For God didn’t appoint us to wrath, but to the obtaining of salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, that, whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with him. Therefore exhort one another, and build each other up, even as you also do.
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1 Thessalonians 5:9-11 sits inside this longer paragraph.
But concerning the times and the seasons, brothers, you have no need that anything be written to you. For you yourselves know well that the day of the Lord comes like a thief in the night. For when they are saying, “Peace and safety,” then sudden destruction will come on them, like birth pains on a pregnant woman. Then they will in no way escape. But you, brothers, aren’t in darkness, that the day should overtake you like a thief. You are all children of light and children of the day. We don’t belong to the night, nor to darkness, so then let’s not sleep, as the rest do, but let’s watch and be sober. For those who sleep, sleep in the night; and those who are drunk are drunk in the night. But since we belong to the day, let’s be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet, the hope of salvation. For God didn’t appoint us to wrath, but to the obtaining of salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, that, whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with him. Therefore exhort one another, and build each other up, even as you also do. But we beg you, brothers, to know those who labor among you, and are over you in the Lord, and admonish you, and to respect and honor them in love for their work’s sake. Be at peace among yourselves.
Parallel Translations
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For God didn’t appoint us to wrath, but to the obtaining of salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ,
who died for us, that, whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with him.
Therefore exhort one another, and build each other up, even as you also do.
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For god hath not apoynted vs vnto wrath: but to obtayne salvacion by the meanes of oure lorde Iesu Christ
which died for vs: that whether we wake or slepe we shuld lyve togedder with him.
Wherfore comforte youre selves togedder and edifie one another even as ye do.
Show all 3 translations
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For God hath not appointed vs vnto wrath, but to obtaine saluation by the meanes of our Lord Iesus Christ,
Which died for vs, that whether we wake or sleepe, we should liue together with him.
Wherefore exhort one another, and edifie one another, euen as ye doe.
Cross-references (58)
- Ephesians 4:29 (v11) Let no corrupt speech proceed out of your mouth, but only what is good for building others up as the need may be, that it may give grace to…
- Romans 15:2 (v11) Let each one of us please his neighbor for that which is good, to be building him up.
- Hebrews 10:25 (v11) not forsaking our own assembling together, as the custom of some is, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day…
- Hebrews 3:13 (v11) but exhort one another day by day, so long as it is called “today”, lest any one of you be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.
- 1 Thessalonians 4:18 (v11) Therefore comfort one another with these words.
Show all 58 cross-references
- 1 Thessalonians 1:10 (v9) and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead: Jesus, who delivers us from the wrath to come.
- Romans 14:19 (v11) So then, let’s follow after things which make for peace, and things by which we may build one another up.
- 1 Corinthians 14:12 (v11) So also you, since you are zealous for spiritual gifts, seek that you may abound to the building up of the assembly.
- Ephesians 4:12 (v11) for the perfecting of the saints, to the work of serving, to the building up of the body of Christ,
- Ephesians 4:16 (v11) from whom all the body, being fitted and knit together through that which every joint supplies, according to the working in measure of each…
- Jude 1:20 (v11) But you, beloved, keep building up yourselves on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit.
- 1 Peter 2:10 (v9) In the past, you were not a people, but now are God’s people, who had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy.
- 1 Corinthians 10:23 (v11) “All things are lawful for me,” but not all things are profitable. “All things are lawful for me,” but not all things build up.
- Romans 14:8-9 (v10) For if we live, we live to the Lord. Or if we die, we die to the Lord. If therefore we live or die, we are the Lord’s. For to this end…
- 2 Peter 1:12 (v11) Therefore I will not be negligent to remind you of these things, though you know them, and are established in the present truth.
- 2 Timothy 2:10 (v9) Therefore I endure all things for the chosen ones’ sake, that they also may obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus with eternal…
- Romans 15:14 (v11) I myself am also persuaded about you, my brothers, that you yourselves are full of goodness, filled with all knowledge, able also to…
- 2 Corinthians 12:19 (v11) Again, do you think that we are excusing ourselves to you? In the sight of God we speak in Christ. But all things, beloved, are for your…
- Acts 13:48 (v9) As the Gentiles heard this, they were glad, and glorified the word of God. As many as were appointed to eternal life believed.
- 1 Corinthians 14:29 (v11) Let the prophets speak, two or three, and let the others discern.
- 1 Peter 3:18 (v10) Because Christ also suffered for sins once, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring you to God, being put to death in the…
- Proverbs 16:4 (v9) Yahweh has made everything for its own end— yes, even the wicked for the day of evil.
- 1 Corinthians 14:5 (v11) Now I desire to have you all speak with other languages, but rather that you would prophesy. For he is greater who prophesies than he who…
- 1 Timothy 1:4 (v11) and not to pay attention to myths and endless genealogies, which cause disputes, rather than God’s stewardship, which is in faith—
- Romans 9:11-23 (v9) For being not yet born, neither having done anything good or bad, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works,…
- 1 Thessalonians 3:3 (v9) that no one would be moved by these afflictions. For you know that we are appointed to this task.
- 1 Thessalonians 4:10 (v11) for indeed you do it toward all the brothers who are in all Macedonia. But we exhort you, brothers, that you abound more and more;
- Exodus 9:16 (v9) but indeed for this cause I have made you stand: to show you my power, and that my name may be declared throughout all the earth,
- 2 Thessalonians 2:13-14 (v9) But we are bound to always give thanks to God for you, brothers loved by the Lord, because God chose you from the beginning for salvation…
- 1 Timothy 1:16 (v9) However, for this cause I obtained mercy, that in me first, Jesus Christ might display all his patience for an example of those who were…
- Ezekiel 38:10-17 (v9) “ ‘The Lord Yahweh says: “It will happen in that day that things will come into your mind, and you will devise an evil plan. You will say,…
- Matthew 20:28 (v10) even as the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
- Romans 11:7 (v9) What then? That which Israel seeks for, that he didn’t obtain, but the chosen ones obtained it, and the rest were hardened.
- 2 Corinthians 5:15 (v10) He died for all, that those who live should no longer live to themselves, but to him who for their sakes died and rose again.
- Ephesians 5:2 (v10) Walk in love, even as Christ also loved us and gave himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling fragrance.
- 1 Timothy 1:13 (v9) although I used to be a blasphemer, a persecutor, and insolent. However, I obtained mercy, because I did it ignorantly in unbelief.
- 2 Timothy 2:19-20 (v9) However God’s firm foundation stands, having this seal, “The Lord knows those who are his,” and, “Let every one who names the name of the…
- 1 Peter 2:8 (v9) and, “a stumbling stone and a rock of offense.” For they stumble at the word, being disobedient, to which also they were appointed.
- John 15:13 (v10) Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.
- Acts 1:20 (v9) For it is written in the book of Psalms, ‘Let his habitation be made desolate. Let no one dwell in it;’ and, ‘Let another take his office.’
- Acts 1:25 (v9) to take part in this ministry and apostleship from which Judas fell away, that he might go to his own place.”
- Romans 5:6-8 (v10) For while we were yet weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will hardly die for a righteous man. Yet perhaps for a…
- Romans 8:34 (v10) Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, yes rather, who was raised from the dead, who is at the right hand of God, who also makes…
- 2 Corinthians 5:21 (v10) For him who knew no sin he made to be sin on our behalf; so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
- 1 Thessalonians 4:17 (v10) then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air. So we will be with…
- Titus 2:14 (v10) who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify for himself a people for his own possession, zealous for…
- 1 Peter 2:24 (v10) He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live to righteousness. You were healed by his wounds.
- 2 Peter 1:1 (v9) Simon Peter, a servant and apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who have obtained a like precious faith with us in the righteousness of our…
- 2 Peter 2:3 (v9) In covetousness they will exploit you with deceptive words: whose sentence now from of old doesn’t linger, and their destruction will not…
- Jude 1:4 (v9) For there are certain men who crept in secretly, even those who were long ago written about for this condemnation: ungodly men, turning the…
- Matthew 26:24 (v9) The Son of Man goes, even as it is written of him, but woe to that man through whom the Son of Man is betrayed! It would be better for that…
- John 10:11 (v10) I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.
