At its core, work is…? – 1 Thessalonians 4:11–12; 5:14, Part 1

How many hours do you work each week? Ever totaled up a close approximation of the hours you will work in your lifetime?  If you work for 45 years, 50 weeks per year, 45 hours per week, you will have worked over one hundred thousand hours in your life.  Perhaps the only activity we do more than work is sleep. 

Given the sheer amount of time we spend working, it makes sense that we would want to have God’s perspective on work. 

Have you ever thought about that?  That God might have a perspective on work?  He does.  In fact, God talks about work quite often in the Bible. 

Right from the very beginning we see God working, creating, and then resting. In Genesis 1, we read about God creating all things, and in Genesis 2, verses 2 and 3, we read that “God rested from all his work…of creating.”  Our God is a working God. 

When God creates humanity, he declares in Genesis 1, verse 26, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.”

God works to create humans, and then he gives those humans a mandate to work.  In Genesis 1:26, part of that work is to rule over God’s creation. That “rule over” is a reference to the idea that we are stewards of God’s creation.  A steward is one who works to lead and guide and care for someone else’s property and possession.  The fundamental understanding of human work is that it is stewardship work.  We steward God’s creation, which means that we care for it like God would want us to.

Scan ahead to Genesis 2, verse 15, and we learn that when God creates the man, God “put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.”  Then God decides that the man shouldn’t be alone, so he brings animals to the man to name the animals.  More work on God’s part, and more work that the man does.  God and man are working together. 

But no animal is a suitable as an equal partner to the man.  So God creates woman.  Eventually, in chapter 3, the man and woman disobey God, and for their punishment, God declares that work will be difficult. The pain of childbearing.  Farming the ground will be toilsome. 

So there is a sense that God institutes work, he is a working God, and he invites us to join with him in working.  Both men and women are workers. Work is generative, creative, productive.  It is toilsome, laborious, and sometimes difficult. 

To summarize, work is good, work is instituted by God, for the good of God’s creation.  The primary way we view our work is that we are stewards of God’s creation.  From that foundation of the goodness of work, we turn to 1 Thessalonians.

In 1 Thessalonians, we are reading a letter that an ancient missionary, Paul, wrote to a group of Christians in the Greco-Roman city of Thessalonica.  In the letter he is urging them to continue living a life that is pleasing to God.  Last week, Molly Stouffer blogged on some verses in chapters four and five that talk about brotherly love.  This week, I’m also in chapters four and five, but my verses are about work.

We get started in the next post.

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What kind of workers (and retirees) does God want us to be? – 1 Thessalonians 4:11-12; 5:14, Preview

When I was working on my doctoral dissertation in 2020-2022, I began writing about organizations.  My goal was to examine what the Bible has to say about organizations.  One of my first hurdles was to define organizations.  

When you think of an organization, what comes to your mind?  I think about an organization as a large business.  But in my doctoral classes, because I was in the organizational theology track, we spent time talking about a definition of organizations, and we concluded that an organization is “people working together.”  Given that definition, you soon realize that there are lot of organizations.  

Think about how many instances of “people working together” there are in the world.  Families, neighbors, friend groups, religious groups, volunteer groups, non-profits, educational institutions, health agencies, governments, athletics, creatives, and of course businesses of all shapes and sizes. My guess is that you are probably a member (formally or informally) of at least a handful of organizations.

So I had to narrow my doctoral dissertation.  I decided to focus on businesses (and ultimately changed that to togetherness).  Most dissertations start with a literature review, which is a search for and reading of books and articles by people who have worked on the field of study one’s dissertation is related to.  To study business, I got a whole bunch of books about the intersection of theology, the bible, and work.  

Here are a few titles:

  • Rituals For Work by Ozenc and Hagen
  • Bring Your Human To Work by Keswin
  • The Fifth Discipline: The Art & Practice of the Learning Organization by Senge
  • Framing Organizations by Bolman and Deal
  • Every Good Endeavor: Connecting Your Work To God’s Work by Keller and Alsdorf
  • Kingdom Calling: Vocational Stewardship For The Common Good by Sherman

There are so many more books out there about this topic.  If you’ve read one of the above, or a different one, what do you think? Do you have a favorite book on the intersection of work and biblical theology?

