1 Thessalonians 4:1-12

Paul's Love Letter and Life Instructions for Thessalonians Good morning church, we have been going through the book of First Thessalonians and in the first 3 chapters we saw Paul thank God for the faith, the church members of Thessalonica for not just for their faith, but for their love and for their hope. He also talked about the kind of love that he has for the church people in chapters 2 and in chapter 3. In fact, he as we looked at this passage last week in chapter 3, he actually wrote them a love letter. That's that's chapter 3, full of emotions, full of love for the church members. And now we're in chapter 4 being in chapter 4, Paul moves to instructions for life and his focus is very simple. Live to please God. Christians live to please God. You'd have read the same expression, Ephesians 4, Ephesians 5, Colossians 1, Philippians one walk in a manner worthy the Lord. It's the same expression used in the section. Christians are people who live to please God. Speaker 2 Now the Church of Thessalonica were already. Speaker 1 Doing that, you would have seen that expression two times in this. Speaker 2 You're already doing this, But Paul urges them to do this even. Speaker 1 More keep growing. I want you to keep. Speaker 2 Pressing forward. Speaker 1 In obedience. That was Paul's concern for the Church of Thessalonica, and I believe that's. Speaker 2 Paul's concern for us. Speaker 1 Too that we would not just be people who start well, but then we would finish well. Not just that we would believe the gospel, but that we would live and please God every day in all aspects of life. Now, in this section, we have already observed he addresses 2 areas where the Thessalonian Christians needed to grow in, two areas that they needed to grow in. And I think there are two areas that we need to grow in, sexual purity and quiet faithfulness. Sexual purity and quiet faithfulness. Well, friends, if you have your Bibles with you, please start with me, the First Thessalonians chapter 4. If you don't, please raise your hand. We have some extra Bibles kept at the back. We'd love to serve you by giving your Bible. You can keep the Bible with you. Thank you for asking. I have two desires this morning and they stem from the major encouragement of Paul. My desire is that we would yearn and desire to walk in a manner that pleases God through sexual tyranny and through quiet faithfulness. We desire to please God. We make it our ambition to please God through sexual purity and through quiet faithfulness. Look at me verses one and two. Why is it that when we come to texts in the New Testament, we always have to come with three points? The First Point: Living to Please God Through Obedience The first point, walk to please God. Speaker 2 You see before. Speaker 1 Paul addresses issues in the life of the church, specific issues actually. He lays the foundation with a very with a very simple, clear reminder. Speaker 2 Brothers and sisters, verse one we ask and encourage you in the Lord Jesus. Look at the last part of verse one that you do this even. Speaker 1 More now. Speaker 2 What does Paul want them to do? More and more same verse, to live to please God. Now the Thessalonian Christians had received instructions, as the verse already says, how to live in a way that pleases God. If you look at verse 2, Paul says we've given you commands through the Lord Jesus Christ. These were in Paul's opinions, these commands were delivered through the apostles and they were delivered through the apostles by Jesus Christ and they were meant to be obeyed. When you obey these instructions, which comes with commands you. Speaker 1 Please God, so Paul says. Speaker 2 Paul actually affirms their obedience. He says you're already doing that verse one, and yet he encourages them to do it even more. Speaker 1 You know 2nd Corinthians 5 Paul uses. Speaker 2 This language, we make it our ambition, we make it our aim. Speaker 1 To please God. Speaker 2 Christians don't just occasionally think about pleasing God, they aim at it. They make this their life ambition. Not in some seasons or in selective matters, but in all things that at all times. And if you want to live to please God, two things are. Speaker 1 Essential look at the section very carefully. What's 1 and 2? Speaker 2 Two things. Speaker 1 Are essential to walk in a manner that pleases God. Speaker 2 You must know. Speaker 1 God's commands and you must obey God's commands, so you give them instructions and so they know and he says. Speaker 2 Do this even more. Obey. You need to know God's commands and you need to keep. You need to do this. You see, you can't please God in ignorance. You must know what He requires. So let me ask all of us, do you know what God requires of you right now? Because you can't obey what you