For not only has the word of the Lord sounded forth from you in Macedonia and Achaia, but your faith in God has gone forth everywhere, so that we need not say anything. For they themselves report concerning us the kind of reception we had among you, and how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come.—1 Thessalonians 1:8–10

Introduction

I’ve never been very good at working with my hands; I’d take a book over a hammer any day. So I admire carpenters and craftsmen who can take their tools and raw materials and make something beautiful and useful. For the past year, dozens of people have skillfully worked on our church’s south campus building in Lakeville. to lay the foundation, frame and finish walls, install pipes and wires, pour floors, fit windows, and much more. This fall, the contractor’s trailer will pull away and hundreds of cars will fill the newly paved parking lot. And the building will be filled, not with the sound of power tools, but the sound of worshippers praising Jesus. This new facility is a wonderful gift to our church, the fruit of years of sacrificial generosity, faithful prayers, and careful planning. But when Jesus promised, “I will build my church,” he wasn’t talking about a building but a people. The Bible says that believers in Jesus are “like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house.”[i] God accomplishes this amazing work through his living and abiding Word in the power of his Spirit. What does it look like when God builds his people into a spiritual house by his Word?

This weekend we are continuing our summer sermon series on 1 Thessalonians, with a special focus on aspiring to be a healthy church. Several weeks ago, Pastor Ken reminded us of our true identity as Christians loved by God and chosen by God. Today we will consider three ways that God works by his Word to change our allegiance and affections and accomplish his purposes in our lives.

The Word at Work

In 1 Thessalonians 1–2, Paul emphasizes God’s “word” and the gospel:

• The gospel came in both word and power (1:5)
• This church received the word in much affliction with joy (1:6)
• The word of the Lord sounded forth from this church (1:8)
• This church received the word of God and accepted it not as merely human teaching but as the word of God, “which is at work in you believers” (2:13)

In our passage today (1 Thessalonians 1:9–10), we see three ways that God’s word works in our lives:

1. The Word brings true conversion
2. The Word brings true worship
3. The Word brings true hope

Said another way, as we aspire to be a healthy church, we should respond to God’s word by turning from idols, serving God, and waiting for Jesus.

1) The Word Brings True Conversion (v. 9)

For they themselves report concerning us the kind of reception we had among you, and how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God. 

“You turned to God from idols”—this is one of Bible’s clearest summaries of what genuine conversion is all about. Turning means a decisive change of allegiance and orientation. You used to serve idols, now you serve God. 

Idols are false gods that people worship and trust in. Idols can be anything or anyone that we look to in order to find our supreme happiness, security, and fulfillment. In NT times, these idols were everywhere. People had idols in their homes and businesses and offered prayers and sacrifices at temples, in hopes of securing material prosperity, protection, health, and good fortune. The residents of Thessalonica worshipped a variety of pagan gods, such as Dionysius (god of wine), Aphrodite (goddess of love), Zeus (god of weather and vegetation), and Asclepius (god of healing). The Thessalonians also revered the Roman emperors as divine and regularly expressed their patriotic and religious allegiance to their leader. 

When Paul proclaimed the gospel to the Thessalonians, they did not simply add worshipping Jesus to their other religious loyalties. They took the radical step of abandoning the idols worshipped by their family and their community. This led to a riot. In Acts 17, adversaries complain that the Thessalonian believers have turned the world upside down by following king Jesus, not Caesar alone. But they hadn’t turned the world upside down but right side up by acknowledging the rightful Lord of all.

Nine years ago, I traveled to India, and it was jarring to see numerous temples devoted to hundreds of Hindu gods. It was in-your-face public idolatry. In our culture, we do not usually struggle with the temptation to worship golden statues (although there are many temples with these idols in the Twin Cities). But we regularly look to god-substitutes to bring us status, security, and pleasure. Tim Keller in his book Counterfeit Gods explains, “Idolatry is not just a failure to obey God, it is a setting of the whole heart on something besides God.”[ii] Today the gods of wine, love, power, and health go by different names. They have different marketing strategies. But they continue to compete for our affections and allegiance by promising happiness and fulfillment.

