How do we exercise this ministry of the mystery of God's grace? An all-round ministry is a gentle ministry, a godly ministry, and a gospel ministry
An address on 1 Thessalonians 2:7–12, originally delivered at the United Reformed Churches in North America Ministers’ Conference 2015
delivered June 3, 2015, at the URCNA Ministers' Conference, Westminster Seminary California
Introduction: The Ministry
As historic Christians we believe that there is such a thing as “the ministry” in contrast to the members of the congregation. As Paul says in 1 Corinthians 12, “God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers” (v. 28; cf. Eph. 4:11), and then going on to ask rhetorically, “Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers?” (v. 29) That there are those who are set apart for the church while not being set above the church goes without saying from our vantage point.
There are ministers but what is their ministry? Paul says our ministry is to be “stewards of the mysteries of God” (1 Cor. 4:1) and Peter specifies the content of those mysteries, saying we are “good stewards of God’s varied grace” (1 Pet. 4:10).
How do we exercise this ministry of the mystery of God’s grace? In 1 Thessalonians 2, Paul speaks to us of what Charles Spurgeon would later describe as, “An All-Round Ministry.”[1] In context, Paul prays for them in 1:2, 2:13–16, and 3:11–13 before he pleads with them in 4:1ff. And in the context of his thanksgiving prayer, he speaks of the all-round ministry.
Note how in 2:3–8 he contrasts false and ungodly words and deeds in ministry with true and godly words and deeds. He contrasts words: “Our appeal does not spring from error” or “any attempt to deceive” (v. 3) or “words of flattery” (v. 5), but instead springs from the gospel of God himself (vv. 2, 8). In sum, “we speak, not to please man, but to please God” (v. 4). He contrasts deeds: “For our appeal does not spring from…impurity” (v. 3) or “a pretext for greed” (v. 5) or to receive “glory from people, though we could have made demands as apostles of Christ” (v. 6). Instead, “we were gentle among you, like a nursing mother taking care of her own children” (v. 7) and “we were ready to share with you not only the gospel of God but also our own selves” (v. 8).
Paul lays out here an ideal for how we all are to administer our ministry. Of course, as we meditate on Paul’s ministry we see how well rounded he was while we feel like we are just common rocks. Like a common rock, I’m not much to look at with all my rough edges. But like rough rock that is washed over time and time again by the waves of the ocean, so too it is the washing of the Word that causes my color and luster to shine and my rough edges to be smooth and appealing.
A Gentle Ministry
An all-round ministry is a gentle ministry. Speaking on behalf of Silvanus and Timothy, Paul shows his heart saying that they were affectionately desirous of you (2:8).[2] A pastor has a longing, a deep desire for his people. This word, homeirómai, is used only this once in the New Testament, coming from the Greek translation of the Old Testament, where it is used of Job’s passionate desire to die (Job 3:21). They were affectionately desirous of the Thessalonians because they had become very dear to us (v. 8). Notice how he describes this gentleness and affection by using two metaphors. He speaks of himself as a mother as well as a father.
First, Paul speaks of himself as a mother
We were gentle among you, like a nursing mother taking care of her own children (v. 7).[3] He was like a nursing mother (trophòs),[4] looking upon her little baby with nothing but love, care, concern, and affection (see Gal. 4:19). As a nursing mother totally gives herself to her little one, to care and give life, and to raise and to protect, so, too, was Paul with them. As a mother holds a little baby close to her heart, so, too, the apostle Paul says that he held them dear and near to his heart. Like a nursing mother pours her life into a little baby, in the same way Paul says he poured out his life for them like a nursing mother. As John Calvin said, “a mother…reveals a wonderful and extraordinary love, because she spares no trouble or effort, avoids no care, is not wearied by their coming and going, and gladly even gives her own life blood to be drained.”[5] Aquinas said as a nursing mother “bends down to an infant and speaks to the stammering child, so that the child may learn to speak,” in the same way, Paul accommodated himself to the Thessalonians and spoke to them the precious words of truth.[6] What an example Paul gives for the gospel minister to follow.