don't know. And you can't know if you're not reading His will, His Word. Some of us are trying to live the Christian life on spiritual fumes. You know the old sermon that was preached 2 months back? That's when you heard God's word. Really read the passage back then, or maybe last month's reading of scripture. We are spiritually undernourished because we are not drawing from God's Word. And so we don't know what it is that we need to do in order to please God. And if we don't know what He requires, we can't possibly be pleasing Him. Read the Bible to know what God wants you. Speaker 1 To do read. Speaker 2 Start somewhere. Start in Psalms. Start with the Gospels, Start in the book of Genesis. Read the scriptures. Speaker 1 Know his will, but knowing isn't enough. We can know every command and still displease God if we don't obey Him. So right now, as we sit around the world, may I ask as friends, is there any area where you know you're not pleasing God today? Maybe it's your parenting. Maybe it's the way you use your money. Maybe it's the way you use your computer. Maybe it's the way you speak, maybe it's the way you use your time. I don't know. You know, And you know that God has made it clear to you. Pleasing God requires obedience. Not perfection, not perfection, but the posture to obey, progress, pursuit. Speaker 2 Of obedience. This is the Christian life. It is a life that wants to know God's will and obey God, because the heart's deepest desire of the Christian is to please the one who takes great pleasure in us. Speaker 1 Through his Son Jesus. So Paul has said this foundation, Christians are people who live to please God. And now he addresses 2 specific issues. The first one is in verses 3 to 8. That's our second point. Please God, please God through sexual purity. So he explains. How do you live the life to please God? For this is God's will for you, your sanctification. If you want a synonym for that word, Your holification, that's not an English word, but that's what it is, Your Holification, Your Holiness. Speaker 2 To be sanctified, not sanctification. To be sanctified means to be set. Speaker 1 Apart. Speaker 2 To be taken out of where you. Speaker 1 Were from sin to God, that is, to be sanctified, set apart. Speaker 2 If you put your faith in Jesus, you're already sanctified. But sanctification is a process. It is this lifelong journey of increasingly turning from sin to God. It's a life marked by. Speaker 1 2. Speaker 2 Things, love and hatred. It's a life marked by growing love for what is good, pure, true, righteous, just, peaceful. It's a life that is marked by growing hatred for what is evil, sinful, unrighteous, unjust. That's sanctification. But Paul isn't. Speaker 1 Generally, using this word sanctification, we need to be. Speaker 2 Sanctified in all aspects of life here, Paul. Speaker 1 Specifically speaks about sexual sexual relationships, sexual lies. This is God's will for you that your sanctification that he explains you keep away from sexual immorality. That word sexual immorality refers to any any. Speaker 2 Sexual expressions, activities outside marriage between man, one man and one woman. Any sexual engagement outside God's design between one man and one woman. Sexual intimacy is a gift meant designed by God to be enjoyed only in one place, and that's in the context of marriage. Speaker 1 Everything outside the boundary falls under sexual immorality. Let me be specific about what that includes. Sex before marriage is sexual immorality. Sex outside of marriage is adultery. Sexual immorality. Visiting a prostitute is sexual immorality. Seeking Self. Speaker 2 Pleasure sexually, even if you are married on your own, is sexual immorality falls under the umbrella of sexual immorality. Engaging in watching pornography visually, visually engaging in adulterous activity. Sexual immorality. Engaging in conversations using your phones for the sake of sexual pleasure outside of your marriage. Sexting is sexual immorality. Seductive self presentation posting pictures online seductively yours, maybe others you with someone else in order for others to lust after you falls under this sexualized digital content. Instagram feeds, YouTube views feeling the lust of the eyes is literally falling under this umbrella. So children, let me talk to you. It means this. Speaker 1 Where are the other kids? Speaker 2 Your daddy must not live. Speaker 1 With another woman as his wife cannot that sexual immorality your mummy cannot. Speaker 2 Live. Speaker 1 With another man other than your father? That's sexual immorality. Speaker 2 Your father, your mother cannot engage in secret conversations with any man or any woman outside of marriage. Engaging. Speaker 1 In sexual activities, blessed are the children who learn faithfulness from their parents. From