2 Thessalonians 3

CHAPTER 3THEME: The practicality of Christ’s comingChapter 2 concluded with the fact that believers should be established in the Wordthe Word of God. Paul spoke about God comforting our hearts and establishing us in every good word and work. This has to do with loyalty to the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. Also Paul spoke in chapter 2, verses 2Th_2:13-14, of the marvelous position we have in Christ. We are chosen"God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit." And we are called of God “to the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.” This is heady stuff! It is exciting and thrilling. Now here in chapter 3 Paul says that there are certain responsibilities that we have as believers. As Paul put it to the Ephesian believers, “…walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called” (Eph_4:1). Now Paul is saying the same thing to the Thessalonian believers.

2 Thessalonians 3:1

BELIEVERS SHOULD BE ESTABLISHED IN THEIR WALKHe is saying here that the Word of God enables the believer to walk before the wicked world. The Word establishes a believer in his walk. “Finally, brethren"he is coming to the conclusion of his letter. “Pray for us.” Prayer is something that every believer can engage in. I do not think prayer is a gift of the Spirit. Prayer is something that all believers should do. Every work must have prayer behind it if it is to succeed. Every successful evangelist and preacher of the Word, every teacher of the Word who is being used of God, has people who are praying for him. Paul is asking the Thessalonians for prayer so that “the word of the Lord may have free course.” Paul had a very unique ministry.

He was a missionary. He was an evangelist as we think of evangelists today. Actually that word evangelist in the New Testament means “missionary.” Also, he was a pastor and a teacher of the Word. He fulfilled all those offices, and he had fulfilled them all to the Thessalonians. He had led them to the Lord and taught them; now he is acting as their pastor in his letters. He is not only instructing them in the Word, but he is attempting to comfort them and to counsel them.

One of the things he enjoins them to do is pray. “Pray for us, that the Word of the Lord may have free course, and be glorified, even as it is with you.” You cannot pray for Paul today, but you can pray for Vernon. I would appreciate your prayers that the Word of the Lord as I give it out may have free course and be glorified. The Word of God needs to be exalted today. Pray that people will exalt the Word of God in their own lives. It troubles me and it worries me to see that even those who claim to believe the Word of God give so little attention to it. Pray that if people profess to believe the Word of God, they will get into it and find out what it says. My friend, let me urge you to pray for your pastor. Let me say something very carefully. I know what it is to be a pastor, and I know what it is to be a Bible teacher holding conferences. I want to say to you that it is a lot easier to go around and hold conferences than it is to be a pastor. A pastor has a great responsibility because, very frankly, he deals with a great many folk who are unreasonable. Paul asks prayer that he “may be delivered from unreasonable and wicked men.” Did you know that there are wicked persons in the church? A pastor needs to be delivered from such folk. The work of an evangelist is like the work of an obstetrician. He delivers the little baby into the world, and that is quite an undertaking, of course. But then he turns over the little one to the pediatrician. He is the one who sees to it that his diet is right, that he is burped properly, that he gets his shots, and so forth. The pastor, you see, is the pediatrician. He is the one who must deal with cantankerous saints and baby Christians. That is quite a job. My heart goes out to the pastor. When I go out to speak at conferences, I meet some wonderful pastors. The only churches I want to go to are the ones where the pastor is preaching and teaching the Word of God and stands for the things of God. On the other side of the coin, that is the only kind of man who will have me in his pulpit! Recently, as we left such a church, I said to my wife: “We have had a wonderful ministry here at this church for the week. I’ve been here just long enoughI think these people are wonderful, and they think I am wonderful! I left before they got acquainted with me and I got acquainted with them.