Whether you are an employed worker of some kind, whether you are retired, whether you are unemployed, or a student, we can all benefit greatly from attempting to think about our work from the perspective of biblical theology.  To put it another way: What kind of workers does God want us to be?  

This coming week on the blog, as we continue our study through 1st Thessalonians, Paul teaches Christians about how they should think about and perform their work.  I think you’ll find what Paul says to be very meaningful, no matter your station in life. Are you working like God wants you to?

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What a church community should be doing – 1 Thessalonians 4:9-10; 5:11, 14, 27, Part 5

Editor’s Note: I once again welcome Molly Stouffer as guest blogger. Molly is from Hagerstown, MD, studying Pastoral Ministries at Lancaster Bible College.

What does your church community do? Are they doing what they should be doing? In this week’s final post on 1st Thessalonians 4:9-10; 5:11, 14, 27, Paul emphasizes something important any church community should be doing.

To finish his thoughts on brotherly love, Paul gives the church a solemn promise in 1st Thessalonians 5:27. This verse emphasizes the significance of sharing this letter with others. This letter could not be overlooked because it’s contents are essential for them.

Paul, in his wisdom, puts them under oath. This is a solemn promise, which means they better follow through it. Why? Because it is a promise before the Lord. This means God will be watching them to ensure they are held accountable.

Wow, that’s a heavy burden. Why?

Because Paul wants them to really understand how important what he shared is; this can’t be taken lightly. It is so important that the command is to not only read this letter, but to share it. This letter and its contents are not for themselves only, it is for all the brothers and sisters.

So what does that show us? It reveals we need to read and learn in community, a community who loves and builds each other up. Paul one last time is emphasizing community, and what it should be doing.

So I want to ask you, what should we, the church, be doing as a community? We need to be loving one another, building each other up in the Spirit. We need to share the gospel with the lost, and provide for the weak in what they need. In all we do as a community, we need to love each other and build each other up. As we go from here, take this with you, don’t forget it. Brothers and sisters, love each other, build each other up.

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Brotherly love is patient – 1 Thessalonians 4:9-10; 5:11, 14, 27, Part 4

Editor’s Note: I once again welcome Molly Stouffer as guest blogger. Molly is from Hagerstown, MD, studying Pastoral Ministries at Lancaster Bible College.

When you’re watching TV and a commercial comes on, do you change the channel or wait for the show to come back on? When you’re watching a YouTube video and there is an ad before it, do you skip the ad as soon as those grueling 5 seconds are up, or do you wait? When you’re in a conversation with someone and they begin to stutter, do you wait for them to finish their thought or does your mind begin to wander?

Your answers to these questions can give you a sense of your ability to be patient.

We’ve been studying a selections of verses about brotherly love in 1 Thessalonians chapters 4 and 5. While Paul encourages the Thessalonians to encourage the weak (see previous post), he also says to be patient with everyone. Paul could have said be patient with one another, in keeping with the theme of brotherly love and encouragement. But no, Paul says be patient with everybody.

Paul is telling the Christians that they are to extend patience to every single person on the earth. Regardless of their standing in society, regardless of their faith, regardless of their attitude, regardless of the fact if they even deserve our patience. We are called to be patient.

It’s not just patience when it is easy for us, or convenient for our time, it’s all people at any time. How we react in the little mundane moments is a deeper reflection of our heart. How we can treat others in small interactions reveals our patience.

But when we take a step back from patience for a moment and look at the whole of what we’re talking about this week, which is brotherly love, it can almost seem like patience feels a bit out of place. What does patience have to do with love and encouragement?

In Galatians 5:22-23, we read a very familiar passage, the Fruit of the Spirit. And the first of the fruits listed? It’s apples. No, I’m just kidding, it’s love. That’s what we’re talking about this week, a love that’s brotherly and familiar. What gets listed just three fruits later? Patience.

