A Church to Follow

Talk a little bit this morning about the importance of following Jesus as our shepherd and it's also important to follow other role models. I mentioned in the introduction this morning that we all follow people who have been a pattern or an example to us whether it's a parent or a teacher or a coach or someone a mentor in the business world or whatever that may have been a real special person to us and we learned a lot from what churches need role models too and there are several churches that Paul writes to in the New Testament that serve as great role models but probably none better than the church in the important city of Thessalonica. It was a city in Greece a city that one of the first cities Paul came to when he entered that entered Europe right after the first city went to Philippi was the city of Thessalonica you can read about it in Acts chapter 17 he was only there a few weeks but evidently had communication there and some of the men who traveled with him were also there at times and the church continued to grow and prosper and deepen quickly and it became it became a really strong church when Paul writes them two letters these letters have very little to say of criticism as a little problem with a few people who got so off base on the on the coming of Christ they quit their jobs and started mooching off of other folks and Paul has to deal with that in the second letter he wrote to them but mostly this is great church and a lot of good said about them and as he addresses them in chapter one you find that this is a good church to follow I want to point out in in 1st Thessalonians chapter one verses five through 10 three reasons why this is a good church to use as a model first of all they are an exemplary people and then we will find they are an enthusiastic people and we will also see that they are an expectant people this is the way Paul describes them and addresses them so let's look first of all in verses five through seven at the fact that they are an exemplary people they are good examples for others we'll actually begin with the the start of the thinking or Paul's expression in verse four for we know brothers and sisters loved by God that he has chosen you in other words we know that you're one of those who are saved why because our gospel came to you not simply with words but also with power with the Holy Spirit and deep conviction you know how we lived among you for your sake now the first thing that that stands out about these exemplary people is there was an exemplary preaching of the word to them I think verse five is one of the most concise and yet powerful statements of what preaching is supposed to be what the preaching of the word is all about it's one of those verses that just grabs people like me by the throat and says this is what ministry is about this is what God called you to do and these kinds of verses just grip my soul they have ever since 45 years ago at age 17 God called me to preach and and I took as one of my life verses in in what I was in Bible college a verse in Corinthians that talks about God forbid if I don't preach I just felt that urgency and I've never lost that I hope I never lose it till I breathe my last breath but verses like this just become so powerful to preachers because this gives us our job description this tells us what we are supposed to do how the gospel came notice it was the gospel message but Paul says our gospel came to you and then he mentions five things about the ministry of the gospel the preaching of the word which are so important so if if you will allow me for just a moment I'm gonna preach to myself and remind myself of these five things you can listen in if you'd like but I also think it's good for every church to understand what the preacher is supposed to do and what the dynamic of preaching is all about this is not just as some people call it just getting up and giving a little talk well that was a nice little talk I cringe every time I hear that because that's not what this is there is something dynamic going on whenever a preacher takes this book seriously and allows himself just to be put in the place where he becomes a conduit of what God wants to do through his word and this verse describes it notice five things about it first of all preaching is the use of words it is the use of words Paul says because our gospel came to you not simply with words but with words yes not simply with words not only with words but the preaching of the gospel is the use of words the preaching of the gospel is not forms and rituals and ceremonies somehow for some reason God has chosen to use the the message of the gospel the preaching the use of human language the use of words to proclaim the gospel Paul talks about this in first Corinthians where he talks about the whole concept of preaching this preaching is foolishness to the Gentiles they don't understand it the world doesn't get what's happening when the preaching of the word is happening God has chosen to use words the spoken message is it is the proclamation of the gospel the proclamation of the Bible that God uses it is not it can be augmented and helped with technology and with other things but it is still the word preached and the words that God uses to explain his word and apply his word which God uses so it is the use of words not just examples not just not just illustrations not just living things that we can see that put it into practice but God has chosen to use the very foolishness the foolish act of preaching Paul says in first Corinthians to save those that believe and so it is the use of words but it is not just words he says because our gospel came to you not simply with words but also with power now this is not necessarily not limited to the power of the Holy Spirit he'll talk about with the Holy Spirit in a moment that's different there's a different kind of power here that he's talking about the word that he uses for power is inward power this is this is the consciousness of knowing that