1 Thessalonians 4:3

King James Version (KJV)

For this is the will of God, even your sanctification, that ye should abstain from fornication:

Adam Clarke
Bible Commentary

This is the will of God, even your sanctification - God has called you to holiness; he requires that you should be holy; for without holiness none can see the Lord. This is the general calling, but in it many particulars are included. Some of these he proceeds to mention; and it is very likely that these had been points on which he gave them particular instructions while among them.

That ye should abstain from fornication - The word πορνεια, as we have seen in other places, includes all sorts of uncleanness; and it was probably this consideration that induced several MSS., some versions and fathers, to add here πασης, all. Directions of this kind were peculiarly necessary among the Greeks, and indeed heathens in general, who were strongly addicted to such vices.

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Albert Barnes
Notes on the Whole Bible

For this is the will of God, even your sanctification - It is the will or command of God that you should be holy. This does not refer to the purpose or decree of God, and does not mean that he intended to make them holy - but it means that it was his command that they should be holy. It was also true that it was agreeable to the divine will or purpose that they should be holy, and that he meant to use such an influence as to secure this; but this is not the truth taught here. This text, therefore, should not be brought as a proof that God intends to make his people holy, or that they are sanctified. It is a proof only that he requires holiness. The word here rendered “sanctification” - ἁγιασμὸς hagiasmos- is not used in the Greek classics, but is several times found in the New Testament. It is rendered holiness, Romans 6:19, Romans 6:22; 1 Thessalonians 4:7; 1 Timothy 2:15; Hebrews 12:14; and sanctification, 1 Corinthians 1:30; 1 Thessalonians 4:3-4; 2 Thessalonians 2:13, and 1 Peter 1:2; see the Romans 6:19 note; 1 Corinthians 1:30 note. It means here “purity of life,” and particularly abstinence from those vices which debase and degrade the soul Sanctification consists in two things:

(1) in “ceasing to do evil;” and,

(2) in “learning to do well.” Or in other words, the first work of sanctification is in overcoming the propensities to evil in our nature, and checking and subduing the unholy habits which we had formed before we became Christians; the second part of the work consists in cultivating the positive principles of holiness in the soul.

That ye should abstain from fornication - A vice which was freely indulged among the pagan, and to which, from that fact, and from their own former habits, they were particularly exposed. On the fact that they were thus exposed, and on the reasons for these solemn commands on the subject, see the Acts 15:20 note, and 1 Corinthians 6:18 note.

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Matthew Henry
Concise Bible Commentary

To abide in the faith of the gospel is not enough, we must abound in the work of faith. The rule according to which all ought to walk and act, is the commandments given by the Lord Jesus Christ. Sanctification, in the renewal of their souls under the influences of the Holy Spirit, and attention to appointed duties, constituted the will of God respecting them. In aspiring after this renewal of the soul unto holiness, strict restraint must be put upon the appetites and senses of the body, and on the thoughts and inclinations of the will, which lead to wrong uses of them. The Lord calls none into his family to live unholy lives, but that they may be taught and enabled to walk before him in holiness. Some make light of the precepts of holiness, because they hear them from men; but they are God's commands, and to break them is to despise God.

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SDA Bible Commentary (limited)
Volume 1-7

3. The will of God. God’s will here represents His desires for His children. It is not His will that even one member of His family should perish because of any kind of sin (Matt. 18:14).

Sanctification. Gr. hagiasmos (see on Rom. 6:19). The term hagiasmos is an inclusive one, and is not to be limited to chastity, although the apostle has chastity in the forefront of his mind in the present context. The will of God, however, can be fulfilled only in our complete consecration. Christ died to make our holiness possible (Eph. 5:25-27), but such a result is not obtained in a moment. Justification is accomplished momentarily when the repentant sinner accepts God’s forgiveness, but not so with sanctification, which is a continuous work of grace (see on Rom. 12:1, 2). It is “not the work of a moment, an hour, a day, but of a lifetime” (AA 560).

