Furthermore then, we beseech you, brethren, and exhort you 1 Thessalonians 4:1-8 Earnest exhortations to a high sanctity G. Barlow. Purity is the perfection of the Christian character. It is the brightest jewel in the cluster of saintly excellencies, and that which gives a lustre to the whole. It is not so much the addition of a separate and distinct grace as the harmonious development of all. As Flavel has said, "What the heart is to the body that the soul is to the man; and what health is to the heart holiness is to the soul." In the prayer just offered the apostle indicates that God will fill them with love to this end. He now urges the attainment. Human agency is not destroyed but stimulated by the Divine.Observe — I. THAT A HIGHER SANCTITY CONSISTS IN LIVING UNDER A SENSE OF THE DIVINE APPROVAL. 1. Religion is a life. A "walk" implies continual approach to a goal. Religion is not an ornament, a luxury, a ceremony, but a life, all penetrating, ever progressing, but sometimes concealed. 2. Religion is a life modelled after the worthiest examples. "As ye have received of us." The Thessalonians not only received the wisest counsels from their teachers but they witnessed their holy and consistent lives; and their attention was constantly directed to the all-perfect example — Christ Jesus. It is the tendency of all life to shape itself after the character of its strongest inward force. The love of God is the mightiest power in the life of the believer; and the outer manifestation of that life is moulded according to the pattern of the inner Divine ideal. 3. Religion is a life which finds its chief joy in the Divine approval. "And to please God." It is possible, then, so to live as to please God. What a powerful incentive to a holy life. Donne, on his death bed, said, "I count all that part of my life lost which I spent not in communion with God, or in doing good." 4. Religion is a life capable of vast expansion. "So, ye would abound," etc. God has made every provision for our increase in holiness. There is no limit in our elevation but our faith. II. THAT THE NECESSITY OF A HIGHER SANCTITY IS ENFORCED BY DIVINE AUTHORITY. "For this is the will of God even your sanctification." 1. A higher sanctity involves a conformity to the Divine nature. God is holy, and the aim of the believer is to be like Him. There is to be not only an abstinence from impurity but a positive experience of purity. By faith we participate in the Divine nature, and possess qualities analogous to the Divine perfections — mercy, truth, justice, holiness. 2. A higher sanctity is in harmony with the Divine will what God proscribes must be carefully avoided; what He prescribes must be done. His will is here emphatically expressed; it is supported by abundant promises of help; and it is declared that without holiness no man shall see the Lord. The will of God is at once the highest reason, the strongest motive, and the final authority. 3. The Divine will regarding a higher sanctity is enforced by duly authorized messengers, and well understood precepts (ver. 2). The apostle did not assume authority in any dictatorial spirit. He delivered unto others what he had received. These precepts were well known. Obedience should ever be in proportion to knowledge. Knowledge and practice are mutually helpful to each other. To know and not to do is to incur the heaviest condemnation. "Not My will, but Thine be done." III. THAT THE POSSESSION OF A HIGHER SANCTITY IS REPEATEDLY URGED BY EARNEST EXHORTATIONS. "We beseech you, brethren, and exhort you." Doctrine without exhortation makes men all brain, no heart; exhortation without doctrine makes the heart full, leaves the brain empty. Both together make a man. The apostle laboured in both. Here we have a fine example of the combination of a tender, brotherly entreaty, with the solemn authority of a divinely commissioned ambassador. Some people, says a certain writer, are as thorns; handle them roughly and they pierce you; others as nettles; rough handling is best for your safety. A minister's task is an endless one. Has he planted knowledge? — practice must be urged. Is the practice satisfactory? — perseverance must be pressed. Do they continue in well-doing? — they must be stimulated to further progress. The end of one task is the beginning of another. Lessons: The believer is called to the attainment of a higher sanctity — 1. By the voice of God. 2. By the voice of His faithful ministers. 3. And by the aspirations of the life divinely planted within him. ( G. Barlow. )

Benson Commentary 1 Thessalonians 4:1 Furthermore then we beseech you, brethren, and exhort you by the Lord Jesus, that as ye have received of us how ye ought to walk and to please God, so ye would abound more and more. 1 Thessalonians 4:1-2 . Furthermore — ?? ?????? , as for what remains to be said, in subserviency to the important end of your being presented before God in the final judgment, perfected in holiness; we beseech you, by the Lord Jesus — By his authority, in his name, and for his sake; that as ye have received of us — While we were among you; how ye ought to walk — If you desire to adorn your Christian profession; so ye would abound more and more — Striving continually to make advances in every Christian grace and virtue. Here the apostle reminds the Thessalonian believers that from his first coming among them he had exhorted them to conduct themselves in a holy manner, if they wished to please and continue in the favour of the living and true God, in whom they had believed; and that he had explained to them the nature of that holiness which is acceptable to God. And the same method of exhortation and instruction he undoubtedly followed in all other cities and countries. For you know — You cannot but remember; what commandments we gave you — Commandments very different from those enjoined by the heathen priests, as pleasing to their pretended deities. 1 Thessalonians 4:2 For ye know what commandments we gave you by the Lord Jesus. 1 Thessalonians 4:3 For this is the will of God, even your sanctification, that ye should abstain from fornication: 1 Thessalonians 4:3-6 . For — As we solemnly assured you, and charged you to keep continually in remembrance; this is the will of God, your sanctification — That, as God hath chosen us from the rest of the world to be a people dedicated to his honour and service, we should not pollute ourselves with those abominations which are so common among the heathen, but that we should be perfectly holy in heart and life; and therefore, to mention one single branch of the contrary; that ye should abstain from fornication — And every other kind of lewdness, so commonly practised among those who are unacquainted with the true religion. This beautiful transition of the apostle, shows that nothing is so seemingly distant, or below our thoughts, but we have need to guard against it. That every one of you should know — Should learn and accustom himself to exercise that holy skill; how to possess his vessel — His body; for this word in some other passages signifies the body, ( 1 Peter 3:7 :) Giving honour to the wife as the weaker vessel. That is, as weaker in body. ( 1 Samuel 21:5 ,) And the vessels, bodies, of the young men are holy. The body was called by the Greeks and Romans a vessel, because it contains the soul, and is its instrument. The apostle’s meaning may be, Let