Also I think I helped the pastor; he tells me that I did. But he is the one who is carrying the burden and the load there. He is the one who has the problems. I can simply walk away from them.” I think the work of an evangelist or of an itinerant Bible teacher, as some of us are, is easy compared to the work of the man who is the pastor. Paul asked for prayer that he might be delivered from “unreasonable and wicked men.” I find that the spreading of the gospel is hindered more by people in the church than by anything else. No liquor industry, no barroom, no gangster ring has ever attacked meat least I have never known about it. But I have had so-called saints in the churches attack me. As you know, in our churches we have the saints and the “ain’ts,” and there are a lot of “ain’ts.” They can give a pastor a rough time. It’s too bad that we can’t all settle down and give out the Word of God. Now when he says, “For all men have not faith,” that is really “the faith.” All men do not have the faith. That is, they do not hold to the doctrines as the apostles taught them. The foundation of the church rests upon the doctrine which the apostles have given to the church. That is what we should teach and preach. It is one thing to hold the truth of the coming of Christ, to love His appearing; but it is another thing to walk worthy of that great truth. This is what Paul is writing about to the Thessalonians. If we really love His appearing, we will prove it by our relationship to the Word of God and by our walk through this life.

2 Thessalonians 3:3

That is so wonderful! I have let Him down on several occasions, but He has never let me down. He is faithful. He is always faithful. Christians should hold tenaciously to this little verse. The Lord is faithful, and He will establish you. Christians need to be established. Right now the home is in disarray, the church is in disarray, and the lives of believers are in disarray. We need to be established. How can you as a believer be established? By coming to the Word of God and letting it have its influence in your life. The Lord operates through His Word. The Word of God will keep you from evil. Someone has said, “The Bible will keep you from sin, and sin will keep you from the Bible.”

2 Thessalonians 3:4

Christians are commanded to do certain things, and there are specific commandments for Christians. We saw that in Paul’s first epistle to the Thessalonians where he records twenty-two commandments in the fifth chapter. There are not only ten but twenty-two commandments which the believers are to do. The Lord Jesus said, “If you love Me, keep My commandments” (see Joh_14:15) and these are His commandments. Paul had “confidence in the Lord touching” them. He committed them to the Lord with the confidence that they were doing and would continue doing the things which he commanded. He believed that this Thessalonian church which had a wonderful testimony would continue to maintain that testimony.

2 Thessalonians 3:5

The believer is to walk in “the love of God.” My friend, if you are walking today in the sunshine of His love, the love of God is shed abroad in your heart and you know He loves you. And you can manifest that love by the power of the Spirit, because only the Spirit of God can make God’s love real to us. Love is a fruit of the Spirit. You can’t naturally love every Tom, Dick, and Harryand I’m of the opinion God does not expect that of us. Paul wrote to the Philippian Christians that our love is to be in judgment, which implies that we should be careful about loving those around us. There are folk who will hurt us if we open our arms to them. “Into the patient waiting for Christ.” This does not mean that you are to argue about being premillennial or pretribulational or posttribulational or amillennial, but that you are to be patiently waiting for the coming of Christ. Oh, what wonderful verses these are!

2 Thessalonians 3:6

“Now we command you, brethren"Paul doesn’t beat around the bush! The believer is not to walk with the “disorderly.” I know men who insist that we should go into the barrooms, sit down with the drunkard and have a beer with him as we witness to him. Unfortunately, I know of a young lady who became an alcoholic by following that procedure. God says that we are to “withdraw” ourselves from the disorderly. Certainly we are to witness to them, but we are not to fraternize on their level. God makes it very clear whom we are to follow

2 Thessalonians 3:7

Birds of a feather flock together. You will be like the crowd you run around with. Believers need to be very careful about the company they keep and the people with whom they associate.

