Chapter 1:1-10

¹ “Paul, and Silvanus, and Timotheus, unto the church of the Thessalonians which is in God the Father and in the Lord Jesus Christ: Grace be unto you, and peace, from God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ. ² We give thanks to God always for you all, making mention of you in our prayers; ³ Remembering without ceasing your work of faith, and labour of love, and patience of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ, in the sight of God and our Father; ⁴ Knowing, brethren beloved, your election of God. ⁵ For our gospel came not unto you in word only, but also in power, and in the Holy Ghost, and in much assurance; as ye know what manner of men we were among you for your sake.

⁶ “And ye became followers of us, and of the Lord, having received the word in much affliction, with joy of the Holy Ghost. ⁷ So that ye were ensamples to all that believe in Macedonia and Achaia. ⁸ For from you sounded out the word of the Lord not only in Macedonia and Achaia, but also in every place your faith to God-ward is spread abroad; so that we need not to speak any thing. ⁹ For they themselves shew of us what manner of entering in we had unto you, and how ye turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God; ¹⁰ And to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, even Jesus, which delivered us from the wrath to come.”

This book was completed by or about 52 AD. Jesus had scarcely been gone back to Heaven for 20 years, and the church at Jerusalem was flourishing and exporting the Gospel via men like Paul, Timothy, and Silvanus. The Roman invasion of 70 AD was still some 20 years away, the Gospel was exported freely, and the churches were popping up everywhere. This church in Thessalonica kind of just popped up, we are told in Acts 17:2; Paul was there preaching for just 3 Sabbaths, about 21 days. There are some scholars who think he was there for a bit longer, maybe 3 months, but nonetheless, whether 3 weeks or 3 months, this church was quick to materialize. And it is obvious that Paul did as much as he could do, but there was more to be done after he left, and this letter was written just a few months after he left.

As with many Greek churches and converts, the idea of idolatry had to be dealt with. People, even many religions today, are accustomed to having some form of statue or idol to focus on. In many ‘churches’ even today, you can see idols that they claim depict Jesus, Peter, Mary, and a host of other Biblical characters. We need to be careful about this, but in our modern Baptist churches, we can be just as idolatrous of the piano, or the architecture of the new building, or whatever is more important than Jesus. We often hear that if we don’t have the youth group or the young adults or the youth program or whatever, we cannot get people to come and stay. All too often, programs can become idols, and we go to a church and seek the program at the risk of doctrine.

This young church was facing persecution already, and Paul wanted to help them to keep their hope up. The Gospel attracts attacks. It is impossible for the devil to stand by and not take on a new local church to see if he can crush it and thwart any expansion ideas that they have. So, by the guidance of the Holy Spirit, Paul, now in Corinth, writes this first letter to them to encourage them. And now, almost 2,000 years later, he is encouraging us. Let us take a look at what he had to say to them and now us.

• God sees and knows your situation, verse 2-3

It is easy for us, myself included, to think that God has forgotten us or that God no longer cares for us because of the situation we find ourselves in. Often, these situations are not of our own making; rather, we are in a position that we are unable to fight, and no amount of pleading seems to work. We can’t get out. Paul writes to assure these young Christians that they are being prayed for every day. The situation they are in is being prayed about, and God knows what is happening. He has not abandoned you.

One of the hardest lessons to learn in life is that the vast majority of good things that happen are the fruit of some kind of suffering. It would seem that in the present, we humans are most productive under pressure. This seems to be the case even among the Lord’s churches. When things go well as they have for the past 50+ years here in North America, we see the expansion of churches all across the world. But hand in hand with that is a certain worldliness that has encroached into the local church.

Leisure breeds worldliness in churches, and persecution tends to thin the attendance but purifies the flock. People who are not truly saved rarely stick around for hard times in local churches. Shallow Christians have to make choices either to stay and grow or run and hide. But over the past 2,000 years of the New Testament church, persecution has done more to expand it than thwart it.

God will give us the grace to endure, and if necessary, to die for the cause and name of Jesus. We are to trust Him and stay the course. We are to trust that He knows who we are, where we are, and what we are going through. He has never been surprised, and we can trust His promise to never leave us or forsake us.