When the word of God comes with power and full conviction, people turn from idols. In 2 Kings 18, Hezekiah “removed the high places and broke the pillars and cut down the Asherah.” In Acts 19, new believers in Ephesus publicly burn their valuable books of magic. True conversion is not just changing our behavior, cleaning up our act. It is a reorientation of our hearts, minds, and wills to worship a new Lord.[iii]

Think back to your own conversion when you turned to God from idols. What were the particular counterfeit gods that you used to trust in for security, identity, and hope? How did God’s word expose these idols and reveal the surpassing beauty and goodness of Jesus? Tell about the work God has done in your life with your small group, neighbors, and friends in the coming weeks. For some here today, perhaps you have been trying to follow Jesus without turning from the idols in your life. You may attend church services, pray at mealtimes, and perhaps even read your Bibles, all the while continuing to live for culturally accepted counterfeit gods like financial security, entertainment, and pleasure. God’s word calls and compels you to turn from these idols that cannot save or satisfy you and turn to the true and living God with your whole heart.

2) The Word Brings True Worship (v. 9)

True conversion has two parts: We stop serving idols and we also start serving the living and true God. The Bible often uses “worship” and “serve” interchangeably to express our adoration and allegiance either to the one true God or to false, man-made idols. For example, Deuteronomy 6 says, “You shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve.”

What does it mean to serve God? In Acts 17, Paul explains that God is not “served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything.” We do not serve God by supplying any deficiency he has or meeting his needs. The word “serve” here in 1 Thessalonians 1:9 refers to the service of a slave for a master. It involves complete loyalty and devotion. It’s the same word Jesus uses in Matthew 6:24 when he says, “No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.”

Paul calls God true and living; he is the antithesis of idols, which are false gods that don’t have life and can’t give life. Psalm 115 describes the fake gods of the nations this way:

Their idols are silver and gold, the work of human hands.
They have mouths, but do not speak; eyes, but do not see.
They have ears, but do not hear; noses, but do not smell.
They have hands, but do not feel; feet, but do not walk; and they do not make a sound in their throat.
Those who make them become like them; so do all who trust in them.

In contrast, the psalmist declares “Our God is in the heavens, he does all that he pleases” … trust in the Lord! he is our help and shield.

True conversion leads to a total commitment to a new master; we experience a radical new direction, devotion, and delight. 1 Thessalonians 1:6–8 help to illustrate what this total commitment to God looks like:

• You became imitators of us and of the Lord Jesus
• You received the word in much affliction
• You have the joy of the Holy Spirit
• Your faith in God has gone forth everywhere.

We express our total commitment to worship the living and true God by gathering weekly with other believers to sing, pray, and study his word together. But true worship is not limited to attending a 90-minute church service. Serving the living and true God shapes every area of our lives: our relationships, work, parenting, finances, entertainment choices, schedules, and more.

Is it evident to our neighbors, family, friends, and coworkers that we have turned from idols and now worship the true and living God? What difference does serving God make in our daily lives?

3) The Word Brings True Hope (v. 10)

We’ve seen that a healthy church responds to God’s word by turning from idols and serving the true God. The Word of God also helps us to wait for Jesus’s return. Look again at v. 10: “to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come.” 

Waiting is closely related to hope: Verse 3 mentions believers’ hope in Jesus, and here Paul says that believers wait for Jesus. Waiting means that you don’t yet have what you are expecting or anticipating, whether good or bad; hope focuses on something good you want to happen or believe will happen in the future. Everyone waits for something, but not everyone has hope that things will work out. Hope is a commonplace word: I hope it doesn’t rain during the picnic. … I hope the Twins beat the Yankees. … I hope the test results come back negative. During the 2008 presidential election, I remember the numerous t-shirts, posters, and bumper stickers with Obama’s face and one word: “Hope.”

In the Bible, hope is not a wish for favorable weather, improved health, political change, or a championship team in Minnesota. Hope is a confident expectation that God will bring about future good as he has promised. For Christians, the face of hope is the risen, returning Son of God. Revelation pictures Jesus as a conquering king who slays his enemies and marries his bride. We are not destined for wrath but eternal life with Jesus, our living Lord. 

We’re a people in tension between our present reality and future destiny. The church is betrothed to Christ, yet we wait for the glorious wedding day. We are justified by faith, yet we still struggle daily with sin. We worship Jesus, who defeated death and rose again, yet we still suffer and die. We live in tension as residents of this earthly city though we seek a city that is to come. It’s like reading a book when you know how the story ends. One of our family’s favorite books is The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. When the White Witch and her cronies bind, ridicule, and kill Aslan at the Stone Table, it seems like evil has triumphed and all hope is lost. My kids often cover their ears and ask to stop reading, but I remind them that we don’t need to give up because they know how it ends—Aslan will come back to defeat the Witch and restore order in Narnia.

We know how the great story of history will end, when the trumpet will sound and our rescuer will return to set the world right again. But until that day comes, we are a waiting people with a stubborn hope.

