(REFLECTIONS ON 1 Thessalonians 5:1-28)

In the Old Testament, the prophets preached the word of God to Israel. They did not speak their own words, mixed with their own desires and motives, but it was their duty to be a vessel for God’s word to His people.

However, there were prophets that didn’t speak God’s word, but spoke rather the words of their own hearts and words that pleased those that heard them. They spoke a message of “Peace and Safety!” even though the Lord wanted them to speak a message of repentance and coming back to the Lord. Yet, it pleased them more to please the people, rather than pleasing God.

In today’s Scripture, we also read of those saying, “Peace and Safety!” However, Paul writes that it is in the midst of their message of “Peace and Safety!” that “destruction will come upon them suddenly like labor pains upon a woman with child, and they will not escape.”

That is why Paul encourages the Thessalonians to not just sit idly by and lean back reveling in “Peace and Safety!”, but rather to be alert, to be sober and self-controlled, “having put on the breastplate of faith and love, and as a helmet, the hope of salvation.”

It is an attitude of the heart and a knowledge of the mind that the world is passing away, and is broken, and is not just “Peace and Safety!”, but rather a sign that we are to turn to Jesus Christ, and put our hope in Him, because it is only through Him that we can be saved from the despair.

Paul writes,

16 Rejoice always; pray without ceasing; in everything give thanks; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus. 19 Do not quench the Spirit; 20 do not despise prophetic utterances. 21 But examine everything carefully; hold fast to that which is good; 22 abstain from every form of evil.

We do not rejoice only when our life is full of “Peace and Safety!”, but all the more when we look around at the brokenness and pain in this world. We rejoice because there is an answer and a way to rise above this despair in the Lord, Jesus Christ.

Rather than satisfaction with the message of “Peace and Safety!” we are to pray without ceasing, giving thanks to even the pains our life, because these pains remind us that our hope is not found in this world, but in Christ.

Let us not with our trust and belief in this world, quench the Spirit, shut out the words of God, but to let the words of God pry us away from the chains of false “Peace and Safety!” in this world, and to hold fast to that which is good, and to believe that in Christ is new life. Let the Spirit speak to us truth, and give us wisdom to know the difference between false security, and true life found in the Lord.

Pastor Michael Lu
Enduring Word Bible Commentary: 1 Thessalonians 5