More from 1 Thess. 4:1-2

Spiritual Diary

 

I promised to find a portion in John MacArthur’s sermon that speaks of some grammar questions in it.  The following is that excerpt from his sermon.

 

“The priority of excelling still more compelled by a longing after God, that's our priority. Let me give you a second thought that rises from this text. The power for excelling...the power for excelling.  Notice verse 1, "Finally then, brethren, we request and exhort you in the Lord Jesus."  Now the question comes up, to what does this phrase "in the Lord Jesus" apply or to whom? Does it modify the verb or verbs, request and exhort in the Lord Jesus? Or does it modify the pronoun you?

Without taking you through all of the hoops in the process, suffice it to say that I think it best to see this as modifying the pronoun you. "Finally then, brethren, we request and exhort you in the Lord Jesus." We're speaking to those of you who are in the Lord Jesus. It is you we are requesting and exhorting to excel. Why? Because you are the only ones who have the power to do that.

“By virtue of being in the Lord Jesus, that wonderful concept of having your life hid with Christ in God, being united in solidarity with Christ, in Christ, by virtue of that union with Him is the resource and the power to excel. That, I believe, is what is on his heart.

“Back in verse 12 of chapter 3, he wanted their love to excel, their love to abound and he said, "May the Lord cause you to increase and abound in love." And there he recognizes the same thing. The only way that love can excel, the only way that you can excel still more and more in your spiritual progress is when the Lord causes it to happen. And the Lord only works in those in whom He dwells.

The point here is the power of excelling is the power of the indwelling Christ. He's calling then to a level of spiritual excellence, possibly only to those who are in Christ.”

 

          Now one more thing that I want to add to this and that is that as believers we have a choice of whether or not we want to “excel still more” and an example of a church that did not want to excel still more is the church from Corinth.  When we look through the books of 1^st and 2^nd Corinthians we see that Paul had to settle many things that were not right with this church.  It seems they were more interested in caring for things about themselves than to grow in the Lord, but this was not the case with the Thessalonian church.  We have a choice as to which of these churches we want to follow.