Episode 346: HE Will Surely Do It | +Quigg Lawrence

Introduction

Alrighty. Good morning, friends. Anybody tired? Me too. I used to sleep a lot in church. Church is an awesome place to sleep. I was in a little Episcopal church in a rural area, Goochland County, and we would kneel for prayer. And I thought, well, what if I just knelt forward during the sermon? I would take my arm and put that on the hardwood of the pew in front of me, and I would look like I was praying. Honestly, generally, it was pretty either boring or above my head, and very quickly, like somebody speaking after lunch, I would fall asleep.

And how, in fact, did I know this? Because usually, by the end of the sermon, I had drool on my shoes. I remember once I preached in Rwanda, and it’s a tough deal because you fly over there and you miss a night of sleep. I was preaching in the largest cathedral. Actually, y’all helped build it. And I preached, and then about thirty minutes later, in front of seven, eight thousand people, whatever it was, I fell asleep and started snoring back here on the platform. It was embarrassing.

Recognizing Exhaustion and Presence of the Lord

So I know it's risky, but as I was praying this week, one thing the Lord impressed on me is that a lot of people here are exhausted. You're just exhausted. Exhausted. So at the risk of putting you to sleep, I actually want you to experience the presence of the Lord with no noise.

So, I get it. I like to do lots of things. Phones down. Could we just literally take thirty seconds? It'll seem like ten minutes. Could we take thirty seconds and just breathe and say, Lord, fill me with your Spirit. Let me adore you in the beauty of your holiness.

I'd like to give you five, but let's even just shoot for thirty. Come, Lord Jesus. That intimacy you're beginning, just beginning to experience is the presence of the Lord. And all God's people said, amen. I think we'd be healthier people if we did that more often.

And guys, we need to step up. I saw a meme this week, and it talked about all the things that mom does for Christmas and all the things dad does. And I know if you're single, you pretty much do everything. We need to carve some time. I don't care where it is. It could be in a tree stand. It could be in your car. It could be in a warm bubble bath. It could be somewhere. But just time that you would get with the Lord. Because if not, you are going to spiritually starve to death, and me too.

The Context of the Passage

Today, we're going to be in 1 Thessalonians 5. It's around page 988 in your pew Bible. I don't care where you find it, but if you would go there, that would be awesome.

So, Saint Paul went to Thessalonica in Greece, and it was pagan. There were no Christians there. There were some Jews there, but no Christians, and he talked about Jesus. And he talked about Jesus so much that some converted, but eventually, the authorities ran him out of town. He left because he had to. They ran him out, not the church people, but the bad guys.

So, he's writing this letter to encourage this young, growing group of believers. It's almost like if you've ever grown something in a garden or you have a flower or something you're growing. At first, you plant the seed and water it, and it starts to grow. You hope it's going to grow. And so, Paul’s writing—I don't remember the amount of time, maybe two or three years or so—but it was some time after he left, and he’s trying to encourage them. They’re getting very frustrated. They’re like, “Hey, we love Jesus. Yes, we do. But where is he? Where is he? We want him to come back.” And some of us have died.

So, he talks a lot about the return of Jesus and those who've fallen asleep in Jesus. But then he also gives a lot of commands for walking as a Christian. You see, churches are really good at telling people how to get saved, how to get born again, how to be born from above. You use whatever phrase you want. How to know Christ. But we're pretty lousy generally at telling people how to live as a Christian. Amen? Amen.

This little passage, 1 Thessalonians 5:12 and following, is some very practical advice Paul’s giving to the church. Let's look. Go down and look.

1 Thessalonians 5:12
We ask you, brothers, to respect those who labor among you and are over you in the Lord. He's not talking about government. He's talking about pastors. He's saying, "Hey, if you want to be a healthy follower of Jesus, this is part of it. You're to respect those who labor among you in the gospel. Those who are over you, like pastors and teachers, evangelists, respect those." And he says, "that are over you and who admonish you."

And what I realized quickly is, too often pastors, we don't admonish people. We may get mad at them, we may yell at them. Admonishment seems like a negative word, doesn't it? Admonish. But actually, admonishment really means that you love somebody enough that if you see them going off the road, you speak words of life, and you warn them.

