Now, brothers and sisters, about times and dates we do not need to write to you, for you know very well that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night. While people are saying, “Peace and safety,” destruction will come on them suddenly, as labor pains on a pregnant woman, and they will not escape.

But you, brothers and sisters, are not in darkness so that this day should surprise you like a thief. You are all children of the light and children of the day. We do not belong to the night or to the darkness. So then, let us not be like others, who are asleep, but let us be awake and sober. For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk, get drunk at night. But since we belong to the day, let us be sober, putting on faith and love as a breastplate, and the hope of salvation as a helmet. For God did not appoint us to suffer wrath but to receive salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ. He died for us so that, whether we are awake or asleep, we may live together with him. Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing.

A series of contrasts underlies this entire passage. Paul uses these contrasts to emphasize the magnitude of the change that happens when people become Christians. Before they came to Christ, they were just like the people around them; now they are not. They were in one kingdom; now they are in another. Their identity changed. Their loyalty changed. They changed.

This is an important theme throughout Paul’s letters. Again and again, he says things like this: “For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord.” (Eph. 5:8). “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation!” (2 Cor. 5:17). “You were slaves to sin…but now…have become slaves to God.” (Romans 6: 20, 22).

The series of contrasts Paul uses in this passage include Light and Darkness, Knowledge and Ignorance, Expectancy and Surprise, and Soberness and Drunkenness. These contrasts come as Paul reminds the Thessalonians of What They Know (vv. 1-3), What They Are (now that they have Christ, vv. 4-5), and What They Should Do (vv. 6-8) – Know…Be…Do.  He ends the section by reminding them of What God Has Done and Why He Has Done It (vv. 9-11). We’ll take each of these sections in turn.

We start with Know. There is a huge emphasis in the Bible on knowledge. In the Book of Proverbs alone there are 41 uses of the noun and 16 of the verb, 32 uses of the noun for “understanding” and 12 more of the verb. 101 uses of just those word groups, and that’s just in Proverbs.

In the New Testament, the words, “you know” appear 67 times. People say what you don’t know can’t hurt you, but the biblical writers would have disagreed. What you don’t know can make a mess of things. Paul reminds the Thessalonians of what they do know.

As I began to exegete this passage, I remembered something a beloved, old deacon said to me. I had just arrived here and so I didn’t yet know how to take this man. One day he asked me if I knew what it means when a preacher takes off his watch and conspicuously sets it on the pulpit. When I said that I didn’t, he looked at me with a twinkle in his eye and said, “Absolutely nothing!”

I thought of that conversation when I read the opening line of chapter 5. Paul says, “Now, brothers and sisters, about times and dates we do not need to write to you…” but then he goes ahead and writes about it. What does it mean when an apostle says, “We don’t need to write you”? Absolutely nothing.

But that’s not fair, for Paul does not write about times and dates but about the fact that people do not and cannot know times or dates, for the Day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night. The church got this metaphor from Jesus himself and it was apparently part of the teaching that new Christians received. There is no doubt that Christ will come. There is no certainty about when.

Outside the church, people do not know that Christ is coming and so will be taken by surprise. Paul says (verse 3), “While people are saying, “Peace and Safety,” destruction will come on them suddenly.”

New Testament scholars like Richard Hays believe that “Peace and Safety” (or perhaps better, “Peace and Security”) was a political slogan in the Roman empire, like Neville Chamberlain’s, “Peace in our time,” or Herbert Hoover’s, “A chicken in every pot.”

If this was a first century political slogan, it is interesting to think of people chanting it at some massive rally before the emperor, who stands on the dais beaming. But he and they are oblivious to the fact that Jesus may come at any moment. And when he does, he will have his own slogan – or rather, a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and the trumpet call of God.

And it is interesting to think that people chant similar slogans today, fed to them by political machines like Rome’s, still oblivious to Jesus’s return. Perhaps people will be chanting, “Finish the Job” or “Make America Great Again,” at the very moment the shout of command is given, and the trumpet of God sounds. But you, if you are a Christian who has been instructed in the way of Jesus, know that Jesus is coming. In terms of Paul’s contrasts, you are in the know, but they are in the dark.

They will be surprised (verse 4), but you should be expecting this day – “the Day of the Lord.” That phrase appears 30 times in the Bible and is referred to many more times as “the Day,” “that Day,” “the Day of God,” and in other ways. The Day of the Lord is the day when God rescues those who trust in him and judges those who do evil. Even nations will be held to account. This idea was not new: the prophets had spoken of it for centuries. The new information here is that the Day of the Lord will be kicked off by Jesus’s sudden return.

But the Thessalonians knew all this and should not be surprised. But that doesn’t mean they can predict the day when Christ will come. To use Paul’s illustration, which also comes from Jesus: a woman knows she is going to have a baby – there’s no doubt about that – but that doesn’t mean she knows when she is going to have the baby. Our first baby took us by surprise. He came three weeks early. When Karen roused me at two in the morning with the words, “My water broke,” I uncomprehendingly answered, “No, it didn’t,” and rolled over. I should have been expecting this. But I wasn’t ready.

In verses 5 and 6, Paul moves from knowing to being.The reason the Thessalonians know something their neighbors and friends don’t is that they are something their neighbors and friends aren’t. When a person trusts in Jesus Christ, when they surrender their life to him and confess Jesus Lord (which is what happens when a person trusts in Jesus Christ), they are changed. Remember what Paul said: “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation!”

