Peter Barnes: 1 Thessalonians 5:25-28
(1 October 2017)
SERMON NOTES: PRAYING, GREETING, READING (1 Thessalonians 5:25-28)
Sanctification, or growing in holiness, is often, as B. B. Warfield says, ‘a slow process’, but it should be a real and energetic process.
- We are to pray.
– 5:25; these Thessalonian Christians, who had only been Christians for, say, two months or so, are asked to pray for Paul, Timothy and Silas.
– what a change from Gal.1:14! Paul would often ask his readers to pray for him and his colleagues – Rom.15:30-32; Eph.6:18-19; Col.4:3-4. See too 2 Thess.3:1-2.
– in C. S. Lewis’ correspondence with an unnamed American lady, he invariably asked her to pray for him.
- We should greet each other warmly.
– 5:26. Paul meant this literally e.g. 1 Kings 19:20; Luke 7:45; 15:20. J. B. Phillips paraphrases this for Westerners as ‘Give a handshake all round among the brotherhood.’ See Matt.5:41.
– Paul’s commitment to other people – 1 Thess.2:8.
- We should be committed to hearing and reading Scripture.
– 5:27. This may be where Paul writes in his own hand – 2 Thess.3:17.
– William Hendriksen thinks that the oath is ‘not surprising’, but it seems surprising to me.
– Col.4:16 (which may be referring to Ephesians as a general letter). There is authority in what he says, which comes from Christ the Lord.
– Luther: ‘Ears are the only organs of the Christian’.
– Paul finishes as he began – 1:1 and 5:28