their dad and from their mom, Paul. Speaker 2 Does not say manage this sin. Did you notice that? It doesn't say manage it. It doesn't say take a summer break. He doesn't say gradually abstain from sexual sin. He says abstain, keep away the other language in First Corinthians, I think. Speaker 1 Not Paul. Speaker 2 Benjamin Benjamin Red Flee flee from sexual immorality like have 0 tolerance for this sin. Speaker 1 So, children. Speaker 2 If you're exposed to this sin, and I wouldn't be surprised. Speaker 1 If you are already, if you're exposed to this sin, maybe through pictures, I'm sorry, you're sitting on the front row, all eyes on your eyes. Everyone's staring at you. Something, whether it's through pictures or through videos or even a relationship. You know what Paul is saying, End it now. End it now. That's evil before God. It'll destroy you. If if you're in a place where you just can't come out, you can't bring it to your parents. Speaker 2 For help. I know it's weird. I know it's it's scary. It's kind of weird to go to your dad, to your mom and to say that I'm I'm in the sin. It's a shameful thing, but you need help. This sin will destroy your life if you don't flee from it. Parents, if your child comes to you. Speaker 1 Confessing their need for help. Please don't crush them by accusing them. Affirm your love for that and help them. This is when they need you the most. When they're fighting Sidney. Don't crush them, singles, if you're engaging in sexual sin right now, maybe your phone is stacked with pornographic pictures. Maybe you're involved in sexting. Maybe you are involved in physical relationship with someone else. You're not even married. Speaker 2 Jesus commands to end it now. Not gradually, not next week like right now. If you're entertaining it, clicking on pictures, fantasizing your life that's outside of mantle bounds, you are allowing evil to take root in your heart. The seeds that you sow into your heart today will bear fruit. You think this is preparing you for marriage? Speaker 1 Oh no, it's not. It's training you for lust. Speaker 2 It's teaching you nothing about love. It's teaching you everything about lust and you don't even understand that what you're farming within yourself by sowing the seeds of pornography, pictures, videos and so on is growing lust in you. Speaker 1 For bodies, it will never prepare you for marriage, it will destroy you. So abstain, married people, if you're engaged in secret relationships, whether it's emotional, whether it's physical, Jesus commands you to end it Now. You see, you're not only destroying your marriage, you're being unfaithful to your spouse. You'll be unfaithful to your children to. Speaker 2 Jesus, and even to the church as if you're watching porn that encourages sexual immorality in your heart. If you're reading blogs, magazines that sow the seeds of sexual immorality in you, friends, brothers, sisters, please end it now. If you've begun to cross boundaries, maybe you're touching someone else other than your spouse inappropriately. Don't ask me what inappropriately is. You know, something that only your wife or your husband deserves that kind of a touch. Maybe you're hugging too much because you have that urge in you and it's growing. You feed in your flesh and it's growing. Flee now. End it now. This is not entertainment. Speaker 1 This is sin. Repent. Well, you know, it's interesting how Paul writes it, right? You abstain from sexual immorality and then he goes on to explain what that looks like. Control Your Body in Holiness, Honor, Not Lustful Passion He says practically this is what it looks like that each of you knows the next verse that each of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honour. Christian sexual purity is controlled by two things, holiness and honour. The word holiness was just mentioned in the previous verse. It's the word sanctify. Holiness means set apart from for God you. You control your body in holiness. Sexual self-control is shaped by your relationship with God. With your relationship with God. Your control for your body stems from the fact that you belong to him. Your body is God's temple. Honor means dignity or respect. You control your body because. Speaker 2 People are in objects, their image bearers, deserving respect. Sexual self-control is shaped by honor for others. So Paul seems to be saying that sexual purity flows from reverence for God and respect for people. What is what Paul does next? He makes a contrast. Not in lustful passion like the Gentiles who don't know God, Like control your body in holiness and honor. Not in lustful passion. You know this lustful passion is this uncontrollable? Uncontrollable desire for an improper evil relationship. You just can't control it. That's the word that's used there. It's this excessive