He had been praying for them all the time (3:11–13)

He had been praying for them all the time (1 Thess 3:11–13)


11 Now may our God and Father himself, and our Lord Jesus, direct our way to you, 12 and may the Lord make you increase and abound in love for one another and for all, as we do for you, 13 so that he may establish your hearts blameless in holiness before our God and Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his saints.

Having mentioned in verse 10 his earnest and continuous prayers, he immediately breaks into prayer in his letter. He expresses three precise and particular petitions, namely that God will bring him to see the Thessalonians again, and that he will increase both their love and their holiness. First, Now may our God and Father himself and our Lord Jesus clear the way for us to come to you (11). It is an amazing bracketing on a level of equality, as in 1:1, of God the Father and Jesus the Lord, and this time it is the more remarkable because the double subject (Father and Son) is followed by a singular verb (kateuthynai). There follows a wish in the form of a prayer, that God will ‘make straight’ or level the way which Satan has cut up, or remove the obstacles with which he has strewn it (2:18). Paul’s prayer was answered, although only (so far as we know) about five years later when he visited Macedonia twice towards the end of his third missionary journey.74

    Secondly, Paul prays: May the Lord (meaning Jesus, as almost always in the New Testament when ‘the Lord’ occurs without further designation) make your love increase and overflow for each other, in the Christian community, and for everyone else, ‘the whole human race’ (JB), just as ours does for you (12). It is impressive to note this prayer’s double progress, on the one hand from each other to everybody and on the other from increasing to overflowing, the latter ‘implying an overplus of love’.75

    Thirdly, Paul prays: May he strengthen (steœrizai again, as in 3:2) your hearts so that you will be blameless and holy in the presence of our God and Father when our Lord Jesus comes with all his holy ones (13), which could mean ‘angels’ or ‘saints’, but is best understood as including both, namely ‘all who belong to him’ (JBP). There is no greater stimulus to holiness than the vision of the Parousia, when Jesus comes in glory with his holy ones. In order that we may be ‘blameless and holy’ then, Paul prays that we may be inwardly strengthened now. For sanctification is a present, continuing process; perfection awaits the Parousia. The ‘Amen’ of JB (footnote)76 is omitted from nearly all English versions. But [1 & 2 Thessalonians, Page 68] it is quite well attested, and it seems a fitting climax to Paul’s prayer.

NBC:-
11-12 From telling his readers about his prayers, Paul turns to actually praying. Instead of addressing God directly in the second person, e.g. ‘O God, clear the way for us to come to Thessalonica’, Paul expresses his prayer in the third person, ‘May God clear the way for us to come to you’ (cf. Nu. 6:24-26; Ps. 20:1-5). The prayer links God as Father and the Lord Jesus Christ (cf. 1:1, and, in reverse order, 2 Thes. 2:16). The first petition voices Paul’s desire to revisit the church, and the second expresses his longing for their growth in love and holiness—the theme developed in the instruction that directly follows the prayer (4:1-12). Their love must expand beyond the church to include everyone else (cf. Gal. 6:10 in reverse order). Paul cites himself as an example (cf. 1:6; 2 Thes. 3:7-9; Acts 20:35)—not to give information to the Lord, but because this prayer also functions as a means of instructing the readers as to how they should pray and how they should live.

    13 Paul wants the readers to be blameless and holy to meet the Lord when he comes in judgment. He is not praying that they will grow and develop so as to be blameless at some future point when the Lord comes. Rather he believes that the Lord can come very soon (not immediately, to be sure, as 2 Thes. 2 indicates), and therefore he prays that God will make their hearts firm in these qualities now and that they will continue in this state right until the Lord’s coming. At the judgment which will take place when Christ comes (2:19; cf. 1:10), they need not fear the wrath of God (1:10), but it will be nevertheless a time of assessment and reward or loss. The solemnity of the occasion is stressed by the description of Jesus coming with all his [p. 1281] holy ones. These are either believers who have died and who come with living believers to meet the Lord (4:16-17) or the angels who accompany the final coming of God (Zc. 14:5) or of the Son of Man (Mk. 8:38) and add to his glory. (2 Thes. 1:7 supports this second interpretation.)