This is the Truth Network. Welcome to Ignite the Light Ministries radio and podcast. It is our mission to help listeners develop a deeper relationship with Jesus by sharing what the Bible says and what it means. We aim to encourage and equip you to serve others, share the gospel, and reflect Christ in every aspect of your life. I'm Pastor Wyatt Cudd.
Thank you for tuning in.
So two Sundays ago, we were in Thessalonians chapter 5, verses 12 through 15, looking at the believers' behavior towards each other. Those were that we are to honor leaders. Leaders are to be servants. were to challenge the wayward to return to the Lord. Encourage and support those who are timid and disheartened.
Support those who are weak and struggling, to be patient. to be peacemakers. for the kingdom. And all of that, simply put, Love one another. Love one another.
This week we're going to be looking at the believer's behavior towards God, and some of the final exhortations. Uh and also, simply put, we can summarize this. Love God.
Well God. Love one another. Love God.
Matthew 22, 37 to 39, these are the two greatest commandments. Love God.
and love each other. Two greatest commandments that all the law and the prophets hang on, like two nails holding up a beautiful painting. You're missing even one of them, that thing is falling to the ground. Love God, love one another.
So We'll just pick up our reading and just let the Word of God speak for itself. And then we'll talk about it.
So we're going to be in 1 Thessalonians 5, verse 16. You got it up there? Awesome. Rejoice always. Pray continually.
Give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus. Do not quench the spirit. Do not treat prophecies with contempt. But test them all. Hold on to what is good.
Reject evil of every kind. May God Himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul, and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The one who calls you is faithful and he will do it. Yeah.
Verse 25, brothers and sisters, pray for us. Greet all God's people with a holy kiss. I charge you before the Lord to have this letter read to all the brothers and sisters. Verse 28, final verse. The grace of our Lord Jesus be with you.
Love God.
Let's take a look here. We're going to be focusing on verse 16 to 22. Uh I'm gonna let you on in on a little secret. If we want to love God, it's directly correlated to our obedience. The God as He leads us.
It's like a child with their father, as the father instructs them. They love him best by following his lead and respecting dad knows best, right? Uh Now maybe it's not in my best interest as the child to take a stick and poke the dog in the eye, but dad's like, stop doing that, stop poking the dog in the eye. Or maybe it's not in my best interest to jump off the roof of the house onto the trampoline again and again, spend my afternoon doing that. True story, by the way.
Dad's like, what are you doing? This is not smart. Uh It is interesting though. Uh because The way we love God back It's following his lead. It's actually the best thing for us.
The way we love God back Is the same, it's synonymous with our own personal spiritual growth and development. Boys, if you want to love God, become the best godly man you can be. Girls, if you want to love God, become the best godly woman you can be. He calls us to it. He calls us to growth.
Just like fodder. Watching your child grow. I'm not a father, but I imagine the most rewarding thing you can see. You can love me by honoring my instruction, becoming the best version of yourself. That is our God in heaven.
Love God.
Love God by obedience to His Word.
Okay. Not only is it how we love God back, it's how we grow into the best version of ourselves. God instructs us primarily, so we say, Well, what does God say? What am I supposed to do? God instructs us primarily through His Word, the Bible.
So if we want to know God's will for our lives, And we're not reading the Bible, it's kind of like we're feeling around in the dark with a flashlight in our back pocket. You know, we have the Word of God to illuminate what we're supposed to do, and if we're not spending time with it, we're not spending time in the Word, we're going to be fumbling around in the dark.
So if If you're new to this, If you're new to reading scripture, my encouragement is to start with the book of John. The book of John tells us who Jesus is. And then from there, the book of Romans. That tells us, well, in light of who Jesus is, who am I supposed to be?
So if you're starting out, that's what I would encourage you with. When I was starting out, I'd read through a book of the Bible. And then I go on YouTube, and there's a group called the Bible Project, and they'll go through and break down the main themes of the book. Oh my gosh, it is so good. If you read through a book and then you go to the Bible Project, they can help you see: all right, did I miss something in my read-through?