And so, part of a pastor’s job is to admonish people. And let me just tell you, they don’t always like it. I don’t like to be admonished, right? But that’s part of being a healthy Christian—that God, the great shepherd, has put under-shepherds over you to warn you when he sees you, or they see you, going off the road into a ditch.

You know, I’m a senior pastor here, but I have a head bishop over me. And trust me, he has admonished me. And even as a bishop—I’m a bishop—oh, purple shirt, collar, wow. But you know what? We admonish one another. We’ve had bishops removed from their posts because they failed to listen to the clear admonition of their brother bishops.

But anyway, he’s saying, I want you to respect those who are you—the pastors and the teachers. I want you to esteem them very highly in love because of their work. Be at peace among yourselves.

Why do you reckon pastors don’t like confrontation? What happens when you admonish people? After COVID, I called a bunch of people up and said, “Hey, man, I love you. Yes, I do. But you need to get your butt back in church.” And some of them received it joyfully, and some of them haven’t come back yet. But I didn’t say it mean, but it was important.

So, we have this job to admonish, and not just about church attendance. So, let’s look at just really quickly—we’ll look at a couple of scriptures that sing the same song.

Hebrews 13:17 says this:

Hebrews 13:17
Obey your leaders and submit to them. Well, maybe you’re like me. Maybe you’re an antinomian. Maybe you don’t like authority. Maybe you like breaking rules. I understand that. I really do. But the call from God to be a healthy believer is to obey your leaders and submit to them. Unless they ask you to do something that’s immoral or unbiblical, obey them. That’s it. And it says, “for they are keeping watch over your souls.”

That actually is a job of a pastor, not just to fill your head with information, but to care for your souls. And I would say it trickles down even—that you have people that lead your life group, that are kind of the spiritual leaders of your small group, and they see what’s going on in your life more than some of us. And so he says, obey your leaders, submit to them. They’re keeping watch over your souls as those who will have to give an account.

Let them do this with joy and not with groaning, for that would be of no advantage to you. So that’s Hebrews. First Timothy 5:17 says this:

1 Timothy 5:17
Let the elders or presbyters who rule well be considered worthy of double honor.

Now, we’re not talking about a megachurch with a guy who has jets and helicopters and wants you to sow seeds of faith money. We’re not talking about that. We’re not talking about what I see sometimes even in Africa. They call the bishops “my lord bishop.” I don’t like that. We call it one Lord. One Lord.

But the one thing the Africans have learned that maybe we haven’t is to honor the man of God that God has placed over them. Honor, real honor, not feigned honor. Nobody likes feigned honor, right? But respect and honor.

So we see that. 1 Thessalonians, we see it in Hebrews, we see it in 1 Timothy.

Galatians 6:6 says:

Galatians 6:6
Let the one who has taught the word share all good things with the one who teaches.

Did you hear that? Let the one who’s taught the word of God share all good things with the one who teaches. Now, I’m not asking you to give me anything right now. Our church is very generous with our pastors. We do the scale of one to ten, and we like to be like a seven, seven and a half pay thing. We’re generous. Fair to fair plus. We kind of lean into fair plus. So our church gets an A for that.

But some of us today, this is a challenging word—that the Lord wants you to be generous with those who are teaching you. It’s there in the Bible. I didn’t write it.

One more. Oh, 1 Timothy—already said that one.

So let’s pick it up. The next verse, 13. It says, what? Y’all help me because I’m on a computer because my printer died. So tell me what verse 13b says. Yeah.

Be at peace among yourselves.

Isn’t that what, right? Isn’t it the fruit of the Spirit? Love, joy, peace? Jesus is the Prince of Peace. Peace. Shalom. We certainly need this.

Can you imagine the alternative to living at peace? Living at peace takes hard work. It takes turning the other cheek. Sometimes it takes having hard conversations, hearing things you don’t want to hear. But he says, to live at peace among yourselves.