In Galatians, Paul is connecting love and patience to be a fruit of the Spirit. Why this connection is so important to make is that these are natural results of being filled with the Spirit. Paul is reminding the Christians that they are to people who have love that is evident in their lives. Because they live in the Spirit, they live and they love, as a result, they should also be patient people. Love and patience are a natural response of being a person filled with the Spirit.

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How to be an encourager – 1 Thessalonians 4:9-10; 5:11, 14, 27, Part 3

Editor’s Note: I once again welcome Molly Stouffer as guest blogger. Molly is from Hagerstown, MD, studying Pastoral Ministries at Lancaster Bible College.

It can be easy to encourage someone who’s got it all going well. But what do we do when someone comes to us after they lose a job? Their relationship ends? A family is estranged from each other? A traumatic accident occurs? Are we willing to encourage those who cannot be easily encouraged? Or what about those who are not living in a way that God intends? The person in relationship in lust? The one who lives a double lifestyle? A glutton? A cheater? A liar? How can we encourage them? How can we encourage those who are so broken and hurt?

Paul shows us how. In 1 Thessalonians 5, verse 14, Paul teaches us how to encourage the broken. Paul knows this kind of encouragement can be hard, so he gets personal again. He addresses the church as brothers and sisters. He’s saying to them that this is how we love them, this is how we encourage them.

Warning and encouraging go hand in hand and they inform our approach to evangelism. We need to tell people about the gospel, about the grace and mercy of our Savior Jesus Christ. I’m in a class this semester called Evangelism and Discipleship. This class has been quite a challenge. Our main work and assignments for the class are, you guessed it, discipleship and evangelizing. And, boy, is that out of my comfort zone.

However, being forced to evangelize has been an eye-opening experience to see how open people are to talking about God. I found myself at the Apple Store in the mall a couple weeks back. And somehow, during my interaction with the Apple Genius employee, God helped share about Him with the employee. God places us in unique circumstances and relationships, to use us to share about Him. What a blessing that is to see and be a part of.

So when we come in contact to the disheartened, encourage them, tell them the Good News. When you come into contact with someone who’s idle and unsure, honestly talk about the reality of their situation, but don’t forget the good news. Yes we’re sinners, yes we’re imperfect, yes we could never make it to heaven by our own accord. But. God.

God sent His son to live a perfect life. God had His son put to death to pay the price of every sin we commit. God raised Jesus from the dead three days later, forever conquering sin and death. We are sinners, but God made a way.

One last note from my class, and something I want to encourage and challenge you with. This may be a hard truth and reality to face, but one we need to understand. My professor shares this quote so often, I have it memorized: “How much do you have to hate someone to not share the gospel with them?”

That word “hate” might sound harsh, but think about it. When God’s love changes us from the inside out, when it really changes our hearts, we are going to want to share, we are going to want to tell people about a new life in Him. And it’s not being pushy or rude; you are telling God’s story. You are sharing a story of a lost sheep returning home, or a son running home to his father (Luke 15). So, listen to other people’s stories, and then share your story, share your testimony, and they might just listen too.

In verse 14 Paul describes two additional ways to encourage people: help the weak and be patient with everyone. From the beginning of the early church in Acts 2, the church worked hard to help those in need and find ways to be patient with each person.

So, let’s break this down, helping the weak. In order to help the weak, the weak must be identified. I think weak can break down into two categories; in spirit and in flesh.

Encouraging the weak in spirit. Before anyone finds Jesus, we all have a desire to be fixed. Deep down we all are imperfect and broken creatures, longing for a savior. Perhaps the weak in spirit don’t know the hope of the Savior, or they have not seen the depths of His love. There are so many people in this world, lost in their sin, looking and longing for a savior. The thing they’re looking for is the savior we know and love. So when we help those who are weak in spirit, we help them by introducing them to their creator and savior. We show them the love of God and what He did just to spend forever with them.

