332. Faith, Love, and Hope<\/p>\n
1Th_1:3<\/p>\n
The earliest of the Epistles is that written to the Church in Thessalonica, and in it we find all the truths of the Gospel, and how those truths affected the lives of the members of the Christian fraternity.<\/p>\n
1. An Active Believer. \u201cYour work of faith\u201d (1Th_1:3). Faith is the Spirit\u2019s act and attitude towards the Lord. The act puts us in touch and relation to Him\u2014Joh_1:12, and the attitude is the continuance of trust and obedience\u2014Col_2:6. A workless faith is a worthless one. Faith in Christ is more than believing what He says is true, it is the grace that brings us into vital union with Him, and through the life He communicates we are able to do what He wishes and bids.<\/p>\n
2. An Inspired Worker. \u201cLabour of love\u201d (Col_2:3). The labour here signifies hard work, toil. The word is rendered \u201cweariness\u201d in 2Co_11:27, and a relative word is given \u201ctoiled,\u201d in referring to the disciples who \u201ctoiled all the night\u201d in fishing (Luk_5:5). How many of us have ween \u201cwearied\u201d (same word as \u201ctoiled,\u201d Joh_4:6) in working for the Lord?<\/p>\n
But what a toil toil is, if we only toil! Hence the importance of having love coupled with labour. Some of us will never have \u201cLL.D.\u201d to our name; but we may have \u201cL.L.\u201d\u2014that is, \u201cLoving Labourer.\u201d When love moves and moulds us, we move to purpose, and although we may be tired in toil, we will never be tired of toil, Carlyle says: \u201cBlessed is he who has found his work; let him ask no other blessedness. He has a work, a life-purpose; he has found it, and will follow it.\u201d<\/p>\n
3. An Enduring Looker. \u201cPatience of hope\u201d (Joh_4:3). Endurance is the meaning of patience. The word and its cognates are rendered \u201cendurance\u201d (see the six references in the Epistle to the Hebrews, Joh_10:32, Joh_10:36; Joh_12:1-2, Joh_12:3, Joh_12:7), and mean not merely passiveness, but actively keeping on and not giving in, like Christ, who \u201cendured the Cross\u201d and \u201ccontradiction,\u201d and also, like the runner in the race, who keeps on till he reaches the goal. The drawing power which enables the believer to continue is the \u201chope\u201d of the Lord\u2019s return. When \u201chope\u201d is in the objective it always refers to the Lord\u2019s Coming for His people.<\/p>\n
All these graces find their centre and circumference in the \u201cLord Jesus Christ,\u201d and live \u201cin the sight,\u201d or presence, \u201cof God and our Father.\u201d<\/p>\n
By: DR. F. E. MARSH<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
332. Faith, Love, and Hope 1Th_1:3 The earliest of the Epistles is that written to the Church in Thessalonica, and in it we find all the truths of the Gospel, and how those truths affected the lives of the members of the Christian fraternity. 1. An Active Believer. \u201cYour work of faith\u201d (1Th_1:3). Faith is … Continue reading “0338. 332. Faith, Love, and Hope”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-26130","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermons"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26130","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26130"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26130\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26130"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26130"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26130"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}