There was a time, 2003—that would be about twenty years ago—our church had a church split. We had a, you know why? We don’t have church meetings now? I’ll tell you. We had a humdinger of a church meeting. I was so embarrassed for the new people in our church. There was a faction in the church, and people were screaming and yelling, veins coming out. I was trying to keep my cool, and I did for about twelve minutes. And then I didn’t. And then my friend Jack Sale kind of took the mic, and I did the walk of shame back to my seat.

The call of a Christian is to live at peace with others. Not cheap peace, not artificial peace, but real peace. We have churches very near us that are having a bonfire and a split now. And we don’t rejoice in that. They’re the body. They’re Jesus’ church. We want to pray for them, really, really, really. Because when one part of the body hurts, the whole body hurts. And it’s not just here in Roanoke. There are churches all over that are splitting and dividing denominations.

And as much as it depends on you, live at peace with all people.

Practical Commands for Christian Living

Now, if we go to verse 14, if you’re following the scriptures, it says, and we urge you, brothers.

I think he must have been southern, right? And y’all raised by a southern mama or grandmama? Honey, mama would like you to do so and so. That really doesn’t mean she’d like you. She’s not really urging you. She’s telling you, do it. Do it and do it yesterday.

So, what are the—what are the things we’re supposed to do? It’s going to seem like a heavy burden until I get to the end. I want you to know, at the end, we can only do this through Christ.

So what are the—what are the—what are the things that we’re being urged to do by Saint Paul? Not just pastors are to admonish. Right? I don’t want to be the guy with the, you know, admonishment thing in my head. Stop that. Do this. Stop that. Do that.

We are to admonish one another. Again, when you admonish a brother or sister in Christ, take heed lest you fall. Take heed lest you fall. Maybe the prayer is like, Lord, search me. Try me. If there’s any offensive way in me, you pull it out. Pull the beam out of my eye so I can see clearly before I step into this loving act of trying to admonish or warn a brother or sister who’s going off track.

But the call is still there, not just for pastors, but for all believers. Admonish the idle or disorderly. You’ll not always be invited to the country club or get an attaboy or attagirl when you do it, but that’s the call of a Christian believer—to admonish those who are going off track.

And it’s not simply to warn them, but what else? What’s the next thing we’re called to do? To encourage. I remember somebody snuck into our staff kitchen and put a sheet of 50 ways to encourage your child. I’ll never forget it. Encouragement goes a long way. The world will kick you in the teeth. We need to speak words of life and encouragement. Good job. Not fake encouragement, right? Not fake, because that’s no good, but authentic encouragement.

How are you encouraging your children? How are you encouraging your grandchildren? How are you encouraging the people you work with? Are you speaking words of life and encouragement to build them up, especially in Christ?

Admonishment and encourage the faint-hearted. We get a lot of faint-hearted people. What’s the third thing we’re called to do? Help the weak. And that could be spiritually weak, psychologically, emotionally weak. Last year, you gave so generously in December. You guys were amazing. We were so deep in the hole. I was like, “Oh, we’re in trouble.” We made up six hundred thousand dollars in like three weeks, and then it was more than that. We had so much money that we helped Archbishop Ben and Mama Gloria build a house. They want to have 500 orphans that they’re going to adopt. They’ve already hired 13 people.

Most of those kids have gone to college because they paid for them to go to college. Their kids—they adopted. And there is a Walmart-sized house in Nigeria right now that is not quite ready for them to move into. We're hoping by the end of the year that we’re going to say, “Hey, guys, we’re going to stroke you a check because we see what you’re doing. We want to encourage you in the Lord. We want to help those who are weak.”

So, whether you admonish, you encourage, or you’re helping the weak, we want to be patient with all people.

Rejoicing, Prayer, and Faithfulness

Patience. Oh, are you like me? I like microwaves. I mean, really, I don’t, but I like the speed of a microwave. I want everything fast. And when I want things changed, I want to go, boop, boop, boop. Start.

But the call to walk with other Christians is to be patient. To be patient.

Now, let’s go to verse 15. See that no one repays anyone evil for evil, but always seek to do good one to another.

