Be Complete

I Thessalonians 1:2-3 “We give thanks to God always for you all, making mention of you in our prayers; Remembering without ceasing your work of faith, and labour of love, and patience of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ, in the sight of God and our Father;”

Most good things in life would cease to be good if they were not complete. Do you like eggs? Many of you would say yes. Do you like them raw? Of course not! They are not complete. Some may dispute this next example, but what good is a hamburger without ketchup? What about a ranch without horses? A car is a good thing, right? What about a car without its keys? Again, these things aren’t much good when they are not complete. Like these illustrations, many things in our walk with God are not good unless they are complete. In I Thessalonians 1:3, we see three of these good things that should be complete in our lives.

First, the verse speaks of a “work of faith.” We all should be busy working for the Lord, but our work needs to be completed by faith. As the saying goes, we should work as if everything depends on us, but we should pray as if everything depends on God. Both work and faith are important!

The Lord does not want us to pray for things if we are not willing to do what we can about it. For instance, do not pray for the lost souls in your city if you are not willing to go out and give the Gospel to the people you are praying for! On the other hand, do not work for God without depending upon His enabling. Without His power, our work is futile. To be complete, the work we do for Christ must be a “work of faith.”

Secondly, the verse speaks of a “labour of love.” Labor and love must go together to be complete. Haven’t we all received crummy service at a gas station before? That’s a good example of labor without love! But we can be just as guilty of laboring for the Lord without love in our hearts. God is not interested in what we do for Him if we are not motivated by love.

This “love” isn’t talking about love for everyone, though we should be characterized by love for other people. But the love that should complete all of our labor is a love for God. This takes the drudgery out of labor and makes it something the Lord can bless. The other side is true as well. We should not profess love without being willing to put actions with our words. Labor and love need to go together to be complete.

Lastly, verse 3 speaks of a “patience of hope.” Hope here is not a wistful maybe but a confident expectation. Did you know that patience is something that comes from hope? If we truly expect something to happen, we will have the patience to wait for it to happen. What is our hope? Verse 10 tells us to “wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, even Jesus, which delivered us from the wrath to come.” Jesus is coming again! That is our hope.

No matter how good or bad your day may be, always remember that this life is not the final story. We have a God in heaven we will see face-to-face and an eternity in heaven to look forward to. These truths give us the patience to wait on God. We have something to live for!