Grace & Peace

Well, today we start a new series on 1 Thessalonians. 1 Thessalonians, I also learned something new this week. If you're looking for 1, 2 Thessalonians or 1 and 2 Timothy, go to the T's and you're somewhere in the ballpark. So when you're in the New Testament and you find the T's, you're somewhere around one of them. So they're all grouped together. I never knew that until Jim told me that at men's studies. So the things you glean.

1 Thessalonians chapter one. You can find 1 Thessalonians chapter 1 on page 1048 of your Pew Bibles. 1 Thessalonians chapter 1, and we'll read the whole chapter, but the sermon this morning is going to come from verse 1. Hear now God's holy and perfect word. Paul, Salvanus, and Timothy, to the Church of the Thessalonians, in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

We give thanks to God always for you all, making mention of you in our prayers, remembering without ceasing your work of faith, labor of love. and patience of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ in the sight of God. our God and Father, knowing, beloved brethren, your election by God.

For our gospel did not come to you in word only, but also in power and in the Holy Spirit and in much assurance, as you know what kind of men we were among you for your sake. And you became followers of us and of the Lord, having received the word in much affliction. with joy of the Holy Spirit, so that you became examples to all in Macedonia and Acacia who believe. And from you the word of the Lord has sounded forth, not only in Macedonia and Acacia, but also in every place.

Your faith towards God has gone out, so that we do not need to say anything. For they themselves declare concerning us what manner of entry we had to you, and how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, even Jesus, who delivers us from the wrath to come. Thus ends this portion of the reading of God's word.

Prayer for Illumination

Let's pray. Father, we thank you so much for your word. We pray, Father, that we would receive this word with joy, that your spirit would impress it upon our hearts, that we would have ears to hear and eyes to see and hearts to believe. In Jesus's name, amen.

Sermon

Well, recently I was online and as I was there, one of my friends put up a meme, I love memes, they get pointed truths across real quickly. And he said, idolatry says, I messed up and my dad doesn't care. Legalism says, I messed up, oh no, I have to tell dad. The gospel says, I messed up, I need to call my dad. Where's your heart? How do you think of your father? Is it, I messed up? Dad doesn't care. Have you fallen into the trap of antinomianism against the law?

Or maybe you're one of those, oh no, God is so angry, I messed up and I'm fearful to go to God the Father. Or has the gospel, the good news that the Father has loved you so seeped down into your heart that you would say, I messed up, I need to go to Dad. I need to go to my father.

That's the spirit that Paul writes the Thessalonians here. Paul, Silvanus, and Titus to the church of the Thessalonians, and God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Grace to you and peace. from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, grace and peace.

Grace and peace is what we're looking at today. Grace and peace is actually what Paul ends with. If you just turn over a page to 1 Thessalonians chapter five, that's how he ends the book. It started with grace and peace and it ends in 1 Thessalonians chapter 5, 28, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you, amen. And in between is all the points of grace. It's the gospel starts with grace, it ends with grace, indeed it is grace incarnate. And it's amazing that Paul here says something that we just kind of overlook. We just overlook when we read these words sometimes and it says things like, to the Church of the Thessalonians, in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

I love how the Westminster Shorter Catechism slows down the Lord's Prayer. And what does it say? How does the Lord's Prayer start? Let's start with that. Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. But it starts with our Father and the Shorter Catechism says, what does the preface to the Lord's Prayer teach us? The preface to the Lord's Prayer, Our Father in Heaven, teaches us, the preface of the Lord's Prayer teaches us to draw near to God with all holy reverence and confidence as children to a father, able and ready to help us. Paul starts off his epistle here, his letter to the Thessalonians. You have a father who's gracious to you. A father who gives you peace. A father who's ready and able to help us. So God has made peace with us. Peace from what though? Why do we need peace? Is this just talking about, you know, there's a donut shop in Pittsburgh, peace, love, and little donuts. Is that what this is talking about? You know, something like that. Just, you know, 1960s, everybody just be calm with each other. No, that's not what this is talking about. The peace that we need is this constant warfare, this constant battle that was happening between God and man.

That end the garden when God, we talked about this last week, this is review for you guys, you know these things. But in that garden when God said, if you keep my law perfectly, right? You got this beautiful garden, you have all the trees, there's a whole orchard, eat anything you want. He walks with them, he loves them, he cares for them. Just don't eat of that one tree. For the day you eat of that one tree, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you're gonna die.

And the implication was if they had kept that one law, they would have lived forever. They would have lived in peace with God. They would have lived in fellowship with God. But when Eve was deceived and Adam ate, we find that what we talked about in the confession this morning, Did our parents remain in that estate wherein they were first created? No. Our parents being left to the freedom of their own will fell from that estate wherein they were first created.