God is working as his word is preached you can sense that conviction is happening you can sense that hearts are being penetrated you can sense that minds are being affected it is an inward power that emanates from the preached word and the word itself this word is powerful and if a preacher preaches this book if you explain what it means apply it to our lives illustrate it so that people can understand what it's saying but if it's coming directly from this word there is a unique and special power that is resident in this book we know that it has the power to change lives it has the power to renew minds Romans 12 too it has the power to save first Peter 123 it's the the word of God which is the seed that God uses to bring life we know that it has the power to to break hearts hardened hearts Jeremiah likened it to a hammer Jeremiah likened it to a fire within his own bones that he couldn't keep from giving out there is power in this book and that's the kind of power he's talking about so it is the preaching of the word itself that is powerful but then thirdly it is accompanied by the power of the Holy Spirit notice he says our gospel came to you not only not simply with words but also with power with the Holy Spirit and deep conviction notice that phrase with the Holy Spirit this is the power this is the energy that is behind the power of the word that I just talked about there is the sense that the Holy Spirit is also at work first of all in the heart of the preacher and secondly in the hearts of the listeners this is something that a lot of people don't understand about preaching and it's one of the most exhilarating things about the ministry of the word and it is that this is the instrument this is the method that that God the Holy Spirit has chosen to use and so God the Spirit works kind of as a conduit through the preacher as he ministers the word to put out with power the word of God which carries its own power and there is a sense in which anybody who has ever preached and I'm not just talking about getting up and talking about the Bible there's a difference between that and and having immersed yourself in the scriptures to the point that it becomes like that fire in your bones and you must proclaim it you must preach it that's the preaching of the Bible there's something that happens that is almost like an out of body experience now please don't please don't get scared here I'm not some kind of mystic or anything like that but there is something that happens when God the Holy Spirit takes over and actually you can sense that God is working through giving you in your mind what words to say I mean I've got a lot of stuff written down here that I want to say but it may not come out exactly like this there are points at which you can sense that the Spirit of God is saying this is the direction you go this is what you say this needs to be emphasized and and that power of the Spirit of God flowing through the heart and mind of a preacher and then the word of God being its own power carrying its own power there is a dynamic there that God has intended in the preaching of his word that is unlike anything else and it is an amazing thing honestly sometimes when you sense that God is doing that and I wish I sensed it more but sometimes when you sense that that's what God is doing it is almost as though you're standing beside yourself watching it happen it is the most incredible thing I've ever experienced apart from leading a person to Christ and that's what Paul's talking about here is the in working power of the Word of God but the power of the Holy Spirit through the actual act of preaching the Word of God and then he says something else goes into preaching it is not only words but with power with the Holy Spirit and deep conviction this deep conviction is that the conviction on the part of the preacher that this is God's Word and it does have supernatural power I could get up and tell you funny stories I could get up and give you history lessons I could get up and do all kinds of other things if I wanted to but none of that would carry the power and there would be no conviction to that or it might be fun and it might be entertaining but there is something about this book that we know by conviction by deepness of purpose by confidence that if you preach this book God is going to do something he has promised his word will not return void and I will assure you that conviction is so deeply rooted in my soul that it consumes me there it's the only thing that keeps me going at times if the only thing that kept the only thing that kept me going in ministry was the the the visible results I would have quit a long time ago but I learned a long time ago that God does things through the preaching of His Word that sometimes don't show up for years and sometimes you never see with the human eye but God does in people's hearts and I am I believe that kind of conviction I believe that with with every breath in my being if I didn't I would not be able to preach His Word there's simply not enough visible return for the investment made and so I have this deep conviction that God does work through His Word in ways that I may never know and I don't need to know that's God's business and you'll take care of all of that in eternity the results will be seen then but I am so convinced of that I would stake my life on it that is what preaching is all about and then there's one final element of it and it's the lifestyle of the preacher he says my gospel came not it came to you not simply with words but also with power with the Holy Spirit and deep conviction you know how we lived among you for your sake conduct and character must accompany the message of the Word of God there must be and no preacher is perfect at this certainly not me but there must be godly motives there must be an unselfish heart of service there must be a pure lifestyle through which then God chooses to evidence His power to proclaim the Word of God which is powerful in and of itself and He will