It is amazing how Paul uses this feminine metaphor and image to describe himself, and to describe the minister in terms of the care and affection towards the church. Notice how he uses this same image, yet in a different way, with the Galatians: “My little children, for whom I am again in the anguish of childbirth until Christ is formed in you! I wish I could be present with you now and change my tone, for I am perplexed about you” (Gal. 4:19–20). In Galatians he had been chastising them: “Who has bewitched you?” (Gal. 3:1) “Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?” (Gal. 3:3) “Does he who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you do so by works of the law, or by hearing with faith?” (Gal. 3:5) In chapter 4, though, he wished to change his tone. He wanted to look in the eyes of these brothers and sisters and be able to communicate face to face. It’s like sending emails today. We cannot discern the mood and the facial expressions, the affections from the heart or even the anger that comes through, and instead we assume and impute things. Although the image is used in slightly different ways in these two passages, the same sort of image of a mother and her children is used. Like the mother in anguish, travail, and turmoil brings forth a baby into a new state of life, in the same way Paul describes himself like a mother for his flock to bring them, through anguish, to a new level of love towards each other.
It is important for us to meditate on this imagery in terms of how we might think of our ministry. All too often, we are placed on a pedestal with a spotlight on us. The problem in the Dutch church is not that our people call us domine but that we believe it! We speak of the ministry as the highest calling that any man can have—which it is. We speak of preaching as the very voice of Christ to us, his people—which it is and to which we say, “This is the Word of the Lord!” But we romanticize the ministry. We think of the minister and the ministry and think it is all glorious as we have a direct line to God. Paul says it involved anguish, brothers and sisters. Paul describes it as giving birth. As men we do not know what that feels like, but we know that it involves anguish. Just YouTube men connected to electrodes to simulate labor and see how long it takes for them to cry, “Epidural!” Paul says this elsewhere in Second Corinthians as he defends his ministry against so-called huperlián apostólōn:
…but as servants of God we commend ourselves in every way: by great endurance, in afflictions, hardships, calamities, beatings, imprisonments, riots, labors, sleepless nights, hunger…through honor and dishonor, through slander and praise. We are treated as impostors, and yet are true; as unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and behold, we live; as punished, and yet not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, yet possessing everything. (2 Cor. 6:4–5, 8-10)
The minister is an irony. You are constantly dying while you live; you are full of sorrow, yet at the same time full of joy. Our people might see with their eyes what looks to be very glamorous and exciting, but what they do not see is the sorrow; what they do not see is the dying; what they do not see is the agonizing. Paul writes as a mother who gave life and who gives of her own self to sustain life. In the same way the minister gives himself for the life of others.
Second, Paul speaks of himself as a father
For you know how like a father with his children (v. 11). He was like a father who loves his sons and daughters, who is concerned for them, who is happy for them, and who has great joy to see them grow up. We can feel Paul’s feelings as a father for the Thessalonians as if they were his own children. Paul was very personal in his words toward the Thessalonians. And he was not just personal, he was personal with a passion. The Thessalonians were his spiritual children. They were the ones he loved through hard times and great times. He had been with them; cried for them; prayed with them; rejoiced with them; and he’s anguished for them.
Remember how he called himself merely “Paul” (1:1). He did not heap up any titles. He says here, we could have made demands as apostles of Christ (v. 6). But he writes to them just as Paul. They knew him by name and he knew them. He cares for them and they care for him. Describing preaching, C. H. Spurgeon once put it like this: “when we speak as ministers, and not as men; as preachers, instead of penitents; as theologians instead of disciples, we fail.”[7] When we do not speak as Paul speaks, personally, sincerely, passionately, and even gently, we fail in our duty as pastors. If we distance ourselves we are failures! We must not speak merely as theologians or ministers, but as sinners and disciples; as brothers, or else we fail. We must be men not merely of scientia, knowledge, but experientia, experience, according to Thomas Manton. This is why we follow Paul’s excellent example and as shepherd visit our flocks “from house to house” (Acts 20:20).[8] In the words of John Calvin, “No man will ever be a good pastor, unless he shows himself to be a father to the church entrusted to him.”[9]
A Godly Ministry
The ministry is also a godly ministry. The ministry is not just the affection and feeling that he has in his heart, but it should lead to tangible expressions of these. Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy worked hard, as he says, that we might not be a burden to any of you (v. 9). They were being an example of hard workers, of toiling and anguishing for them. Calvin said a good minister “should remove all obstacles in their course as far as they are able.”[10] But they were doing more than just working hard, they were striving with all that was in them to be an example of godliness. This is why Paul says to young pastor Timothy elsewhere, “Keep a close watch on yourself and on the teaching. Persist in this, for by so doing you will save both yourself and your hearers” (1 Tim. 4:16). The ministry cannot merely be words, it must also be evidenced in deeds, and the minister must exemplify that to the people of God. Paul goes on to say that they were witnesses, and God also, how holy and righteous and blameless was our conduct toward you believers (v. 10; Titus 2:12). Can you say that before your people this coming Sunday with a clear conscience? God help us to be such godly and righteous ministers!