craving. It consumes you so that you are so overpowered and dominated by these evil desires that you're actually a slave to these desires. And Paul says the ones who have these kind of desires are the ones who don't know God. Godless people live with lustful passions. Godly people fight these. Speaker 1 Passions. Do you know why they fight these passions? Speaker 2 Well, because they know. Speaker 1 That lust is the opposite of love lust. Speaker 2 Only wants the body. Love wants commitment to the person lust seeks to take. Love seeks to give and protect. Lust seeks pleasure by taking what does not belong to you. Love seeks pleasure in giving to the one who truly belongs to you. Lust is cheap, it's selfish, and it dishonours the person. There is No Fear of God in lustful activity. That's why I believe sexual immorality is not just disordered desire is. Speaker 1 Disordered worship. There is No Fear of God specifically in the church at this one I got this was played out in a specific way, right? Look at verse six in the first part. This means now he's he's applying to the specific situation that's going on there. This means one must not transgress against and take advantage of a brother or sister in this matter. 2 strong words like it seems like in the church at this one I got these things were happening like there seems to be this this guy or this lady who was transgressing Transgress has the idea of I want to use this Malayalam environment, but you know you jump the wall to the other side, you're not allowed to jump but. Speaker 2 You jump the wall. Speaker 1 You just jump the boundary. Speaker 2 That's set. That's the word used there. You cross forbidden lines, you overstep boundaries. Sexual sin always involves crossing God ordained boundaries. Always it seems like in this church there was some guys, some some ladies stepping boundaries. But it's not just. Speaker 1 Transgress. It's also. Speaker 2 Taking advantage the word, my goodness, that word actually means to exploit, to defraud, to actually steal. You exploit because greed drives you sexual sin is actually relational theft. You take what is not rightfully yours. You're stealing. That's the word that Paul. Speaker 1 Uses. Speaker 2 As it seems like some people in the church were exploiting other marriages or other singles getting close to a brother or a sister, luring them into sexual immorality, Paul says. You're stealing intimacy that belongs to their spouse or their future spouse. You're crossing boundaries. Speaker 1 You're exploiting. Sexual sin is never private, it always wrongs someone. I want to speak to the women not church 1st and then to men and women. There are women, there are young young women or the women not church. Can I just tell you that there are men who come to our church and who make unhealthy advances toward you and you are uncomfortable with that? Walk away. It is not a sin to walk away from unhealthy advancement. Please walk to elderly agreement now. Church, walk to your elders. We want to protect you as church. We don't want women, not churches, to be exploited. Speaker 2 Church. Speaker 1 Members, if you see men or women, you you see them cross boundaries. Please don't ask me what these boundaries are. Speaker 2 You know it's unhealthy advances. You see that? Don't don't close your eyes to that. Call it out. Question them, encourage them to say this will. Maybe right now you're not sinning. Maybe it's going to lead you to sin. Call them up. This is an act of love. Remember, love protects. You saw it last week. Love protects Paul. Paul. Speaker 1 Feels the weight. Speaker 2 Of what's going on here, and so it gives them three reasons why 3. Speaker 1 Reasons, guys. He gives them three reasons. Speaker 2 Why? Speaker 1 We must flee sexual sin. 3 reasons. Speaker 2 And that's in verses 6. Speaker 1 To 8, but I'm going to start with verse 8. I'm just going to go the reverse order, right? Speaker 2 Reason #1 Why should? Speaker 1 We free flee sexual sin one verse 8 because sexual immorality means rejecting God. Speaker 2 He says, consequently, anyone who rejects this doesn't reject man, but God. Sexual purity isn't, in Paul's opinion, it's actually God's command. This is about our submission to God, and so to reject sexual purity is to reject God himself. Persisting in sexual sin isn't just breaking a rule, it's a rejection of the highest authority on earth, God rejecting God. Speaker 1 Not just a book. Speaker 2 Not just a man, not just a preacher, but God himself who set the boundaries. That's the first reason why we should avoid sexual immorality. Reason #2 is in verse 7, you Christians, believers, you're called to holiness. For God hasn't called you to impurity, but to live in holiness. In other words, he's saying this is your identity. God called you. It's past