People might think this is weird, but I have always been very open with my kids about our family finances. When I get financial statements regarding my retirement, I share them with the family. They know how much I owe on my mortgage, how much I have in my checking account, how much I earn, how much I give, and what I'm invested in. I figure the best way I'll be able to teach them careful biblical stewardship is by being honest and transparent about what I'm doing. From what I can tell, it seems to be working.
With that in mind, my sons recently chose to invest a portion of their earnings in some of the same investments I'm utilizing. After several weeks of growth, and feeling like they had made the best financial decision of their lives, recent news reports caused the market to noticeably dip.
We were talking about this other day, and I asked one of my sons, "Do these market fluctuations worry you?" He said, "Yes, a little." Then he asked me, "Are you worried?" And I said, "Not in the least. I've seen this play out a hundred times in my life, and when the panic fades, I suspect the markets will recover like they have in the past." I also told him, "Smart investors actually look for opportunities like this to invest a little more while prices are temporarily down."
I don't want to sound cynical when I say this, but I seem to be getting to the season of life when nothing surprises me anymore. I'm not surprised by the latest cause of panic. I'm not surprised by trends. I'm not surprised by depravity. The more you read Scripture, and the more familiar you become with the history of humanity, the more you realize there really is nothing new under the sun. People do what people do.
And God is going to do what God does. In fact, in 1 Thessalonians 5:1-11, the Lord reveals through the Apostle Paul more of the specifics of what He has in store, and how we can be prepared for it to unfold. None of it needs to catch us off guard. None of it needs to surprise us.
I. I won't be surprised by Christ's return
“Now concerning the times and the seasons, brothers, you have no need to have anything written to you. For you yourselves are fully aware that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night. While people are saying, “There is peace and security,” then sudden destruction will come upon them as labor pains come upon a pregnant woman, and they will not escape. ”
When I was a child, my family owned a neighborhood grocery store in Scranton, Pennsylvania. When you own a business, you need to be aware that shoplifting and other forms of theft can really hurt profitability. For that reason, our family took obvious precautions, but we weren't prepared for one particular thief. I'll never forget the morning when my father arrived to open the store only to discover that sometime during the night, a thief cut a hole in the roof above the cash register, climbed into the store, hacked the register open with an axe, and stole the money inside. That was something we were not prepared for.
In this passage, Paul describes the day of the Lord coming "like a thief in the night." This is the same analogy Jesus used to describe His return in Matthew 24.
But know this, that if the master of the house had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into. Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect. (Matthew 24:43-44, ESV)
As Paul was speaking to the Thessalonians about the day of the Lord, he was referencing the same event that had been spoken of by Isaiah, Joel, Amos, Zephaniah, and Jesus. This is a period of time that the Apostle John also elaborated on in the book of Revelation. It's a time of blessing and a time of judgment. Those who trust in Christ will experience the joys of being part of His kingdom forever, and those who have rejected Christ will experience the outcome of choosing to remain under the wrath of God.
If Jesus returned today, would you be caught off guard? Would His return surprise you? Would you be disappointed or delighted if today was the day being referenced in these passages? I am at the point of my relationship with Him where I would be delighted if He returned today, but I wouldn't be surprised. I have been looking forward to His return for years.
II. I won't be spooked by walking in darkness
“But you are not in darkness, brothers, for that day to surprise you like a thief. For you are all children of light, children of the day. We are not of the night or of the darkness. ”
In the early days of our church, we used to have a lot of problems with vandalism and crime around our building. When it got particularly bad, I would drive over at night before I went to bed and make sure everything was OK. One particular night, I pulled into the lot and interrupted a drug sale between two cars that were side by side. One of the vehicles quickly pulled away, but the other car wasn't able to leave before I got their plates.
When people are walking in "darkness", they go about their life in such a way as to produce shame and regret. Scripture speaks of darkness as a state of living in rejection of the Lord. It's the state of living in disbelief. When a person is living in darkness, that means they're convinced that their heart will only find joy and satisfaction through indulging their fleshly appetites. It's a manner of living that produces regret, pain, and ultimately death, but that usually only becomes apparent once the damage is done.
