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"Knowing." In what way did Paul `know' so profound a matter? He used a word that
means "something that has come within the circle of one's sphere of vision". In this
same epistle we read `to see' your face (2: 17); `to see' us (3: 6); which is in the
original the same word that is translated `to know'. In the same epistle the Apostle refers
to current events, using this same word, `As ye know' (2: 2, 5, 11). What therefore had
he `seen' to make him so sure of the `election' of these Thessalonians? Had he seen their
`work of faith', their `labour of love', and `the patience' of their hope? Yes, for he
follows his claim to the knowledge of their election with an explanation:
"For our gospel came not unto you in word only . . . . . ye became followers of us,
and of the Lord, having received the word in much affliction, with joy of the Holy Ghost"
(I Thess. 1: 5, 6).
To take another illustration, Peter, writing to the believers among the `dispersion', said
of them:
"Elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification of the
Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ" (I Pet. 1: 2).
Here once again we see the perfect combination of things high and things lowly;
things of eternity and things of time.
We have
The Father - - - Foreknowledge.
The Spirit - - - Sanctification.
The Son - - - Blood sprinkled.
However, we have omitted one word in our summary, the word `obedience'. This is
the believer's response to this gracious choice of God.
"As obedient children, not fashioning yourselves according to the former lusts in your
ignorance; but as He which hath called you is holy, so be ye holy in all manner of
conversation" (I Pet. 1: 14, 15).
"Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit" (I Pet. 1: 22).
Paul knew the Thessalonian election by their response to the Word; the same was true
of Peter's perception. This he enlarges upon in the second epistle where he speaks of
making their `calling and election sure'. How could this be accomplished? After
speaking of the `precious faith' and the divine power that had given all things pertain to
life and godliness, the apostle Peter goes on to urge that to faith should be added virtue,
to virtue knowledge, and concludes:
"For if these things be in you, and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be
barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ . . . . . Wherefore the
rather, brethren, give diligence to make your calling and election sure" (II Pet. 1: 8-10).
The calling and election from the Godward standpoint had been settled in the counsels
of eternity; but for the believer to enter experimentally into these exceeding great and
precious promises, in other words, for the believer to `possess his possessions', the
knowledge that he had of Christ must be neither barren nor unfruitful; he must prove the