A VERSE BY VERSE COMMENTARY ON FIRST THESSALONIANS 4

1. 1 THESSALONIANS 4 COMMENTARY
EDITED BY GLENN PEASE
Living to Please God
1 As for other matters, brothers and sisters, we
instructed you how to live in order to please God, as in
fact you are living. Now we ask you and urge you in
the Lord Jesus to do this more and more.
1.BARNES,” Furthermore then - Τᆵ λοιπᆵν To loipon. “As to what remains.” That is, all
that remains is to offer these exhortations; see the 2Co_13:11 note; Gal_6:17 note; Eph_6:10
note; Phi_4:8 note. The phrase is a formula appropriate to the end of an argument or discourse.
We beseech you - Margin, “request.” The Greek is, “we ask you” - ᅚρωτራµεν erotomen. It is
not as strong a word as that which follows.
And exhort you - Marg, “beseech.” This is the word which is commonly used to denote
earnest exhortation. The use of these words here implies that Paul regarded the subject as of
great importance. He might have commanded them - but kind exhortation usually accomplishes
more than a command,
By the Lord Jesus - In his name and by his authority.
That as ye have received of us - As you were taught by us. Paul doubtless had given them
repeated instructions as to their duty as Christians.
How ye ought to walk - That is, how ye ought to live. Life is often represented as a journey;
Rom_6:4; Rom_8:1; 1Co_5:7; Gal_6:16, Eph_4:1.
So ye would abound more and more - “That is, follow the directions which they had
received more and more fully.” Abbott.

2. 2. CLARKE, “We beseech you, brethren, and exhort - We give you proper instructions
in heavenly things, and request you to attend to our advice. The apostle used the most pressing
entreaties; for he had a strong and affectionate desire that this Church should excel in all
righteousness and true holiness.
Please God more and more - God sets no bounds to the communications of his grace and
Spirit to them that are faithful. And as there are no bounds to the graces, so there should be
none to the exercise of those graces. No man can ever feel that he loves God too much, or that he
loves man too much for God’s sake.
3, GILL, “Furthermore then we beseech you, brethren,.... Or request of you in the most
kind and tender manner, from real and hearty love and affection for you, and with a view to your
good, and the glory of God:
and exhort you: or beseech and entreat you. The apostle does not lay his commands upon
them as he might have done, and sometimes does, but endeavours to work upon them by way of
entreaty, and which he doubtless thought the most effectual method to win upon them, and gain
them; for some minds are more easily wrought upon by entreaty than by authority: and this he
does in the most moving and powerful manner, even
by the Lord Jesus; or "in the Lord Jesus"; in his name and stead, as personating him, and as
though he did beseech and entreat them by him, and his fellow ministers; or for his sake,
intimating, that if they had any regard to him, any value for his name, if that had any weight
with them, or they had any concern for his honour and interest, then he begs their attention to
the following exhortation; or by the Lord Jesus, by all that is in him, or done for them by him; in
whom they were chosen, by whom they were redeemed, in whom they were made new creatures,
to whose image they were to be conformed, whose followers they professed to be, whose Gospel
they embraced, and by whose name they were called.
That as ye have received of us how ye ought to walk, and to please God. The walk of
believers is twofold, either internal or external. Their internal walk is by faith, which is the going
out of the soul by faith to Christ for every supply of grace. Their external walk is not as it was
before conversion, according to the course of this world, or as other Gentiles walk, but in a holy
religious life and conversation; and this requires spiritual life, strength and direction from
Christ; for neither dead men, nor, if alive, yet weak, can walk; nor is it in a spiritual man, that
walketh to direct his steps; and such a walk also denotes continuance, in well doing, and a
progression or going on in it, and supposes ways to walk in. Christ, he is the chief and principal
way, and there are other paths which regard him, or relate and lead unto him; as the way of
truth, the path of ordinances, and of religious worship, both public and private, and the ways of
righteousness, holiness, and good works: the manner in which saints are to walk is as Christ
himself walked, after the Spirit, and not after the flesh, according to the rule of the word, which
is the standard of faith and practice, with prudence, wisdom, circumspection, and worthy of
God, and of that calling wherein they are called: and of such a walk there is a necessity; it
"ought", it must be both on the account of God, it being his will, and for his glory, and the
contrary would show great ingratitude to him; and on the account of the saints themselves, to
adorn them, and their profession, and preserve them from shame and disgrace, to show their
faith, and demonstrate their calling and election to others; and likewise on account of others,
partly for the winning of some, by recommending in this way the Gospel to them, and partly for
the bringing of others to shame and silence, who falsely accuse their good conversation. Now

3. when the apostle, and those that were with him, were at Thessalonica, they gave these saints
directions and instructions about their walk and conversation, to order it in such a manner as
might "please God"; which is not to be understood of rendering their persons acceptable to God
hereby, for the saints' acceptance with God is only in Christ the beloved; nor of their gaining the
love and favour of God by such means, for the love of God is from everlasting, and is free, and
sovereign, and does not arise from, or depend upon the holiness and obedience of men; or of
making peace with God by such a walk, for peace is only made by the blood of Christ; but of
doing those things, and in such a way God approves of: unregenerate men cannot please God,
nor anything they do, because they are destitute of the Spirit of God, and are without Christ, and
his grace and have not faith in him, without which it is impossible to please God; but what a
believer does in faith, from a principle of love, in the name and strength of Christ, and to the
glory of God, is approved of by God, and is acceptable to him through Christ, and for his sake;
and there are many things of this kind, as prayer, praise, acts of beneficence to the poor, and
indeed every good work and holy action: and inasmuch as they had been thus taught and
instructed how to behave and conduct in their outward walk and conversation, they are
entreated and exhorted to go on and abound in the work of the Lord:
so ye would abound more and more: that is, be more and more in the exercise of every
grace, and in the discharge of every duty, making advances in holiness of life, and perfecting it in
the fear of God. Beza's ancient copy, and another manuscript, as also the Alexandrian copy, and
some others, add between the preceding, and this last clause, "as ye also walk"; and so the
Vulgate Latin and Ethiopic versions seem to have read; commending them for their present and
past walk and conversation, in order to persuade and encourage them to go forward.
4. HENRY, “Here we have,
I. An exhortation to abound in holiness, to abound more and more in that which is good,
1Th_4:1, 1Th_4:2. We may observe,
1. The manner in which the exhortation is given - very affectionately. The apostle entreats
them as brethren; he calls them so, and loved them as such. Because his love to them was very
great, he exhorts them very earnestly: We beseech and exhort you. The apostle was unwilling to
take any denial, and therefore repeats his exhortation again and again.
2. The matter of his exhortation - that they would abound more and more in holy walking, or
excel in those things that are good, in good works. Their faith was justly famed abroad, and they
were already examples to other churches: yet the apostle would have them yet further to excel
others, and to make further progress in holiness. Note, (1.) Those who most excel others fall
short of perfection. The very best of us should forget those things which are behind, and reach
forth unto those things which are before. (2.) It is not enough that we abide in the faith of the
gospel, but we must abound in the work of faith. We must not only persevere to the end, but we
should grow better, and walk more evenly and closely with God.
3. The arguments with which the apostle enforces his exhortation. (1.) They had been informed
of their duty. They knew their Master's will, and could not plead ignorance as an excuse. Now as
faith, so knowledge, is dead without practice. They had received of those who had converted
them to Christianity, or been taught of them, how they ought to walk. Observe, The design of
the gospel is to teach men not only what they should believe, but also how they ought to live; not
so much to fill men's minds with notions as to regulate their temper and behaviour. The apostle
taught them how to walk, not how to talk. To talk well without living well will never bring us to
heaven: for the character of those who are in Christ Jesus is this: They walk not after the flesh,
but after the Spirit. (2.) Another argument is that the apostle taught and exhorted them in the

4. name, or by the authority, of the Lord Jesus Christ. He was Christ's minster and ambassador,
declaring to them what was the will and command of the Lord Jesus. (3.) Another argument is
this. Herein they would please God. Holy walking is most pleasing to the holy God, who is
glorious in holiness. This ought to be the aim and ambition of every Christian, to please God and
to be accepted of him. We should not be men-pleasers, nor flesh-pleasers, but should walk so as
to please God. (4.) The rule according to which they ought to walk and act - the commandments
they had given them by the Lord Jesus Christ, which were the commandments of the Lord Jesus
Christ himself, because given by authority and direction from him and such as were agreeable to
his will. The apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ were only commissioned by him to teach men to
observe all things whatsoever he had commanded them, Mat_28:20. Though they had great
authority from Christ, yet that was to teach men what Christ had commanded, not to give forth
commandments of their own. They did not act as lords over God's heritage (1Pe_5:3), nor
should any do so that pretend to be their successors. The apostle could appeal to the
Thessalonians, who knew what commandments he gave them, that they were no other than
what he had received from the Lord Jesus.
5. JAMISON,” 1Th_4:1-18. Exhortations to chastity; brotherly love; quiet industry;
abstinence from undue sorrow for departed friends, for at Christ’s coming all His saints shall
be glorified.
Furthermore — Greek, “As to what remains.” Generally used towards the close of his
Epistles (Eph_6:10; Phi_4:8).
then — with a view to the love and holiness (1Th_3:12, 1Th_3:13) which we have just prayed
for in your behalf, we now give you exhortation.
beseech — “ask” as if it were a personal favor.
by, etc. — rather as Greek, “IN the Lord Jesus”; in communion with the Lord Jesus, as
Christian ministers dealing with Christian people [Edmunds].
as ye ... received — when we were with you (1Th_2:13).
how — Greek, the “how,” that is, the manner.
walk and ... please God — that is, “and so please God,” namely, by your walk; in contrast to
the Jews who “please not God” (1Th_2:15). The oldest manuscripts add a clause here, “even as
also ye do walk” (compare 1Th_4:10; 1Th_5:11). These words, which he was able to say of them
with truth, conciliate a favorable hearing for the precepts which follow. Also the expression,
“abound more and more,” implies that there had gone before a recognition of their already in
some measure walking so.
6. CALVIN, “Furthermore. This chapter contains various injunctions, by which he trains up the
Thessalonians to a holy life, or confirms them in the exercise of it. They had previously learned what
was the rule and method of a pious life: he calls this to their remembrance. As, says he, ye have
been taught. Lest, however, he should seem to take away from them what he had previously
assigned them, he does not simply exhort them to walk in such a manner, but to abound more and
more. When, therefore, he urges them to make progress, he intimates that they are already in the
way. The sum is this, that they should be more especially careful to make progress in the doctrine
which they had received, and this Paul places in contrast with frivolous and vain pursuits, in which
we see that a good part of the world very generally busy themselves, so that profitable and holy

