1 Thessalonians 5:14 Commentary and Bible Study

A third duty is to ‘warn them that are unruly.’ This is not just pastors that he is talking to; it is all of us. It is a negative duty. It is the people in the church, of course, that are in mind here. Some of these duties will extend to those outside the church, but this has in mind fellow members in the church. Warn is the ‘put in mind’ word. It does not necessarily mean a stentorian warning. It may be as friendly as it can be done perhaps, sometimes, but it is to put in mind those that are unruly. Warn them what they are doing. So although we are to be friendly, it sometimes happens that there are people who in different ways are out of order, out of step, antibodies, difficult, people who do not agree with anything. They seem to think their calling in life, yes even among Christians, is to be against everything or to do their own thing. You cannot just be friendly and keep quiet. We have a duty to ‘put in mind’, to challenge or to help people who have drifted into unruly behaviour, disorderly behaviour is the Greek term in some shape or form.A fourth duty which is quite different is, ‘Comfort the feeble minded.’ I have to acknowledge that in our King James Translation we have a poor translation here. ‘Feeble minded’ is not inaccurate but it suggests people who are simple or inadequate in their mental equipment in some way. The Greek actually means something like ‘the small souled’. The person with a small soul is somebody who is unassured, very worried about their salvation, very discouraged, inclined to worry in life. Do not just say, pull yourself together; you should have more faith. Comfort the worrier. Comfort the unassured. You may be in the same position yourself one day. If you suffer some blows which make you stagger for a while spiritually, you may need comfort. So comfort the person who is, just for the moment, small souled, lacking assurance and comfort the feeble minded. So while we challenge the unruly, we quickly comfort the small soul, and we ‘support the weak’. The Greek for ‘support’ really speaks of physical support, though not necessarily literally, as if somebody is about to fall over and with the weight of your own body you support them and hold them up. The fifth duty is, ‘be patient toward all men.’ Literally it is be longsuffering towards all men. Bear patiently with all within the church. Never be rude, never be abrupt, never be insulting, never be testy. Be longsuffering with people. Impatience has a terrible effect upon us. If we get into the habit of being impatient, and it is easy, you can suddenly develop the impatient tendency, and everything makes you irritated. Anything that someone else is doing in the home or around you, may become irritating, but as soon as you start letting it get to you, you know it has the effect of inflaming your pride. Impatience prompts pride.Oh, I am above this kind of behaviour that this other person is exhibiting. These small annoyances or deficiencies. I am impatient with them because I would not do that. It inflates my pride. I should not be subjected to this. I should not have an inadequate person annoying me with this frustrating behaviour. It is pride promoting. And not only is it pride promoting, but it sours our nature to be impatient. It sours us generally. And we become sour in other ways also.