Abstain. Gr. apechomai, “to hold oneself away from,” hence, “to abstain.” God expects the Christian to keep away from sin, not to expose himself to temptation (see on 1 Cor. 6:18).

Fornication. Gr. porneia (see on Matt. 5:32; Acts 15:20; 1 Cor. 5:1). This sin needed emphatic denunciation among Gentile converts, for they had been reared in an atmosphere where moral laxity was accepted and vice consecrated as a religious rite (see Vol. VI, pp. 91, 92). The patron deity of Corinth, whence Paul was writing, was Aphrodite, the goddess of love and generation, and her worship was accompanied by the wildest orgies. It would be difficult for Christians in any pagan city to remain unaffected by such blatant immorality. But all that is contrary to chastity of heart, in speech and behavior, is contrary to the command of God in the Decalogue, and to that holiness which the gospel requires (cf. Matt. 5:27, 28; Acts 15:29; 1 Cor. 6:18; Gal. 5:19; Eph. 5:3). In our day, when standards of sexual conduct are lowered, when chastity is so commonly regarded as being outmoded and divorces are so frequent, this injunction deserves the scrupulous attention of every professed follower of the Lord.

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Ellen G. White
The Acts of the Apostles, 262

In his anxiety that the believers at Thessalonica should walk in the fear of God, the apostle pleaded with them to reveal practical godliness in the daily life. “We beseech you, brethren,” he wrote, “and exhort you by the Lord Jesus, that as ye have received of us how ye ought to walk and to please God, so ye would abound more and more. For ye know what commandments we gave you by the Lord Jesus. For this is the will of God, even your sanctification, that ye should abstain from fornication.” “For God hath not called us unto uncleanness, but unto holiness.” AA 262.1

The apostle felt that he was to a large extent responsible for the spiritual welfare of those converted under his labors. His desire for them was that they might increase in a knowledge of the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom He had sent. Often in his ministry he would meet with little companies of men and women who loved Jesus, and bow with them in prayer, asking God to teach them how to maintain a living connection with Him. Often he took counsel with them as to the best methods of giving to others the light of gospel truth. And often, when separated from those for whom he had thus labored, he pleaded with God to keep them from evil and help them to be earnest, active missionaries. AA 262.2

One of the strongest evidences of true conversion is love to God and man. Those who accept Jesus as their Redeemer have a deep, sincere love for others of like precious faith. Thus it was with the believers at Thessalonica. “As touching brotherly love,” the apostle wrote, “ye need not that I write unto you: for ye yourselves are taught of God to love one another. And indeed ye do it toward all the brethren which are in all Macedonia: but we beseech you, brethren, that ye increase more and more; and that ye study to be quiet, and to do your own business, and to work with your own hands, as we commanded you; that ye may walk honestly toward them that are without, and that ye may have lack of nothing.” AA 262.3

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Ellen G. White
Counsels on Health, 584

[Special Testimonies, Series B 15:16-23 (1900).]

The Lord has instructed me to present the following scriptures to our physicians: “Furthermore then we beseech you, brethren, and exhort you by the Lord Jesus, that as ye have received of us how ye ought to walk and to please God, so ye would abound more and more.... For this is the will of God, even your sanctification.” 1 Thessalonians 4:1-3. “As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in Him: rooted and built up in Him, and established in the faith, as ye have been taught, abounding therein with thanksgiving. Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.” Colossians 2:6-8. CH 584.1

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Ellen G. White
The Sanctified Life, 86-7

The apostle himself was endeavoring to reach the same standard of holiness which he set before his brethren. He writes to the Philippians: “What things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ. Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: ...that I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death; if by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead. Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect: but I follow after, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus. Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3:7-14). There is a striking contrast between the boastful, self-righteous claims of those who profess to be without sin, and the modest language of the apostle. Yet it was the purity and faithfulness of his own life that gave such power to his exhortations to his brethren. SL 86.1

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Ellen G. White
Reflecting Christ, 98.1

Ye know what commandments we gave you by the Lord Jesus. For this is the will of God, even your sanctification. 1 Thessalonians 4:2, 3. RC 98.1

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Cross References

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1 Thessalonians 5:18

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