5. meditation as to the due regulation of life scarcely obtains a place, even the most inferior. Paul,
accordingly, reminds them in what manner they had been instructed, and bids them aim at this with
their whole might. Now, there is a law that is here enjoined upon us — that, forgetting the things that
are behind, we always aim at farther progress, (Philippians 3:13) and pastors ought also to make
this their endeavor. Now, as to his beseeching, when he might rightfully enjoin — it is a token of
humanity and modesty which pastors ought to imitate, that they may, if possible, allure people to
kindness, rather than violently compel them.
7. EBC, “PERSONAL PURITY
THE "finally" with which this chapter opens is the beginning of the end of the Epistle. The
personal matter which has hitherto occupied us was the immediate cause of the Apostle’s
writing; he wished to open his heart to the Thessalonians, and to vindicate his conduct against
the insidious accusations of his enemies; and having done so, his main purpose is fulfilled. For
what remains-this is the meaning of "finally"-he has a few words to say suggested by Timothy’s
report upon their state.
The previous chapter closed with a prayer for their growth in love, with a view to their
establishment in holiness. The prayer of a good man avails much in its working; but his prayer
of intercession cannot secure the result it seeks without the cooperation of those for whom it is
made. Paul, who has besought the Lord on their behalf, now beseeches the Thessalonians
themselves, and exhorts them in the Lord Jesus, to walk as they had been taught by him. The
gospel, we see from this passage, contains a new law; the preacher must not only do the work of
an evangelist, proclaiming the glad tidings of reconciliation to God, but the work of a catechist
also, enforcing on those who receive the glad tidings the new law of Christ. This is in accordance
with the final charge of the Saviour: "Go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the
name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost, teaching them to observe all things
whatsoever I have commanded you." The Apostle had followed this Divine order; he had made
disciples in Thessalonica, and then he had taught them how to walk and to please God. We who
have been born in a Christian country, and bred on the New Testament, are apt to think that we
know all these things; our conscience seems to us a sufficient light. We ought to know that,
though conscience is universal in the human race, and everywhere distinguishes between a right
and a wrong, there is not one of our faculties which is more in need of enlightenment. No one
doubts that men who have been converted from heathenism, like the Thessalonians, or the fruits
of modern missions in Nyassaland or Madagascar, need to be taught what kind of life pleases
God; but in some measure we all need such teaching. We have not been true to conscience; it is
set in our human nature like the unprotected compass in the early iron ships: it is exposed to
influences from other parts of our nature which bias and deflect it without our knowledge. It
needs to be adjusted to the holy will of God, the unchangeable standard of right, and protected
against disturbing forces. In Thessalonica Paul had laid down the new law, he says, through the
Lord Jesus. If it had not been for Him, we should have been without the knowledge of it
altogether; we should have had no adequate conception of the life with which God is well
pleased. But such a life is exhibited to us in the Gospels; its spirit and requirements can be
deduced from Christ’s example, and are explicitly set forth in His words. He left us an example,
that we should follow in His steps. "Follow Me," is the sum of His commandments; the one all-
embracing law of the Christian life.
One of the subjects of which we should gladly know more is the use of the Gospels in the early
Church; and this passage gives us one of the earliest glimpses of it. The peculiar mention of the
Lord Jesus in the second verse shows that the Apostle used the words and example of the Master

6. as the basis of his moral teaching; the mind of Christ is the norm for the Christian conscience.
And if it be true that we still need enlightenment as to the claims of God and the law of life, it is
here we must seek it. The words of Jesus have still their old authority. They still search our
hearts, and show us all things that ever we did, and their moral worth or worthlessness. They
still reveal to us unsuspected ranges of life and action in which God is not yet acknowledged.
They still open to us gates of righteousness, and call on us to enter in, and subdue new
territories to God. The man who is most advanced in the life which pleases God, and whose
conscience is most nearly identical with the mind of Christ, will be the first to confess his
constant need of, and his constant dependence upon, the word and example of the Lord Jesus.
In addressing the Thessalonians, Paul is careful to recognise their actual obedience. Ye do walk,
he writes, according to this rule. In spite of sins and imperfections, the church, as a whole, had a
Christian character; it was exhibiting human life in Thessalonica on the new model; and while
he hints that there is room for indefinite progress, he does not fail to notice their present
attainments. That is a rule of wisdom, not only for those who have to censure or to teach, but for
all who wish to judge soberly the state and prospects of the Church. We know the necessity there
is for abounding more and more in Christian obedience; we can see in how many directions,
doctrinal and practical, that which is lacking in faith requires to be perfected; but we need not
therefore be blind to the fact that it is in the Church that the Christian standard is held up, and
that continuous, and not quite unsuccessful efforts, are made to reach it. The best men in a
community, those whose lives come nearest to pleasing God, are to he found among those who
are identified with the gospel; and if the worst men in the community are also found in the
Church at times, that is because the corruption of the best is worst. If God has not cast off His
Church altogether, He is teaching her to do His will.
"For this," the Apostle proceeds, "is the will of God, even your sanctification." It is assumed here
that the will of God is the law, and ought to be the inspiration, of the Christian. God has taken
him out of the world that he may be His, and live in Him and for Him. He is not his own any
longer; even his will is not his own; it is to be caught up and made one with the will of God; and
that is sanctification. No human will works apart from God to this end of holiness. The other
influences which reach it, and bend it into accord with them, are from beneath, not from above;
as long as it does not recognise the will of God as its rule and support, it is a carnal, worldly,
sinful will. But the will of God, to which it is called to submit, is the saving of the human will
from this degradation. For the will of God is not only a law to which we are required to conform,
it is the one great and effective moral power in the universe, and it summons us to enter into
alliance and cooperation with itself. It is not a dead thing; it is God Himself working in us in
furtherance of His good pleasure. To tell us what the will of God is, is not to tell us what is
against us, but what is on our side; not the force which we have to encounter, but that on which
we can depend. If we set out on an unchristian life, on a career of falsehood, sensuality,
worldliness, God is against us; if we go to perdition, we go breaking violently through the
safeguards with which He has surrounded us, overpowering the forces by which He seeks to
keep us in check; but if we set ourselves to the work of sanctification, He is on our side. He
works in us and with us, because our sanctification is His will. Paul does not mention it here to
dishearten the Thessalonians, but to stimulate them. Sanctification is the one task which we can
face confident that we are not left to our own resources. God is not the taskmaster we have to
satisfy out of our own poor efforts, but the holy and loving Father who inspires and sustains us
from first to last. To fall in with His will is to enlist all the spiritual forces of the world in our aid;
it is to pull with, instead of against, the spiritual tide. In the passage before us the Apostle
contrasts our sanctification with the cardinal vice of heathenism, impurity. Above all other sins,
this was characteristic of the Gentiles who knew not God. There is something striking in that
description of the pagan world in this connection: ignorance of God was at once the cause and
the effect of their vileness; had they retained God in their knowledge, they could never have

7. sunk to such depths of shame; had they shrunk from pollution with instinctive horror, they
would never have been abandoned to such ignorance of God. No one who is not familiar with
ancient literature can have the faintest idea of the depth and breadth of the corruption. Not only
in writers avowedly immoral, but in the most magnificent works of a genius as lofty and pure as
Plato, there are pages that would stun with horror the most hardened profligate in Christendom.
It is hardly an exaggeration to say that on the whole matter in question the heathen world was
without conscience: it had sinned away its sense of the difference between right and wrong; to
use the words of the Apostle in another passage, being past feeling men had given themselves up
to work all manner of uncleanness. They gloried in their shame. Frequently, in his epistles, Paul
combines this vice with covetousness, -the two together representing the great interests of life to
the ungodly, the flesh and the world. Those who do not know God and live for Him, live, as he
saw with fearful plainness, to indulge the flesh and to heap up gain. Some think that in the
passage before us this combination is made, and that 1Th_4:6 -"that no man go beyond and
defraud his brother in any matter"-is a prohibition of dishonesty in business; but that is almost
certainly a mistake. As the Revised Version shows, the Apostle is speaking of the matter in hand;
in the Church especially, among brethren in Christ, in the Christian home, the uncleanness of
heathenism can have no place. Marriage is to be sanctified. Every Christian, marrying in the
Lord, is to exhibit in his home life the Christian law of sanctification and noble self-respect.
The Apostle adds to his warning against sensuality the terrible sanction, "The Lord is an avenger
in all these things." The want of conscience in the heathen world generated a vast indifference
on this point. If impurity was a sin, it was certainly not a crime. The laws did not interfere with
it; public opinion was at best neutral; the unclean person might presume upon impunity. To a
certain extent this is the case still. The laws are silent, and treat the deepest guilt as a civil
offence. Public opinion is indeed stronger and more hostile than it once was, for the leaven of
Christ’s kingdom is actively at work in society; but public opinion can only touch open and
notorious offenders, those who have been guilty of scandal as well as of sin; and secrecy is still
tempted to count upon impunity. But here we are solemnly warned that the Divine law of purity
has sanctions of its own above any cognisance taken of offences by man. "The Lord is an avenger
in all these things." "Because of these things cometh the wrath of God upon the sons of
disobedience."
Is it not true? They are avenged on the bodies of the sinful. "Whatsoever a man soweth, that
shall he also reap." The holy law of God, wrought into the very constitution of our bodies, takes
care that we do not violate it without paying the penalty. If it is not at the moment, it is in the
future, and with interest, -in premature old age; in the torpor which succeeds all spendthrift
feats, excesses of man’s prime; in the sudden breakdown under any strain put on either physical
or moral courage. They are avenged in the soul. Sensual indulgence extinguishes the capacity for
feeling: the profligate man would love, but cannot; all that is inspiring, elevating, redeeming in
the passions is lost to him; all that remains is the dull sense of that incalculable loss. Were there
ever sadder lines written than those in which Burns, with his life ruined by this very thing,
writes to a young friend and warns him against it?
"I waive the quantum o’ the sin,
The hazard o’ concealing;
But Och! it hardens a’ within,
And petrifies the feeling."
This inward deadening is one of the most terrible consequences of immorality; it is so
unexpected, so unlike the anticipations of youthful passion, so stealthy in its approach, so
inevitable, so irreparable. All these sins are avenged also in the will and in the spiritual nature.
Most men repent of their early excesses; some never cease to repent. Repentance, at least, is