every man consider his body as a vessel consecrated to the service of God, and let him dread the impiety of polluting it by any vile, dishonourable indulgence whatever, or by putting it to any base use. Or, as some think, by his vessel, he may mean his wife. In sanctification and honour — In a chaste and holy manner, answerable to that dignity which God has put upon it by making it his temple. Not in the lust of concupiscence — ?? ????? ????????? , in the passion of lust; not indulging passionate desires; as the Gentiles — The heathen; who know not God — To any saving purpose; and are ignorant of that pure and sublime happiness which arises from contemplating, adoring, imitating, and having communion with him. That no man go beyond — The bounds of chastity, or of matrimony; or overreach, as some render ??????????? ; and defraud — Or, exceed toward, his brother, in any, or in the, matter — Namely, of which the apostle had been speaking. Beza, Le Clerc, and some others, understand this as a prohibition of injustice in general; but the context seems to determine its meaning to that kind of injury by which chastity is violated. Probably the apostle intended here to prohibit three things; fornication, ( 1 Thessalonians 4:3 ,) passionate desire, or inordinate affection in the married state, and the breach of the marriage contract. Because the Lord is the avenger of all such — Will severely punish all such gross misdeeds; as we also have forewarned you, &c. — As I formerly testified to you when I preached to you in Thessalonica. For God hath not called us — In so extraordinary a manner, and separated us from the rest of the world; to uncleanness — To leave us at liberty to defile ourselves with any kind of sin; but unto holiness — Of heart and life. He therefore that despiseth — The commandments we give by authority from God, and according to his will; despiseth not man — Only or chiefly; but God — Speaking in and by us; who hath also given unto us — Who are his divinely-commissioned teachers; his Holy Spirit — To guide us in what we deliver. What naked majesty of words! how oratorical, and yet with how great simplicity! a simplicity that does not impair, but improve the understanding to the utmost; that, like the rays of heat through a glass, collects all the powers of reason into one orderly point, from being scattered abroad in utter confusion! 1 Thessalonians 4:4 That every one of you should know how to possess his vessel in sanctification and honour; 1 Thessalonians 4:5 Not in the lust of concupiscence, even as the Gentiles which know not God: 1 Thessalonians 4:6 That no man go beyond and defraud his brother in any matter: because that the Lord is the avenger of all such, as we also have forewarned you and testified. 1 Thessalonians 4:7 For God hath not called us unto uncleanness, but unto holiness. 1 Thessalonians 4:8 He therefore that despiseth, despiseth not man, but God, who hath also given unto us his holy Spirit. 1 Thessalonians 4:9 But as touching brotherly love ye need not that I write unto you: for ye yourselves are taught of God to love one another. 1 Thessalonians 4:9-12 . As touching brotherly love — That peculiar affection which one disciple of Christ owes to another; ye need not so much that I should write unto you; for ye yourselves — Independent of any teaching of mine; are taught of God — By his Spirit; to love one another — In an especial manner, even with pure hearts fervently, 1 Peter 1:22 . And indeed ye do it — And not only with respect to the brethren in your own city, but toward all who are in Macedonia — All the believers in that province, relieving them in their necessities according to your ability. But we beseech you that ye increase more and more — In this divine and necessary endowment. And that ye study — Literally, that ye be ambitious, to be quiet — To live quietly in the practice of those peaceful and humble virtues which suit the genius of Christianity; an ambition worthy of a follower of Jesus: and to do your own business — Without meddling, uncalled, with the concerns of others; and to work with your own hands — Not a needless caution; for to attend to temporal matters is often a cross to them whose hearts have been lately filled with the love of God. That ye walk honestly — ?????????? , decently, as becomes Christians; toward them that are without — The enclosure of the church; that they may have no pretence to say, (but they will say it still,) “This religion makes men idle, and brings them to beggary.” And that ye may have lack of nothing — Needful for life and godliness: more than which no Christian should desire, unless that he may have wherewith to supply the wants of others. 1 Thessalonians 4:10 And indeed ye do it toward all the brethren which are in all Macedonia: but we beseech you, brethren, that ye increase more and more; 1 Thessalonians 4:11 And that ye study to be quiet, and to do your own business, and to work with your own hands, as we commanded you; 1 Thessalonians 4:12 That ye may walk honestly toward them that are without, and that ye may have lack of nothing. 1 Thessalonians 4:13 But I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope. 1 Thessalonians 4:13 . I would not have you ignorant, brethren — The apostle had intimated, ( 1 Thessalonians 3:10 ,) that he desired to make them another visit at Thessalonica, in order to perfect that which was lacking in their faith. Perhaps what he now proceeds to say was part of what he wanted to teach them, as not having seen it proper when he was with them to enter into such discoveries as are here made. But having been informed that they lamented over their dead with immoderate sorrow, and perhaps that they hired mourners on such occasions, and were even apt to repine at the divine providence for taking their pious friends and relatives from them, he here proceeds to give them information well calculated to support and comfort them in such circumstances. Concerning them who are asleep — ??? ???????????? , who have slept; who have departed this life. The death of the body is termed its sleep, because it suspends the exercise of all the animal functions, closes all its senses, and is a cessation of all motion and feeling in it; and because it shall be followed by a reviviscence to a more vigorous and active life than it now enjoys. That ye sorrow not — Immoderately: herein the efficacy of Christianity greatly appears, that it neither takes away nor imbitters, but sweetly tempers, that most refined of all affections, our desire of, or love to the dead. As others — Who are unacquainted with the truths of the gospel. It was the custom of the heathen, on the death of their relations, to make a show of excessive grief, by shaving their heads, and cutting their flesh, ( Leviticus 19:27-28 ,) and by loud howlings and lamentations. They even hired persons, who had it for a trade to make these howlings and cries. But this show of excessive grief, as well as the grief itself, being inconsistent with that knowledge of the state of the dead, and with that hope of their resurrection, which the gospel gives to mankind, the apostle forbade it, and comforted the Thessalonians by foretelling and proving Christ’s return to the earth, to raise the dead, and carry the righteous with him into heaven. Who have no hope — Many of the heathen entertained a kind of belief of a future state, but that belief being derived from nothing but an obscure tradition, the origin of which they could not trace, or from their own wishes, unsupported by any demonstrative reasoning, could scarcely be called belief or hope, and had very little influence on their conduct. See note on Ephesians 2:12 . Add to this, none of them had any knowledge or expectation that the righteous, or virtuous, would be raised from the dead with glorious, immortal, incorruptible bodies, and taken to heaven; neither had they any conception of the employments and enjoyments of that immortal state. St. Paul’s discourse, therefore, concerning these grand events, must have given much consolation to the Thessalonians under the death of their relations, as it assured them that if they all died in Christ, they should all meet again, and spend an endless life in complete happiness, never more to part. In this light death is only a temporary separation of friends, which is neither to be dreaded nor regretted. Concerning our knowing one another after the resurrection, see on 1 Thessalonians 2:20 . 