Community of Christ

1 Thessalonians 5:12-25 does a very good job of laying it out for us when it says, "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 idle, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient  with them all. See that no one repays anyone 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 to 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 is faithful, he will surely do it. Brothers, pray for us."

There is so much in this passage, so many direct clearly stated does and don'ts. Do this, do not do this, there isn't much room left for us to get confused but some how we still manage to misunderstand so much of what is written for us.

This passage begins with a request asking us to respect each other, to respect those who work with you for the same purpose and for those who are over your in leadership. Whether they are over your or not their is a call for respect, but we are not only called to respect one anther but it goes further and calls us to esteem each other very highly in love. The word respect is used to commonly today, every one in this world wants respect and many demand it through aggression and force because they want it so badly. We are taught that it is a good thing to have respect but that it doesn't matter how you get it just as long as you have it. If that means lowering your standards or smashing someone else we'll do it. But being of Christ doesn't ask for this type of respect, it is asking for a respect given not based on who the person is or what they can do but based on what Christ as done for them, and yet it doesn't stop there either. As Christians we are called to an even higher level, we are told to esteem others very highly in love. It can be easy to give mutual respect to others, but that is not what Christs asks of us. He asks us to give respect even if its not returned and to esteem others. It goes much further and deeper then what we would do or even want to do. Think quickly of your own Christian Community, I'm am sure it will not take you long to think of just one person that you don't want to respect and definitely don't want to esteem very highly but yet this is the very first thing Paul says for us to do in his final instructions to the Thessalonians. I think its the first thing he tells us for us reasons, because without this kind of respect for each other the following instructions are impossible.

The texts moves from respect to explain the kind of relationship we should have with one another. From verse 14 through 16 we are told to do some very great things on before and for one another all of which are not possible if first you do not have a relationship with the other person so that you know them and their situations in life. It says first to admonish, to call one another out in love but this is not something you do unless you know person well enough to know their faults and what and where they need to be called out on. This is followed with the urge to encourage the fainthearted. Admonishing cannot be done without encouragement and here Paul calls us to be in such a relationship with one another that these things are what resemble our lives as a community of Christ. We are to help each other, to be patient with and for each other. We are to repay no one evil but should always be seeking to do good to everyone. This is no light thing, how often do we grow jealous of others wishing what happened to them didn't or that we had gotten the promotion instead. Envy, jealousy have no choice but to be destroyed by this command. We are to desire the very best for another, to rejoice always in every circumstance and to help each other find reasons to rejoice. Our relationships should be governed by such respect, esteem and care for each other that everything, admonishing, encouraging, helping, being patient and good to one another is an out flowing of our love for our King.

Pray without ceasing. We are to pray for one another, we are to be without ceasing, to continually be holding each other in pray. We are to be interceding on behalf of one another, praying against the power of the devil in our lives and praying that God would continue to over take our lives. We are to know each other well enough to know how to pray for each other, to be in close contact and communication able to ask each other to pray for us when times do get difficult. This passed weekend I was so blessed to be able to pray for particularly three of my brothers and sisters in Christ who's lives hit a rough patch. They were able because of our relationship to come and ask for prayer and later when I was not with them I was burdened for them and continued to hold them in prayer only to be blessed further by them being burdened and praying for me in times when they didn't even know what was going on in my mind and life. I was able to experience this type of community were it didn't matter where we were or who was around it only matter that we took everything going on to our heavenly Father. We are to be fighting for each other through prayer in the times of  trouble and temptation and we are to be giving thanks for and with each other in the times that are good.

From prayer the text moves to do not quench the Spirit. Paul reminds us to pray for each other and then reminds us that we are not to quench the Spirit because these two co-reside together. If we quench the Spirit we will not pray, we will not be moved to pray. We are to listen to the Spirit we are also not to despise prophecies but instead we are to test everything. It is easy to kick the Spirit out of our lives, to ignore His promptings or to reason away His moving in our lives by things in this world. But if we do that we will be unable to do what we are called to and will miss out on so much blessing. I've quenched the Spirit, I've reasoned away His voice and I have experienced being unable to do the things I am called to as a Christian because of this. We are called to listen, but are also called to test everything. It is also easy on the other side of things to almost blame everything on the Spirit or to forget that we have an army of the devil trying to break us down and so we are called to test, to hold everything before God and to abstain from evil. Quenching the Spirit puts a huge halt on our lives as Christians and so does partaking in evil. Nothing hinders us more, tears us down more, deceives us more then the devil grabbing hold of a tiny insignificant part of your life and making it his. Except we are called to have our whole lives surrendered to God, every single part of our lives and so then there is no insignificant part that we have secretly have under the control of the devil and still expect our lives to be filled in every part with God. We deceive ourselves with this lie and with every piece the devil grabs a hold of we are taken further and further from where we are suppose to be. Don't quench the Spirit let it convict, let it move in your life, don't be help captive by sin, abstain from every form of evil.

It is laid out plainly for us what we are called to do and what we are to keep away from. The good news is though that we are not left just with a long list of does and don'ts, Paul finished this amazing passage with "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 the Lord Jesus Christ. He who calls you is faithful; 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" We are not left alone to do this we have the hope of our Savior who give us His peace who sanctifies us that we may be blameless in our whole being at the coming of our Lord! And then it says, He who calls you is faithful and will surely do it. Our God is faithful and He will complete this work in us. It is only through the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ that we are able to try to live our lives in a way that is in community with Christ with our brothers and sisters. But I urge you as Paul urged the Thessalonians to do these things, to respect and esteem others to grow in relationship as you walk this short life together and to pray without ceasing for and with each other until the return of our Lord "And I am sure of this that He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ!" Phil 1:6