Without
1 Thessalonians 4:12 “That ye may walk mnhonestly toward othem that are without, and that ye may have lack ||of nothing. 13 But pI would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning qthem which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, reven as others swhich have no hope.” [1]
I. Humility
A. Without
B. With
II. Honorability
A. Understandably
B. Undeniably
III. Hopefully
A. Joyful
B. Joyless
Introduction: Next Sunday we will commemorate Merry Oaks Baptist Memory Day. I wonder who started the idea of monasteries. If you travel through southeastern Texas and visit the Alamo and take a guided tour of the area missions, the tour guide will explain about the monks and their places where the outside world was held out as they took vows of silence listening intently to hear a word from God.
Last Easter we did something here that for some was a new idea. We took a prayer walk in silence. In Seminaries or Bible Institutes and colleges, this is commonplace. It is done when a new class comes in and maybe never again. I remember mine up there on the side of that Carolina Mountain. I pray that yours here last Easter was as peaceful and meaningful.
We pray for each other in this life because God gave His Only Begotten Son to come here to renew the broken relationship that we had lost with Him. Now we can pray and we do pray and we tell God those things that He already knows but Oh how He loves to hear from us. We want our conversations with God to be meaningful as we pray for those who are going through hard times that perhaps we have been through. We ask God for His intervention because the greatest intervention of all time is what Jesus did for us and He continues to do now as He is seated beside His and Our Heavenly Father.
We read in Ecclesiastes 3 that to everything there is a time and a purpose under heaven. There is a time to pray to let our petitions be known but there is also a time to listen. My friend Tommy said last Sunday evening that we have two ears and one mouth. We should listen more than we talk. We are taught by that same book of Ecclesiastes that when this life is over, there is nothing else to ask for those who are dead because their life and their opportunity to make righteous decisions is over. So what do we do with the memories of those who were so important in our lives?
Listen! Listen! Be quiet and let God bring the truth about those that He used to shape you. That is what we will do next Sunday for a few minutes during our service. Being absolutely quiet is very uncomfortable for some but eternally essential if you desire to hear from God.
We live in a world where “dead air” is a scary thing. When I was on the radio, it was imperative that as long as the transmitter was on, there must be something going out over the air. I was talking, a song was playing, or a commercial spot was being run but never ever dead air of silence. It’s no surprise that many say they never hear God, they never listen.
Do you want to hear from those who are no longer here? Listen! God will put those memories into your hearts and minds and nobody will ever be able to take them away from you just as nobody and nothing will ever take Jesus, God the Father and The Holy Spirit from you.
There have always been those who have weaker faith that turn away and take matters into their own hands because they have not heard. I pray that we here listen next Sunday. I pray that we hear here today.
Scripture: The message title today is “Without.” The scripture is 1 Thessalonians 4:12-13. When you have found it please rise to your feet for the reading of God’s written word.
Prayer: Please be seated
Message: Waiting is one of the hardest things that I have had to learn. A delivery from the delivery truck seems to come after I finally give up and decide it’s OK if it doesn’t get here. The lesson is the same as God seems to have for me always. Give up and then you will finally receive! As long as you expect things when you want them, you will have the same test all over again. God’s speed! Not your timing but God’s timing.
The folks in First Baptist Thessalonica were getting impatient. Paul wrote these letters to them attempting to encourage them not to give up their faith. It is difficult to continue in faith when others around you are losing theirs. As a chaplain, the thing that I often heard from those who professed faith but were unchurched was that they lost confidence in going to church.
Most unchurched believers would tell me that someone would say something and there would be a break in the church they attended. Though they decided to stay, the next thing they knew, something else happened and it just got to be too much. They decided not going to a place where everybody finds reasons to not be together was too hard. Nothing ever changed.
Imagine how this might have been some of the conversation there in Thessalonica. “Jesus only lay in the grave three days before the stone was rolled away and He was resurrected. The several saw Jesus in His glorified body ascend into the sky. He said He would come back but where is He? Our folks have been in their graves for months and some have been there for years. When is enough, enough? We’ve waited long enough! We’re giving up. We’re going back to doing for ourselves.”
Please read this short letter up to this point where we are today when you get a chance. It is so easy to be influenced by others who have lost hope and have weak faith; especially when you need strength yourself. To lose confidence in the FedX truck is one thing. To lose confidence in being together united in Christ is altogether different. When we don’t trust Him, we come up with all sorts of crazy ideas. When we act on those ideas, people suffer. People are left out.
There is a denomination that has used this focal text as the basis for their doctrine called soul-sleep. We in this life, in this time are here on earth. Heaven is there. Jesus is there beside His and Our Heavenly Father. We with faith know that Jesus is not waiting for this world to end before heaven is created. We with faith know that in Luke 23:42 that Jesus told the man on the cross beside Him, “Verily I say unto thee, To day shalt thou be with me in oparadise.” [2] We with faith know that Paul said in 2 Corinthians 5:8, “We are confident, I say, and owilling rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord.” [3] We with faith know through faith that this is true and we must live in that hope.
