Welcome to Books of the
Book where we are studying,
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1 Thessalonians and I'm
Pastor Jon Ciccarelli and
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I'm joining Doctor Jon Paulien.
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Jon here we are in
1 Thessalonians and it
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has been a great study.
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Why don't you take us
where we want to go today?
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Alright, our text for
today begins with Chapter 2 and
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verse 13 to the
end of chapter 3.
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I should probably mention
that in Chapter 1, Paul is
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focusing on his
prayers for the Thessalonians.
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The focus is on who they
are and what God has been
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doing in their lives.
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In the first 12 verses of
chapter 2, Paul switches the
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focus to himself
and his fellow apostles.
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He gets into the motivations
of why they are in ministry.
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Its conclusion was basically
there is two motivations.
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One is pleasing God,
and the other is his love
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for the Thessalonians people.
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So that brings us back to
loving God and loving people
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again, I remember you had a
few things to say about that
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from your sermon series.
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Yeah, I love Paul
and we have talked
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about his authenticity before.
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You really see his motivations
for life, his love for God
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is so obvious, his love for
people, he describes himself
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as sometimes as a father
and sometimes as a mother in
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how he cares for
the Thessalonians.
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Here we see, because often
we will often hear well how do
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you actually live these great
commandments you just talked
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about? Love the Lord your
God with all your heart, mind,
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soul, and strength and
love your neighbor as yourself.
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That's so difficult to do,
and yet when we read Paul we see
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what it looks like, this is
what it looks like the love,
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God and to love people.
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So as we grow in that
relationship with God in loving
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people, we really
focus on relationships.
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Obviously relationship is big
to God, He came to die for us
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so we could be
with Him for ever.
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He also leads us into relation-
ships with others and so in
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this Society, this culture,
I think one of the things
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we wrestle with intention,
everything is always about
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productivity,
produce, produce, produce.
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Do more, do more,
do better, do better.
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Even in ministry! - Even
in ministry and yet Paul,
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in his ministry, was
focused on relationships.
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Relationships are so
important, you know it is funny,
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when I came to the Calimesa
church, I have only been there
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about two years now.
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The church I was at
before Calimesa, I was there for
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17 years, I was there 11
years as an Associate and Youth
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Pastor and six
years as a senior Pastor.
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The relationship was rich.
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When I was interviewing at
Calimesa, I asked the question.
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I said, I said what are you
really looking for in a Senior
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Pastor? One gentleman on
the search committee looked me
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right in the eyes and
said, we are looking for someone
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who will be here 17 years.
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They wanted relationship,
and that is what I wanted
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as well, and that
is what Paul has here.
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As we grow in our love for
God, He will lead us deeper
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into our love for others,
it's just a natural thing.
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It is part of that
fruit, and we will focus more on
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relationships and maybe not
worry as much about productivity
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Let God be the
judge of the productivity.
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Focus on loving God and
loving others, and that is what
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we see Paul doing.
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Well this section we are
looking at this time 2:13 going
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all the way to Chapter 3:11-13.
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Paul begins this section
with a prayer, and he ends
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this section with a prayer.
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It seems whenever Paul
is praying, he gets into
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thankfulness and praise.
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The two go together, and that
is one of the amazing things.
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Everywhere you go in 1
Thessalonians, - I don't think
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you can't praise God
when you're giving thanks.
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When you realize how
much you can be thankful for,
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you just start
praising Him. - That's right!
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So it is about relationships,
but it is also about
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thankfulness and so on.
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It seems that Paul used
prayer to kind of process what
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was going on in his life.
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He didn't just let his
mind spin, is it possible to
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spin your wheel's in prayer?
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Yes it is possible, I can
testify and I think there is
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a fine line when we are
praying with God about what ever
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it is we are talking about.
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It could be fears, worries,
anxieties, different things.
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If we are not careful, instead
of processing it with God it is
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almost like we can begin to re-
hearse our worries and anxieties
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You know, over and over and
get into that type of a cycle.
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But what I love about Paul,
is that he really processes
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his life with prayer.
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And when he processes it, he
is not just thinking about it,
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not just thoughts, he's really
talking with God about it.
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He releases them to God, he
is with God in the experience
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with the people and I think
that is so important for us.
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When we are praying with
God, not to just get in and kind
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of let the wheel spin about
whatever we are anxious about,
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or worried about, but
really just be with God in it.
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Process it with God, let
Him have it, surrender it
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and think about what He
has said about those things in
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His word, and we can
think about those things.
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Really process it with
God. So I love that about Paul.
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He process life
with his prayers.
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He has habits too come he
is intentional about those
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things and I think it is
important for us to be habitual,
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if you will, or you mention
thankfulness in our prayers
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and in our praise.
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The word discipline, we often
think of that in a negative
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context, but think about
the athletes that we admire.
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They are very disciplined
people, and at the root of the
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word discipline,
is the word disciple.
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To be a disciple of Jesus
means that there is a discipline
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involved about being inten-
tional, about the things that
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God asks us to be
intentional about.
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That includes being thankful,
Scripture says later on
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that is God's will for us,
is to be thankful and to pray
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continually and so forth.
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So there is a habit, there
is that intentionality and we
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see it with Paul definitely.
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That is a great leading to
the text. 1 Thessalonians 2:13.
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And I will mention once
more that the translation from
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Thessalonians are my own
intended sometime to bring out
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the grammar of the Greek,
more than to be good solid
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English so you can see
some of the dynamics that are
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going on in the text.