But through Christ, we're empowered to walk in the light. In this passage, believers are called "children of the light" and "children of the day" because we've been cleansed of our sin and set free from our slavery to it. When we stop giving into it, the fruit of godly integrity becomes more obvious in our lives. We don't need to have a hidden life because we've moved on from trying to be our own lord, to true life where Christ is our Lord.
III. I won't be caught sleeping or drunk
“So then let us not sleep, as others do, but let us keep awake and be sober. For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk, are drunk at night. But since we belong to the day, let us be sober, having put on the breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet the hope of salvation. ”
We live in an era where home delivery is becoming a primary source of business for many large companies. My father's grocery store offered home delivery long before Amazon made it fashionable, but I'll never forget the day when the man he hired to make those deliveries showed up to work drunk. He walked into the store, prepared to grab the keys to the delivery van, and my grandfather who had stopped by noticed his condition. My grandfather took the keys and told the driver, "Get out! You're fired!" When my father came out of his office, to see what was going on, he asked, "What just happened?" My grandfather said, "I just fired your driver, so it looks like you're making deliveries today." "That's fine," my father said. "But if I'm making deliveries, you're cutting meat." At that point, my grandfather called my grandmother to let her know he wasn't coming home any time soon.
In this passage, Paul references the states of drunkenness and sleep as analogies for being caught off guard and ignorant of the Lord. When a person is drunk, they aren't alert. When a person is deep in sleep, they are oblivious to what is going on around them.
Paul's challenge to the church was to be sober-minded in obvious ways, and in some ways that might not be quite as obvious. In some of Paul's other writings, he explained that there is a spiritual battle taking place all around us that can be easy to miss if we aren't inclined to think about things from a spiritual perspective.
To prepare us for the battle we're facing against spiritual forces aligned with Satan, the Lord has equipped His children. Ephesians 6 speaks about the spiritual armor the Lord has given believers. In Ephesians 6, Paul speaks of "the breastplate of righteousness" that we've been given to guard our hearts. In 1 Thessalonians 5, he speaks of "the breastplate of faith and love" and the "helmet" of the hope of salvation.
I believe he's using these word pictures, in part, to remind us of the fact that our hearts and minds need to be guarded against the schemes of Satan which seek to penetrate both areas. Satan wants to steer the affections of our hearts and the meditations of our minds away from Christ and the truth of the gospel. But since we've been made "children of the day", we are empowered by Christ to resist the darkness of evil, and we don't need to be caught sleeping or drunk in the midst of this spiritual struggle any longer.
IV. My future life with Christ isn't unknown to me
“For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us so that whether we are awake or asleep we might live with him. Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing.”
When I watch a movie, I want to be surprised. I don't want to know anything about it ahead of time once I've decided to see it, but I have a few terrible friends who usually spoil movies for me. So, to avoid that, I no longer tell them what I'm interested in seeing.
But when it comes to my life and my future, I don't like surprises. I like being prepared, so I want to know as much as I can ahead of time. I'm actually grateful that the Lord includes "spoilers" in His word regarding the movie of my life.
Toward the end of his life, British novelist H. G. Wells (author of The Time Machine) grew despairing about the fate of the human race. One evening at dinner, Wells laid out his picture of the future. Mankind had failed because evolution had failed to produce in us the right kind of brain. Therefore, Wells claimed, we will destroy ourselves, die out as a species, and revert to the mud and slime from which we arose. “And we shall deserve our fate,” he said, adding that the human race had only “one thousand years more” to survive. - Today in the Word, November, 1996, p. 24
If my greatest hope was in evolution to rescue humanity, I would feel the same way. If I thought our hope for the future rested on human effort, I'd also be filled with despair. But God's word paints a more hopeful picture for us.
1 Thessalonians 5:9-11 tells us that God's children are not destined for wrath. Rather, through faith in Christ, we will obtain the outcome of our salvation which is eternal joy as objects of God's affection. We're also reminded yet again of the price Christ paid to be able to offer us this outcome. He endured death so we can enjoy life through Him.
I don't grow tired of reading that truth or preaching about it, and I don't grow tired of talking about it with others whose hearts are also refreshed by it. In fact, Paul told the church at Thessalonica to "encourage one another and build one another up" in the knowledge of these very things.
Don't be surprised when the day comes and the very things God has been promising us for generations come to pass.
© John Stange, 2020