tense. God called you at the time of your conversion. God called you out of darkness into light. He saved you from the Kingdom of Satan into the Kingdom of his beloved Son. And he did not save us to sin. He called us to holiness. To persist in sexual sin is to deny our identity. We can't say Jesus is Lord while our body says. Speaker 1 Otherwise you can't. It says Paul. Let's solve the wrong. You can't say I love Jesus and keep doing sin. Third reason is in verse 6, the light apart, God will judge, God will judge. So it's because the Lord is an avenger of all these offenses. I want just to give these guys. God is not passive about sexual sin. Persistent sexual sin invites divine judgment. Hebrews 13. Four, God will judge the sexually moral and adulterous people. Speaker 2 Fijians 5 is 5. God's wrath is on those who are disobedient the sexually moral. In other words, Paul is saying that God will judge the sexually mortal people. This should actually sober us, terrify us. Even if you persist in unrepentant sexual sin, you are storing a. Speaker 1 Wrath for yourself. Speaker 2 Says Paul. Hear me carefully, Franz. Paul isn't saying that one moment of temptation disqualifies you, that you suddenly become a non Christian just because you fell once. No, no, he's actually warning against habitual, unrepentant practice of sexual sin. The person who says I'm a Christian, but he continues to live in ongoing sexual sin, Adultery, engaging in pornographic addiction or sexual exploitation, that person is in grave danger. The Lord will judge. Don't take this lightly or judge, but Paul is a. Speaker 1 Pastor at heart. So he gives us some good news. Verse 8 in the last part this is gospel hope for us says God gives us his Holy Spirit this. Speaker 2 Is good news. Speaker 1 For those who put their faith in Jesus, did you see the tense guys? It's a little bit of grammar. Paul doesn't say God gave you the spirit like past tense he did. Speaker 2 He could have said that he doesn't say he doesn't use the future tense, that God will give you the holy. Speaker 1 Spirit. Speaker 2 Like a future promise, he actually says God gives you meaning he continuously gives his spirit to help those who wrestle with this sin. So there is hope for the struggle. There is real help for the one who wants to fight for obedience when every single minute, every single day, every time you face temptation, the. Speaker 1 Spirit is there to help. So how do you fight this sin? How do you fight this sin? Too many numbers. Today I'm going to give you 4 things that you should do to fight this. In four things I like 4. The first one is made of this. It's just three to four. Speaker 2 First one is you. Remember that words in Galatians 5 walk by the Spirit and you will not fulfill the desires of the flesh. I think that's 5 words 18 or 21 Walk by the spirit and you will not fulfill the desires of the flesh. Walk by faith in the workings of the Spirit so that you will not fulfill the desires of the flesh, which is sexual immorality. Walk by faith. That's my first point. Walk by faith in the workings of God Himself in our heart. Speaker 1 Two, pray daily, depend on God like please OK. Speaker 2 I'm not asking. Speaker 1 You to say God please help me. Speaker 2 I'm asking you to genuinely pray, Genuinely, sincerely pray. Like saying, God, I actually want to take my phone right now and look at these pictures. Every single cell in my body wants this. I can't fight it. I don't have it in me to fight it. I want you, God, to make me have a bitter taste for this so that I'll hate this. Pray like that. Like be honest about your sin. Three, feed your soul. Feed your soul. Who are the people? Speaker 1 Who engage in sexual immorality in in verse 3 or 4 he actually says the ones who don't know God, like the gentiles who don't know God, who are the ones who would fight sexual immorality, the ones who know God. OK, so here's this This is the greatest secret to fighting section No God, no God. You know His Holiness, know His love for you, know His honorship of your bodies, know of an eternity of pleasure. Promise for those people who put their faith in Jesus. Speaker 2 I know there are. Speaker 1 Tons of books, and there are tons of. Speaker 2 Sermons out there who will tell you how to fight this sin, the sick sin. Speaker 1 Thank God for those. Speaker 2 Resources. But please don't do that at the expense of knowing God personally, that unless I know God, I will not have an affection for God, and unless I have this affection growing, I will not begin to hate sin. We must know God, love God, treasure God in order to hate sin. Speaker 1 Know God 4th Seek help. Maybe you're wrestling this invite now and you don't know who to ask. Seek help because the community is God-given. God already means to produce growth in you. Walk