8. what it is habitually called; but that is not really repentance which does not separate the soul
from. sin. That access of weakness which comes upon the back of indulgence, that breakdown of
the soul in impotent self-pity, is no saving grace. It is a counterfeit of repentance unto life, which
deludes those whom sin has blinded, and which, when often enough repeated, exhausts the soul
and leaves it in despair. Is there any vengeance more terrible than that? When Christian was
about to leave the Interpreter’s house, "Stay," said the Interpreter, "till I have showed thee a
little more, and after that thou shalt go on thy way." What was the sight without which Christian
was not allowed to start upon his journey? It was the Man of Despair, sitting in the iron cage, -
the man who, when Christian asked him, "How camest thou in this condition?" made answer: "I
left off to watch and be sober; I laid the reins upon the neck of my lusts; I sinned against the
light of the word and the goodness of God; I have grieved the Spirit, and He is gone; I tempted
the devil, and he is come to me; I have provoked God to anger, and He has left me; I have so
hardened my heart that I cannot repent." This is no fancy picture: it is drawn to the life; it is
drawn from the life; it is the very voice and tone in which many a man has spoken who has lived
an unclean life under the cloak of a Christian profession. They who do such things do not escape
the avenging holiness of God. Even death, the refuge to which despair so often drives, holds out
no hope to them. There remaineth no more a sacrifice for sin, but a fearful expectation of
judgment.
The Apostle dwells upon God’s interest in purity. He is the avenger of all offences against it; but
vengeance is His strange work. He has called us with a calling utterly alien to it, -not based on
uncleanness or contemplating it, like some of the religions in Corinth, where Paul wrote this
letter; but having sanctification, purity in body and in spirit, for its very element. The idea of
"calling" is one which has been much degraded and impoverished in modern times. By a man’s
calling we usually understand his trade, profession, or business, whatever it may be; but our
calling in Scripture is something quite different from this. It is our life considered, not as filling a
certain place in the economy of society, but as satisfying a certain purpose in the mind and will
of God. It is a calling in Christ Jesus; apart from Him it could not have existed. The Incarnation
of the Son of God; His holy life upon the earth; His victory over all our temptations; His
consecration of our weak flesh to God; His sanctification, by His own sinless experience, of our
childhood, youth, and manhood, with all their unconsciousness, their bold anticipations, their
sense of power, their bent to lawlessness and pride; His agony and His death upon the Cross;
His glorious resurrection and ascension, -all these were necessary before we could be called with
a Christian calling. Can any one imagine that the vices of heathenism, lust or covetousness, are
compatible with a calling like this? Are they not excluded by the very idea of it? It would repay
us, I think, to lift that noble word "calling" from the base uses to which it has descended; and to
give it in our minds the place it has in the New Testament. It is God who has called us, and He
has called us in Christ Jesus, and therefore called us to be saints. Flee, therefore, all that is
unholy and unclean.
In the last verse of the paragraph the Apostle urges both his appeals once more: he recalls the
severity and the goodness of God.
"Therefore he that rejecteth, rejecteth not man, but God." "Rejecteth" is a contemptuous word;
in the margin of the Authorised Version it is rendered, as in some other places in Scripture,
"despiseth." There are such things as sins of ignorance; there are eases in which the conscience
is bewildered; even in a Christian community the vitality of conscience may be low, and sins,
therefore, be prevalent, without being so deadly to the individual soul; but that is never true of
the sin before us. To commit this sin is to sin against the light. It is to do what everyone in
contact with the Church knows, and from the beginning has known, to be wrong. It is to be
guilty of deliberate, wilful, high-handed contempt of God. It is little to be warned by an apostle
or a preacher; it is little to despise him: but behind all human warnings is the voice of God:

9. behind all human sanctions of the law is God’s inevitable vengeance; and it is that which is
braved by the impure. "He that rejecteth, rejecteth not man, but God."
But God, we are reminded again in the last words, is not against us, but on our side. He is the
Holy One, and an avenger in all these things; but He is also the God of Salvation, our deliverer
from them all, who gives His Holy Spirit unto us. The words put in the strongest light God’s
interest in us and in our sanctification. It is our sanctification He desires; to this He calls us; for
this He works in us. Instead of shrinking from us, because we are so unlike Him, He puts His
Holy Spirit into our impure hearts, He puts His own strength within our reach that we may lay
hold upon it, He offers us His hand to grasp. It is this searching, condescending, patient,
omnipotent love, which is rejected by those who are immoral. They grieve the Holy Spirit of
God, that Spirit which Christ won for us by His atoning death, and which is able to make us
clean. There is no power which can sanctify us but this; nor is there any sin which is too deep or
too black for the Holy Spirit to overcome. Hearken to the words of the Apostle in another place:
"Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers
of themselves with men, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners,
shall inherit the Kingdom of God. And such were some of you: but ye were washed, but ye were
sanctified, but ye were justified in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ, and in the Spirit of our
God."
8.MEYER, “CALLED TO SANCTIFICATION
1Th_4:1-8
The first paragraph of this chapter exhorts to purity, the second to industry, the third to
expectation of the Second Advent. But the three are closely combined, because those who wait
for the Lord will instinctively wear white robes. The body is compared to a vessel, and we must
keep it clean for the Master’s use, walking day by day so as to please Him. Before Enoch was
translated, he had the testimony borne him that he had pleased God, Heb_11:5. It is God’s will
that we should be holy-the whole object of our redemption has this for its purpose. Therefore we
ought to be holy, and if we ought we can, and if we can we must; and if we must we will! If you
cannot possess yourself of your own nature, be possessed by the Holy Spirit. God giveth His
Holy Spirit for this purpose.
No one must come in between husband and wife to defraud either of the lawful love which each
should receive from the other. The home has been rescued and exalted by Christ, and the
Christian Church must still be its custodian, not only inculcating the ideal, but revealing the
sufficient power for its defense.
9. Charles Simeon, “ADVANCEMENT IN HOLINESS ENFORCED
1Th_4:1. We beseech you, brethren, and exhort you by the Lord Jesus, that as ye have received of us
how ye ought to walk and to please God, so ye would abound more and more.
OUR blessed Lord, when about to leave the world, commanded his Apostles to go and “proselyte all
nations” to his religion, “teaching them at the same time to observe and do all things that he had
commanded them.” Thus, in their ministrations, principle and practice were to go hand in hand. But many

10. are disposed to separate what he has thus united; some making the Gospel little else than a system of
moral duties; whilst others omit duty altogether, and occupy themselves entirely in establishing their own
peculiar views of its doctrines. Both of these parties we conceive to be wrong. A superstructure is nothing
without a foundation; neither is a foundation any thing without a superstructure. Each indeed has its
appropriate place; but both are alike important: for if, on the one hand, the superstructure will fall, without
a foundation; so on the other hand, it is for the sake of the superstructure alone that the foundation is laid.
St. Paul, “as a wise master-builder,” was careful at all times to lay his foundation deep and strong: but,
having done this, he was careful also to raise upon it a beauteous edifice, such as God himself would
delight to inhabit [Note: 1Co_3:10-11. Eph_2:22.]. This appears in all his epistles, not excepting those
which are most devoted to the establishment of sound doctrine. In the epistle before us he seems to have
had little else in view, than to assure the Thessalonians of his tender regard for them, and to excite them
to the highest possible attainments in universal holiness. He was ready enough to acknowledge, that his
instructions had produced the most salutary effects upon them; but he was anxious that they should still
press forward for higher attainments, as long as any thing should remain to be attained.
The words which we have just read consist of an appeal, and an exhortation. Let us consider,
I. The appeal—
St. Paul had not sought to amuse them by curious speculations; nor had he given them maxims whereby
they might please and gratify their fellow-creatures. His object had been to bring them to such a holy and
consistent “walk,” as would be pleasing and acceptable to their God. What kind of a walk that is, it will be
profitable for us to inquire.
If we would so walk as to please God, we must,
1. Walk in Christ, by a living faith—
[This is particularly required by St. Paul in the Epistle to the Colossians: “As ye have received Christ
Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in him [Note: Col_2:6.].” By this is meant, that we should walk in a continual
dependence on the Lord Jesus Christ for all those blessings which we stand in need of. He is the fountain
of them all: they are treasured up in him, on purpose that we may have them secured for us against every
enemy [Note: Col_3:3.]. Do we need a justifying righteousness? To him we must look for it, and from him
we must receive it: “We must call him, The Lord our Righteousness [Note: Jer_23:6.].” Do we need grace
to sanctify and renew our souls? From him we must receive it, according to our necessities
[Note: Joh_1:16.]. Our wisdom, our strength, our peace, our all, is in him, and must be derived from him in
the exercise of faith and prayer [Note: 1Co_1:30.]. Thus it was that St. Paul himself walked: “The life
which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me
[Note: Gal_2:20.].” And thus it is that we also must live, depending on him for every thing, and glorying in
him alone [Note: Isa_45:24-25.].]
2. Walk after Christ, by a holy conversation—
[This also is particularly specified by another Apostle as essential to an acceptable walk with God: “He
that abideth in him ought himself also so to walk even as he walked [Note: 1Jn_2:6.].” Our blessed Lord
“has left us an example, that we should follow his steps.” Like him, we must live altogether for God,
making it “our meat and our drink to do his will.” Like him, we must rise superior to all worldly cares, or
pleasures, or honours, “not being of the world, even as he was not of the world.” Like him, we must
exercise meekness and patience, and forbearance, and love even to our bitterest enemies, never
swerving in the least from the path of duty for fear of them, nor yielding to any thing of a vindictive spirit
on account of them, but rendering to them, under all circumstances, good for evil, and committing
ourselves entirely to the disposal of an all-wise God [Note: 1Pe_2:21-23.]. In a word, “the same mind
must be in us as was in him,” under every possible situation and circumstance of life [Note: Php_2:5.]:
and then, as “he pleased the Father always,” so shall we infallibly be approved by him in the whole of our
conversation [Note: Rom_12:2.].]