- John 10:15 (v10) even as the Father knows me, and I know the Father. I lay down my life for the sheep.
- John 10:17 (v10) Therefore the Father loves me, because I lay down my life, that I may take it again.
- Romans 11:30 (v9) For as you in time past were disobedient to God, but now have obtained mercy by their disobedience,
- 1 Corinthians 15:3 (v10) For I delivered to you first of all that which I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures,
- 1 Thessalonians 4:13 (v10) But we don’t want you to be ignorant, brothers, concerning those who have fallen asleep, so that you don’t grieve like the rest, who have…
- 1 Timothy 2:6 (v10) who gave himself as a ransom for all, the testimony in its own times,
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this passage (22 sources)
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John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On vv9–11 9 For God hath not appointed us. As he…
9 For God hath not appointed us. As he has spoken of the hope of salvation, he follows out that department, and says that God has appointed us to this — that we may obtain salvation through Christ. The passage, however, might be explained in a simple way in this manner — that we must put on the helmet of salvation, because God wills not that we should perish, but rather that we should be saved. And this, indeed, Paul means, but, in my opinion, he has in view something farther. For as the day of Christ is for the most part regarded with alarm, having it in view to close with the mention of it, he says that we are appointed to salvation
The Greek term περιποίησις means enjoyment, (as they speak,) as well as acquisition. Paul, undoubtedly, does not mean that God has called us, that we may procure salvation for ourselves, but that we may obtain it, as it has been acquired for us by Christ. Paul, however, encourages believers to fight strenuously, setting before them the certainty of victory; for the man who fights timidly and hesitatingly is half-conquered. In these words, therefore, he had it in view to take away the dread which arises from distrust. There cannot, however, be a better assurance of salvation gathered, than from the decree of God. The term wrath, in this passage, as in other instances, is taken to mean the judgment or vengeance of God against the reprobate.
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv9–11 He pricketh us forward by seeing most certain hope…
He pricketh us forward by seeing most certain hope of victory before us.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv9–11 9 For God hath not appointed us to wrath,…
9 For God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ,
Ver. 9. God hath not appointed us] As he hath all drunken beasts, 1Co 4:10. Yet, all those dry drunkards, Isa 28:1, that will not awake (though never so much warned) out of the snare of the devil, &c., 2Ti 2:25.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv9–11 For God hath not appointed us to wrath, but…
For God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation: some expositors make these words an argument to all the duties of holiness mentioned both in this and the foregoing chapters; and it is true, that the knowledge of our being elected, or appointed to salvation, doth not in the elect encourage to sin or sloth, as some affirm, but engage to all holiness: but I had rather restrain the words, and that either to the hope of salvation, mentioned immediately before, and then the sense to be this, we may well hope for salvation seeing God hath appointed us to it; or, to his whole discourse about the coming of Christ, and so they may give the reason why the dead in Christ must rise, and must, with the living saints, meet the Lord in the air, and be for ever with him; yea, and why they need not fear the destruction that will come upon others at that day, and why they should be watchful for its coming, because, saith the apostle: God hath not appointed us to wrath but to obtain salvation, & c. Having spoken of two sorts of persons, the children of the day, and children of the night, and the sudden destruction of the one and salvation of the other at the coming of Christ, he here ascends to the first original of both, which is God’s appointment, which is an act of God’s sovereign will, determining men’s final estates; which seems to be more than mere prescience or foreknowledge, an act of God’s mind, as appears by Rom 8:29; 1Pe 1:2, or more than appointing of the means and way of salvation; but not of persons to be saved, or of persons only materially, as to the number how many, but not formally, or individually, who they are that shall be saved; whereas the apostle writes of some whose names are in the book of life, Phi 4:3, and that from the foundation of the world, Rev 17:8, and chosen before the foundation of the world, Eph 1:4; otherwise, every man’s salvation would depend more upon the uncertainty of man’s will, than the eternal and immutable will of God; whereas whatever God works in man’s salvation, is according to the counsel of his will, Eph 1:11; and God’s counsel is certain, immutable, and eternal, extending not only to actions and means, but persons, Rom 8:29,30. Neither is this appointment of God grounded upon the foresight of man’s faith; for if faith be the gift of God, this gift proceeds from God’s counsel and fore-appointment; else men may say: That I may be saved I must thank God, but that I am saved I must thank myself: and hence there is a possibility for no man to be saved, and all the counsels of God in Christ to be made frustrate. But this is no place for controversy; only where God appoints to salvation, he appoints also to means, and without the means there is no attainment of the end, Eph 1:4; 1Pe 1:2. And the apostle here makes salvation stand opposite to wrath; what before he called destruction, 1Th 5:3, he here calleth wrath, because God’s wrath produceth it, and is manifested in it. And those that are saved are delivered from it; and the supreme reason is, because they were not appointed to it, but to salvation, and none that are appointed to the one are appointed to the other. The vessels of wrath and of mercy are set in an opposite distinction, Rom 9:22,23, and so in the text, to illustrate the mercy of God the more in them that are saved. And whereas the apostle calls it the obtaining of salvation, it implies man’s endeavours for it, though he be appointed of God to it; and speaking positively, not only of himself, but these believing Thessalonians also, he hath appointed us to obtain salvation, doth not this also imply that some good assurance of salvation may be obtained in this world.
By our Lord Jesus Christ; the decrees of salvation are executed in him, and by him; and there is no salvation in any other, Act 4:12. And he saveth not only by his doctrine and example, as some have affirmed, but by his blood as the meritorious, and his Spirit as the efficient, cause of salvation. Whether the infinite wisdom of God could have found out another way I shall not inquire, but this it hath pitched upon, wherein mercy and justice are admirably glorified together, and the highest engagement imaginable laid upon men to love, serve, and honour their Creator. And as the freeness of God’s grace is manifested in his appointing men to salvation, so the exceeding riches of it, in saving them by Jesus Christ. And whereas two things are necessary to it, the reconciling us unto God, and restoring his image in us, the former we have by the merit of his blood, and the latter by the operation of his Spirit; so that we have no ground for that fond opinion, that if men walk honestly and uprightly, they may be saved in any religion.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
William Burkitt 1703 · Public Domain On v9 Observe here, 1. A reason enforcing the apostle’s exhortation…
Observe here, 1. A reason enforcing the apostle’s exhortation to holiness of life, For, or because God has not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by Jesus Christ.
Note here, 1. What a Christian is not appointed to; he is not appointed to wrath.
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2. What he is appointed to, namely, to obtain salvation.
3. The means by whom a Christian doth obtain salvation, and that is by our Lord Jesus Christ.
Learn, hence, that God’s ordination and appointment of us to happiness and salvation, doth not discharge us from care and endeavour after the practice of universal holiness; it is the greatest piece of folly imaginable, from the appointment of the end, to infer the refusal or neglect of the means.
Learn, 2. That our Lord Jesus is the person appointed by God the Father, by whom alone all believers shall obtain salvation.
Learn, 3. That nothing short of the death of Christ was sufficient to purchase salvation for us, we obtain salvation by Jesus Christ, who died for us.
Learn, 4. That the great end designed by Christ in dying for us, was our living to him, in order to our living with him; a life of grace on earth, is our evidence for a life of glory in heaven; whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with him.
Observe lastly, the great and important duty which he exhorts the Thessalonians to perform mutually to each other, and that is, to comfort themselves together with this hope, and to edify and build up one another in faith and holiness; wherefore comfort yourselves together, and edify one another, as also ye do; implying, that as it is the duty, so it ought to be the endeavour of Christians to edify one another, both in their graces, and in their comforts.
William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain On v11 In these words the apostle exhorts the Thessalonians to…
In these words the apostle exhorts the Thessalonians to several duties.
