2 Thessalonians 1-3
*Click here to read this passage:
“Keep away from every brother who is idle …” “Never tire of doing what is right.”
In this letter to the Thessalonians in chapter 3, Paul is writing
to them about working hard so as not to be a burden on anyone. He says that he and the apostles, or as
we would call them today missionaries, had the right to be supported by them, but
they wanted to set an example for them to follow in working hard. He encouraged them not to be lazy and
not to get burned out on working, but to keep at it.
I think this teaching applies not only to physical idleness verses
work, but also spiritual. I’ve
been a believer and follower of Jesus since I was young, and there was one
stage in my walk with the Lord that I got into a bit of a funk. I was a senior in high school (I’ve
said it before … it can be a tough time being a teenage Christian), and I
started feeling tired of being known as the “goody goody.” I felt like I took a lot of grief from
people for making the choices I did because of my faith, and I was getting
tired of that.
Living a Christian life started to feel meaningless. When I would go to church I would feel
like I had heard the same sermon a million times and sang the same songs
without thinking about the words we were singing over and over. I had also seen people within the
church bickering back and forth over silly things and not necessarily living
what they were teaching. And the
hard honest description of the church I was at would have been “idle.” Every week was the same; there was no
real movement or even desire for movement. And to me it all began to feel pointless.
I remember the night that I got pulled out of this funk. I had just started college at
Campbellsville University, and I went to the first BSU meeting (Baptist Student
Union), which was basically like a church service with worship and a message. I was surrounded by people my age truly
worshiping full on with their whole hearts, and then afterward a group of them
I had quickly become friends with wanted to meet outside the building and pray. We stayed and prayed for a long time
that night, and decided that we would come back to that spot every night and
pray together. These people were
really living this Christian thing.
It was real to them. It
meant something. They wanted to
make things happen. And I got
fired up for Jesus again.
Idleness is contagious … but so is passion!
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