In this part of 1 Thessalonians, Paul thanks God for how the Thessalonians received the word of God and how that word has gone to work in them. How does God’s word “work”? We’ll explore that in this message.

Our text today is a difficult one to sort. It is full of complex sentences, parenthetical statements, explanatory notes, and changes of subject. That makes it hard to outline, but there are a couple of themes that emerge that we will be looking at this morning. They are: The Working of the Word (that is, the word of God); and the Persecution of the Church. We’ll look at these in turn, but first let’s read part of our text.

(1 Thess. 2:13-14; 3:1-4) And we also thank God continually because, when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as a human word, but as it actually is, the word of God, which is indeed at work in you who believe.  For you, brothers and sisters, became imitators of God’s churches in Judea, which are in Christ Jesus: You suffered from your own people the same things those churches suffered from the Jews …

So when we could stand it no longer, we thought it best to be left by ourselves in Athens. We sent Timothy, who is our brother and co-worker in God’s service in spreading the gospel of Christ, to strengthen and encourage you in your faith, so that no one would be unsettled by these trials. For you know quite well that we are destined for them. in fact, when we were with you, we kept telling you that we would be persecuted. And it turned out that way, as you well know.

Let’s read verse 13 again: “And we also thank God continually because, when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as a human word, but as it actually is, the word of God, which is indeed at work in you who believe.” A very wooden, literal translation would go, “When you received God’s word of hearing from us…” The New Testament places great emphasis on the importance of hearing.^[1]

Jesus regular refrain was, “Whoever has ears to hear, let him hear” (Luke 8:8). In other words, be careful that you hear. It is possible to go through life with our ears stopped up. God may speak to us, but we might not hear him. I suspect this happens more often than any of us realize, and the results are more tragic than we know.

In Mark 4:24, Jesus says literally, “Be careful what you hear.” We can hear the wrong things. While the orchestra is playing, we can tune our ears to the gossip the couple in the seats in front of us is sharing. We can form our lives around what the news media says rather than around the word God has spoken. The racket around us, some of which we make, can drown out the quiet voice of God. That’s the way some people want it.

Jesus also said (literal translation again), “Be careful how you hear” (Luke 8:18).[2] We can go to church, listen to the word of God, even take notes, and yet listen in a way that is unhelpful. We can listen with what Paul called “itching ears,” only tuning in to the things that entertain us. We can turn God’s church into an echo chamber where all that comes back to us are our own political or theological views.

We can be “forgetful hearers,” to borrow a line from St. James. That is, we can listen, register facts, and even think about how it might apply to our lives. But then we walk out of church and forget what we heard, thought, and felt. Then we come back next week and do it all over again.

The words can enter our brains but not reach our hearts. Neurotransmitters fire, but our wills remain in neutral. People are not transformed by what passes through their minds but by what lodges in their hearts. That means we must listen to God’s word with our heart as well as our ears.

When the Thessalonians received God’s word, they received it with their ears and their hearts. They received it, Paul says, for what it is: the word of God. If you find a word written on a piece of paper but don’t know whose wrote it, you won’t know who it’s for and probably won’t do anything about it. Perhaps it spells, “Run,” but if you do not know who is saying it, you won’t run. The power of a word, as Dallas Willard said, always lies in the personality that word conveys.

Tomorrow, if your mail includes a glossy investment opportunity in Micron Technologies, it will probably go in the trash. But if you receive a personal letter from Warren Buffet urging you to buy Micron, you’d own stock in Micron before the closing bell. The Thessalonians recognized whose word it was that Paul and Silas shared. It was God’s, and so they acted on it.

In Greek mythology, Cassandra was the daughter of King Priam and Queen Hecuba of Troy. Her older brother was Hector, the famous Trojan hero. In the story, the god Apollo tried to win Cassandra’s love by giving her a special gift: the ability to see the future.

In Aeschylus’s version of the story, Cassandra promised herself to Apollo, but after receiving the gift, went back on her word. Apollo was incensed but was powerless to revoke the divine gift. So, he added a curse to it. Though she could foresee the future, he made sure that no one would ever believe what she said. She knew the truth and spoke it, but no one accepted it.