I. Towards those who were nearly related one to another. Such should comfort themselves, or exhort one another, and edify one another, Th1 5:11. 1. They must comfort or exhort themselves and one another; for the original word may be rendered both these ways. And we may observe, As those are most able and likely to comfort others who can comfort themselves, so the way to have comfort ourselves, or to administer comfort to others, is by compliance with the exhortation of the word. Note, We should not only be careful about our own comfort and welfare, but to promote the comfort and welfare of others also. He was a Cain that said, Am I my brother's keeper? We must bear one another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ. 2. They must edify one another, by following after those things whereby one may edify another, Rom 14:19. As Christians are lively stones built up together a spiritual house, they should endeavour to promote the good of the whole church by promoting the work of grace in one another. And it is the duty of every one of us to study that which is for the edification of those with whom we converse, to please all men for their real profit. We should communicate our knowledge and experiences one to another. We should join in prayer and praise one with another. We should set a good example one before another. And it is the duty of those especially who live in the same vicinity and family thus to comfort and edify one another; and this is the best neighbourhood, the best means to answer the end of society. Such as are nearly related together and have affection for one another, as they have the greatest opportunity, so they are under the greatest obligation, to do this kindness one to another. This the Thessalonians did (which also you do), and this is what they are exhorted to continue and increase in doing. Note, Those who do that which is good have need of further exhortations to excite them to do good, to do more good, as well as continue in doing what they do.
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II. He shows them their duty towards their ministers, Th1 5:12, Th1 5:13. Though the apostle himself was driven from them, yet they had others who laboured among them, and to whom they owed these duties. The apostle here exhorts them to observe,
1. How the ministers of the gospel are described by the work of their office; and they should rather mind the work and duty they are called to than affect venerable and honourable names that they may be called by. Their work is very weighty, and very honourable and useful. (1.) Ministers must labour among their people, labour with diligence, and unto weariness (so the word in the original imports); they must labour in the word and doctrine, Ti1 5:17. They are called labourers, and should not be loiterers. They must labour with their people, to instruct, comfort, and edify them. And, (2.) Ministers are to rule their people also, so the word is rendered, Ti1 5:17. They must rule, not with rigour, but with love. They must not exercise dominion as temporal lords; but rule as spiritual guides, by setting a good example to the flock. They are over the people in the Lord, to distinguish them from civil magistrates, and to denote also that they are but ministers under Christ, appointed by him, and must rule the people by Christ's laws, and not by laws of their own. This may also intimate the end of their office and all their labour; namely, the service and honour of the Lord. (3.) They must also admonish the people, and that not only publicly, but privately, as there may be occasion. They must instruct them to do well, and should reprove when they do ill. It is their duty not only to give good counsel, but also to give admonition, to give warning to the flock of the dangers they are liable to, and reprove for negligence or what else may be amiss.
2. What the duty of the people is towards their ministers. There is a mutual duty between ministers and people. If ministers should labour among the people, then, (1.) The people must know them. As the shepherd should know his flock, so the sheep must know their shepherd. They must know his person, hear his voice, acknowledge him for their pastor, and pay due regard to his teaching, ruling, and admonitions. (2.) They must esteem their ministers highly in love; they should greatly value the office of the ministry, honour and love the persons of their ministers, and show their esteem and affection in all proper ways, and this for their work's sake, because their business is to promote the honour of Christ and the welfare of men's souls. Note, Faithful ministers ought to be so far from being lightly esteemed because of their work that they should be highly esteemed on account of it. The work of the ministry is so far from being a disgrace to those who upon other accounts deserve esteem, that it puts an honour upon those who are faithful and diligent, to which otherwise they could lay no claim, and will procure them that esteem and love among good people which otherwise they could not expect.
III. He gives divers other exhortations touching the duty Christians owe to one another. 1. To be at peace among themselves, Th1 5:13. Some understand this exhortation (according to the reading in some copies) as referring to the people's duty to their ministers, to live peaceably with them, and not raise nor promote dissensions at any time between minister and people, which will certainly prove a hindrance to the success of a minister's work and the edification of the people. This is certain, that ministers and people should avoid every thing that tends to alienate their affections one from another. And the people should be at peace among themselves, doing all they can to hinder any differences from rising or continuing among them, and using all proper means to preserve peace and harmony. 2. To warn the unruly, Th1 5:14. There will be in all societies some who walk disorderly, who go out of their rank and station; and it is not only the duty of ministers, but of private Christians also, to warn and admonish them. Such should be reproved for their sin, warned of their danger, and told plainly of the injury they do their own souls, and the hurt they may do to others. Such should be put in mind of what they should do, and be reproved for doing otherwise. 3. To comfort the feebleminded, Th1 5:14. By these are intended the timorous and faint-hearted, or such as are dejected and of a sorrowful spirit. Some are cowardly, afraid of difficulties, and disheartened at the thoughts of hazards, and losses, and afflictions; now such should be encouraged; we should not despise them, but comfort them; and who knows what good a kind and comfortable word may do them? 4. To support the weak, Th1 5:14. Some are not well able to perform their work, nor bear up under their burdens; we should therefore support them, help their infirmities, and lift at one end of the burden, and so help to bear it. It is the grace of God, indeed, that must strengthen and support such; but we should tell them of that grace, and endeavour to minister of that grace to them. 5. To be patient towards all men, Th1 5:14. We must bear and forbear. We must be long-suffering, and suppress our anger, if it begin to rise upon the apprehension of affronts or injuries; at least we must not fail to moderate our anger: and this duty must be exercised towards all men, good and bad, high and low. We must not be high in our expectations and demands, nor harsh in our resentments, nor hard in our impositions, but endeavour to make the best we can of every thing, and think the best we can of every body. 6. Not to render evil for evil to any man, Th1 5:15. This we must look to, and be very careful about, that is, we must by all means forbear to avenge ourselves. If others do us an injury, this will not justify us in returning it, in doing the same, or the like, or any other injury to them. It becomes us to forgive, as those that are, and that hope to be, forgiven of God. 7. Ever to follow that which is good, Th1 5:15. In general, we must study to do what is our duty, and pleasing to God, in all circumstances, whether men do us good turns or ill turns; whatever men do to us, we must do good to others. We must always endeavour to be beneficent and instrumental to promote the welfare of others, both among ourselves (in the first place to those that are of the household o faith), and then, as we have opportunity, unto all men, Gal 6:10.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv9–11 For God hath not appointed us to wrath,.... To…
For God hath not appointed us to wrath,.... To destruction and ruin, the effect of wrath; though there are some that are vessels of wrath, fitted for destruction, of old ordained to condemnation, and who are reserved for the day of evil; but there are others who are equally children of wrath, as deserving of the wrath of God in themselves as others, who are not appointed to it; which is an instance of wonderful and distinguishing grace to them:
but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ; salvation is alone by Christ, he alone has wrought it out; it is in him, and in no other; he was appointed to this work, was called and sent, and came to do it, and has done it; and God's elect, who were chosen in him, are appointed in the counsel and purpose of God, to obtain, possess, and enjoy this salvation; and which, as this appointment may be known, as it was by these Thessalonians; the Gospel having come to them, not in word only, but in power, and in the Holy Ghost, and in much assurance; as it is an encouragement to faith and hope, so it excites to sobriety and watchfulness, and the discharge of every duty. The doctrine of predestination does not lead to despair, but encourages the hope of salvation; and it is no licentious doctrine, for election to salvation by Christ is through sanctification of the Spirit, and unto holiness; and good works are the fruits of it, and are what God has foreordained his people should walk in.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv9–10 God hath not appointed us to wrath - As…
God hath not appointed us to wrath - As he hath the obstinately impenitent.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv9–11 Verse 9. For God hath not appointed us to…
Verse 9. For God hath not appointed us to wrath] So then it appears that some were appointed to wrath, εις οργην, to punishment; on this subject there can be no dispute. But who are they? When did this appointment take place? And for what cause? These are supposed to be "very difficult questions, and such as cannot receive a satisfactory answer; and the whole must be referred to the sovereignty of God." If we look carefully at the apostle's words, we shall find all these difficulties vanish. It is very obvious that, in the preceding verses, the apostle refers simply to the destruction of the Jewish polity, and to the terrible judgments which were about to fall on the Jews as a nation; therefore, they are the people who were appointed to wrath; and they were thus appointed, not from eternity, nor from any indefinite or remote time, but from that time in which they utterly rejected the offers of salvation made to them by Jesus Christ and his apostles; the privileges of their election were still continued to them, even after they had crucified the Lord of glory; for, when he gave commandment to his disciples to go into all the world, and preach the Gospel to every creature, he bade them begin at Jerusalem. They did so, and continued to offer salvation to them, till at last, being everywhere persecuted, and the whole nation appearing with one consent to reject the Gospel, the kingdom of God was wholly taken away from them, and the apostles turned to the Gentiles. Then God appointed them to wrath; and the cause of that appointment was their final and determined rejection of Christ and his Gospel. But even this appointment to wrath does not signify eternal damnation; nothing of the kind is intended in the word. Though we are sure that those who die in their sins can never see God, yet it is possible that many of those wretched Jews, during their calamities, and especially during the siege of their city, did turn unto the Lord who smote them, and found that salvation which he never denies to the sincere penitent.
