Why does 1 Thessalonians 4:11 say to work with your hands?

Next follows a call to abound in brotherly love, in which the apostle does glide into the connected proprieties of daily labour animated by care for others. "Now concerning brotherly love ye have no need that we write to you; for ye yourselves are taught of God to love one another; for, indeed, ye do it toward all the brethren that are in the whole of Macedonia. But we exhort you, brethren, that ye abound still more, and that ye make it your aim to be quiet and mind your own affairs and work with your own hands, even as we charged you, that ye may walk honourably toward those without, and may have need of nothing" (vers. 9-12). The possession of Christ does wonderfully bind hearts together; and as affection one toward another is a spiritual instinct, so all that is learnt of Christ deepens it intelligently. Intercourse may test its reality sometimes, but as a whole develops it actively, and the more as sharing the same hostility from the world. Here, too, the apostle looks that it should abound more and more, and along with it the studious aim to be quiet and to mind their own affairs, which brotherly love would surely promote: the very reverse of that meddling disposition which flows from the assumption of superiority in knowledge or spirituality or faithfulness. Further, he calls on them to work with their own hands, even as we charged you (and who could do it with so good a grace?), that they may walk honourably toward those without and may have need of nothing [or none]. There is not such a thought as encouraging the needy to draw on the generosity of others. Let it be the ambition of those who love, and would keep the love of others, to spare themselves in nothing and avoid encroaching on the help of any, so as to cut off all suspicion from those without. Brotherly love would be questioned if heed were not paid to propriety; it flourishes and abounds where there is also self-denial.

But again, to "study to be quiet, and to work with your own hands" was important. The thrill of a newfound faith, the excitement of a wonderfully prosperous work of God, might too easily occupy souls. There must be a settling, a learning to quietly estimate things rightly and soberly. This studying therefore is a true, consistent application of the heart. Work with the hands is, of course, a good balancing factor to keep souls from a one-sided type of emotional Christianity. The reality of their faith would be proven to "them that are without" by an honest walk steadily maintained. This was to be diligently cultivated. The latter part of verse 12 may be translated "and that ye may have need of no one," that is, that they would not be dependent upon men.

Towards them that are without the Christian circle we are to walk righteously, or reputably. With this end in view, the Apostle says, “seek earnestly to be quiet and mind your own affairs” (N. Tn.). It is natural for a man of the world to take part in its affairs, even if they are only of local interest. The Christian, remembering that he is called out of the world, will earnestly strive against this natural tendency, and quietly pursue his way, avoiding, as far as possible the questions and controversies that occupy the world around. We are to work with our own hands, acting honestly in our business relations, in order to supply our daily needs. There are those, as we know from Scripture (v. 12-13), who give themselves to the work of the ministry, but evidently it is the mind of God for His people generally that they abide in their earthly calling, if they can do so with God.

The third ambition of which Paul speaks is found in 1 Thess. 4:10-11. The Apostle beseeches his beloved Thessalonian brethren to "be ambitious to be quiet, and to do your own business, and to work with your own hands." I sadly fear that most of the Lord's people today love the honour of working with their heads in a clean and honourable position, rather than soiling their hands by using them in hard work. They forget their Master worked with His own hands until He was about thirty years of age. They forget that the one who exhorted to this ambition could hold out his hands, and say "Yea, ye yourselves know, that these hands have ministered unto my necessities, and to them that were with me." "These hands" were probably worn and calloused with making tents. And let us remember his words: "I beseech you to be imitators (mimics: mimetes: always in a good sense in the New Testament) of me." (1 Cor. 4:16). And to the very saints whom he exhorted to be ambitious to be quiet, and to work with their own hands, in the very same Epistle, he wrote: "Ye became our imitators (mimics: mimetes), and of the Lord." (1 Thess. 1:7; See also 2:14.) And in the Second Epistle, Chapter 3, Verses 7 & 9, we read: "Ye know yourselves how ye ought to imitate (mimic) us … We … give ourselves as an example to you, in order to your imitating (mimicking) us." (See New Translation).

The Thessalonians were marked by brotherly love (v. 9) but this virtue was not to be abused. It was not to be relied on as a substitute for their own honest work (v. 11; see also the ‘disorderly’ referred to in 5:14 and 2 Thess. 3).

But the apostle had to notice also some evil that was among them. He had to admonish as well as comfort, and to pray not only that their hearts might be comforted, but established in every good word and work. (2 Thess. 2:17) For some of them had ceased "to labour with their hands." It may be that this had been the fruit of some corrupt view of their great distinguishing doctrine, the coming of the Lord. For it is Satan's way, if he cannot rob us of truth, to corrupt it while it is still in our hand. The Thessalonians were zealous, they had come to meet the Lord with purpose of heart, but this had become connected with a desertion of their quiet, industrious, private walk. But he does not condemn this zeal, or seek to correct the evil by withdrawing the Lord's coming from their view. We have seen that it is rather his great subject; but he desires for them that they might be in patient, and not disorderly, waiting for it, and urges this duty upon them by reminding them of his example and his precepts while he was among them. For he had been a labourer for his own support at Thessalonica, this having been so ordered in the provisional wisdom of God, who now by His Spirit uses that fact for the admonition and guidance of the saints there.

