2 Thessalonians 1:3-6

(3) We are bound to thank God always for you, brethren, as it is meet, because that your faith groweth exceedingly, and the charity of everyone of you all toward each other aboundeth; (4) So that we ourselves glory in you in the churches of God for your patience and faith in all your persecutions and tribulations that ye endure: (5) В¶ Which is a manifest token of the righteous judgment of God, that ye may be counted worthy of the kingdom of God, for which ye also suffer: (6) Seeing it is a righteous thing with God to recompense tribulation to them that trouble you;

We have several very beautiful and blessed consequences arising out of these verses, which the Reader will do well to notice one by one. First. Observe how blessedly Paul ascends to the fountain head, in ascribing all glory to the great Head of the Church, for their prosperity. He takes no notice of men or things, ordinances or ministers; these in Paul's view were secondary and subordinate. Who then is Paul, and who is Apollos, but ministers by whom ye believed, even as the Lord gave to every man? 1 Corinthians 3:5. How delightful is it to refer all the glory where alone it is due, and to bless God, as it is meet, when faith towards God, and charity towards men, grow under the Lord's favor!

Secondly. Let the Reader observe the growth of faith and brotherly love, as twin graces coming from the Lord. They grow and increase under divine cultivation, and they are very blessed evidences of God's elect children. Paul elsewhere distinguisheth it from the mere professional belief, so common among the carnal world, by calling it, the faith of God's elect, and the acknowledging of the truth, which is after godliness. Titus 1:1. Let the Reader, therefore, carefully mark the vast difference. When a child of God is new born, and that immense work of God the Spirit by regeneration, is wrought in quickening the sinner, which was before dead in trespasses and sins, the spiritual life is given, which can die no more. Being made a partaker of the divine nature, this principle is as holy as it ever can be. But, like a new-born child in nature, so the child in grace groweth and increaseth with all the increase of God. Col 2:19; 2 Peter 3:18. And let the Reader remark yet further, that these graces of faith and charity, with all others that are thereby induced from the spiritual life, given by the Holy Ghost to the child of God, are the fruits and effects resulting from the love of the Holy Three in One, in their covenant-offices and characters. Faith and love, however exceedingly they grow and abound, form no cause in the great work of salvation. Christ's Person, in his blood and righteousness, is the sole cause. Our faith in him, and love to all saints, are effects.

Thirdly. When the Apostle saith, that he, and his faithful companion in the ministry, gloried in the Churches of God, let the Reader recollect, that no more can be meant, but that of holy joy, that the Lord blessed them with his grace. It was a constant maxim of Paul, that no man should glory in men. 1 Corinthians 3:21. And, therefore, he did not tell the Church, in this place, that their good deeds, or their zeal, no, nor their faith and charity, as their acts, were subjects of his glory. He only meant to say, that the Lord's blessing upon them, opened a source of giving glory to God, and he rejoiced in their progress in grace.

Fourthly. I beg the Reader to remark with me, how Paul interprets, the Lord's blessing upon his Church, a sure token of the Lord's displeasure to their enemies. And I beg the Reader to remark it the rather, because the same holds good in all ages of the Church. Depend upon it, in whatever congregation of the Lord's faithful people, the Lord's cause prospers, while the Lord manifests his favor thereby to them; this becomes his frown upon those who oppose them. David was so convinced of this, that he made it a subject of prayer, that by the Lord's countenancing him, his enemies might behold it, and hang their heads. Shew me (said he) a token for good: that they which hate me, may see it, and be ashamed: because thou, Lord, hath holpen me, and comforted me. Psalms 86:17. Reader! do bring this decision, (for it is the Lord's own decision, and upon scriptural grounds), into practice, for forming righteous judgment in the present awful day. While the great and glorious truths of the Gospel are frittering away through the land, and flimsy subjects supply the place of preaching God's electing love, Christ's redeeming grace, and the Spirit's regenerating mercy; while places which our forefathers, of blessed memory, occupied, and where those precious truths, whereon was founded all the hope, and joy, and comfort of their truly regenerated souls, once were continually heard, now resound with daring denials of Christ's finished salvation, and the final perseverance of thy saints; look and see where God owns and blesseth his word, and where congregations are, among whom conversion work, and confirming work are going on. This will be the way to discover, what the Apostle here calls, the manifest token of the righteous judgment of God. The Lord hath engaged to honor them who honor him. 1 Samuel 2:30. And we may reasonably expect to behold God's electing love manifested in the assemblies where God's electing love is faithfully preached, and Christ's redeeming mercy felt and enjoyed, where redemption by his blood is insisted on as the sole cause of salvation. And God the Spirit doth, and will, awaken sinners, dead in trespasses and sins, where he sends his faithful servants to preach to the congregation, as the Prophet sent by him did to the dry bones in the valley, whose whole movement, breath, and life, can only come from his sovereign power. Ezekiel 37:4. This will be the way to decide where righteous judgment is formed, not from conclusions drawn from numbers, but from conclusions drawn from the real work of God upon the heart. Oh! the high favor the God of all grace manifesteth to that real congregation of Zion, called by what name soever it may be among men, whom the Lord shall count when he writeth up the people, that this and that man was born there. Psalms 87:5.