Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 1857
“We are bound to thank God always for you, Brethren, as it is fitting, because your faith grows exceedingly, and the charity of every one of you all abounds toward each other.” 2 Thessalonians 1:3.
LAST Lord’s-Day I tried to say cheering and encouraging words to “Little-Faith.” I trust that the Holy Spirit, the Comforter, did thereby strengthen some to whom the Savior said, “O you of little faith, why did you doubt?” But none of us would desire to remain among the Little-Faiths—we long to press forward in our march to the better land. If we have just started in the heavenly race, it is well, for there are grounds of comfort about the first steps in the right way, but we are not going to stop at the starting-point! Our desire is towards the finish line and the crown. My prayer, at the commencement of this discourse, is that we may, each of us, rise out of our little faith into the loftier region of assurance, so that those who love us best may be able to say, “We are bound to thank God always for you, Brethren, as it is fitting, because your faith grows exceedingly.”
The Church of Jesus Christ at Thessalonica did not commence under very propitious circumstances. Remember that oft-quoted text about the Bereans—“These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they searched the Scriptures daily whether those things were so.” That record does not relate to the converts in Thessalonica, but to those Jews who heard Paul preach in the synagogue and refused to test his teaching by a reference to the Old Testament. They were not a noble sort of people and yet, from among them, there were taken by almighty Grace a certain company who were led to believe in the true Messiah! Thus they became more noble than even the Bereans, for we do not hear of a Church in Berea, neither was an Epistle written to the Bereans. Thessalonica received two Epistles, bright with hearty commendations. Paul praised the Philippians, but the Thessalonians he praised even more, thanking God at every remembrance of them, and glorying in them among the Churches of God for their patience and faith.
I shall ask you, with your Bibles open, to see whether we cannot account in some measure for this remarkable condition of things. The verse before us is full of thanksgiving to God for the growth of the Thessalonians in faith and in love. And to my mind, it sounds like an echo of the First Epistle to the Thessalonians. The First Epistle is the key and the cause of the Second. Very often a man’s success in this place, or in that, will tally with his own condition of heart in relation to that place. As we sow we reap. The Grace of God enabled Paul to sow toward the Thessalonians with great hopefulness, trust and prayerfulness and, consequently, he reaped plentifully.
Observe how (1 Thess. 1:2, 3) Paul began by distinctly recognizing the existence of faith and love in that Church. “We give thanks to God always for you all, making mention of you in our prayers; remembering without ceasing your work of faith, and labor of love, and patience of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ, in the sight of God and our Father.” Recognize the root and then look for the flower! See that faith is in the soul, smile upon it and foster it—and then you may expect that the faith will steadily increase. In our text Paul mentions faith as growing and love as abounding, while in the next verse he mentions patience, which is the outgrowth of hope—“the patience of hope.” He noticed in the Thessalonians the birth of those three Divine sisters—faith, hope, and charity! That which he recognized with pleasure, he afterwards saw growing exceedingly! Those who cherish the seed shall rejoice in the plant. Observe in the children under your care the first blossoms of any good thing and you shall observe its increase! Despise not the day of small things. When you have learned to recognize faith in its buds, you shall soon see faith in its flowers and faith in its fruits! Do not overlook feeble Grace, or criticize it because it is as yet imperfect—mark its beginnings with thankfulness and you shall behold its advance with delight!
In addition to recognizing the beginnings of faith, Paul labored hard to promote it. Look in the second chapter and read verses 7, 8, 11, 12—“But we were gentle among you, even as a nurse cherishes her children: so being affectionately desirous of you, we were willing to have imparted unto you, not the Gospel of God, only, but also our own souls because you were dear unto us. As you know how we exhorted and comforted and charged every one of you, as a father does his children, that you would walk worthy of God, who has called you unto His kingdom and glory.” He threw his whole strength into the work of building that Church, toiling night and day for it and, consequently, he obtained his desire— for still it is true in the farming of God, that those who sow and steep their seed in the tears of earnestness, shall doubtless come again, rejoicing, bringing their sheaves with them!