by Darrel Cline (darrelcline biblical-thinking.org)
Chapter # 1 Paragraph # 1 Study # 6 January 24, 2024 Broadlands, Louisiana (Download Audio)
I. The Introduction.
A. According to the general scholarship, this book was the second of Paul's letters, following Galatians, written about A.D. 51, though there is some debate because of a difference of opinion as to where the Galatian letter was sent.
B. In any case, the general thrust of the Thessalonian letters has to do with the "hope" that believers are to live under.
C. Paul's identification of himself, Silvanus, and Timothy and those who sent this letter to the Thessalonians.
D. Paul's identification of his readers.
1. The church of the Thessalonians.
2. The description as "in God [the] Father and in [the] Lord Jesus Christ".
a. The issue of "being in".
1) This phrase is found in multiple places in Paul's letters.
2) He got it from Jesus (Galatians 1:1 and 1:15-24).
a) When he returned to Damascus (Galatians 1:17), he was able to "confound the Jews ... by proving that this [Jesus] is the Christ" (Acts 9:22).
b) The reason he could "confound them" was that he had been in Arabia and was taught by Jesus Himself.
i. In Acts 9:21 those that heard Saul's teaching said, "Is this not he who in Jerusalem destroyed those who called on this name, and 'hadcome' here for the purpose of bringing them bound before the chief priests..."
(i) This verb (had come) is one of only a few instances of a verb in the Pluperfect Tense in the New Testament (there are five uses of this verb in this tense in the New Testament ((John 7:30; 8:20; 11:30; Acts8:27 and 9:21))).
(ii) This verb in this place is a declaration that Saul had been in Damascus and had left and had returned.
ii. This meaning of this phrase, "in God Father and in Lord Jesus Christ" is taught by Jesus in John 10:38 where His argument is that His works declare a kind of relationship between Himself and His Father that forces us to "understand" that Jesus and the Father are inextricably united.
(i) Jesus had already declared that the "works" of those who are "in God" (through "faith into Him") are actually produced by the reality that God was also "in them" (John 3:21), producing what good works were being done by them.
(ii) To be "in God Father and in Lord Jesus Christ" is fundamental to the New Testament concept of "disciples bearing fruit" (John 17:21 compared to Galatians 2:20).
b. The "locus" of the believers "being in" is two-fold (In God Father and in Lord Jesus Christ): it is an inextricable condition (Romans 11:29).