Was there something said here that I didn't get? And you go through and look again. It really helps. It really helps. Helps me, did I connect the dots properly here?
So Love God. Follow his instruction. Go to his word. for instruction. And so this is what he says today.
Verse 16, rejoice. Always. Rejoice always. What does that mean? Rejoice always, well, means always rejoice, right?
Uh And we can do this, we can rejoice always because God saved us from our sin. Not only that, he looks after us. He's our protector. He takes care of us. He is our provider.
Nothing can take us away from the hand of Jesus. We're safe with Him. For that, I can rejoice always. Because of what God has done for me, my life has these guardrails around them. Nothing will ever happen in my life that is outside of my Creator's control.
Nothing will ever happen that is outside of God's love for me. Even if I don't understand it, even if it's hard, I can rejoice because I know God is in control and He loves me. Likewise, we rejoice to God for all the good things. When we have blessings in our life, We can rejoice for these things because they are provision. From God.
We rejoice because God gave himself so that we can have eternal life. With him. There is no other proper response but for us to rejoice. And God.
Now this is Separate and independent from our circumstances. What's going on in our lives? We can rejoice separate from that. And we see this because verse 18. Paul addresses, he tells us what to do with our circumstances.
We can rejoice always regardless of what's going on because of what Jesus has done for us. But in our circumstances, verse 18, what does he say? Give thanks in all circumstances.
So when things are going good, Sometimes we can forget. God is the source of this goodness. God is the source of my blessing.
Sometimes, when things are going good, we forget our utter dependence on God.
So, I encourage you, if you're going through a good time right now, praise God. But Praise God. Say, God, thank you. You get the credit for this. I give you all my thanks.
I'm so thankful for the blessing you have given me. In the good times, we give credit to God. Thank you, God. Things are going sideways though. The whole world feels like it's coming down on you.
Well man, it's often in those moments we see I need God. right now. We see our deep need from God. in the hard times. But how am I supposed to to thank God?
for the for the trials how am i supposed to thank god For suffering and for sin and for death. How am I supposed to thank him for those things? And I think the easy answer is Well, we don't. We're not supposed to. We're not supposed to thank God.
Like, I wouldn't say, thank you, God, for my sin. Be like, what are you talking about? You're supposed to run from your sin. Don't thank me for it. It says we give thanks to God in all circumstances, not for all circumstances.
We give thanks to God in all circumstances. Not four.
So What scripture means here Is that there is victory in Christ to triumph every circumstance, no matter how terrible, no matter how awful, no matter how discouraging or painful. And I want you to know when Jesus was praying right before he went to the cross, and he had blood, he was sweating blood. He said, God, would you take this cup from me? Do we have to do this, God? But not my will, your will.
It is okay to have Painful, upsetting emotions for very real, upsetting situations. That is okay. And it is okay to say, God, I don't like this. Take this from me, please. But not my will.
your will. There's nothing wrong with that. Jesus Model that. Verse seventeen. We're going back a verse, because I skipped a verse.
Verse 17. Pray without ceasing. or pray continually. What does that mean? How do I pray without ceasing?
Doesn't Paul know I got a job? Doesn't Paul know I need to get eight hours of sleep? How am I supposed to pray without ceasing? What does he mean there?
Well, prayer is how we communicate. With God. You want to talk to God? You pray. You pray and God responds, God hears every single one of our prayers.
And he responds to them.
Now it's not always the response we want. But it's always the response we need. Isn't that a reasonable? rejoice. And the more we pray, The more we see God respond, And then the deeper of our knowledge of who is God, the deeper our knowledge of God.
becomes If you want to know what your husband thinks of the new curtains, Are you asking? Honey, what do you think of the new curtains? And then he says, have we got any curtains? And he said, yeah, last month he says, well, I don't know. Um If you want to know what God thinks, You asked him.
You pray. God, what do you think about this? What do I do in this circumstance? How am I supposed to respond to this? You take it to the Lord in prayer.
And we will understand more deeply God's heartbeat. How do I respond to these situations? What am I supposed to say to this person? Ask God. He will respond.
