Vi. Problems Associated With The Parousia (4:13-5:11) 134
i i Make it your ambition to lead a quiet life, to mind your own business and to work with your hands, just as we told you, 12 so that your daily life may win the respect of outsiders and so that you will not be dependent on anybody.
We could take this section as part of the preceding one (as many commentators in fact do). But it deals with the practical outworking of Christian love rather than with that love itself, so I have made it a separate section. This is the first indication we have had in this epistle that some of the Thessalonians were so excited by all the wonderful things in the Christian faith that they were not bothering to earn their living. But there are a number of indications in the Thessalonian correspondence that this was so (cf. especially 2 Thess. 3:11). A number of possible reasons for this have been suggested, but it is most likely that it arose out of second advent speculations 44 The Thessalonian believers had learned very well that the Lord would be returning in mighty power, and evidently some of them felt that it would be very soon. Accordingly there was no point in continuing in some steady job. It was much more realistic, they evidently reasoned, to be about the business of proclaiming the near end of the world. If they had need of this world's goods in the meantime, why, there were others, Christian brothers, who could be relied on to come to their rescue (it may be no accident that verses 11-12 follow a section in which Paul stresses brotherly love). This kind of thing can be done from a sense of serious purpose, but, human nature being what it is, it can easily degenerate into downright laziness and idleness. People can be so taken up with the spectacular, with excitement over the near approach of the Lord, that they pass over the important things of everyday life. So Paul gives attention to such matters, and counsels these brothers to mend their ways.45
Paul joins to the general injunction to be quiet the specific one to "mind your own business" (Moffatt). The expression is found only here in the New Testament, though it is not uncommon in nonbiblical Greek. It perhaps points to a tendency to interfere in the running of the church on the part of those who were not church officers. It does not seem extravagant to suggest that, meeting trouble in their endeavor to be kept by the earnings of their brothers, some members had attempted to have the church officially support their demands. Or it may be that Paul is condemning taking undue interest in the concerns of one's neighbors. It is not impossible that these are the people accused of being busybodies in the second letter (3: 11), though there again there is uncertainty about the precise meaning. At any rate, it is clear that Paul wants each to put his attention where it belongs.
Closely joined to this is the command to work with their hands.47 This unashamed advocacy of manual labor in a letter to a community in a Greek city must be remarked. The typical Greek attitude was that slaves did this sort of work, but that freemen would not stoop to it. It was degrading. Here, as in so many other ways, the Christians refused to take their standards from the community in the midst of which they lived. Rather, they held that all things they did should be done as service to Christ (Col. 3:17), and they specifically held that manual labor was good (Eph. 4:28). Doubtless they remembered that Jesus himself had been a carpenter (Mark 6:3). How could the followers of the Carpenter do other than welcome manual work?48
This reference probably points us to the status of the Thessalonians. While, of course, manual work may be skilled as well as unskilled, we are probably right in thinking that the majority of the believers came from the lower social classes and were poor rather than rich 49 Once again Paul insists that he is not bringing some new teaching. He is simply repeating what he had said when he was among them. It is remarkable that he had been able to provide so well for the future needs of his band of converts. The pity of it is that they had not learned as well as he had taught.50
12 Paul gives two reasons for earning their living in this way. The first is the effect of their behavior on those who are not Christians. What NIV renders "so that your daily life may win the respect of outsiders" is more literally to "walks' becomingly toward those outside." Believers must always bear in mind the impact of their conduct on those who are without faith.52 What they do may be done from a good motive but yet appear to the outsider in quite a different light. Under these circumstances it is impossible for faithful followers of the Lord to go ahead without regard to appearances. They must reflect that they are their Lord's ambassadors, and their conduct must commend the Lord to others. If that is so in the case of things that are indifferent in themselves, much more is it so in matters like the one before Paul at this moment. When some of the believers did no work at all, but lived on the charity of others, with the result that they spent their time in what must have looked like idle gossip, what could outsiders think? It would be a sure way of bringing the church into disrepute. Paul urges the Thessalonians to consider the implications of all this. He suggests that they should walk (see on 4:1) "becomingly," his adverb directing their attention to the fitness of things (cf. Col. 4:5). See further on 2:9.
There is a slight doubt about the exact meaning of Paul's second reason for working. The words rendered "not be dependent on anybody" could equally be translated "have need of nothing" (cf. REB, "never be in want"); the gender is indeterminate. In actual practice, though, it comes to much the same whichever interpretation we adopt. The situation clearly was that those who were not working were depending on their more industrious brothers for their means of livelihood, and Paul is counseling them to work so that this undesirable state of affairs may be ended. He may mean, "Work, and then all your needs will be supplied. You will be in need of nothing." Or he may mean, "Work, and then you will have need of no one to help you. You will be quite independent." Either way he is making the point that the Christian cannot be a parasite.53
This whole section on earning one's living is closely connected with the previous one on brotherly love, and that not only in syntax. Those who imposed on the generosity of their fellows were not living in love. Or, to put the same thing the other way around, the exhortation to brotherly love carries with it the necessity for providing for one's own needs, so that undue strain may not be placed on the brother (though Paul does not specifically mention this point).