2 Thessalonians 2:16-3:5
Fifth Sunday after Pentecost - 9 July 2017
Rev. John Derme
Did you celebrate Independence Day this past week? If you did, I am curious as to why you celebrated. I understand that it is the nation's birthday. But I wonder what makes the birth of our nation worth celebrating to you. Why are you glad that the States gained their independence? You're welcome to tell me your answer to that question sometime. But for now I have a guess at an answer that might suit many of you: freedom. Freedom was the reason that the founding fathers declared the States to be independent. In the Declaration of Independence, they said that "Liberty" is an unalienable right. Because they did not want freedom to be lost, they included in the Constitution the Bill of Rights, the first ten amendments to the Constitution.
One of those freedoms listed in the Bill of Rights has an enormous impact on each of us and our congregation. The First Amendment guarantees the free exercise of religion. We believe as the Bible teaches, we confess our faith publicly, we engage in mission work, and we live out our faith in our everyday lives. The First Amendment says that the government will not interfere with any of that. Do you think this is a freedom worth celebrating?
What if the free exercise clause of the First Amendment would be removed from the Constitution or just plain ignored? What if the U.S. government began to tell Christians that they could no longer live how their faith tells them to live when those actions might seem like discrimination? What if the government would tell churches that they can no longer confess certain beliefs? What if the government would actively persecute Christians and shut down churches? This would make it much more difficult to be a Christian.
Some people say that such things could never happen. Other people say that some of these things have already happened. I don't know the future, so I am not going to tell you what will happen. But if we would lose the freedom to exercise our religion, and the government or other anti-Christian people would try to stop us from believing in, confessing, and acting on what the Bible teaches, I think St. Paul would tell us that we should not be surprised. He would say that's normal. There are many people who do not want the Word of the Lord to be spread.
The apostle Paul was the Christian missionary who first brought the message of Jesus to the city called Thessalonica. But soon after he began preaching there, sooner than he planned, he was forced to leave. A non-Christian religious group and the government worked together to persecute Paul and the other Christians. Shortly afterward, Paul wrote two letters to the Thessalonian Christians, because he couldn't come back and teach them.
There was no such thing as a guarantee of the free exercise of religion in the Roman empire. Paul got used to persecution from the government and non-government people. Eventually, the Roman empire executed him. Yet as long as he lived, Paul never stopped spreading the gospel to new places. He knew that there were many people who needed to hear about Jesus. Countless people came to faith through his work.
Of course, Paul was not on his own. He was a servant of the Lord. Jesus worked though him to spread the Word in spite of persecution. You and I live in a very different time and place. Our government actually promises that it will not execute us for our faith! But there are still wicked and evil people in this world. Those are the words that Paul uses to describe those who do not want the Word of the Lord to spread.
Of course, they don't think of themselves as wicked and evil people. But anybody who tries to stop another person from proclaiming the good news of Jesus is exactly that. Recently in northern Egypt, seven Christians were killed and 300 others were forced to flee their city. In China, men were arrested for bringing Bibles into the country. In Malaysia, a pastor was kidnapped and hasn't been seen since. In the Sudan, several pastors have been jailed. These are wicked and evil acts! So also it is wicked and evil when one person even pressures another person not to speak the Word. The Word of the Lord is what every person needs. They need to know what Jesus has done for them. To keep someone from hearing the message is to keep them out of faith and in unbelief, to keep them out of heaven and in hell.
You and I are pressured not to spread the Word. We are called "intolerant" and "bigots" and "anti-science" for believing the Bible. With pressure like that, who wants to speak up? But it could get even worse. We could completely lose the free exercise of religion, and be like many other Christians of other times and places. Would we lose our courage then? Would we stop speaking the good news? Would we think that wicked and evil people have kept the Word from spreading? Would we lose our faith in the Lord? Would we lose heaven?
It is easy for us to get discouraged even where we live! So you can understand why Paul prayed for the Thessalonians: May our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father, who loved us and by his grace gave us eternal encouragement and good hope, encourage your hearts and strengthen you in every good deed and word. We need encouragement from Jesus' Word! If we stop hearing it, we will lose both our courage and our faith!
But Jesus speaks to us in his Word to encourage our hearts. He wants you to trust him! He wants you to go to heaven! He loves you so much that he came from heaven and was persecuted here on earth. He was executed for you. It's not that the wicked and evil men were able to stop him, though. When he died, he won eternal life for you. And now he lives again to send his message to you. Through faith in Jesus, you have hope now and forever!
And you can also understand why Paul asked the Thessalonians to pray for him: Finally, brothers, pray for us that the message of the Lord may spread rapidly and be honored, just as it was with you. And pray that we may be delivered from wicked and evil men, for not everyone has faith. But the Lord is faithful, and he will strengthen and protect you from the evil one. We have confidence in the Lord that you are doing and will continue to do the things we command. May the Lord direct your hearts into God’s love and Christ’s perseverance. We're not apostles or traveling missionaries like Paul was. Yet Jesus calls all Christians to take part in the work of spreading his Word. If it were up to us to accomplish the work, though, we would fail. Wicked and evil people would stop us. But we ultimately aren't the ones who spread the Word. When we spread it, Jesus is speaking through us! We would lose courage if we were on our own. But we faithfully carry out the work to which Jesus has called us, because he will cause it to succeed!
I told you before about things that wicked and evil people have been doing in other countries to stop Christians from spreading the gospel. Let me tell you about something else that happened within the last year. Persecution is very fierce in and around Syria. There is a Christian pastor who lives on that country's border. He proclaims the gospel to Muslims whenever he gets the chance. He and his family have been threatened, of course, and he admits that he was living in fear. So he prayed to the Lord for strength. One day an ISIS fighter came to his home. Would the fighter stop him from spreading the Word? The Lord gave this pastor the strength to tell him that Islam is false and Jesus is the truth. The ISIS fighter heard the Word and came to faith. Six months ago he was baptized. He has spread the Word to his wife. Now he lives in a refugee camp and spreads the Word of the Lord there.
Wicked and evil men can't stop the gospel from spreading in Syria. They won't stop it here, either. We will hear and spread the Word. It will keep us in the faith. It will keep bringing others to faith.
We have a guarantee that is much stronger than any that the government can make. This guarantee is from God. He doesn't tell us that we will always have the free exercise of religion. Rather, he says that whether we have that freedom or not, the Word of the Lord will spread. Many who hear it, in nations where it is legal and where it is illegal, are coming to believe. No person can stop it, because it is Jesus who is spreading his Word.