I suppose that Paul sometimes felt like Cassandra. When he told people the good news of Christ, he knew he was sharing a word from God, but people often did not believe him. When he and Barnabas spoke at a synagogue in Pisidian Antioch and people scoffed at them, a Cassandra-like Paul said, “Since you reject [the word of God] and do not consider yourselves worthy of eternal life, we now turn to the Gentiles” (Acts 13:46). It’s no wonder Paul was thankful when he arrived in Thessalonica and people received the word as coming from God.  

The Thessalonians didn’t merely receive the word as God’s, they welcomed it. The verb the NIV translates as “accepted” is the same word that is used of welcoming someone into your home. I might receive a notice of jury duty, but I probably wouldn’t welcome it. I might receive a cold virus, but I won’t welcome it either. The Thessalonians received God’s word and they welcomed it. They were eager to hear it, know it, and live according to it. They were enthusiastic about hearing the word of God.

In our church, and in many churches, people stand when the Gospel of our Lord Jesus is read. This is a small way that we convey our welcome of the word of God. We are eager to hear and receive it.

Notice that the word of God works. Paul speaks of “the word of God, which is at work in you who believe.” There is something here we need to understand about how God interacts with his creation: he works through his word. He created the universe by speaking it into existence. The Big Bang was but the echo of his voice. “…the universe was formed,” writes the author of Hebrews, “at God’s command” (Hebrews 11:3). The refrain of the opening chapter of the Bible, repeated 8 times, is, “God said.” When God speaks, things happen. The psalmist wrote, “For he spoke, and it came to be; he commanded, and it stood firm” (Ps. 33:9).

If I want to create something, let’s say a raspberry pie, I cannot say, “Let there be raspberry pie.” Perhaps I could say that, and my wife would bake a raspberry pie, but she would need to pick the raspberries, clean them, combine them with sugar, cornstarch, and tapioca. She’d add some butter, and put it into a crust made of flower, salt, and shortening. My word might result in the creation of a raspberry pie, but it would not be instantaneous, and would need to be effected in steps.

God’s word sometimes works through others over time, but he is not limited to that approach. If he works through others, it is for their sake, that they have the honor and joy of being his co-workers. He does not work this way from necessity but from compassion. Unlike our words, his words can bring immediate results.

There is, however, one instance in which our word or thought (the Greek term λόγος covers both) brings the same kind of immediate results. When we think, “Raise hand,” our hand raises. We do not need to go through a series of steps or involve others (under normal circumstances). We simply think, and it is so.

As your body is wired to your thoughts, your interior words, the universe is wired to God’s thought and word. So, the psalmist says, “…lightning and hail, snow and clouds, stormy winds … do his bidding (Psalm 148:8). God not only created the cosmos by his word, he also sustains it by his word: “The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word.”

Understanding that God creates and maintains his universe by his word is a great help to faith. If we assume the universe runs on its own, like a watch that the watchmaker wound long ago, but has ignored ever since, we won’t be able to trust God. If we believe the universe is merely the result of interactions between the four forces of nature (the strong and weak nuclear forces, electromagnetism, and gravity) as they mindlessly bump into each other, faith will be impossible. But if we believe that those four forces of nature are the expressions of God’s thought, his word, which he still speaks, faith becomes possible.

So, the word of God works. It is at work in the universe around us and, according to Paul, it is at work in us who believe (verse 13). If his powerful word created and sustains the vast universe, what might it do inside a person? The Bible mentions various things.

It is God’s word that gives us new life: “For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God” (1 Peter 1:23). The word of the faithful God inspires faith. St. Paul says that “Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ” (Romans 10:17). James says that God’s word implanted in people is able to save their souls (James 1:21).

According to the author of Hebrews, God’s word goes deep into our being and is able to judge our most intimate thoughts (Hebrews 4:12). That is a wonderful thing. We are incapable of judging the truth or justice of our own deepest thoughts. Indeed, we can rarely even access them, but God’s word can. A wise person will take advantage of that and regularly open his thoughts to the living and active word of God.

