Let's turn in our Bibles this morning to 1st Thessalonians
chapter 4. We're going to read verses 1 to
8. First Thessalonians chapter 4,
verses 1 to 8. Let's hear the Word of God,
reading of course from the Authorised Version, or as many
affectionately call it, the King James Bible, First
Thessalonians, chapter 4. We'll read verses one through to
8. Let's hear the word of God.
Furthermore, then, we beseech you, brethren, and exhort you by
the Lord Jesus, that as you have received of us how you ought to
walk and to please God, so you would abound more and more.
For ye know what commandments we give you by the Lord Jesus.
For this is the will of God, even your sanctification, that
you should abstain from fornication, that everyone of
you should know how to possess his vessel in sanctification and
honour, not in the lust of concuptions, Even as the
Gentiles, which know not God, that no man go beyond and
defraud his brother in any matter, because that the Lord is
the adventure of all. Such as we also have forewarned
you and testified. For God has not called us unto
uncleanness, but unto holiness. He therefore that despiseth,
despiseth not man, but God, who also who have also given unto us
His Holy Spirit. Amen.
We know that the Lord will stamp with his own approval and
blessing this reading of His own precious and infallible Word.
Now this morning, as you're aware, we are in the middle of a
series of expository sermons as we go through this New Testament
letter written by the Apostle Paul to a church in the ancient
Roman Empire in a city known as Thessalonica.
Now my text this morning is found in First Thessalonians
chapter 4, verses 1 and 2, and I want to take the theme that I've
entitled the Christians Pathway to Pleasing God.
Or are you walking to please God?
Look at First Thessalonians chapter 4, verse one.
The first word there is furthermore literally that word
means as to what remains or in addition to or the next item.
You're standing at the checkout and you hear next, please.
Well, that's what the word furthermore means, in addition
to to what remains the next in line.
This word stands to indicate a shift from Paul's affirmation as
to what doctrine we believe to what duty we must therefore
display. The Apostle Paul is going to
offer some very practical instruction for holy living.
In chapter 1 he's talked about the conversion of the
Thessalonians to Christ. He says in chapter 1, verse 8.
For from you sounded out the word of the Lord, not only in
Macedonia and Ikaya, but also in every place your faith to God
were to spread abroad, so that we need not to speak anything.
In chapter 2 he's explained the nature and character of the
gospel ministry that he had among them.
Remember that was amid all the standard of certain Jews who
falsely laboured him as a con artist and who misrepresented
him. He explained to them why he
wasn't literally back in the city of Thessalonanka after his
hasty departure. This was because of what in
chapter 2 verse 18 we read. Wherefore we would have come
unto you, even I Paul once and again.
But Satan hindered us. He rejoiced in Timothy's
ministry amongst them, and Timothy's faithful report about
them in chapter 3, verse 6. But now when Timothy came unto
you unto us and brought us good tidings of your faith and
charity, and that ye have good remembrance of us always
desiring greatly to see us as we also to see you.
Therefore, brethren, we were comforted over you and all our
affliction and the stress by your faith.
He urged them to stand fast in the Lord.
Verse 8, chapter 3. For now we live if you stand
fast in the in the faith in the Lord and then he assured them of
prayer. He says night and day verse 10
of chapter 3 praying exceedingly that we might see your fears a
night perfect that which is lacking in your faith.
Now having done that, having said all that in his mind in
addition, he wants to add something else in his mind.
He wants to go to the next thing, and the next thing is to
remind them of the practical duty of living out to Christian
life, literally having disclosed certain doctrinal truths to
them. Now here's the devotional.
Here's the practical outworking of this in application.
It's as if he's saying you who are now truly converted in
Thessalonica, this is the conduct that will follow.
And of course, what follows is practical instructions for holy
living. And we're just thinking today of
one of those practical instructions.
And it's rooted in the words, as you have received of us, how you
ought to walk and to please God. So you would abound more and
more for you know what commandments we give you by the
Lord Jesus. I have three things this morning
and I know you're tired after last night, but I I pray that
you'll be able to listen well and receive this instruction.
I want you to think of the priority in the Christian's
walk. Notice the words here.
And to please God. The pleasing of God ought to be
the greatest ambition of the Christian life.
It ought to be the great ambition of every individual
born of the Spirit. Notice the word, brethren, he
says in chapter 4, verse one. Moreover, then we beseech you,
brethren, and exhort you, he's writing to born again believers.