1 Thessalonians 4:14 For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him. 1 Thessalonians 4:14 . For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again — Namely, 1st, In attestation of the truth of his doctrine, in which he taught expressly the immortality of the soul, Matthew 10:28 ; Luke 23:43 ; and the resurrection of the body, John 5:28-29 . 2d, For the expiation of sin, and the procuring of justification and peace with God for the penitent that should believe in him, however guilty they had before been, Hebrews 9:26 ; Romans 4:24-25 . 3d, That he might procure and receive for us the Holy Spirit, to work that repentance and faith in us, assure us of our justification and of our title to that future felicity, and to prepare us for it by inward holiness; and, 4th, That he might ascend, take possession of it in our name, receive our departing souls, and raise from the dust our fallen and corrupted bodies, and so exalt us to that immortal, glorious, and blessed state; even so them also which sleep in Jesus — Who die in the Lord, ( Revelation 14:13 ,) in union with him, and possessed of an interest in him; will God bring with him — They will be found in the train of his magnificent retinue at his final appearance, when he comes to judge the world, and reward his faithful servants. 1 Thessalonians 4:15 For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep. 1 Thessalonians 4:15 . For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord — By a particular revelation from him. No words, as Dr. Doddridge observes, can more plainly assert that, in what follows, the apostle declares precisely what God revealed to him, and consequently that there can be no room for any such interpretation of this passage, as supposed him to be at all mistaken in any circumstance of the account he gives. That we who are alive and remain — This manner of speaking intimates the fewness of those who will be then alive, compared with the multitude of the dead. It is well observed, says Whitby, by the Greek scholiasts, that the apostle speaks these words, not of himself, but of the Christians that should be found alive at the second coming of Christ: so Chrysostom, Theodoret, Œcumenius, and Theophylact; for he well knew that he was not to live till the resurrection: yea, he himself expected a resurrection, saying to the Corinthians, He that raised up the Lord Jesus, shall raise up us also by Jesus, and present us with you, 2 Corinthians 4:14 . He laboured that he might attain to the resurrection of the dead, Php 3:11 . Yet some divines have inferred, from this and some other places in the epistles, that the apostles themselves thought and taught, that they might live until the second coming of Christ; and that St. Paul afterward changed his opinion on this subject, and admonished the Thessalonians of it, 2 Thessalonians 2:2-6 . But this certainly is a dangerous mistake, and highly prejudicial to the authority of the apostles, and therefore to the Christian faith. Indeed, if the churches of Christ had once received this doctrine from them, and afterward had understood, even from their own confession, that it was a mistake, this would naturally have led them to conceive that the apostles might have been mistaken also in any other doctrine, and to suspect the truth of all that was contained in their epistles. This the apostle seems to insinuate, 2 Thessalonians 2:1-2 . But that this apostle taught no such doctrine in either of his epistles to the Thessalonians, will be exceeding evident, 1st, From the following words in that chapter, 1 Thessalonians 4:3 , Let no man deceive you by any means, declaring them deceivers who either taught this doctrine, or imposed it on them as taught by the apostles; and also having said, in opposition to such an opinion, that day was not to come till there was a falling away first, adding, Remember you not that when I was yet with you I told you these things? He therefore had taught them the contrary before he had written either of these epistles, and, of consequence, cannot rationally be supposed to contradict himself. 2d, From the very words used in proof of this opinion, which are introduced with this solemn declaration, This we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive, &c., in which words he most plainly vouches the authority of Christ for the truth of what he says; and therefore, if he were mistaken, either our Lord himself must have erred with him, or the apostle must vouch Christ’s word, and his authority, when Christ had spoken no such word, and given him no authority to declare such doctrine in his name; both which assertions overthrow the certainty and truth of all St. Paul’s epistles. And hence it follows that the apostle could not deliver this assertion in any other of his epistles, for all the learned agree in this, that these epistles to the Thessalonians were the first epistles St. Paul wrote; whence it must follow that he could not deliver, in his following writings to that church, or any other churches, that doctrine which he had so industriously before confuted, and declared very dangerous, in his epistle to the church of Thessalonica. The truth is, such expressions as these, we who are alive, ( 1 Thessalonians 4:15 ,) we shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, &c., ( 1 Corinthians 15:51 ,) are not to be understood of the writers themselves: they are mere figures of speech used by the best authors to draw their readers’ attention, or to soften some harsh or disagreeable sentiment; without intending to represent themselves either as of the number, or of the character, of the persons with whom they class themselves. Thus Hosea says, ( Hosea 12:4 ,) God spake with US in Bethel; and the psalmist, ( Psalm 66:6 ,) WE rejoiced, namely, at the Red sea, when divided; and, ( Psalm 81:5 ,) I heard a language I understood not, that is, in Egypt, though neither were in existence at the times when the facts referred to happened. This figure in the mouth of Christ’s disciples has a singular propriety, because all of them making but one collective body, of which Christ is the Head, and which is united by the mutual love of all the members, individuals may consider every thing happening to the members of this body, as happening to themselves. We shall not prevent — Or anticipate; them