Now there's When we think of prayer, there is A daily prayer routine. I pray at this time, I go to this place, I read the word, perhaps you journal, there's habit and there's routine built around. This is my prayer time. I think of it as very intentional prayer. But man, then there's also those very small, quick prayers throughout the day.
And it doesn't have to be one or the other. Oh, well, I pray continually at little small times throughout the day, or I pray continually, I have this set time each day. It doesn't have to be one or the other. I think Both are good. uh together.
Small, quick, quick prayers throughout the day, like while you're driving, the prayer when something comes up, you want to give it to God, or you're in a conversation with somebody, you ain't got time to go get on your knees and pray. It's the quick, like under-the-breath. Prayer You know? I'm giving this to God right now. God help me.
What do I say here? What do I say here? I think a healthy prayer life has both of these. The intentional time with God, I'm giving this time to God, and then also the impromptu. Lord, there's situations coming up right now, I'm giving these to you.
So it says, Rejoice always. Pray without ceasing. Give thanks in all circumstances.
Then Paul says Regarding these things, This is God's will for you in Christ Jesus. God wants you to delight. And hell. God wants to spend time with you fellowshipping. Pray with you in prayer.
God wants to spend this time with you, He loves you. He wants to meet with you. God wants us to see that He is with us. In all these circumstances, So we love God, and we love God back with our obedience. We love Him, we follow His lead.
This is what He says to us. Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances. And again. Like a father. The way I love God back It's the best thing for me.
It's actually the best thing for me. Verse 19 it says, Do not quench The spirit. Do not quench. The spirit. The spirit The word in the Greek is pneuma.
It receives capitalization because it's not in reference to any old spirit. It's a reference to a specific person. The Holy Spirit. Y'all seen Star Wars? I like Star Wars.
I grew up on Star Wars. Luke, I am your father. And he's like, no. It's cold. I love Star Wars.
I grew up on Star Wars. Uh but in my humble opinion Any of the Star Wars movies that Disney made after the original six, I don't accept these. These are not canon. I don't believe that it's Star Wars. I don't accept them.
I have a childhood to protect.
So I don't accept the Disney versions of Star Wars. You had four, five, and six, then you had one, two, and three. Everything after that. Didn't happen. I don't, I didn't happen.
Thank you for coming to my TED Talk. But in Star Wars you have The force. Pick things up with your mind, do Jedi mind tricks, or shoot lightning. It's pretty cool. Uh I think sometimes We mistake the Holy Spirit for like this impersonal Force.
That if I just pray hard enough, I can invoke the Holy Spirit. Then this person could be healed, or I could cause something to happen. If I just pray hard enough to God, what I want will then happen. If I just pray hard enough to God, I will know where the best parking spot is as I'm pulling into the Walmart. Uh But if I don't pray hard enough, And then it won't happen.
And if I don't get what I want, then maybe I didn't pray hard enough. And the Holy Spirit is not like this. The Holy Spirit is a person. Just like God the Father, just like Jesus the Son. And a person, a person has thoughts.
A person has a will. A person has agency. The Holy Spirit, being God, is his own person with thoughts, with will, and agency. The Holy Spirit is. A person.
And when we accept Jesus as Lord, this person, the Holy Spirit, comes to live within us. And He's there with us through every circumstance. He prompts us when and how we should act. He will guide us in situations if we go and listen. And he will show us Areas we need to grow in.
Things we need to stop doing. He will prompt you. You will feel that. Quench, that word quench. Means to extinguish like a fire.
Like you got this fire of God in you, burning bright, illuminating things we need to do or things we need to stop doing. And Quench is I don't listen. Or, I put this fire out intentionally because I'm not ready to change. Uh So what it's saying here is When God leads us We can't ignore We can't neglect it. We can't disobey.
Don't quench the spirit. Follow God as He leads you. Again, coming back to the idea of We follow God. It's the best thing for us. It's the best thing for us.
Verse 20: it says, Do not treat prophecies. With contempt. Verse 21, but test them all and hold on to what is good. A prophecy is a spiritual gift. of proclaiming truth.