• God’s election, verse 4

Knowing our election gives us security in troubled times. Election is such a divisive doctrine in the Lord’s churches today and even back in Paul’s day. There are many who believe that some are born to go to Heaven and others are born to go to Hell. This is the ‘Cole’s Notes version of Calvinism: God made some for Heaven and the rest for Hell. The Gospel is not really Good News to everyone, only to the elect of Christ. To all others, it is just bad news, really. Jesus did not die for you, you are not a part of the ‘whosoever’ in John 3:16, and Jesus is The Way for the elect but not for you.

From the very beginning, one of the defining things about mankind has been the ability to choose. God gave us this. God gave Adam and his wife the ability to choose obedience or not and to suffer the consequences thereof. And, God in His Omniscience promised a plan to redeem man from his bad choices in Genesis 3:15. Choice is the very foundation of Christianity.

Joshua 24:15, “Choose you this day whom you will serve.”

Elijah’s call, “If God be God, serve Him, but if Baal, serve him.”

The three Hebrews boys chose not to worship Nebuchadnezzar’s idol. Daniel chose to pray in Daniel 6. We can go on and on, but the choice is the very foundation of the Gospel. God has chosen the route for one’s salvation that is in Jesus’ death, burial and resurrection. See Romans 10: 9-10, John 3; 16-18, also John 14:6, “No one comes to the Father except through me [Jesus].” God’s election is about the method of salvation, NOT who gets saved. We have the choice to be saved, but only in Jesus; there is no other way. It is easy in times of persecution to think that maybe we are not saved. Maybe if we were saved, this kind of trouble would not come our way, and we would not be in this kind of hurt. Saved people live lives full of fun, money, no pain, and no suffering.

The devil wants you to think that you are not saved, and maybe if you just got saved again, added to the truth, or do whatever, the pain will go away. But Paul reminded these young Christians to look at the pure Gospel and have confidence in it. Did you place your faith in the person of Jesus? Did you trust His full payment for your sins? Did you trust that He rose from the dead? Then, according to Romans 10: 9-10, you are saved. Hold on; God has you.

Paul reminded them of the power they saw when he was there and that even at the very beginning, there was trouble as the Gospel was changing them (see verses 6-7). Don’t give up now: God has just begun a work in you.

• God is using you to spread the Gospel, verses 8-9

As I mentioned earlier, persecution and external troubles seem to somehow inspire expansion. The Gospel thrives in trouble. I can see that one of the reasons is that there is no fake profession in the midst of death threats. People have to choose Jesus in the midst of understanding that they could die when they choose Him. I think of our brothers and sister in Afghanistan and other places like China and many Muslim countries. They have to choose Jesus in the face of great danger, and they have to know that the choices they make can affect their kids and cause them great damage, loss, and pain.

But these Thessalonian churches or this one church had begun to export the Gospel to Macedonia. These were, for all intents and purposes, baby Christians, but they understood their responsibility to send the Good News of Jesus out to the world around them, and they did it at great personal risk.

When was the last time you shared the Gospel with someone?

I had the privilege of helping a young man ask Jesus to be his Saviour a few months ago, and I try to share the Gospel with those who will listen. But what about you? Are you actively sharing the Gospel? Are you prepared to share the Gospel? Do you have verses memorized, and can you take a person who wants to know on the journey from lost to saved? Christians in Thessalonica could and did in the midst of great persecution. Maybe what we need here in North America to expand the Gospel is persecution.

• God wants you to focus on Jesus, verse 10

I saw a great meme on FB the other day that there are no verses that command us to look for the anti-Christ. We can see the signs and know the times, but we are to focus on Jesus and His return. We are to live ready to meet Jesus. Paul encouraged these young Christians at Thessalonica to keep looking for Jesus. Keep focused on Jesus, and this will carry you through a lot of hard times.

This is not different for us today; Jesus and His return should be the focus that we have in all aspects of life. Do you want to be a better husband? Focus on Jesus’ return. Do you want to be a better dad? Focus on Jesus’ return. Do you want to be a better pastor, friend, worker, servant, and citizen? Focus on Jesus’ return. My family and the church I grew up in believed in the rapture so much that sometimes if my mom and I got separated in the grocery store, I would wonder if she had been raptured and I was left behind. The return of Jesus has been drilled into my psyche since I was a kid. You need to drill it into your kids, your church, and your mind. Jesus is the focus, His return is the focus, and this will carry us through some of the hardest times of life.

God bless you,

Dr. Sean Gooding
Pastor of Mississauga Missionary Baptist Church

PS: I will be away on vacation next week, and there won’t be any Bible study sent out.

