IV. Mind our own business.—1. Because it is becoming. 2. Brings advantage. 3. It is necessary. 4. We are commanded to do so.—Farindon.

Mind your own Business.

  1. The Bible contains little encouragement for the idler.
  2. The text enjoins diligence not only in business, but in one’s own business.
  3. The counsel of the apostle is supported by the best wisdom of the world.—“It becomes a man,” said Herodotus, “to give heed to those things only which concern himself.”
  4. The apostle takes it for granted that ours is a worthy business.
  5. Only by diligence in the care of your own souls will you be able to do really effective work for Christ.—A. F. Forrest.

MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—Verses 13, 14.

Sorrow for the Dead.

The Thessalonians who cherished a vivid expectation of the near approach of the second advent of Christ appear to have fallen into a misconception as to the relation of their deceased friends to that glorious event. While believing that the pious dead would ultimately be raised again, they feared they would not be permitted to share in the joy of welcoming Him back to His inheritance of the redeemed earth and in the triumphant inauguration of His reign. “It was just as if, on the very eve of the day of the expected return of some long absent father, a cruel fate should single out one fond expectant child and hurry him to a far distant and inhospitable shore.” But all their fears and perplexities were dissipated by the sublime disclosures contained in this epistle.

I. That sorrow is a merciful relief to a soul bereaved.—Sorrow is nowhere forbidden. It may be an infirmity, but it is at the same time a solace. The soul oppressed and stricken by the weight of a great calamity finds relief in tears.

“O ye tears! O ye tears! till I felt you on my cheek,
I was selfish in my sorrow. I was stubborn, I was weak;
Ye have given me strength to conquer, and I stand erect and free,
And know that I am human, by the light of sympathy.”

The religion of the Bible does not destroy human passions. We do not part with our nature when we receive the grace of God. The mind that is capable of a real sorrow is capable of good. A griefless nature can never be a joyous one.

II. That sorrow for the dead is aggravated by ignorance of their future destiny.—“I would not have you to be ignorant concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope” (ver. 13). The radius of hope is contracted or expanded in proportion to the character and extent of intelligence possessed. Ignorant “sorrow is a kind of rust to the soul, which every new idea contributes in its passage to scour away. It is the putrefaction of stagnant life and is remedied by exercise and motion.” The heathen, who have no satisfactory knowledge of the future life, give way to an excessive and hopeless grief. Du Chaillu describes a scene of wailing for the dead among the Africans. “The mother of poor Tonda,” he writes, “led me to the house where the body was laid. The narrow space of the room was crowded; about two hundred women were sitting and standing around, singing mourning songs to doleful and monotonous airs. As I stood looking, filled with solemn thoughts, the mother of Tonda approached. She threw herself at the foot of her dead son and begged him to speak to her once more. And then when the corpse did not answer she uttered a shriek, so long, so piercing, such a wail of love and grief that tears came into my eyes. Poor African mother! She was literally as one sorrowing without hope, for these people count on nothing beyond the present life.” It was the dictum of an old Greek poet—a man once dead there is no revival; and those words indicated the dismal condition of unenlightened nature in all lands and in all ages. What an urgent argument is here for increased missionary efforts among the heathen!