Finally then, brethren, we urge and exhort in the Lord Jesus that you should abound more and more, just as you received from us how you ought to walk and to please God; for you know what commandments we gave you through the Lord Jesus. (I Thessalonians 4:1-2)
Up to this point, most of what the apostles taught to the Jews and then the Gentiles after Jesus' resurrection and after they were filled with the Holy Spirit was explaining and demonstrating that the Christ had to suffer and rise again from the dead, and saying, “This Jesus whom I preach to you is the Christ.” (Acts 17:3) After making sure the hearers had accepted Christ Jesus a their Savior and Lord, then they were lead by the Holy Spirit to help the new converts learn to trust God to help them make the necessary moral changes in their everyday lives, so that they would live as Christians, true representative of Christ before others.
At one point, the apostles even wrote a letter To the brethren who are of the Gentiles in Antioch, Syria, and Cilicia: (Acts 15:23) Near the end of this very short letter, The apostles, the elders, and the brethren, (Acts 15:23) concluded by stating, For it seemed good to the Holy Spirit, and to us, to lay upon you no greater burden than these necessary things: that you abstain from things offered to idols, from blood, from things strangled, and from sexual immorality. If you keep yourselves from these, you will do well. (Acts 15:28-29) This charge given to the Gentiles would be rather difficult, because most of the Gentile nations were "amoral", because God, who in bygone generations allowed all nations to walk in their own ways. (Acts 14:16)
Moral is to be concerned with the principles of right and wrong behavior and the goodness or badness of human character. Immoral is not conforming to the pattern of conduct usually accepted or established as standards of morality. But amoral is having or showing no concern about whether behavior is morally right or wrong, living by the motto that "anything goes". This is one of the main reasons the apostles, especially Paul spent so much time preaching to the Gentiles that God was the only True and Living God and that God ...commands all men everywhere to repent, because He has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man [Christ Jesus] whom He has ordained. (Acts 17:30-31)
The Gentile nations amoral lifestyle would be challenging to the converts who stayed in those areas, just like it's difficult for us who are saved now to be "in the world, but not of this world". We have to learn as they did that we who are Christians are sanctified, set apart by God for sacred use, consecrated, made holy, growing in divine grace as a result of our belief, faith and acceptance of Christ Jesus as our Savior and Lord. For God said, For I am the Lord your God. You shall therefore consecrate yourselves, and you shall be holy; for I am holy. (Leviticus 11:44) Consecrate yourselves therefore, and be holy, for I am the Lord your God. And you shall be holy to Me, for I the Lord am holy, and have separated you from the peoples, that you should be Mine. (Leviticus 20:7, 26) but as He who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, because it is written, “Be holy, for I am holy." (I Peter 1:15-16)
For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you should abstain from sexual immorality; that each of you [Gentiles who now know God] should know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor, not in passion of lust, like the Gentiles who do not know God; that no one should take advantage of and defraud his brother in this matter, because the Lord is the avenger of all such, as we also forewarned you and testified. For God did not call us to uncleanness, but in holiness. Therefore he who rejects this does not reject man, but God, who has also given us His Holy Spirit. (I Thessalonians 4:3-8)
Many times we think that what we do doesn't affect other people, but as Paul stated that no one should take advantage of and defraud his brother in this matter, because the Lord is the avenger of all such, as we also forewarned you and testified. Paul was helping these new converts that had lived all their lives in amorality understand that in order to be holy, for God is holy, they and all of us who are Christians have to live in a way first, that brings honor and glory to God, and secondly, that doesn't offend others.
In other words, we all have to learn how to live the greatest commandments, “The first of all the commandments is: ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.’ This is the first commandment. And the second, like it, is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” (Mark 12:29-31) Sin is sin, and God is clear that For whoever shall keep the whole law, and yet stumble in one point, he is guilty of all. (James 2:10) But sexual immorality is especially offensive to God because we are ...committing what is shameful, and receiving in themselves the penalty of their error which was due. (Romans 1:27) Every sin that a man does is outside the body, but he who commits sexual immorality sins against his own body. (I Corinthians 6:18)
The Gentile converts couldn't and we can't be holy, for God is holy if we continue in amorality and even immorality. No, you yourselves do wrong and cheat, and you do these things to your brethren! Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God. (I Corinthians 6:8-10) No matter where we come from nor what we've been exposed to nor what we ourselves may have done, if by the grace of God we accept the free gift of salvation, then we are freed from all of these things, And such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the [Holy] Spirit of our God. (I Corinthians 6:11)
Once we become Christians, we have to allow the Holy Spirit to take over in our lives, so that the way we live will lead others to Christ and not turn them away; However, because by this deed you [may give] great occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme,... (II Samuel 12:14) But concerning brotherly love you have no need that I should write to you, for you yourselves are taught by God to love one another; and indeed you do so toward all the brethren who are in all Macedonia. But we urge you, brethren, that you increase more and more; that you also aspire to lead a quiet life, to mind your own business, and to work with your own hands, as we commanded you, that you may walk properly toward those who are outside, and that you may lack nothing. (I Thessalonians 4:9-12) AMEN!
No comments:
Post a Comment