In 1 Thessalonians 5:19–21, we discover a curious sequence of exhortations: “Don’t quench the Spirit. Don’t despise prophecies, however check the whole lot.”
What precisely did the apostle Paul imply when he urged the believers in Thessalonica to not “quench the Spirit”? And what are we alleged to do about “prophecies”? Are our church buildings “quenching the Spirit” once we discourage the sharing of “phrases from the Lord” and as a substitute look to the regular, systematic educating of Scripture?
J. B. Phillips’s paraphrase of the New Testomony is useful right here: “By no means damp the fireplace of the Spirit, and by no means despise what’s spoken within the identify of the Lord.” Prophecy, as Paul makes use of the time period right here, will not be strictly a phrase of revelation that involves a person or lady at a second in time; it’s the phrase of God proclaimed—in no matter context (1 Peter 4:10–11; 2 Peter 1:20).
At one time within the historical past of God’s individuals, to profit from such prophecy required testing prophets (Deut. 18:18–22). In our time, it is going to imply attending to the Phrase of God recorded within the Scriptures and testing the preachers who proclaim it. If we’re to be aflame with the Spirit, we’ll solely change into so by listening correctly to God’s Phrase.
“Do Not Despise Prophecies”
Whereas we are able to’t say with certainty what’s the context of those statements from Paul, we are able to enterprise some educated guesses that—correct or not—will give us an concept of the methods we are able to go improper.
Maybe, as in Corinth, there have been some in Thessalonica who handled talking in tongues as a higher reward than forthright educating (1 Cor. 14). Such women and men would have dramatized the spectacular and diminished the mundane. If that’s the case, then Paul can be saying, primarily, “I don’t need you to disregard and despise the clear educating of God on account of those different issues. Give it due honor.” In different phrases, we aren’t to be gullible, turning into so enamored with what’s novel and thrilling that we ignore what is obvious and plain.
Then again, it’s not too far a stretch to think about that these admonitions could have been responding to a fascination with the query of the return of the Lord Jesus Christ (1 Thess. 5:1–11; 2 Thess. 2:1–2). Maybe, as occurs at present, hypothesis ran rampant to the purpose of incredulity, in order that affordable individuals have been tempted to dispose of the query of Christ’s return altogether: “Oh, it’s all simply conjecture and hype!” After all, the truth that some individuals mistreat the Phrase is not any excuse for despising it. We can not change into so impatient with the overly excitable that we roll our eyes on the truths from which they’ve launched themselves into hypothesis.
When God’s Phrase is proclaimed, we must always concentrate. We must always guard ourselves from distraction on the one hand and scorn on the opposite.
So when Paul says, “Don’t despise prophecies,” no matter he meant then, what it means now’s merely this: When God’s Phrase is proclaimed, we must always concentrate. We must always guard ourselves from distraction on the one hand and scorn on the opposite. No matter anybody else is doing, God’s Phrase is God’s Phrase.
But when we’re to be neither gullible nor cynical in terms of God’s Phrase, what different is left to us? Paul’s reply is direct and clear: “Take a look at the whole lot.” In its adjectival type, the Greek phrase for “check” seems in 2 Timothy 2:15, the place Paul speaks to Timothy as a trainer of the Phrase: “Do your finest to current your self to God as one accepted, … rightly dealing with the phrase of reality” (emphasis added; c.f. 1 Thess. 2:4). Simply as a widget in a manufacturing facility will get inspected and accepted earlier than it’s shipped, so we ought to check the educating of the Phrase in opposition to confirmed requirements earlier than we take it for reality.
Checks of Content material
Each check requires some kind of rubric, some set of requirements in opposition to which we’re to measure the outcomes produced by the test-taker. Within the case of the proclamation of God’s Phrase from our church buildings’ pulpits, we’d take into account a rubric consisting first of three checks of content material.
Initially, we must always all the time check the educating of the Scriptures in opposition to the Scriptures themselves. That is what the Bereans did: “They obtained the phrase with all eagerness, inspecting the Scriptures each day to see if this stuff have been so” (Acts 17:11). We could ask: Does what’s being declared right here accord with the plain reality of the entire Bible? (This implies we must always likewise watch out for those that both inform us they’ve one thing novel to show or draw outlandish conclusions from obscure passages of Scripture faraway from their context.)
Many have been roped to error via ignorance of the reality about Jesus.
Second, we must always ask if the educating accords with who Jesus is and what He has achieved. The cults—Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and so forth—love to make use of the language of Scripture with respect to Jesus whereas denying the reality of His divine identification. “We love Jesus,” they are saying. “He’s a son of God.” After all, that alternative of article—a fairly than the—is essential. But many have been roped to error via ignorance of the reality about Jesus.
Third, we ought to take into account whether or not the educating accords with the Gospel of God’s free and saving grace. “Even if we or an angel from heaven,” Paul says, “ought to preach to you a gospel opposite to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed!” (Gal. 1:8). False lecturers all the time inform us to work our means to heaven, or else inform us that works don’t matter at all. To that we should say, “By no means!” (Rom. 6:2, 15).
Checks of Character
Past these three checks of content material, we’d add two checks of character to our rubric.
First, we ought to check whether or not the character of the speaker accords with the reality of the Scriptures. The central query shouldn’t, after all, be “Is that this man good?”—for there’s solely been one good man. A greater query is “Is that this individual for actual? Is the Gospel he preaches together with his mouth steadily upheld by his personal works?”
Jesus tells us, “Watch out for false prophets …. You’ll acknowledge them by their fruits. … Each wholesome tree bears good fruit, however the diseased tree bears dangerous fruit. A wholesome tree can not bear dangerous fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit” (Matt. 7:15–18). A depraved, unrepentant coronary heart can not dwell a constant lifetime of non secular fruit.
Second, we must always take into account the influence of lecturers’ educating on the character of their listeners. A very prophetic message that brings God’s Phrase to bear upon God’s individuals throughout the local weather of their day will strengthen and equip. It’ll encourage and luxury. It’ll convey conviction of sin. It’ll convey an consciousness of God. It is going to be conducive to peace, love, and order.
After all, true educating is not going to all the time produce widespread repentance. The prophets have been rejected. So was Jesus. So have been the apostles. But even once we check a rejected preacher, we must always discover that he’s rejected for his good phrase and that he taught with the intention of increase within the reality.
Holding On to Good, Avoiding Evil
Within the verses that observe his admonition to “check the whole lot,” Paul urges his readers to “maintain quick what is nice. Abstain from each type of evil” (1 Thess. 5:21–22). Like a discerning clerk accepting a money cost, we have to know the true from the false. Slightly boy could also be ecstatic when he will get his first recreation of Monopoly and finds that it’s stuffed with money. Maybe solely slowly and with nice disappointment will it daybreak on him that the cash can solely purchase property on the board—and that solely lasts till the sport is over and the items are put again within the field.
In terms of biblical educating, we have to know the distinction. As followers after Jesus, we’re to be neither roped in by the mere look of fine nor jaded by all of the dangerous we’ve seen. Relatively, testing and approving, we’re to carry on to the nice and vehemently reject what’s evil.
This text was tailored from the sermon “Listening to the Phrase of God” by Alistair Begg.