accomplish what He intends to do with it that is what the powerful ministry of the Word is all about and and there is no greater privilege in all of life and to be called to be a part of that I read this about twice a month not this book but the forward of this book this is a commentary by Kent Hughes I do not have his commentary on first Thessalonians need to get it he's written books the commentaries on every book of the New Testament he's preached through the New Testament and these are excellent commentaries this is one of Colossians but he writes a forward in every one of his commentaries he was a preaching pastor at college church in Wheaton Illinois I had him for a professor in in my doctoral program and I've heard him preach many times and he's a tremendous preacher but he he writes this and I'm going to just share it with you tonight because it's such an important part of how I feel and and it's it's what he summarizes what we've just seen in this verse he puts in the front of every one of his commentaries a word to those who preach the Word he says there are times when I am preaching that I have especially sensed the pleasure of God I usually become aware of it through the unnatural silence the ever present coughing ceases and the pews stop creaking bringing an almost physical quiet to the sanctuary through which my words sail like arrows I love that imagery I experience a heightened eloquence so that the cadence and volume of my voice intensify the truth I am preaching there is nothing quite like it the Holy Spirit filling one's sales the sense of his pleasure and the awareness that something is happening among ones here is this experiences of course not unique for thousands of preachers have similar experiences even greater ones and every one of us I know he would say this and I would too we wish we experienced it all the time we don't but there are times when you sense that God has chosen to mesh all of the elements of what we've just seen in verse 5 together and he's doing something entirely outside what any human is capable of doing just through the preached word he goes on to say what has happened when this takes place how do we account for this sense of his smile the answer for me can't use has come from the ancient rhetorical categories of logos ethos and paythas three Greek words and it'll explain what they mean the first reason for his smile is the logos in terms of preaching logos means word it's a Greek word for word in terms of preaching God's word this means as we stand before God's people to proclaim his word we've done our homework we have exegeded the passage mind the significance of its words in their context and a plowed applied sound hermeneutical that's Bible interpretation principles in interpreting the text so that we understand what its words meant to its hearers and it means that we have labored long until we can express in a sentence what the theme of the text is so that our outline springs from the text of scripture then our preparation will be such that as we preach we will not be preaching our own thoughts about God's word but God's actual word his logos this is fundamental to pleasing him in preaching that's exactly what Paul has said then he goes on to say the second element in knowing God's smile in preaching is ethos ethos is is ethic morality he says it means what you are as a person there is a danger in dimmick to preaching which is having your hands and heart caught arise by holy things philips Brooks who was a great preacher of a hundred years ago or more philips Brooks illustrated by the analogy of a train conductor who comes to believe that he has been to the places he announces because of his long and loud heralding of them you see the analogy there you see the danger and that is why Brooks insisted that preaching must be the bringing of truth through personality though we can never perfectly embody the truth we preach we must be subject to it long for it and make it as much a part of our ethos as possible as the Puritan William Ames said next to scriptures nothing makes us sermon more to pierce than when it comes out of the inward affection of the heart without any affectation without any put on when a preacher's ethos backs up his logos there will be the pleasure of God and then he says last there is pathos which means personal passion and conviction David Hume the Scottish preacher and skeptic was once challenged as you was seen going to hear George Whitfield preach I thought you do not believe in the gospel Hume replied I don't but he does just so when a preacher believes what he preaches there will be passion and this belief and requisite passion will know the smile of God the pleasure of God as a matter of logos the word ethos what you are and pathos your passion and can't use finishes with as you preach the word may you experience his smile the Holy Spirit in your sales I read that about twice a month because it summarizes for me what Paul says in verse five this is my life this is my heart and there's nothing like it in the world I hope I die preaching I know that I will not always be able to pastor but I hope I die preaching I love what Chuck Swindall said I hope I die in the pulpit my chin hitting it on the way down because that is my life and my heart it has been for 45 years and I hope it will be till I die and exemplary people begins with the preaching of the word and when Paul said that's what he did and that's what happened that led to a strong church that led to an exemplary people my that clock is a horribly fast moving clock but let's at least talk about the exemplary response to the word on the part of these people in verses six and seven their response to the word of God is indicated Paul has talked about how he preached the word now in verse six you became imitators of us and of the Lord for you welcomed the message in the midst of severe suffering with the joy given by the Holy and so you became a model to all the believers in Macedonia and Kaya their response to