1 I, Paul, am writing this letter. Silas and Timothy join me in writing.
We are sending this letter to you, the members of the church in Thessalonica. You belong to God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
2 May God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ give you grace and peace.
Paul Prays and Gives Thanks
3 Brothers and sisters, we should always thank God for you. That is only right, because your faith is growing more and more. We also thank God that the love you all have for one another is increasing. 4 So among God’s churches we brag about the fact that you don’t give up easily. We brag about your faith in all the suffering and testing you are going through.
5 All of this proves that when God judges, he is fair. So you will be considered worthy to enter God’s kingdom. You are suffering for his kingdom. 6 God is fair. He will pay back trouble to those who give you trouble. 7 He will help you who are troubled. And he will also help us. All these things will happen when the Lord Jesus appears from heaven. He will come in blazing fire. He will come with his powerful angels. 8 He will punish those who don’t know God. He will punish those who don’t obey the good news about our Lord Jesus. 9 They will be destroyed forever. They will be shut out of heaven. They will never see the glory of the Lord’s strength. 10 All these things will happen when he comes. On that day his glory will be seen in his holy people. Everyone who has believed will be amazed when they see him. This includes you, because you believed the witness we gave you.
11 Keeping this in mind, we never stop praying for you. Our God has chosen you. We pray that he will make you worthy of his choice. We pray he will make every good thing you want to do come true. We pray that he will do this by his power. We pray that he will make perfect all that you have done by faith. 12 We pray this so that the name of our Lord Jesus will receive glory through what you have done. We also pray that you will receive glory through what he has done. We pray all these things in keeping with the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ.