Today Our Daily Bread 1 Thess 5 & 2 Cor 2:14

Oops I guess I posted wrong passage yesterday It should have ben 2 Cor, not 1 Cor- sorry! Scripture selections are taken from the Rock Church Daily Bread Reading schedule for each month. “Lena’s Journalin’” are Lena’s comments on the specific passages from her Daily Journal.

1 Thessalonians 5
1 I really don't need to write to you about how and when all this will happen, dear brothers and sisters.[a] 2For you know quite well that the day of the Lord will come unexpectedly, like a thief in the night. 3When people are saying, "All is well; everything is peaceful and secure," then disaster will fall upon them as suddenly as a woman's birth pains begin when her child is about to be born. And there will be no escape.

4But you aren't in the dark about these things, dear brothers and sisters, and you won't be surprised when the day of the Lord comes like a thief. 5For you are all children of the light and of the day; we don't belong to darkness and night. 6So be on your guard, not asleep like the others. Stay alert and be sober. 7Night is the time for sleep and the time when people get drunk. 8But let us who live in the light think clearly, protected by the body armor of faith and love, and wearing as our helmet the confidence of our salvation. 9For God decided to save us through our Lord Jesus Christ, not to pour out his anger on us. 10He died for us so that we can live with him forever, whether we are dead or alive at the time of his return. 11So encourage each other and build each other up, just as you are already doing.
Pauls Final Advice
12Dear brothers and sisters, honor those who are your leaders in the Lord's work. They work hard among you and warn you against all that is wrong. 13Think highly of them and give them your wholehearted love because of their work. And remember to live peaceably with each other.
14Brothers and sisters,
we urge you to
~ warn those who are lazy.
~ Encourage those who are timid.
~ Take tender care of those who are weak.
~ Be patient with everyone.
~ 15See that no one pays back evil for evil, but ~ always try to do good to each other and to everyone else.
~ 16Always be joyful.
~ 17Keep on praying. 18No matter what happens,
~ always be thankful, for this is God's will for you who belong to Christ Jesus.
~ 19Do not stifle the Holy Spirit.
~ 20Do not scoff at prophecies,
~ 21but test everything that is said.
~ Hold on to what is good.
~ 22Keep away from every kind of evil.
Pauls Final Greetings
23Now may the God of peace make you holy in every way, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless until that day when our Lord Jesus Christ comes again. 24God, who calls you, is faithful; he will do this.
25Dear brothers and sisters, pray for us.
26Greet all the brothers and sisters in Christian love.[b]
27I command you in the name of the Lord to read this letter to all the brothers and sisters.
28And may the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with all of you.
Footnotes:
1 Thessalonians 5:1 Greek brothers; also in 5:4, 12, 14, 25, 26, 27.
1 Thessalonians 5:26 Greek with a holy kiss.
~Lena’s Journalin’~
In our days of busy, busy- rush, rush- pressured life that is full of stress, I don’t think people are necessarily “saying” all is well, everything is peaceful and secure, BUT spiritually speaking and concerning their relationship with God, the Creator of this whole Universe, they do. There is a certain purposeful ignorance going on and people are living as though there is plenty of time to think of that later on when we are older, have slowed down a bit, have lived out the desires and plans of our self directed lives, etc. This is what Paul is speaking of here. Concerning God, His word, Prayer, relational issues, eternity, they are acting as though they have the choice of death and life and control their own destinys. This is a symptom of a prideful spirit, which is the spirit of the devil who could care less if we live eternally separated from God our Father and Creator. In fact that is his whole plan, to distract us from what is truth and the true reality of the true life of the spirit. He wants us to fil our lives with more and more false purposes and stay on the moving sidewalk of stress and business which amounts to nothing at all in the light of eternal peace. He’s saying if we succumb to this worldly pull and give in to its call, we will suddenly find ourselves in a grievous place, because the lord will come, he will appear to each one of us and we will know very clearly right then, what we chose and did not choose. There will be no way to run back the ‘tape” and do it over, none at all, no matter how badly we’d like to do that.
There is a groaning going on, because the birth of the purposes of God manifested in the earth, is eminent and is upon the earth, whether they acknowledge Him or not. Those who know Him, know He is coming. They can recognize His call and the evidences of His soon arrival and call to order.
There is an attack like never before on us, we are busy busy and we are sleepy sleepy, yet have accomplished nothing! This is a spiritual matter and must be dealt with. Those who sleep must shake themselves and shake their lives up or allow god to shake them. It is a matter of the death or life of the purposes of God!
It is a time like no other for constant reminders and encouragement to help keep each other away from the deception of darkness and sleep.
“Can you not wait for Me 1 hour” is upon the church! Watchman watchmen of the night…..ARE YOU AWAKE? If not, wake up O sleeper, arise from the dead and let the SON shine, why? How? Jesus Christ is risen in you! You may feel you can’t, but that is an outright lie, the word of God says you Can DO ALL things through Christ who strengthens you! Yes maybe you in your flesh and under the sawy of a curse cannot, but who do we serve? Is He small? Is He weak? Is He asleep? No He does not sleep or slumber, He is always there. He is the LORD strong and Mighty, Mighty in your small battle with stress.
Rebellion would love to have its way, that is its nature. It does not want anyone to bring change or tell it what to do! God sends teachers, lovers into our lives to show us the way to His purposes, show us the way to victory and rebellion rises up and protests- “we don’t like to do it that way”. Well the truth is the flesh does not like to do “it” at all. So lay down the flesh man and its desires and put on Christ, who humbly took on human nature to show us the possibilities available to us to rise up in spiritually activated life here on earth! Humility is an action word, it does what it is told. It quenches rebellion by obedience, no matter how it feels. It opposes rebellion.
When Paul speaks about helping our leaders/teachers here, honoring them in humility. He is showing us the way to become and stay victorious over god’s enemies, namely rebellion. When we, as adults who teach children – mind you, obey a teacher, and trust that God sent and gave us that teacher, we are demonstrating a victory in Christ. A victory over rebellion, and this victory MUST be maintained. We cannot go back to our old fleshly ways or we will defeat the purpose of God.
Paul gives us a maintenance plan here- always pray, encourage, love etc, etc. THIS is the way to walk out our salvation! How can one on earth be blameless? By obedience to God, His word and His ways. through the blood of Jesus covering our mistakes as we walk out God’s praise.
So then how or why would one stifle the Holy Spirit? Let’s look at this word, it is the word quench which is defined- to extinguish, quench, of fire or things on fire, to be quenched, to go out, metaph. to quench, to suppress, stifle of divine influence
Think of communication. So you say something to me, because you love me and are concerned for my welfare, you desire to see in my life a successful outcome. Your love for me and desire to see success leads you to speak with me about certain matters in my life. I don’t take it as love at all, I receive it as criticism and in rebellion to my perceived criticisms, I disregard your advise to me, I categorize it as a suggestion, which I have the prerogative to take or leave. I leave it, not because it is bad advise, but because of the rebellion against criticism that I deal with. This happens in our relationship again and again. You think I don’t ever like your advice, you think I’m somewhat foolish and selfish, because I always do the opposite of what you’ve seen, as my friend, would help me. This affects our communication in the future, your receptivity to me and my words and my advice is very, very limited. You can hardly express your love and concern for me anymore, because rather than listen to you I block your words out. I have quenched the “fire” or passion or energy of the flow of a two way relationship. I won’t allow you influence in my life. I’m my own person, I’m independent of you. Our relationship has changed, over time it has to, it has not progressed at all because I disregard you and your wisdom. Now we are casual, we are friendly, more like acquaintances, not close.
This is what we do to God, His word, His messengers, His Spirit. We are our own persons and our pride tells us we can hear God’s voice for our own selves and don’t need the advise or explanation of the word from others, or the Divine input God has set up in our lives through people and relationships. We have quenched God’s Holy Spirit, we have removed His Divine passion out of our sphere of influence. Remember the property of fire is one of change? It changes what is to what will be. When we quench the fire of God, we remove the possibilities of Him changing us. If we despise change, we quench His Spirit, because who He is will change us, and He wants us to invite Him to change us.
Testing prophecies, does not mean criticize them. It means compare them with God’s word and the words of God he has given to you personally. That’s all.
Notice when one gets what is good, he must keep it, he must hold on to it? he must not let go. Things are so easy to let go of, especially good ones, as soon as a good things comes our way, the enemy wants to bring thoughts of evil and steal away what is good. Oh magnify your problems with me, says the enemy, lets us exalt evil together. Dear God help us! I just want to stick my fingers in my ears and say “I CAN”T hear YOU!” I want to turn the worship songs up and say ”I CAN”T hear you!” I’m LISTENING TO GOD! I can’t take THAT call, I’m speaking with my Father! I’m listening to and doing His word. No matter what! Amen.

(daily repetitive verse)
2 Corinthians 2:14
Now thanks be to God who always leads us in triumph in Christ, and through us diffuses the fragrance of His knowledge in every place.