the word is exemplary it is exactly what our response should be to the word of God there are there are four things about it first of all he says they were imitators they became imitators I love that word it means literally to mimic and it does not carry the negative connotation of the English word when we think of an imitator that that's a negative connotation does that's someone who doesn't have enough originality or gumption about themselves to come up with a thought on their own and so they just imitate someone else but that's not the idea here it's not a negative thought it's a positive thought what Paul is saying is these people believe the message and then they began to live their new life in Christ by looking around for models to follow examples to follow people who were walking as God wanted them to walk so that they could imitate them and so they looked first of all at Paul and they said we're going to imitate you you've brought us the word of God now we're going to imitate your life and then notice he says and of the Lord now that that order is important for new believers for young believers new converts they will naturally look first at the people in the church who have led them to the Lord or the people in the church who they've looked up to and that's not a bad thing which highlights for us who've known the Lord for a while the critical importance of keeping our lives close to Christ and living as he wants us to live because somebody somewhere some younger person some child is looking up to you every one of us can probably think of people like that when I first came to know Christ when I was nine years old obviously preacher Jimmy was one of those people for me and I looked up to him all the rest of his life but there was someone else that I looked up to also there were lots of folks that I looked up to as a kid in this church one of them was Mary Wade Mary Wade was my high school Sunday school teacher and it was probably the most dynamic class in the church and everybody who was a teenager in the sixties that was here at Johnston Chapel understood Mary Wade fired us up with passion for the word of God as teenagers she was an amazing teacher and I will never forget she was such a godly example for us it's natural when you're young either chronologically or young in the faith to look up to someone else to become an imitator of someone else to say I want to be like that person and that that again highlights the importance for those of us who are a little further down the road to live the kind of life that is worthy of being imitated but but soon hopefully eventually at least that following that imitating gravitates toward the Lord because really you recognize that what you've been seeing all along is what the Lord has done in that person's life and so you want to you want to move on to follow the one they're imitating to imitate the one they're imitating and that's the Lord and so that's why Paul does it says it the way he does you became imitators of us and of the Lord so their response to the word was to become followers to become imitators Paul was aware of the importance of that in responding to the word they were exemplary in that but the second thing they were exemplary in is they were willing to suffer in their response to the word he says you became imitators of us and of the Lord for you welcomed the message in the midst of severe suffering let me stop right there for now you welcomed the message in the midst of severe suffering now I want us to let those words sink in for a moment they accepted the message willingly they welcomed it voluntarily they embraced it even though they knew it would mean suffering they took it readily into their hearts and into their lives even though they knew it would cost them Paul came to Thessalonica from Philippi he had been in Philippi for some time and it preached the gospel and you remember what had happened there he got thrown into prison and might have even been killed for his faith there except that earthquake you remember flipping jailer gets saved the people basically running out of town where does he go he goes to Thessalonica and in Thessalonica they know the story they've heard the story they know that the message Paul brings is not a message that is going to be readily accepted by everyone in the community it's probably going to bring the same kind of suffering that Paul experienced in Philippi and it did within three weeks there are more threats to the life of Paul and those who are receiving his message in that city of Thessalonica and so there was suffering there they were willing however to suffer it was a courageous act to follow the Lord even though they knew it would mean suffering when knowing that you're going to follow Christ brings derision or violence for them that's exactly what it meant it meant self denial it meant they had to be willing to give up their comforts it meant they had to be willing to give up honor in the community even their position in the community for some of them maybe their jobs it meant their jobs for some of them meant they would be kicked out of their families for some of them it meant they might be persecuted and maybe even give their lives and yet they embraced the message I don't think we really understand today I mean I don't I don't want suffering I don't want persecution I'm not looking for that I'm not anxious to experience that but I don't think we understand what it was like in the first century to commit your life to Christ for many people it was like a death sentence and certainly meant they might lose everything they had if they did not give their lives it's difficult for us to really appreciate that what it cost them but they were willing to embrace it in spite of the cost which they knew they had to know it would come there may be costs to pay in the future for those of us who know Jesus Christ there may be I don't know I'm no prophet nor the son of a prophet I'm a king and the son of a king with I'm not a little prophet so