d. Earning one’s living (4:11–12)
5. Exhortation to Christian living (4:1–12)
As is usual in the Pauline writings, after some solid doctrine we have a concluding section (introduced by oun, ‘therefore’) drawing out the application of the teaching to Christian living. Because the doctrine is true, consequences follow for the way we live.
a. General (4:1–2)
1. There are divergent views about the Greek translated finally (loipon oun). While C. F. D. Moule accepts this rendering,17 Whiteley forthrightly refers to it as a ‘mistranslation’, and Bailey argues that it simply marks a transition. Paul can use it quite early in a letter (1 Cor. 1:16), but as used here it seems to mean that the main argument has been concluded, though other, not unimportant, matters are now to be dealt with.
Paul uses the affectionate address, brothers, and reminds his readers that they had already been told how they should live out their Christian faith (live is actually ‘walk’; the Christian way means steady if unspectacular progress). How to live is really ‘how you must live’; pleasing God is not a matter of personal choice, but an imperative necessity for the Christian. We instructed you is rather ‘you received’ (paralambanō; see on 2:13) ‘from us’; they received the authentic Christian tradition. Now, Paul says, we ask you and urge you, where there is not much difference between his two verbs (Best regards them as synonymous, but Thomas differentiates them); perhaps the first signifies ‘request’ and the second ‘urge’. In the Lord Jesus is basic to the whole exhortation. Paul does not presume to urge a line of conduct on them because of his personal stature or knowledge, but because this is the kind of conduct that should characterize those who are in Christ, as he is and they are.
The purpose is that the Thessalonians should do this more and more, where the verb means ‘abound’ as in 3:12 (‘overflow’); there it is used of abounding in love, but here it is used absolutely, a use that brings out the thought that the Christian life is the more abundant life (cf. John 10:10). It is the only life that really frees people.
2. The word for instructions (parangelias) is not common in Christian writings, being found elsewhere in the New Testament with reference to commands in the faith twice only (1 Tim. 1:5, 18; the cognate verb occurs more often). Properly it signifies an order passed from one to another, as when a command is passed along a line of soldiers, and it is often used for military orders. It is thus very appropriate for authoritative commands, such as those given by the authority of the Lord Jesus. The preposition by is dia, which makes it clear that the commands were not Paul’s but God’s (they came ‘through’ Jesus). There does not seem much difference from ‘in the Lord Jesus’ (v. 1), but ‘in’ may perhaps be more dynamic. But the repetition of the idea makes it clear that Paul is not concerned with merely human directions. He had from the beginning shown them the way of God, and this is what he continues to do.
b. Sexual purity (4:3–8)
A marked feature of life in the first-century Roman Empire, and specifically in Greece, was sexual laxity. The Thessalonian Christians lived in a world where people did not see fornication as a sin, but as part of normal life. It featured in the worship of more than one deity, and men in general found it difficult to feel deeply on the subject. But in this, as in many things, the Christians refused to take their standards from contemporary society. They insisted that sexual vice incurs the wrath of God and that it is to be avoided scrupulously by every follower of Christ. This makes Paul’s words very relevant to our age, an age not conspicuous for high moral standards. As Neil trenchantly puts it, ‘In our own semi-pagan society it needs to be stated again as firmly as Paul does here. “Affairs” are not a source of easy laughs for radio or variety comedians, but—more properly described as promiscuous fornication—are one of the Seven Deadly Sins.’
3. Paul puts the subject on the highest plane with his opening, It is God’s will (NIV omits his ‘for’, which ties this into the preceding argument). In the Greek will has no article, signifying that what follows is not the whole will of God. There are many things included in God’s will, but one is certainly the injunction that follows. Christians must not concern themselves only with those things that appeal to them. They must have regard to the fact that God is interested in all that they do, and God’s will is that they should be pure. ‘Your sanctification’ (NASB) points to the process of which ‘holiness’ is the completed state. From the moment anyone believes, he is set apart for God, set apart to be ‘holy’; in New Testament language he is a ‘saint’. As we saw in the comment on 3:13, this does not mean that he is morally perfect, but that he is given over to God to do his will. Thus a process is begun in which the old ways and the old habits are increasingly done away and replaced with new ways that fit the service of God. This is a long and necessary process, and much of the New Testament is taken up with instruction as to how it may be furthered. Here Paul lays it down firmly that it is God’s will that God’s people live in God’s way.
