Participants: Jon Paulien & Jon Ciccarelli
Series Code: TBOTB
Program Code: TBOTB000010A
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00:21 Welcome to Books of the book.
00:23 We've been studying the letters of Paul 00:25 to the Thessalonians and in previous programs 00:28 we've been working our way through first Thessalonians. 00:31 And now we're at the very conclusion 00:33 of that series of studies. 00:34 First Thessalonians five and verses 12:27. 00:39 I am Jon Paulien. 00:40 Dean of the school of Religion at Loma Linda University, 00:43 and with me is my pastor Jon Ciccarelli, 00:46 pastor at the Calimesa Seventh-Day Adventist Church. 00:49 Jon, it's good to be together again 00:51 and we're finally bringing first Thessalonians to a close. 00:54 I'm looking forward to second Thessalonians 00:56 in our next episode. 00:57 But today we're looking at verses 12:27, 01:00 and Paul just gets really practical here. 01:02 He talks about leadership. 01:04 He has a lot of admonitions that we're gonna look at, 01:06 but really practical stuff for the church. 01:09 So I'm looking forward to our, our study today. 01:11 Why don't we jump into that? 01:12 All right. Well, this is -- one of those places 01:14 where the Greek scholarship really is extremely helpful 01:18 because in verses 12:22 you have a series of 17 admonitions. 01:25 But interestingly enough the first nine of these 01:28 which are about mentoring, Discipleship, 01:32 you know, leaders and members how they relate to each other, 01:35 the first nine, the verb comes first. 01:38 So it starts through the verb 01:39 and then you have little statement. 01:41 Then the last eight where he's talking about 01:44 how to deal with attitudes toward prophecy and attitudes 01:50 relating to prayer and joyfulness and the verb comes 01:53 at the end each time. You have these, these clip 01:55 statements, first nine the verbs at the beginning, 01:58 second eight the verbs at the end, it's a little bit like, 02:01 like preaching a thing. You see, he's got King's going. 02:04 He's on a roll. He's on a roll 02:05 and I think we gonna have some fun with this. 02:08 Yeah, yeah, great. So why don't we get started 02:11 and we can go right into verses 12 and 13? 02:16 Perhaps you could read that first. 02:18 Paul says, "Now we ask you, brothers 02:21 to respect those who labor among you, 02:23 and who are placed over you, and who admonish you, 02:26 and to regard them super highly on account of their work. 02:30 Be at peace with one another." 02:32 Couple of things I want to say 02:33 about that passage right away. 02:35 First of all that builds on verse 11. 02:38 He's summed up everything he said before 02:40 was encourage one another. 02:42 We encouraging to one another. 02:44 I think what we're getting into here 02:46 is sort of explicating that, encourage one another, you see. 02:50 And the other thing I'd mentioned 02:52 is in these two verses he's talking 02:54 to the members of the church 02:56 and how they're supposed to relate to their leaders. 02:59 And as a pastor I really like this verse. Okay. 03:02 But, you know, I like what he brings up 03:05 here though because there's a lot to be said 03:08 for mentoring and discipleship. 03:09 I mean Jesus said go make disciples and sometimes 03:13 I think if we're not careful, you know, 03:15 things can just become all about programs, 03:17 you know, at the church, programs, 03:18 more programs, more programs, 03:19 and you can have lots of programs, 03:22 without any disciplining taking place, 03:23 without any intentional leadership taking place. 03:26 And as leaders we have to be extra careful. 03:29 And we've talked about this in the other episodes 03:31 by keeping ourselves in check. 03:32 We're not just trying to build our empire, 03:35 you know, our personal empire, but that we are 03:37 by the grace of God allow Him to build up His kingdom 03:40 through us in the lives of people. 03:42 And that's something I know I always 03:43 have to keep myself in check on. 03:45 And that I am not just about productivity or empire building, 03:48 I don't want that at all. I want God's kingdom 03:50 to reign in me and to reign on those that I am leading, 03:53 and by His grace that happens. 03:55 You know, when I came to the Calimesa church, 03:58 and they had their search committee together. 04:00 Some people may know Louis Venden. 04:02 He was on that search committee. Lou intimidating 04:04 you know, when we showed up to search committee 04:05 and Louis Venden was sitting there-- 04:07 One of my faculty, and -- very highly regarded person. 04:09 Oh, yes, and great preacher, 04:12 and I asked Lou afterwards I said, I said, Lou, 04:17 if God wills it that -- I come here in Calimesa 04:19 would you be willing to enter into a mentoring relationship? 04:22 I saw God was -- giving me a gift in Lou. 04:25 If I came to Calimesa to -- continue to build into my life 04:28 as one of my mentors and -- of course, you know he said, oh. 04:30 He's such a humble man. He says, oh, oh, 04:32 this would be a mutual thing. 04:33 And I said no, no, Lou, let's get this right. 04:36 It'd be completely downward mentoring me. 04:38 You would be mentoring me. 04:40 And we get together about every six weeks. 