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Lastly I have a short slideshow of the previous week of the things some of the things and people and places we did at Vacation Bible School.

I'd like to share that with you guys because I know a lot of you were praying.

So here's a little window into what we did last week a lot of silliness, but yeah thankfully a lot of prayer as well, which is actually [literaly] the focus of this morning's message.

We're going to conclude chapter one today where Paul shares that he's praying always for the church there. And I know that when we have things like this, where there's just a clear, you know, event or or crisis, it's easy sometimes for us to, in those places, find moments of intercession.

Right? To to remember to pray for one another in the things going on and the challenges that we face.

But Paul prays uh for the church in Thessalonica from a place of gratitude, and he gives us good direction to I think increase and encourage our our intercessory prayer life for one another outside of just in the day to day, right?

Not just when we're in crisis or or in facing sickness or a big event or or tragedy has happened in our lives but we still are called to pray for one another and support and just be there before the Lord in an intercessory way, and so we get good direction in this morning's passage concerning that.

So thank you for praying for vacation Bible school that is a week that always tests and grows those volunteering um in walking in their faith as much as it teaches and encourages and a fun way the children and lives about the truth of God, so I know that this last week wasn't possible without those prayers because when we're praying we're acknowledging the power of God; we're saying Lord we need you, God we're inviting you in, we're seeking to understand your leading. Where we're seeking to recognize your provision and your sufficiency in our lives, we're inviting his work in our hearts and an opportunity to surrender our overwhelm and ourselves to take on his heart and love for those around us, right? More of him, less of me.

And that is our confidence in living effectively in the kingdom as ambassadors of Christ. It's not our resources or our influence that finds lives impacted in eternity, it's God reigning in my life like Zechariah 4:6 tells us, that it's not by might nor by power but it's by my spirit says the Lord of hosts. And so as we show up. We need to continually be looking to God and in finding ourselves with him and and when we pray we're choosing to seek that and put that first right make that the priority it's an exercise of our faith as we trust and surrender to God, right?

And all that simply within a conversation simply saying, "Lord this is what I'm facing; God this is what I am, my heart is."

Simply to take the time to say "Hello God."

Acknowledging him here's my heart here are my cares knowing that he cares for me and will speak and work as we quiet and humble ourselves before him, knowing that your cares are in God's hands.

Like the song many of us sung as kids, if you know that the Lord is keeping you what you got to worry about, right?

Matthew 6:32 says "For after all these things the Gentiles seek but your heavenly father knows that you need all these things and he is a good good father."

So that's the place where thankfulness flows from we saw last week Paul was bound to give thanks he said he had no other response because he saw the work of God.

It was fitting, not forced from him, and Paul writes this letter in the mind of Christ, not looking out for his own interests, but for the interests of others.

And when we see this prayer of intercession today, or their prayer.

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When I say intercession, a prayer on behalf of others, right, it comes forth as chapter one draws to a close.

Paul is sharing throughout his letter how and what he prays for, and I think we do well to take note of that, letting him teach us in the way that we pray for one another, and letting God lead us in his word of how we interact through prayer. We're having a look at just two verses this morning,

and these are two verses that are not hopes and dreams for the church. They're not vision and direction for them to follow, but it's a window into what God burdened the Apostle Paul's heart for his people to intercede with the wisdom of a wise master builder.

So this prayer comes on behalf of this blessed and growing and yet young fellowship of believers. I think we should understand and know the heart of God towards us in this prayer as well, but also join with this heart in seeking it on behalf of those God burdens our hearts for, of those that we are also bound

to give thanks for. So our passage this morning is very small, but join me with a word of prayer and we'll look at these two verses today.

And Heavenly Father, I thank you for this time. God, I thank you for your word, Lord, and today as we begin a new month, Lord, as we celebrate our nation's founding, Lord, that we would know where our eternal home is.

God, that we would step out, Lord, in a confidence of eternity and, Lord, desire to see that kingdom grow. So we thank you in Jesus' name.

Amen. All right, well, 2 Thessalonians, chapter 1, verse 11 and 12 today. Paul says, "Therefore we also pray always for you that our God would count you worthy of this calling and fulfill all the good pleasure of his goodness and the work of faith with power.

That the name of our Lord Jesus Christ may be glorified in you and you in him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ." There's a lot in these two verses here, but Paul is sharing us the prayer that he has been lifting up on behalf of the church there in Thessalonica. A handy

tool in your Bible reading is if you've ever come across or start a passage with the word "therefore" like we have in verse 11 today, make sure that you know what the "therefore" is therefore because it is directly drawing upon the previous section to be able to continue forward from. And it is a crucial context to rightly

proceed with even in this prayer this morning. Here it is the things that Paul had thanked God for, right?