The particular aspect of sanctification in mind is sexual purity. Negatively this means that you should avoid sexual immorality. Paul’s word is porneia, which strictly means ‘fornication’, but is used in New Testament times for any kind of sexual sin. The Christian is to have nothing to do with it (cf. Phillips, ‘and that entails first of all a clean cut with sexual immorality’).
4. Positively, each should keep himself in sanctification and honour. It is interesting that Paul uses the verb ‘know’ (NIV learn); it is as though this sin is unthinkable in anyone who knows what the Christian faith implies. This is capable of wider application, for the Christian faith reaches into all of life and uplifts all it touches. Paul repeats his word ‘sanctification’ from verse 3, for this mastery of self is to be looked for in those who walk the way of holiness. With this he links ‘honour’, for sexual impurity brings dishonour and shame.
There is a problem about the meaning of the word translated body (skeuos). The word literally means ‘vessel’, which many of the early Greek commentators took to mean ‘body’, though skeuos does not seem to have this meaning elsewhere. But in Greek writers generally the body is sometimes thought of as the instrument or container of the soul, and, while this is not a New Testament thought, there are passages that contrast the real ‘I’ with the body (e.g. 2 Cor. 4:7; 5:1–4, 6–8), and some where ‘vessel’ means people (Acts 9:15; Rom. 9:22–23; 2 Tim. 2:21). But Theodore of Mopsuestia, Augustine and others took the word to mean ‘wife’18 here and many accept this view today. It is supported by the fact that the verb translated ‘to control’, which more literally means ‘to acquire’, is not very suitable for ‘body’ but is found in LXX and elsewhere of marrying a wife. Support is also sought in the reference to the wife as ‘the weaker vessel’(1 Pet. 3:7, AV). This last point does not count for much, for (a) both husband and wife are ‘vessels’ in this verse, the wife being the ‘weaker’, and (b) both are vessels of the Holy Spirit. The wife is not the husband’s ‘vessel’.
The big difficulty in the way of ‘body’ is the verb ‘acquire’. But there is evidence that it can mean what follows from acquiring, i.e. ‘possess’ (MM cite a papyrus dated AD 23 where a man declares on oath that he ‘has’ thirty days to produce a man he bailed out of jail; they think that here the meaning is ‘gradually obtain the complete mastery of the body’); the difficulty is not insuperable. Against ‘wife’ are two strong arguments. One is that it demands a low view of marriage (i.e. that the primary function of the wife is to satisfy her husband’s sexual desires) just where Paul is advocating a high view. The other is that there is no reason for holding that the words apply only to the male section of the church. The letter is written to the whole church (masculine forms like his arise because the Greek masculine embraces both sexes in such contexts). Neither single nor married ladies could acquire a wife, but all, of both sexes, married and single, should control their bodies. Our best understanding is that Paul is calling on the Thessalonians to keep their bodies pure (perhaps in the style of 1 Cor. 6:18–20).
5. They are to do this ‘not in the passion of lust’ (RSV). The former of these two nouns, pathos, properly denotes ‘a feeling which the mind suffers’(GT), and so a passion. It ‘signifies not, like Eng. “passion,” a violent feeling, but an overmastering feeling, in which the man is borne along by evil as though its passive instrument’ (Findlay, CGT). It is the passive side of a vice, whereas the following epithymia, ‘lust’, is the active side. The combination points to the surrender to one’s passions.
This surrender was common in the world of that day, and Paul goes on to say that it was characteristic of the heathen (ta ethnē), a term often translated ‘the Gentiles’. It usually denotes non-Jewish nations, but sometimes, as here, people outside the Christian church. Their characteristic is that they do not know God. This does not mean that God had given them no revelation of himself, but that they had rejected the light they had (cf. Rom. 1:18–32). Paul speaks not of an innocent ignorance, but of blameworthy neglect of the light they had received, so that they were given up to unnatural lusts (Rom. 1:19–20, 24–27).Unbelief often has its basis in the rejection of the light God has given.