I don't know what will come but there may welcome increasing polarization in our society and culture it's obvious that with legal challenges and things that are happening even this past week in the Supreme Court that Christian morality and biblical truth is being pushed more and more to the fringes and I think it will not be too long until we're seeing as some kind of radical fanatics and bigots I don't think that's outside the realm of possibility in our culture and I wonder what we will do when we're faced with that and this is not politics I'm not talking Democrat Republic and I don't care the party or who's in office I'm talking about the drift of our culture which runs across party lines in many ways because the drift of our culture is driven by a worldview dominated by Satan himself Satan's not a Democrat or Republican or an independent or whatever he's wanting to push his priorities regardless and I think our culture is going to move further and further that way I wonder will we be willing to suffer will we be willing to to to take our stand for Christ even when the going gets hard they were an exemplary church in their response to the word and that they were willing to suffer thirdly they were willing to suffer with a joyful outlook did you catch that again in verse six you became imitators of us and of the Lord for you welcomed the message in the midst of severe suffering with the joy given by the Holy Spirit yes they were willing to suffer they knew they would suffer but this outward adversity that they were going through was balanced with an amazing inner experience of joyful outlook on life and a joyful outlook on what they were experiencing because there's something I believe if I understand the Bible correctly there's something about suffering which lifts our eyes above what's happening here and toward our real home and we begin to gain more of an eternal perspective on this life I think that's the way it works and if if I understand the examples of scripture if people are willing to endure suffering for Christ it elevates their vision of life to an eternal perspective so that you begin to interpret what's happening here in light of eternity and you can see that the sufferings we have here are only temporary and the real joy is knowing this is not our home anyway and we have a home waiting for us and a savior who's waiting for us and that brings great joy and to know that if we are faithful to him we will hear his well done good and faithful servant this is not just some kind of superficial excitement or kind of bubbly happiness that the Thessalonians had not at all this is a deep seated power of the Holy Spirit this is joy given by the Holy Spirit Paul says this is not an escape from reality this is a clear looking through the hard reality at what is beyond and what is beyond brings joy you see that's what got Jesus through the cross right he brews 12 to who for the joy that was before him endured the cross despising the shame you see Jesus was looking through the adversity through the shame through the awful excruciating physical pain and even the spiritual separation from his father he was looking through all of that beyond all of that above all of that to the joy that lay before him what was the joy that lay before him being the head of the church welcoming us into his family gathering a flock of people to whom he would be their shepherd that was the joy that lay before him that's what was happening here a joyful outlook this is not to pie in the sky this is not a bitter complaining about everything here and just hoping we can finally get through it to get to heaven though this is a confident looking forward to what will happen there which gives us an inner sense of peace and hope that joyfully carries us through even the adversities of life that's what that's what this is about but he says because of that their response to the word forthly was they they became examples to others you see it there in verse 7 and so you became a model to all the believers in Macedonia and the chaos you became an example a model the word literally means a mark left by a blow and it was used of impressing an image on a coin a blow a mark is left you're that kind of example to others you are a pattern a model to other people this word is used six or seven more times in the New Testament it always always means that model example pattern that we're to be to other people into amazing at first they imitated Paul then they realize okay let's imitate Christ that he's imitating let's imitate him and then now people are imitating them that's the model of Christian growth as new young believers we're just looking to other people to figure out how this works how am I supposed to live what am I supposed to do and then as we grow in mature we realize our real model is Christ and we begin to follow closely to him and desire to become more like him and then as we're doing that and moving toward him we look behind us and there's some folks following us now that's exactly what happened to the Thessalonians what a great example they are to us we're gonna have to stop there they're an exemplary people but maybe we'll come back to this and and see what Paul says about them being an enthusiastic people and an expectant people because this is a great church to model a church after let's pray together Father thank you for the church at Thessalonica thank you Father for the the work which was raised up there through the apostle Paul and your spirits working through his preaching there Lord they are a great example for us Paul's a great example for me this church is a great example for us as a church help us Lord to receive your word with the same kind of joyful embrace no matter what it means by we have suffering may we embrace it joyfully and live it out to such an extent that people become imitators of us as we imitate you or it happens to be this kind of church exemplary church to other people just to be that way individually and as a group we pray in Jesus name