Biblion Bible Commentary
Read the introduction to 1 Thessalonians · About this commentary
Now We Live
1 Thessalonians 3:6-8
6 But Timothy has just now come to us from you, and brought us glad news of your faith and love, and that you have good memories of us always, longing to see us, even as we also long to see you. · WEB
Timothy comes back with good news, and Paul's relief is stated as though he had not been alive until it arrived.
But Timothy has just now come to us from you. The word just now dates the letter — it was written immediately, in the first flush of the news, which explains its warmth and its slightly disordered arrangement.
What he brought is called glad news, and the verb is the one Scripture normally reserves for preaching the gospel. Paul uses it of a report about his own converts, which is either a slip of enthusiasm or a small joke; either way it registers what the news meant to him.
Three things came back: their faith, their love, and that they have good memories of us always, longing to see us. The third is not a virtue but a reassurance — after a hasty night departure, Paul had reason to wonder whether he was remembered kindly.
Verse 7 says the effect: we were comforted over you in all our distress and affliction through your faith. His own hardships are mentioned only as the background their news relieved.
And verse 8 states it without restraint. For now we live, if you stand fast in the Lord. It is an overstatement and it is meant to be. A man reports that he has started breathing again because a congregation four hundred miles away is still standing.
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