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We have here —

1. POINTS OF RESEMBLANCE.

(1)  The mode of the preaching, and

(2)  its two-fold result: "some believed the things that were spoken, and some believed not."

2. Points of contrast; a difference in their way of hearing and in their manner of inquiring into truth. It is deeply interesting to be able thus to individualise some of Paul's congregations. We all know that there are such differences now. There are varieties of character and locality. Between one country and another, between one part of one country and another part, there are many noticeable differences, the result of many various and long-working influences. Often the ministry has to be blamed or praised for them. A place in which a faithful pastor has long been at work bears the impress of his hand for the next generation or two. And the absence of such a ministry will leave an opposite stamp. Who that reads the Epistles of St. Paul could for one moment confuse or interchange the spiritual characteristics of the churches of Corinth, of Philippi, of Galatia, of Thessalonica? Take that of —

I. THESSALONICA. Berea was more noble, because it received the Word frankly, and searched the Scriptures. Thessalonica was less noble in this respect. But there were those even in Thessalonica who had all the nobleness of Berea. Look at St. Paul's Epistles to them. Observe —

1. How St. Paul had treated them.

(1) Like a father, "we exhorted and comforted and charged you, as a father does his children"; and like a mother also, "we were gentle among you, even as a nursing mother cherisheth her own children." What a picture of the true pastor! not a "lord over God's heritage," not one "having dominion over their faith, but a helper of their joy."(2) "Ye remember our labour and travail; for labouring night and day, because we would not be chargeable to any of you, we preached unto you the gospel of God." If we, by changes of times, and by God's overruling goodness, are exempted from the necessity of working for our bread, let us take heed that that toil saved from the one be given to the other.

2. His teaching. First of all, it was a gospel, a message of comfort and joy to fallen man. It told him that his sins are forgiven. But it did not leave him even there. What is it to me to be told that God forgives, if you cannot add that God will give me His Holy Spirit to live in me and to work in me effectually? In the strength of this he was not afraid to preach to them of duty. "This is the will of God, even your sanctification"; and if it is His will that we should be holy, certainly He will give His Holy Spirit to them that ask Him. But St. Paul knew that, if you would inspirit a man for duty, you must inspire a man with hope. Therefore he fixed their eyes upon an Advent of the Lord and Saviour in which "blessed and holy is he who shall have part."

3. The rapidity of the work of God there. A few weeks at the very utmost must have comprised it, and yet what a work was already wrought (1 Thessalonians 1:3-10). It is our own fault if the gospel works in any of us slowly or indecisively. A few short weeks are enough, in God's hand, for a complete transformation of the heart and life. Yet let us not lose the force of that solemn admonition, that he who thinketh he standeth must always take heed lest he fall. Scarcely had St. Paul left Thessalonica than he sends back Timotheus to see "lest by any means the tempter had tempted them, and so his labour should be in vain." We are still in an enemy's country, however armed; in the region of death, however full of life. Even from our Lord Himself, after His great temptation, the devil departed but for a season: let us take heed lest confidence breed presumption, presumption sin, and sin death!

II. BEREA.

1. In speaking of Thessalonica, we have spoken of the Church gathered out of the world. The nobleness of the Bereans was shown not in their way of acting upon a gospel already believed, but in their way of trying the credentials of a gospel first heard. They did not refuse the gospel because it contradicted their previous opinions; neither did they, in an excess of credulity, receive it because it was presented to them. They listened to it with the readiness of a candid spirit, and they daily examined their Scriptures to see whether its language and theirs were the same. "Many therefore of them believed."

2. If our teaching were carried back by you to your Bible; if, when we urge upon you any particular duty, or any side of the truth, you would readily examine your Scriptures to see whether what you have heard has God's sanction to it or no, how interesting would become the work of hearing and the work of teaching! You would feel that you were engaged in a pursuit of truth; that it was not a question of pleasure or interest, but a question of right and wrong, of life and death; you would come hither not to criticise, but to learn, and you would go hence not to discuss, but to digest. And we on our part should feel that we were aiding you in settling the most momentous questions, and that out of such inquiries would spring forth a full-flowing stream of satisfaction, strength, and peace. The word denotes the examination of a witness, or the trial of a challenged life. Let us thus put the Word of God upon its trial. Let us not treat it as a dead, unmeaning, monotonous thing, to be carried in the hand, read at church, or suffered on the table; but rather as a living person, to be questioned, to be listened to and judged. So treated, the Bible will become to us a voice, not a page only. So treated, we shall at last be able to say, "Thy Word is tried to the uttermost, and Thy servant loveth it."

(Dean Vaughan.)

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KJV: And the brethren immediately sent away Paul and Silas by night unto Berea: who coming thither went into the synagogue of the Jews.

WEB: The brothers immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Beroea. When they arrived, they went into the Jewish synagogue.