04:41 We have lunch together and, and the spirit of God 04:44 just oozes out of him. 04:45 But we need to allow the church to be a safe place 04:48 where we can have mentors, who can minister the love of God 04:51 to us and grow us and disciple us in that. 04:54 And our churches, I think, it's important 04:56 that they're multigenerational. 04:58 One of the sad things we see so much segregation 05:01 with the generations, and I think we miss out 05:04 on the lot of the disciplining in that way because we have, 05:08 we have this cutting off with the generations 05:10 and so we don't have the older generations 05:12 building the younger generations 05:14 and the younger generations are missing out as well. 05:17 I was leading worship one time at a church in San Diego 05:20 and we would do some, some courses but we do some hymns 05:24 as well and we did save you like a Shepherd Lead Us, 05:29 you know, that hymn and I had someone in their 40s come up 05:33 to me and say, wow, we really loved 05:34 that new song you did today. 05:35 I said what song was that? 05:37 The one about the shepherd. 05:39 And I thought my goodness this person 05:40 has never heard this hymn and he has been raised 05:42 in the Adventist Church his whole life. 05:43 Obviously there is some, some segregation there. 05:46 But it's important, it's important that we, 05:48 that we keep the generations together 05:50 and that we be intentional 05:52 about our mentoring and our disciplining. 05:54 And so, I, I can go on forever, you know, on this. 05:56 But I'm gonna, I'm gonna stop with this so that we continue 05:58 move into our texts, but this is something 05:59 that's close to my heart. 06:01 All right, I appreciate that very much. 06:03 You probably wondering what has to Jon 06:06 so excited about in this -- text, it's because Paul 06:09 is telling the members how they should treat 06:11 their leaders and he tells them to respect them highly. 06:16 He says those who labor among you, who are placed over you 06:20 and admonish you, respect them highly. 06:23 You see, he's encouraging people, somebody 06:25 who is in-charge within the church. 06:28 It's tough work. 06:29 It's difficult stuff and they need encouragement too. 06:32 And sometimes we would, the pastor does all the encouraging. 06:35 We, we just sort of knock back, but no, 06:37 pastors need encouragement too. 06:39 And Paul is saying this here. 06:42 Now at this stage of the churches 06:43 history it's very early. 06:45 And they don't have officers yet. 06:47 Later on they were elders and deacons and Bishops 06:50 and different things like that. 06:52 But this is only 20 years 06:54 after the death of resurrection of Jesus 06:56 and basically the only office here is this is those 07:00 who are placed over you. 07:03 It's interesting, the early church shied away from 07:06 the leadership language of Ancient Rome. 07:09 They had words that we get words like Hegemon, 07:12 monarchy, these are -- all based on the, 07:15 on the Roman Latin and so on. 07:17 It has the idea of someone who is in power over you. 07:19 The only leadership word that the early church accepted 07:23 from that whole scene was these word 07:26 those who are over you, because in the Roman context 07:31 those who are over you, were people who cared about you. 07:35 It was, it was almost a family kind of a thing, 07:37 the caring connection. 07:38 And the Christian said that's the word we can use. 07:41 But these other words, they only applied to Jesus. 07:44 It's very interesting. Later on they picked up words 07:47 from the Synagogue and the -- home that they use elders, 07:50 deacons and so on language that they used for leadership. 07:54 Now here he's says "respect those who labor among you, 07:58 regard them super highly." 08:01 Paul loves that word "Super," 08:02 regard them super-highly who admonish you. 08:06 And this word "admonish" is a tough Greek word, 08:09 it kind of means knock some sense into you. 08:12 So do you ever have to do that, Pastor? 08:15 Oh, absolutely, you know. No, but sometimes-- 08:17 Tell me about it. I have members who...who 08:20 recognized I need some sense 08:22 knocked into me too every once in a while, you know. 08:25 But no, it's a, but it's not always welcomed. 08:27 I mean, I think personally it's hard for us to welcome 08:30 when someone comes up and admonishes us, 08:32 come and tries to knock some sense into us. 08:35 But--but it's that, I think it's that tough love. 08:39 You know, being willing to say the things that someone 08:42 might need to hear because you love them so much. 08:45 Yeah. You know, if we never talked honestly 08:49 in that way then, then we -- prevent people from growing 08:52 the relationship with God 08:54 and maybe the relationships through others. 08:55 And I mean look at Jesus, look at all the tough love 08:57 he gave to the religious leaders. 08:59 There is a lot of tough love. 09:01 And He spoke those things because he loved them but it's 09:04 not easy. Well, confrontation is critical to relationship 09:06 because it's letting people know that there is things 09:09 that they're doing that -- will scuttle the relationship 09:12 unless they're made aware of that, 09:14 unless some change comes in. 09:16 As a Bible scholar, I have to deal with that. 09:19 When I am going to some tough biblical text 09:22 and I make clear everybody says, oh, wonderful I. 09:25 I just love that, you see. 09:26 But in sometimes I go to a text 09:28 that a person thought was clear, was clear to them. 09:31 Yeah. I said, you know, that's not really what it saying. 