in a manner that pleases God by fighting for sexual purity 2 Sorry, this is the Third Point. Love Others Through Quiet Faithfulness and Hard Work Walk in a manner that pleases God through. Speaker 2 Quiet faithfulness. Speaker 1 Quiet Faithfulness, verses 9 to 12. Speaker 2 So Paul showed us that the. Speaker 1 First way to please God is through sexual purity. You love others by not exploiting them. That's the first section, right? Sorry. Second section. Now He shows us that you love others by not burdening them. Stop being a pain to others. Stop being a burden to others. Love one another through quiet faithfulness. Where's my He says about brotherly love? OK, it's a very interesting word you say. I want to touch on this about brotherly love because Joel here, Joel is one of our church members. He's a Christian. But if you ask me if he's my brother, I will tell you he's not my brother. Joel is not my brother. I have only one brother and he's older To me. That's my brother right on earth. That's the word that's used there. You know, that brother or your sister, that that sibling that you have your own, the inside your house, your family. That's the language when Christ came into the picture, I look at Joel and say my brother family language. That's the word he's using there. You know what that kind of family love, brother, sister, family love. You don't need me to write to you. He says, because the USOS are taught by God to love another. God has instructed you. You're taught by God. Speaker 2 Through our teachings and by his spirits, work in your heart. And it's evident. Paul says it showed they were already loving the brothers and sisters throughout the region of Macedonia. There's churches in Philippi, There's a church in Philippi. There's a church in Athens. There's a church in Corinth. The church in Berea. Probably when the believers were passing through, they hosted them. Probably when the churches were in need. This church at this one, like I reached out and helped them. But it's financially it's going to them. We don't know, but it's certain that they loved them. Speaker 1 With the family kind of love, but Paul doesn't. Speaker 2 Stop there, he says. Do this even more. I encourage you to do this even more. Do what? Speaker 1 More do what? More. Well, love another. More love another. Speaker 2 More. Speaker 1 Well, how do you love another more? Where's the ladder? What does that look like? He uses three ways. Don't you love one another more one? Speaker 2 You seek to live. Speaker 1 A quiet life like make it your ambition to live peacefully peacefully meaning. Speaker 2 You don't go and. Speaker 1 Create. Be the problem maker anywhere. Like don't be the troublemaker. Stop creating disturbance in the lives of other people. Love promotes peace, not chaos. Live a restful life. That's what he's saying. Stop creating problems for others. That's not all he builds up, right? Second, mind your own business. I used to tell this to my wife before we got married. Not to mind your own business, but when people were saying a lot of things about me, I said you should tell them First Thessalonians chapter 4 and verse 11. Mind your own business. That's not what he's actually saying. Speaker 2 He's actually saying focus on your own responsibilities, mind your own business. Focus on your responsibilities not others as affairs don't meddle in their lives and start spreading rumours. Meddling becomes rumours, rumours become gossips, gossips fracture the community. Love respects boundaries and protects unity. Mind your own business. He says focus on your own responsibilities. 3rd, work with your own hands. It means use your hands to work. Like start working, be productive, support yourself by working. It seems like some people in the church that this one I had stopped working that's mentioned in second this one. But right now it seems like someone stopped working and they were meddling in others lives and causing problems in the church. They've become troublemakers and even financial burdens. What's false solution work? Speaker 1 Well, why? Why would he say that's love? Why would he say that is love you? Speaker 2 See when you don't. Speaker 1 Work others must provide for you you take resources that could actually go to someone else who's. Speaker 2 Genuinely in need, but when you work, you contribute, you serve, you bless. Love refuses to be a burden. Speaker 1 Love. Speaker 2 Laborers to give. Did you notice the relationship between these three expressions? When you work, you focus on what really matters. You avoid living. Speaker 1 Living a troublesome life. So why should you love this way according to verse 12, Paul says so that you may behave properly in the presence of outsiders. Unbelievers are watching, they're observing how Christians. Speaker 2 Live and