When the Jews were rejected, and appointed to wrath, then the Gentiles were elected, and appointed to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ, whose Gospel they gladly received, and continue to prize; while the remnant of the Jews continue, in all places of their dispersion, the same irreconcilable and blasphemous opponents of the Gospel of Christ. On these accounts the election of the Gentiles and the reprobation of the Jews still continue.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv9–11 For God hath not appointed us to wrath -…
For God hath not appointed us to wrath - This is designed as an encouragement to effort to secure our salvation. The wish of God is to save us, and therefore we should watch and be sober; we should take to ourselves the whole of the Christian armor, and strive for victory. If he had appointed us to wrath, effort would have been in vain, for we could do nothing but yield to our inevitable destiny. The hope of a final triumph should animate us in our efforts, and cheer us in our struggles with our foes. How much does the hope of victory animate the soldier in battle! When morally certain of success, how his arm is nerved! When everything conspires to favor him, and when he seems to feel that God fights for him, and intends to give him the victory, how his heart exults, and how strong is he in battle! Hence, it was a great point among the ancients, when about entering into battle, to secure evidence that the gods favored them, and meant to give them the victory.
For this purpose they offered sacrifices, and consulted the flight of birds and the entrails of animals; and for this armies were accompanied by soothsayers and priests, that they might interpret any signs which might occur that would be favorable, or to propitiate the favor of the gods by sacrifice. See Homer, passim; Arrian’s Expedition of Alexander, and the classic writers generally. The apostle alludes to something of this kind here. He would excite us to maintain the Christian warfare manfully, by the assurance that God intends that we shall be triumphant. This we are to learn by no conjectures of soothsayers; by no observation of the flight of birds; by no sacrifice which we can make to propitiate his favor, but by the unerring assurance of his holy word. If we are Christians, we know that he intends our salvation, and that victory will be ours; if we are willing to become Christians, we know that the Almighty arm will be stretched out to aid us, and that the “gates of hell” cannot prevent it.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On v10 Whether we wake or sleep. That is, whether we…
Whether we wake or sleep. That is, whether we be of the number of those whom Jesus Christ shall find still upon earth, when he shall come to judgment, or among those who have slept and returned to dust, it is his will that we should be his. (Theodoret)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv9–11 For--assigning the ground of our "hopes" (Th1 5:8).
For--assigning the ground of our "hopes" (Th1 5:8).
appointed us--Translate, "set" (Act 13:47), in His everlasting purpose of love (Th1 3:3; Ti2 1:9). Contrast Rom 9:22; Jde 1:4.
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to--that is, unto wrath.
to obtain--Greek, "to the acquisition of salvation"; said, according to BENGEL, Of One saved out of a general wreck, when all things else have been lost: so of the elect saved out of the multitude of the lost (Th2 2:13-14). The fact of God's "appointment" of His grace "through Jesus Christ" (Eph 1:5), takes away the notion of our being able to "acquire" salvation of ourselves. Christ "acquired (so the Greek for 'purchased') the Church (and its salvation) with His own blood" (Act 20:28); each member is said to be appointed by God to the "acquiring of salvation." In the primary sense, God does the work; in the secondary sense, man does it.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv9–11 9. For—Giving a reason for this hope of salvation.
9. For—Giving a reason for this hope of salvation.
Not appointed us— Who wait, and watch, and war, in hope of his glorious coming.
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To wrath—Which waits the unwatching unbeliever.
Salvation—From destruction at the advent.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv9–11 9. For God hath not appointed us to wrath]…
9. For God hath not appointed us to wrath] In the strict order of the words, appointed us not unto wrath, but (to something very different) unto the obtaining of salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ.
“Obtaining” is securing, making a thing absolutely one’s own,—as in 2Th_2:14 (see note), “the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.” In Heb_10:39 the same word is rendered “saving of the soul;” in Eph_1:14 it signifies, passively used, a sure possession. In all these instances it points beyond the present attainment of salvation, still subject to trial and hazard, to the full realisation thereof, which is the object of the Christian’s hope (1Th_5:8), as it is the end of God’s designs for him.
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“Salvation,” in St Paul and in the N. T. generally, includes the whole of the benefits and blessings of the Gospel, the entire new life and well-being that it brings, both to the individual man and to the world; but it is referred more specifically to two essential elements, or moments, in the great process of renewal—(1) that spoken of in Luk_1:77 as “knowledge of salvation … in remission of sins,” and (2) to man’s deliverance from the grave and entrance on the risen life of the future world,—“salvation that is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory” (2Ti_2:10). In the word redemption this double reference is even more conspicuous: see, e.g., Eph_1:7; Eph_1:14. To this ultimate “salvation” the Apostle directs his readers’ thoughts and hopes.
“Appointed” reminds us of “election” (ch. 1Th_1:4, see note); it implies the authority with which God called the Thessalonians to salvation (comp. ch. 1Th_2:12), as well as the fact of His gracious intention respecting them. Comp. 1Ti_1:12, “appointing me to service,” and ch. 1Th_3:3 above. In 2Th_2:13-14 (see notes) this Divine appointment of grace is more fully set forth.
For the negative side of God’s purpose—not unto anger—see notes on wrath in ch. 1Th_1:10; 1Th_2:16; 2Th_1:8-9. With the thought of Christ’s second coming, so constantly present to St Paul’s mind at this time (see Introd. pp. 18–21), there were present also the issues of the Last Judgement and its solemn contrast—the glorious “salvation” then to be attained by the sons of God, and the final and awful manifestation of His “anger” against the wicked. Similarly “the day of the Lord” is seen in Rom_2:5 as a “day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgement of God;” and in this light, wrath and future salvation are contrasted in Rom_5:9-10, just as they are here. There also, as in this passage, Christ’s death (see 1Th_5:10) is set forth as our ground of hope in this prospect; through “His blood” we are brought from the sense and fear of God’s anger into His favour, and entitled to expect that eternal redemption will be ours.
It was the conviction that such is God’s purpose and will respecting those who believe in Christ that made St Paul’s “helmet of salvation so strong, and gave it all its splendour. Read Rom_8:31-39 as a commentary on this saying.
On the fall title “our Lord Jesus Christ” see note to ch. 1Th_1:3.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv9–11 (9) For.—This is not the reason for being watchful,…
(9) For.—This is not the reason for being watchful, but for being hopeful of salvation. The image of the soldier is abandoned’ as suddenly as it was introduced.
Hath not appointed.—Rather, did not appoint, referring to some mysterious moment of God’s eternal counsels, when He fixed His predestination of us—whether the moment of creative thought, or of sending the gospel to us. The “wrath” is that which is to come upon the “children of wrath” at the Second Advent, as in 1Th_1:10; 1Th_2:16. (Comp. 1Pe_2:8.) We may well be confident then, for we ourselves are the only persons that can defeat God’s predestinations.
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To obtain salvation.—More than “obtain;” the Greek means “acquire” by one’s own efforts;” earn and make our own;” being the same word as is used in 1Ti_3:13 and Act_20:28 in the verb; and in the substantive in Eph_1:14 (where it is translated “purchased possession”); 2Th_2:14; Heb_10:39 (translated “saving”); and 1Pe_2:9, where see Note. It will be seen that God does not predestinate men to “salvation” without laborious acquisition on their part, but predestinates them to occupy a position in which they will be able to “work out their own salvation” by placing them “under grace” in the Church. The very same word is used of the Christian’s way of securing salvation, and of Christ’s way of securing it for him (see references); both are “purchasing,” “earning.” But mark that the Christian can only so purchase salvation “through our Lord Jesus Christ:” apart from Him a man can do nothing to redeem himself, but through union with Him the believer can pay the whole price of his salvation (see e.g. Joh_15:5);
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv9–11 For. Not a new reason for watchfulness and sobriety,…
For. Not a new reason for watchfulness and sobriety, but referring to "the hope of salvation," why we may with confidence put on such a hope as a helmet. God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain or, to the acquisition ofsalvation by or, through our Lord Jesus Christ. Not through the doctrine of Christ, nor even through faith in Christ, but through the Lord Jesus Christ himself, through what he has done for us, and especially through his atoning death. The appointment of God"s grace is here mentioned as the efficient cause of our salvation; and the Lord Jesus Christ, as the Mediator through whom salvation is bestowed.