11. The Apostle, appealing to them that he had so taught them, exhorts them to press forward in the course
he had pointed out. Let us proceed then to consider,
II. The exhortation—
In this he acknowledges, that they had already done well: but he wishes them to redouble their exertions
in their heavenly way. Let us notice here,
1. The fact conceded—
[When he says, “Ye have received of us,” he does not mean merely that they had heard his instructions,
but that they had so heard them as to be influenced by them. It was at all times a delight to the Apostle to
acknowledge the good that was in his converts, and to bestow commendation on them as far as it was
due. And it is with unfeigned joy, that we can make the same acknowledgment respecting those to whom
we have ministered, We bless God that many have been brought to live by faith upon the Lord Jesus
Christ, and “so to walk as they have him for an ensample [Note: Of course, a congregation should be well
known before such concessions are made. They come best from a stated pastor, who is well acquainted
with their spiritual condition.]:” and it is our earnest desire and prayer to God, that our ministrations may
produce the same blessed effect on all. But whatever advances you may have made in the divine life, we
must call your attention to,]
2. The duty urged—
[Paul would not that any one of his converts should faint or be weary in well-doing. “The path of the just is
like that of the sun,” which advances without intermission to its meridian height and splendour
[Note: Pro_4:18.]. Having begun to run well, we must continue; yea, like racers in a course, we must
forget that which is behind, and press forward with ever-increasing ardour to that which is before, exerting
ourselves the more, the nearer we approach the goal [Note: Php_3:13-14.]. Behold then our duty: Have
we begun to “walk in Christ Jesus?” let us live more entirely upon him every day we live. Let us resemble
the branch of a vine, which incessantly derives its sap and nourishment from the stock, and derives it only
in order to its more abundant production of the choicest fruit [Note: Joh_15:4-5.]. Have we begun to
“walk after Christ?” let us seek a more entire conformity to his image, yea, a perfect transformation into it
“from glory to glory by the Spirit of the Lord [Note: 2Co_3:18.].” We must know no bounds, no limits to our
exertions: we must seek to “grow up into him in all things,” to attain “the full measure of his stature
[Note: Eph_4:13; Eph_4:15.],” be “holy as he is holy,” and “perfect as he is perfect.”]
The affectionate and earnest manner in which the Apostle urges this duty upon them, will furnish us with
an important and appropriate conclusion—
He might well have enjoined these things in an authoritative manner; but “for love’s sake he rather
besought them [Note: Philem. ver. 8, 9.].” But what an argument did he use! “I exhort you by the Lord
Jesus!” By this sacred name I would also beseech you, beloved brethren: I would entreat you,
1. By the consideration of all that he has done and suffered for you—
[Can you reflect on the humiliation, the labours, the sufferings to which he submitted for you, and not long
to requite him to the utmost of your power? He never assigned any bounds to his love, and will you fix
any bounds to yours? He never ceased from his work, till he could say, “It is finished:” and will you stop
short in yours? O brethren, “this is our wish, even your perfection [Note: 2Co_13:9.].” Let the same be
your wish, your labour, your continual pursuit.]
2. By the consideration of all the interest that he yet takes in your welfare—
[Night and day is he occupied in promoting the salvation of your souls. Though seated on his Father’s
throne, and partaking of all his Father’s glory, he is not forgetful of you. On the contrary, he is making
continual intercession for you, and administering the affairs of the whole creation for your good. Does he

12. see you deviating in any respect from the path which he trod? “Father,” he cries, “forgive them, and lay
not this sin to their charge.” Does he see the powers of darkness striving to ensnare you? He sends a
host of angels to your aid, that they may “minister unto you,” and “hold you up in their hands, that you
dash not your foot against a stone.” Does he see you ready to faint in your spiritual course? “Go,” says
he, “go, my Spirit, strengthen the hands, and encourage the heart, of that drooping saint:” “Take of the
things that are mine, and shew them unto him:” “glorify me before him:” and “fulfil in him all my good
pleasure.”
Now then, when the Saviour thus cares for you, will you intermit your care for him? When he is thus
managing your concerns, will you not with increasing confidence commit them to his care? When he is
doing every thing that can possibly be done for you, will you leave any thing undone that can be done for
him?]
3. By the consideration of the honour he will derive from you—
[He himself tells us, that “his Father is glorified in our fruitfulness [Note: Joh_15:8.].” And St. Paul speaks
of Christ also as magnified in his body, whether by life or death [Note: Php_1:20.]. What a thought is this!
Can you, my brethren, glorify the Father, and magnify the Lord Jesus, and will you not strive to do it?
Know assuredly, that “your professed subjection to the Gospel of Christ” does cause him to be
exceedingly magnified: and the more “the exceeding grace of God” appears in you, the more of praises
and adoration and thanksgiving will abound to him [Note: 2Co_9:13-14.]. Let this blessed prospect
animate your souls: and whereinsoever you have hitherto glorified him, seek to “abound more and more.”]
4. By the consideration of the glory that will accrue to him in the day of judgment—
[In that great day the Lord Jesus “Christ will be glorified in his saints, and admired in all them that believe
[Note: 2Th_1:10.].” The brighter his image shone upon them here, the more radiance will appear around
them there; and all will be as jewels to compose his crown [Note: Mal_3:17.]. When the demoniac had
confessed his inability to withstand the Lord Jesus, and yet had prevailed over seven men who attempted
to cast out the evil spirit, we are told that “the name of the Lord Jesus was magnified [Note: Act_19:17.].”
How then will it be magnified, when the extent of his power in you shall be seen, and your once dark
polluted souls shall shine forth as the sun in the firmament for ever and ever! Now then is the time for you
to exalt his name, and to augment his glory to all eternity. It is but a little time that you will be able to do
any thing for him: when death comes, all your opportunities to advance his glory will cease for ever. Up
then, and be doing. We have shewn you how to walk and to please God, and you have begun the
blessed work: but O, we entreat you to abound more and more! And may “the God of peace, who brought
again from the dead the Lord Jesus, that Great Shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the
everlasting covenant, make you perfect in every good work to do his will, working in you that which is
well-pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ: to whom be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen
[Note: Heb_13:20-21.].”]
10. BI, “Earnest exhortations to a high sanctity
Purity is the perfection of the Christian character.
It is the brightest jewel in the cluster of saintly excellencies, and that which gives a lustre to the
whole. It is not so much the addition of a separate and distinct grace as the harmonious
development of all. As Flavel has said, “What the heart is to the body that the soul is to the man;
and what health is to the heart holiness is to the soul.” In the prayer just offered the apostle
indicates that God will fill them with love to this end. He now urges the attainment. Human
agency is not destroyed but stimulated by the Divine.
Observe—

13. I. That a higher sanctity consists in living under a sense of the Divine approval.
1. Religion is a life. A “walk” implies continual approach to a goal. Religion is not an
ornament, a luxury, a ceremony, but a life, all penetrating, ever progressing, but sometimes
concealed.
2. Religion is a life modelled after the worthiest examples. “As ye have received of us.” The
Thessalonians not only received the wisest counsels from their teachers but they witnessed
their holy and consistent lives; and their attention was constantly directed to the all-perfect
example—Christ Jesus. It is the tendency of all life to shape itself after the character of its
strongest inward force. The love of God is the mightiest power in the life of the believer; and
the outer manifestation of that life is moulded according to the pattern of the inner Divine
ideal.
3. Religion is a life which finds its chief joy in the Divine approval. “And to please God.” It is
possible, then, so to live as to please God. What a powerful incentive to a holy life. Donne, on
his death bed, said, “I count all that part of my life lost which I spent not in communion with
God, or in doing good.”
4. Religion is a life capable of vast expansion. “So, ye would abound,” etc. God has made
every provision for our increase in holiness. There is no limit in our elevation but our faith.
II. That the necessity of a higher sanctity is enforced by Divine authority. “For this is the will of
God even your sanctification.”
1. A higher sanctity involves a conformity to the Divine nature. God is holy, and the aim of
the believer is to be like Him. There is to be not only an abstinence from impurity but a
positive experience of purity. By faith we participate in the Divine nature, and possess
qualities analogous to the Divine perfections—mercy, truth, justice, holiness.
2. A higher sanctity is in harmony with the Divine will what God proscribes must be
carefully avoided; what He prescribes must be done. His will is here emphatically expressed;
it is supported by abundant promises of help; and it is declared that without holiness no man
shall see the Lord. The will of God is at once the highest reason, the strongest motive, and
the final authority.
3. The Divine will regarding a higher sanctity is enforced by duly authorized messengers,
and well understood precepts (1Th_4:2). The apostle did not assume authority in any
dictatorial spirit. He delivered unto others what he had received. These precepts were well
known. Obedience should ever be in proportion to knowledge. Knowledge and practice are
mutually helpful to each other. To know and not to do is to incur the heaviest condemnation.
“Not My will, but Thine be done.”
III. That the possession of a higher sanctity is repeatedly urged by earnest exhortations. “We
beseech you, brethren, and exhort you.” Doctrine without exhortation makes men all brain, no
heart; exhortation without doctrine makes the heart full, leaves the brain empty. Both together
make a man. The apostle laboured in both. Here we have a fine example of the combination of a
tender, brotherly entreaty, with the solemn authority of a divinely commissioned ambassador.
Some people, says a certain writer, are as thorns; handle them roughly and they pierce you;
others as nettles; rough handling is best for your safety. A minister’s task is an endless one. Has
he planted knowledge?—practice must be urged. Is the practice satisfactory?—perseverance
must be pressed. Do they continue in well-doing?—they must be stimulated to further progress.
The end of one task is the beginning of another. Lessons: The believer is called to the attainment
of a higher sanctity—
1. By the voice of God.

