1 Thessalonians 3:4Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

Paul, foreseeing this, foretold them: “We shall suffer affliction,” he says, “as indeed happened, and you know.” The Apostle speaks not only of what happened, but also of the fact that he had foretold many other things that likewise came to pass.

“We are appointed to this.” Therefore one must not be troubled and disturbed by past temptations alone, for that is what “to be shaken” means. One must not be troubled by future ones either, should they occur. “We are appointed to this.”

According to St. John Chrysostom, “The Apostle did this from an abundance of love. Those who love, from burning zeal, fear even for what is safe. Although he said, ‘we are appointed to this,’ the excessive multitude of evils frightened me.

“He did not say, ‘having noticed something bad in you, I sent,’ but, ‘unable to endure it any longer,’ which properly comes from love. In afflictions we lay aside remembrance of everyone. Yet he so feared and trembled for his children that he sent to them even the one who was his consolation, Timothy, his companion and helper.

“Confusion in affliction is the work of the devil and his deceit. The Apostle calls wavering a temptation from the devil. Only the one who is already wavering is tempted, the one who has already accepted the devilish enchantment.”

Blessed Theophylact adds to this: “When the devil finds a favorable time for temptation, he shakes the unstable by reminding them of their former ease, so that they may fall away from what caused their afflictions.”

This cause was a change of faith and life. By the word “to be troubled,” “the Apostle wished precisely to express that someone, because of afflictions endured for accepted convictions and rules of life, might not waver in fidelity to them through the enticement of a former quiet life and flattering expectations. The afflictions of the Apostles could also shake them” (Bishop Theophan).

“Disciples are troubled not so much amid their own temptations as when they see the temptations of their teachers. Likewise, a soldier is not so much troubled by his own wounds as when he sees his commander wounded.”

Exegetes of the negative school, on the basis of parallel passages (Acts 17:14; 18:5; 1 Cor 4:17; 16:10 and others), raise objections concerning the sending of Timothy to Thessalonica. Yet these passages only confirm it. According to Acts, Paul’s meeting with Timothy is implied (17:14-15), as is Timothy’s mission to Macedonia (18:5). Here, in 1 Thess 3:1-8, this meeting and mission are stated positively.

“We must not be troubled by afflictions,” says St. Chrysostom, “because nothing extraordinary or unexpected is happening to us. This was enough to encourage them. Do you see that Christ also said to His disciples: ‘And now I have told you before it comes to pass, that when it does come to pass, you may believe’ (Jn 14:29)?

“For it gives much consolation to disciples when they hear from their teachers what will happen to them. If a sick man hears beforehand from the physician that this or that will happen to him, he is not too greatly troubled.

“But if something unexpected happens to him, so that the physician himself is perplexed and the illness surpasses his skill, then the sick man grows despondent and troubled. So it is here also.”

“We are to suffer affliction” means all of us: both you who have believed and we who proclaimed the faith to you. What consolation for the Thessalonians, when the Apostle calls even their afflictions his own, apart from those he himself endured.