Vers. 9-11.
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The source, channel, and end of the salvation hoped for.
The apostle is now led to illustrate the hope of salvation.
I ITS SOURCE. "For God did not appoint us to wrath, but to the obtaining of salvation.
1. The calling is according to the purpose. "Whom he predestinates, them he also calls." The security of the believer depends, not upon himself, but upon God"s unchangeable and loving purpose.
2. The purpose is not to wrath, but to salvation. Though believers were once of wrath," they are now reconciled to God, and saved from wrath to come.
3. Gods purpose of mercy toward us does not free us from the necessity of being watchful concerning the means of salvation.
II THE CHANNEL OF SALVATION. "By our Lord Jesus Christ.
1. The covenant was ordained in the hand of a mediator. ". (Gal_3:19)
2. His death, not his doctrine or example merely, was necessary to our salvation. "Who died for us.
3. His death was substitutionary. It was "for us.
III THE END OF THIS SALVATION. "Who died for us, that, whether we wake or sleep, we should live with him together." This was "the joy set before him" for which "he endured the cross". (Heb_12:2) that we might live to him in order to our living with him.
1. It is life with Christ. Not merely life in him, but life with him in glory. "I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is far better". (Php_1:23) It is the greatest joy and glory of heaven. (Rom_14:8, Rom_14:9; 1Co_5:9)
2. It is life with all believers. They are to live with him, unsevered from one another; for whether they "are alive and remain," or whether they are of those who "have fallen asleep," they will be together, in Christ"s society. Thus the great salvation is the "common salvation.
IV THE CONSOLATORY ASPECT OF THESE TRUTHS. "Wherefore comfort yourselves together, and edify one another, even as also ye do. " These truths afforded a grand basis for mutual comfort and edification. The Thessalonians ought, therefore, to dismiss their despondency and alarm, and encourage each other with the blessed hopes of the gospel. T.C.
Vers. 9, 10.
The Divine appointment of Christians.
To some it may seem superfluous that a Christian apostle, writing to the members of a Christian Church, should say, "God appointed us not unto wrath." But the import of this declaration is made apparent by what precedes. St. Paul has been contrasting the condition of the sons of light with that of the children of darkness. Among the latter are to be found all degrees of that conduct which bides under the cloak of night from the carelessness that sleeps, down to the debauchery that is awake only to cause its own shame. Such things must bring wrath in "the day of the Lord" (ver. 2). But Christians are called to quite another life. They are not destined to wrath. Let them, therefore, not behave as the sons of the night, but in a way that is worthy of their call to salvation, with sobriety and confidence, strong in faith and love, and rejoicing in hope (ver. 8).
I THE DIVINE APPOINTMENT TO SALVATION.
1. It springs from an august Source. God appoints to salvation. He has a hand in our destinies. We are not left to discover a way of escape from ruin for ourselves. God has interfered for our deliverance.
2. It is determined by a firm ordinance. God "appointed." This word signifies prevision, arrangement, definite order. Redemption is not an irregular makeshift brought about by a hasty after-thought. It enters into the calm, eternal thoughts of God, and takes its place in the orderly disposition of the Divine government.
3. It aims at securing a large result. When God makes bare his arm and settles a solemn appointment, this must be for some adequate result. The object must be large to justify so large an action. Here it is nothing less than perfect deliverance from the ruin of sin. Salvation is not a technical phrase. It is too big a word to be defined by a theological sentence. It is deliverance all round from root and fruit of evil, from wrath of justice, from penalty of law, from tyranny of Satan, from vice of heart, from judgment without, from corruption within.
4. It is to be personally accepted. We are appointed to "the obtaining of salvation;" for
(1) though ordained by God, it is not enjoyed by us until we have personal experience of it;
(2) this personal acceptance depends on our own will and act;
(3) the full consequences of the Divine ordinance of salvation are still future.
II THE METHOD OF ACCOMPLISHING THIS DIVINE APPOINTMENT.
1. It is secured by the mediation of our Lord Jesus Christ. Thus it is to be obtained "through" him, which means
(1) that the salvation itself is brought about by the action of Christ; and
(2) that it becomes ours when we are united to Christ.
Now each of these points has its own distinct position in the great work. Too often they are confused together. It is not necessary for us to comprehend all that Christ does. Our part is to see that we are united to him. He will do his part whether we understand it or not.
2. It involved the death of Christ for us. So much we know as a fact, whatever theory we may have as to the bearings of the crucifixion upon the process of redemption. And it is the great fact which is of supreme importance to us. It is unfortunate that abstract propositions concerning the theological aspects of it should confuse our vision of the simple, touching statement, "He died for us.
III THE END FOR WHICH THIS DIVINE APPOINTMENT IS MADE.
1. This is flint we may live in fellowship with Christ. Strictly speaking, the fellowship with Christ is given as the object of the suffering of death by Christ. But the earlier part of the passage shows us the Divine appointment of salvation as secured through Christ. Putting the two together, we see that salvation is worthless without the life in Christ, as well as that salvation is only possible to those who are in fellowship with Christ. Salvation is in itself a negative term. Bare deliverance is of little use unless some good is to be made of the liberty and immunity. While a fellow-creature is being saved from death by drowning we follow the process with intense interest; but after his deliverance we may not feel much concern with his future career. It may be that he will make but a poor use of his restored life. If we finished the story we might find the issue to be a pitiable anti-climax. God is guarding his great appointment from a similar catastrophe. They who are saved live in fellowship with Christ. Such a life is worth securing at the greatest cost.
2. This fellowship with Christ is independent of the greatest outward changes. It remains whether we wake or sleep, i.e. whether we live or die. W.F.A.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv9, 11 For God hath not appointed us unto wrath
1Th_5:9-10
For God hath not appointed us unto wrath
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Gods everlasting purpose
I.
Gods purpose is--
1. That we should not be lost. We all deserve wrath. All have sinned, and every sin the Divine indignation will avenge. The longer we live in sin, therefore, the greater the amount of wrath our iniquities are treasuring up. And yet, although we are daily provoking the Divine anger, God has not appointed us to wrath. He willeth not the death of a sinner.
2. That we should be saved. The kingdom He has prepared from the foundation of the world.
(1) This should comfort us in trial. Gods purpose none can frustrate. Fear not, little flock, etc.
(2) Dont distress yourselves about election. God has told you that His will is that all men should be saved , and, therefore, if any one perishes, it is not because of Gods secret purpose, but His own want of inclination. Ye will not come.
II. Its accomplishment.
1. There is only one way in which Gods purpose can be effected: By our Lord Jesus Christ. Neither is there salvation in any other. The grand subject of Christianity is Christ; and those who do not make Christ all in all are like those Jewish builders who refused the headstone of the corner, or like the foolish man who built on the sand.
2. In what respect salvation is through Jesus Christ is plainly told us: Who died for us. Christs death rescues us from wrath. That which our sins provoked was borne by Christ.
3. How sad the mistake of those who think little or nothing of Christs atonement, on which hinges our salvation. He that believeth, and he only, shall be saved.
III. Its effects.
1. Life with Christ on earth. Whether we wake. To me to live is Christ. To this end Christ was called Emmanuel. This life is in union with Christ. Wherever you go, Christ goes. He never leaves or forsakes you.
2. Life with Christ in heaven. Our bodies sleep, but not our souls. Absent from the body, etc. This day shalt thou be with Me in paradise. This association will be--
(1) More intimate than that on earth.
(2) More blessed.
(3) More enduring.
Conclusion: We hence perceive--
1. The nature of our present existence. If we are Christians, this life is only the porch to a better; if not, a porch to a worse.