14. 2. By the voice of His faithful ministers.
3. And by the aspirations of the life divinely planted within him. (G. Barlow.)
A fuller consecration
A superstructure is nothing without a foundation; neither is a foundation anything without a
superstructure. Each, indeed, has its appropriate place, but both are alike important; for if, on
the one hand, the superstructure will fall without a foundation, so, on the other hand, it is for
the sake of the superstructure alone that the foundation is laid. St. Paul, “as a wise master
builder,” was careful at all times to lay his foundation deep and strong; but, having done this, he
was careful also to raise upon it a beauteous edifice, such as God Himself would delight to
inhabit. This is evident in all his letters; and hence in this to the Thessalonians, having been the
instrument of their conversion, he would excite them to the highest possible attainments in
universal holiness.
I. His appeal He had not sought to amuse them by curious speculations; nor had he given them
maxims whereby they might please and gratify their fellow creatures. His object had been to
bring them to such a holy and consistent “walk” as would be pleasing and acceptable to their
God. What kind of a walk that is it will be profitable for us to inquire.
1. Walk in Christ by a living faith.
2. Walk after Christ by a holy conversation.
II. His entreaty. In this the apostle acknowledges that the Thessalonians had already done well;
but he wishes them to redouble their exertions in their heavenly path. Let us notice here—
1. The fact conceded.
2. The duty urged. He might well have enjoined these things in an authoritative manner, but
“for love’s sake he rather besought them.” He calls them “brethren,” and as brethren he
entreats them—
(1) By the consideration of all that Christ has done and suffered for them.
(2) By the consideration of all the interest He yet took in their welfare.
(3) By the consideration of the honour He would derive from them.
(4) By the consideration of the glory that will accrue to Him in the day of judgment. (C.
Simeon, M. A.)
A deepening consecration
I. The idea of a deeper consecration is a familiar one. Moses was set apart for special work.
Aaron and his brother priests were consecrated. Paul as an apostle, and others, were separated
by the Holy Spirit. That is the Old Testament idea of consecration—“setting apart a person or
thing for sacred uses.” The person might not at first be holy in himself; but because of his daily
association with sacred things, holiness was required of him. In New Testament times holiness
of person and holiness of service move along together. Conversion is the dedication of oneself
for the first time to God. A revival of religion is a rededication to more faithful service. The
discipline of sorrow, meditation, the work of faith and labour of love, etc., still further deepen its
spiritual life, and strengthen its activities.

15. II. There are occasions when the call for deeper consecration is clear and loud. Such was the
preaching of the Baptist, and of Peter and Paul, summoning to repentance. A great popular
excitement that moves deeply a people is providential preparation. An exigency in life when one
is hurled from his self-dependence down upon his dependence upon God; a responsibility that
compels one to put up new bulwarks to faith and a new criticism upon life; a calamity that opens
all the doors and windows of life—those things teach you of your exposure and of your need that
some pavilion drop its curtains around you. These indeed are felt to be Divine exhortations to
higher, closer walk with God.
III. This deeper consecration is not necessarily the doing of new things, but doing the old things
better. The advice of Paul to the Thessalonians was to abound more and more in the very things
in which they had been active. We can fritter away strength in variety. We can make the moral
nature nervous by seeking continually a new excitement. Perfection and finish are not gained in
trying new things, but by repetition. We become perfect penmen by making the same letters
over and over again. Skill in the mechanic arts, in sculpture and in painting, is gained by
repetition of the fundamentals of each. Wear the channels of the old religious routine deeper
then. Lean with more entire self-abandonment upon the tried methods of Church activity. The
Christian teacher will find the occasion of deeper consecration in the deeper work along the old
lines of fidelity, study, and prayer. The officers of the Church will find their open door into more
satisfactory life along the tried ways of tender consideration, faithful regard to vows, bearing still
better responsibilities. The Christian father and mother will find their life growing less troubled
and worldly if they make the family altar a place of greater regard, and the religious oversight of
the family a matter of more constant attention. “Which things also ye do, but I beseech you,
abound more and more.” Depth comes in running constantly in the old curriculum.
IV. You are to be led to this deeper consecration by an old motive. “I beseech and exhort you by
Jesus Christ.” It was the love of God in Jesus Christ that first broke your heart from the ways of
sin, and it is this same love that must lift the life to higher and finer activity.
V. The danger to which this consecration is exposed. The danger of routine, of system, of
familiar acquaintance with Biblical truths, the very thing the worth of which we have been
advocating.
1. Simply because consecration must run in the old channels and be drawn on by the same
motive, there is danger that we miss the vital contact with the Lord Jesus, that the spirit dies
out while the system goes on. Church and prayer meeting attendance may degenerate into a
profitless habit. Your soul may be satisfied with the form and die for want of sustenance.
Class teaching may become as spiritless as school teaching—the mere teaching of the lesson.
Great alarm about our own spiritual condition should smite us when we find ourselves doing
Christian duties for the sake of getting rid of them and of appeasing the conscience.
2. Then, again, the performance of Christian duties leads us into expressions of faith and
desire that they may become stereotyped. Biblical language is the fittest medium by which to
express our prayer and our faith. And the quickened soul can find comfort and relief for
itself in repeating the same form. But let the fire die out, and living contact with Jesus
shrink, and the form of words will remain, and we will have the startling inconsistency of
devout expression enveloping a shrivelled and dead heart.
3. There may be movement in Christian life but no progress. Like the water wheel that turns
round in the same place that it did ten years ago, may be the Christian life that runs the
weekly round of Church services. Like the door that swings on the same hinge, but never
moves from the door post, may be the Christian life excessively busy, continually in and out,
but never advancing into the interior truths of God’s Word. Christian life is not a treadmill
round; Christianity is not meant to teach us how to talk, but to teach us how to walk, and

16. walking is orderly, constant progress towards a terminus, a glory. The path of the just
shineth more and more unto the perfect day.
VI. The practical methods by which the deeper consecration can be maintained without falling
into spiritless form.
1. Let there be an act of consecration; a holy hour when we surrender ourselves anew to God.
We know that specious argument of the evil one about “resolving and re-resolving, and
doing the same.” We know that timidity of the honest mind that shrinks from a new self-
dedication where it has so often failed; and yet how is life to be lifted up to finer issues unless
there is the strong desire and resolve of the spirit? We do not drift into consecration and holy
life?
2. Assist the memory. We fail in our consecration because we forget. Business engrosses the
mind. A multitude of cares drives out the one special thought of the heart. Time slips along,
weaving into the web of life new things with bright or dark colours. The very success of the
first efforts of consecrated days has a subtle danger. Against this flood of insidious attack we
must rear a defence that shall remain with us. I have known a book, for instance, selected
because its contents and aim were along the line of the consecrated purpose, to be to the
memory a continual reminder. I have known a text of Scripture chosen for its
appropriateness to some individual weakness or to fill up the gaps of failure, or to string the
soul to its best music hung as a motto on the wall, that every time you looked you were
reminded of the weakness, the failure, the hope of your life. I have known men who have sat
down and drawn up for themselves rules of life, meeting their deficiencies and aspirations by
specific regulations, making their daily activity run along these prescribed channels, and
their biographies have proved how good, how conscientious, how holy they were. I need only
mention the names of Jeremy Taylor and Jonathan Edwards. I have known a voluntary
service given to some spiritual meeting whose regular recurrence was continual reminder, or
to some charity whose blessed work was constant call for service, or to some personal
visitation of the poor and the sick.
3. Assist the spiritual nature by renewed study of the character of Jesus. The sculptor who is
to make a model of your face and head, the painter who is to paint your portrait, asks of you
many sittings, and the more sittings you can give him the more perfect will be bust or
portrait. The daily study of Jesus will fashion the life after the glorious model. (S. B.
Bossiter.)
The Christian’s walk and its object
I. The Christian’s walk.
1. You young Christians have just got a walking power. There was a time when you thought
you could stand, and you tried, but fell helplessly by the wayside. But Jesus of Nazareth
passed by and said, “Wilt thou be made whole.” You responded in faith, and like the man at
the Gate Beautiful you found a new energy and walked and leaped and praised God.
2. This new power was given you to enable you to realize that “they that wait upon the Lord
shall … walk and not faint.” The sun may be very hot, and you ready to give way, but
remember this promise; and remember it when the goal of the journey seems a great way off.
Don’t be discouraged.
3. Paul had given these Christians directions how to walk. He did not leave them to wander
about in the darkness. We, too, have directions. Look up the word “walk” in your
concordance. We are to—

17. (1) “Walk by faith.” We do not behold the form of Jesus leading us on to victory, nor is
our reward visible, but we apprehend both by Faith.
(2) “Walk in the Spirit,” opposed to which is “walking after the flesh,” by worldly
considerations, and a desire for gratification.
(3) “Walk in wisdom.” Do not give unnecessary offence, or obtrude your religion in a
disagreeable way. The perfect Christian is a perfect gentleman.
(4) “Walk honestly,” or rather honourably. There is a certain un affected dignity that
belongs to the friend of God, and commands the respect of men. The child of the
heavenly royal household cannot stoop to social meannesses, or commercial sharp
practices.
(5) “Walk circumspectly,” i.e., accurately. Be particular about little things, little vanities,
self-indulgences, worldlinesses, sins of tongue and temper. There are some who have
only a vague, not an accurate notion of what a Christian’s walk ought to be; others walk
timorously always expecting to make mistakes. Some strike out wildly never thinking of
where they are going; others go painfully as though they were walking on egg shells or
glass bottles. Let us avoid these two mistakes—not to allow ourselves to be so bound and
hampered as to lose our spiritual liberty; but not to disregard trifles which put together
make such a great thing in the end.
II. The motive. “To please God.” We shall not walk rightly without a right motive. God looks at
that as well as at the effect.
1. What are you going to live for? To be happy? To get to heaven? You may get both, but
these are not what you were sent into the world for.
2. If you want to find out what should be the object of your life, look at Jesus. From first to
last He lived simply to please the Father. He came to do the Father’s will, and He did it.
(1) You may do a man’s will because you are his ,servant paid to do it, and therefore your
duty to do it, or because he is your friend and you delight to do it. Between these two
classes of motives lies the difference between the law and the gospel.
(2) There are two ways of seeking to please God, We often notice in earthly relationships
that there is less of conscious anxiety to please where love and confidence are strongest,
while on the other hand strenuous efforts to please are frequently the results of
misgivings as to the disposition of the person they are designed to please. The same may
be said of our relationship towards God. There are some who really wish to please Him,
and yet say, “I wonder whether this or that has pleased Him.” But the blessedness of the
Christian position is this, that we are accepted in the Beloved so that He can regard us
with complacency in order that we may go on to please Him.
3. Let the thought of pleasing God ever take precedence of the thought of pleasing ourselves
and others.
4. You are pleasing God much if you are trusting Him much. To doubt Him is to cast a
reflection on His changeless love. (W. H. M. H. Aitken, M. A.)
How to walk so as to please God
I. With faith. Without this “it is im possible to please” Him.
II. With humility. He abases the proud, show ing His abhorrence of them, but exalts the humble
because He delights in them.