who are asleep — Shall not receive our glorified bodies before them. 1 Thessalonians 4:16 For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: 1 Thessalonians 4:16-18 . The Lord himself — The Lord Christ, arrayed in all his own glory, and in that of his Father; shall descend from heaven — “This expression does not imply that the Lord Jesus will fix his tribunal on the earth; but that he will descend so as to fix his seat in the air, at such distance from the earth that every eye shall see him, and every ear shall hear his voice, when he passes the awful sentence by which their state shall be unchangeably fixed. This conjecture is confirmed by 1 Thessalonians 4:17 , where we are told that, after the judgment, the righteous shall be caught up in clouds to join the Lord in the air.” — Macknight. With a shout — Raised by millions of happy attendant spirits. The word ?????????? , so rendered, denotes the shout which the soldiers of an army used to make at their first onset to encourage one another in the attack; it is therefore used with great propriety to express the loud acclamation which the whole angelical hosts will utter to express their joy at the coming of Christ to raise the dead and judge the world. The voice of the, or rather, (as the article is wanting in the original,) an archangel — He, probably, who will preside over that innumerable company of angels who are to attend Christ when he comes to judge the world. And the trump of God — Sounding, doubtless, with more loud and terrible blasts than those uttered on mount Sinai when the law was given. Perhaps the voice of God himself is meant, or a great and terrible sound made by attendant angels, analogous to that of a trumpet. This circumstance is mentioned likewise 1 Corinthians 15:52 , where see the note. And as Theodoret remarks, If the loud sound of the trumpet, when the law was given from mount Sinia, especially when it sounded long, and waxed continually louder and louder, was so dreadful to the Israelites, that they said to Moses, Let not the Lord speak to us lest we die; how terrible must the sound of this trumpet be, which calls all men to that final judgment that will determine their lot for ever! And the dead in Christ — Those that had departed this life in a state of union with, and conformity to him; who had received his Spirit in its various graces, and imitated his example; shall rise first — Shall spring forth out of their graves in forms of glory, to the infinite astonishment of the surviving world, before the rest of the dead are raised, or the living saints are changed. Then we who are alive — Those in Christ who are found living at his coming; shall be caught up — That is, after their bodies are changed and rendered glorious and immortal; together with them — Namely, with the saints now raised, while the wicked remain beneath. What is intended by the expression caught up, Dr. Scott ( Christ. Life, vol. 3. pp. 1, 204) thinks shall be effected by the activity of the glorified bodies of the righteous. But this opinion does not seem consistent with the original word, ???????????? , here used, which implies the application of an external force. Doubtless they shall be caught up by a mighty and instantaneous operation of the divine power; to meet the Lord in the region of the air — Where his throne shall then be erected; and there, having been openly acknowledged and acquitted by him, they shall be assessors with him in that judgment to which wicked men and angels are there to be brought forth; and when the final sentence is passed upon them, shall accompany their re-ascending Saviour. And so shall we ever be with the Lord — Where we shall spend a blissful eternity ill the sight and participation of his glory. Wherefore — Make these grand events the subject of your frequent meditation; and when your hearts are distressed with grief for the loss of your pious friends, or on any other occasion which can arise in this mortal life; comfort one another with these words — The tenor of which is so important, and the truth contained in them so certain, as being taught by the infallible dictates of the Spirit of God, and revealed to us by him, from whose fidelity, power, and grace, we expect this complete salvation. 1 Thessalonians 4:17 Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord. 1 Thessalonians 4:18 Wherefore comfort one another with these words. Benson Commentary on the Old and New Testaments Text Courtesy of BibleSupport.com . Used by Permission.

Expositor's Bible Commentary 1 Thessalonians 4:1 Furthermore then we beseech you, brethren, and exhort you by the Lord Jesus, that as ye have received of us how ye ought to walk and to please God, so ye would abound more and more. Chapter 9 PERSONAL PURITY 1 Thessalonians 4:1-8 (R.V.) THE "finally" with which this chapter opens is the beginning of the end of the Epistle. The personal matter which has hitherto occupied us was the immediate cause of the Apostle’s writing; he wished to open his heart to the Thessalonians, and to vindicate his conduct against the insidious accusations of his enemies; and having done so, his main purpose is fulfilled. For what remains-this is the meaning of "finally"-he has a few words to say suggested by Timothy’s report upon their state. The previous chapter closed with a prayer for their growth in love, with a view to their establishment in holiness. The prayer of a good man avails much in its working; but his prayer of intercession cannot secure the result it seeks without the cooperation of those for whom it is made. Paul, who has besought the Lord on their behalf, now beseeches the Thessalonians themselves, and exhorts them in the Lord Jesus, to walk as they had been taught by him. The gospel, we see from this passage, contains a new law; the preacher must not only do the work of an evangelist, proclaiming the glad tidings of reconciliation to God, but the work of a catechist also, enforcing on those who receive the glad tidings the new law of Christ. This is in accordance with the final charge of the Saviour: "Go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you." The Apostle had followed this Divine order; he had made disciples in Thessalonica, and then he had taught them how to walk and to please God. We who have been born in a Christian country, and bred on the New Testament, are apt to think that we know all these things; our conscience seems to us a sufficient light. We ought to know that, though conscience is universal in the human race, and everywhere distinguishes between a right and a wrong, there is not one of our faculties which is more in need of enlightenment. No one doubts that men who have been converted from heathenism, like the Thessalonians, or the fruits of modern missions in Nyassaland or Madagascar, need to be taught what kind of life pleases God; but in some measure we all need such teaching. We have not been true to conscience; it is set in our human nature like the unprotected compass in the early iron ships: it is exposed to influences from other parts of our nature which bias and deflect it without our knowledge. It needs to be adjusted to the holy will of God, the unchangeable standard of right, and protected against disturbing forces. In Thessalonica Paul had laid down the new law, he says, through the Lord Jesus. If it had not been for Him, we should have been without the knowledge