1 Thessalonians 1:3 – the Word at Work

3 …unintermittingly remembering your work of faith and toil of love and endurance of expectation…

In the previous verse, we saw that Paul thanks God concerning the Thessalonians. Here he states why: he unintermittingly remembers “your work of faith and toil of love.” What he sees among them gives him reason to thank God. For in it, he recognizes first and foremost not a human achievement, but what the Word has brought about among them.

Paul speaks of “the work of faith.” By “faith” here, he does not so much mean their believing, but the truth of the faith: that which is believed. The Thessalonians had heard that truth and embraced it in faith. And now that message was doing its work in them. This fits beautifully with what Paul says a little further on: the Evangel came to them not “in word only, but in power also” (verse 5). The Word is operative and brings something about.

That work became visible, among other things, in “the toil of love.” The Greek kopos speaks of labor that costs effort and exertion. Love was no sentiment for the Thessalonians, but proved itself in practice. In this too, Paul recognized the operation of the Word. Hence his thanks to God: it is His Word that works.

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