It's as if he's saying to them, if you've truly believed in the
Lord Jesus Christ, believed that he was born for you, believed
that he lived the sinless life, died in atoning death, rose
again bodily from the dead, deceive us from God's wrath,
deceive us from the power of sin, deceive us from hell
itself. Then our priority, our purpose
in this new life in Christ is to walk and live in a manner
pleasing to God that sought not just to be a passing aim.
No, this is to be a matter of great priorities.
Get your priorities right. I heard that years ago.
It resonated with me. Our great priority and ambition
ought to be to please God, and our great ambition to please Him
is not the ground of our salvation.
We're not pleasing Him in order to be saved or to be accepted by
him. No, it's because we are saved.
It's because we know Him now as Lord and Redeemer.
It's because we love Him all but feebly.
It's because we are indwelt by a spirit.
Remember Romans 8 and 9 says if any man of not the Spirit of
Christ, he is none of his. We're born of the Spirit, we're
indwelt by the Spirit of God. The Spirit of God indwells these
bodies of ours. We are led by the Spirit and
this ability to please him. This eeman ambition is
ultimately the result of his work in us, and our aim is to
walk with him as children of the light.
Remember what Paul says to the church at Ephesus.
There in Ephesus chapter 5 and in the verse 8 he says this, For
ye were sometimes darkness, but now are you late in the Lord?
Walk as children of the light, for the fruit of the Spirit is
in all goodness and righteousness and truth, proving
what is acceptable unto the Lord.
So the question for us this morning is this, is this our
priority? Is this our number one aim?
Am I living with an I to pleasing God to hear well done,
good and faithful servant. Now that's not easy.
I admit that that's a struggle. Why?
Because even as born again believers, it's so easy to come
to the natural bend of pleasing ourselves, putting self first
rather than the saviour. I wonder when we wake up in the
morning, do we think to ourselves?
I wonder what's going to make me happy today?
What's going to make me smile? What's going to make me to know?
Joy and contentment. You see, when we wake up in the
morning with that mindset, we're not naturally or necessarily
consumed with the thought of what is going to please God
today. See, often our priorities
revolve around who we are and what we do and what is going to
bring us satisfaction and happiness.
For as the aim and ambition ought to be when we wake up in
the morning, what is going to bring the greatest pleasure to
God today? So as true born again believers,
we have to fight in a spiritual sense to overcome this mindset.
See let's remember the Bible says in Hebrews Chapter 11 verse
6. But without faith it is
impossible to please him, for he that cometh to God must believe
that He is, that He's a rewarder of them that diligently seek
Him. So I asked, do you know the Lord
Jesus Christ? Is he your Lord and Saviour this
morning? Have you faith in him?
And because you have faith in him, this is your great ambition
and aim in the Christian life, to live and to walk in a manner
that's pleasing him. Not what pleases me, but what
pleases the Master. Remember Paul emphasised this,
he says in the book of Corinthians and 1st Corinthians
chapter 6 and in the verse 19. What know ye not that your body
is the temple of the Holy Ghost, which is in you, which you have
of God, and you're not your own, for you're bought with a price.
Therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which
are gods. These believers were being
encouraged to walk in fellowship with the Lord, not stand still,
not going backwards, but walking speaks of progress.
Because they knew and loved the Lord, they were walking in
fellowship with Him and therefore they were encouraged
to be less careless. They were encouraged to be less
inclined to sin. They were encouraged to be less
taken up with themselves and prioritise the Lord in their
life. They were being exhorted.
Notice that word he says and exhort you by the Lord Jesus
that that's stronger than encouragement.
Exhortation includes encouragement, but it's more
than that. It's it's really saying we
exhort you. We've already come alongside
you. This was a humble, gentle
exhortation from a fellow brother, from a from a pastor's
heart, not trying to browbeat the people of God, not not not
trying to be overbearing, but but exhorting by the Lord Jesus
in light of his service and sacrifice, in light of his
salvation. He tells them here in the verse
one as you have received of us. In other words, it was not a new
thing. He was not telling them
anything. He hadn't told them before.
He had already told them by word of mouth.
He had told them face to face. He had told them by this letter.
He had told them by his holy walk before them.
The matter for here is walk. He ought to walk a decisive,
deliberate commitment to choose to obey the Lord, to know His
Word, to know His will. So do we really have this aim
and ambition? The priority of the Christians
walk is to please God. We do it willingly, we do it
gladly, we do it sacrificially, we do it steadily, we do it
joyfully, we do it dearly, we do it progressively.
