Chapter 2
| 1 Thessalonians: Chapters -1- -2- -3- -4- -5- |
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| 2:1 For you yourselves are aware, brothers and sisters, that our entrance towards you was not without purpose. 2 But, as you are aware, after we suffered and were mistreated in Philippi, we had boldness inside of our God to speak towards you the gospel of God inside much conflict. 3 For our encouragement is not out of wandering away, nor out of impurity, nor inside of trickery; 4 but just as we have been proven under God to be entrusted with the gospel, so we speak, not as pleasing humans, but God, the One proving our hearts. 5 For never at any time were we inside any word of flattery, just as you are aware, nor in a pretext for greed – God witness – 6 nor seeking glory out of humans, nor from you, nor from others, though being empowered inside of the burden as Christ’s apostles and sent ones. • 7 But we were gentle in the midst of you, as a nursing mother would cherish her own children. 8 So, yearning over you, we were well-pleased to have imparted to you not only the gospel of God, but also our own souls, because you had become beloved to us. 9 For you remember, brothers and sisters [e], our labor and hardship, working night and day in order not to burden any of you, we proclaimed into you the gospel of God. 10 You are witnesses, along with God, how devotedly and justly and blamelessly we were toward you who are believing; 11 just as you are aware how we encouraged you and comforted and testified into each one of you, as a father does his children, 12 that you would walk worthily of God who calls and summons you into His own kingdom and glory. 13 And through this also, we give thanks to God unceasingly that, having received the word you heard from us as out from God, you did not receive it as the word of men, but even as it truly is, the word out from God, who also energeoes inside of you who believe. 14 And you, brothers and sisters, became imitators of the churches of God that are in Judea inside of Christ Jesus. For, just like them, you also suffered from your own countrymen, as they also did from the Judeans, 15 who killed the Lord Jesus and their own prophets, and drove us out as well, who do not serve or please God, and who are hostile to and set against all other humans, 16 are hindering us from speaking to the other ethnic families that they might be saved, resulting in always filling up their sins. Now angry opposition has come upon them into completion [f]. 17 We, however, brothers and sisters, having been bereaved of you for a brief time, in face though not in heart; we are more abundantly eager with great desire to see your face. 18 Therefore, we wanted to come to you – indeed, I, Paul, a couple of times – but Satan hindered us. • 19 Who, then, is our hope, or joy, or crown of boasting and exultation? Is it not even you, in the face of our Lord Jesus, inside of His presence? 20 For you are our glory and our joy. |
| Gospel Comments | Notes |
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| • Life: As Gospel Word comes through us to others, it does much more than generate Life. With the power of the Devoted Spirit, it carries the image of God’s own Soul, and with our faith, it carries the image of our souls. With God, we impart our own souls to our brethren, even as they do to us. • Kingdom: We know that we are inside of the revelation of the Father, that is, the Kingdom, when the faces of our brothers and sisters have become as Jesus to us. Their great weight of Value has become our reward and our Joy. |
e. In most languages, including Greek, the male term includes both male and female, thus adding “sisters” to adelphos is fully appropriate. f. We must accept the profound “antisemitism” of the gospel, for the Cross of Christ puts every Judean to death, the primary reason many opposed Paul. The belief that Jesus is the Messiah is the central meaning given inside the modern definition of “anti-semitism.” |