In verse 3, he says, "We are bound to thank God always for you, brethren," and then he went on to share the things that he was grateful to God that he was witnessing in the church, right? You can go back and listen to last week's message, but in bullet points, it was simply a growing faith that there

was an increasing in the scope and the strength of their trust in God in their lives. There was an abounding love, right?

That it wasn't just a receiving of the love of God in their lives, but it was overflowing that it was applied towards others, this love of God that is active and sacrificial and life-giving. That there was patience in the church, that there was this enduring in the midst of persecution that made known God's righteous judgment, that he

is long-suffering, right? That he seeks to give all opportunity for the gospel to be received.

And then finally, this surrendered vengeance or an offering of forgiveness, knowing that one day all things will be held into account and God has everything in his hands and there will be a punishment of evil and wickedness, and yet knowing our call to go out as light to the world and as ambassadors of the gospel. That we

preach a message of salvation, right? That those who accept his sacrifice will be glorified in his great love on that day and today give a life of testimony of the free gift and love of God and Jesus Christ, right?

These are all good things Paul is thankful for and witnesses in the church there as it's growing. But he says again, he's bound to give thanks for these things.

There's a healthy church on all accounts, full of believers, and rather than saying then, "Okay, you guys are good," I'll focus my attention elsewhere, right? On this kind of dumpster fire that is in Corinth, right?

Nope. He says, "I'm going to pray therefore always for you" in verse 11. "Therefore we pray always for you," right?

It's since they were excelling that they needed prayer. It was since that they were doing good things and God was working in their life that Paul was moved to be sure to pray for these people that he knew, right?

Pray for these people that he was concerned about, right? And that might challenge our understanding and practice of intercessory prayer, right?

When we pray for others, do we consider and ask God on their behalf for help and guidance and provision and blessing? I'll bet that that is typically dominated by situations that we don't envy, right?

I'm glad I'm not going through that myself. I'm going to pray for them, right?

Places you don't want to find yourself in, right? A hurricane-torn city or something like that, right?

Illnesses, trials, persecution. That is typically places we find ourselves moved to intercessory prayer in.

But I would say it's to a lesser extent that we see and come to mind people that we consider excelling in their walk, right? That we recognize are being presently blessed with the Lord and unity within their family and community.

But Paul shows us here that prayer that's committed always in the good as well as the bad for them. He says, "So therefore, because I'm bound to thank God for you and the things that he's doing rightly and powerfully in your life, I'm going to continue to pray for you," and that he says, "God would count you

worthy of this calling." So we see a prayer on guard interceding. It's not time to install a security system when the robbery is in progress, right?

Who do we thank God for in our lives? Let's be praying for them, right?

Make them a regular part of your time with God and seeking their blessing and maturity in the relationship with the Lord. Like Proverbs 27, "Iron sharpens iron, so a man sharpens the countenance of his friend," right?

We might be sharp, but we can be sharpened. So we hear in 2 Thessalonians, I think there's happening an occurrence of that in prayer.

"Lord, count them worthy of this calling. Count you worthy." Those three words there to be counted worthy is one word in the original language, but it's a phrase that seeks to rightly represent, right?

To keep in correspondence, right? To be on the same page with, so to speak, of what it is that our calling is, right?

What is our job as the children of God, right? What has he entrusted us with as he has gone back to the right hand of the throne of God?

It's to be to the praise of his glory. It's to be witnesses to his name.

It's to go out and make disciples and shine his light, to bear his image to a world that is in destruction and darkness. If we look back to verse 10, it's that we are witnesses of his glory, of his truth and his love, right?

That when he comes in that day to be glorified in his saints, to be admired among those who believe, we have a calling to worship him and in that to be glorified among the world. All things clearly proclaimed in scripture, but alive in us, right?

God is good. God is true.

God is faithful. But our calling is to be living stones of that, right?

A holy temple to God, ambassadors for his name. 2 Corinthians 5:20 says, "Now then we are ambassadors for Christ as though God were pleading through us.

We're imploring you on Christ's behalf, be reconciled to God." That God would count you worthy of this calling. Very literally, if God were to hold your life to communicate his truth and love, right?

Would it be accurate? Do we just know the truth of the gospel and accept it and trust it?

