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Christ Community Chapel is a church in Hudson, OH, that invites people to reimagine life because of Jesus. Learn more about us at ccchapel.com.
first Thessalonians 5:
12-28 we ask you Brothers to respect
those who labor among you and are over
you in the Lord and admonish you and to
esteem them very highly in love because
of their work be at peace among
yourselves and we urge you Brothers
admonish the idol encourage the
fainthearted help the weak be patient
with the all see that no one repays
anyone evil for evil but always seek to
do good to one another and to everyone
Rejoice always pray without ceasing give
thanks in all circumstances for this is
the will of God in Christ Jesus for you
do not quench the spirit do not despise
prophecies but test everything hold fast
what is good abstain from every form of
evil now may the God of Peace himself
sanctify you completely and may your
whole Spirit soul and body be kept
blameless at the coming of our Lord
Jesus Christ he who calls you is
faithful and he will surely do it
Brothers pray for us greet all the
brothers with a holy kiss I put you
under oath before the Lord to have this
letter read to all the brothers the
grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with
you hey everybody uh welcome great to
have you thanks for coming um we are in
the sixth week of our 10we series we're
calling the church God calls good and
we're looking at two letters that Paul
wrote to a little church in a city
called thessalonica and this first and 2
Thessalonians and today we're actually
closing out the first letter so if you
have your Bibles go ahead and turn to 1
Thessalonians chapter 5 uh you can look
it up on your phone uh the words will
come up on the screen uh eventually and
then if we going to use one of our
Bibles in the pews or over in the back
of East Hall it's on page
929 page
929 all right uh so this passage that
you just had read to you sounds like
Paul is just taking a scatter gun and
just listing out uh a bunch of things uh
he especially in verse 14 he says we
urge you Brothers admonish the idol
encourage the fainthearted help the weak
be patient with them all verse 16
Rejoice always pray without ceasing give
thanks in all circumstances it's like
boom boom boom boom boom uh a bunch of
unrelated things he's trying to cram in
before he signs the letter and sends it
off but I don't think that's what Paul
is doing I think Paul is actually
talking about just one thing just one
thing uh let me start with a story that
Jesus tells in Matthew chapter 18
uh in Matthew chapter 18 Peter asks
Jesus a question it's a good question
it's a hard question uh Peter asked
Jesus how many times do I have to
forgive someone who hurts me how many
times do I have to forgive someone who
sins against me in response to that
question Jesus launches into a story and
this is a story he says there was a king
who had servants and one of his servants
owed him
10,000 talents now a Talent was a
measurement of money it was an enormous
amount of money my Bible actually says
that 10,000 talents was equivalent to
200,000 years of
wages
200,000 years of wages it's like Jesus
said this guy owed the king a bazillion
dollar like he uses just an
astronomical number and the King calls
his servant in and says pay me what you
owe me and the servant says I can't and
he says please give me mercy and the
King uh decides to forgive him of his
debt which is crazy
amazing it would be amazing if he just
cut the debt in half or if he if he cut
it all the way back to just say one
lifetime of wages or even one year of
wages but instead he wipes it
completely out
and so that servant who came in with an
insurmountable debt had that debt lifted
and was going out forgiven it's a great
story until that servant ruins the story
by going and finding a fellow servant
who owed him a hundred days of
wages and uh he says pay me what you owe
me and his fellow servant says I can't
please show me mercy and this servant
who had been forgiven for so much ends
up saying no and he has him thrown into
prison and Jesus point was that that
first
servant didn't get the
gospel and of course this story is about
forgiveness which means it's a story
about the gospel because if this servant
had gotten the gospel it really
understood it he would have acted
completely
differently and and it it's so obvious
that Jesus doesn't even take the time to
explain it he just lets the story hang
there a church that God calls good is a
church that's filled with people who get
the
gospel who understand that we are like
the the servant who walked into the
king's presence with an
insurmountable debt and we walk out
completely
forgiven and debt free there's there's
nothing quite like it I don't know if
you you've ever seen the show Undercover
Boss uh few years ago I just binged on
that show I just I don't know if it's
still on or not but if you're not
familiar with the show it's a a boss
goes undercover in a company large
enough so no one would recognize them
but I love the end of each show and the
end of each show the boss sits down with
an employee or several employees one at
a time and the boss ends up saying
something like I've I just want to
surprise you and give you
something and then the boss says I'm
going to pay off your house I'm going to
start a college fund for each one of
your kids here the keys to your new car
they're outside and the employee just
starts to to cry and the the camera
follows them outside when they call
their spouse or a family member and
they're crying they're just saying I
can't believe it it's unbelievable
what's happened to me what they don't do
is go outside and call somebody who owes
them a hundred bucks and says pay me