6. The Greek rendered in this matter is literally ‘in the matter’ and some think there is a change of subject, with business affairs now in mind. But NIV is surely right in seeing ‘the’ matter as the one just mentioned. While the verbs used could be meaningful if applied to business affairs, they are also significant when sex is in mind. Sexual sin, besides being an offence against holiness and honour, is an act of fraud against a brother; it takes what is rightly his. In this sense brother, of course, means ‘brother man’, not ‘brother in Christ’. What Paul says applies obviously to adultery; this wrongs others than the two parties. The same applies to pre-marital promiscuity; the impure person cannot bring to the marriage that virginity that is the other’s due.
Such conduct cannot go unpunished. The Lord will punish (or, ‘is an avenger’, cf. Ps. 94:1), which means that he will do justice (cf. Rom. 13:4). God will punish all such sins, i.e. sins of uncleanness. This probably looks forward to the Day of Judgment, though there is a sense in which God’s judgment operates in the here and now (Rom. 1:24, 26, 28). This was also part of Paul’s preaching at Thessalonica; the preachers had warned of this (the verb means ‘solemnly testified’).
7. For ties this in to the argument (and probably refers back to vv. 3ff., not simply to the end of v. 6). The Christian life rests on the basis of God’s call, not on human initiative. The idea of this call means a lot to Paul, though it is not frequent in the Thessalonian epistles (see, however, 2:12; 5:24; 2 Thess. 2:14). From the time of his own spectacular conversion Paul was in no doubt that the primary fact is that God calls people, not that people decide to be God’s. It is interesting to see this major Pauline concept so early.
There is a change of preposition: God did not call us ‘for’ uncleanness, where epi gives the idea of purpose (as in being called ‘for freedom’, Gal. 5:13, or of being created ‘for good works’, Eph. 2:10). But to live a holy life is rather ‘in’ holiness or sanctification; this is the atmosphere in which believers find themselves.19 The noun is that referring to the process (as in v. 3) not the state (as in 3:13).
8. Therefore points us to a consequence. Because God has called us in sanctification it follows that those who treat this lightly are despising no less a person than God himself. There is a little difficulty about the word atheteō, rejects; it is translated in various ways, e.g. ‘set aside’ (Gal. 2:21), ‘frustrate’ (1 Cor. 1:19). It means something like ‘to treat as null and void’, ‘to regard as of no account’, and that is its meaning here. The person who takes sexual sin lightly, who sees it as something that does not matter much, is, in effect, treating God as of no account, for the prohibition is his (cf. Luke 10:16 for a similar thought).
The particular aspect of the divine activity singled out is his giving of the Holy Spirit, a continuing and present activity. It is not that the offenders despise a God who gave the Spirit a long time ago, but one who keeps on giving him. Their sin is a sin against the continuing presence of the Spirit (cf. 1 Cor. 6:19).
In an unusual word order Paul speaks of ‘the Spirit of him the holy’, a more stately expression than that usually employed and one which emphasizes both the majesty of the Spirit and the holiness that is such a feature of this passage. He also says that the Spirit is given to you. He might have left the statement general, but he makes it personal to the Thessalonians.
c. Brotherly love (4:9–10)
9. Two things in particular marked off the Christians of New Testament days from contemporary society: the purity of their lives and the love that they practised so fully. Here Paul passes from the one to the other. Brotherly love (philadelphia) is not the same as agapē, the love towards all that must characterize those who have experienced the agapē of God (see on 1:3).20 It is to be exercised by the Christian towards all people, irrespective of their merit or the reverse. But he should also exercise a special brotherly love to those united with him in the household of faith. Outside the New Testament philadelphia almost invariably denotes the love that binds together the children of one father; in the New Testament it is without exception used for the love uniting Christians to one another. James Denney thought that the importance of this ‘is not sufficiently considered by most Christian people; who, if they looked into the matter, might find that few of their strongest affections were determined by the common faith. Is not love a strong and peculiar word to describe the feeling you cherish toward some members of the Church, brethren to you in Christ Jesus? yet love to the brethren is the very token of our right to a place in the Church for ourselves.’ These words are not yet out of date.
