I Thessalonians 1
Dear RTB’ers,
Today we go in a new direction in our walk through the Bible –the first of Paul’s epistles. Although our Bibles have (in order) seven epistles before we get to I and II Thessalonians, most scholars agree that I Thessalonians was the first epistle that Paul wrote – in fact, the first of any of the New Testament writings that we include in our Bibles. Some scholars argue for Galatians to have been the first epistle that Paul wrote, but they are in the minority.
The background to the Thessalonian letters begins in Acts 17:1-10 with Paul’s visit to Thessalonica during his second missionary journey. Most importantly in those verses we see that …the Jews were jealous, and … they formed a mob … (Acts 17:5) and …the brothers immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea… (Acts 17:10a). Right away we remember the problems that Paul had with “the Jews from Asia” during his first missionary journey and continuing with his trials later in Acts. We see the same behavior by the Thessalonian Jews – jealous, angry, violent against Paul’s preaching. So Paul is quickly taken south to Berea, then on to Athens (Acts 17:16-34), then on to Corinth (Acts 18:1-18a) where he stayed a year and a half. From Corinth Paul sent Timothy (and Silas?) back to Thessalonica to encourage the believers there. Timothy’s report to Paul when he returns to Corinth forms the base for I Thessalonians, wherein Paul spends much of his writing answering questions that arose from Timothy’s report.
So now, with this background in place we begin Paul’s epistles. Enjoy!
Blessings!
The beginning of this letter is so encouraging: everyone has heard of the faithfulness of the Thessalonians! The believers were united in their faith through the power of the Holy Spirit.
I hope that we may be similarly united in the coming years because I see ridicule and downright anger directed toward the believing church more and more—just look at the heretical portrayal of the Last Supper at the Paris Olympics!
As the song says, “May all who come behind us find us faithful…”