Biblion Bible Commentary
Read the introduction to 1 Thessalonians · About this commentary
Abound More and More
1 Thessalonians 4:1-2
1 Finally then, brothers, we beg and exhort you in the Lord Jesus, that as you received from us how you ought to walk and to please God, that you abound more and more. · WEB
The turn to instruction begs rather than commands, and asks for more of what they are already doing.
Finally then, brothers, we beg and exhort you in the Lord Jesus. Two verbs, and the first is a request rather than an order. Paul has spent three chapters establishing that he took nothing from them and claimed no authority over them 1 Thessalonians 2:6, and the manner of this transition is consistent with it.
The content is a reminder before it is a requirement: as you received from us how you ought to walk and to please God. Nothing new is being introduced. The verb received is the one used of a tradition handed over intact.
Then the request itself, and it is unusual: that you abound more and more. Not that they correct a fault but that they increase in something already present. He will use the identical phrase again about their love 1 Thessalonians 4:10, where he also concedes they are already doing it.
Verse 2 anchors the authority somewhere other than himself: you know what instructions we gave you through the Lord Jesus. The word is a military term for orders passed down a line — the man delivering them did not originate them, which is the same distinction he drew about the message itself in 1 Thessalonians 2:13.
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