More Than Words

More Than Words--May 30, 2018

For we know, brothers and sisters beloved by God, that he has chosen you, because our message of the gospel came to you not in word only, but also in power and in the Holy Spirit and with full conviction; just as you know what kind of persons we proved to be among you for your sake. [1 Thessalonians 1:4-5]

As a child of the 1980s, I will confess that I can't read these words of Paul's without hearing the old song by Extreme, "More Than Words."  The recurring lyrics keep running through my head:  "More than words/ Is all you have to do to make it real/ Then you wouldn't have to say that you love me/ 'cause I'd already know."  The song itself, of course, is sung as a request, or maybe a challenge, from the singer to his beloved, insisting that she make it clear that her feelings are more than just talk.  Now whether he's got ulterior motives in putting that dare to her, or whether he really does wonder if he's being strung along by his girlfriend, are questions for another day (and probably not as part of a devotional conversation on 1 Thessalonians).  But the point of the lyrics above is a powerful one in any case--anybody can talk a great game, but if all we've got to go on is words, we can easily be let down.  Too many times before in life we have gotten our hopes up because of big talk, polished rhetoric, or flowery prose, only to find there was no substance to the speech.  Too many times we've been in the same place as the singer in the song, afraid of letting our hearts be broken by empty promises, whether from romantic interests or political promisers.

Now, the surprising thing to me reading Paul's words today is the direction he takes this idea of needing "more than words."  We religious folk tend to automatically assume this train of thought is aimed at other people, or even ourselves.  We know the words of James that faith without works is dead, and we might be suspicious of people who say they believe but show no evidence (to us) of a sufficiently changed life to be "really" redeemed.  We know the words from John's letters that call us to show love "not in word or speech, but in truth and action," and we know that all too often that can be us, paying only lip service to our calling to love God and neighbor with all we have and all we are.  So, yeah, it's true that the Bible does call us to a way of life that is "more than words," and to a faith that goes beyond talking the talk. 

But that's now how Paul is thinking here.  Here, in these opening verses of 1 Thessalonians, Paul isn't trying to poke our consciences and make us do more to show God that our faith is sincere.  He's trying to assure us that God's faithfulness is sincere, and that the Good News Paul brought was more than just talk.  Paul is reminding the Thessalonians that even if the gospel sounds too good to be true, they can know it's the real thing because when Paul came to them to tell them about God's free grace through Christ, it wasn't just a sales-pitch.  They had an encounter with the living Holy Spirit, who came among them in "power" and "full conviction."  Whether Paul means that they saw miracles or wonders done, or that the Spirit's presence was made clear in some other way, Paul doesn't say--but his readers apparently remembered whatever it was.  And Paul is convinced that their experience of the Spirit confirms that the Good News of Jesus is not just an interesting story. The power of the Spirit's presence is their guarantee that Paul was not peddling snake-oil, and his God is not the snake. And then he caps it all off and says if nothing else, the Thessalonians can remember the way Paul lived among them and they can see from his own transformed life that this Jesus is the real deal.

In other words, here in this verse, Paul isn't trying to goad Christians into putting forth "more than words" to convinced God that they really love him.  He's turned that whole song around and says, "Look here--God has given us more than words to assure us that the words he does speak to us in the gospel are true!"  Paul is putting the "more than words" test to none other than God, and saying that God has been found truthful after all.  The amazing, even unbelievable, good news that we are beloved through Jesus apart from our earning and without restriction is really the honest-to-God truth, and we can rely on that truth, because God has shown us more than words. In a world where a lot of voices are just talk, God has given us the Spirit, who shows up with a power that is always more than we can manufacture for ourselves.  And God has given us the lives of saints around us who have been transformed by the free grace of Jesus as yet a further sign to us that the Gospel is more than wishful thinking.  God has held himself to the "more-than-words" standards, and if we are honest at all, we can see that God has not been found wanting.

Today, we go out into a world confident that the news we bring is more than a political platform or empty romantic gesture.  We go out bringing the news of God's love with the assurance that God actually backs up the promise with the power and presence of the Spirit, who will transform us and leave ripples behind as we go.

Lord God, come among us in power and full conviction again so that we will be assured that your promises are true, and so that we will be transformed in the sight of the watching world, and so be your witnesses of a promise that sounds too good to be true, and yet is indeed the Gospel truth.