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You know this I think has
great impact for how we read
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the Bible, we need to
understand this is not just ink
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on a page, the Bible
is the very words of God.
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It is designed for us to
give us guidance from life in a
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way perhaps nothing
else possibly could.
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Why don't we go on
and read verses 14-16?
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These are kind of
challenging verses,
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they're troubled some people.
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Jon, I feel a little
uncomfortable with this so maybe
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you can help us unpack this.
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It has troubled a lot of
people through the years.
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It is possible to read
this passage in a way that would
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make the Nazis proud.
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I think we have to take
a careful look at it and
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understand a couple of things.
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First of all the
location starts out with Judea.
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In the Greek language the
word for Jews and the word for
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Judeans is basically the same.
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So what I think is happening
here is Paul is focusing
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particularly on
the ruling council.
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Now he was one of them, the
Sanhedrin because it was the
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ruling council that killed Jesus
and it seems from this text
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that the ruling council
was following Paul around.
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They were sending represent-
atives who were following
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him around and
causing trouble it seems
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almost wherever he went.
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In the Gospel of John, the
Jews doesn't mean all Jews.
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Paul is a Jew, there are
many Jews following Jesus
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so this is not a
blanket that covers every Jew,
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but rather in the Gospel
of John, the Jews was the
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ruling authority in particular.
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I think when we
understand the text in this way,
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Paul is frustrated about
some people who not only killed
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Jesus, they are following
him around and causing trouble
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where ever they go
for malicious purposes.
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I think that helps us understand
what is going on in this text.
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Is it possible sometimes
our greatest opponents are those
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who are closest, and Paul had
been part of this very group.
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It does seem to often, I
think our greatest opponents can
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be those that are closest to us.
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And maybe that is also
because there's heartstrings
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attached, things that can
really get down deep under us.
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It is often the
case, it seems like.
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We find that in
church too, you know.
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Sometimes, within the
church, even though we love each
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other and we are with
God, we can get into fights.
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There can be disruptions,
it always seems it's often been
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close to home where some of
our greatest opponents can be.
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God wants to change that.
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Let's say you are a group of
people in church, and someone
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makes a derogatory
comment about Jews or Muslims or
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blacks, or something,
how do you handle that?
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Well I think it is very
important, especially looking at
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this text for example.
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Not to make a blanket statement
about somebody in that.
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For instant you
wouldn't want to say with this,
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this is speaking about all Jews.
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Look at the horrible thing
at the Holocaust, just looking
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at that, we just can't do that.
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We have to always again to
seek to understand instead of
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being understood, we have
to seek to understand people
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and to be with them, we
have to understand them.
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So when someone makes those
blanket statements, say wait,
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wait, wait a minute, this is
not the way God calls people.
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Because someone could make
a derogatory statement about
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your ethnic
group too. - Exactly!
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Or your religion or so
on, everybody is like that.
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Always and everybody
are not good words to use.
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In every group, in every
ethnic group, in every religious
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faith there are people that
are tuned into God, and there
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are people that are sliding
away and it is not ours to
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judge, it is God's to judge.
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Well looking at the
broader picture and moving ahead
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we see Paul sending Timothy.
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He sends Timothy
to encourage them.
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Is there a need for
encouragement in the church?
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Is there ever.
Encouragement for everybody,
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Pastors included, we can
all use more encouragement.
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You know this life is hard,
this life we are getting beat
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up everywhere you go, at
the job, when you go to school,
00:12:02.22\00:12:06.15
even when you just drive
down the road and you look at
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the billboards you get
beat up, you're not good enough,
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you're not smart enough,
you don't have enough money
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or whatever it is.
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The society out there
is not real conducive to
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encouragement sometimes,
and in the church this ought
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really be the place
where we are getting built up.
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I think of the Barnabas
who came along side of Paul
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when others were afraid of him.
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He is the one who brought them
in, the son of encouragement.
00:12:29.81\00:12:32.65
Barnabas means son of
encouragement, I noticed in our
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Calimesa church we have
Pastor appreciation month.
00:12:35.82\00:12:38.95
How does that feel?
- It feels really good.
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They take time to
really take time to say,
00:12:42.16\00:12:45.36
we really appreciate you.
00:12:45.36\00:12:46.59
11 challenging
months. - that is right.
00:12:46.59\00:12:48.06
One month of encouragement
can get you through a lot.
00:12:48.06\00:12:51.00
Give us a little
summary of Paul's emotions as
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he goes through Chapter 3.
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We have talked about it before,
but we can make it pretty quick.
00:12:56.71\00:12:59.71
I think, again I love Paul's
authenticity as transparency.
00:12:59.71\00:13:04.81
He says, my heart is just
breaking, I am longing to see
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you, it's like I've
been orphaned from you.
00:13:09.88\00:13:11.95
I almost can't endure, I'm under
distress and I just might not be
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able to go on living.
It's almost funny to read.
00:13:16.42\00:13:19.29
But we really see his attachment
to the Thessalonians here.
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He kind of sums up
in 3:12 where he says,
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He is praying that their love
will increase for each other
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but also for people outside.
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He is concerned that this
kind of relationship they have,
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the feelings they have
will be expanded throughout all
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the work that they do.
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That brings us up to a time
for break and we will be back
00:13:56.67\00:13:59.83
with you in just a moment.
00:13:59.83\00:14:00.87