09:34 Suddenly, you're not so popular--Changed or popular- 09:37 And so Paul here is saying look, 09:40 though this is tough work, this admonishing. 09:43 So give them respect and, and, and, 09:45 and show the right attitude. 09:48 Interestingly enough is there is a whole background here. 09:53 I talked about the popular philosophers 09:54 in earlier programs that were going around in the cities 09:57 just like Paul was and-- they had these whole idea 10:00 of how to diagnose where people were at 10:04 and to be sensitive to when they're open 10:08 to conviction and when they're not, 10:09 when you can admonish them and when you can't. 10:12 There is a right timing to talk to people. 10:15 There is an appropriate remedy and it inappropriate remedy 10:18 and all that stuff is discussed in detail 10:20 in ancient Greek writings. 10:22 And examine yourself before you admonish somebody else. 10:27 Paul adds one thing to all of these, and that is that God 10:31 ultimately is the model of leadership, not us. 10:35 And if we're following God's model of leadership 10:37 then we will know when to admonish and when not. 10:42 So the Paul doesn't balance it out here. 10:46 He can be tough on leaders too. 10:48 In second Corinthians 10:13 he holds them accountable. 10:51 So balance is important to you. 10:53 Yes, hold your leaders respectful, honor them, 10:58 but at the same time hold them accountable. 11:00 Both things are necessary 11:02 and finding that balance can be the tough thing. 11:04 Yeah, and I think you know it's important to remember that, 11:07 that leaders, pastors and so forth are still in discipleship. 11:13 There are still being led by God, hopefully. 11:16 And we're still, you know, it's not like 11:18 the pastor is the master discipliner. 11:20 I mean is disciplining everybody, 11:21 but he is also being disciple by God 11:23 through His congregation or -- whoever the leader might be, 11:25 those who are leading. 11:27 And, and looking to God to continue disciple him. 11:30 And when that happens then we become 11:33 like you said lead like Jesus. 11:34 Jesus was a servant leader. 11:37 It was, you know, often times we look at-- 11:38 organizational structure and leadership when we think 11:42 of this pyramid with the leader at the top. 11:44 But Jesus really flipped that Pyramid upside down, 11:48 you know, were he was at the bottom and He was lifting 11:50 and He was serving and He was edifying and that's really 11:53 the model of leadership that we see in God 11:55 that he became a servant. 11:57 You know, left heaven to come and serve us, 12:00 to love us so much and to save us, you know. 12:03 And the other part that's so important I think with 12:06 leadership is that who we are when the spotlights not on. 12:10 It's what, is where who we really are. 12:12 It's about character. Exactly. 12:14 And we talked about that in chapter two, 12:15 didn't we? Yeah, yeah. 12:17 Well, we need to move ahead verses 14 and 15 12:20 and let me-- mention once again 12:21 these translations are my own, 12:24 so that we can try to get some of the flavor of the grammar 12:26 of the Greek here from time to time 12:28 and the unusual meanings of words. 12:31 We also encourage you, brothers, it says, 12:34 "admonish the unruly, cheer up the discouraged, 12:37 take an interest in the weak, be patient with everyone, 12:42 see that no one pays back evil for anyone else's evil, 12:46 but always pursue what is good, 12:48 towards one another and toward everyone." 12:51 Here I see him talking to leaders 12:54 about confronting people and so on. 12:57 And this, the language here is very interesting. 13:00 He says admonish knock sense into the unruly, 13:04 the word, the Greek word for unruly here, 13:07 kind of has the meaning of people 13:10 who are willfully difficult. 13:12 They're people who are just messed up, 13:14 you know, but there are people 13:16 who are trying to be difficult, 13:18 who are-- disruptive by nature. 13:20 These are the ones you knock sense into, he says. 13:22 Then there are people who are discouraged. 13:26 The Greek word here actually could 13:28 be translated little souls. 13:30 These are people who think small, 13:33 people who don't have the lot of self-confidence. 13:36 And then he says, in addition to that taking 13:39 interest in the weak, the weak, are people 13:42 who are moral and spiritual limitations. 13:45 They're easily discouraged. 13:47 They're fearful. 13:49 In fact pastors sometimes stay away from them. 13:52 They gonna say, they're never gonna change. 13:53 These are people no matter what you say 13:54 they never carry it out, you see. 13:57 So Paul here is counseling the leaders 14:01 how to deal with people and the final word in this verse 14:05 is where he says, look don't payback evil for evil. 14:10 If you're leader, evil's gonna happen. 14:12 If you're a leader, you gonna be criticized. 14:15 If you're a leader, you gonna have to suffer. 14:17 Don't payback, because the -- minute the leader pays back 14:21 the way he's been treated 14:23 that-it disrupts the entire community. 14:27 It's a disaster, so some super council from Paul 14:31 here about practical everyday affairs. 14:33 It's time to go for a break. 14:35 We'll see you back in just a little bit. |
Revised 2023-01-25