I want you to search your heart. Are we doing this in this way
that I've described? I came across something that was
tremendous, a little quote from Thomas Watson.
Let me read it to you. I beseech you, keep your
constant hours every day with God.
The godly man has set apart not only because God has set him
apart by election, but because he has set him apart by
devotion. Give God the best of the day.
Begin the day with God. Visit God in the morning before
you make any other visit. Wind up your hearts towards
heaven in the morning, and they will go the better all the day
after. Or turn your closets into
temples. Read the scriptures.
The two testaments are the two lips by which God speaks to us.
They will make you wise unto salvation.
Scripture is both a looking glass to show you your spots.
In other words, your sin. And scripture is a lever to wash
away that sin, because the blood of Jesus Christ His Son
cleanseth us from all sin besides heaven.
With your prayers, perfume your house and keep a constant
fellowship with heaven. I received that this morning
from her brother in England in reading a tremendous
encouragement and I thought that I would include it in to this
priority very quickly. And secondly, the pathway of the
Christians walk. Notice these words.
If you look again at the text, it says how you ought to walk,
so you would have bound more and more.
You see the aim and ambition to please God.
Where does it begin? It begins in your heart.
Well, you're born again and led by the Spirit of God.
We discover this desire to please Him begins in the heart.
You see, for God to walk with us and for us to walk with God and
to know Him and love Him and serve Him and be in fellowship
with Him, we must walk in the light as He is in the light.
That's what he says in first John chapter one, verse seven.
The first reference to walking in the Bible is Genesis 3, verse
8, where God came walking in the Garden of Eden and the cool of
the day to walk with Adam in union and communion and
fellowship. The Lord was with Adam, Adam was
with God, and they were walking in the light of who God is.
That's the picture. That's the pathway of the
Christian's walk. It must begin in the heart.
It's a heart relationship. It refers, of course, here how
you ought to walk, not just to the manner of living your
lifestyle, but it also refers to your motivation.
We must have a heart for God. And if there's anything we need
to discover or rediscover in the Free Presbyterian Church coming
up to the 75th anniversary in 2026 is this.
We must have a heart for God, not just belief, not just say I
believe in God. See, see hundreds today in
Northern Ireland into their thousands, say if we asked them
do you believe in God? They would say yes, but does
that impact upon their behaviour?
Does that impact upon their lifestyle choices as they live
out their lives before God and before man?
You see, if I say this is my creed, I believe in God, I
believe in Christ, I believe in heaven and hell, I believe the
Bible, then that creed must impact upon my conduct.
It must impact upon me. You see, before we can give God
our hands and our feet and our tongue and our ears, we must
give him my heart. Give me thine heart.
We must have a heart for God. Our hearts must be true and
clean to walk with God. Our hearts must be in harmony
with Him. We certainly can't be against
Him. Hearts have to be changed.
If any man be in Christ, as you new creature, old things have
passed away, and all things become you, there has to be a
radical difference. See, many today are involved in
service, but they have no heart for Him.
They have a form of godliness, but deny the power thereof.
That's why many are not flocking to the House of God in the day
of God. That's why many churches have
become empty. It's not just to do with the
demographics that have changed, and I understand that.
But there's many ministers in the pulpit who have given their
hands to him, their mouth for him, their their, their feet for
him. And they're doing things for
God, but they have no heart for him.
And what is true of the minister has to be true of the elder, the
Deacon, and the professing Christian.
Many are involved in doing lots of things for God, but they have
no heart for him. They're not born of the Spirit.
They do not know Him and to walk with him, remember, God is
light, and Emma's no darkness at all.
He's a God of truth, a God of righteousness, a God of
holiness. You need a new heart to walk
with God, to walk in purity, to walk in truth.
Not a fleshly performance, but a joint participation with God.
See those that walk in fellowship with God, with a new
heart and harmony, with an eye to purity, righteousness and
holiness. They'll abhor falsehood.
They'll abhor all the filthiness of this world.
They will abhor the lust of the flesh, the pride of life.
They'll they'll hate the world, the flesh, the devil that they
will love sin, and their heart all but imperfectly, will strive
to be in total agreement with God and with the things of God.
And what God loves we will love, and what God hates, we will
hate. Amos three and three asked the
question, Can two walk together except to be agreed?
