Living to please God
Powerpoint for sermon (100kb)
The title of my message today is "Living to please God". I was reading the
New Testament book of 1 Thessalonians this week and the heading from chapter
four grabbed my attention. I think as Christians we should want to live in a way
that pleases God. Jesus gave His all for us and living the right way is one of
the ways we say thanks. It is a right response to the actions of a loving God.
It is interesting that when you read through chapter 4, and in
particular verses 1-18, it naturally breaks into four paragraphs. These natural
breaks can be given four headings that give us a clue of what it is to live in a
way that pleases God. Today I will be reading from the NLT.
Bible Reading
1 Thessalonians 4:1-2,7-18
1 Finally, dear brothers and sisters, we urge you in the name of the
Lord Jesus to live in a way that pleases God, as we have taught you. You live
this way already, and we encourage you to do so even more.
2 For you remember what we taught you by the authority of the Lord
Jesus…
7 God has called us to live holy lives, not impure lives.
8 Therefore, anyone who refuses to live by these rules is not disobeying
human teaching but is rejecting God, who gives His Holy Spirit to you.
9 But we don't need to write to you about the importance of loving each
other, for God Himself has taught you to love one another.
10 Indeed, you already show your love for all the believers throughout
Macedonia. Even so, dear brothers and sisters, we urge you to love them even
more.
11 Make it your goal to live a quiet life, minding your own business and
working with your hands, just as we instructed you before.
12 Then people who are not Christians will respect the way you live, and
you will not need to depend on others.
13 And now, dear brothers and sisters, we want you to know what will
happen to the believers who have died so you will not grieve like people who
have no hope.
14 For since we believe that Jesus died and was raised to life again, we
also believe that when Jesus returns, God will bring back with Him the believers
who have died.
15 We tell you this directly from the Lord: We who are still living when
the Lord returns will not meet Him ahead of those who have died.
16 For the Lord Himself will come down from heaven with a commanding
shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trumpet call of God. First,
the Christians who have died will rise from their graves.
17 Then, together with them, we who are still alive and remain on the
earth will be caught up in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. Then we will
be with the Lord forever.
18 So encourage each other with these words.
Key verse
Verse 1 - Finally, dear brothers and sisters, we urge you in the name of
the Lord Jesus to live in a way that pleases God, as we have taught you. You
live this way already, and we encourage you to do so even more.
- Continue to live in a way that pleases God
- You already do, but…
- We encourage you to keep growing in it.
Message Points
As I said before there are four natural breaks in the text. I have assigned four
headings to them to help us break the text apart and give us points we can
remember and apply to our lives.
1. Continue to live in purity
Verse 7 tells us why. "For God did not call us to be impure, but to live a holy
life".
Verses 3-8 tell us that we should live in a way that pleases God. It calls us to
live in purity or a sanctified life, which means set apart for God’s holy use.
Holiness and living in purity are an ongoing theme in the Bible. One of the main
ways God describes Himself is Holy. Holiness is a quality of perfection,
sinlessness, and inability to sin that is possessed by God alone.
For us as Christians we are made holy in God's sight by the work of Christ on
the cross, but we are also called to live a holy life. 1 Peter 1:15 says, "But
just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do. "
Now when we talk about being sanctified or sanctification there are two tenses –
- Past – When we stood before God and He declared us righteous when we were saved.
- Present - An ongoing change that takes place as we think and become more like Christ.
When I came to Christ 30 years ago today. God declared me righteous in
Christ. I was made holy in His eyes as He looked at me through the lens of
Christ. However, in my everyday life, I did not always think like Jesus, I
didn’t always speak like Jesus and I certainly didn’t always live like Jesus. I
needed the ongoing sanctification process through the Word and God and the
Spirit of God to bring change.
If you want to please God, aim to live right in all you do. It is a right
response for all He has done for us.
2. Continue to show brotherly love
9 Now about your love for one another we do not need to write to you, for you
yourselves have been taught by God to love each other. 10 And in fact, you do
love all of God’s family throughout Macedonia. Yet we urge you, brothers and
sisters, to do so more and more.
Verses 9-10 tell us the importance of brotherly love. It says that we should try
to love each other more and more. At the heart of brotherly love is caring for
others, helping them when in need and showing respect.
The idea or theme of Love on another is mentioned many times in the Bible. John,
in particular, talks about loving one another a lot.