Paul assures his friends that there is no need for him to exhort them in this matter (cf. 2 Cor. 8:1ff.), and gives as his reason that they have been taught by God (theodidaktoi, here only in the New Testament, though cf. John 6:45) to love each other, which follows strikingly on the reference to the work of the Holy Spirit in the previous verse. We are reminded of Jesus’ words, ‘If anyone chooses to do God’s will, he will find out whether my teaching comes from God’ (John 7:17; cf. 6:45). God is active in the sincere seeker, and specifically it is God who teaches believers to love.
10. And in fact (kai gar) marks an advance; it is one thing to know what to do and quite another to do it. The Thessalonians constantly practised brotherly love; the present tense in you do (poieite) has the full force of continuous action: ‘you habitually do’. In Macedonia we know of churches only in Philippi, Berea and Thessalonica, but this does not mean that only these three existed. Believers in these centres would spread the gospel, and missionaries like Silvanus, Timothy and Luke may have worked in other cities. Lightfoot thought it probable that churches had been established at least in the larger towns like Amphipolis and Pella. But Paul would not have them rest on their oars. He urges them to do so more and more (perisseuein again, as in 3:12; 4:1). Paul comes back repeatedly to the thought of the abundant life. The primary meaning here is that of abounding love, but it is fair to comment that growth and freedom from constricting restraints are integral parts of the Christian life.
d. Earning one’s living (4:11–12)
Following the injunction to abound in love for one another, Paul exhorts his readers to take the lowly place. That is the way love acts.
11. ‘We urge you … to make it your ambition to have no ambition!’ (Phillips) brings out something of Paul’s vigorous paradox, though the exact meaning of his words is not completely clear. His verb (philotimeomai) in the classics meant ‘to be ambitious’, but later ‘to strive eagerly’, ‘to seek restlessly’, pointing to a wholehearted and energetic pursuit of the object (cf. Rom. 15:20; 2 Cor. 5:9, its only other New Testament occurrences). It may well have this meaning here. It is a colourful command, whether Paul meant ‘make it your ambition to be unambitious’ or ‘seek restlessly to be still’.
Now come two other infinitives: to mind your own business and to work with your hands. Why this stress on the virtues of the quiet life and of steadily working at one’s occupation? Some of the Thessalonian Christians seem to have been living in idleness, depending on the charity of their fellows. They may have reasoned that the parousia was very near; if so, would it not be good to spend all one’s time preparing people for it? Whether that was the reason or not, it is clear that some were not working for their living and Paul seems to have them in mind when giving these strong injunctions to avoid the spectacular and to work hard.
It is noteworthy that in writing to people in a Greek city he says work with your hands, for Greeks despised manual labour; they saw it as an occupation fit for slaves. But the Christians (like the Jews) did not hesitate to insist on the dignity of manual work (cf. Eph. 4:28). Some conclude that most of the Thessalonian Christians were of the artisan class, and this may well have been so. There are few indications throughout the two epistles that any of them were wealthy; everything points to their coming from the lower strata of society. This is not a new command; Paul had told them this before. His verb told (=‘commanded’) is often used of the orders of military officers. There is a ring of authority about it.
12. Now come two reasons for earning their own living. First, that your daily life may win the respect of outsiders. In one sense the Christian must live without regard to the opinion of the world, for his standards are those of his Master, not those of the community in which he lives. But in another sense he must always have in mind the opinion of the world, for he must not bring discredit on the faith by being careless of appearances. The Thessalonians were distinguished by brotherly love, a fact that enabled some of them to stop working and live on the bounty of others. This was a wonderful testimony to the charity of those who provided for them, but the effect of the loafers on outsiders must have been deplorable. While believers must always be ready to help others (Gal. 6:2), believers must also shoulder their own burden (Gal. 6:5).
The second reason is that they may be independent. Paul’s words may mean ‘that you may have need of nothing’ or ‘that you may have need of no-one’; either gives a good sense. Those living on the charity of others needed to be told not to depend on men. But Paul may mean that anyone who works constantly will find ample provision for all his needs; he will have no lack of anything. Either way, he insists on the importance of being independent.