They fell from that estate wherein they were in perfect harmony with God. Out of their own desires, out of their own will, eating of that fruit. And thus starts the long line of bloodshed and of torment of pain and of hurt. And indeed God tells us in Romans chapter three that the wages of that sin, of falling short of the glory of God, is death. The wages of sin is death. So there's this constant enmity between God and man, this constant fighting between the children of Adam and the God who created Adam. This constant raising of the fist to God, I know better than you, I can do what I want with my marriage, I can do what I want with my money, I can do what I want with my city, I can do what I want with my kids.

I don't need God's rules for my life, even though all of God's ways are for prosperity, for good, for peace, for building us up. But in the midst of the enmity, some people did wanna be made right with God. Some people did want to be made right with God, but they wanted to be made right with God by their own terms, by their own works, by their own actions. This is where we get the idea of legalism from. Some people want to come to God and they want to say, okay, Lord, I'm going to be good enough. Lord, I am going to make peace with you. I mean, we hear this sometimes with evangelists or with just people who are good hearted, you know, you gotta get right with God.

But they don't tell them that God's already made a way for them to be right with him. So instead, people get this idea that, oh, okay, I need to be made right with God, so what do I need to do? Well, I need to quit drinking, I need to quit smoking, I need to keep going with girls who do. You know, I need to put away sinful things in my life, and if I do enough good things, then God's gonna have peace with me. But the problem is that's not how this works.

See, the reality of sin is if you had a plate, and if you had a plate and it was a perfect plate, but then you take a pair of wire cutters, and on the edge of that plate, you just take one snap on the edge of that porcelain plate, what's going to happen? Well, at minimum, you're gonna have one giant crack down the middle of that plate. Now you can later on say, okay, I'm gonna get some super glue and I'm gonna put that plate back together and I'm gonna, you know, but are you still gonna see the crack? Is it still gonna be a cracked plate?

That's what we are. Just because we think we can put the pieces back together, it doesn't change the nature of who we are in our person. Once we break the law, that's what Galatians says, we become a law breaker. That's who we are. So the legalists, even in Christian churches, will think, well, if I just pray enough, God will have peace with me. If I just read my Bible enough, then I'll be made right with God. If I just put enough in the offering plate in the back, then God will be okay with me. If I just stop doing this and this, or if I just keep doing these good things, maybe I'll earn enough merit, maybe I'll fill up a treasure box that God will look at the judgment day and say, okay, you did just enough good things to be made right with me. Brothers and sisters, it's a false gospel. There's no hope in that. There's no rest for your soul. Maybe for some of you, that's where you have been or were at times in your life, and you know how exhausting that is. Never being able to have rest. When have you done enough? When have you come to communion enough? When have you prayed enough? When have you read your Bible enough? When have you given to the poor enough? When have you done enough?

The reality is if we're trying to have peace with God by doing enough, it's never gonna be enough. The book of Isaiah says, even our good deeds are as filthy rags, stained with our human nature, stained with the reality that everything we touch is corrupted in some way or another. How often have we done a good thing only to find ourselves bragging about it to somebody later? We didn't intend to, but it just comes out. How often do we do a good work and we think, okay, that's so great, and then we realize we have pride in our heart. How often do we go and we read our Bible and we think, oh yeah, I'm doing this great work, and then we find out my heart hasn't actually been in it, I've just been really excited about checking off my to-do list. None of those things are bad in and of themselves, the actions, but it's just the reality that the human heart is deceitfully wicked above all else. So that's a lot of bad news. But what's the good news?

Romans chapter five, verse eight, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. God demonstrated his own love for us. And that while we were still sinners, he made a way of peace with us by sending his son to die. So Jesus Christ gave up his life. This is how we find peace with God. Not by our works, but by what He has done. This is where those great solas of the Reformation come in, sola gratia and sola fide, sola Christus, by faith alone, by grace alone, by Christ alone.

We can't earn it. We can't do it, brothers and sisters, I am begging you. I am begging you, if you miss this point and you mix in your works, your good deeds, what you think you have to do to be made right with God, brothers and sisters, you are ripe for the picking for any legalist, moral-based, religious system that's going to come to you. If we get this wrong, Mormons will be quick to come and talk to you, and Jehovah's Witnesses would love to talk to you about the way of salvation. If we get this wrong, brothers and sisters, This is what the difference of the gospel is versus every other religion of the world. Every other religion of the world says do, do, do. Christ says it is finished. Come to Christ. This is where we find peace with God. This is where we find hope for our souls. This is where we can have assurance of salvation, because it doesn't depend on me. It depends on what God did through his son upon that cross and demonstrated the power of it by raising his son from the dead.

Titus chapter three verse five says, not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy, he saved us through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit. Did you catch it? Not by works which we have done, Right, but according to who? His mercy. That's how he brought peace to us. That's how he has cared for us.