This is proclaiming the gospel, but it can also be proclaiming or predicting the future. Under the influence of the Holy Spirit. That sounds That sounds amazing. There's a lot of spiritual gifts. You can find a list of them in 1 Corinthians 12.
Now there when Paul lists the gifts what he says is the Holy Spirit is the cause of these things Spiritual gifts, back to the idea of the force, the spiritual gifts are not like superpowers where I can just turn on super strength and just go throw cars around in the parking lot when I want to. The spiritual gifts are not like this. Rather, they are miraculous things that God chooses to work through us. 1 Corinthians 12, 11, it says, The gifts are from the same Spirit that works all of these things. distributing to each one individually as he wills.
So, these things, these spiritual gifts, the prophecy that's being taught here, these things happen according to God's will. It's not like a trait that He gives to some and not others. No, God will work these things, chooses to work these things. There was. Uh And it says, do not treat prophecies.
With contempt. So, what does that mean? When God works in this way, And we see it. Paul says, don't minimize or dismiss. But God speaks in this way.
Rather, verse 21, test them and hold on to what is good.
Now God can speak to us in some unique ways. Scripture is the primary way that God speaks to us. But It can also be Through the body of Christ, through other people, God can speak to us. God can speak in dreams. He can speak very directly.
He's God. Uh But God can also speak in visions. And these things have not stopped. When they happen, it is my advice Take every aspect of God speaks to you outside of Scripture. Take every aspect of what is said and test it against Scripture.
Test everything against Scripture because God will not contradict himself. God is a God of truth. Contradictions, there is something in there that is not true.
So if God speaks in this way. And we test it against Scripture and Scripture says, that's not right. probably wasn't God. Scripture is the mind of God. Revealed.
God has revealed his mind to us. in scripture.
So uh if What is said contradicts scripture, go with scripture over what is said. That's prophecy. Then verse 22, reject every kind of evil.
So in this idea of Prophecy. We've attested against Scripture. Things that fail the test, things that sound like they're right, but when we look at the Word of God, they contradict the Word of God, we throw them away. We throw them away.
Now in the Greek the word for reject is a Pekko, I think I said that right. It has a range of meanings.
So reject every kind of evil. The NIV, we use the word reject, but it can also mean be distant from. or abstain from, be distant from evil, abstain from evil. I like the be distant one. Be distant from evil.
If I'm trying to Lose weight. If I'm trying to slim down a little bit, It's probably not a good idea for me to be eating a whole bunch of donuts every day. That is just It's not gonna work out. It's just not gonna work out.
So if I'm trying to lose weight, I'm not going to be eating donuts. I'm going to abstain, but be distant from. If I am In my car circling the Krispy Krem donut, or if I'm circling the Krispy Kreme, it's just like it's a matter of time, you know? If that's what I'm doing, it's just a matter of time before I park and I go in and I eat 24 of them. It's just a matter of time.
Be distant from every kind of evil.
So it's the same thing we can apply to our sin. If there's something that we're weak to, something that we're struggling with, don't circle the Krispy Kreme parking lot. You see, that's a cliff that I don't want to fall off of. I need to be distant from that.
So, what I'm gonna do is, I'm not going to tempt fate. Get right up to the cliff, dangle my feet off of it. That's not good. Be distant from evil. I would say best practice is to build a fence 10 feet away from that cliff.
I don't want to sin in that way anymore. I'm gonna build a fence 10 feet away. I'm gonna set up personal boundaries that I commit to myself. I commit to God. I'm not going past this line anymore.
I love you too much to do that, God.
So if you got something you're struggling with, set up a fence. 10 feet away, don't even allow yourself to get close because your willpower will fail you. Hey there. I hope this sermon has enriched your day. If you like this message, I want to personally invite you to join us for Sunday worship.
We have two locations in Virginia, Trinity Methodist Church in Concord and Mount Comfort Methodist Church in Appomattox. Come join us Sunday morning at 9.45 and we will help you get connected. As always, I'm Pastor Wyatt Cudd. Thank you for tuning in.
