Grace and peace to you dear friends. Last week we learned the fate of those who are not children of the day. We learned that if they suppress God’s truth continually and do not honor Him and if they think they are wise in their own eyes, that God will eventually cover their eyes causing them to be delusional, or to think something is true when it is not. God allows them to be and to pursue those things that their hearts longed for anyway. Aren’t you glad that you are a child of the day?! Aren’t you glad that you were not meant for the wrath of God but for the glory of God?!

I pray that as you are reading this, you remain aware of the last part of our lesson last week, namely bringing glory to God. At the end of every day, ask yourself the question, “What did I do today that glorifies God?” The Church that remains here on earth would be so much more effective in these last days if we were purposely aware of and intentional about bringing glory to God.

Oh, how I love to read 1 Thess. 5:10-11! What peace it brings to my heart. There are a lot of people in my friends and family circle who are already with the Lord. I went most of my life without losing a friend. And then, 3 years ago it happened. A dear friend died. I have a lot of acquaintances. I have a lot of friends. But I only have a few sister friends, those that I talk to frequently and share with deeply. For the past 3 years, I’ve lost 1 sister friend each year and it has been devastating to me. I didn’t anticipate the death of any of them, not that that would have made it easier, although somehow, I believe it would.

The above picture seems like a strange way to begin a lesson. The End is a peculialr topic, especially when talking about eternity. For the believer in Christ, we know that when we get to the end of one era, another one begins. There is no end to eternity. That is such a difficult concept and I can’t understand it. Yet, I accept it because Scripture confirms it. When I started studying the book of 1 Thessalonians, I couldn’t wait to get to chapter 4, the rapture chapter. What a glorious hope we have as believers to know and ponder this hope. My dad often jokes about buying some big-ticket item and financing it til the rapture! We know it’s coming.

I don’t know about you, but this picture nearly brings me to tears. It encourages my weary heart to know that I have something to look forward to. a reason to look up, and so do you if you know Jesus as your personal Savior. I have been impatiently waiting to get to 1 Thess. 4 since we began this journey! Oh, what sweet hope and promises we are going to study about this week!

Last week we learned that Paul was grateful that what he had taught the young Thessalonian church stuck with them because they apparently had teachable spirits. We also learned that when believers suffer for their faith, that it most often strengthens their faith, something the unbelieving world could never understand. We learned that there are limits to our authority, but there are no limits to God’s authority.

Before we jump into the next chapter, let’s do a little review on what we already know. We know that the Apostle Paul wrote a letter to the church at Thessalonica and that this letter is what we refer to as 1 Thessalonians. We know that this was a young church in terms of how long it had been in existence. We know that Paul wrote the letter between AD 50-51. This letter was meant to encourage these believers because they were living in a pluralistic society with Greek, Roman, and Jewish traditions.

For me, the most difficult part of writing any study is just getting started! Where to begin? How to paint the picture of what was going on, etc. I have long been enamored with the books of 1 and 2 Thessalonians because of the promises that are contained therein. This book contains the promise of rescue via the rapture of the Church. It is a promise that is increasingly more precious to me because the world is progressively more evil these last days.
By the end of this lesson, you should be able to answer the major questions: Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How.

Fall 2022