28 July. Living a life that pleases God
"Brothers and sisters, we taught you how to live in a way that will please God, and you are living that way. Now we ask and encourage you in the Lord Jesus to live that way even more."
"You know what we told you to do by the authority of the Lord Jesus. God wants you to be holy and to stay away from sexual sins. He wants each of you to learn to control your own body in a way that is holy and honourable."
"Don't use your body for sexual sin like the people who do not know God. Also, do not wrong or cheat another Christian in this way. The Lord will punish people who do those things as we have already told you and warned you."
"God called us to be holy and does not want us to live in sin. So the person who refuses to obey this teaching is disobeying God, not simply human teaching. And God is the one who gives us his Holy Spirit."
"We do not need to write to you about having love for your Christian family, because God has already taught you to love each other. And truly you do love the Christians in all of Macedonia. Brothers and sisters, now we encourage you to love them even more."
"Do all you can to live a peaceful life. Take care of your own business, and do your own work as we have already told you. If you do, then people who are not believers will respect you, and you will not have to depend on others for what you need."
(1 Thessalonians 4:1-12)
In this part of his First Letter to the Thessalonians, Paul encourages the new believers to live in the power of the Holy Spirit in a way that pleases God.
They should be completely free from sexual immorality, living a peaceful life and earning a decent living so they are not dependent on other believers.
Paul is writing to new believers who have only recently moved away from a hedonistic and immoral lifestyle where temple prostitution and promiscuous sex was the norm (not unlike today?).
He asks them to be 'holy' i.e. 'set apart or 'different' from others. They should be counter-cultural, NOT living by the norms of society as "God called us to be holy and does not want us to live in sin" (1 Thessalonians 4:7).
This is still a good test of our commitment to Jesus - do others notice that we are different? Do they spot that we don't do what others do? Do they see the Holy Spirit shining out through our lives every day? If not, why not??
The photo shows people walking along the pedestrianised High Street in the centre of Solihull, UK. Do Christians stand out from the crowd? How?
You can read more from Paul's letter @ https://www.thebiblejourney.org/…/paul-hopes-to-visit-thes…/