1 Thessalonians 5:6-11

V6-11 – ⁶So then, let us not be like others, who are asleep, but let us be alert and self-controlled. ⁷For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk, get drunk at night. ⁸But since we belong to the day, let us be self-controlled, putting on faith and love as a breastplate, and the hope of salvation as a helmet. ⁹For God did not appoint us to suffer wrath but to receive salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ. ¹⁰He died for us so that, whether we are awake or asleep, we may live together with Him. ¹¹Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing.

Paul has given eschatological doctrine, and he has explained it in more detail. Now he lays out how we ought to respond to his teaching. Paul preaches that we believers are not to be like unbelievers. “Don’t be like the people who don’t believe in Jesus.” How often do we hear that from the pulpit in church? Probably not enough… Since we are “sons of the light and sons of the day” (v5), we ought to “be alert and self-controlled” (v6), “putting on faith and love as a breastplate, and the hope of salvation as a helmet” (v8, cf. Ephesians 6:13-18). The call is to wake up, stay alert, and go to war! Calvin comments, “The life of Christians is like a perpetual warfare, inasmuch as Satan does not cease to trouble and molest them. [Paul] would have us, therefore, be diligently prepared and on the alert for resistance: farther, he admonishes us that we have need of arms, because unless we be well armed we cannot withstand so powerful and so strong an enemy.”

Paul notes in v9 that believers need not fear “the day of the Lord,” or “Judgment Day,” because “God did not appoint us to suffer wrath (Romans 9:16-24), but to receive salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Acts 13:48; John 5:24). Cheung concludes, “We are not taken by surprise because we are spiritually and morally ready for God to come and act in judgment. This is a superior kind of readiness. If we do not become spiritually prepared to meet Him, it would still be useless to know the time. His coming would only bring judgment upon us. But if we remain in a constant state of moral readiness, then we do not need to know the time of judgment – He will find us steadfast in our faith and labor when He comes.” We’ll have more to say about eschatological matters when we come to 2 Thessalonians 2, but for now, we conclude by noting the closing exhortation – continue to “encourage one another and build each other up” (v11).