2 Thessalonians 3:8Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

Even if I ate with someone, it would not have been for nothing: "The laborer is worthy of his food" (Mt. 10:10). See the commentary on 2 Thess. 3:10.

Great boldness is given to a teacher by the thought that he can appeal to his righteous deeds when exhorting his disciples. Therefore Paul said: you yourselves know how you ought to imitate us. A teacher must teach more by life than by word. Let no one think that the Apostle said this because he wished to praise himself excessively. Necessity compelled him to say it, and he did so for the common benefit.

"Nor did we eat anyone's bread for nothing." Notice that the Apostle called the support he received from them free food. Yet it was not free, because he preached. And the laborer is worthy of his food. "But we labored and toiled night and day." Pay attention to the strengthening of the speech. If those taught by us in anything do not honor us for God's sake, we become indignant, as though we had suffered the greatest injury. "That we might not burden any of you." It is especially burdensome to take from one's hearers. In the present case the Apostle speaks of this because the Thessalonians were poor.

What evil idleness is, is there any need to speak of this, when the Apostle clearly commands that one who does not work should not even eat? Therefore, as the daily taking of food is necessary for each person, so work according to one’s strength is also necessary. For Solomon did not write in praise without cause, “and she does not eat the bread of idleness” (Prov 31:27). And again the Apostle writes of himself: “nor did we eat anyone’s bread for nothing, but we labored and toiled night and day,” although, in preaching the Gospel, he had the right to live from the Gospel. Therefore we must fear lest the same thing be said to us on the day of judgment, when He who gave us strength to work will require work proportionate to that strength.

You know perfectly well that, when we brought the divine Gospel to you, we took nothing from anyone. Instead, we spent day and night in labors, so that through this we might obtain what was necessary for our sustenance. Then, making known that this was beyond the divine law, he added: "Not because we do not have authority, but to give ourselves as an example to you, that you might imitate us." So also in the Epistle to the Corinthians he wrote: "Do we not have authority to eat and drink?" (1 Cor. 9:4). And again: "The Lord commanded those who preach the Gospel to live from the Gospel" (1 Cor. 9:14).

Abba Serapion once aptly exposed the pretense of humility. A man came to him who showed great self-abasement in appearance and words. According to custom, the elder invited him to pray with him. The man would not agree to his request at all. Bowing down, he insisted that he was burdened with so many sins that he was unworthy even to breathe the common air. He would not sit on the mat, but on the ground. Still less would he consent to the washing of his feet. After dinner, when custom called for conversation, Abba Serapion began gently and kindly to admonish him. He told him not to wander everywhere as an idle vagrant, especially since he was young and so healthy. He should not be carried about by frivolous instability, but should remain in his cell.

"For we did not behave disorderly among you, nor did we eat anyone's bread without paying, but with labor and toil, working night and day, that we might not burden any of you" (2 Thess 3:7-8). But would the Apostle really have burdened the Thessalonians if he had received his support from them? Certainly not, especially since he had the right to do so by Christ's commandment (Lk 10:7), and the Thessalonians were a zealous people. Yet, on the one hand, because of the most delicate and tender fatherly feeling which the Apostle had for the Thessalonians (1 Thess 2:7-9), he wished to trouble them in nothing, not even in the least.

In rebuking the idlers, the Apostle recalls how he labored while living in Thessalonica, although he had the right to receive support from them for his preaching of the Gospel. He labored so as not to be a burden to anyone and to show an example of diligence. The idlers, as it were, did not see this. Therefore the Apostle reminds them of himself, in order to stir them toward some form of bodily labor. Perhaps they had abandoned it under the pretext that the second coming of the Lord would soon occur, and that labor was therefore not worth undertaking. St. John Chrysostom writes: "Great boldness is given to a teacher by the thought that he can admonish his disciples by appealing to his own righteous deeds.

After this brief introduction, the Apostle states directly what is troubling him. In the Church of Thessalonica the disorder about which the Apostle had written in the first epistle had not yet ceased. The disorderly, idle life of some Thessalonians still continued, despite the Apostle's rebuke of it. Therefore the Apostle now, as the representative of Christ Himself, "in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ," commands his readers to withdraw from such people. This is all the more necessary because the Apostle not only opposed this idle life in words, but also taught them the contrary by his own example.

"Nor did we eat bread from anyone without paying" begins in the interpretation of verse 7. We did not eat bread from anyone for nothing, although "even if we had eaten from someone, it would not have been for nothing, for 'the laborer is worthy of his wages'" (Mt 10:9-10), says Chrysostom. Therefore those who are being rebuked ate bread for nothing, or lived in idleness, at another's expense. Perhaps they also caroused, going from house to house to eat and drink. In this way they exhausted one another, or those among them who had some means. Having strength to work and thereby obtain their own support, they were not ashamed to insinuate themselves into the houses of others by every sort of injustice and devour their goods.