Sometimes, however, the weak in spirit are those in the church. Sometimes we have doubts and fears. Sometimes we forget the truths of scripture. Sometimes we wrestle with God. And we are still to help the weak, and this comes in loving encouragement.

Encouraging the weak in the flesh. For a variety of reasons, many people struggle with poverty, hunger, homelessness, and addictions. So many people have been hurt and abused, left behind by a unloving parent or maybe an unfaithful spouse. So many people are poor and broken, and Christians, we are called to care for them.

I think it’s really easy to forget how blessed we are. If you can go home right now, turn on a faucet, and drink a glass of clean water, you’re in a minority. Almost four billion people in the world either have no clean water in their homes, or cannot even access clean water.

Maybe you rationalize this with the fact that we’re in America. But you’d be wrong to assume America doesn’t contribute to this number. 1 in 245 households in the US do not have access to clean water. 1 in every 500 Americans are living on the streets. Over a million Americans cannot even flush a toilet, due to lack of water and or money. That is this country, that is our country.

And as Christians, we cannot turn an eye to these numbers. Paul is telling the church then, and the church now, take care of those in needs. If someone has a need you can meet, do it! If you have clean water, a home, and a toilet that can flush, you have more resources than almost 25% of the country.

We are so blessed by God. He gives us clean water, warm homes, stable jobs, and loving families. We are so blessed. And because God has provided this to us, it is our responsibility to be a good steward of what we’re given. So I want to challenge you; how can you be a good steward of what God’s given you? Whether that’s money, time, resources, skills, or abilities, God has not given you these things for you to keep them to yourself, so use them!

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Participate in the flowing movement of encouragement – 1 Thessalonians 4:9-10; 5:11, 14, 27, Part 2

Editor’s Note: I once again welcome Molly Stouffer as guest blogger. Molly is from Hagerstown, MD, studying Pastoral Ministries at Lancaster Bible College.

Did you know that there is flowing movement of encouragement? At the end of 1 Thessalonians verse 10, Paul describes a flowing movement of encouragement. The movements starts with the Christians he encouraged. Then the movement keeps flowing as they encourage one another in the church. Finally the movement continues as the Christians encourage those beyond the church. Let’s take a deeper look at Paul’s flowing movement of encouragement.

The flowing movement of encouragement starts in verse 10, where we read that Paul, Silas, and Timothy (see Acts 17:1–4; 1 Thessalonians 1:1) have been encouraging the church. The apostles’ encouragement comes from a place of knowing and living in God’s love. Their encouragement is for the church to love even more, that brotherly love we talked about in the previous post.

In case you missed it, twice within these two verses (1 Thessalonians 4:9–10), Paul affirmed the Christians in Thessalonica that they were already participating in the flowing movement of encouragement. Paul in verse 9 said they have already been taught, and then in verse 10 Paul encourages them to keep encouraging even more than they already were. This church knew and practiced brotherly love, and yet Paul says “I urge you to do so more!” Keep the flowing movement of encouragement going!

Encouragement starts with love from God, but jump over to 1 Thessalonians 5:11, and we see what comes next in the flowing movement of encouragement: the church. As Paul wrote in chapter 4, verses 9–10, “you’re already doing this.” Does this stand true for your church? Are you already participating in the flowing movement of encouragement?

Faith Church is my college church, and we have a wonderful, supporting community that looks for ways to encourage and build each other up. Whether it’s willingness to serve in ministries or with the refreshments after service, or willingness to lead songs or give announcements. I also see us encouraging one another when we mention Fruit of the Spirit sighting.

That support for other believers goes beyond our immediate church family. We open the doors and sanctuary to other churches, coming from different styles, backgrounds and languages. I see it in our worship service prayer times, when we pray each week for a church in our community.

Just as Paul is encouraging the Thessalonians to continue encouraging one another, I want to encourage you too. Keep building each other up. Keep looking for the fruits of the Spirit, keep praying for other churches, keep serving where help is needed. Keep being there and loving each other, because that’s what we’ve been called to do, love. We know love is so important, or Paul wouldn’t have mentioned it four times in two verses. We know love is so important because John said that God Himself is love. Brothers and sisters, love.