2. The readiness of God to save. He willeth not the death of a sinner. (C. Clayton, M. A.)
Called to salvation
God is pleased to day to put up before your eyes the white flag of mercy, calling you to come to Jesus and live. But recollect, if you do not yield to it, He will put up the red flag of threatening, and then the black flag of execution will not be far off. Perhaps some of you have been suffering under bodily disease--take that as a warning. When our vessels of war would stop a suspicious vessel, they fire a shot athwart her bows as a warning. If she does not haul to, perhaps they give another; and if no notice is taken of this, the gunners go to their business in real earnest, and woe to the offender. Your affliction is the gospels warning gun. Pause awhile, I beseech you; ask the Lord in mercy to look upon you, that you may be saved! As I think upon some of you here who are not saved, I feel some thing like the boy I read of yesterday in the newspapers: Last week there were two lads on the great rocks of Lundy Island, in the Bristol Channel, looking for seagulls eggs; one of them went far down the cliff, and lost his footing, and when his brother, hearing a faint voice, looked down, he saw him clinging to a jutting crag, and striving in vain to find a place for his feet. There stood the anxious brother, alarmed and paralyzed with dread, quite unable to help the younger one in so much peril below, who soon relaxed his hold and was dashed to pieces far beneath. I feel somewhat like that alarmed brother, only there is this happy difference: I can hope for you, and bid you hope for yourselves. You are clinging now, perhaps, to some false hope, and striving to find a rest where rest is not to be found; but the strong-winged Angel of the everlasting gospel is just underneath you this morning, crying, Drop now; simply, drop into My arms; I will take you and bear you aloft in safety. That Angel as the Angel of the Covenant, the Lord Jesus Christ. You must be dashed to pieces forever unless you rest in Him; but cast yourself upon Him, I pray you, and then, as you are carried in safety far off from every fear, you will magnify the grace of God and extol the glorious gospel. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Who died for us that whether we wake or sleep. More exactly watch. So popular a motto of early Christian life--caught as it was from the lips of Christ (Mar_13:34-37)--that it took the form of a name--Gregory. It has been said that there are three sleeps for man--those of nature, sin, and death; and three corresponding awakenings--those of nature, righteousness, and life eternal. It is of the second that Paul speaks here. Salvation is through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us for this purpose, in order that, whether we keep lifes long toilful watch, or fall asleep in what is called death, we should have our true life together with Him. (Bp. Alexander.)
Salvation
I. It is life We shall live. This is the common Scripture designation of all we include in Spiritual and eternal life. All that is opposed to death; the holy, happy, and immortal existence of the whole man, soul and body.
II. Life with Christ. Association or communion. Companionship with Christ.
2. Participation of His life, its power, holiness, blessedness, glory.
III. The life of all. We shall all--all the redeemed, all those dear to us who belong to Christ, all in every age and nation who love Him, are to be made the subjects of this life. (C. Hodge, D. D.)
Assured salvation through Christ
The Thessalonians had groundless fears for their departed friends (1Th_4:13).
I. Gods purpose.
1. We are not appointed to wrath.
2. We are appointed to salvation.
3. We are appointed to salvation obtainable by our Lord Jesus Christ.
II. Nothing can frustrate this purpose.
1. Because Christ has died for us. A continent of truth is spread out in this one fact.
III. Our salvation is assured to us.
1. In this present existence--whether we wake.
2. In death--or sleep. Salvation has two parts--that which is present, or the state of grace; and that which is future, or the state of glory.
IV. We are united to Christ, and our life is joined to His life; and thus, whether we live or die, we are the Lords. It should be noticed, however, that the glory and chief hope of the Church are not to be realized at death (of the individual), but at the Lords coming: one is not to anticipate the other, but all are to be glorified together at Christs coming (1Th_4:14-17; Col_3:4; Heb_11:40). Death affects the mere individual, but the coming of Christ, the whole Church. At death our souls are invisibly and individually with the Lord; at Christs coming, the whole church, with all its members, in body and soul, shall be visibly and collectively with Him.
V. Here is an enduring basis for hope and comfort.
1. Salvation is sure--as sure as Omnipotence can make it in view of Christs death.
2. Salvation will be complete. The body shall be raised in im mortal strength and beauty, and the soul shall be sinless and happy in the service of God.
3. Grief over the dead is natural (Joh_11:31-35; Php_2:27); but, with the hope of resurrection and recognition hereafter, it should be moderated.
4. In all this we perceive the immense benefits revelation and grace have conferred upon us.
(1) In contrast with heathenism. The Greeks believed in the immortality of the soul, but knew nothing about the resurrection of the body. Their dead were called shades. Even the Egyptians did not believe in the resurrection of the body, unless the return of the spirit, as it was believed, to inhabit the mummified body, can be called a resurrection.
(2) As culminating in the Gospel. The Old Testament presented the two doctrines as counterparts to each other--the immortality of the soul and the resurrection of the body. But these two doctrines were not so clearly understood in the Old Testament times as in the New. That they were revealed is evident from such passages as relate to Enoch and Elijah, the raising of the dead, and from Psa_16:9; Psa_16:11; Psa_17:15; Psa_73:24; Pro_14:32; Isa_38:18-19, etc. These doctrines were made illustrious by the death, resurrection, and ascension of the Lord Jesus Christ, and by explicit statements in the New Testament. Hence, in its clearer light, there is more of hope, joy, and comfort than was possible before the coming of Christ. He is the first fruits of them that slept. (L. O. Thompson.)
Christs desire for His peoples company
How all-inclusive the passage is! The whole of that grand purpose for which the Bible was written is contained in these few lines. What have you not in this verse? You have Christ, His death, His substitutionary work, His resurrection, the fact of His present life, the assurance of His return, the saints salvation, the saints eternal glory. This text is also a window through which we look into the heart of Christ, and behold the Saviours great desire that all His people should live together with Him.
I. Loves desire. That we should live together with Him.
1. Viewed from one stand point, this is only natural. Grant love, and you are necessarily compelled to grant something else--desire for the presence of the object beloved. I cannot imagine it possible for the two ever to be separated. Love is always restless until the object of affection is close by. In proportion as the love is pure and intense, so will the delight in the nearness of the object become intensified; and Christ finds His greatest happiness in having His people near Him. Have you joy in communion? He joys more. As you look up to Him, do you feel constrained to sing? He, too, when He looks down on you, feels that He must sing; for the Lord thy God in the midst of thee is mighty: He will joy over thee with singing.
2. And yet it is very marvellous.
(1) Where did the love spring from? Why did He love me at all? Has any friend on earth treated any of us half so ill as we have treated Christ? And yet His choicest desire is that we shall live together with Him. Is it not strange that, though there are some people who would not care to have you in their house, yet Christ wants to have you in His home?
(2) Mysterious? More so still when I call to mind the fact that I do not like to live with myself. Self is my plague. And yet how strange that, though I want to get away from self, Christ wants me to go and live with Him.
3. How all-inclusive the desire is. It is that we should not only live with Him, but together with Him. What is that?
(1) Take it as including all His people, and then it teaches us that Christ is not content for one to be absent. He wants to see all the members of His family brought round the table. Is it not always so when there is love to all? What is the bliss of heaven? All His people together. Fathers united once more to the children who went before, husbands reunited with wives, friends with friends--all together; and then all together with Him. To Christs eye that is the most beautiful picture that heaven itself can present--Christ and all His numerous family, without an absentee.
(2) Or does together apply to Christ? And, if so, there is a beautiful thought in it. You may live in the same house with a person, and yet not live together. Together implies a certain amount of intimacy. When Christ brings His people together He brings them to a home. He does not merely collect a multitude of people. No; in heaven there will be holy familiarity.
II. Loves method to obtain its desire. Christs was most costly. Greater love hath no man than this, etc. If you would measure Christs love, you can only do so by the Cross. Here is the explanation of Calvary. If you say that Christ died in order to satisfy Divine justice, to make an atonement for sin, to deliver from hell--all that is true. But now put it in a more beautiful way: that I might live together with Him who died not on a soft bed, but hanging on hard timber; not with loving friends around, but a hooting crowd; not with death lit up by His Fathers smile, but crying, Eloi, etc., out on a felons hill. And He died in my place. If He had not, I must. Now there is no room for doubt. If, when you were a sinner, Jesus loved you enough to die for you, do you not think that now you are one of His friends, He will love you enough to bring you home?