of it altogether; we should have had no adequate conception of the life with which God is well pleased. But such a life is exhibited to us in the Gospels; its spirit and requirements can be deduced from Christ’s example, and are explicitly set forth in His words. He left us an example, that we should follow in His steps. "Follow Me," is the sum of His commandments; the one all-embracing law of the Christian life. One of the subjects of which we should gladly know more is the use of the Gospels in the early Church; and this passage gives us one of the earliest glimpses of it. The peculiar mention of the Lord Jesus in the second verse shows that the Apostle used the words and example of the Master as the basis of his moral teaching; the mind of Christ is the norm for the Christian conscience. And if it be true that we still need enlightenment as to the claims of God and the law of life, it is here we must seek it. The words of Jesus have still their old authority. They still search our hearts, and show us all things that ever we did, and their moral worth or worthlessness. They still reveal to us unsuspected ranges of life and action in which God is not yet acknowledged. They still open to us gates of righteousness, and call on us to enter in, and subdue new territories to God. The man who is most advanced in the life which pleases God, and whose conscience is most nearly identical with the mind of Christ, will be the first to confess his constant need of, and his constant dependence upon, the word and example of the Lord Jesus. In addressing the Thessalonians, Paul is careful to recognise their actual obedience. Ye do walk, he writes, according to this rule. In spite of sins and imperfections, the church, as a whole, had a Christian character; it was exhibiting human life in Thessalonica on the new model; and while he hints that there is room for indefinite progress, he does not fail to notice their present attainments. That is a rule of wisdom, not only for those who have to censure or to teach, but for all who wish to judge soberly the state and prospects of the Church. We know the necessity there is for abounding more and more in Christian obedience; we can see in how many directions, doctrinal and practical, that which is lacking in faith requires to be perfected; but we need not therefore be blind to the fact that it is in the Church that the Christian standard is held up, and that continuous, and not quite unsuccessful efforts, are made to reach it. The best men in a community, those whose lives come nearest to pleasing God, are to he found among those who are identified with the gospel; and if the worst men in the community are also found in the Church at times, that is because the corruption of the best is worst. If God has not cast off His Church altogether, He is teaching her to do His will. "For this," the Apostle proceeds, "is the will of God, even your sanctification." It is assumed here that the will of God is the law, and ought to be the inspiration, of the Christian. God has taken him out of the world that he may be His, and live in Him and for Him. He is not his own any longer; even his will is not his own; it is to be caught up and made one with the will of God; and that is sanctification. No human will works apart from God to this end of holiness. The other influences which reach it, and bend it into accord with them, are from beneath, not from above; as long as it does not recognise the will of God as its rule and support, it is a carnal, worldly, sinful will. But the will of God, to which it is called to submit, is the saving of the human will from this degradation. For the will of God is not only a law to which we are required to conform, it is the one great and effective moral power in the universe, and it summons us to enter into alliance and cooperation with itself. It is not a dead thing; it is God Himself working in us in furtherance of His good pleasure. To tell us what the will of God is, is not to tell us what is against us, but what is on our side; not the force which we have to encounter, but that on which we can depend. If we set out on an unchristian life, on a career of falsehood, sensuality, worldliness, God is against us; if we go to perdition, we go breaking violently through the safeguards with which He has surrounded us, overpowering the forces by which He seeks to keep us in check; but if we set ourselves to the work of sanctification, He is on our side. He works in us and with us, because our sanctification is His will. Paul does not mention it here to dishearten the Thessalonians, but to stimulate them. Sanctification is the one task which we can face confident that we are not left to our own resources. God is not the taskmaster we have to satisfy out of our own poor efforts, but the holy and loving Father who inspires and sustains us from first to last. To fall in with His will is to enlist all the spiritual forces of the world in our aid; it is to pull with, instead of against, the spiritual tide. In the passage before us the Apostle contrasts our sanctification with the cardinal vice of heathenism, impurity. Above all other sins, this was characteristic of the Gentiles who knew not God. There is something striking in that description of the pagan world in this connection: ignorance of God was at once the cause and the effect of their vileness; had they retained God in their knowledge, they could never have sunk to such depths of shame; had they shrunk from pollution with instinctive horror, they would never have been abandoned to such ignorance of God. No one who is not familiar with ancient literature can have the faintest idea of the depth and breadth of the corruption. Not only in writers avowedly immoral, but in the most magnificent works of a genius as lofty and pure as Plato, there are pages that would stun with horror the most hardened profligate in Christendom. It is hardly an exaggeration to say that on the whole matter in question the heathen world was without conscience: it had sinned away its sense of the difference between right and wrong; to use the words of the Apostle in another passage, being past feeling men had given themselves up to work all manner of uncleanness. They gloried in their shame. Frequently, in his epistles, Paul combines this vice with covetousness, -the two together representing the great interests of life to the ungodly, the flesh and the world. Those who do not know God and live for Him, live, as he saw with fearful plainness, to indulge the flesh and to heap up gain. Some think that in the passage before us this combination is made, and that 1 Thessalonians 4:6 -"that no man go beyond and defraud his brother in any matter"-is a prohibition of dishonesty in business; but that is almost certainly a mistake. As the Revised Version shows, the Apostle is speaking of the matter in hand; in the Church especially, among brethren in Christ, in the Christian home, the uncleanness of heathenism can have no place. Marriage is to be sanctified. Every Christian, marrying in the Lord, is to exhibit in his home life the Christian law of sanctification and noble self-respect. The Apostle adds to his warning against sensuality the terrible sanction, "The Lord is an avenger in all these things." The want of conscience in the heathen world generated a vast indifference on this point. If impurity was a sin, it was