Agreement means standing for all that the Lord is.
Hearts that are open and transparent, Open to the truth
of who God is, open to purity and holiness, open to the great
doctrines of grace. Open to embrace all that God
says about himself, about righteousness, about heaven,
about hell, about judgement to come.
Hearts that are open to kneel before him in prayer and confess
their sin and cry out for help. Isn't it wonderful to know what
a friend we have in Jesus, all our sins and griefs to bear?
What a privilege to carry everything to God in prayer.
Maybe you've come with a burdened heart, your burden for
a loved one not saved your burden for a loved one who's ill
and you, you really don't know what way to turn.
And at times you feel, you know, I'm standing here on the edge of
what's in corner and, and, and how am I going to get through
today? Well, here's the answer.
Kneel before the Lord in prayer. The Bible says, let us therefore
come boldly unto the throne of grace that we may obtain mercy
and find grace to help in time of night.
See, our hearts, if they're right, our hearts, if they're in
harmony with him, if they have a new heart, then that heart will
be motivated to do things out of a sense of thankfulness and
gratitude that they'll be done in love and devotion.
And it impacts upon every area of life, impacts upon me as the
minister. It impacts upon ministry of you
and your service for God. It impacts upon our marriage.
It impacts upon our money, it impacts upon music, it impacts
upon our merriment, it impacts upon materialism and, and, and
how we have an attachment to things.
We'll have a loose attachment. Why?
Because they'll say they're all his.
They're not mine, they're his. And if he wants them, then I'd
readily give them to him. That was the mindset that the
late Fanny Crosby lived in a life of sacrifice and service
for God impacts upon every sphere of life with no
restrictions, no regrets, no retreats.
I want you to finish this morning on the precepts of the
Christian's walk. Notice verse 2.
It says for you know what commandments we gave you by the
Lord Jesus. You see, here's the standard in
walking to please God, underline the word commandments.
One standard defines this holiness of life, this holy walk
to please God. And I believe the reference to
commandments here refers to the moral law.
The moral law, there's 10/2 tables, one in our relationship
to God, 1st 4 commandments, the next six are relationship to our
fellow man. And those 10 commandments are a
summary of the divine will of God for the life of his people.
And we could unpack the 10 commandments this morning, only
we don't have time. But it impacts upon every kind
of behaviour in relation to God and relation to our fellow man.
To me, they're clear and transparent.
To me, they're transcendent. Isn't it tremendous that they're
written them down? I was sharing at the Bible
Beginners Bible Course on Friday night about this man who had
broken some very expensive ornament in his house.
It was valued at 500 points. He was trying to reclaim it on
his house insurance. What am I paying insurance for?
The insurance man came and he said to him, will you have
excess here that you're going to have to pay £50.
I'll tell you what we'll do. We'll write into the book here.
The item costs £550. You won't have to pay any
excess. The man looked at him and said,
thank you, but no, why not? He says, well, the Bible teaches
thy shall not steal. And because he was confronted
with that commandment, with this thought, God is watching me,
Then the moral law not only confronted him, but the moral
law comforted him that he was doing the right thing.
This was how I ought to walk. You see, the Spirit of God
brought the word of God to his mind, and he applied it in his
life situation. And he was saying, desiring to,
to, to live a heart of holiness unto God.
If you're born again by the Holy Spirit, I believe you should
love the 10 commandments. I believe we should live by the
10 commandments, not as a ground of salvation, but as the
evidence the Bible says. They shall love the Lord thy God
with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind,
and with all thy strength, and they shall love thy neighbour as
thyself. And these hang all the law and
the prophets. And yet the reality is in our
natural state, we can't love God until we're born of the Spirit,
then dwelt by Him and then LED to this law of love.
John 14 verse 15, the Lord Jesus said, if you love me, keep my
commandments. Not only the explanation of the
commandments, but think lastly of the experience of these
commandments. See, these commandments produce
love for a life of holiness and happiness and harmony unto God
in our hearts. The Lord Jesus said, now you're
clean through the word which I have spoken unto you.
It says there in First Corinthians Chapter 9 and in the
verse 21, First Corinthians 9 and 21, Paul says to them that
are without law as without law being not under being, not
without law to God, but under the law to Christ, that I might
gain them that are without law. See, there's no conflict.
The gospel liberty brings us to the law of Christ, and the law
of Christ is comprehended in these 10 laws that become the 10
commandments, and they are a rule for life.