what you owe me right that'd be the
farthest thing from their
mind what Paul is telling the Thessalon
thessalonica church and what he's
telling our church is that if we're a
church that's filled with people who
understand the go gospel we
know we are like the the employee goes
outside and calls Anybody Everybody and
says my life has become
unbelievably wonderful because of Jesus
you know whenever you get a group of
people together there's a name for the
the vibe that that group of people as a
whole give off they call that Vibe what
they call it is the culture of that
group uh football teams can be described
as having a winning culture not in
Cleveland but in other cities right
businesses have cultures families have
cultures churches have
cultures what what Paul is doing here
and listing out all these things he's
reminding the
Thessalonians about their culture he's
saying if you are a church that's filled
with people who understand the gospel so
this is your culture this is what you
you will ooze to anybody who comes in
contact with you it's it's unlike any
place in the whole universe let me read
the verses again and then I'll give you
my three points and my three points are
really just going to be the three
characteristics of a church whose
culture is shaped by the gospel this is
what it says we ask you Brothers to
respect those who labor among you and
are over you in the Lord and admonish
you to esteem them very highly and love
because of their work be at peace among
yourselves and we urge you Brothers
admonish the idol encourage the
fainthearted help the weak be patient
with them all see that no one repays
anyone evil for evil but always seek to
do good to one another and to everyone
Rejoice always pray without ceasing give
thanks in all circum cumstances for this
is the will of God in Christ Jesus for
you do not quench the spirit do not
despise prophecies but test everything
hold fast what is good abstain from
every form of evil now may the God of
Peace himself sanctify you completely
and may your whole spirit and soul and
body be kept blameless at the coming of
our Lord Jesus Christ he who calls you
as faithful he will surely do it
okay A a church that is shaped by the
gospel will do two do three things right
the first treat your pastor like a coach
treat each other like a Band of Brothers
and treat yourself like a lottery winner
okay those are my three points you know
I sit in my office and I try to think of
three points that'll be sticky and
you'll remember and I wrote These down
when I got these I was I I made myself
laugh um treat your pastor like a coach
treat each other like a band of brothers
treat yourself like a lottery winner
okay first treat your pastor like a
coach this is what it says we ask you
Brothers to respect those who labor
among you and are over you in the Lord
and admonish you to esteem them very
highly and love because of their work be
at peace among
yourselves when Paul says that what he's
saying right away he's implying there is
a a government kind of structure in a
somebody's in charge in a
church and it it's spelled out more the
qualifications of leadership in the
church are spelled out more clearly in
first Timothy and
Titus but in this these couple of verses
he uses some words that are really
important for a pastor he uses the word
labor and
admonish for people in the church he
uses the words
esteem and
respect and love and the result of that
is
peace as your pastor my my job is to
care for you but but more than that my
job is to develop you into a a follower
of Jesus into what God created you to be
and that word admonish has two parts to
it it means to encourage courage and it
also means to correct both those
things and I say treat your pastor like
a coach I grew up playing basketball in
high school and in college and my coach
in college was a man named Paul
Patterson and Coach Patterson was a he
was a great coach uh he was a very
demanding coach he had a bunch of saying
that he would uh repeat over and over
again he would drill it into every team
member and now you know those of us who
were on a Coach Patterson team like over
the course of Coach Patterson's career
of 20 30 years we can all give these
same sayings and here are some of the
sayings I actually have on a
bookmarker he says uh respect the
process appreciate the struggle good is
hard hard is good hard work is first a
separator then a unifier you have to get
comfortable being uncomfortable the game
honors toughness I mean you can kind of
catch what kind of a coach he was by
those says let me tell you one quick
story about Coach Patterson that I
remember is uh we were running skeleton
offense skeleton offense in a basketball
team is uh where the offense gets in no
defense so it's it's really for muscle
memory it's like you to run a play you
pass pass pass to this guy pass to that
guy pass it in score the bucket right
you and then the first team goes out
second team comes in past it's really a
Mindless thing all right so I had been
uh on the floor my group was off I went
to the side kind of away from coach and
then when I rotated back in we went pass
pass pass and I took a shot and the
whistle blew immediately and Coach
Patterson said everybody on the
sidelines 16 Sidelines that was the
worst punishment it was brutal
punishment and I said for what and he
said uh I said no more shots from the
corner and I said I didn't hear you and
he said it's your job to hear me and I
was so mad I mean I was just like I
can't believe this now I just told you
that Coach Patterson was a great coach
what I was convinced of no I I should
tell you too that I never walked off on
the other side of the court again in my
whole career I always went right next to
him because was my job to hear him but I