certainly not a crime. The laws did not interfere with it; public opinion was at best neutral; the unclean person might presume upon impunity. To a certain extent this is the case still. The laws are silent, and treat the deepest guilt as a civil offence. Public opinion is indeed stronger and more hostile than it once was, for the leaven of Christ’s kingdom is actively at work in society; but public opinion can only touch open and notorious offenders, those who have been guilty of scandal as well as of sin; and secrecy is still tempted to count upon impunity. But here we are solemnly warned that the Divine law of purity has sanctions of its own above any cognisance taken of offences by man. "The Lord is an avenger in all these things." "Because of these things cometh the wrath of God upon the sons of disobedience." Is it not true? They are avenged on the bodies of the sinful. "Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap." The holy law of God, wrought into the very constitution of our bodies, takes care that we do not violate it without paying the penalty. If it is not at the moment, it is in the future, and with interest, -in premature old age; in the torpor which succeeds all spendthrift feats, excesses of man’s prime; in the sudden breakdown under any strain put on either physical or moral courage. They are avenged in the soul. Sensual indulgence extinguishes the capacity for feeling: the profligate man would love, but cannot; all that is inspiring, elevating, redeeming in the passions is lost to him; all that remains is the dull sense of that incalculable loss. Were there ever sadder lines written than those in which Burns, with his life ruined by this very thing, writes to a young friend and warns him against it? "I waive the quantum o’ the sin, The hazard o’ concealing; But Och! it hardens a’ within, And petrifies the feeling." This inward deadening is one of the most terrible consequences of immorality; it is so unexpected, so unlike the anticipations of youthful passion, so stealthy in its approach, so inevitable, so irreparable. All these sins are avenged also in the will and in the spiritual nature. Most men repent of their early excesses; some never cease to repent. Repentance, at least, is what it is habitually called; but that is not really repentance which does not separate the soul from. sin. That access of weakness which comes upon the back of indulgence, that breakdown of the soul in impotent self-pity, is no saving grace. It is a counterfeit of repentance unto life, which deludes those whom sin has blinded, and which, when often enough repeated, exhausts the soul and leaves it in despair. Is there any vengeance more terrible than that? When Christian was about to leave the Interpreter’s house, "Stay," said the Interpreter, "till I have showed thee a little more, and after that thou shalt go on thy way." What was the sight without which Christian was not allowed to start upon his journey? It was the Man of Despair, sitting in the iron cage, -the man who, when Christian asked him, "How camest thou in this condition?" made answer: "I left off to watch and be sober; I laid the reins upon the neck of my lusts; I sinned against the light of the word and the goodness of God; I have grieved the Spirit, and He is gone; I tempted the devil, and he is come to me; I have provoked God to anger, and He has left me; I have so hardened my heart that I cannot repent." This is no fancy picture: it is drawn to the life; it is drawn from the life; it is the very voice and tone in which many a man has spoken who has lived an unclean life under the cloak of a Christian profession. They who do such things do not escape the avenging holiness of God. Even death, the refuge to which despair so often drives, holds out no hope to them. There remaineth no more a sacrifice for sin, but a fearful expectation of judgment. The Apostle dwells upon God’s interest in purity. He is the avenger of all offences against it; but vengeance is His strange work. He has called us with a calling utterly alien to it, -not based on uncleanness or contemplating it, like some of the religions in Corinth, where Paul wrote this letter; but having sanctification, purity in body and in spirit, for its very element. The idea of "calling" is one which has been much degraded and impoverished in modern times. By a man’s calling we usually understand his trade, profession, or business, whatever it may be; but our calling in Scripture is something quite different from this. It is our life considered, not as filling a certain place in the economy of society, but as satisfying a certain purpose in the mind and will of God. It is a calling in Christ Jesus; apart from Him it could not have existed. The Incarnation of the Son of God; His holy life upon the earth; His victory over all our temptations; His consecration of our weak flesh to God; His sanctification, by His own sinless experience, of our childhood, youth, and manhood, with all their unconsciousness, their bold anticipations, their sense of power, their bent to lawlessness and pride; His agony and His death upon the Cross; His glorious resurrection and ascension, -all these were necessary before we could be called with a Christian calling. Can any one imagine that the vices of heathenism, lust or covetousness, are compatible with a calling like this? Are they not excluded by the very idea of it? It would repay us, I think, to lift that noble word "calling" from the base uses to which it has descended; and to give it in our minds the place it has in the New Testament. It is God who has called us, and He has called us in Christ Jesus, and therefore called us to be saints. Flee, therefore, all that is unholy and unclean. In the last verse of the paragraph the Apostle urges both his appeals once more: he recalls the severity and the goodness of God. "Therefore he that rejecteth, rejecteth not man, but God." "Rejecteth" is a contemptuous word; in the margin of the Authorised Version it is rendered, as in some other places in Scripture, "despiseth." There are such things as sins of ignorance; there are eases in which the conscience is bewildered; even in a Christian community the vitality of conscience may be low, and sins, therefore, be prevalent, without being so deadly to the individual soul; but that is never true of the sin before us. To commit this sin is to sin against the light. It is to do what everyone in contact with the Church knows, and from the beginning has known, to be wrong. It is to be guilty of deliberate, wilful, high-handed contempt of God. It is little to be warned by an apostle or a preacher; it is little to despise him: but behind all human warnings is the voice of God: behind all human sanctions of the law is God’s inevitable vengeance; and it is that which is braved by the impure. "He that rejecteth, rejecteth not man, but God." But God, we are reminded again in the last words, is not against us, but on our side. He is the Holy One, and an avenger in all these things; but He is also the God of Salvation, our deliverer from them all, who gives His Holy Spirit unto us. The words put in the strongest light God’s interest in us and in our sanctification. It is our sanctification He desires; to this He calls us; for this He works in us. Instead of shrinking from us, because we are so unlike Him, He puts His Holy Spirit into our impure