Biblion Bible Commentary
Read the introduction to 1 Thessalonians · About this commentary
Blameless in Holiness at His Coming
1 Thessalonians 3:11-13
11 Now may our God and Father himself, and our Lord Jesus Christ, direct our way to you. · WEB
A prayer in three movements, and the middle one asks for love as the thing that makes the last one possible.
Now may our God and Father himself, and our Lord Jesus Christ, direct our way to you. The subject is compound and the verb in the Greek is singular — the Father and the Son as one subject of one action, which is how these letters keep speaking without ever arguing the point.
The first request is the practical one Paul has been pressing since chapter 2: that the road be opened.
The second widens past himself. May the Lord make you to increase and abound in love toward one another and toward all men. The second phrase is easy to skip and does real work: a persecuted minority is asked to grow in love toward the population persecuting it.
And the third is the destination the whole letter faces. To the end he may establish your hearts blameless in holiness before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his saints.
The order is the argument. Established hearts come from abounding love, and blamelessness at the coming is not achieved by inspection but grown into. The verb establish is the same one Timothy was sent to perform 1 Thessalonians 3:2 — what a colleague could begin, God finishes. Third chapter, third ending on the coming.
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