2 Thessalonians 3

2 Thessalonians 3:1

You, that were sometime alienated. In a state of estrangement before conversion. Enemies in [your] mind by wicked works. Hostile on account of wicked works. A wicked life will fill a man with hostile thoughts to God. Yet now hath he reconciled. Christ has changed them by the gospel to that they are enemies no longer. God needs no change. The change must be wrought in man.

2 Thessalonians 3:2

In the body of his flesh through death. It is through the sufferings of Christ that they are enabled to come to God. Without Christ and the cross there could be no gospel. To present you holy and unblameable and unreproveable in his sight. Through his blood their sins are cleansed, so that they are holy in the sight of God.

2 Thessalonians 3:3

If ye continue in the faith. Their continued acceptance depends on their clinging to Christ who redeemed them. Grounded and settled. Having an immovable foundation, so that they could not be moved from the “hope of the gospel” by any “wind of doctrine” (Ephesians 4:14). Which hath been preached, etc. See PNT Colossians 1:6.

2 Thessalonians 3:4

Who now rejoice. Rather, I now rejoice. My sufferings for you. He was a prisoner and a sufferer because he preached the gospel of the Gentiles. And fill up that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ. Christ endured afflictions for us. We must have a fellowship of his sufferings (1 Peter 4:13). Paul also suffers that he might share the afflictions of Christ. Not only did he suffer with Christ, but Christ suffers with his afflicted people. See Acts 9:4. Hence, afflictions suffered for Christ may be called his afflictions. All the suffering required for the sake of the church is “behind of the afflictions of Christ”.

2 Thessalonians 3:5

According to the dispensation. God made him a minister of the church. That ministry was a “stewardship” (dispensation) committed to him. He refers to the great responsibility of the apostolic office. He as a “steward of the grace of God” (Ephesians 3:2). To fulfil the word of God. Not only to do what the word required, but to preach the word everywhere.

2 Thessalonians 3:6

Even the mystery . . . is made manifest to his saints. The mystery of the gospel, of salvation through Christ, hidden from past ages, but now revealed to the saints. A mystery, as Paul uses the term, is a thing hidden in the past, but now made known.

2 Thessalonians 3:7

To whom God would make known. To the saints he would reveal the glory of the mystery. The glory of the mystery is Christ in you, the hope of glory. Christ dwelling in the saved and filling their hearts with the hope of glory.

2 Thessalonians 3:8

Whom we preach. Christ. Every man. Note that this is repeated three times in the verse. The apostle impresses the fact that the gospel is not for a favored few, but for every one. In all wisdom. In every form of wisdom. Perfect in Christ Jesus. We should all aim at perfection; the apostle aims to bring all to this ideal. The high ideal is before, for which we all should aim. However, he whose sins are all blotted out will be counted perfect in the great day.

2 Thessalonians 3:9

According to his working. Christ within us is a life and a power. If we conquer the flesh and give ourselves entirely up to him he will work “mightily”.

2 Thessalonians 3:11

Warnings Against False Theories SUMMARY OF COLOSSIANS 2: Paul’s Conflict for the Churches. Present with Them in Spirit. Exhortation to Be Rooted and Grounded in Christ. Warning Against Vain Philosophy. The True Circumcision. The Baptismal Burial. The Handwriting of Ordinances Removed. Keeping Sabbath Days. Angel Worship Forbidden. What great conflict I have. Anxiety. For you. The brethren at Colosse. And [for] them at Laodicea. A sister church only a few miles away. Laodicea was one of the Seven Churches of Revelation. See Revelation 3:14. As many as have not seen my face in the flesh. This seems to imply that he had never visited either of these churches in person. The reasons for his anxiety are revealed in this chapter. They were assailed by false teachings.

2 Thessalonians 3:12

That their hearts. He was deeply anxious that they might “be comforted, . . . knit together in love”, and enjoy the full assurance of understanding, a clear insight that would lead them to know the mystery of God. This knowledge would make them proof against the arts of false teachers. For “mystery”, see notes on Colossians 1:26,27.

2 Thessalonians 3:13

In whom are hid. In Christ “all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” are hidden, and mysteries until revealed. The gospel reveals them, and those in Christ know them.

2 Thessalonians 3:14

Lest any man should beguile you. Had they full knowledge, this would not be possible. See Colossians 2:2.

2 Thessalonians 3:15

For though I be absent in the flesh, yet am I with you in the spirit. He was either present in spirit by having them in mind, being fully informed of their state by Epaphras, which I think is more in harmony with the whole tenor of the New Testament, or he was enabled by divine power to look upon them and behold them. The latter is the view of most commentators. If this view is correct, why does he say (Colossians 1:7) that he learned their state from Epaphras?

2 Thessalonians 3:16

Walk ye in him. Continue to live in, obey and believe upon Christ as he was first preached to you.

2 Thessalonians 3:17

Rooted . . . in him. Your life growing out of Christ as a tree out of the soil. As ye have been taught. The point of the exhortation is to cling to the gospel as it has been taught them.

2 Thessalonians 3:18

Spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit. Make spoil of you and carry you off as booty through some philosophical speculation, or empty deceit. After the tradition of men. By appealing, not to the Scriptures, but to human traditions. These traditions probably referred mainly to the matters spoken of in Colossians 2:18 below. After the rudiments of the world. Paul uses this expression elsewhere of Jewish ordinances (Galatians 4:3). Colossians 2:16 shows what it refers to is shown in