Or are we worthy of that calling? Are we living in accordance with that life that he has given us?

This is an area that I know that we can all grow in and always grow in because there are places where that's easier to do, isn't it? Maybe at church it's easier to be a Christian, right?

Versus when you're alone in your car or you're at home, right? And the things of more familiar and intimate like raw emotions are able to be expressed, right?

When we're not so much in a formal setting, right? There's areas we can grow in always.

You don't know anything about me other than I'm human and I know that the flesh is weak, right? It's to be human.

Worthy there is not to achieve a status, to receive something, but it's a true representation of something, right? Like a worthy opponent.

It's somebody who's not maybe just dressed the part, right? He's the knight that comes out all dressed up in the armor.

He's got the sword and the lance, right? And the shield.

But he's not a worthy opponent. He's just some guy they picked out of the crowd, right?

A worthy opponent would be somebody who truly is the knight that they're dressed like, right? That we would be counted worthy of this calling, truly being who we claim to be inside and out, genuine in the presence.

We obtain that worthiness through the work of Christ. Hebrews 10:19 through 22 says, "Therefore, brethren, we have boldness to enter the holiness by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way which he consecrated for us through the veil that is his flesh." And having a high priest over the house of God, let's draw near with

a true heart, right? A worthy heart, a heart that is genuine and full assurance of faith.

Having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water, right? We're worthy of this calling when we know where our salvation has been found, right?

Then those weaknesses that we have, right? They become opportunities for testimony, opportunities for seeking God in when they're pointed out and we say, "Yes, it's not me." It's simply but by the blood of Christ that I am able to have a confidence and peace within my heart.

And I can realize that the failings that I have are not worth holding onto. But I can lay those down in their pride and seek forgiveness because I know that I've been forgiven so much.

We're counted worthy when we agree with God that he is the way, the truth, and the life. Those are the true ambassadors of our calling to glorify God, right?

More of Christ, less of me. Continuing in verse 11, he also prays that their lives would fulfill all the good pleasure of his goodness and the work of faith with power.

The good pleasure of God's goodness. That sounds good, doesn't it?

Are we engaged in that? In his goodness, in his good pleasure, or our good and our good pleasure?

Are we growing in awareness and practice of extending grace into our world, the grace of God? Do we know God's good pleasure, right?

What it is that his heart to bless his creation is found in? And the thing is that we don't have to guess what that is, right?

We have the very word of God. We have his very heart in revelation to us.

And as his children born again, new creations in Christ, he directly shapes our hearts as the potter and we are the clay. In Philippians 2:13, we're told that it's God who works in you both to will and to do his good pleasure, right?

So in seeking these people to fulfill the good pleasure of his goodness, it's seeking a continued work of God in their lives, that their hearts would be being transformed into his, right? Being molded by his hands to be the vessels for him to use for his purposes.

And we know that there's nobody that can do that other than God himself because there is none good but God. But if he's the one shaping my heart, if he's the one that I'm looking to to guide and create in me the outpouring of his love through my life, well, then I can trust that what will be

coming from that is good, right? His goodness is holy.

It's not partial. It finds the just and the just.

It's like the rain that comes down from heaven. It blesses all.

And God is blessed because of that. It's poured out upon his creation and it says his good pleasure to bless.

And so Paul, as he's praying, he's desiring to see the church continue rightly representing the Lord with good things being engaged with. At the end of verse 11, it says with faith and power, that it would be a work of faith in their life.

Faith is actually going forward in what you know God is calling you to and who he is. It's with a confidence responding to his leading in our lives.

We find in James 2, verse 14 through 17, he asks, "What does a prophet, my brother, and if somebody says he has faith but does not have works, can faith save him? Or if a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food and one of you says depart in peace and be warmed and filled, but

you do not give them the things which are needed for the body, what does it profit?" So thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead. Faith isn't simply proclaiming something.

It's knowing God's leading and having confidence in God to provide and then showing up in that. This thing of him calling us and being his ambassadors, this thing of his good pleasure and his goodness being worked through our lives to the world, it's not, again, in hopes and dreams.

It's not in simply having the right words to say and showing up, but finding ways that God would practically lead us in fulfilling those things in our world. And it comes with power.

It comes with his power. If we're trying to step out in the flesh to show the world the goodness of God in our will, we're no better than Simon the sorcerer, desiring the power of God but not surrendered to his will.

But to walk by faith, not only do we get the will of God, but we are walking in the power of God as well. We can expect his power to provide, to glorify God, to witness his truth to the world.