hearts, He puts His own strength within our reach that we may lay hold upon it, He offers us His hand to grasp. It is this searching, condescending, patient, omnipotent love, which is rejected by those who are immoral. They grieve the Holy Spirit of God, that Spirit which Christ won for us by His atoning death, and which is able to make us clean. There is no power which can sanctify us but this; nor is there any sin which is too deep or too black for the Holy Spirit to overcome. Hearken to the words of the Apostle in another place: "Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with men, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the Kingdom of God. And such were some of you: but ye were washed, but ye were sanctified, but ye were justified in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ, and in the Spirit of our God." 1 Thessalonians 4:9 But as touching brotherly love ye need not that I write unto you: for ye yourselves are taught of God to love one another. Chapter 10 CHARITY AND INDEPENDENCE 1 Thessalonians 4:9-12 (R.V.) WHEN the gospel first came abroad in the world, two characteristics of its adherents attracted general attention, namely, personal purity and brotherly love. Amid the gross sensuality of heathenism, the Christian stood out untainted by indulgence of the flesh; amid the utter heartlessness of pagan society, which made no provision for the poor, the sick, or the aged, the Church was conspicuous for the close union of its members and their brotherly kindness to each other. Personal purity and brotherly love were the notes of the Christian and of the Christian community in the early days; they were the new and regenerating virtues which the Spirit of Christ had called into existence in the heart of a dying world. The opening verses of this chapter enforce the first; those at present before us treat of the second. "Concerning love of the brethren ye have no need that one write unto you: for ye yourselves are taught of God to love one another." The principle, that is, of brotherly love is of the very essence of Christianity; it is not a remote consequence of it which might easily be overlooked unless it were pointed out. Every believer is taught of God to love the brother who shares his faith; such love is the best and only guarantee of his own salvation; as the Apostle John writes, "We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brethren." It is perhaps not unnecessary to remark that, in the New Testament, brethren means fellow Christians, and not fellow men. We have duties to all men, which the Bible does not fail to recognise and enforce; we are one with them in the nature God has given us, and the great alternatives life sets before us; and that natural unity is the basis of duties which all owe to each other. Honour all men. But the Church of Christ creates new relations between its members, and with these new relations mutual obligations still more strong and binding. God Himself is the Saviour of all, specially of them that believe; and Christians in like manner are bound, as they have opportunity, to do good unto all men, but specially to those who are of the household of faith. This is not sufficiently considered by most Christian people; who, if they looked into the matter, might find that few of their strongest affections were determined by the common faith. Is not love a strong and peculiar word to describe the feeling you cherish toward some members of the Church, brethren to you in Christ Jesus? yet love to the brethren is the very token of our right to a place in the Church for ourselves. "He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love." These words of John give us the key to the expression "taught of God to love one another." It is not likely that they refer to anything so external as the words of Scripture, "Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." Even in the Old Testament, to be taught of God was something more spiritual than this; it was the same thing as to have the law written on the heart. That is what the Apostle has in view here. The Christian has been born again, born of God; he has a new nature, with new instincts, a new law, a new spontaneity; it is now native to him to love. Until the Spirit of God enters into men’s hearts and recreates them, life is a war of all against all; man is a wolf to man; but in the Church that internecine strife has ended, for its members are the children of God, and "everyone that loveth Him that begat loveth him also that is begotten of Him." The selfishness of man’s nature is veiled, and to some extent repressed, in other societies; but it is not, as a principle, exterminated except in the Church and by the Spirit of Christ. A family ought to be an unselfish place, ruled only by love, and fostering the spirit of love; yet if Christ be not there, what selfish passions assert themselves in spite of all restraint. Any association working for the common good-a town council even-ought to be an unselfish body; yet how often, in such places, is rivalry conspicuous, and self-seeking, and envy, and detraction, and all that is unlike Christ. In the Church which has been taught of God, or, in other words, which has learned of Christ, we find at least some manifestations of a better spirit. It does contain people who love one another because they are Christians; who are unselfish, giving way to each other, esteeming each other, helping each other; if it contained none such, it would not be a Church at all. The brotherly love of the early Church was not only visible to the world; it was its great recommendation in the world’s eyes. It had brought a new thing into being, a thing for which the world was pining, namely, vital society. The poor people in the cities of Asia and Europe saw with wonder, joy, and hope, men and women united to one another in a spiritual union, which gave scope to all their gifts for society, and satisfied all their desires for it. The early Christian churches were little companies of people where love was at a high temperature, where outward pressure very often tightened the inward bonds, and where mutual confidence diffused continual joy. Men were drawn to them irresistibly by the desire to share this life of love. It is the very same force which at this moment draws those who are outcasts from society into the Salvation Army. Whatever the failings of that organisation may be, its members are as brothers; the sense of union, of mutual obligation, of mutual confidence, in one word, of brotherly love, is very strong; and souls that pine for that atmosphere are drawn to it with overpowering force. It is not good for man to be alone; it is vain for him to seek the satisfaction of his social instincts in any of the casual, selfish, or sinful associations by which he is often betrayed: even the natural affection of the family, pure and strong as it may be, does not answer to the width of his spiritual nature; his heart cries out for that society founded on brotherly love which only the Church of Christ provides. If there is one thing more than another which explains the Church’s failure in missionary work, it is the absence of this spirit of love among her members. If men were compelled to cry still, as in the early days of the gospel, "Behold these Christians, how they love one another," they would not be able to remain outside. Their hearts