1 Thessalonians 1

₁I, Paul, am writing this letter to you with Silvanus and Timothy. We write to the congregation in Thessalonica which belongs to God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. We greet you and we pray that God will be gracious to you and that He will give you his peace.

₂When we pray, we think of all of you and we always thank God. ₃Yes, when we pray to our God and Father, we remember everything that you do because you believe in Christ. We also remember how hard you work because you love Christ and how you keep on hoping because you know that our Lord Jesus Christ will come again.

₄Friends, God loves you and we know that He chose you to belong to Him. ₅We know this because you have heard the Good_News from us, and even more, you have also seen miracles that the Holy_Spirit has done. You believe with all your hearts that everything we say is the truth. You also know how we have lived among you. We did it so that you could see how believers must live.

₆You have learned to live like the Lord and us. Some people made you suffer when you started to believe the Good_News, but the Holy_Spirit has made you very happy. ₇In this way you have shown all the believers in the provinces of Macedonia and Achaia how they must live.

₈Because of your Christian lives, many people in Macedonia, Achaia and a lot of other places have heard the message of the Lord. Someone told us that you started to believe in God. We did not have to tell them about the message of the Lord. ₉These people tell everyone that you welcomed us. They also tell them that you have turned away from the idols and turned to God and that you have started serving the living God, who is the only true God. ₁₀You are waiting for God's Son to come back from heaven. God raised his Son and made Him live again. His Son, Jesus, will save us on the day when God judges all people.