2 Thessalonians 3:8

BELIEVERS SHOULD BE ESTABLISHED IN THEIR WORKThe Thessalonians were walking in a right relationship to the Lord Jesus, and they were being persecuted for it. Paul comforted them, instructed, and encouraged them. Now he lets them know that he also is undergoing persecution and difficulty. And, friend, if you stand for the Lord, it will cost you something. We have seen that the believer is to be established in the Word of God. Then we have noted how important the walk of the believer is, and how his walk should be grounded in the Word. Now we come to the work of the believer, which is also very practical. This involves things in which we need to be engagedthat the Word of God may have its way in our hearts and lives. “Neither did we eat any man’s bread for nought"that is, for nothing; he paid for what he ate. “But wrought with labour and travail night and day, that we might not be chargeable to any of you.” His practice was that he would not let anyone pay him for his missionary work among them. I think this applied especially to his first missionary journey. When he arrived in town as a missionary, there was no reservation for him at the local motel. There was no stipend given to him, no love offering taken for him the first time he was there. He was very careful about paying his own way. He mentions that to the Thessalonians and also to the Corinthians. When he was establishing churches he supported himself by tentmaking. However, after the churches were established and Paul had come back to visit them a second and a third time, he did receive an offering from them. He makes it clear to the Galatians that they should give. He thanks the Philippians for their gift. He himself took an offering on his third missionary journey to be given to the poor saints in Jerusalem. Obviously, the great truth of the coming of Christ had not caused Paul to become some sort of a fanatic or to take some unreasonable position in relation to money matters. In every age there are fanatical people. In the last century there were those who expected the return of Christ; so they sold their homes and property, wrapped themselves in white sheets and got on the top of the roof to wait for the Lord to come! There were several actions which identified them as fanatics. For example, why get on the roof? Couldn’t the Lord draw a person into the air from the ground as easily as from a roof? If one needed to get up on a roof, then wouldn’t a mountaintop be better?

And then, why in the world would one need a white sheet? I think the Lord is going to furnish us with suitable coverings when we come into His presence. And why would they sell their property and turn it into money? Did they think they could take the money with them? You see, people can do some very peculiar, senseless things because they say they believe in the soon coming of Christ. The fact is that there is no other doctrine in the Bible that will make you work harder or more sensibly for Christ.

If you believe that He is coming, you will work for Him. You will be busy for the Lord in some phase of His work. You will be putting out a few seeds of the Word of God in the field of the world so that they might bring forth a harvest.

2 Thessalonians 3:9

Paul is saying that as an apostle who had led them to the Lord and established a church among them, he had the right, the authority, to claim an offering. However, he did not do this because he wanted to be an example to the believers in Thessalonica that they might not be led to some fanatical position. A young couple who had been in my classes when I taught at a Bible institute were inclined toward fanaticism. They thought they were super-duper saints, way out ahead of everyone else. But their exam papers were graded Cs or Ds, because they didn’t really know the Word, although they affected to be very spiritual. (Incidentally, I don’t think a person can be truly spiritual and be ignorant of the Word of God.) They came to me after I had become a pastor in that city and said they wanted to go to the mission field. They attended the church I served although they were not members. I asked them if they had their financial support. They said no.

I asked, “Do you mean that you are going to the mission field without support?” “Oh,” they said, “we’re going to trust the Lord.” Well, I said, “It’s nice to trust the Lord, but can’t you trust Him to raise your support here? Must you wait until you get into the mission field to trust Him for support? Why don’t you get under a reputable mission board and work with them? If the Lord has called you to go to the mission field, He will raise up support for youthe Lord will lay your needs on the hearts of certain folk who will pray for you and support you financially.” No, they didn’t want to do it that way, they were just going to trust the Lord. Well, this young couple went out to the mission field, and there they became casualties. They had to be brought home with money that some friends raised to pay their passage.

Since that time they have separated and are divorced. She is married again. I have heard that he has lost his faith altogether, although I doubt that he ever really had faith. Their behavior was foolish and fanatical. Paul was making missionary work very practical. He supported himself by working with his hands, and he did it to be an example to the Thessalonian believers. He is going to make a point of this in the next verse.

2 Thessalonians 3:10

A believer who is looking for the Lord to return is not a dreamer; he is a worker. No workno food. That is the rule laid down by the apostle. “If any would not work, neither should he eat.” It is amazing how fanatical people can get about these things. The dean of men at Moody Bible Institute told about an incident that happened about fifty years ago. Two young men roomed together who were other examples of those super-duper saints who thought they were completely sanctified. One day they didn’t appear in the dining room for breakfast or for lunch or for dinner; so the dean went up to see what was the problem. They were just sitting there, looking out into space. He asked them if they were sick.