(V. 11) It is possible that some had so wrong a viewpoint in reference to the nearness of the Lord's coming that they considered it not necessary to work at all. But this reasoning is sinful. Though I am not to be doubtful or worried as to the future, yet I am to labor, working with the hands that which is good in order to have to give to others who may be in need. Work is not simply to be a means of amassing provision for the future on earth but of providing things honestly in the sight of all men, at present. What utter disgrace for a Christian to decide that since Christ is coming soon, therefore he need not work at all, but take his support from others who do work! Nor will it end there. They also become "busybodies," for since paying no attention to their own business, they shamefully interfere in the business of others. The apostle both commands and exhorts such "that with quietness they work and eat their own bread." For one to despise this was to despise the commandment of God.

At Thessalonica an evil habit had already manifested itself of what the apostle called walking disorderly — brethren working not at all, yet seeking temporal support from others in the assembly. Against such a habit the apostle writes very strongly, charging the saints to discountenance it, charging those guilty of it to discontinue it: "We command you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye withdraw yourselves from every brother that walketh disorderly, and not after the tradition which they* received of us." (2 Thess. 3:6.) Such were his words to the saints. "Now them that are such [i.e. disorderly] we command and exhort in the Lord Jesus Christ, that with quietness they work, and eat their own bread." (v. 12.) Such were his words to the offenders. Both parties were to see that the question was a serious one; and as they owned Jesus as Lord, they were to obey the injunction given by His apostle. Eating the bread of others in idleness was no part of Christian teaching; nay, the contrary was enjoined. Exhortations to be liberal and brotherly to those really in need abound in the Word (Gal. 6:6; Eph. 4:28; 1 John 3:17; 3 John 8); but eating the bread of others in idleness the Word distinctly forbids. To eat their own bread was to be the aim and desire of such as had been doing the contrary — learning of the apostle, who could labour night and day at his trade, that he should not burden the saints. From all offenders after this sort Christians were to withdraw; and should there be one who did not obey the apostolic injunction communicated in writing, they were to note him, and not to keep company with him, that he might be ashamed. (v. 14.)

Then again a strange set of fanatics, both in rather early and in later days of Christendom, made abstinence from labour a counsel of perfection. They claimed to be in a peculiar degree men of prayer, and were called Euchites by those who condemned them. Their boast was neither to sow nor reap; but they could not escape the reproach that they liked the barn and to have it well filled. The germ of this selfishness showed itself among the Thessalonian saints. But it did not fail to receive immediate discouragement and a heavy blow from the apostle, who could appeal to his own work with his hands where it made for the Lord's glory. But he also ruled such a claim as unworthy of Him, and a dishonour to such as were ensnared in cheat. "Now we enjoin you, brethren, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, that ye withdraw from every brother [not rising to superior spirituality but] walking disorderly and not according to the tradition which he received from us. For yourselves know that ye ought to imitate us, because we were not disorderly among you, nor did we eat bread of any one for naught, but with labour and toil working night and day, that we might not burden any of you. Not because we have not authority, but that we might give ourselves an example to you, that ye should imitate us. For even when we were with you, this we enjoined you that, if anyone will not work, neither let him eat. For we hear of some walking among you disorderly, working not at all, but busy-bodies. Now such as those we enjoin and exhort in the Lord Jesus Christ that working quietly they eat their own bread" (2 Thess. 3:6-12).

Nor did it cost him nothing. A man of means may preach and teach publicly and privately; but then he escapes necessarily the pressure of manual labour by day or by night. When wearied by his spiritual exertions, he has not to think of filling up with other work every available minute that he can fittingly abstract for the supply of his bodily wants. The apostle, in an energy of devoted love which has never been equalled among the sons of men, tells us in a few words the simple truth of his ordinary life, while enjoining the saints how to mark their sense of the disorder in Thessalonica. And he faithfully lets them know that he was giving them this truly christian zeal as an example for their imitation. How it acted on the Thessalonians in general we know not; but we may be sure that such a gracious abandonment of fleshly ease and of worldly etiquette was eminently suited to inflict the most withering rebuke on the idlers who, liking to talk rather than work, imposed on the kindness of the brethren and dishonoured the Lord. How blessed when the fault of others turns to our learning afresh the grace of Christ as it applies in a world of sin, selfishness, and misery! Still more so, when he who thus teaches walked from first to last in the grace he commends to others; and this, not only as now to the saints generally but to the elders in particular, as we read in his parting address at a later day to the Ephesian overseers at Miletus. "Ye yourselves know that these hands ministered to my wants and to those that were with me. I showed you all things that so labouring ye ought to help the weak and to remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how that he himself said, It is more blessed to give than to receive."