you daily conduct. Your daily conduct either commence the gospel or distorts the gospel. So when unbelievers see Christians who are lazy, meddling in other people's lives, being busy bodies, always creating problems, gossipers, slanderers, troublemakers, what does it communicate to the others outside the church? Well, Christians are no different from anyone outside the church. They're the same. Speaker 1 They. Speaker 2 Claim to say that the gospel is a powerful message, but. Speaker 1 It's obvious that the Gospel has no effect. Speaker 2 It discredits Christ. It makes the gospel look powerless. So Paul is saying that your work ethic matters. You're refusing to gossip, to create problems. You're refusing to do that. They are part of your witness. The world is watching live in a way that they can actually see Christ at work in you. Speaker 1 The second reason you should do this is so that you will not be dependent on others. Speaker 2 Meaning you will not become a burden for others because you're not working. You have no money. The church will have to take on the burden of giving you money when you can actually work and make money. But you become a burden. You know what? The more I thought about this. Speaker 1 I don't think we have this problem here in our church. I don't think so. I think we have two problems connected to this. Some of us struggle with underworking, others struggle with overworking. Both lack love. Underworking people are lazy. They're passive. It's thoughtful. Speaker 2 When we are lazy, we don't enjoy giving. When we are passive, we wait for others to do the work of loving. We avoid being. We avoid inconvenience. We love our comfort zone. We become unwilling to step in and help others. And when we fail to carry out our responsibilities, others must take up take up on our responsibilities too. It becomes a burden for them. That's not loving. Love labours so that others may flourish. Laziness makes you slow to love and eventually unwilling to love. Speaker 1 Love requires effort, sacrifice and movement, and lazy people don't move. Underworking people are lazy people, for many of us are overworking people. I am convicted of this. We're very busy, exhausted. Speaker 2 Constantly doing work. Hello Martha, Constantly doing work. Some of us are so busy chasing career and productivity and slowly community life disappears. We stop having energy to serve. We stop having time to love people. All working makes us just as unloving as the under working person. Not because we're idle, but because we are unavailable. We're not there. I'm too busy. Paul isn't saying please work. He's actually saying work faithfully so you can love. Well, work is actually a gift, but it's not ultimate. He's actually meant to serve love, not to replace. Speaker 1 Love. Speaker 2 Some of us. Speaker 1 Need to work more. Some of us need to work less, but all of us need to work faithfully in a way that gives us freedom to love others, not to prevent love from happening. Jesus, The Perfect Example of Pleasing God If this passage does anything, brothers and sisters, it should make us see how desperately we need Jesus. No one has ever loved like Jesus. He never exploited anyone, He never used people for his game. He crossed every boundary to serve, not to take. You will never find a verse in New Testament that says Jesus was lazy or passive. You would never find a word that says Jesus was too busy to care for people. He was a busy man and he always found time for the broken, for the needy, for the outcast. He lived to please God perfectly. He had no sin, and yet He was pierced for our sin, crushed for our iniquities, counted among the rebels. Speaker 2 Even when he loved perfectly, no one has ever pleased God like. Speaker 1 Jesus and no one will. If you trust in this person who's pleased God perfectly through his life and death. God is pleased with you, yes, and if you walk by faith in this Jesus, His Spirit will supply all that you need to please the one who takes great pleasure in you. That's great, Father, out of the goodness of your heart, we ask that your Spirit would keep fraudiness even right now, to abandon sin for Jesus 'cause us to see the darkness that is in sin and the light there is in Jesus. The slavery that sin brings, the freedom that Christ brings, causes to run from sin right now. Please, please, for these repentant hearts, help us as a community to be a loving people who love God's design, who love God, who hates him. Teach us what it means to love well. Teach us what it means to work well in all quietness. This is what it means to look at Jesus and to be encouraged and to be moved so that as we see the love that Jesus has for us, we are moved to love others the way Jesus loves us. So have mercy on us, Jesus. It's in your precious name we pray. Amen.