A little while ago, I produced a verse by verse series in Philippians. I really enjoyed that exercise and have been wondering if I should take on another book. Well it turns out that 1 Thessalonians is the victim of my machinations, and hopefully, the thoughts produced by this fantastic book will edify and encourage the reader.

As with Philippians I am going to limit each post to one verse, and hopefully produce a short, succinct read for my friends who follow.

1 Thessalonians 2:10 You are witnesses, and God also, how holy and righteous and blameless was our conduct toward you believers.

In our last post I made hay by speaking of the personal interaction Paul had with these believers, poking at the “foolishness” of his method of ministry, or at least my understanding of his ministry amongst the faithful.

His connection with those who believed his message was relied upon for a character judgement on his own life. He appealed to their memory of his interaction with them. He spoke of the tireless effort he put out, to make time for them, and to not be a burden.

What a minister! What an attitude!

In this verse, he appeals again to them as witnesses of his character, and appeals to God Himself, of his manner of life amongst them.

Now it is one thing to appeal to a man’s memory, but a quantum leap to appeal to God as a witness of his character. This is not a light thing for the apostle to do, for it brings his audience to a point of acceptance or rejection of the claim. In rejecting this claim Paul is making is to reject God’s witness, and to call God a liar.

Of course it may be claimed that Paul is simply telling stories, but note the wisdom of the Apostle. First he appeals to their memory, and then seals it completely as truth by appealing to God. Those believers remembered Paul and his manner of life and would mentally agree to his character description but when the witness of God is included, it caused any middle ground that might be argued to be abandoned. Either Paul was what he said he was, or he wasn’t. No middle ground!

He describes his conduct with three terms.

Holy

I have written on holiness previously (Share His Holiness), and am always challenged by the topic, not only of the call of God for my own life, but also as to my understanding of this word.

To be holy has many implications, some of which are to be physically pure, morally blameless, or religiously consecrated. All that is theologically true, but a brother once provided me a picture of how holiness and ice cream are related. Check out Names of God – JEHOVAH MEKODDISHKEM (THE LORD WHO SANCTIFIES YOU) – 13.

To make the point, to be holy is to be completely devoted to God by God Himself. He owns us, and has made this ownership known to all of creation.

We are to strive for holiness, for right living and moral purity, but it is so encouraging to realize He has “licked us” first. (If you didn’t check the link out above, you many not get that last statement, but trust me – it makes sense for my puny mind!)

Righteous

To be righteous, is to obey a standard. The Lord has provided a standard in the Old Testament, that of the Ten Commandments. This law was the standard to judge all righteousness, and of course we know from New Testament teaching that the law could not produce righteousness, it simply defined the standard.

And we miserably failed at every attempt.

Some may think I am over the top in my statement, saying we miserably failed at every attempt. For your sake, I would challenge you to take one of the commandments – not all ten – just choose one, and keep it perfectly, every minute of the day, with no “let up”, continually obeying not only the written command, but the spirit of the law given, to have a pure motive in honoring that one command, to follow after it with all your passion and effort.

Let me know how long you last. I am truly interested!

But I digress.

We have a standard today, which is far greater than the written law of God. It is the life of Jesus, His perfect character, His loving kindness, His sacrificial acts. The standard we have is a life lived perfectly righteous in conformity to the command of God and the Fathers instantaneous will as He followed His Abba-Father.

Remember, we all judge righteousness according to an accepted standard. Many use the culture we live in as a standard, and judge themselves better than the average. Might I say – that is a very very low bar to be judged by.

Some may take on a religious standard, even claiming to follow the ten commandments. If so, we can end up in two conditions.

1. Complete failure mode constantly.
   • That is if we are honest with ourselves – remember that test above? Try it! Come on – it is good to know experientially how utterly weak and helpless we are.
2. Self delusion.
   • If we are not honest with ourselves, we may claim a righteousness, feel superior, and yet are only fooling ourselves. That self righteous stench permeates everyone’s nose but own own!

The only standard that is the righteousness of God is the man Christ Jesus, and He is our only hope. I say no more.

Blameless

Is to be blameless synonymous with being perfectly sinless?

Let us consider what it means to be blameless. I propose that it does not mean perfect sinlessness!

To be blameless is to keep short accounts. Let me explain with a silly story.

I entered my Sunday School class early one morning, and Fred was already there. He approached me for a friendly handshake, but instead of receiving that gesture of friendship, it got in my head to give him a punch in the gut. He went down hard! I am to blame for this violent action.

(Remember this is a story to illustrate a truth and not a retelling of an actual occurrence! I would never punch Fred – He is so much bigger than I!)

I am to blame for this action, but if a few hours pass, or better yet, a few moments pass, and I come to my senses, realizing I am to blame, that I have no justification for my action, and that I will not make excuses, but simply and humbly request forgiveness from Fred, I have at that point become blameless. I have sought to repair my relationship with Fred!

If he receives my request for forgiveness or not, when I in truth admit my fault and request forgiveness, I can no longer justifiably be “blamed” for that action. Even if Fred harbors an unforgiving spirit, my desire to be right with him provides me the covering of blamelessness!

Now of course this concept may be abused, deceiving ourselves as we may not truly seek forgiveness, or use this concept to perform an evil, with this as a “backup” plan. This simply reveals our wicked heart, and any thought of righteousness must be abandoned!

I have run on too long for my reader, but these concepts, these truths Paul speaks of as being his manner of life are truly humbling, especially in that he called for both his friends and God to witness to his life.

To be holy. To live righteously. To be blameless, (especially by not punching poor old Fred) This is the call of God on each of our lives.

It is a high calling, much higher than I first expected as I entered the faith. May we all have the humility to seek Him for strength to live as He pleases.

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Thanks again for coming to visit. I hope you found something of interest in this post and would appreciate a comment, to begin a discussion.