This study is from an on going online Daily Bible Study at:
DailyBibleStudy.Org | Daily Bible Study Index Page | Daily Bible Study Online E-Book Library
Blog postings occur at 6 P.M. each day following the day they have been written. The Daily Studies are available a full day earlier by signing up on the Daily Bible Study Mailing List (optional of course).
To allow the Daily Bible Study to come to you via e-mail every day, and also offer your support for the study, then please consider signing up on the:
Bible Study Mailing List
1 Thessalonians 4:1
1 Furthermore [loipon] then [oun] we beseech [erotao] you, [humas] brethren, [adelphos] and [kai] exhort [parakaleo] you by [en] the Lord [kurios] Jesus, [Iesous] that as [kathos] ye have received [paralambano] of [para] us [hemon] how [pos] ye [humas] ought [dei] to walk [peripateo] and [kai] to please [aresko] God, [theos] so [hina] ye would abound [perisseuo] more and more. [mallon] KJV-Interlinear
4 Finally then, brethren, we request and exhort you in the Lord Jesus, that, as you received from us instruction as to how you ought to walk and please God (just as you actually do walk), that you may excel still more. NASB
Finally, and that is Pauls beginning for reminding the Thessalonians, and you and me, that because of all of these things, you have no excuse for not preparing yourself in your spiritual life.
The truth of life is clear and lucid, and coherent, and obvious. We have examples all around us, that indicate that this life is a temporary one, that the plans of man are inadequate and always head into abuses or favoritism, and that means that the most of us, the greater population will end up suffering in some fashion, while the favored few will have an easier time of it, at our expense.
Humanity can pursue noble causes, but humanity cannot attain them. The leadership almost always has its own agenda for gaining and holding their power and authority. They gain their power either by force or by leading people on, with dignified causes. ‘Don’t you want your planet green? Don’t you want everyone to have a healthy life? Don’t you want everyone working?’ And so forth.
And while no one can disagree with these types of arguments, the real motive behind them is to gain the trust and support of the people so the leaders can get into power.
There will always be a number of exuberant followers, who will push the noble agenda. And they are used to the fullest in order to gain even more following of the masses who don’t especially follow the arguments, or don’t follow the particulars of the debate, whatever it may be. They are the naïve who simply go with the political, or whatever seems popular, flow of society.
And all of the good intentions, and all of the good promises, cannot be fulfilled because they are unattainable, and that leads to the rules, and to the exceptions to the rules and then exceptions to the exceptions.
This pattern was followed as far back as the Levitical Priesthood, when the regulations became so massive, that people could not even function in life for fear of violating some rule or regulation.
And even in our more current history, Mao, Stalin, Lennon, and Hitler, all came into power with promises of freedom and equity, and ended up with horrendous abuses of power.
In the future, when the Rapture occurs, there will be a huge population of people left behind on this earth, after the believers have left. The huge unbelieving population will not be without its problems. The anti-christ leader will be the savior on the white horse, but who will turn disastrous policies into mass murder campaigns. The policies will not work, therefore someone must be blamed and punished. Christians, Jews, Gypsies, and others will be among those blamed.
But before we get to the Rapture and a huge unbelieving population, there has to be a decline in the spiritual lives of people in the world. That means more folks looking to worldly solutions for their lives and less to God.
And since that does not occur overnight, then a generation or two, of negative people, have to come into the picture. Less doctrine means more human viewpoint. More human viewpoint means more radical solutions. More radical solutions means more failures because man does not have the wherewithal to accomplish his own plans.
And as the plans fail, then rationing is tried, rules are implemented, exceptions and favoritism are put into placed, the blame is sought, and then people suffer because of it all.
In the past, a negative population ended up in economic depressions, famines, wars and such things. These served to bring them back to reality and to God and doctrine.
But one day, that correction in history will not occur.
The Rapture will mark the beginning of the last big negative population handling policy of God.
With every former worldly disaster, people turned to God through repentance and a renewed positive attitude. God rescued them.
However, in the future, since the believers will diminish and the negative population will increase, that implies that there will come a time when this repentance turnaround, because of increasing world troubles, will not occur. A gap is people believing in Christ will occur, and quite possibly that will be among the many reasons for Gods timing of the Rapture.
This (the Rapture), will remove the believing population from out of a suffering and dismal world, and shock those who simply will not turn back to God, back to God with a huge and horrendous shock, as never before in history.
Now, you know the future. And even though none of us know the exact timetable, we all know that this life is determined by attitude toward God, Christ, doctrine and the spiritual life.
Those who are for God and will in fact pursue their spiritual life will be successful for all of eternity.
Those who look at all of this as a bunch of hokum, will discover the truth the hard way, and lose. And along the way they will be responsible for causing suffering for everyone else.
The difference in your life, between an unbelieving life and a saved life is literally infinite. The difference between a spiritually immature life and a spiritually mature life, is also literally infinite. And because these are the only real realities in life worth noting, that is why Paul here in this verse beseeches (a mild word) and exhorts (a more stern word), everyone to pursue their spiritual life correctly, honestly, genuinely, and consistently, because so much is at stake.
Your entire future depends on your daily decisions, and knowing that this world is going to trend toward the anti or indifferent attitude toward God, then this alone should encourage you even more, to do that which no one else, or at least fewer and fewer folks, will be doing, as time advances in the coming years or decades.
