March 25, 2006 - Dean Honnette, Hope Center (Pleasant Hill)

March 25, 2006

1 Thessalonians 5:16-24
Dean Honnette, Hope Center (Pleasant Hill)

Read the passage and respond to these questions:
1. How many commands appear in this passage? Arrange them by category.
2. If you were to obey these admonitions faithfully, what area(s) of your life would be most affected?
What a great passage! Paul starts with these rapid-fire commands addressing the wide-ranging areas of our lives—from internal attitudes to church activities to our moral behavior. If we could take a day of so to consider each command perhaps we could absorb them, but taken in altogether we can be left feeling quite overwhelmed. One unconscious response we might have to reduce that feeling is to pick a couple of commands to take seriously and shelve the others as too much to carry. Another escape route is to start thinking about people in my life who need to obey one of these instructions “more than I do” – “Sally should just pray more consistently”; “Joe needs to ‘test everything’ and not be so gullible.” Then I can conclude—since they need this command more than I do—I don’t need to worry about applying it to myself. Or we could simply lie to ourselves and tell ourselves that we are doing really well in all of them and go blindly on our way.

The truth is that none of us can keep all these spiritual plates spinning consistently on our own. Perhaps the healthiest response to these machine-gunned commands is to be overwhelmed and to throw up our hands in surrender. But in order to move forward on the road of discipleship we need to be embracing all eight of these instructions. In order to progress toward the lofty goal Paul places before us in verse 23 – “That our whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ” obeying three or four or even five of these eight won’t do. We need to obey all eight so we need help.
That’s why the last phrase in this text is such very good news – “The one who calls you is faithful and He will do it.” Jesus has called us on the wonderful and difficult path to wholeness of “spirit, soul and body”. But He does not intend for us to try to walk that path alone or by our own strength. We can only move forward in obedience to these eight life giving instructions by His strength working in and through us. He obeyed these commands completely when he walked this planet so He can surely help us to move in that direction today.

So, which of these eight commands do you find easiest to embrace? the hardest? By identifying these as one or the other, what temptation must you avoid?
Prayer
Lord Jesus, I long to be whole in spirit, soul and body, so I declare my dependency on your faithfulness today to call me, and move me forward in blessed obedience. Amen.