18. III. With obedience.
1. Active. “To obey is better than sacrifice.” “Children, obey … for this is well pleasing unto
the Lord.”
2. Passive. When in sickness, trial, etc. Nothing is more acceptable than the spirit which
says, “Thy will be done.” “The servant that doeth not his Lord’s will shall be beaten with
many stripes.”
IV. In communion with his people. “They that feared the Lord spake often one to another; and
the Lord hearkened and heard.” Would He have done so had He been indifferent or displeased?
“Where two or three are met together in My name, there am I in the midst of them.”
V. Benevolently. “With such sacrifices God is well pleased.” (G. Burder.)
Walking so as to please God
I. What is it to please God?
1. Negatively. Not as if we could do anything in its own nature pleasing to God (2Co_3:5).
2. Positively. So that He may accept us in Christ (Mat_3:17).
(1) Our persons (Eph_1:6).
(2) Our actions (1Pe_2:5; Luk_2:14).
(a) So as not to be angry with us for them.
(b) So as to be favourable to us (Pro_8:35; Zep_3:17).
(c) So as to give us a reward (Mat_6:4; Mat_10:42).
II. Why should we please God? Because—
1. He is so great and mighty (Jer_5:22).
2. So just.
3. So gracious (Psa_130:4).
4. His pleasure is the highest happiness (Psa_30:5; Psa_63:3).
5. This is the end of Christ’s incarnation and our profession (Act_3:26; 2Ti_2:19).
III. How may we please Him?
1. In general (Heb_11:5).
(1) We must be renewed (Rom_8:8).
(2) Do what He has commanded.
(3) Therefore do it that we may please Him.
(4) Do it with understanding and discretion (1Co_14:15).
(5) With cheerfulness (2Co_9:7; Psa_40:8).
(6) In faith (Heb_11:6).
(7) To His glory (1Co_10:31).
2. Particularly, these things please Him—

19. (1) Repentance (Eze_33:11; Psa_51:17).
(2) Humility (Isa_57:15; Isa_66:2; 1Pe_5:8).
(3) Trust in His promises (Psa_147:11).
(4) Submission to His providences (1Sa_3:18; Psa_39:9).
(5) Prayer (1Ki_3:10; 1Ti_2:1-4).
(6) Frequent meditations upon Him (Psa_19:14).
(7) Justice (Mic_6:7-8; Psa_51:19).
(8) Mercy and forgiveness (Psa_103:9-11; Mat_6:14).
(9) Charity to the poor (Php_4:18).
(10) Thankfulness (Psa_69:30-31).
IV. Use: Endeavour to please God. Consider—
1. Otherwise you cross His end in making you (Pro_16:4).
2. So long as He is displeased you are in danger of hell.
3. If you please Him you need please none else (Pro_16:7).
4. Nor take care of anything (Mat_6:33; 1Jn_3:22).
5. He will bless all His providences to you (Rom_8:28).
6. Pleasing God is the work of heaven (Psa_103:20-21).
7. Please Him here, and enjoy Him hereafter. (Bp. Beveridge.)
Pleasing God
There are in the world self-pleasers, men-pleasers, God-pleasers. The last only deserve our
imitation.
I. God can be pleased. That being the case—
1. He notices our conduct.
2. Observes the character of our actions.
3. Has a disposition with regard to men.
II. He can be well pleased (Col_3:20). Those please Him best who are most like in character and
action to Him in whom He was “well pleased.”
III. He can be easily pleased. He requires no impossible services. His approbation is not wrung
from Him with difficulty.
IV. He can always be pleased. “He waiteth to be gracious.” When the Christian walks in the way
of His commandments, he walks with God.
V. He ought to be pleased. This is required by—
1. Himself. His commands all amount to this. His glory is promoted by this.
2. Man. Pleasing God is the directest way of securing the welfare of the world.

20. 3. Our own well being. To please God is to have a tranquil conscience, the approbation of the
God, an endless reward. (B. Pugh.)
Pleasing God is
I. Possible. He has been pleased with men—Enoch, Noah, Daniel, etc. This is wonderful—
wonderful that the Infinite should condescend to notice any one individual so insignificant as
man. Still more wonderful that He should be pleased with anything that man can do. God is a
pleasable Being, and man can contribute something to His pleasure.
II. Incumbent. “Ye ought.” Why?
1. Because He is the absolute Proprietor of your existence. He has a right to everything you
have.
2. He is the most righteous of sovereigns. He does not require you to do anything that is not
right and just.
3. He is the most tender of fathers. The only way to please yourselves is to please Him. (D.
Thomas, D. D.)
So ye would abound more and more—
I. What is it to abound?
1. Negatively. Not as if we could do more than is required. For—
(1) We cannot do all that is required (Psa_119:96).
(2) We can do nothing as it is required (2Co_3:5).
(3) Yet if we could it is no more than our duty (Luk_17:10).
2. Positively.
(1) Endeavour to go beyond others (1Co_12:31).
(2) Be more serious in pleasing God than in anything else (Ecc_9:10; Rom_12:11;
Mat_6:33).
(3) Every day excel ourselves and grow better (2Pe_3:18).
II. What should we abound more and more in?
1. In works of piety towards God; in—
(1) Godly sorrow for sin (2Co_7:9-11)).
(2) Turning from our present lusts (Rom_6:12).
(3) Faith in Christ for pardon (Eph_1:7); for grace (Act_3:26; Joh_15:4-5; Php_4:13).
(4) Dependence on God’s mercy (Pro_3:5).
(5) Making Him our only joy and love (Mat_22:37).
(6) Prayer (Rom_12:12).
(7) Hearing His Word (Luk_4:16), and receiving His sacrament.
2. In works of equity to our neighbour—

21. (1) Wronging none (Mat_5:44).
(2) Endeavouring the good of all (Gal_6:10).
(3) Being charitable to the poor (1Ti_6:18; 2Co_9:6-8).
III. Why should we abound more and more?
1. We are commanded (Heb_6:1; 2Pe_1:5-6; Eph_6:10; 1Co_15:58).
2. Unless we grow better we shall surely grow worse.
3. We can never abound too much; nor indeed enough (Php_3:11).
4. The more we abound the more glory we shall have (Luk_19:16-19; 1Co_15:41-42).
IV. How shall we abound more and more?
1. Often think of spiritual things—
(1) Of God (Psa_63:6; Psa_139:18).
(2) Of Christ.
(3) Of the world to come (Amo_6:3).
Conclusion:
1. Motives.
(1) We have abounded in sin too long (1Pe_4:3).
(2) Our life is continued for that end.
(3) The more we abound the more comfort we shall have.
(4) Abounding is the best sign of the truth of grace (Jas_2:26).
(5) Heaven will make amends for all.
2. Uses.
(1) Of reproof.
(a) To those who never please God, but abound in sin.
(b) To those who take more pains to abound in riches than in graces.
(2) Of examination. Compare your present with your past.
(3) Of exhortation. “Abound more and more.” (Bp. Beveridge.)
Of abounding more and more
If any one wishes to see what it is to begin well in Christian faith and practice and at the same
time what care should be taken not to depend too much on mere beginnings however
praiseworthy, he cannot do better than examine carefully these two Epistles to the
Thessalonians. The apostle seems hardly to know how to say enough of their faith and charity,
or of the noble and self-denying way in which they had received the gospel (see 1Th_1:5-8;
1Th_3:7-10). There could not well be more promising converts; and yet the very next words
show how anxious he was that they might not trust in their first promising conversion, “Praying
exceedingly that we might see your face”: to what purpose? not for his own pleasure, but “to
perfect that which was lacking in their faith.” The same feeling runs through the whole of the

22. letter; his joy in what they had done is everywhere tempered by a real and serious anxiety lest
they should stop short and begin to think that they had done enough.
I. Now, with regard to the absolute necessity of continual improvement, it appears in the first
place from this circumstance that if we rightly value the first good beginning, we must from the
very nature of the case go on from one degree of holiness to another. Men may very well do
something which looks like repentance upon poor imperfect worldly reasons, and may deceive
themselves and others into a notion that they are true Christian penitents; as, for example,
intemperance may be left off for health or character’s sake, or a quarrel may be made up with a
view to our worldly interest, or the fear of approaching death may drive men against their will to
long-neglected ordinances of religion; and it is no wonder if such a repentance as this very soon
begins to stand still: if, having reached such and such a point, the man imagines himself good
enough, and takes no more pains to be better: but this is quite contrary to the nature of true
repentance upon Christian principles.
II. This is yet more absolutely necessary, because, if men do not improve they are in practice
sure to go back. They cannot stay where they are; they must either grow worse or better. For it is
the nature of all strong impressions to act vehemently on the mind at first, and after a little time
to fade away as it were and gradually become weaker and weaker. Thus the fear of God and the
dread of sin and punishment, in which repentance usually begins, if we do not resolutely and on
purpose endeavour to keep them up, are sure to lose their force on our minds.
III. It may help us in judging more truly of our duty in this respect if we put ourselves as nearly
as we can in the place of these Thessalonians, who had learned Christianity from the lips of St.
Paul himself. For, indeed, we are very nearly in their place; we, like them, have received of the
apostles how we ought to walk and to please God. The only difference is, that they received this
knowledge by word of mouth, we by reading the apostolic letters and listening to the apostolic
Church. Now what sort of a spirit and temper should we have judged these Thessalonians to be
of, if we found that as soon as their teacher was gone away to Athens, they had become careless
about his instructions, thought much of what they had done already, and took no pains whatever
to improve? Whatever censure we pass on them we must acknowledge surely to be due to
ourselves, in such measure as we neglect the duty of amending daily because our Teacher is out
of sight. Yet this is what we are sure to do, if we be not constantly exhorted and reminded of it;
nay, there is great reason to fear that all exhortation may prove in vain.
1. For, first of all, having been bred up from our cradle in the knowledge and understanding
of our Christian duty, we are apt to fancy ourselves familiar with the practice of it too. We
are convinced in our minds that we know it well enough; and this of itself inclines us to be
too soon satisfied with our accustomed way of doing it.
2. Again, a sincere Christian will be on his guard that he make no dangerous comparisons
between himself and his neighbours. It will never do to take it for granted that we keep our
place in respect of piety and goodness—that we are no worse than we were, in fact—because
we are no worse in comparison with them. It may be that all around you are gone astray
from God, and in the way to everlasting ruin: if such turn out to be the case, you may excuse
and flatter yourself now that you are no worse than they; but it will be little comfort to you in
the day of account, when you find that your condemnation is as bad as theirs. (Plain
Sermons by Contributors to “Tracts for the Times.”)
The necessity of progress
It is a sure law that, as Luther said, “He who is a Christian is no Christian.” He who thinks that
he has gained the fulness of the faith has lost it. Progress is a requirement of spiritual vitality;