God tells us to love one another in 1 John 3:23 - “And this is His commandment:
We must believe in the name of His Son, Jesus Christ, and love one another, just
as He commanded us.”
In 2 John 1:5 it says, “I am writing to remind you, dear friends, that we should
love one another. This is not a new commandment, but one we have had from the
beginning.”
In 1 John 4:7 “Dear friends, let us continue to love one another, for love comes
from God. Anyone who loves is a child of God and knows God.”
In 1 Peter 3:8 Peter joins in and tells us to "live in harmony with one another;
be sympathetic, love as brothers, be compassionate and humble".
From these verses we see the importance to be loving, caring, compassionate and
humble. This is what God wants for us and what is best. Jesus said that people
will know we belong to Him because of our love for one another.
If you want to please God, then continue to love one another.
3. Continue to be a good testimony
11 and to make it your ambition to lead a quiet life: You should mind your own
business and work with your hands, just as we told you, 12 so that your daily
life may win the respect of outsiders and so that you will not be dependent on
anybody.
Verses 11-12 talks about living a quiet life and minding your own business. It
also says that we should work with our hands, so we are not dependent of anyone.
If we do these things, we will earn the respect of others and have a good
reputation in our community.
I have heard it said that for many people our lives are the only Bibles people
will read. The way we live in an important testimony to those around us.
The Bible calls us to be salt and light in Matthew 5:13-16. It says, “"You are
the salt of the earth. But what good is salt if it has lost its flavour? Can you
make it salty again? It will be thrown out and trampled underfoot as worthless.
"You are the light of the world--like a city on a hilltop that cannot be hidden.
No one lights a lamp and then puts it under a basket. Instead, a lamp is placed
on a stand, where it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let
your good deeds shine out for all to see, so that everyone will praise your
heavenly Father.”
Church that is the life I long to live. Simple things like having a positive and
encouraging attitude and really living out what we believe is at the heart of
being salt and light. Treating people with love and respect and then helping
them when they are in need makes a huge difference. A good testimony is all
about really loving God, obeying His commandments, and really loving our
neighbour.
If you want to please God, then be a good testimony.
4. Continue to have hope in Christ
13 Brothers and sisters, we do not want you to be uninformed about those who
sleep in death, so that you do not grieve like the rest of mankind, who have no
hope. 14 For we believe that Jesus died and rose again, and so we believe that
God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him.
Verses 13-18 talks about Jesus return and those who have already died in Christ.
It says we should look forward to the future with hope and expectation that we
will be with the Lord forever. Some of the people in the early church were
thinking Jesus was coming back very soon. So, they were worried that family and
friends that had died had already missed out. But Paul, Silas and Timothy wanted
to encourage the people their loved ones had not missed out. That they could
have hope they would see them again.
One of the great truths of Christianity, that I have shared many times before,
is that Christ died for our sins and on the third day He rose to life. Because
of His resurrection we have a great hope that we too will be raised to life when
we die.
As we live in this sometimes chaotic, fallen and unfair world we need to have
hope. Knowing that Christ has gone to prepare a place for us and that He is
coming back for us gives us hope (John 14:3). We will be with Him forever. We
need to cling to this hope and encourage each other with these words as verse 18
reminds us.
If you want to please God, live with the great hope of Christ’s return.
5. Living to please God more and more
Just before I finish, I want to draw your attention to one more thing. The
phrases found in verses 1 and 10. Verse 1 says, "Now we ask you and urge you in
the Lord Jesus to do this more and more". In verse 10 it says, "we urge you,
brothers and sisters, to do so more and more".
The Greek word "Mallon" is used here in both verses for "more". It means "more,
much more, to a greater degree, better or in a greater way".
Verse 1 is about growing and improving at living right and living to please God.
Verse 10 is about growing and improving in our love for one another. I just
found this really interesting. Paul didn't want the Thessalonians to be content
and feel like they have made it, but he wanted them to keep striving to grow and
improve in love and living right. And this ties in with the idea of ongoing
sanctification – becoming more like Christ is the way we think and in the way we
live.
Closing
If you want to live a life that pleases God, this passage gives us five things
you can do.
- Continue to live in purity
- Continue to show brotherly love
- Continue to be a good testimony
- Continue to look forward to Christ's return with hope
- Continue to please God more and more.
Let us pray.
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