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Where true love is found – 1 Thessalonians 4:9-10; 5:11, 14, 27, Part 1

Editor’s Note: I once again welcome Molly Stouffer as guest blogger. Molly is from Hagerstown, MD, studying Pastoral Ministries at Lancaster Bible College.

Almost a month ago, my favorite football team, the Eagles won the Super Bowl. And the week following that, there was great big parade to celebrate in the City of Brotherly Love. The name “Philadelphia” is from the Greek word meaning “brotherly love,” philia. For the past couple weeks, we have been studying Paul’s first letter to the church in Thessalonica. In 1st Thessalonians chapter 4, verse 9, Paul mentions brotherly love, philia. I wonder if Thessalonica was known as the city of brotherly love too?

To get the full picture that Paul is painting about brotherly love, we’ll have to jump between a few verses in chapters 4 and 5. These verses blend together in such a unique way, highlighting brotherly love. In the first few blog posts I’ll cover chapter 4, verses 9-10, and then later in the week, chapter 5, verses 11, 14, and 27.

I want to talk a little bit about this familial language in these verses. We know Paul didn’t get to spend much time in Thessalonica, and yet he knows their love. He knows their love so well, that in just two verses, love is mentioned four times.

And what goes right along with these phrases? Familial language. Christian family, brothers and sisters, its very personal and intimate language.

If this family language wasn’t enough, Paul highlights the father-like nature of God with us as His children. In verse 9, Paul says God has taught the Christians. God is our Heavenly Father, who guides and teaches us. We see in verse 9 these Christians already have love for each other why? Because their Father has taught them well.

We know from 1 John 4:16, that God is love. He himself encompasses what love is. So of course, God can teach us what love is, because it is Him! God is love and God is the perfect example of love for the church then, and the church today. And because God is love, love can only be found in Him.

1 Thessalonians 4, verses 9 and 10 aren’t the only places we find family language in the passage; our last verse, 5:27, ends with “brothers.” Paul intentionally uses familial language to begin and end this topic because it all starts with love. Without brotherly love established, what Paul invokes this church to do is meaningless.

They are to do these things with love, from love. They are to act because of the love given to them by God, and to share that love in their lives and actions. God gave them love, or rather revealed His love, when He sent His son to die in our place. I’m getting ahead of myself a bit, but we will come back to this idea of how God showed His love for us through Jesus.

What Paul introduces is the big idea in this passage: The church is called to love each other and encourage one another, and to provide for the lost, where our actions are flowing out of God’s love for us.

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The Brotherly Shove and the Bible – 1 Thessalonians 4:9–10; 5:11, 14, 27

Did you hear that at least one NFL team wants the NFL to ban The Brotherly Shove?  The potential of that ban is big news for all you Philadelphia Eagles fans.

Given that I live in Philadelphia Eagles territory, I suspect that the Eagles are the most popular NFL team in my church family. It sure helps that Eagles have been very good the past few years, having played in three Super Bowls and won two since 2018.  In the last few years, one of the reasons the Eagles have been so successful is their signature play, The Brotherly Shove. 

The Eagles use The Brotherly Shove when they need to advance the ball a short distance to get a first down or touch down.  Here’s how it works: the Eagles’ giant offensive linemen crouch down low in tight shoulder-to-shoulder formation.  Then the center hikes the ball to the quarterback, and the quarterback hugs the ball, following closely behind the line as they rush forward.  Meanwhile other players shove the quarterback, pushing his rear end to give him extra forward momentum.  (That’s why this play is also called “The Tush Push”!).  The play is a variation on the classic quarterback sneak.

It’s really a matter of physics.  The bigger, heavier, stronger Philadelphia line bowls over the opposition’s wall, and the Eagles advance.  Check out this article for how the play has been very successful for the Eagles.  No surprise, some fans and NFL teams want the NFL to ban the play, citing it as boring or unfair.  