would kindle at the glow, and all that hindered their incorporation would be burned up. The Apostle acknowledges the progress of the Thessalonians. They show this brotherly love to all the brethren that are in all Macedonia; but he beseeches them to abound more and more. Nothing is more inconsistent with the gospel than narrowness of mind or heart, however often Christians may belie their profession by such vices. Perhaps of all churches in the world, the church of our own country is as much in need of this admonition as any, and more than most. Would it not be higher praise than some of us deserve, to say that we loved with brotherly cordiality all the Christian churches in Britain, and wished them God-speed in their Christian work? And as for churches outside our native land, who knows anything about them? There was a time when all the Protestant churches in Europe were one, and lived on terms of brotherly intimacy; we sent ministers and professors to congregations and colleges in France, Germany, and Holland, and took ministers and professors from the Continent ourselves; the heart of the Church was enlarged towards brethren whom it has now completely forgotten. This change has been to the loss of all concerned; and if we would follow the Apostle’s advice, and abound more and more in this supreme grace, we must wake up to take an interest in brethren beyond the British Isles. The Kingdom of Heaven has no boundaries that could be laid down on a map, and the brotherly love of the Christian is wider than all patriotism. But this truth has a special side connected with the situation of the Apostle. Paul wrote these words from Corinth, where he was busily engaged in planting a new church, and they virtually bespeak the interest of the Thessalonians in that enterprise. Christian brotherly love is the love which God Himself implants in the heart; and the love of God has no limitations. It goes out into all the earth, even to the end of the world. It is an ever advancing, ever victorious force; the territory in which it reigns becomes continually wider and wider. If that love abounds in us more and more, we shall follow with live and growing interest the work of Christian missions. Few of us have any idea of the dimensions of that work, and of the nature of its successes. Few of us have any enthusiasm for it. Few of us do anything worth mentioning to help it on. Not very long ago the whole nation was shocked by the disclosures about the Stanley expedition; and the newspapers were filled with the doings of a few profligate ruffians, who, whatever they failed to do, succeeded in covering themselves, and the country they belong to, with infamy. One would fain hope that this exhibition of inhumanity would turn men’s thoughts by contrast to those who are doing the work of Christ in Africa. The national execration of fiendish wickedness is nothing unless it passes into deep and strong sympathy with those who are working among the Africans in brotherly love. What is the merit of Stanley or his associates, that their story should excite the interest of those who know nothing of Comber and Hannington and Mackay, and all the other brave men who loved not their lives to the death for Christ’s sake and Africa’s? Is it not a shame to some of us that we know the horrible story so much better than the gracious one? Let brotherly love abound more and more; let Christian sympathy go out with our brethren and sisters in Christ who go out themselves to dark places; let us keep ourselves instructed in the progress of their work; let us support it with prayer and liberality at home; and our minds and hearts alike will grow in the greatness of our Lord and Saviour. Brotherly love in the early Church, within the limits of a small congregation, often took the special form of charity. Those who were able helped the poor. A special care was taken, as we see from the Book of Acts, of widows, and no doubt of orphans. In a later epistle Paul mentions with praise a family which devoted itself to ministering to the saints. To do good and to communicate, that is, to impart of one’s goods to those who had need, is the sacrifice of praise which all Christians are charged not to forget. To see a brother or a sister destitute, and to shut up the heart against them, is taken as proof positive that we have not the love of God dwelling in us. It would be difficult, one might think, to exaggerate the emphasis which the New Testament lays on the duty and the merit of charity. "Sell all that thou hast, and give to the poor," Christ said to the rich young man, "and thou shalt have treasure in heaven." "Give alms," He cried to the Pharisees, "of such things as ye have and behold, all things are clean unto you." Charity sanctifies. Nor have these strong sayings been without their due effect. Charity, both organised and private, is characteristic of Christendom, and of Christendom only. The pagan world made no provision for the destitute, the sick, the aged. It had no almshouses, no infirmaries, no orphanages, no convalescent homes. The mighty impulse of the love of Christ has created all these, and to this hour it sustains them all. Acknowledged or unacknowledged, it is the force which lies behind every effort made by man for the good of his fellows; wherever this disinterested love burns in a human bosom, it is the fire which Christ cast upon the earth, and He rejoices at its kindling. As a recent example, look at the great scheme of General Booth: it is the love of Christ which has inspired it; it is the love of Christ that must provide all the subordinate agents by whom it is to be administered, if it is ever carried into effect; it is on the public conviction that he is animated by the love of Christ, and has no by-ends of his own to secure, that General Booth depends for his funds. It is only this Christ-enkindled love which gives charity its real worth, and furnishes any sort of guarantee that it will confer a double blessing, material and spiritual, on those who receive it. For charity is not without its dangers, and the first and greatest of these is that men learn to depend upon it. When Paul preached the gospel in Thessalonica, he spoke a great deal about the Second Advent. It was an exciting subject, and some at least of those who received his message were troubled by "ill-defined or mistaken expectations," which led to moral disorder in their lives. They were so anxious to be ready for the Lord when He came, that they neglected their ordinary duties, and became dependent upon the brethren. They ceased working themselves, and so became a burden upon those who continued to work. Here we have, in a nutshell, the argument against a monastic life of idleness, against the life of the begging friar. All men must live by labour, their own or some other’s; and he who chooses a life without labour, as the more holy, really condemns some brother to a double share of that labouring life to which, as he fancies, the highest holiness is denied. That is rank selfishness; only a man without brotherly love could be guilty of it for an hour. Now in opposition to this selfishness, -unconscious at first, let us hope, -and in opposition to the unsettled, flighty, restless expectations of these early disciples, the Apostle propounds a very sober and humble plan of life. Make it your ambition, he says, to be quiet, and to busy yourselves w