Not by, for by grace you have been saved through faith and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God. Do you see that it is an undeserved gift of God that he has given to you? For by grace you have been saved through faith and that not of yourselves, it is a gift of God, not the result of works. Why?

Because if it could be by works, we would boast about it. That's what chapter or verse nine ends with. If it's about me making the way right with God, then I have a boast about it. I made myself right with God. I fixed the problem. It makes God less and it makes us more. Brothers and sisters, any gospel which makes God less and you more is a false gospel.

Jesus gave a beautiful picture of this, and you can go ahead and turn there. We're gonna spend the majority of the small amount of time we have left, and in Luke chapter 15, Jesus gives a beautiful picture of what this looks like. Luke chapter 15, page 925, if you're using your Pew Bibles. Jesus gives this picture of the prodigal son, of the lost son. There's a son who goes to his father and this son is really He's insensitive, he's greedy, he's mean to his father. I don't even want to wait till you die. I want the money now. I want the inheritance now.

And listen to what his father does, verse 11 and following. Then he said, a certain man who had two sons, the younger of them said to his father, give me the portion of the good that falls to me. So he divided to them his livelihood. And not many days after, the younger son gathered all together, journeyed to a far country, and there wasted his possessions with prodigal living.

He takes his dad's money, he takes his inheritance, he told his dad basically, I wish that you were dead. And actually, let's just act like you're dead and just give me half your 401k right now, all right? And he takes that huge lump of money and he goes off to some place like Vegas or Dubai and there he's going to live in licentious luxury. There he's going to waste his money, he throws the grandest parties, he has the biggest friend group, he has all the trappings of all the world, he throws himself into the world.

But when he had spent all there, there arose a famine in that land. and he began to be in want. Then he went and joined himself to the citizen of that country, and he sent him into his fields to feed a swine, and he would gladly have filled his stomach with the pods that the swine ate, and no one gave him anything. He finds himself after he had spent all of his father's stuff. after he had wasted away the great blessings that his father had given him. Everything that his father had given him as a gift that he didn't deserve, what does he do?

He finds himself eating the slop. All right, not even that. They won't even let him eat the slop from the trough. No mercy for him, this is a wasteful kid. We're not even gonna give him the pig food. No, no, right? I'll hire him for penance, but I'm not gonna, he doesn't deserve to even eat the food that we're feeding the pigs. What's a good Jewish boy think of himself as he's there feeding unclean animals?

He's sitting there and he realizes how low he's gone. He had been in this loving household of his father and he had gone into licentious living and he had gone blowing all of his inheritance. A famine arises, providence changed, he finds himself feeding pigs. He's working for a non-believer, he's working for a gentile. Nobody shows him mercy. It comes to his senses. Verse 17, but when he had come to himself, he said, how many of my father's hired servants have bread enough to spare?

And I perish with hunger. And then he gets an idea. I'll go to my father. I will arise and will go to my father and will say to him, father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. And I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Make me like one of your hired servants.

He comes to his senses and he realized, I had it good with my father. Things were going well. My father cared for me. My father was merciful. He was even merciful to his servants. All these unbelievers I'm working for, all these Gentiles, they won't even let me eat the slop that's being fed to the pigs. But yet, in my father's house, even the servants were cared for. And so he lowers himself and he says, I'm gonna go to my dad. And he rehearses this speech. He rehearses this conversation in his brain.

Okay, when I go there, I'm gonna walk to the house and I'm gonna be humble. And as I walk up to the house, I'm gonna go there and I'm gonna tell dad, I don't even deserve to be let in the house. I'll sleep with the servants in the barn. I'm not even good enough to be one of your servants. Just please let me back in.

He goes and he asks, he's rehearsed in his head to ask his father for mercy that he knows he doesn't deserve. Could you imagine what that walk home must have been like? Gotta tell him about where's all the money. He's gonna smell the pigs on me. He's gonna know that I have not invested this money well. Is he gonna turn his back on me? Is he gonna shut the door? Is he gonna whip me? Is he gonna treat me like a hired servant? He doesn't have to. Don't know how he's gonna treat him.

Verse 20, and he arose and he came to his father. But when the son was still a great way off, his father saw him and had compassion and ran and fell on his neck and kissed him. Brothers and sisters, the father wasn't waiting in his house, stubborn and thinking, oh boy, that kid, when he comes back, I'm going to give it to him what he's really owed. But the father, the head of the family, the one who has the authority, has been standing at the door and is waiting for him, looking for him, longing for him to return. And when he sees the son come to him, he doesn't just stand there stoic and think, I'm gonna make sure he humbles himself. I'm gonna make sure that he has a right heart first. I'm gonna make sure he deserves my mercy.