How to Connect with Us

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Romans 9: 14-21

“What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? Certainly not! For He says to Moses, ‘I will have mercy on whomever I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whomever I will have compassion.’ So then it is not of him who wills, nor of him who runs, but of God who shows mercy. For the Scripture says to the Pharaoh, ‘For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I may show My power in you, and that My name may be declared in all the earth.’ Therefore He has mercy on whom He wills, and whom He wills He hardens.

^“You will say to me then, ‘Why does He still find fault? For who has resisted His will?’ But indeed, O man, who are you to reply against God? Will the thing formed say to him who formed it, ‘Why have you made me like this?’ Does not the potter have power over the clay, from the same lump to make one vessel for honor and another for dishonor?'”

This has been a troubling week for the whole world. We have the introduction of mandatory vaccines for many Government employees. We had the Premier of Ontario, the equivalent of a Governor in the US, fire one of the elected Ministers because he and his wife decided not to take the vaccine for personal reasons. The Premier had spoken of personal freedoms just a week or so ago, but it obviously did not apply to this dear man. He still has his job, just not the political part, and he will not be allowed to rejoin the party without a vaccine.

The city of Toronto has mandated that all employees must be vaccinated by October 31st this year. There is great division among us about these vaccines. One side is totally about safety – we must do all we can to be safe. The other is about freedom, and we have seen through the history of mankind that when one trades freedom for safety, you lose both. I saw today that some restaurants in NY will require proof of at least one vaccine shot to be able to eat there or at least eat inside. The irony of this is that one can cross into the US from Mexico without any proof of vaccination even with COVID and still be allowed to stay.

But no event of this past week has had more impact on me like the events in Afghanistan. Why, you ask? I have been following the plight of the many Christians that live there now. They got to experience freedom for a short time, to live out their faith in Jesus, and the churches there grew. In July of this year, many Christians came out from the darkness and stood for Jesus publicly; they registered themselves with the Government as Christians. One man that I read said he did not want his children and grandchildren to live in fear and in the shadows. So, under the freedoms that they had under the US military and government, they stood up for our Lord and declared publicly that they were Christians. Little did they know the betrayal that was coming.

As we now know, the Biden administration abandoned the people in Afghanistan. They have left or are leaving, and the Christians there now find themselves in a dire situation. Some have already been killed; others know that death is imminent still; others are more concerned for their children, especially virgin young girls who will be taken to be Taliban’ wives.’ What a horrible situation! I cannot imagine what I would do if I knew someone was coming for my almost 9-year-old daughter to take her to be a sex slave. It is harrowing.

And, so I have a confession to make. I made this confession to our church folks on Tuesday evening during our Bible study. I began to have some soul-searching questions, the kind that makes you wonder about your own faith. Maybe you have had some of the same questions, maybe not, and your faith is as solid as a rock. Praise the Lord if it is.

Here are a few questions I had: Why would God allow these brothers to come out and be open since He knew the plight that was coming their way. God knew the US would abandon them and that they and their families would die, yet He allowed them to register publicly. Why would God allow the Christians in Afghanistan to suffer as they are? Why allow Christians to suffer at all? I know many faithful brothers and sisters that suffer from various diseases, from cancer to heart issues, from depression to migraines; why let them suffer? He is God and able in one thought to take it all away.

There are many other questions that came to my mind, and maybe you have had some as well. I had some other questions like: When do the crooks start getting arrested and tried? When do we see the treasonous leaders begin to get arrested? Man, they even seem to live longer the eviler they are; it just shook me!

In a recent video by Martyn Iles, he responded to some of the ‘celebrity’ Christians who had abandoned the faith in the past few years. From authors to musicians and even pastors, many of them had the same questions about suffering, and, of course, many no longer believed that a loving God could create and actually use Hell. And so, they left. They turned their backs on God, and I am sure many of their fans left with them. I love how God made sure that I saw that video as I was asking these questions. I had watched countless videos by Martyn Iles, but I had never seen that one.

And then, as I was preparing for Tuesday night’s Bible study, I came across an interview with an Afghani Christian, one of the pastors. And when asked about the situation, he showed no regrets about going public with his faith. Rather, he understood the Sovereignty of God, and he pointed to our passage today from Romans. God is Sovereign, and He has the right to allow His people to suffer if that is what brings Him the glory and what moves the plan further and further to the end that He has told us is coming. This dear brother understood that God had the right as He is the potter, and we are the clay. God can do with us as He pleases; we are bought with a price. We are the redeemed; we are no longer our own.

