(1 Thessalonians 3:9-13)
Although it’s unlikely that Paul had just stuffed himself full of turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, too many pieces of pie, and then passed out on the couch while the football games were on the TV. Nonetheless, the sentiments of Thanksgiving certainly are in line with what he wrote in this section to the believers in Thessalonica: “How can we thank God enough for you in return for all the joy we have in the presence of God because of you?” (v.9).
Paul was feeling gratitude. He was grateful for what God had done and had continued doing in the lives of the believers there. He directed his gratitude, his thanks, to God. He was rightly thanking God for the joy that the Thessalonians had brought into his life. And, as is the case with genuine gratitude, Paul was interested in more than just empty words, but backing that gratitude up with action. That’s why he desired to return among the Thessalonians to continue what had been started: keep feeding their faith by supplying what was still lacking (v.10-11). What Paul wrote after that is essentially a prayer.
In that prayer, Paul expressed his desire that “the Lord make [their] love increase and overflow for each other and for everyone else…” (v.12). It’s as if Paul is providing a flow chart for us to see how the Christian life works. It all starts with God, who then funnels his gifts to us through faith. Then, as we grow in our faith, those gifts – like an increase in love as well as the other blessings that will follow, will all increase, too. Do you want a “Real Christmas” this year? Here’s your recipe! Go back to the basics: God and his gift of faith and growing it, which leads to other spiritual gifts spilling over, like the ones Paul continues to pray for.
Paul’s prayer continues. “May he strengthen your hearts so that you will be blameless and holy in the presence of our God and Father when our Lord Jesus comes with all his holy ones” (v.13). We know the physical dangers of a weak heart. Not only can it cause complications, but even the slightest physical activity with a weak heart can potentially cause serious damage or even be fatal.
But a weak heart spiritually is even more dangerous. A spiritually weak heart can lead one to drift from God or depend on some other source for strength and sustenance. That will certainly do damage for this life, but the greater concern of having a weak heart is how it potentially will leave us “in the presence of our God and Father” (v.13).
When will we find ourselves in that situation? Paul is looking way beyond the celebration of Christmas to the most monumental event, the Last Day, “when our Lord Jesus comes with all his holy ones” (v.13). The Gospels in the Bible record Jesus teaching and preaching about this day. Even Paul, in this same letter, speaks of what that day will be like. The Thessalonians believers were someone what confused on the details of that Last Day. It’s worth noting that even that much closer to the life and ministry of Jesus, Paul was already focusing on his return and what its looks like to be ready for that day.
What does being ready for that day look like? It means we “will be blameless and holy in the presence of our God.” The first part of that may grab your attention, as “will be” almost sounds as if that status of being “blameless and holy” is something still to come, something to strive for, something to be attained at some point in the future.
That view would certainly fit the common ideas people have of good people getting into heaven. It’s based on the idea that good people would do – and keep doing – good things. Then, at the end of the day when their time is up, God would sit down with them for what amounts to a sort of performance review to determine if they’re in or not. So long as they have a strong enough track record, they’ll be fine. It’s no surprise then, that since we all imagine ourselves tending to have a pretty good track record in our own minds, replaying the “best-of’s” and the highlights of our lives, we’re rather confident that we’ve got nothing to fear.
The idea of eventually arriving at being “blameless and holy” might also seem to be supported by Paul’s own words, even in these very verses. After all, a faith that is “lacking,” love that can “increase and overflow,” and hearts that can be “strengthen[ed]” would imply that “holy” hasn’t quite been achieved yet.
So which is it? Are we holy right now, or is holiness a status that is arrived at by putting in the appropriate time and effort? How do we ensure that we’re blameless and holy on that final day?
Both can be true. We can be holy right now, and we can also be becoming holy. Now that doesn’t mean that we’re following in the footsteps of the world that says truth is relative and subjective, and that we can all have our very different truths, even when those contradict each other. There’s a difference between each of our individual constructs of truth as we drum it up in our own respective worlds and what we’d call a paradox in Scripture. Our subjective truths have no backing or support from anything authoritative – they are based purely on our own personal thoughts or feelings. The Bible, however, as the Word of God, is authoritative.
So when the Bible speaks both ways, so do we. And the Bible does. It says that we can grow in our faith. Nearly half of what Paul writes in the New Testament is Paul addressing Christian living and spiritual growth. It lines up with exactly what he is writing in these verses, encouraging growth in our spiritual lives. Moreover, we personally know how necessary it is for us to grow as Christians in all areas of our lives. Yes, we are saints, but on this side of heaven we are saints who still sin and are still a work in progress. We want to grow and mature in our daily responsibilities and vocations, and rightly so!
But the Bible also speaks about our status before God. God calls us holy, and he calls us holy right now, in the present, as we are in this very moment. “But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light” (1 Peter 2:9). “And by that will, we have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all” (Hebrews 10:10).
We notice two things in just these two passages – and we could have mentioned many other passages as well. First, there are no “ifs” in these verses. There is no carrot-on-a-stick holiness that is held out to us if we meet certain conditions or criteria. Holiness isn’t conditional.
Second, the tense of the verbs speaks volumes! We “are” holy because we “have been made” holy. There is no “someday down the road if you play your cards right.” There is no “once this happens, then…” There is only who we are because of what happened to make us that way.
So how does it feel? You are holy right now! And it is because God declares you to be holy right now that you also strive to live holy lives right now as you grow in holiness.
Perhaps one of the clearer Bible passages that ties our status as holy before God with our call to continue growing in holiness is found in Colossians 3:12. “Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience” (Colossians 3:12). Compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience aren’t the prerequisites to achieving holiness; rather, they are how our holiness is expressed as we grow in them and put them on display in our Christian lives. You are holy right now. And you are growing in holiness right now.
But if this holiness isn’t something we arrive at or achieve on our own, then how does it happen?
The answer is Christmas. Holiness left heaven and entered earth to bring holiness with him. If holiness is required to get into heaven, but holiness cannot be achieved outside of heaven, then holiness had to be brought to us. And to be brought to us, God had to come to us, which is exactly what happened at Christmas.
When you assemble enough things over the years, at some point you’ve experienced the frustration of arriving at a dead end. You can’t move forward because something is missing. You retrace all of the previous steps in the directions to make sure you didn’t use the wrong piece in the wrong place, and confirm that each step was properly followed. Just as you are getting ready either to disassemble everything and return it or contact customer service, convinced a piece was missing, in trots one of your children, caught up in some imaginary game, or possibly pretending to “help” you, and you notice they have in their hand the piece you need to finish the assembly. Now that you have that piece, you finish putting everything together.
Jesus is that piece. Only he is much more than a missing piece to our holiness (as if we were somehow almost there and he just needed to come in and supply what was missing)! He isn’t just a missing piece; he is the whole thing! He IS our holiness, through and through. We cannot have holiness apart from him.
And for him to be able to be our holiness, he had to provide our holiness by entering a holi-less world and bringing it with him. On Christmas, he was born to bring his holiness into a holi-less world. His perfect life in perfect obedience to God’s perfect law resulted in our holiness.
Therefore, dear friends, because of what Jesus came to do in the past, we know that we already have what we need when he comes again in the future on that Last Day. By faith in Jesus, we have holiness. His holiness. Yes, we have all that we need to be “blameless and holy in the presence of our God and Father when our Lord Jesus comes with all his holy ones” (v.13). Christmas can’t get any more real than that!