No, that's not what the father does. What does the father do? He picks up his robe and he runs down the road to go kiss the son. The father initiates the mercy. The father initiates the grace. The father has been longing to see the son come back home.

And the son has been rehearsing this conversation in his mind, and he's finally going to tell his father. What is he saying? And the son said to him, Father, I have sinned against heaven and in your sight, and I am no longer worthy to be called your son. But the dad doesn't let him get everything out of his mouth. It's like the dad says, hey, hey, hey, stop, hey, come on, bring the fat cat, bring him some clothes, let's take care of my son. He's come back, he's come back.

I don't wanna hear none of this nonsense about you're worse than a servant. You're my son, and I love you. You're not just like going to be put down in the stall somewhere. You're not going to just be given the leftovers. Bring a feast. Let's care for my son. He's returned.

And the son said to him, Father, I have sinned against heaven and in your sight and am no longer worthy to be called your son. But the father said to his servants, bring out the best robe and put it on him and put a ring on his hand and sandals on his feet and bring the fattened calf here and kill it. and let us eat and be merry, for this my son was dead and is alive again. He was lost and is found, and they began to be merry."

This is the picture of grace and peace. The son didn't deserve this of the father, but the father showed him unearned favor. Grace, mercy, peace. This is the picture that Jesus gives us of what the father is like. Merciful and gracious to servants. Calls us sons, even though we don't deserve it. Calls you a daughter, not because you earned it, but because he loves you. Not everybody's happy about it, though. Not everybody's happy.

He's got a brother, remember. A man had two sons. Verse 25, and following now, his older son was in the field and it came and drew near to the house. He heard music and dancing. So he called on the servants and asked what these things meant. And he said to him, your servant has come and because he has received him safe and sound, your father has killed the fattened calf.

But he was angry and would not go in. Therefore, his father came out and pleaded with him. So he answered and said to his father, lo, these many years I have been serving you, I've never transgressed your commandments at any time. And yet you never gave me a young goat that I might make merry with my friends.

But as soon as this son of yours came, who has devoured your livelihood with harlots and killed the fattened calf for him, and he said to him, son, you are always with me and all that I have is yours. It was right that we should make merry and be glad for your brother was dead and is alive again and was lost and is found. The legalist doesn't want grace. They might want grace for themselves. But how does the older brother, the legalist in this picture, see his relationship to his father?

Merit-based. I've been a slave to you. The word there, I have served you, is a word for slavery. I was a slave for you. I never broke any of your rules. I did every single little task. When there were morning chores, I was out milking the cows. When the harvest was here and there was hay cutting, I baled the hay. When there was wheat to grind, I ground the wheat. I did everything you asked, and you're never gracious to me. And you're gracious to him?

Do you see how the son doesn't understand the father's love? The legalist always looks around and says, they should dress better for church. They should get right before God before they're able to take communion. I know that they have sin that's still in their life because I've seen it in their lives. Let me ask you, when did it ever say in the story that the son blew his wealth with harlots? A legalist always likes to think the worst of others and diminish the grace of their father. Now, some of you though might say, some people might rightly ask, all right, so if this is true, if this is how God's grace operates, if this is how this is supposed to go, then I could do whatever I want then, right? If it's all by grace, all by faith, all God's mercy, all God's work, I should sin and just sin and sin because God will be more and more gracious to me. May it never be. God forbid.

We are not saved by grace so that we can keep on sinning, but we are saved by grace that out of love we might serve the Father. We don't earn his love by our service. We serve because we love him. He's gracious to us. He's merciful to us. If we've tasted of that mercy and of that grace that he's poured out upon us, we're not gonna wanna go back to the slop. We don't wanna go back to those days where we were tired and hungry and no one would show us mercy. No, we wanna live like sons. We wanna live like daughters.

Christianity is not a religion of do, do, do. The gospel is Jesus has done it. It's done, it's finished, it's complete once and for all. This is what we remember when we come to the Lord's table. When you come, brothers and sisters, examine your heart. When you come to the Lord's table, ask yourself, am I taking this because I think I'm good enough? Or do you see that this is a beautiful picture that God has shown you that Jesus is enough? As Romans chapter six verse 23 says, for the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord. We remember that free gift that Jesus offered himself up for our sins.

That the father ran and wrapped his arms around you and kissed your neck, has put his robe of righteousness upon you. and loves you with an everlasting love. This is the gospel. This is the grace and peace of God. This is where our heart should be warmed, where we're humbled, where God becomes bigger and we become smaller.

Closing Prayer

Let's pray. Father, we thank you We thank you for the finished work of Jesus. Lord, we pray that you would push these truths deep down in our souls. Lord, we pray that you would burn away the dross, take away the chaff. Lord, we pray that we would have a true faith. In Jesus' name.