To Walk and to Please God (eBook)

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You Turned to God

Salvation and the Start of the Christian Journey

The Thessalonian correspondence is devoted to cheering on fledgling believers. This is partly accomplished by fixing their eyes on the end of the course (cf. Phil. 3:12–14; Heb. 12:1–2), a strategy we investigate later (see chap. 3). But they also nourish confidence to complete the journey by repeatedly referencing the strong start already made.

Biblical Images of Salvation

The Bible offers a surprising variety of metaphors for Christian salvation from peril: redeemed from slavery to serve a better master, reconciled or adopted into a family, judicially justified for a fresh lifestyle, reborn or transformed into a new person, brought from stumbling in darkness to walk in light, awarded a heavenly citizenship or inheritance, granted privileged access into God’s secure presence, and so on. These images are often studied separately, so it’s pleasing to see a growing number of resources that collate them and showcase their diversity.1

Most believers and preachers harbor one or two favorite models of salvation and think not to budge. We are sometimes ignorant of the breadth of the array. Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy publicize something of this variety in their letters.

I have chosen to shape this book under the rubric of a journey—more protracted than a race and more mundane than a pilgrimage—even though the image isn’t drawn directly from the Thessalonian writings. This metaphor foregrounds valuable theological elements. It allows us to draw attention to the commencement of the journey; such commencement is sometimes the substantial or sole focus of scholarly and popular discussions of salvation. But the journey metaphor also recognizes a goal or an end point. And it acknowledges the effort required between start and finish to persevere against troublesome opponents and arduous circumstances. It invites questions about how to conduct and sustain oneself along the way. And it raises the possibility that not everyone who boldly ventures forth will necessarily complete the course. It is a thoroughly biblical metaphor, one that can be complemented with images of athletic contests and other competitive quests.2

Thessalonian Images of Salvation

A quick catalogue of our letters’ metaphors is valuable. Singling these out might protect us from skating too superficially or too uniformly over familiar terminology.

Salvation

Five times the letters use overt language of “salvation” or “being saved,” and once they mention spiritual “rescue.” The two clearest examples accord well with contemporary Christian usage:

God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ. (1 Thess. 5:9)

God chose you as the firstfruits to be saved, through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth. (2 Thess. 2:13)

Both excerpts introduce additional language unpacked below. We also already glimpse all three persons of the Trinity participating in humanity’s salvation. And the contexts of these examples accent how Thessalonian “salvation” is understood particularly as reprieve from God’s final wrath.

Of course, we know to look for other terms, illustrating Christians’ longstanding reliance on wider imagery of salvation.

A Message Communicated and Received

Although it may appear obvious to the point of condescension, the Thessalonian letters are among those that most clearly demonstrate how images of salvation are packaged in words. The Christian gospel is a message communicated from one group of humans to another, using everyday conduits such as speaking and hearing or writing and reading. The following examples are transparent:

We proclaimed to you the gospel of God. (1 Thess. 2:9; cf. 2:2)

When you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as a human word, but as it actually is, the word of God. (1 Thess. 2:13 NIV)

I put you under oath before the Lord to have this letter read to all. (1 Thess. 5:27)

So then, brothers [and sisters],3 stand firm and hold to the traditions that you were taught by us, either by our spoken word or by our letter. (2 Thess. 2:15; cf. 2:2; 3:6, 14)

Such is the apostles’ regular missionary quest, and they describe more broadly their “speaking to the Gentiles that they might be saved” (1 Thess. 2:16).

This brief selection hints at the prominence of “gospel” language; proportionally, only Galatians and Philippians use the term more densely. As with Paul’s other writings, Thessalonians doesn’t directly spell out what constitutes this good news; we’re left to glean that from the wider theology of the letters. (Even “gospel”-saturated Galatians outlines the message more indirectly than directly. The passages in Rom. 1:1–4; 1 Cor. 15:1–11; and 2 Tim. 2:8 come closest to providing definitive content.) We need to continue our survey of Thessalonian images of salvation for insights into gospel content.4

The opening chapter introduces the two key descriptors: “Our gospel came to you,” and “You received the word” (1 Thess. 1:5–6). These two nouns are regularly treated synonymously, and they’re elsewhere linked together and with salvation (esp. 1 Cor. 15:1–2; Eph. 1:13). Something of their source and content is foreshadowed, especially once we realize that the connecting “of” is notoriously slippery both in English and in the Greek construction it renders. Consider the phrase “the songs of Michael Jackson.” These are variously the songs performed by, composed by, owned by, or written about him.5 In our letters, commentators are largely consistent in treating “the gospel/word of God” as being from God (1 Thess. 2:2, 8, 9, 13 [2x]) and “the word/gospel of the Lord / Lord Jesus / Christ” as being about Christ (1:8; 3:2; 4:15; 2 Thess. 1:8; 3:1).6 The asymmetry may feel curious, and we should recognize that (1) it is usually and rightly the biblical context that helps us decide, (2) there is more unanimity about “the gospel of God / the Lord” than about “the word of God / the Lord,” and (3) these first two points explain why 1 Thessalonians 4:15 bucks the trend, with scholars in general accord with the ESV’s phrasing: “a word from the Lord.”7

As we continue developing a composite image of the gospel message, we can delight in its power (cf. Rom. 1:16; 1 Cor. 1:18). It is active like an additional participant in God’s mission.8 The same opening chapter rejoices that the word from God about Jesus is attended with power: the convicting work of the Holy Spirit (1 Thess. 1:5–6). The gospel continues to “work” among the Thessalonian believers (2:13), just as other biblical uses of this verb celebrate the energizing actions of God himself.9 In one of the few prayers the missionaries request for themselves, they ask that this gospel message “speed ahead” further or faster in the world (2 Thess. 3:1; cf. Eph. 6:19–20). As Gary Shogren notes, “The gospel is not a series of philosophical chats, but a message through which the King himself changes lives.”10

Faith/Belief

The Thessalonian letters include a few mentions of the human element of “believing” the gospel message. Greek uses a single word group that’s expressed by a variety of English terms concerning “belief” and “faith.”

The believers’ (!) faith is assumed in various passages (1 Thess. 1:3, 8; 3:2, 5, 6, 7, 10; 5:8; 2 Thess. 1:3–4, 11), and indeed, “believers” is one common shorthand for the faithful (!) in Thessalonica and elsewhere (1 Thess. 1:7; 2:10, 13; 2 Thess. 1:10). The object of such belief/faith is also clarified. As we might expect, salvation involves “faith in God,” including the doctrinal confession of Jesus’s death and resurrection (1 Thess. 1:8; 4:14). The alternative to believing such truth is to believe falsehood (2 Thess. 2:11–13). The language of believing a message or truth is sometimes extended to “receiving,” “accepting,” “welcoming,” or even “loving” it (1 Thess. 1:6; 2:13 [2x]; 4:1; 2 Thess. 2:10; 3:6). Thus, even though “faith” is sometimes linked with “hope” and “love” (1 Thess. 1:3; 5:8; cf. 1 Cor. 13:13), one analyst fairly argues that it’s faith that portrays “the essential response to the gospel.”11