Well, Paul, you seem to like these people at Thessalonica.
"Oh, yes, they are my joy and crown."
Why?
"Well, when Christ comes, I want to have this whole crowd there. I am going to see them at the rapture - changed in a moment and caught up to be with the Lord. They are my joy and crown. They are our hope, our joy, our crown of rejoicing in the presence of the Lord Jesus at His second coming."
All who win souls are going to have something to rejoice about when Jesus comes! - John R. Rice [Comments on 1st Thessalonians, pg. 15]
We should be careful that Jesus will find our hearts unblameable in holiness when He comes.
Holiness is not a bad word. "Holiness" and "sanctification" mean the same thing in the Bible--being set apart for God. It does not necessarily mean sinlessness. None of us are without sin. - John R. Rice [Comments on 1st Thessalonians, pg. 19]
When one gets saved he is set apart for Heaven. He is set apart for God. And so you may call a saved person a saint. The letters are addressed "to the saints at Corinth," saved people who are set apart for Heaven. - John R. Rice [Comments on 1st Thessalonians, pg. 19]
What is wrong with the modernist is not his intelligence, but his sin. Education never made a modernist and a Christ-rejecter. There are no facts in science or history which make the Bible unacceptable to an educated man. There is only a wickedness in the heart that turns people away from Christ and the Bible. Jesus very properly said in Luke 24:25, "O fools, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken." - John R. Rice
There is another sense in which one may grow in sanctification. In the high priestly prayer in John 17 Jesus prayed, "Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth" (vs. 17). Christians are to be set apart and changed and are more and more dedicated to Jesus as they read and love the Bible, and live by it. Daily use of the Bible tends to get one's mind more and more from the world, and to Jesus Christ. - John R. Rice [Comments on 1st Thessalonians, pg. 20]
"This is the will of God, even your sanctification, that ye should abstain from fornication: That every one of you should know how to possess his vessel in sanctification and honour." [1 Th. 4:3-4]
Sanctification means a Christian ought to be separated to the Lord, out and out. Paul said, "I am praying for that for you people, praying for you to live a sanctified life" (in the sense of being separated unto God). He warned them, "Watch your bodies, because even Christians have sex temptations." That means being careful about your contact with the other sex, being careful in the way you walk, in the pictures you see, in the books you read. Keep your body holy. Keep your vessel unto honor. - John R. Rice [Comments on 1st Thessalonians, pg. 21-22]
"This is the will of God, even your sanctification, that ye should abstain from fornication: That every one of you should know how to possess his vessel in sanctification and honour." [1 Th. 4:3-4]
Is the body a vessel? Yes. It is the home of the Holy Spirit. Every Christian has the Holy Spirit abiding in him. And He must be offended when you stink up the body with tobacco. The Spirit of God inside is grieved at that. And to take away part of your senses so as to dull your wits by drinking and slow your reactions and make it so you may land in jail or do something dishonest, or be led in some crime--that would grieve the Holy Spirit. So keep that body, the home of the Holy Spirit, as a holy vessel. When Paul says "sanctification" he means being set apart for God. - John R. Rice [Comments on 1st Thessalonians, pg. 22]
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