I do not know if this man and his family are still alive, but if not, he went to the grave faithfully serving the Lord, and he trusted that God was greater than the circumstances he found himself in. Man, what a convicting interview and a harrowing challenge to me as to how I have conducted myself in the past 18 months! These people never stopped assembling, never stopped openly serving the Lord, and died free rather than live in fear. And they were at times afraid, I am sure. I prayed a lot for our brothers and sisters in Afghanistan. I prayed that God would comfort them, that He would not let them suffer in dying, and that He would let their deaths leave an impression like Stephen’s did in Acts 7, an impression that helped change the life of one Saul of Tarsus.

As I thought about this writing, the words of Asaph, one of David’s chief musicians, came to mind. In Psalm 73, he laments the good fortune of the wicked, and as he observed them, it shook him that they had no fear, no wants. They seemed to have the best lives ever, and it almost caused him to turn his back on the faith until he saw their end:

Psalm 73:16-19 “When I thought how to understand this, it was too painful for me— Until I went into the sanctuary of God; Then I understood their end. Surely You set them in slippery places; You cast them down to destruction. Oh, how they are brought to desolation, as in a moment! they are utterly consumed with terrors.”

These people who attack our brothers and sisters will one day face our God. These politicians and others that we know are corrupt, who defy the laws and attempt to change the laws of God, and make themselves to be gods will one day face the true God. Unless they repent like Saul of Tarsus, they will go to Hell. They will suffer for eternity, and they will NOT get away with the evils they have done. God knows all; yes, even the God they deny exists.

But what about you and me? How will our/my time go before the judgment? We who are saved will not be going to Hell; we have that security in Jesus. But we will be answering to the Lord as to how we lived, in fear or for Him. I see our brothers and sisters in Afghanistan living out their faith in the midst of real danger, and I see us cowering in the midst of perceived danger. Yes, some are dying with COVID but not as many as they want you to believe. The CDC in the US makes that clear. The vast majority of those that died had other diseases, and many were in hospice care already and dying. But this has been a tool to challenge our freedoms, and we/I have failed.

Listening to the Afghani Christians made me realize how we/I take freedom for granted. I recently read part of an interview from the documentary on the Hungarian Jews from the Hitler era. They were asked how was it that they didn’t do something? They answered, ‘We didn’t run away; we didn’t hide. Well, things didn’t happen at once. Things happened very slowly. So, each time a new law came out or a new restriction, we said, well, just another thing. It will blow over.’ It did not, and soon… well, we know the end.

The questions have been answered. God is in control, and I am not sure what will happen here in Canada. God is Sovereign, and I pray that should we be called upon to die for His name and glory, I will have His comfort to get through it. But what if, instead of dying, we have to suffer; lose my job, my home, and see my family hurt. I pray that God will grant me the grace to suffer without regrets and still lead my family to honor Him no matter what. While I appreciate the technology that allows us to ‘gather’ virtually – and I can see the need for the very ill, maybe the elderly and the shut-ins – too many have used the excuse not to gather. And we have seen the demise of the faith of many, and worse, their children. Lord forgive us.

It is okay to have questions; many great servants of the Lord did and do. But seek the right answers. Do not use human reasoning and knowledge to find the answers. Seek the Word of God; read Psalm 73, read all of Job, read the life of Joseph in Genesis 37-50, and read the life of Jesus in the Gospels. Suffering is actually a part of the Christian’s walk for the vast part of the history of the New Testament church. When that could not stop us, they used accommodations and comforts. These two are now being taken away, and being a Christian is becoming uncomfortable for many of us. We are asking if it is worth the discomfort. I pray you will seek God’s face and find the answers. But as for me and my house, as God gives me grace and strength, we will serve the Lord. He is the Potter and I/we the clay.

God bless you,

Dr. Sean Gooding
Pastor of Mississauga Missionary Baptist Church

P.S. I will be away on vacation next week, and there won’t be any Bible study sent out.

How to Connect with Us

On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MississaugaMissionaryBaptistChurch
Online: https://www.mississaugamissionarybaptistchurch.com/ (under construction)
Email: missionarybaptistchurch76@yahoo.ca