It is impossible to overstate the magnitude of that change. Some people think that Christians are just like everyone else, only more religious. And it’s true that Christians experience temptations, limitations, and sinful inclinations just like everyone else. It is true that Christians are no smarter than other people. They are not necessarily nicer, happier, or morally superior. When they become Christians, their weight doesn’t change, their hair color remains the same, and their appetite for adventure, ice cream and alcohol usually persists.

So, has anything changed? It has. It is not a change that can be weighed or measured, and yet it means that nothing will be the same again. When a person trusts in Jesus Christ, his weightless and measureless spirit is brought to life (you could say it is enabled) by a connection to God’s Spirit. He is reborn. This is what Paul meant when he said that God “made us alive with Christ.” We become – and this is what changes everything – “alive to God in Christ Jesus,” as Paul put it in Romans 6:11. For the first time, there is a part of us that can respond to God, that can receive his guidance, encouragement, and correction—his life. That is transformative.  

That transformation begins with God, not us. It is what we call grace. The change is not the result of my determination (though that is important) but of God’s love.

Henri Nouwen tells of seeing a nativity scene in a small church that profoundly moved him. It was very simple: three small, wood-carved figures: a woman, a man, and a child. The figures were primitive: no eyes, ears, or mouths, with only the contours of a face. They were smaller than a human hand and hardly attracted any attention.

But then a beam of light shone on the figures and the inconspicuous trio grew into large, hopeful shadows on the sanctuary wall, outlines of majesty and glory. The change was remarkable, though the figures remained the same. It is the light from without that changed everything. And it is the Spirit from without, the Spirit from God, that begins the great changes that happen to us.[1]

In verses 5 and 6, Paul speaks about a change in the nature, the beingness, of the Thessalonians. They are – not should be but – “are all children of the light and children of the day. They no longer belong to – literally, they no longer are of – the night. The change in them has worked a change around them. They have become sons of the light, characterized by visibility and transparency. Because of the Spirit now in them, they thrive in light but wane in darkness.

Because of the change in who we are – our essential being – there is a change in what we do – our existential doing. That is what we see in the next verses. Since we are different now, “we should not sleep as the rest” (literal translation, verse 6), “but rather we should be awake and sober.”

It is surprising how often the apostles tell Jesus’s people to be sober. It makes you wonder if the early Christians had a problem with alcoholism. Certainly, millions of Jesus’s people have fought that battle, and literal sobriety is expected of Jesus’s people. But it is more than that. The idea here is about being clear-headed, not fuzzy, in control of one’s thoughts, not muddled.

There are many things besides alcohol, marijuana, and narcotics that can muddle a person’s thoughts. Envy will do it. So will anger, which works faster than most drugs. Greed, sexual desire, pride can all warp a person’s thinking without the person realizing it. A constant diet of social media, news media, and online shopping will dull the mind. The ability to think clearly, which is enormously important in the Christian faith, can be compromised.

The opposite of being sober is being drunk, in which thinking is distorted. The opposite of being awake is sleeping, in which thinking is disrupted. Paul wants Christians awake and sober and thinking clearly.

In verse 8 – we’re now in the do section of the know…be…do outline), Paul tells us how. A literal translation could go: “But we who are of the day should be sober, putting on a breastplate of faith and love and the helmet of salvation’s hope.” The breastplate and helmet were the two most important pieces of defensive armor.[2] This is about protection. We choose faith and love rather than distrust and hatred for our own protection.

Many people think they are protecting themselves by assuming an attitude of distrust. They wield hate like a shield. But while distrust and hate may protect us in some ways, they will hurt us in others, like an asbestos suit may protect a firefighter from the flames but give him cancer in the process.

Paul also wants us to put on the helmet of salvation’s hope. That does not mean that we hope to be saved (though we do). It means that salvation through Jesus Christ gives a person’s hope, and hope provides powerful protection against “the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune.” People who are filled with hope are shielded against discouragement, despair, and all kinds of sins.

The reason for this hope is stated in verses 9 and 10. God has destined us for salvation through Jesus Christ who died for us. The nature of salvation is brought out by the words, “that…we might live together with him.” Living together with God is precisely what humanity lost when Adam rebelled and was removed from God’s presence. Living together with God was Israel’s hope in the wilderness: “I will walk among you and be your God, and you will be my people” (Leviticus 26:12). It was the promise of the New Covenant: “I will be their God, and they will be my people” (Jeremiah 31:3). It was the hope to which the prophet Ezekiel pointed: “My dwelling place will be with them; I will be their God, and they will be my people.” (Ezek. 37:27). It is the note of hope that rings out at the close of the Bible: “Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things (the order established by Adam’s rebellion) has passed away” (Revelation 21:3-4).

We begin to experience this salvation now when we come to Jesus and receive God’s Spirit, which is why Paul calls the Spirit the down payment of our inheritance. Experiencing God’s Spirit changes us and brings a foretaste of the life to come.

If you have not come to Christ but are ready to do so, or just ready to find out more about it, please come up at the end of the service to talk with one of our prayer helpers. They can give you more information.

But I want to close by speaking to those who have used distrust and hatred to protect themselves. I know that you’ve had to protect yourself from some bad things. You didn’t choose distrust and hate; you were forced into it. But distrust and hate are killing you. There is another way. It is not to gullibly trust everyone, but to intelligently trust God. If you are locked into a cell of distrust and hate, God can let you out. Ask him right now, and he will begin to answer you.

[1] Henri J. M. Nouwen in The Genesee Diary. Christianity Today, Vol. 41, no. 14.

[2] Morris.