23. and the recompense of past progress is the assurance of progress to come. In the words of a
famous Hebrew saying, “The reward of a precept is a precept.” He, that is, who has fulfilled one
commandment is allowed to receive another. He who has reached one height of truth catches a
glimpse of a loftier height beyond. Each attainment in the Divine life becomes the occasion for
the revelation of fresh duty. The crown of labour for a being such as man is not rest but longer
and nobler toil. It is true, we know, that to him that hath more shall be given. And it is no less
true that of him that hath done much shall more be required. Each achievement of the
successful worker was indeed God’s gift. And what we receive, what we realize, what we gain—
however we call the process—is not for contemplation, or for hoarding, but for further service.
What is reaped supplies the seed corn for a richer harvest. The gifts of God answer to His
requirements, and the requirements of God answer to His gifts. “Grace for grace”—grace to be
used in return for grace already used—is the law which regulates God’s blessing; “from strength
to strength” is the description of the Christian’s course. “We must abound more and more.” We
must seek untiringly for signs of growing nearness to God, and show what we have found. The
trained eye learns to see beauties which were once undistinguished. The trained ear learns to
interpret voices which were once inarticulate. And is it so—do we confidently trust that it always
will be so—spiritually with ourselves? Are we able as the years go on to fix our eyes more steadily
on God, shrinking with livelier sensibility from sin more than from suffering, realizing our
fellowship one with another in Him with a more intense vividness, looking, and showing that we
look, beyond the wild confusion of the hour to the one will of peace and righteousness which
cannot at last want accomplishment? Are we able to listen to the Divine wisdom conversing with
us as with sons in the words of apostles and prophets, speaking to us in our own tongues,
interpreting our own thoughts, answering the questions with which our hearts are full? Are we
able to rest with increasing peace in the contemplation of Him who is perfect light, and to bring
before Him who is perfect compassion the unceasing prayer of sympathetic remembrance for all
with whom we are united as fellow workers in the present and as fellow heirs of the future? Are
we able to pause in the solemn stillness of thought till we are alone with God, and to offer
ourselves to the fire of His love; that so little by little all may be consumed in us—all passion and
pride, all self-seeking and self-trust—which does not minister to His glory, which does not, that
is, make clearer to men His infinite perfection? Are we able to regard the world in its
unspeakable vastness, life with its inevitable sorrows, nature with its contrasts (to our eyes) of
beauty and terror, or grace and mocking grotesque ness, as even now gathered up in Christ, and
seek for ourselves the development of every faculty by which we may be taught to spell out better
the One Name written in all that is finite? We tremble perhaps as we put such questions to
ourselves. But they stir us at least with a sense of what our faith is. They make plain to us to
what we are called. They show an obligation to progress, a capacity for influences of which, it
may be, we are habitually unmindful. They condemn us perhaps. But the sentence of
condemnation is the message of hope. It is a revelation of God’s love as well as of man’s failure.
The strength for service and the opportunities for service are still given to us through the gospel.
(Bp. Westcott.)
Abounding more and more
An aged Christian man who had been much benefited through life by God’s blessing, after
thankfully referring to his more than fifty years of health, prosperity, and abounding mercies,
remarked, “I am convinced that if I have to be any happier than I have been or am, I must get
more religion.” The Hindus have a legend that a very little man once got a promise from a great
king that he should have as much territory as he could overstep in three strides. Then the little
man began to grow till his head reached the sky, and at last, when he took his three strides, with
the first he overstepped all the land, with the second he overstepped all the seas, and with the

24. third he compassed all the heavens. If we grow in knowledge, in wisdom, in grace, and in
everything that is good, as we ought, we may at length be able to compass much that will be
most advantageous to ourselves and to others. (H. K. Burton.)
2 For you know what instructions we gave you by the
authority of the Lord Jesus.
1.BARNES,” For ye know what commandments - It was but a short time since Paul was
with them, and they could not but recollect the rules of living which he had laid down.
By the Lord Jesus - By the authority of the Lord Jesus. Some of those rules, or
commandments, the apostle refers to, probably, in the following verses.
2. CLARKE, “Ye know what commandments we gave you - This refers to his
instructions while he was among them; and to instructions on particular subjects, which he does
not recapitulate, but only hints at.
3, GILL, “For ye know what commandments we gave you,.... When among them; such
as those of faith and love, the ordinances of the Gospel, baptism, and the Lord's supper, and all
such as relate to the worship and service of God, to the discipline of Christ's house, to their
behaviour one towards another, and their conduct in the world: and which were delivered to
them, not as from themselves, and by their own authority, but
by the Lord Jesus; in his name, and by his authority, and as ordered by him; for their
commission ran to teach men all things, whatsoever Christ commanded: now since they knew
what these commandments were, and whose they were, and the obligation they lay under to
regard them, the apostle makes use of it as a reason or argument to engage them to obedience to
them; for he that knows his Lord's will, and does it not, shall be beaten with many stripes,
Luk_12:47.
4. JAMISON, “For ye know what commandments we gave you,.... When among them;
such as those of faith and love, the ordinances of the Gospel, baptism, and the Lord's supper,
and all such as relate to the worship and service of God, to the discipline of Christ's house, to

25. their behaviour one towards another, and their conduct in the world: and which were delivered
to them, not as from themselves, and by their own authority, but
by the Lord Jesus; in his name, and by his authority, and as ordered by him; for their
commission ran to teach men all things, whatsoever Christ commanded: now since they knew
what these commandments were, and whose they were, and the obligation they lay under to
regard them, the apostle makes use of it as a reason or argument to engage them to obedience to
them; for he that knows his Lord's will, and does it not, shall be beaten with many stripes,
Luk_12:47.
3 It is God’s will that you should be sanctified: that
you should avoid sexual immorality;
1.BARNES,” For this is the will of God, even your sanctification - It is the will or
command of God that you should be holy. This does not refer to the purpose or decree of God,
and does not mean that he intended to make them holy - but it means that it was his command
that they should be holy. It was also true that it was agreeable to the divine will or purpose that
they should be holy, and that he meant to use such an influence as to secure this; but this is not
the truth taught here. This text, therefore, should not be brought as a proof that God intends to
make his people holy, or that they are sanctified. It is a proof only that he requires holiness. The
word here rendered “sanctification” - ᅋγιασµᆵς hagiasmos - is not used in the Greek classics, but
is several times found in the New Testament. It is rendered holiness, Rom_6:19, Rom_6:22;
1Th_4:7; 1Ti_2:15; Heb_12:14; and sanctification, 1Co_1:30; 1Th_4:3-4; 2Th_2:13, and
1Pe_1:2; see the Rom_6:19 note; 1Co_1:30 note. It means here “purity of life,” and particularly
abstinence from those vices which debase and degrade the soul Sanctification consists in two
things:
(1) In “ceasing to do evil;” and,
(2) In “learning to do well.” Or in other words, the first work of sanctification is in overcoming
the propensities to evil in our nature, and checking and subduing the unholy habits which we
had formed before we became Christians; the second part of the work consists in cultivating the
positive principles of holiness in the soul.
That ye should abstain from fornication - A vice which was freely indulged among the
pagan, and to which, from that fact, and from their own former habits, they were particularly
exposed. On the fact that they were thus exposed, and on the reasons for these solemn
commands on the subject, see the Act_15:20 note, and 1Co_6:18 note.

26. 2. CLARKE, “This is the will of God, even your sanctification - God has called you to
holiness; he requires that you should be holy; for without holiness none can see the Lord. This is
the general calling, but in it many particulars are included. Some of these he proceeds to
mention; and it is very likely that these had been points on which he gave them particular
instructions while among them.
That ye should abstain from fornication - The word πορνεια, as we have seen in other
places, includes all sorts of uncleanness; and it was probably this consideration that induced
several MSS., some versions and fathers, to add here πασης, all. Directions of this kind were
peculiarly necessary among the Greeks, and indeed heathens in general, who were strongly
addicted to such vices.
3, GILL, “For this is the will of God, even your sanctification,.... Which is another
reason to enforce the above exhortation. "Sanctification" is internal or external. Internal
sanctification is the work of the Spirit of God, and is a principle of spiritual life in the soul, a
divine and spiritual light in the understanding, a flexion of the will to the will of God, and a
settlement of the affections on divine things, and is an implantation of every grace in the heart.
External sanctification arises from this, and lies in holiness of life and conversation; and is what
is chiefly designed, as appears both by what goes before, and follows after: and this is "the will of
God"; the will of his purpose and decree; for in the same decree that he wills the salvation of any
by Jesus Christ, he also wills their sanctification in heart and life, and here and hereafter: and
this is his approving will, or what is well pleasing in his sight, being agreeable to his nature, and
divine perfections, particularly his holiness, in which he is glorious; and it is his will of
command, and what he requires in his law, which is holy, just, and good, and perfectly agrees
with the sound doctrine of the Gospel, and the revelation of his will in both.
That ye should abstain from fornication: which is particularly mentioned, abstinence
from it being a branch of external holiness; and because that this sin was common among the
Gentiles, and not esteemed a sin by them; as also to observe to these Christians, that as simple
fornication was not to be allowed of, much less other acts of uncleanness, as adultery, incest,
sodomy, and the like, which were iniquities that greatly prevailed among the Heathens. The
Syriac version renders it, "from all fornication"; on this subject the apostle enlarges in some
following verses.
4. HENRY, “A caution against uncleanness, this being a sin directly contrary to
sanctification, or that holy walking to which he so earnestly exhorts them. This caution is
expressed, and also enforced by many arguments,
1. It is expressed in these words: That you should abstain from fornication (1Th_4:3), by
which we are to understand all uncleanness whatsoever, either in a married or unmarried state.
Adultery is of course included, though fornication is particularly mentioned. And other sorts of
uncleanness are also forbidden, of which it is a shame even to speak, though they are done by
too many in secret. All that is contrary to chastity in heart, speech, and behaviour, is contrary to
the command of God in the decalogue, and contrary to that holiness which the gospel requires.
2. There are several arguments to enforce this caution. As, (1.) This branch of sanctification in
particular is the will of God, 1Th_4:3. It is the will of God in general that we should be holy,
because he that called us is holy, and because we are chosen unto salvation through the