Away with any of your thoughts that you walk on water above your people! You’re not the perfect husband; you’re not the perfect dad; you’re not the best of friends; you’re not the perfect son. You are a wretched sinner. You are a filthy sinner in thought, word, and deed. You need to be a penitent in prayer. Why? Because the point of the minister’s godliness is not an end in itself, but is to share it with others. James Fergusson, a seventeenth-century Scottish preacher, said it like this: “It is not enough that a Minister of Christ abstain from such scandalous sins of flattery, greed and ambition, as time-servers are guilty of; but he must also labor for the exercise of such virtues as may commend his ministry.”[11] The minister’s greatest fear should be that his people would say of him, “Do as I say, not as I do.” God help us all that that is not true. The minister is to be an example to his people. Paul describes the ministry by saying we were ready to share with you, not only the gospel of God, but also our own selves (v. 8)—“our own souls” (tas heautōn psuchas). The ancient preacher, John Chrysostom, said this about this phrase: “For merely to preach is not the same thing as to give the soul. For that indeed is more precious, but the latter, is a matter of more difficulty….The Gospel we indeed proclaim, because God commanded it; but so much do we love you, that, if it were possible, we would have given even our souls.”[12] In the words of Paul to the Corinthians, “I will most gladly spend and be spent for your souls” (2 Cor. 12:15). A true pastor, then, has “a higher regard for the well-being of the Church than for their own life.”[13]
I don’t know how you feel when you read a passage like this about pastoral holiness and godliness. When I read a passage like this before my people I feel like a total hypocrite. But this is the Word of God. By faith, we have to see even as God sees, beyond the outward and see the inward. To see the example of the minister for what it is, it is a faint reflection of Christ. But any evidence of godliness that can be exhibited to you is not to commend yourself but is to point you to Christ, that you might decrease, that he might increase.
Any ability to speak the gospel is to point us to Christ, our great Prophet and Teacher. Any evidence of being gentle toward you is merely a faint reflection of Jesus, the Great Shepherd of the sheep. Yet Paul does say that he was an example, even as a sinner, and that the Thessalonians followed: “you became imitators of us, and of the Lord” (1:6). That old evangelical adage is true, that people do not care how much you know, until they know how much you care. J. C. Ryle said it like this:
We should beware of resting our claim to the people’s attention on our outward [pastoral] call only. It will never do to tell our people, “We are your ordained ministers, and therefore you must believe and follow whatever we tell you”…That man has no right to expect the attention of his people, who does not preach the Gospel and live the Gospel. The rule of Paul is clear on this point. He told the Thessalonians to esteem their ministers very highly “for their work’s sake” (1 Thess. 5:13). When there is no “work” done, it is vain to expect the people’s esteem.[14]
A Gospel Ministry
But all the affection of his heart, all the action of his hands, meant nothing apart from the proclamation of the gospel. The ministry, then, ultimately, is a gospel ministry. All that gentleness and godliness, all of it was expressed in the best of ways in the words of what he describes so often here as the gospel of God himself (vv. 8, 9; cf. 2:2; Rom. 1:1; 15:16; 2 Cor. 11:7). The gospel is God’s because he himself has spoken it in Christ the incarnate Word. The gospel is God’s because he himself has done it in Christ. And all of it came to the Thessalonians through the person of Paul. There was a nineteenth-century Episcopalian preacher by the name of Phillips Brooks who once defined preaching with three words: “truth through personality.”[15] Paul’s gentleness with them and godliness before them were merely the means through which he could speak the truth of the gospel to them.
J. C. Ryle recounted a story once of a missionary who on his death-bed at the age of 95, heard his friends saying one to another, “What would our old friend do, if he had to live his life over again?” He rose on his pillow, and said, “The very best thing that a man can do, is to preach the Gospel!”[16]
Notice the connection between Paul’s affection for the Thessalonians and the gospel (v. 8). His longing for them was that he might preach the gospel of God to them. The pastoral heart and concern has a twofold purpose in terms of the gospel. The twofold reason of preaching the gospel is to win sinners to Christ and to prepare saints for a life of godliness. Preaching’s first purpose is to get men, women, and children to turn to Christ and then to turn away from sin. He wanted them to turn from idols to God constantly (cf. 1:9–10).
