1 Thessalonians 4:8

CRITICAL AND EXPLANATORY NOTES

1 Thessalonians 4:8. He therefore that despiseth.—Margin and R.V. “rejecteth.” He who pushes aside sanctification in his preference for uncleanness will have to reckon with God Himself.

MAIN HOMILETICS OF 1 Thessalonians 4:8

A Word to the Despiser.

I. The Christian minister is spiritually commissioned to exhort men to holiness.—“Who hath also given unto us His Holy Spirit.” The apostles were endowed for their special ministry by the extraordinary gifts of the Holy Ghost; they were infallibly guided into all truth; they wrought miracles; and their word was with power. Though miraculous gifts are no longer bestowed, Christian ministers are nevertheless called and qualified by the divine Spirit; they are empowered to proclaim the will of God and to urge men to reconciliation and purity (2 Corinthians 5:20). The Rev. F. W. Robertson was once hesitating in the pulpit of a brother-clergyman which of two sermons he should preach. Something whispered to him, “Robertson, you are a craven; you dare not speak here what you believe.” He selected a sermon that seemed almost personal in its faithfulness and power. But it was the message given to him for that hour.

II. That the most faithful exhortations of the Christian minister may be despised.—This is done when men reject the word spoken, refuse to listen to it, neglect to meditate upon it, and decline to enter upon the course of holy living which it counsels. This conduct shows:—

1. The voluntary power of man.—He can resist the truth or accept it. He is responsible for the exercise of all his moral powers, and therefore incurs guilt by any abuse of those powers.

2. The blinding folly of sin.—It darkens the understanding, perverts the will, petrifies the affections, and banishes the good that elevates and saves. Sin is also a force—a stealthy, remorseless, destructive force; wherever it breathes, it blasts and withers; wherever it plants its sharpened talons, it lacerates and destroys; and the disorder, the moral anarchy, the writhing agony of a groaning world bear witness to the terrible ravages of man’s great enemy. To wilfully reject the overtures of righteousness is to relinquish the inheritance of eternal life, and to doom the soul to the endless miseries of spiritual death.

III. That to despise the faithful exhortations of the Christian minister is to despise God.—“He therefore that despiseth, despiseth not man, but God.” The contempt of the true minister does not terminate in his person alone, but reaches the majesty of that Being by whom he is commissioned. To disregard the message of an ambassador is to despise the monarch he represents. The Saviour declared, “He that despiseth you, despiseth Me” (Luke 10:16). As the edicts proclaimed by the public herald are not his own, but the edicts of the prince who gives them authority and force, so the commands published by the divinely commissioned minister are not his own, but belong to Him whose will is the law of the universe. It belongs to God to reveal the law, freighted with His sanction and authority; it belongs to man to declare it. The exhortation, whether uttered by a Moses, who was commended for the beauty of his personal appearance, or by a Simeon Niger, who was remarkable for his physical deformity, is equally the word of God, to which the most reverential obedience is due. To despise the meanest of God’s ministers is an insult to the majesty of Heaven, and will incur His terrible displeasure. In Retzsch’s illustrations of Goethe’s Faust there is one plate where angels are represented as dropping roses upon the demons who are contending for the soul of Faust. Every rose falls like molten metal, burning and blistering where it touches. So is it that truth acts upon the soul that has wilfully abandoned its teachings. It bewilders when it ought to guide.

Lessons.—

1. The divine commands concern man’s highest good.

2. Take heed how ye hear.

3. To despise the divine message is to be self-consigned to endless woe.