Today’s Reading: I Thessalonians 2
When reading Paul’s letters, I love to reference the first visit or introduction to the now established church. When you understand the first introduction of the church, you can understand better, Paul’s writings and teachings to the church later on . We are first introduced to Thessalonica in Acts, Chapter 17.
“They took the road south through Amphipolis and Apollonia to Thessalonica, where there was a community of Jews. Paul went to their meeting place, as he usually did when he came to a town, and for three Sabbaths running he preached to them from the Scriptures. He opened up the texts so they understood what they’d been reading all their lives: that the Messiah absolutely had to be put to death and raised from the dead—there were no other options—and that “this Jesus I’m introducing you to is that Messiah.” Some of them were won over and joined ranks with Paul and Silas, among them a great many God-fearing Greeks and a considerable number of women from the aristocracy. But the hard-line Jews became furious over the conversions. Mad with jealousy, they rounded up a bunch of brawlers off the streets and soon had an ugly mob terrorizing the city as they hunted down Paul and Silas. They broke into Jason’s house, thinking that Paul and Silas were there. When they couldn’t find them, they collared Jason and his friends instead and dragged them before the city fathers, yelling hysterically, “These people are out to destroy the world, and now they’ve shown up on our doorstep, attacking everything we hold dear! And Jason is hiding them, these traitors and turncoats who say Jesus is king and Caesar is nothing!” That night, under cover of darkness, their friends got Paul and Silas out of town as fast as they could. They sent them to Berea, where they again met with the Jewish community. They were treated a lot better there than in Thessalonica. The Jews received Paul’s message with enthusiasm and met with him daily, examining the Scriptures to see if they supported what he said. A lot of them became believers, including many Greeks who were prominent in the community, women and men of influence.”
Acts 17:1-5, 10-12 MSG
Some of the citizens of Thessalonica were frustrated and upset at Paul and his friends for their proclamation of the gospel. The individuals were so upset that they created a mob and were willing to kill Paul and Silas for their teachings.
In today’s reading, we are in the first book to the Thessalonians in chapter 2. Throughout this chapter, Paul is not remembering the harshness and the hurt and the trauma from their experience. In this passage, Paul remembers their friendship. He uses the word friend several times in this small passage.
“So, friends, it’s obvious that our visit to you was no waste of time. We had just been given rough treatment in Philippi, as you know, but that didn’t slow us down. We were sure of ourselves in God, and went right ahead and said our piece, presenting God’s Message to you, defiant of the opposition.
You remember us in those days, friends, working our fingers to the bone, up half the night, moonlighting so you wouldn’t have the burden of supporting us while we proclaimed God’s Message to you. You saw with your own eyes how discreet and courteous we were among you, with keen sensitivity to you as fellow believers. And God knows we weren’t freeloaders! You experienced it all firsthand. With each of you we were like a father with his child, holding your hand, whispering encouragement, showing you step-by-step how to live well before God, who called us into his own kingdom, into this delightful life.
Friends, do you realize that you followed in the exact footsteps of the churches of God in Judea, those who were the first to follow in the footsteps of Jesus Christ? You got the same bad treatment from your countrymen as they did from theirs, the Jews who killed the Master Jesus (to say nothing of the prophets) and followed it up by running us out of town. They make themselves offensive to God and everyone else by trying to keep us from telling people who’ve never heard of our God how to be saved. They’ve made a career of opposing God, and have gotten mighty good at it. But God is fed up, ready to put an end to it. * * *”
1 Thessalonians 2:1-2, 9-12, 14-16 MSG
This friendship was made in the churches in Thessalonica and the response that they received. Paul’s maturity to see the good and encourage people in spite of his trauma is witnessed in this letter. Paul has found how to allow God to use him through these difficult circumstances that he’s going through to be an encouragement to others.
This past week at my job, I learned a new set of skills. One of the set of skills was to be able to comfort people in their trauma and in their places of hurt. So many people are going through so much trauma which can be hidden or it could be obvious, but they are attempting to manage this trauma. They will reach out to you and one thing that you have to do is just to listen.
As we listen to our people and comfort them in their trauma, sometimes we get over burdened by all of their trauma. We have to find a place to Refresh ourselves. Jesus has given us the ability to connect with him to refresh ourselves from comforting others who are going through trauma.
Throughout trauma, we hurt.
Throughout trauma, we cry.
Throughout trauma, we may become paralyzed.
But through Christ, he has given us the ability to comfort and encourage others from our past traumas and our current traumas and our future traumas. We have to begin to allow Christ to take these traumas from us and the ones we have absorbed and then allow Christ to heal us as well.
As we walk through our journeys, may God allow us to allow Christ to comfort us and allow the Holy Spirit to be present to comfort others as we comfort them.
Be Blessed
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