was really mad at him because I felt
like he had done something that was not
right but I loved Coach Patterson by the
end of my time there and when he passed
away three years ago I cried and I went
to his funeral with all the other
players that he coached because what I
was convinced of with Coach Patterson is
that he wanted me to be the very best
version of me as a player and as a young
man and he worked hard to do that and
that took encouragement and correction
and sometimes he would make mistakes but
I knew he and I wanted that for me I
wanted to be the best basketball player
I could be I wanted to be the best
person I could
be people who are pastors and I can
speak for every Pastor on our
staff we only do
this for
you we only do this because we really
want you to become what God intended for
you to
become and he uses the word in verse 23
sanctify and I I mentioned that word a
few weeks ago sanctification means
becoming the person God intended you to
become God created you to be radiant to
be glorious to be joyful to be beautiful
and that will take encouragement it'll
take correction at times and we'll make
mistakes at times but what Paul says if
you have pastors that that want that for
you that will do that for you then
esteem them respect them love them
because that's hard work it's hard to do
listen I need to tell you this too long
before there was a portal for athletes
where they could jump into the portal
and transfer to another school the
minute they didn't like something their
coach did or said there's been a church
portal where people can jump in and go
to another church don't do that so
quickly I don't know if if there had
been a church or a portal back when I
was playing for Coach Patterson I don't
know I might have jumped in it a couple
of times because I was hurt or
frustrated or thought he made a
mistake and now some 40 years later I'm
so glad I didn't because I'm a better
man today because of staying there so
that's the first thing that Paul says in
a church that's shaped by the
gospel treat your pastor like a coach
the second thing is treat each other
like a Band of Brothers this is what he
says in verse uh 14 and 15 and we urge
you Brothers admonish the idol encourage
the fainthearted help the week be
patient with them all see that no one
repays anyone evil for evil but always
seeks to do good to one another and to
everyone in uh 2001 HBO came out with a
miniseries called Band of Brothers it's
my alltime favorite miniseries I think
it it Chronicles the the true story of
uh easy company in World War II of the
the 506 parachute regimen of the 101st
Airborne Division
and it Chronicles their whole experience
from training camp all the way to the
end of the war and each episode begins
with the the soldiers themselves they're
old men now and they are
recounting uh their experiences and
they're they're even though they're old
men their memories are still fresh and
the bond that they formed uh was amazing
as they went through the experiences now
as soon as I read these words uh that
Paul wrote I went I started thinking
about Band of Brothers because if you
remember the reason that Paul is writing
these letters is because he started this
church in thessalonica almost
immediately after he started the church
persecution arose that was so Fierce
that Paul had to run for his life and he
knew that the church was involved in
persecution so he sent Timothy back to
find out how they were doing and this is
a response these letters are a response
to the report that Timothy brought back
and the reason my mind went to Band of
Brothers is because in many ways being a
Christian is like being in a battle
thessalonica was a hostile place our
country is becoming more and more of a
hostile place for
Christianity and what Paul is saying is
that a church with the whose culture is
shaped by the gospel will do certain
things where we will help each other in
the fight and there are five things that
he lists out the first thing he says is
admonish the idol what I realize in Band
of Brothers is that uh no one was
allowed to do nothing everyone had a job
no one could just be Idol and every job
was important and my point is that if if
Christianity if being a Christian really
is going to get harder and harder then
we're going to need each other and
they're going to be times in your life
for going to you're going to feel like
becoming Idol uh spiritually that you're
going to begin to stagnate you're going
to want to stop coming or stop serving
or stop giving and you're going to need
somebody to call you up and say no don't
drop out come on we need you we need you
and there are people that you know that
are not here and that are dropping out
that you need to call this week to just
say
don't he says admonish the idol the
second thing he says is uh encourage the
fainthearted there's a scene in Band of
Brothers where there's a private named
private blle and uh in a firefight he's
in a foxhole and he's just Frozen with
fear and there's a man named Lieutenant
Winters who's standing uh over him like
in the line of fire and he's shouting at
private ble saying get up ble
you can do it you can do it he is taking
his me away from the battle to like lend
courage to ble and ble finally stands up
and
engages listen our culture is going to
become more and more hostile which means
there going to be times where you're
going to need to encourage people to
lend your courage to people you're going
to need courage and to be a Christian in
the midst of your family or your
schoolmates or your work environment or
your neighborhood where we will have to
encourage each other uh when we're
tempted to shy away and
disengage or we're Frozen with fear the
next thing he says is
