistreated and insulted"

in much struggling

"while struggling under great opposition"

translationWords

brother

suffer

Philippi

bold

God

good news

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.

Was not in vain [ου κενη γεγονεν] . More accurately, hath not proved vain. Kenh is empty. Mataia, also rendered vain, is fruitless.

Marvin R. Vincent, Word Studies in the New Testament (1887–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.