The Lord Jesus applied them in the Sermon of the Mount, didn't
He? He talked about murder.
We think of the physical act, but He talked about murdering
someone in your heart. He talked about adultery, the
physical act, and then he talked about lust in the heart.
He that looketh on a woman lustfully have committed
adultery with her already in his heart.
You see, it's a matter of the heart.
That's what we need to discover and the precept to guide that is
the law of Christ and love remembers the fulfilment of the
law. See, if we see a brother or
sister, they're in trials and troubles.
What we should we do? We should listen to them.
We should feel a sense of sympathy with them and for them.
Their burden should be our burdens.
We should pray for them. We should practically help them
if we can. We should not only sympathise
but of empathy. Try to walk in their shoes.
Before we judge someone, let's try to get out of our shoes,
into their shoes and say why would I react in that situation?
What would I do in that context? Let's not be callous, let's not
be cold hearted. Let's not be bitter and harsh.
Let's not be selfish. Why?
Because out of love to God and love to our neighbour, we're
guided by the law of Christ. In Isaiah 8 and 20 we read this
to the law and to the testimony. If they speak not according to
this word is because there's no light in them.
We must learn as a church, we must learn individually to judge
all things by the Word of God. The Lord has given us the Bible
as the only infallible rule of faith and practise.
Here's the yardstick to measure every doctrine, every clium,
every practise, and we dare not adopt any other standard.
We're not going to add tradition to the Scriptures.
Do you know why? Because we'll soon end up tuning
the Scriptures to accommodate the traditions of men.
We're not going to add science to the Scriptures because we'd
end up denying the Word to accommodate some passing
scientific theory from the lips and mind of a man.
We're not going to add church councils because church councils
can err. We're not going to add the
creeds of men because the creeds of men are subordinate to the
Scriptures. Even our Westminster Confession
of Faith, the Baptist Confession of Faith, the Savoy Declaration
of Faith, is all subservient to the Scriptures.
We're certainly not going to make our experience the standard
because we'd end up making the Bible agreeing with our
experience and we could defy all sound principles of biblical
truth and interpretation. The Bible alone must be the
standard of our belief and behaviour.
Only the Bible. Listen to what I say as I finish
to the law and to the testimony. If they speak not according to
this word, it is because there's no light in them and things that
today are contrary to sound doctrine.
It's because there's no light. It's because they're agent of
darkness. It's because they're energised
by the Prince of darkness. Every Bible rejector.
You know how the Lord describes them.
They're dark and fools today. Their folly has wounded many
churches. Rationalism has spread it's
poison in Northern Ireland. Rationalism has closed churches.
Good churches. I heard of 1 yesterday when I
was down in Lurgan. Breaks my heart.
I take no joy or delight as a Free Presbyterian minister to
see what's happening in other denominations, whether it be
Presbyterian Methodist or Church of Ireland or Brethren or
Pentecostal. How many Bible rejecters have
undermined faith in Christ under the guise of the claim of
scholarship we must surrender to the authority of the Scriptures?
You'll never be misled, you'll not be misguided when you bow
the knee to the scriptures. Let's learn the scriptures of
truth. Summarise for us in the 10
Commandments. Let's love the 10 Commandments.
Let's live by them. Let's hold all to the touchstone
and if it's biblical and it's in the Bible, believe it.
And if it's not biblical and if it's not in the Bible, then
let's say no. We have to expound these
commandments, but they have to be experienced in our heart.
That is the precept for the Christian's walk.
I've just given you 3 simple things this morning, how we
ought to walk and to please God. Let's make this a priority in
our life. Let's walk this pathway, making
sure that our hearts are in harmony with God's heart.
We're walking in agreement because we have a new heart born
of the Spirit. And let's make the precepts of
our Christian walk the Word of God as embodied in the 10
commandments, and let's live that out to the glory of God.
Thus saith the Scriptures. May the Lord apply this word to
our heart, and I pray that the Lord will help us going forward.
Now we're going to close in a moment.
We're going to sing our final hymn.
But before we do, could I encourage you to pray for next
Lord's Day? We're going to deal with the
very difficult subject of sanctification.
If you look at verse 3 and there's a lot of hard things to
be said in relation to the subject, and I pray for wisdom,
I pray for grace, I pray that you'll come and you'll listen to
what the word of God has to say on a very, very important
subject, the will of God, even your sanctification.