The Brotherly Shove also illustrates the power of togetherness.  All those guys working together in unity for victory.  What’s more, I love the title “The Brotherly Shove” to describe a uniquely Philadelphian move, because the name Philadelphia means “The City of Brotherly Love.”  

There are multiple words in the New Testament for love, and one of those words, phileo, means “brotherly love.”  In our series through 1st Thessalonians, Paul next teaches about the importance of brotherly love.  What is brotherly love?

This coming week I once again welcome guest blogger Molly Stouffer who will be writing about brotherly love from 1 Thessalonians 4:9–10; 5:11, 14, 27.  Molly is a pastoral ministry student at Lancaster Bible College.

Does God punish people? – 1 Thessalonians 4:1–8, Part 5

There are many passages in the Bible that talk about God’s punishment.  Today’s passage is one of them. I have to admit that I don’t like the idea of a God who punishes.  Especially considering that there are loads of other passages in Scripture that talk about God’s love. “God is love,” John writes (1 John 4:7–8), and God lavishes that love on us (1 John 3:1).

So God is a loving God, and at the same time, he sometimes punishes people. The classic passage that brings these two ideas together is Exodus 34:6–7, “The Lord, the Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation.”

What does it mean that God sometimes punishes?  In Exodus 34, we learn that God punishes, but we do not learn how.

In 1 Thessalonians 4:1–8, Paul has been teaching about how Christians are to pursue purity, and he focuses on sexuality. To demonstrate how serious he is about this, take a look at what he writes in verses 6–8,

“The Lord will punish all those who commit such sins, as we told you and warned you before. For God did not call us to be impure, but to live a holy life. Therefore, anyone who rejects this instruction does not reject a human being but God, the very God who gives you his Holy Spirit.”

Clearly there are Christians who commit sexual immorality who never seem to be punished by God in any discernible way.  So we should not interpret Paul’s words as meaning that when you commit a sexual sin, you will automatically and instantly be zapped by God.

So what is Paul saying about God punishing people?  There are options for how to interpret this passage and others that mention God punishing humans.

One option is to suggest that God removes his blessing.  In the Old Testament, God said the if the Israelites disobeyed him, they would be cursed, which was a removal of protection or blessing (for example, see my post on Deuteronomy 26–28). The Israelites did in fact rebel against God many times, and God allowed them to be attacked and defeated and even exiled by other nations. 

Another option is that God allows us to face the natural consequences of the sin.  In Romans 1:24–32, Paul repeats the phrase, “God gave them over,” referring to his people who sinned facing consequences. He doesn’t keep us from those consequences.  Perhaps, even, the sin itself is part of the consequence, because our sinful behavior so often affects us, our guilt, our brokenness, shame, and all the hurt that comes from it.  Like the domino picture above. We set something in motion when we sin, and God allows it to play out till the end.

Notice, though, in 1 Thessalonians 4:6–8, that Paul does not specify what he means when he refers to God’s punishment.  Therefore I think it is important that we also admit that we are speculating here, and we really don’t know how Paul envisions God’s punishment in this passage. 

Even though we don’t have a clear idea of what God’s punishment means, Paul also does not say, “The Lord will be happy when you commit such sins.”  Obviously, when we sin, it is the opposite of what God desires.  It is not his will. 

What is God’s will?  We heard it already in verse 3 (in this post), and Paul mentions it again now in verse 7: God’s will is for us to be holy.  His will is for us to avoid sin. 

Paul concludes in verse 8 with a reminder.  This is God we are talking about here.  Not a human. Think about God. The very God who gives you his Holy Spirit.  When we choose to behave out of line with God’s heart, we know that it grieves the Holy Spirit, which Paul will write in Ephesians 4:30, and when we grieve the Spirit, it seems that we are not fully filled with the power of the Spirit, which Paul writes about in Ephesians 5:18. That lack of filling could hint at the punishment for sin.  When we sin, we have less access to the Spirit. 