Verse 16, rejoice always. What sounds so great on paper, doesn’t it? Rejoice always. Anybody lost a job? Rejoice. You got a diagnosis? I found out yesterday my fourth ablation didn’t work. You know, I don’t know what that means, but it ain’t good.

Can I rejoice? Can I only rejoice when the news is happy? Or can I rejoice in all things? Not because the situation is good, but because I have a father who’s good. And I don’t know what’s going to happen with it. I don’t know. But I know he loves me, and I know I’m not alone.

The call is to rejoice always. A lot of you have lost a loved one. Eventually, we all lose loved ones. And it seems very preachy, very Helen Steiner Rice cardish, if you know who she is. To say, “Oh, just rejoice. Be happy.” It doesn’t say be happier. It says rejoice. That means when you’re going through the hardest thing, whether it’s a marriage disaster, somebody you love dies, you lose your job.

The Christian is that we can give the Lord thanks, not for the thing that happened. We can give him thanks because he’s our dad and he says, “I will not leave you as orphans.” Have you known that truth? In the midst of the worst possible thing that could ever hit you in your life, you can still say, “God will not leave me.” I may not feel it, but I know it’s true. God is good. He’s my Father. He will not leave me as an orphan.

Verse 17 says, pray without ceasing. I’m getting better at it. Sixty four years, I’m finally getting better at it. What I would say is, you don’t have to be a monk. You don’t have to be a monk. Do it in the regular—what’s it—wolf and weave of life? Doing regular stuff. Like, when you get off the phone with somebody, don’t be religious. Just go, “Hey, can I say a quick prayer for you?” We did a wedding. We were down in some fancy place that’s warm, and I got a chance to pray for a lot of people that worked on a ship.

You don’t have to be in a pulpit to pray. You don’t have to be in a monastery to pray. You don’t have to have a fake voice to pray. It’s actually a gift that the Lord would use you—to not go on and on, but to just speak words of life and to pray for other people going through hard times.

Final Exhortations and Faithfulness

Verse 18 says this: because, see, by the end of this passage, I’m like, “Okay, hold on. Let’s just count it quick because we’re—this is a lot of things. I’m supposed to be at peace with all people. I’m supposed to admonish the idle. I’m supposed to encourage the faint-hearted. I’m to help the weak. I’m supposed to be patient. I’m supposed to seek good to do always seek to do good to everyone. I’m supposed to rejoice always. I’m supposed to pray without ceasing. I’m already exhausted.” Right? It’s just another list of things we have to do, and if it ended there, that would be a sad truth. But it doesn’t.

1 Thessalonians 5:18
He who calls you is faithful.

See, see, see—the book, Old Testament, New Testament, was actually a book of human failure. I was shocked the first time I actually read it. I’m like, these people are pathetic. They’re pathetic. Golly. God's people, the Jews, they fail. They fail. They fail. They fail. The New Testament, even the apostles, they fail. They fail. They fail. They fail. They fail.

And now you want me to do all these extra things. I’m going to fail. But the scripture says this: he who calls you is faithful. See, see, the focus is not actually on you. It’s on him. He is faithful. You’ve got a heart condition? He’s faithful. I’m preaching myself. You’ve got one that’s struggling? Maybe one of your kids isn’t walking with Jesus? He’s faithful.

It says, “he’s faithful and he will surely do it,” for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. And so, the refrain I want you to go away with is this: He is faithful, he will surely do it. He is faithful, he will surely do it.

All these things he’s saying, you walk in these, and these are life. He knows you’re going to fail, but he’s faithful, and he will do this in your life. If not, we all might as well all go home and call it a day. God is faithful. He will surely do it. Whatever your situation, I promise you, he is faithful. He’s the one that takes a dead son on a cross and raises him from the dead.

In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Conclusion

Bow your heads with me. And as we prepare to pray, just remind all of you that we want to take just a few minutes here to reflect on what God might have spoken to each one of us individually during that message. These curved rails are for you to deal with the Lord individually, and then we have the straight rails over in the side where someone would love to pray with you. Whatever it is that God has placed on your heart or mind, I encourage you to respond in faith.