Paul’s focus here, though, is for the second purpose of preparing the saints for godliness. Look also at how Paul speaks to them as a father—again—in such moving verbs: to exhort, to encourage, and to charge (v. 12). When the Bible heaps up repetition, we need to listen. This repetition shows how important this is. How did he exhort, encourage, and charge them? To walk in a manner worthy of God (v. 12). The Christian life, what Paul calls our walk (cf. Rom. 16:2; Eph. 4:1; Phil. 1:27; Col. 1:10), must be worthy of the new life God has given us his people. He is calling us into his eternal kingdom and glory so we need to reflect that now. He is calling you into his eternal kingdom and glory so live like that in this life. John Calvin said it like this: “It now remains for us to respond to God’s call, i.e., to show ourselves to be such children to Him as He is a Father to us.”[17] So Paul wants us to live a Christian life that is worthy of God, that shows thankfulness, gratitude, and amazement that God has saved sinners such as us. We are to live this way because God himself is the one who is calling us into his own kingdom and glory (v. 12). Again Ryle said,
Would you like to know what we ministers of the Gospel are ordained to do? We are not set apart for no other end than to read services, administer sacraments, marry people, and bury the dead. We are not meant to do nothing more than show you the church, or ourselves, or our denomination. We are set for the work of showing people the blood of Christ; and except we are continually showing it, we are no true ministers of the Gospel.[18]
This is how Paul speaks elsewhere: “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.” Why? “For it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure” (Phil. 2:12, 13). Walk in a way that is worthy of God. Show yourself to be of righteousness and holiness and blamelessness in your conduct. Why? Because of the gospel. Because God, knowing full well your sins and your slavery to the devil’s kingdom, is bringing you into his own kingdom. He takes you from sin and shame to glory. How can you do anything less than glorify him? How can you do anything less than lay your life down as a living sacrifice? How can you do anything less than turn and serve the living and true God?
Conclusion: What is the Ministry?
The ministry is meant to be a service by a servant, who does not put himself right here in this place because he wants to, or is self-appointed, but because Christ has put him here to serve you. And a minister serves both God and people in proclaiming the Word (2:2, 4, 8, 9, 12) and in loving people (2:7, 8, 11);[19] he saves souls and brings glory to God.[20]
All the gentleness, if there be any in us, is to point people to Jesus Christ, the Great Shepherd. It’s only a faint reflection, and God help us to be more. All the godliness, again, if there is any, may it only point our people to Jesus Christ, and his righteousness. He’s the great chief Shepherd and Bishop of their souls, not you. Any ability to preach the gospel with any bit of clarity whatsoever, is only because it points us to Jesus Christ, the great Prophet of our souls.
The minister merely stammers and stumbles and stutters. But may they not hear us, but may they hear Christ. We don’t see him as he is in truth, not as gentle as he ought to be, but we see Christ. We don’t see him as he is in reality, a sinner, but we see Jesus Christ. We don’t hear merely his words, but we hear Jesus. The ministry brings us to him, to his feet, to his throne, into his glorious kingdom.
Notes
[1] C. H. Spurgeon, An All-Round Ministry (1900; repr., Banner of Truth Trust, 1986).↩
[2] See Leon Morris, 79.↩
[3] I am aware of the debate about the text of 2:7, whether it says “gentle” (epioi) or “babes” (nepioi). I’ll follow the ESV’s “gentle” although if it says “babes” it just goes to show how low Paul was able to make himself for the sake of his hearers. For “gentle” see F.F. Bruce, 29, 31. For “babes” see Morris, 76–78.↩
[4] On whether this is a mother or nurse, see Bruce, 1 & 2 Thessalonians, 31–32.↩
[5] Calvin, Thessalonians, 8:344.↩
[6] Aquinas, Thessalonians, 15.↩
[7] Spurgeon, An All-Round Ministry, 64.↩
[8] See Calvin’s comments in Thessalonians, 8:345.↩
[9] Calvin, Thessalonians, 8:345.↩
[10] Calvin, Thessalonians, 8:345.↩
[11] Fergusson, Thessalonians, 47.↩
[12] Chrysostom, Thessalonians, 13:330 col. 2.↩
[13] Calvin, Thessalonians, 8:344.↩
[14] “Neglect Not the Gift” in Home Truths as found at http://gracegems.org/23/Ryle_neglect_not_the_gift.htm.↩
[15] Phillips Brooks, Lectures on Preaching, 9.↩
[16] “Neglect Not the Gift” in Home Truths as found at http://gracegems.org/23/Ryle_neglect_not_the_gift.htm.↩
[17] Calvin, Thessalonians, 8:346.↩
[18] “Our Sins” in Old Paths (Banner of Truth, 1999), 168–69.↩
[19] See an excellent summary of this in Stott, 1–2 Thessalonians, 68–71.↩
[20] Chrysostom, 332 col. 1.↩
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