For what thanks can we return to God for you, in all the joy wherewith we rejoice for you before our God,
τινα γαρ ευχαριστιαν δυναμεθα τω θεω ανταποδουναι περι υμων επι παση τη χαρα η χαιρομεν δι υμας εμπροσθεν του θεου ημων
7 Church Fathers comment on this verse
You, he says, were the cause not only of life for us, but also of great joy. It is so great that we cannot give thanks to God worthily. We count your success, he says, as a gift of God. You have benefited us so greatly that we count it as done by divine prompting, or rather as the work of God Himself. Such lofty feelings do not belong to the human soul or to human solicitude.
Such, he says, is our joy over you that we cannot even give thanks to God worthily for you. We count your progress as a gift of God. For such an exalted feeling does not belong to the human soul or to human effort. Therefore, though bound to thank Him, we do not find thanksgiving worthy of Him.
For those who are still spiritual infants and need to be fed with milk (1 Cor 3:1-2), every discourse is difficult when it is given not simply so that they may believe the matter, but so that they may understand and grasp it.
For them such discourse is more a driver than a shepherd. Therefore it happens that spiritual people, when speaking with the carnal, do not wholly pass over such things in silence, because of the catholic faith that must be preached to all.
Yet they do not discuss them in such a way that, by wishing to hand this on to one incapable of understanding, they cause him rather to feel aversion toward the discourse with its truth than to receive the truth in it.
That is why Paul remarks in the epistle to the Colossians: “Though I am absent in body, yet I am with you in spirit, rejoicing and seeing your good order and that which is lacking in your faith in Christ” (Col 2:5).
And to the Thessalonians he says: “Night and day praying most earnestly that we may see your face and complete what was lacking in your faith.” The Latin reads: id guod deest fidei uestrae in Christo. The Vulgate version reads: firmamentum eius quae in Christo est fidei vestrae.
The greatness of gladness overcomes the hymn of the lips. We cannot lift up to God a song equal to the joy which you have given us.
Thanksgiving to God for the joyful news, and prayer for the fulfillment of the Apostle’s desired meeting with the Thessalonians, are the essential feelings and thoughts that he considers it a duty of love to tell them.
He does this also to stir them to the day-and-night prayer that he offers for them. According to St. John Chrysostom’s explanation, the Apostle speaks as though saying: “You were the cause for us of such joy that we are unable to thank God worthily.
“We consider your success a gift of God. You have benefited us so greatly that we consider it a work accomplished by God’s inspiration, or rather, the work of God Himself. Such exalted dispositions are not the work of human efforts.”
“The greatness of the rejoicing overcomes the hymnody of the lips. For we are unable to raise to God a song equal to the joy that has been given us by you” (blessed Theodoret).
“When the Apostle gives thanks for his own gladdening, one might think that he gives thanks for himself, for his own happiness. But by adding prayer that he may see the newly converted disciples, he gives us to understand that this gladdening is not all that is in his soul.
“This is on the surface. Deeper lies love. The gladdening came from love for them. Love produced gladness at the news of their good standing in the faith. This same love is the reason why he is not content with joy alone, but also desires to see them.
“Both merge into one feeling and compel him to pray day and night that God may count him worthy to see them again. He prays to see them not merely in order to see them, but to complete what was lacking in their faith.
“During his brief stay in Thessalonica, much had remained unsaid. Similarly, writing to the Romans, he says that he had always desired to see them, that he might impart to them some spiritual gift for their establishment (Rom 1:11)” (Bishop Theophan).
In speaking thus, the Apostle does not exaggerate his love for the Thessalonians in the least. He cannot even render God sufficient thanksgiving for the spiritual joys that the Thessalonians give him by their faith.
He can answer this divine benefaction only with earnest prayer that God would again give him the possibility of serving the Thessalonians in a personal meeting with them.
And now the Apostle prays first of all that God would make straight his path to Thessalonica. Whether or not the Apostle comes to them, he prays that God would increase love in the Thessalonians.
The Apostle’s work is to help fill out the Thessalonians’ knowledge of the Christian faith. God’s work is to multiply love in Christians, and indeed such love as embraces all people.
The heart of the Apostle Paul was especially permeated with this love. He loved the Thessalonians even before they became his brethren in Christ.
This love will establish their heart in perfect purity before God, as it must appear on the day of the Second Coming of Christ.
The first fruit of the news brought by St. Timothy was the gladdening of the Apostle Paul. The second was thanksgiving to God. Being gladdened, he thanks God, from whom every good thing comes.
The spirit that lives in God turns to Him first, whether in joy or in sorrow. “For” is explanatory, in place of: what thanksgiving, then, shall we render?
Or, retaining the usual meaning of this particle as indicating a cause, one may suppose that “what thanksgiving shall we render” stands in place of this: for this is for us the greatest and ineffable good.
This good is from God. Instead of setting forth the greatness of the good, the Apostle speaks of the impossibility of thanking God worthily for it.
It is as though he says: how desirable your firmness in the faith was, and how I feared for it. The news surpassed my expectations. This is a great benefaction of God for me. I have no strength to thank God worthily for this good.
My joy because of you has no measure. St. Chrysostom says: “Expanding what was said above, that is, ‘we live,’ the Apostle says: ‘For what thanksgiving can we render?’
“You were the cause for us of such great joy that we are unable to thank God worthily. We consider your success a gift of God. You have benefited us so greatly that we consider it a work accomplished by God’s inspiration, or rather, the work of God Himself.
“Such exalted dispositions are not the work of human efforts.”
“Can we render.” One renders a debt. Considering himself greatly benefited, he feels obliged to thank God, yet finds no strength to thank Him worthily. So great is the good of being gladdened.
“The greatness of the rejoicing overcomes the hymnody of the lips. For we are unable to raise to God a song equal to the joy that has been given us by you” (Theodoret).
“Concerning you.” He speaks only of his joy because of them, as an expression of his strong and irrepressible love for them.
“For all the joy” either indicates the various things that gave joy, or generally signifies the fullness of joy. Thus it means: for all this joy. To this also belongs “with which we rejoice for your sake.”
“To rejoice with joy” means to rejoice fully, in the highest degree. It is the same as elsewhere, “to rejoice with great joy” (Mt 2:10).
“Before God.” This elevates the value of the joy. He rejoices with such joy as is proper before God, a holy and reverent joy, conceived and maturing in the spirit of faith and devotion to God.
Here too is assurance of the sincerity of his joy, as though he said: before God, the all-seeing witness of everything that happens secretly within.
Passages read together with this verse.
Greek text, 21 words with lemma, transliteration and Strong’s number. Tap to expand.
THEOSIS