III. The only conditions that can satisfy Christs desire. Christ is not going to be disappointed. Any way, whether we wake or sleep, He means that we shall be with Him. What is intended by these words?
1. Take them literally. Sleeping or waking, conscious or unconscious, the saint and the Saviour are never far apart.
2. Awake or asleep means living or dying. Christ will have our company living. Christ would not be satisfied merely to have our company in the glory. He wants it down here. His delight is to commune here with His ransomed ones. And suppose we fall asleep in death. Death is but the Lords black chariot that He sends to bring His darlings home. The billow of death never washed a soul from the Saviours arms. It washes the soul from a thousand other hands that try to retain it, but it only sweeps the spirit away to its eternal home.
3. The chief meaning is that, whether by resurrection or translation, we shall be with Him (1Th_4:16). Then there are some who will fall asleep in death, and there are others who will be alive and awake at Christs coming. Will He be satisfied only to have one of the companies with Him.? No; He died for us that, whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with Him. We shall pass either through the portals of death, or over them as did Elijah; but, either way, the goal reached will be the same. (A. G. Brown.)
Oneness with Christ
A well built stone gets to be one with the foundation. In the old Roman walls the mortar seems to be as hard as the stones, and the whole is like one piece; you must blow it to atoms before you can get the wall away. So is it with the true believer; he rests upon his Lord till he grows up into Him, till he is one with Jesus by a living union, so that you scarce know where the foundation ends and where the upbuilding begins; for the believer becometh all in Christ, even as Christ is all in all to him. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
B. W. Johnson 1891 · Public Domain On vv9–11 9. God hath not appointed us to wrath. Hence…
9. God hath not appointed us to wrath. Hence it is our privilege to hope for salvation through Christ.
B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain On vv10–11 1 Thessalonians
1 Thessalonians
WAKING AND SLEEPING
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1Th 5:10.
In these words the Apostle concludes a section of this, his earliest letter, in which he has been dealing with the aspect of death in reference to the Christian. There are two very significant usages of language in the context which serve to elucidate the meaning of the words of our text, and to which I refer for a moment by way of introduction.
The one is that throughout this portion of his letter the Apostle emphatically reserves the word ‘died’ for Jesus Christ, and applies to Christ’s followers only the word ‘sleep.’ Christ’s death makes the deaths of those who trust Him a quiet slumber. The other is that the antithesis of waking and sleep is employed in two different directions in this section, being first used to express, by the one term, simply physical life, and by the other, physical death; and secondly, to designate respectively the moral attitude of Christian watchfulness and that of worldly apathy to things unseen and drowsy engrossment with the present.
So in the words immediately preceding my text, we read, ‘let us not sleep, as do others, but let us watch and be sober.’ The use of the antithesis in our text is chiefly the former, but there cannot be discharged from one of the expressions, ‘wake,’ the ideas which have just been associated with it, especially as the word which is translated ‘wake’ is the same as that just translated in the sixth verse, ‘let us watch.’ So that here there is meant by it, not merely the condition of life but that of Christian life--sober-minded vigilance and wide-awakeness to the realities of being. With this explanation of the meanings of the words before us, we may now proceed to consider them a little more minutely.
I. Note the death which is the foundation of life.
Recalling what I have said as to the precision and carefulness with which the Apostle varies his expressions in this context; speaking of Christ’s death only by that grim name, and of the death of His servants as being merely a slumber, we have for the first thought suggested in reference to Christ’s death, that it exhausted all the bitterness of death. Physically, the sufferings of our Lord were not greater, they were even less, than that of many a man. His voluntary acceptance of them was peculiar to Himself. But His death stands alone in this, that on His head was concentrated the whole awfulness of the thing. So far as the mere external facts go, there is nothing special about it. But I know not how the shrinking of Jesus Christ from the Cross can be explained without impugning His character, unless we see in His death something far more terrible than is the common lot of men. To me Gethsemane is altogether mysterious, and that scene beneath the olives shatters to pieces the perfectness of His character, unless we recognise that there it was the burden of the world’s sin, beneath which, though His will never faltered, His human power tottered. Except we understand that, it seems to me that many who derived from Jesus Christ all their courage, bore their martyrdom better than He did; and that the servant has many a time been greater than his Lord. But if we take the Scripture point of view, and say, ‘The Lord has made to meet upon Him the iniquity of us all,’ then we can understand the agony beneath the olives, and the cry from the Cross, ‘Why hast Thou forsaken Me?’
Further, I would notice that this death is by the Apostle set forth as being the main factor in man’s redemption. This is the first of Paul’s letters, dating long before the others with which we are familiar. Whatever may have been the spiritual development of St. Paul in certain directions after his conversion--and I do not for a moment deny that there was such--it is very important to notice that the fundamentals of his Christology and doctrine of salvation were the same from the beginning to the end, and that in this, his first utterance, he lays down, as emphatically and clearly as ever afterwards he did, the great truth that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who died on the Cross, thereby secured man’s redemption. Here he isolates the death from the rest of the history of Christ, and concentrates the whole light of his thought upon the Cross, and says, There! that is the power by which men have been redeemed. I beseech you to ask yourselves whether these representations of Christian truth adhere to the perspective of Scripture, which do not in like manner set forth in the foreground of the whole the atoning death of Jesus Christ our Lord.
Then note, further, that this death, the fountain of life, is a death for us. Now I know, of course, that the language here does not necessarily involve the idea of one dying instead of, but only of one dying on behalf of, another. But then I come to this question, In what conceivable sense, except the sense of bearing the world’s sins, and, therefore, mine, is the death of Jesus Christ of advantage to me? Take the Scripture narratives. He died by the condemnation of the Jewish courts as a blasphemer; by the condemnation of the supercilious Roman court--cowardly in the midst of its superciliousness--as a possible rebel, though the sentencer did not believe in the reality of the charges. I want to know what good that is to me? He died, say some people, as the victim of a clearer insight and a more loving heart than the men around Him could understand. What advantage is that to me?
Oh, brethren! there is no meaning in the words ‘He died for us’ unless we understand that the benefit of His death lies in the fact that it was the sacrifice and satisfaction for the sins of the whole world; and that, therefore, He died for us.
But then remember, too, that in this expression is set forth, not only the objective fact of Christ’s death for us, but much in reference to the subjective emotions and purposes of Him who died. Paul was writing to these Thessalonians, of whom none, I suppose, except possibly a few Jews who might be amongst them, had ever seen Jesus Christ in the flesh, or known anything about Him. And yet he says to them, ‘Away across the ocean there, Jesus Christ died for you men, not one of whom had ever appealed to His heart through His eyes.’
The principle involved is capable of the widest possible expansion. When Christ went to the Cross there was in His heart, in His purposes, in His desires, a separate place for every soul of man whom He embraced, not with the dim vision of some philanthropist, who looks upon the masses of unborn generations as possibly beneficially affected by some of his far-reaching plans, but with the individualising and separating knowledge of a divine eye, and the love of a divine heart. Jesus Christ bore the sins of the world because He bore in His sympathies and His purposes the sins of each single soul. Yours and mine and all our fellows’ were there. Guilt and fear and loneliness, and all the other evils that beset men because they have departed from the living God, are floated away
‘By the water and the blood From Thy wounded side which flowed’;
and as the context teaches us, it is because He died for us that He is our Lord, and because He died for every man that He is every man’s Master and King.
II. Note, secondly, the transformation of our lives and deaths affected thereby.
You may remember that, in my introductory remarks, I pointed out the double application of that antithesis of waking or sleeping in the context as referring in one case to the fact of physical life or death, and in the other to the fact of moral engrossment with the slumbering influences of the present, or of Christian vigilance. I carry some allusion to both of these ideas in the remarks that I have to make.