uh help the weak you that word weak
actually can mean several different
things in this context it can mean uh
that where you are weak because of
sadness because of Doubt uh because of
anxiety and fear or because of sin and
what Paul is saying is listen you need
to help them the way we that you help a
wounded soldier you go to them you you
throw them on your shoulder you take
them you patch them up you care for them
in a church that is defined by the
gospel we do not shoot our wounded no
matter how you are
wounded right then the fourth thing he
says is be patient with them all one of
the things I noticed you know be patient
is also the word for longsuffering but
one of the things I noticed in banded
Brothers is that uh there was the least
amount of friction among them when
between them when they're actually in
battle it was when they were not on
Mission that they began to get on each
other's nerves so one of the things I
want to encourage if there are people
around you that are sitting around you
right now that are getting on your
nerves it may be that you need to get in
Mission get back on Mission but what
Paul says is that if the gospel really
permeates this place if we really
understand and get the gospel that we
are forgiven we can be patient with each
other because God has been patient with
us and finally he says do not repay evil
for evil and what that means is don't
fight among
yourselves you there's enough to fight
against if the gospel permeates this
culture we we don't escalate things we
don't have feuds that are ongoing feuds
we we talk good about each other we do
good for each other and the reason that
we can treat each other like a Band of
Brothers is because of my third point
which is treat yourself like a lottery
winner it's what he says at the at the
end Rejoice always pray without ceasing
give thanks in all circumstances for
this is the will of God in Christ Jesus
for
you okay there's this this vibe that
comes with a group of people uh the
culture of a group of people oozes out
of them so that when people come into
this place they're going to catch that
Vibe and Paul describes that Vibe with
three things that there is
Joy there is prayer
and there is
Thanksgiving and one of the things with
joy is that we don't want ever go very
long here without reminding ourselves of
the Gospel that's one of the reasons we
take communion every week is to remind
ourselves that we are the servants that
walked into the presence of the king
with a debt that was
insurmountable and we walked out like
the employee and under cover boss to
call anybody to call everybody and tell
them how our life has become absolutely
wonderful because of
Jesus if we remind ourselves of that all
the time we will be characterized by a
deep and
abiding Joy the second thing is
prayer you know every time what I
realize is that the less I pray uh if
I'm not looking up then I'm looking down
and the less I pray the less clearly I
see what is true and what is right you
know uh Pastor Zach has a podcast called
wake up look up uh it's every day it's
five days a week it's it's really good
if you haven't tuned in to that probably
should he he says it's to connect
everyday events to the Gospel of Jesus I
like it because of the content but I I
like it even more because of the title
because what he's saying is wake up look
up for me every time I look up it helps
me to keep things in perspective to
understand things more clearly there's a
reason why here at this church we wanted
to put something in your hands we called
it lean in 24 days of prayer looking
toward the 24 election so that we could
keep our minds kind of stable in the
midst of this of all that's going to go
on in the next couple of weeks all right
keep doing that because prayer is one of
those things that Paul says as part of a
culture uh where the go where people
understand the gospel and finally he
says Thanksgiving give thanks in all
things you know Studies have shown over
and over again that happiness is
connected to gratitude the most grateful
people are the happiest people the
happiest people are the most grateful
people
show me a church that is
overflowing with gratitude and I'll show
you a church that you want to be a part
of listen every church has a culture
this church has a
culture we want to have a culture that
is permeated with the gospel and if we
are a culture that is defined by the
gospel uh and the understanding of what
Jesus has done for us
the way we do that is for you to treat
your pastor pastors like like
coaches treat each other like a Band of
Brothers in the midst of a battle
because if we're not in one now we will
be and then treat yourself like a
lottery winner because you are the
servant who walked into the presence of
the king with an insurmountable debt and
walked out completely and absolutely
forgiven because of
Jesus let's be a
church with a culture permeated with the
gospel so we can be a church that God
calls good all right pray with
me Father in heaven we come to you and
uh I am so uh
grateful uh I'm grateful for uh all that
you tell us in your word but I'm
grateful that we can have a culture that
is shaped by the gospel because you have
given us
Jesus I pray that you would remind us uh
even
today uh
that we have been
forgiven of a debt we can hardly even
comprehend and because of
that uh we can be free we can be alive
we can be loving we can be forgiving of
each other I pray that you equip us as a
group to treat each other in such a way
that we will be able to uh be in the
midst of a hostile environment and show
your love and your
grace thanks for every person here uh
thanks for giving us uh this your church
and I pray that you'll make us into a
church that you call good we pray this
in Jesus name amen