New Testament Plan

¹Now concerning the times and the seasons, brothers, you have no need to have anything written to you.

²For you yourselves are fully aware that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night.

³While people are saying, “There is peace and security,” then sudden destruction will come upon them as labor pains come upon a pregnant woman, and they will not escape.

⁴But you are not in darkness, brothers, for that day to surprise you like a thief.

⁵For you are all children of light, children of the day. We are not of the night or of the darkness.

⁶So then let us not sleep, as others do, but let us keep awake and be sober.

⁷For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk, are drunk at night.

⁸But since we belong to the day, let us be sober, having put on the breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet the hope of salvation.

⁹For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ,

¹⁰who died for us so that whether we are awake or asleep we might live with him.

¹¹Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing.

¹²We ask you, brothers, to respect those who labor among you and are over you in the Lord and admonish you,

¹³and to esteem them very highly in love because of their work. Be at peace among yourselves.

¹⁴And we urge you, brothers, admonish the idle, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient with them all.

¹⁵See that no one repays anyone evil for evil, but always seek to do good to one another and to everyone.

¹⁶Rejoice always,

¹⁷pray without ceasing,

¹⁸give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.

¹⁹Do not quench the Spirit.

²⁰Do not despise prophecies,

²¹but test everything; hold fast what is good.

²²Abstain from every form of evil.

²³Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

²⁴He who calls you is faithful; he will surely do it.

²⁵Brothers, pray for us.

²⁶Greet all the brothers with a holy kiss.

²⁷I put you under oath before the Lord to have this letter read to all the brothers.

²⁸The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you.

¹Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy, To the church of the Thessalonians in God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ:

²Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

³We ought always to give thanks to God for you, brothers, as is right, because your faith is growing abundantly, and the love of every one of you for one another is increasing.

⁴Therefore we ourselves boast about you in the churches of God for your steadfastness and faith in all your persecutions and in the afflictions that you are enduring.

⁵This is evidence of the righteous judgment of God, that you may be considered worthy of the kingdom of God, for which you are also suffering —

⁶since indeed God considers it just to repay with affliction those who afflict you,

⁷and to grant relief to you who are afflicted as well as to us, when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with his mighty angels

⁸in flaming fire, inflicting vengeance on those who do not know God and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus.

⁹They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might,

¹⁰when he comes on that day to be glorified in his saints, and to be marveled at among all who have believed, because our testimony to you was believed.

¹¹To this end we always pray for you, that our God may make you worthy of his calling and may fulfill every resolve for good and every work of faith by his power,

¹²so that the name of our Lord Jesus may be glorified in you, and you in him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ.

¹Now concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered together to him, we ask you, brothers,

²not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed, either by a spirit or a spoken word, or a letter seeming to be from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has come.

³Let no one deceive you in any way. For that day will not come, unless the rebellion comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction,

⁴who opposes and exalts himself against every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, proclaiming himself to be God.

⁵Do you not remember that when I was still with you I told you these things?

⁶And you know what is restraining him now so that he may be revealed in his time.

⁷For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work. Only he who now restrains it will do so until he is out of the way.

⁸And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will kill with the breath of his mouth and bring to nothing by the appearance of his coming.

⁹The coming of the lawless one is by the activity of Satan with all power and false signs and wonders,

¹⁰and with all wicked deception for those who are perishing, because they refused to love the truth and so be saved.

¹¹Therefore God sends them a strong delusion, so that they may believe what is false,

¹²in order that all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.

¹³But we ought always to give thanks to God for you, brothers beloved by the Lord, because God chose you as the firstfruits to be saved, through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth.

¹⁴To this he called you through our gospel, so that you may obtain the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.

¹⁵So then, brothers, stand firm and hold to the traditions that you were taught by us, either by our spoken word or by our letter.

¹⁶Now may our Lord Jesus Christ himself, and God our Father, who loved us and gave us eternal comfort and good hope through grace,

¹⁷comfort your hearts and establish them in every good work and word.