Through Jesus Christ life may be quickened into watchfulness. It is not enough to take waking as meaning living, for you may turn the metaphor round and say about a great many men that living means dreamy sleeping. Paul speaks in the preceding verses of ‘others’ than Christians as being asleep, and their lives as one long debauch and slumber in the night. Whilst, in contrast with physical death, physical life may be called ‘waking’; the condition of thousands of men, in regard to all the higher faculties, activities, and realities of being, is that of somnambulists--they are walking indeed, but they are walking in their sleep. Just as a man fast asleep knows nothing of the realities round him; just as he is swallowed up in his own dreams, so many walk in a vain show. Their highest faculties are dormant; the only real things do not touch them, and their eyes are closed to these. They live in a region of illusions which will pass away at cock-crowing, and leave them desolate. For some of us here living is only a distempered sleep, troubled by dreams which, whether they be pleasant or bitter, equally lack roots in the permanent realities to which we shall wake some day. But if we hold by Jesus Christ, who died for us, and let His love constrain us, His Cross quicken us, and the might of His great sacrifice touch us, and the blood of sprinkling be applied to our eyeballs as an eye-salve, that we may see, we shall wake from our opiate sleep--though it may be as deep as if the sky rained soporifics upon us--and be conscious of the things that are, and have our dormant faculties roused, and be quickened into intense vigilance against our enemies, and brace ourselves for our tasks, and be ever looking forward to that joyful hope, to that coming which shall bring the fulness of waking and of life. So, you professing Christians, do you take the lessons of this text? A sleeping Christian is on the high road to cease to be a Christian at all. If there be one thing more comprehensively imperative upon us than another, it is this, that, belonging, as we do by our very profession, to the day, and being the children of the light, we shall neither sleep nor be drunken, but be sober, watching as they who expect their Lord. You walk amidst realities that will hide themselves unless you gaze for them; therefore, watch. You walk amidst enemies that will steal subtly upon you, like some gliding serpent through the grass, or some painted savage in the forest; therefore, watch. You expect a Lord to come from heaven with a relieving army that is to raise the siege and free the hard-beset garrison from its fears and its toilsome work; therefore, watch. ‘They that sleep, sleep in the night.’ They who are Christ’s should be like the living creatures in the Revelation, all eyes round about, and every eye gazing on things unseen and looking for the Master when He comes.
On the other hand, the death of Christ will soften our deaths into slumber. The Apostle will not call what the senses call death, by that dread name, which was warranted when applied to the facts of Christ’s death. The physical fact remaining the same, all that is included under the complex whole called death which makes its terrors, goes, for a man who keeps fast hold of Christ who died and lives. For what makes the sting of death? Two or three things. It is like some poisonous insect’s sting, it is a complex weapon. One side of it is the fear of retribution. Another side of it is the shrinking from loneliness. Another side of it is the dread of the dim darkness of an unknown future. And all these are taken clean away. Is it guilt, dread of retribution? ‘Thou shalt answer, Lord, for me.’ Is it loneliness? In the valley of darkness ‘I will be with thee. My rod and My staff will comfort thee.’ Is it a shrinking from the dim unknown and all the familiar habitudes and occupations of the warm corner where we have lived? ‘Jesus Christ has brought immortality to light by the Gospel.’ We do not , according to the sad words of one of the victims of modern advanced thought, pass by the common road into the great darkness, but by the Christ-made living Way into the everlasting light. And so it is a misnomer to apply the same term to the physical fact plus the accompaniment of dread and shrinking and fear of retribution and solitude and darkness, and to the physical fact invested with the direct and bright opposites of all these.
Sleep is rest; sleep is consciousness; sleep is the prophecy of waking. We know not what the condition of those who sleep in Jesus may be, but we know that the child on its mother’s breast, and conscious somehow, in its slumber, of the warm place where its head rests, is full of repose. And they that sleep in Jesus will be so . Then, whether we wake or sleep does not seem to matter so very much.
III. The united life of all who live with Christ.
Christ’s gift to men is the gift of life in all senses of that word, from the lowest to the highest. That life, as our text tells us, is altogether unaffected by death. We cannot see round the sharp angle where the valley turns, but we know that the path runs straight on through the gorge up to the throat of the pass--and so on to the ‘shining table-lands whereof our God Himself is Sun and Moon.’ There are some rivers that run through stagnant lakes, keeping the tinge of their waters, and holding together the body of their stream undiverted from its course, and issuing undiminished and untarnished from the lower end of the lake. And so the stream of our lives may run through the Dead Sea, and come out below none the worse for the black waters through which it has forced its way. The life that Christ gives is unaffected by death. Our creed is a risen Saviour, and the corollary of that creed is, that death touches the circumference, but never gets near the man. It is hard to believe, in the face of the foolish senses; it is hard to believe, in the face of aching sorrow. It is hard to-day to believe, in the face of passionate and ingenious denial, but it is true all the same. Death is sleep, and sleep is life.
And so, further, my text tells us that this life is life with Christ. We know not details, we need not know them. Here we have the presence of Jesus Christ, if we love Him, as really as when He walked the earth. Ay! more really, for Jesus Christ is nearer to us who, having not seen Him, love Him, and somewhat know His divinity and His sacrifice, than He was to the men who companied with Him all the time that He went in and out amongst them, whilst they were ignorant of who dwelt with them, and entertained the Lord of angels and men unawares. He is with us, and it is the power and the privilege and the joy of our lives to realise His presence. That Lord who, whilst He was on earth, was the Son of Man which is in heaven, now that He is in heaven in His corporeal humanity is the Son of God who dwells with us. And as He dwells with us, if we love Him and trust Him, so, but in fashion incapable of being revealed to us, now does He dwell with those of whose condition this is the only and all-sufficing positive knowledge which we have, that they are ‘absent from the body; present with the Lord.’
Further, that united life is a social life. The whole force of my text is often missed by English readers, who run into one idea the two words ‘together with.’ But if you would put a comma after ‘together,’ you would understand better what Paul meant. He refers to two forms of union. Whether we wake or sleep we shall live all aggregated together, and all aggregated ‘together’ because each is ‘with Him.’ That is to say, union with Jesus Christ makes all who partake of that union, whether they belong to the one side of the river or the other, into a mighty whole. They are together because they are with the Lord.
Suppose a great city, and a stream flowing through its centre. The palace and all pertaining to the court are on one side of the water; there is an outlying suburb on the other, of meaner houses, inhabited by poor and humble people. But yet it is one city. ‘Ye are come unto the heavenly Jerusalem, the city of the living God, and to the spirits of just men made perfect.’ We are knit together by one life, one love, one thought; and the more we fix our hearts on the things which those above live among and by, the more truly are we knit to them. As a quaint old English writer says, ‘They are gone but into another pew in the same church.’
We are one in Him, and so there will be a perfecting of union in reunion; and the inference so craved for by our hearts seems to be warranted to our understandings, that that society above, which is the perfection of society, shall not be lacking in the elements of mutual recognition and companionship, without which we cannot conceive of society at all. ‘And so we shall ever be with the Lord.’
Dear friends, I beseech you to trust your sinful souls to that dear Lord who bore you in His heart and mind when He bore His cross to Calvary and completed the work of your redemption. If you will accept Him as your sacrifice and Saviour, when He cried ‘It is finished,’ united to Him your lives will be quickened into intense activity and joyful vigilance and expectation, and death will be smoothed into a quiet falling asleep. ‘The shadow feared of man,’ that strikes threateningly across every path, will change as we approach it, if our hearts are anchored on Him who died for us, into the Angel of Light to whom God has given charge concerning us to bear up our feet upon His hands, and land us in the presence of the Lord and in the perfect society of those who love Him. And so shall we live together, and all together, with Him.
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. W. McGarvey 1914 · Public Domain On vv9–11 For God appointed us not unto wrath, but unto…
For God appointed us not unto wrath, but unto the obtaining of salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ ,
J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On v9 (See Scofield Rom 1:16).
salvation
(See Scofield Rom 1:16).
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv9–11 5:9 God’s anger (1:10; 2:16; Rom 5:9; cp. 2…
5:9 God’s anger (1:10; 2:16; Rom 5:9; cp. 2 Thes 1:6-10; 2:8) represents the carrying out of his judgment against evil. However, God destined believers for salvation, not wrath (2 Thes 2:13-14), and they will escape the terrors of the day of the Lord (1 Thes 5:1-3).
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.