These are the prayers that the church always needs. And yet we tend to put ourselves first, our plans and our provision.

And yet Paul prays for a growing and thriving church to live ever more for the Lord. The reason is in verse 12.

He says that, right? Why?

Is it for the sake of the church? Is it for the sake of Paul and the witness to his ministry?

No, Paul seeks verse 12, that the name of the Lord Jesus Christ may be glorified in you. It's not even for our mental health, right?

It's to glorify Jesus, that his name would be lifted up. Not mine or Calvary, Eureka or yours.

Only Jesus Christ has the power to save, right? Paul witnessed this failure in the church and in Corinth and its tendency.

He says in 1 Corinthians 1:13, he asks, "Was Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you?

Were you baptized into the name of Paul?" As much as Paul loves this church fellowship, right? As much as I love this church fellowship, I know that to continue as pastor, I have to to some extent, but it's more because I love Jesus, more because I desire this fellowship to see him embraced and shine the truth of

his salvation to our community, to see a body of believers that glorifies Jesus and that he is glorified in us. And that can find us as peculiar people in the midst of that.

But what makes us great is that we are in him. Like this church was in verse 1, the church of the Thessalonians in God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, right?

It's that the name of our Lord Jesus Christ may be glorified. The reason he grows and works in the lives of his people, right?

The reason Paul intercedes and seeks God's goodness and a work of faith with power is that the name of Jesus may be glorified. Jesus says in John 15:4, "Abide in me and I in you as the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, and unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me." But

when we do live in him, right? When he is glorified through our lives, through this church body, his truth and his love and his name become glorified, made to be seen for the greatness and the effectiveness that it is in us.

And that fearfully and wonderfully made work of God that you are in his hands begins to shine then in its witness. The end of verse 12 says that the name of our Lord Jesus Christ may be glorified in you and you in him, right?

Ultimately, who you are will come through in its truest reflection, right? In its truest ability to be who you are created to be as a child of God.

And this is a message and witness that a world that is wandering around right now, unaware of their purpose or worth and searching for that through sexuality or a career or some kind of a legacy, Paul knows, God knows for us, it's only when Jesus is glorified in you that you will truly shine for the person that

you are made to be, right? And that's according to the grace of God and the Lord Jesus Christ there.

It's an unmerited blessing, but powerful truth that we get to understand who we were created to be when we're following our creator. And it's God's grace that is able to do this, right?

That we find ourselves free from the miery clay, right? Alive from walking in the death and bondage of sin, redeemed from the destruction to shine the truth of God and the beauty of his love in creative and unique ways that were made by his wise and powerful hand.

It's an unmerited gift. It's something that is undeserved and unfathomably good.

It's by grace we are saved through faith. Why is that?

It's lest anyone should boast. It's God's grace that while we were still sinners, Christ has died for us.

It's that same love is what Paul prays is continued in. It is not left that they wouldn't lose sight of the grace of God in their life as they walk worthy of the calling, as they fulfill his good pleasure, as they exercise faith in his power.

We need prayer like this in our lives. There are people who maybe you envy, you look up to as spiritual examples, right?

Spiritual fathers in your lives. And yet this prayer is needed.

Think of the pastors you may have known through the years who have fallen, right? Who have encouraged lives and yet have become disillusioned or fallen morally, right?

We can sometimes put on a pedestal things that we thank God for in our life, but Paul knows, man, we need to pray always for them, right? Because the enemy is there, right?

The devil would love to disqualify, to discredit, right? To make you a hypocrite in the sight of the world.

The devil wants you to pursue that lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life over the goodness of God, to lie and say that it is just as worthy, but no. It hides the impact and the importance of grace, of a grace that is able from a God who is love.

Acts 20:32 says, "Brethren, I commend you to God and the word of his grace, which is able to build you up and give you an inheritance among all those who are sanctified." And so maybe this week, spend a little extra time making sure our prayer list contains a prayer of a similar heart towards those that you thank

God for. Intercede for them.

You can be confident that this prayer is in accordance with God's word because it is in God's word. That the name of our Lord Jesus Christ may be glorified more and more in not just those people that you might look up to or are thankful for in your life, but also they in him.

Amen. Amen. Lord, and I thank you again for this time, God.

And I thank you that we can, Lord, come before your table of grace this morning, Lord, and remember what it is and how it is that we stand so boldly before this throne. God, I thank you for this time and pray that you'd bless it in Jesus' name.

Amen.