1 Thessalonians 2:1-13
The Model for Christian Witness

For you yourselves know, brothers, our visit to you wasn't in vain, but having suffered before and been shamefully treated, as you know, at Philippi, we grew bold in our God to tell you the Good News of God in much conflict. For our exhortation is not of error, nor of uncleanness, nor in deception. But even as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the Good News, so we speak; not as pleasing men, but God, who tests our hearts. For neither were we at any time found using words of flattery, as you know, nor a cloak of covetousness (God is witness), nor seeking glory from men (neither from you nor from others), when we might have claimed authority as apostles of Christ. But we were gentle among you, like a nursing mother cherishes her own children.

Even so, affectionately longing for you, we were well pleased to impart to you, not the Good News of God only, but also our own souls, because you had become very dear to us. For you remember, brothers, our labor and travail; for working night and day, that we might not burden any of you, we preached to you the Good News of God. You are witnesses with God, how holy, righteously, and blamelessly we behaved ourselves toward you who believe. As you know, we exhorted, comforted, and implored every one of you, as a father does his own children, to the end that you should walk worthily of God, who calls you into his own Kingdom and glory. For this cause we also thank God without ceasing, that, when you received from us the word of the message of God, you accepted it not as the word of men, but, as it is in truth, the word of God, which also works in you who believe.

World English Bible

This passage contains "thick" prose, typical in Paul's letters as Paul tried to communicate as much as he could quickly. I've quoted a large section of this letter so we can pull from it several "real world" descriptions of how Paul witnessed to others and how we can witness like Paul.

We first need to recognize the context. When Paul wrote this letter, he was frustrated that he had not been able to visit Thessalonica again. At the same time, Paul was thrilled with news he had received about how faithful and strong the Christian fellowship continued to be in Thessalonica, even with the repression that many of those believers had suffered. His purpose in seeing this fellowship again was not because they were weak, but because they were strong, and Paul ached to spend time with them again. Because of his close bonds with them, he felt he could write his personal feelings and thoughts with the confidence the readers would accept them with his intended meaning. This means we are reading an "inside" view of how Paul conducted his ministry instead of the "public face" of this man expressed in circumstances where churches didn't know Paul (like Rome) or where churches were opposing Paul's work (like Corinth).

Early in this passage, Paul made it clear that, as much as he loved the Thessalonians, he was serving only God: "…as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the Good News, so we speak; not as pleasing men, but God, who tests our hearts." He was confident in the message he spoke because God was keeping Paul on message. When we think about witnessing, we usually think mostly about the person to whom we are sharing—everything we are taught in school about speaking, writing, and even selling focuses on the audience. This audience focus cannot be allowed to interfere with our Christian message, for what we are offering is the unchanging, perfect God to a world that is flawed and tossed around by change.

Very closely related to this thought is that our Christian testimony must be genuine, deeply rooted in the Person of God living in us. Paul recounts that "…we were well pleased to impart to you, not the Good News of God only, but also our own souls…" This appears dangerous to us because we each know how far we fall short of the perfection of God. We have to accept that God will use our imperfections as part of our Christian message. That may sound bizarre, but Paul's thought matches what Jesus taught in Luke 12. When Jesus was preparing his disciples to minister to a crowd, he told them that they had no secrets from God—and God chose to use them anyway. The same is true for us: God already knows all about our sins and flaws and sends us to witness anyway. We can "bare our souls" in witnessing because we are pointing people to God, not to ourselves.

Paul defied common wisdom and human tendencies in how he witnessed. "For neither were we at any time found using words of flattery… nor seeking glory from men… when we might have claimed authority as apostles of Christ." Paul refused to "sweet talk" the people he tried to reach, but presented the whole, honest truth. We have heard of ministers that "sweet talk" the curious with promises of great wealth to those who will rely on God, but we also know of many faithful believers whose only riches will come in heaven. Just like Paul was completely honest in carrying God's message, he was also humble, a servant of God rather than a human to be revered. He deserved respect and accolades from Christians, but he didn't want that because it could hinder the message. We might daydream of all the good our churches could do with greater power, money, or prestige, but Paul freely ignored all that to focus on what God was going to do next.

Because Paul was so close to this church, what he wrote was not intended as bragging. When Paul wrote about how hard he and his team worked to support themselves, he was not asking for sympathy but pointing out an important truth about God's power. Common sense says that great evangelists should be working full-time plus overtime to spread the Gospel, but Paul was always a part-time missionary. Paul was confident in God's Power to use whatever time he had left over after his "day job" for his ministry, and God's Power never disappointed Paul. We too often forget this message in modern church life, but this message is constant throughout the Old and New Testaments. Remember that when God through Gideon won the battle with the Midianites, God made Gideon send home more than 30,000 soldiers until just three companies of 100 men were sent to accomplish God's amazing victory.

There is one more fundamental for witness that Paul repeated several times in this passage: Love. Paul wrote "like a nursing mother cherishes her own children", and "…affectionately longing for you…", and "because you had become very dear to us", and "we exhorted, comforted, and implored every one of you, as a father does his own children". A parent does not love a child in order to receive love in return, and every parent can recall when love was answered with a child's frustration, anger, and rebellion. Paul loved these Christian fellowships whether they loved him back, as did the Thessalonians, or rejected him, as did the Corinthians, or were curious about this famous stranger, as were the Romans. Paul loved these Christian fellowships because God loved him first.

To summarize the fundamentals of witnessing that Paul gave us in this passage, we need to remember: serve God, be ourselves, speak the truth, remember God provides the Power, and most of all, Love. If we follow these principles, we are not guaranteed that we will start churches like Paul, or even that we will "win any souls for Christ". Those are not our goals if we follow Paul's teaching—our only goal, and our lifetime devotion, is to obey God.