27. sanctification of the Spirit; and not only does God require holiness in the heart, but also purity
in our bodies, and that we should cleanse ourselves from all filthiness both of flesh and spirit,
2Co_7:1. Whenever the body is, as it ought to be, devoted to God, and dedicated and set apart
for him, it should be kept clean and pure for his service; and, as chastity is one branch of our
sanctification, so this is one thing which God commands in his law, and what his grace effects in
all true believers.
5. JAMISON,” For — enforcing the assertion that his “commandments” were “by (the
authority of) the Lord Jesus” (1Th_4:2). Since “this is the will of God,” let it be your will also.
fornication — not regarded as a sin at all among the heathen, and so needing the more to be
denounced (Act_15:20).
6. CALVIN, “For this is the will of God. This is doctrine of a general nature, from which, as
from a fountain, he immediately deduces special admonitions. When he says that this is the will of
God, he means that we have been called by God with this design. “For this end ye are Christians —
this the gospel aims at — that ye may sanctify yourselves to God.” The meaning of the
term sanctification we have already explained elsewhere in repeated instances — that renouncing
the world, and clearing ourselves from the pollutions of the flesh, we offer ourselves to God as if in
sacrifice, for nothing can with propriety be offered to Him, but what is pure and holy.
That ye abstain. This is one injunction, which he derives from the fountain of which he had
immediately before made mention; for nothing is more opposed to holiness than the defilement
of fornication, which pollutes the whole man. On this account he assigns the lust of concupiscence to
the Gentiles, who know not God. “Where the knowledge of God reigns, lusts must be subdued.”
By the lust of concupiscence, he means all base lusts of the flesh, but, at the same time, by this
manner of expression, he brands with dishonor all desires that allure us to pleasure and carnal
delights, as in Romans 13:14, he bids us have no care for the flesh in respect of the lust thereof. For
when men give indulgence to their appetites, there are no bounds to lasciviousness. 567
Hence the
only means of maintaining temperance is to bridle all lusts.
As for the expression, that every one of you may know to possess his vessel, some explain it
as referring to a wife, 568
as though it had been said, “Let husbands dwell with their wives in all
chastity.” As, however, he addresses husbands and wives indiscriminately, there can be no doubt
that he employs the term vessel to mean body. For every one has his body as a house, as it were, in
which he dwells. He would, therefore, have us keep our body pure from all uncleanness.
And honor, that is, honorably, for the man that prostitutes his body to fornication, covers it with
infamy and disgrace.

28. 4 that each of you should learn to control your own
body[a] in a way that is holy and honorable,
1.BARNES,” That every one of you should know how to possess his vessel - The
word “vessel” here (σκεሞος skeuos), probably refers to the body. When it is so used, it is either
because the body is frail and feeble, like an earthen vessel, easily broken 2Co_4:7, or because it
is that which contains the soul, or in which the soul is lodged. Lucret. Lib. iii. 441. The word
vessel also (Greek σκεሞος skeuos) was used by the latter Hebrews to denote a wife, as the vessel
of her husband. Schoettg. Hor. Heb. p. 827. Compare Wetstein in loc. Many, as Augustine,
Wetstein, Schoettgen, Koppe, Robinson (Lex.), and others, have supposed that this is the
reference here; compare 1Pe_3:7. The word body, however, accords more naturally with the
usual signification of the word, and as the apostle was giving directions to the whole church,
embracing both sexes, it is hardly probable that he confined his direction to those who had
wives. It was the duty of females, and of the unmarried among the males, as well as of married
men, to observe this command. The injunction then is, that we should preserve the body pure;
see the notes on 1Co_6:18-20.
In sanctification and honour - Should not debase or pollute it; that is, that we should
honor it as a noble work of God, to be employed for pure purposes; notes, 1Co_6:19.
2. CLARKE, “How to possess his vessel - Let every man use his wife for the purpose
alone for which God created her, and instituted marriage. The word σκευοςanswers to the
Hebrew ‫כלי‬ keli, which, though it signifies vessel in general, has several other meanings. That
the rabbins frequently express wife by it, Schoettgen largely proves; and to me it appears very
probable that the apostle uses it in that sense here. St. Peter calls the wife the weaker Vessel,
1Pe_3:7. Others think that the body is meant, which is the vessel in which the soul dwells. In this
sense St. Paul uses it, 2Co_4:7 : We have this treasure in earthen Vessels; and in this sense it is
used by both Greek and Roman authors. There is a third sense which interpreters have put on
the word, which I forbear to name. The general sense is plain; purity and continency are most
obviously intended, whether the word be understood as referring to the wife or the husband, as
the following verse sufficiently proves.
3, GILL, “That everyone of you should know how to possess his vessel,.... By which
may be meant, either a man's wife, or his body, and it is not very easy to determine which, for

29. the Jews call both by this name. Sometimes they call (p) a woman ‫,גולם‬ which the gloss says is a
"vessel" unfinished. It is reported (q), that when R. Eleazar died, Rabbenu Hakkadosh would
have married his widow, and she would not, because she was ‫כלי‬‫של‬‫קדושה‬ , "a vessel of holiness",
greater than he. Moreover, it is said (r), that
"he that forces (a young woman) must drink ‫,בעציצו‬ "in his own vessel" how drink in his own
vessel? though she be lame, though she be blind, and though she is stricken with ulcers.''
The commentators (s) on the passage add,
"in the vessel which he has chosen; that is to say, whether he will or not, he must marry her;''
see Pro_5:15. And again, they sometimes call a man's wife his tent: hence that saving (t),
"wtva ala wlha Nya "there is no tent but his wife", as it is said, Deu_5:30, go, say to them, get
you into your tents again.''
And certain it is, that the woman is called the "weaker vessel" in 1Pe_3:7, between which
passage and this there seems to be some agreement. The same metaphor of a "vessel" is made
use of in both; and as there, honour to be given to the weaker vessel, so here, a man's vessel is to
be possessed in honour; and as there, husbands are to dwell with their wives according to
knowledge so here, knowledge is required to a man's possessing his vessel aright. Now for a man
to possess his vessel in this sense, is to enjoy his wife, and to use that power he has over her in a
becoming manner; see 1Co_7:4, and which is here directed to "in sanctification and honour";
that is, in a chaste and honourable way; for marriage is honourable when the bed is kept
undefiled; and which may be defiled, not only by taking another into it, and which is not
possessing the wife in sanctification and honour, it is the reverse, for it is a breaking through the
rules of chastity and honour; but it may even be defiled with a man's own wife, by using her in
an unnatural way, or by any unlawful copulation with her; for so to do is to use her in an unholy,
unchaste, wicked, and dishonourable manner; whereas possessing of her according to the order
and course of nature, is by the Jews, in agreement with the apostle, called (u), ‫מקדש‬‫עצמו‬ , "a
man's sanctifying himself", and is chaste, and honourable. And it may be observed, that the Jews
use the same phrase concerning conjugal embraces as the apostle does here. One of their canons
runs thus (w):
"though a man's wife is free for him at all times, it is fit and proper for a disciple of a wise man to
use himself ‫,בקדושה‬ "in", or "to sanctification".''
When these thing's are observed, this sense of the words will not appear so despicable as it is
thought by some. The body is indeed called a "vessel"; see 2Co_4:7, because in it the soul is
contained, and the soul makes use of it, and its members, as instruments, for the performance of
various actions; and, with Jewish writers, we read of ‫כלי‬‫גופו‬ , "the vessel of his body" (x); so then,
for a man to possess his vessel in sanctification and honour, is to keep under his body and bring
it into subjection, and preserve it in purity and chastity; as the eyes from unchaste looks, the
tongue from unchaste words, and the other members from unchaste actions; and to use it in an
honourable way, not in fornication, adultery, and sodomy; for, by fornication, a man sins against
his own body; and by adultery he gets a wound, and a dishonour, and a reproach that will not be
wiped away; and by sodomy, and such like unnatural lusts, men dishonour their own bodies

30. between themselves: particularly by "his vessel", as Gataker thinks, may be meant the
"membrum virile", or the genital parts, which, by an euphemism, may he so called; see 1Sa_21:5
4. HENRY, “This will be greatly for our honour: so much is plainly implied, 1Th_4:4. Whereas
the contrary will be a great dishonour. And his reproach shall not be wiped away, Pro_6:33.
The body is here called the vessel of the soul, which dwells therein (so 1Sa_21:5), and it must be
kept pure from defiling lusts. Every one should be careful in this matter, as he values his own
honour and will not be contemptible on this account, that his inferior appetites and passions
gain not the ascendant, tyrannizing over his reason and conscience, and enslaving the superior
faculties of his soul. What can be more dishonourable than for a rational soul to be enslaved by
bodily affections and brutal appetites?
5. JAMISON,” know — by moral self-control.
how to possess his vessel — rather as Greek, “how to acquire (get for himself) his own
vessel,” that is, that each should have his own wife so as to avoid fornication (1Th_4:3;
1Co_7:2). The emphatical position of “his own” in the Greek, and the use of “vessel” for wife, in
1Pe_3:7, and in common Jewish phraseology, and the correct translation “acquire,” all justify
this rendering.
in sanctification — (Rom_6:19; 1Co_6:15, 1Co_6:18). Thus, “his own” stands in opposition
to dishonoring his brother by lusting after his wife (1Th_4:6).
honour — (Heb_13:4) contrasted with “dishonor their own bodies” (Rom_1:24).
5 not in passionate lust like the pagans, who do not
know God;
1.BARNES,” Not in the lust of concupiscence - In gross gratifications.
Even as the Gentiles - This was, and is, a common vice among the pagan; see the Act_15:20
note; Rom_1:29 note; Eph_4:17-18 notes, and the reports of missionaries everywhere.
Which know not God - See the Rom_1:21, Rom_1:28 notes; Eph_2:12 note.
2. CLARKE, “Not in the lust of concupiscence - Having no rational object, aim, nor
end. Some say, “not like beasts;” but this does not apply as they who use it wish, for the males