No, they weren’t sick. “Then why haven’t you come down for meals?” They said, “We’re just trusting the Lord. We are waiting for Him to tell us whether we should go down to eat.” “Are you hungry?” They admitted that they were hungry. “Don’t you think that is one of the ways the Lord has of letting you know that you ought to go down to eat?” They said, “No, we are waiting for special revelation from Him, and we are not going to move until then.” So the dean said to them, “I have news for you. You are going to move, but not down to the dining room. You are going to move out of school. You cannot stay here.” There is no place for that kind of fanaticism. Today we are seeing a kind of fanaticism in the area of prophecy. It is quite interesting that in this epistle which deals largely in prophecy, almost half of it is given over to that which is practical. Paul puts the emphasis on the practical side of the great truth of the coming of Christ for His church. It is one thing to get fanatical about prophecy; it is quite another thing to believe the prophetic truth and then have it meshed and geared into our living down here so that it becomes practical and working. We are to work while we wait. A gardener for a large estate in northern Italy was conducting a visitor through the castle and the beautiful, well-groomed grounds. As the visitor had lunch with the gardener and his wife, he commended them for the beautiful way they were keeping the gardens. He asked, “By the way, when was the last time the owner was here?” “It was about ten years ago,” the gardener said. The visitor asked, “Then why do you keep up the gardens in such an immaculate, lovely manner?” The gardener answered, “Because I’m expecting him to return.” He persisted, “Is he coming next week?” The gardener replied, “I don’t know when he is coming, but I am expecting him today.” Although he didn’t come that day, he was living in the light of the owner’s imminent return. The gardener wasn’t hanging over the gate, watching down the road to see whether his master was coming.

He was in the garden, trimming, cutting, mowing, planting. He was busy. That is what Paul is talking about when he says we should be established in the work of the Lord in view of the fact that He is returning. “If any would not work, neither should he eat.” You see, the Thessalonians had a few fanatics who simply withdrew themselves and decided that they were going to spend all their time looking for the Lord’s return. Paul writes, “Don’t feed them. They have to go to work.”

2 Thessalonians 3:11

Here we are told the situation. There were some who were not working at anything constructive. They were not interested in getting out the Word of God, but they were busythey were busybodies. They were really making a nuisance of themselves, and they were causing trouble in the church in Thessalonica. It takes just one bad apple to spoil the barrel; it takes just one little fly to spoil the ointment; and one fanatic in the church can affect the spiritual life of a great many people. That is the reason Paul had said before that they were to withdraw themselves from the ones who walk disorderly, and I’m sure he had the busybodies in mind. They were busy as termites and just as effective as termites in the church at Thessalonica.

2 Thessalonians 3:12

This doesn’t sound very spiritual, does it? It doesn’t sound very theological. But it certainly is practical. It would solve a great many problems in the average church if the busybodies, the troublemakers, would work with quietness and do something constructive. It is interesting that the man who was the biggest troublemaker in any church that I served was the smallest contributorand I found that out by accident. The treasurer of the church was talking to me about the trouble this fellow had been, and I said, “Well, he is a man of means, and I suppose a very generous giver, and he naturally is interested in how his money is being spent.” The treasurer looked at me and laughed.

He said, “That man gives ten dollars a year for the Lord’s work!” Believe me, he certainly gave us more than ten dollars worth of trouble! There must have been people like that in Thessalonica. Paul says that they were to quietly go to work and mind their own business.

2 Thessalonians 3:13

How wonderful this is! A believer who holds the blessed hope should not grow weary of working for the Lord. As Moody put it, “I get weary in the work, but not weary of the work.”

2 Thessalonians 3:14

People in the church ought to withdraw from troublemakers in the church. However, many people more or less court their favor, because they don’t want those people to talk about them, knowing they have vicious tongues. But withdrawing from the gossips would be the best thing that could happen in many churches.

2 Thessalonians 3:15

An attempt should be made to win the wayward member.

2 Thessalonians 3:16

Isn’t this lovely!

2 Thessalonians 3:17

This is an epistle from Paul signed with his own hand.

2 Thessalonians 3:18

His letter ends with a benediction. It is the conclusion of a wonderful epistle which teaches that the knowledge of prophecy, rather than leading to fanaticism or laziness, brings peace to the heart.