But there is always forgiveness and grace.  No matter how much or how severely you have sinned, God is like the father in Jesus’ Prodigal Son parable (Luke 15), waiting with arms wide open to welcome you and forgive you. If your sin is sexual in nature, he wants to restore you. As Rob Bell once said in a Nooma video, “There is nothing you can do to make God love you less.”

So clean out those temples.  Clean out your bodies, your minds.  Make your body and mind places of holiness, the home of God.  Do you need to make a change in your thinking?  Do you need to make a change in your viewing habits?  Men, do you need to apologize to women?  Do you need accountability software on your devices? 

Remember the context of this passage.  Paul was telling a group of Christ who were already doing good work in following Jesus that they needed to go deeper, to follow Jesus more closely.  And this is one of those ways.

How about you?  My guess is that most of you are doing a good job following Jesus.  But how might you need to go deeper?

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When it comes sexual expression, men, we need to do better – 1 Thessalonians 4:1–8, Part 4

In contemporary society, we are well aware of the ways in which people harm or take advantage of others sexually.  Certainly in the context Paul wrote, and throughout most of human history, that harm, that taking advantage of, has moved in one direction.  From males to females.  In the vast majority of situations where there is sexual harm and manipulation, it is men who have perpetrated perversion and evil on women.  We know why. There is a physical power imbalance. 

In the previous post, I mentioned two of three ways Paul teaches Christians to practice self-control in their expression of sexuality. Now the third: Paul explains in 1 Thessalonians 4, verse 6, how God’s view of human sexual expression leads to flourishing.  God’s approach leads to flourishing because he desires a practice of human sexuality that intentionally avoids wronging others and taking advantage of others.

In verse 6 Paul says “no one should wrong his brothers or sister.”  When he says “brother or sister” (some translations only refer to “brother”), Paul is not talking about inappropriate expression of sexuality within a family.  Instead, Paul is talking about the church family.  His point is that we do not do anything to wrong or to take advantage of people in our church family. 

Of course, Paul is not saying, “Don’t hurt people sexually in the church family, but you are totally fine to hurt people sexually outside the church family.”  No.  The principle is clear.  We should never hurt, manipulate, or take advantage of anyone in any way, sexually or otherwise. 

And yet, we have so often heard from Christian men that their poor behavior is the women’s fault. As if women are the ones tempting men.  As if men are incapable of self-control.  As if men are robots who have been programmed to lose their minds at the slightest flirtation or sliver of revealed skin or tight clothing. 

The idea that women are always or even mostly at fault is false.  The idea that men are always or mostly innocent is false.  I am also not saying that it is a both-and.  I do not believe it is a both-and, as if men and women are equally at fault.  No.  I believe the vast majority of the harm and manipulation is due to men who use their free will to choose to do harm and manipulate and take advantage of women who are generally physically unable to stop the men. 

Men, we simply need to do better.  We need to train ourselves to honor and respect women enough that we look them in eye, respect them.  We choose to avoid manipulation.  We choose to battle temptation. We honor God with our bodies, with our eyes, with our minds. 

One important step is to invite serious accountability.  Place accountability on devices, if need be.  Have an accountability partner who you can talk openly and honestly about your heart and mind.  Fast-forward sex scenes, if need be. Force yourself to only look at women in the eye. Or if too much eye contact feels awkward, just look away for a second or two.

If you’re a man reading this, perhaps you’re feeling I’m being too hard on men. Maybe you’re wondering about what role women play?  What about modesty? 

Modesty is mostly culturally defined and culturally constructed.  In some cultures, women are always topless.  In others, the only part of the women’s body you can see is their eyes through a tiny slit in their head covering.  And there are many other cultures with varying definitions of modesty in between those poles.

For Christians, there is no precise biblical definition of modesty, and therefore, Christians ought not mandate a particular rule of modesty.

Instead, men, we do well to practice self-control.  Certainly, women are to practice self-control too.  This is an equally applicable practice.  But let me repeat. Given power dynamics, it is men who have perpetrated the vast majority of sexual pain throughout history, and thus we Christian men ought to emphasize self-control.

Photo by Alex Sheldon on Unsplash