There are other important consequences of hearing God’s word, one of which we find in our text. Immediately after Paul writes that the word of God is at work in the Thessalonians, he explains, “For you, brothers and sisters, became imitators of God’s churches in Judea, which are in Christ Jesus: You suffered…” (1 Thess. 2:14). God’s powerful word worked in them so that they would suffer rather than deny their Lord.

We like to hear how God’s word heals us and satisfies our needs, but this is not so welcome. This is not what we want to hear.

But Paul knew it is what we need to hear. The question is not whether we will suffer; God’s people have suffered throughout history. Paul and Barnabas encouraged the believers in the churches they started to remain true to the faith. They told them, “We must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God” (Acts 13:22).

The question is not whether we will suffer but whether we will stay true to God when we do. Many of us – most of us – will suffer from illness and disease or at least old age and we will die. Will we remain true to God when that happens? We will—if his word is at work in us. Some of us – who knows – may suffer a persecution in our lifetimes that rivals or exceeds the persecution the Thessalonians experienced. Will we endure it with faith in God or will the earthquake of trials shake our faith loose? We will endure—if God’s word is at work in us.

How can we make sure it is? We can begin by making room in our lives for his word. Jesus once said to the people “…you have no room for my word” (John 8:37). Might he say the same to us? We fill our lives so full of activities and worries that we leave no room for God to speak to us. I sometimes wonder if that is not intentional. Hearing God speak might be inconvenient. We might need to change, to surrender control. So, like the inn at Bethlehem, we keep every spot filled and leave no room for the inconvenient God.

We can experience the word of God at work in us by regularly engaging the Scriptures. What does the word of God have to do with the Bible? The answer to that question is long and involved, too long and too involved to go into in any depth in this setting, but I will say this: The Bible resulted from God speaking. It is God’s word to us in written form, unique, reliable, and priceless. Anyone who wants to encounter the word of God, can do so in the Bible.

It is true that God doesn’t need the Bible to speak to us. He has spoken to countless people directly, as the Bible testifies. But anyone who wants to hear God speak cannot afford to ignore what God has already spoken. It is no coincidence that the people who genuinely hear God speak to their hearts are the one who consistently hear God speak through the Bible. Listening to God speak through the Bible trains our ears to recognize his voice when he speaks to our hearts. People who say they want to hear God speak but who don’t make room in their busy lives to read or listen to the Bible, do not want to hear God speak very badly.

The application today is simple: Start reading the Bible and think and pray about what you read. Ask the God who spoke his word to give you ears to hear his voice. Doing this daily has had a more profound effect on my life than any other practice. I treasure the Bible not because of the doctrine of biblical inspiration I’ve been taught but because of the God I’ve encountered in its pages. Those encounters have yielded guidance, brought me peace, given me hope, and changed me for the better.

When I first started reading the Bible, I went in fits and starts. Bible reading felt like a chore. It was a chore. I didn’t know if I was doing it right. My mind wandered. I frequently felt like I got nothing out of it. That still happens sometimes. But I would not trade my time in the Bible for anything, for it is there, again and again, that God meets me.

I urge you to read the Bible, not trusting in the Bible, which is a kind of idolatry, or in the ritual, which is a kind of legalism, but in the God who spoke it and still speaks through it. Spend 90 days (that’s about how long it takes to develop a habit) reading, thinking about, and praying about what you see in the Bible.

If reading the Bible intimidates you, or if you just don’t know where to begin, or if you’ve tried it already and failed, take heart. Many of us have had the same experience. Talk with me. We’ll set up a reading plan that is doable and I’ll give you some pointers on how to start. You can do this. You really can’t afford not to.

^[1] Kittel, G. (1964–). ἀκούω, ἀκοή, εἰσ-, ἐπ-, παρακούω, παρακοή, ὑπακούω, ὑπακοή, ὑπήκοος. In G. Kittel, G. W. Bromiley, & G. Friedrich (Eds.), Theological dictionary of the New Testament (electronic ed., Vol. 1, p. 219). Eerdmans.

[2] Warren Wiersbe, The Bible Exposition Commentary: 1 Thessalonians.