Some in Thessalonica were stuck here on this planet. What was the without that Paul was speaking of when he said, “walkm nhonestly toward othem that are without?” [4] What were they without? They were without that hope that they needed to believe and trust patiently.
They only believed what they could see and remember. Their dead were buried and they knew they were dead. There was going to be a physical resurrection because Jesus had one, when would it happen for their loved ones?
We have people walking with us now who are asking the same questions. Their faith is not so that they can understand there are two realms of existence. John was taken to that second realm where Jesus revealed to John what is there and what was to be here. Paul was taken to that realm as he walked on the road to Damascus when he met the resurrected Jesus. We have hope when our faith is strong.
When those who are beloved Christian brothers and sisters lose hope through lack of patience, we must not lose patience with them. One day Jesus will indeed return and on that day there will be a physical resurrection but we do not have to wait and we know that through faith but we must not belittle those who have not learned to look beyond what they see.
There in verse twelve Paul tells us with hope to walk honestly with humility toward them that have not acquired the assurance that we have. We must live honorably, not ignoring the truth of our faith that Jesus is already where we will one day go even though the physical resurrection seems to depend on world time. We can rest in the understandability that the Holy Spirit gives us to assure us that all is well. We can live undeniably that Jesus is where we will be when we leave this life and that undeniable truth can only be acquired through faith in Him alone.
We are not stuck here in the grave when we die and Paul wants to reassure that we keep that truth through faith. We should never ever lose faith that our loved ones who are dead are not in the grave waiting, but we also must not belittle those who can’t be in that faith place.
Those of us who have that hope live now hopefully. That hope, the only hope that Jesus lives, fills that void of not knowing, of not having that fullness of faith with joy. The Holy Spirit brings joyfulness to that place where emptiness once was.
In verse thirteen Paul reminds again that our brethren who are joyless are still are brethren and we must love them and be patient because one day they will be with us even though they feel the wait becoming unbearable.
The Seventh Day Adventists read this particular text and have developed this doctrine of soul-sleep to somehow get through the inability to believe that heaven does not depend on what happens here. God created this place and His day is not our day. Heaven does not revolve around the sun and He is not waiting to take your loved ones home when they die. You will probably hear this doctrine taught at every Seventh Day Adventist funeral you attend but love them anyway. Do not do as I used to do with my sister Carol who was very much Seventh Day Adventist. Arguing only exasperates the relationship. Carol was not comfortable with where we are before Jesus descends back to earth and we could never move beyond that.
I told my sister Jane that Carol no doubt had an awesome surprise when she met our parents without delay. This message today is more to encourage us to have love and patience for those we love who might not realize the same realization that we know through faith.
Prayer:
Invitation: as we prepare ourselves for Merry Oaks Memory Day, my prayer is that we will remember and learn to love those who have left this place even more. As we learn the truth of each other, that truth will make us free to love each other because only through love can we truly be free.
I know that you know someone who is struggling without today. There is that someone who cannot let go of the hurt and now all they have is that hurt but have lost their heart. There is one thing that you can do for them today before it is too late. Pray for them.
In a moment I will ask Karen to play and pray as she does, while I pray for those who have not. There are those in your circle that are as Paul spoke of, they are without. Join me where you are or here at the altar with me as we pray for those who are with us now in this life that are without. Join me as I pray that God reaches and teaches me how to love with that unconditional love He has for me. We will have a time of prayer and then, if there is anyone who feels without that faith here today and wants that hope, I will be here to hear as we sing our song of invitation which is… Please respond to His call.
m Rom. 13:13. So 2 Cor. 8:21. Col. 4:5. ch. 5:22. 1 Pet. 2:12.
n 1 Cor. 14:40 (Gk.).
o See Mark 4:11.
|| Or, of no man.
p See 1 Cor. 10:1.
q ver. 14, 15. See Matt. 27:52.
r Comp. Lev. 19:28. Deut. 14:1, 2. 2 Sam. 12:20. Ecclus. 22:11. & 38:16.
s Eph. 2:12.
[1] The Holy Bible: King James Version. (2009). (Electronic Edition of the 1900 Authorized Version., 1 Th 4:12–13). Bellingham, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.
o 2 Cor. 12:4. Rev. 2:7. Comp. Gen. 2:8. Ecclus. 24:30, &c.
[2] The Holy Bible: King James Version. (2009). (Electronic Edition of the 1900 Authorized Version., Lk 23:43). Bellingham, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.
o So Phil. 1:23.
[3] The Holy Bible: King James Version. (2009). (Electronic Edition of the 1900 Authorized Version., 2 Co 5:8). Bellingham, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.
m Rom. 13:13. So 2 Cor. 8:21. Col. 4:5. ch. 5:22. 1 Pet. 2:12.
n 1 Cor. 14:40 (Gk.).
o See Mark 4:11.
[4] The Holy Bible: King James Version. (2009). (Electronic Edition of the 1900 Authorized Version., 1 Th 4:12). Bellingham, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.