Summary

To sum up, we’ve seen three ways that God’s word works in our lives: it leads us to turn from idols, to serve the true God, and to wait for Jesus’s return. In many ways, these three points serve as a short-hand for our Christian lives. We look back at how the Lord moved us from darkness to light, from servants of lifeless idols to servants of the living God. We look forward with longing and anticipation for the return of Jesus, our risen Lord. And we gladly orient our lives day after day to worshiping the one true God, who is our savior, sustainer, and satisfier. 

Let me close with three points of application. 

1.   Let the Word dwell in you richly.

Bethlehem is a church devoted to the word of God. We prize expository preaching, offer numerous Bible studies and classes, and even have a college and seminary that trains students to treasure and teach God’s inerrant word. The word is at work in many ways at Bethlehem, but remember that the ministry of the word is not limited to pastors and seminary professors. As Pastor Brian Liechty reminded us last week, all Christians are called to speak the truth in love. Colossians 3:16 says, “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom.” Is the word dwelling in you richly? The gospel message and the truths of scripture should be central to our small groups, conversations, activities, and times together.

2.   Flee from idolatry.

Our passage describes conversion as turning to God from idols. But Paul elsewhere exhorts Christians, not just unbelievers, to “flee idolatry” and “put to death … sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry.”[iv] We might prefer to slowly phase out sin, but the Bible uses strong words—flee, put to death—to stress the urgency and necessity of turning away from lifeless idols that steal our joy and imperil our souls.

There’s a memorable exchange in C.S. Lewis’s book The Great Divorce between an Angel and a Ghost with a little red lizard on his shoulder (a picture of lust). The Ghost wants the lizard to be quiet, so the Angel responds, “Then I will kill it.” The Ghost begins to make excuses. Back and forth they go—the Ghost prefers a gradual process or waiting for another time, but the Angel keeps repeating, “Shall I kill it? … May I kill it? It’s the only way [to silence it].”[v] Finally the Ghost gives up his resistance, and the Angel grabs the lizard with its burning hand and hurls it to the ground. Soon after, life begins to return to the Ghost and he turns back into a man.

Is there a little red lizard in your life that you tolerate when you need to terminate it? Is there anything in your life that you’re setting your whole heart on and looking to for true security and hope? For some it might be lust and sexual sin. For others, it might be a craving for the approval and acceptance of others above all. For others, it might be defining our worth and meaning based on our productivity or possessions.

These idols persist when we keep them in the shadows and isolation, so we need to be honest about your struggle with sin and ask other believers to speak truth to you, pray for you, and walk alongside you. Small groups are an ideal context to intentionally exhort one another to keep turning from idolatry and keep serving the true God.

3.   Wait well for your returning Savior.

In her helpful book Seasons of Waiting, author Betsy Childs Howard writes that we “are students in the school of waiting,” and she reminds us that “God is working in our waiting.”[vi]

What are you waiting for? Some in our church are waiting for a spouse; others wait for a child, for a home, for healing, for a job, for a prodigal we love to come back. The Lord enrolled our family in the school of waiting when we submitted an adoption application in early 2016, and we waited two years until we finally met our son and brought him home.

How are you waiting? It’s easy to grow discouraged or disillusioned as we experience the delayed fulfillment of our longings. Sometimes we feel like it’s always winter and never Christmas. Sometimes we cry, “How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever?” Remember that God is working in our waiting. He is teaching us to trust his promises. He is teaching us that he is enough for us. He is teaching us to keep on going because we know how the story ends. We’re all enrolled in the school of waiting; waiting well is a community project. Hebrews says, do not neglect meeting together but encourage one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.[vii] Encourage one another with the truths of God’s word: God is on the throne, even when our lives feel out of control. Even when our hearts break, we call to mind the promises of God: “The Lord is my portion … therefore I will hope in him. The Lord is good to those who wait for him.[viii] Even though it feels like our waiting never ends, Jesus is coming back to make everything right. Until that glorious day, we are a waiting people with a stubborn hope.

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[i] 1 Peter 2:5

[ii] Timothy Keller, Counterfeit Gods, p. 171

[iii] For a similar emphasis, see Michael Lawrence, Conversion, p. 50.

[iv] 1 Corinthians 10:14; Colossians 3:5

[v] C.S. Lewis, The Great Divorce, pp. 96–100

[vi] Betsy Childs Howard, Seasons of Waiting, pp. 14–15

[vii] Hebrews 10:25

[viii] Lamentations 3:24–25