1 Thessalonians 4:3
New International Version
It is God’s will that you should be sanctified: that you should avoid sexual immorality;

New Living Translation
God’s will is for you to be holy, so stay away from all sexual sin.

English Standard Version
For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality;

Berean Standard Bible
For it is God’s will that you should be holy: You must abstain from sexual immorality;

Berean Literal Bible
For this is the will of God, your sanctification: You are to abstain from sexual immorality;

King James Bible
For this is the will of God, even your sanctification, that ye should abstain from fornication:

New King James Version
For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you should abstain from sexual immorality;

New American Standard Bible
For this is the will of God, your sanctification; that is, that you abstain from sexual immorality;

NASB 1995
For this is the will of God, your sanctification; that is, that you abstain from sexual immorality;

NASB 1977
For this is the will of God, your sanctification; that is, that you abstain from sexual immorality;

Legacy Standard Bible
For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality;

Amplified Bible
For this is the will of God, that you be sanctified [separated and set apart from sin]: that you abstain and back away from sexual immorality;

Christian Standard Bible
For this is God’s will, your sanctification: that you keep away from sexual immorality,

Holman Christian Standard Bible
For this is God’s will, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality,

American Standard Version
For this is the will of God, even your sanctification, that ye abstain from fornication;

Aramaic Bible in Plain English
For this is the will of God: your holiness, and that you be separate from all fornication,

Contemporary English Version
God wants you to be holy, so don't be immoral in matters of sex.

Douay-Rheims Bible
For this is the will of God, your sanctification; that you should abstain from fornication;

English Revised Version
For this is the will of God, even your sanctification, that ye abstain from fornication;

GOD'S WORD® Translation
It is God's will that you keep away from sexual sin as a mark of your devotion to him.

Good News Translation
God wants you to be holy and completely free from sexual immorality.

International Standard Version
For it is God's will that you be sanctified: You must abstain from sexual immorality.

Literal Standard Version
for this is the will of God—your sanctification: that you abstain from the whoredom,

Majority Standard Bible
For it is God’s will that you should be holy: You must abstain from sexual immorality;

New American Bible
This is the will of God, your holiness: that you refrain from immorality,

NET Bible
For this is God's will: that you become holy, that you keep away from sexual immorality,

New Revised Standard Version
For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from fornication;

New Heart English Bible
For this is the will of God: your sanctification, that you abstain from sexual immorality,

Webster's Bible Translation
For this is the will of God, even your sanctification, that ye should abstain from lewdness.

Weymouth New Testament
For this is God's will--your purity of life, that you abstain from fornication;

World English Bible
For this is the will of God: your sanctification, that you abstain from sexual immorality,

Young's Literal Translation
for this is the will of God -- your sanctification; that ye abstain from the whoredom,

Additional Translations ...
Audio Bible



Context
Living to Please God
2For you know the instructions we gave you by the authority of the Lord Jesus. 3For it is God’s will that you should be holy: You must abstain from sexual immorality; 4each of you must know how to control his own body in holiness and honor,…

Cross References
Matthew 5:32
But I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, brings adultery upon her. And he who marries a divorced woman commits adultery.

1 Corinthians 6:18
Flee from sexual immorality. Every other sin a man can commit is outside his body, but he who sins sexually sins against his own body.

Ephesians 5:17
Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord's will is.

1 Thessalonians 4:2
For you know the instructions we gave you by the authority of the Lord Jesus.


Treasury of Scripture

For this is the will of God, even your sanctification, that you should abstain from fornication:

this.

1 Thessalonians 5:18
In every thing give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.

Psalm 40:8
I delight to do thy will, O my God: yea, thy law is within my heart.

Psalm 143:10
Teach me to do thy will; for thou art my God: thy spirit is good; lead me into the land of uprightness.

your.

1 Thessalonians 4:4
That every one of you should know how to possess his vessel in sanctification and honour;

1 Thessalonians 5:23
And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

John 17:17-19
Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth…

that.

Matthew 15:19
For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies:

Acts 15:20,29
But that we write unto them, that they abstain from pollutions of idols, and from fornication, and from things strangled, and from blood…

Romans 1:29
Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers,

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Abstain Avoid Desires Flesh Fornication God's Holy Immorality Lewdness Purity Purpose Sanctification Sanctified Sexual Unchastity Whoredom Yourselves
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Abstain Avoid Desires Flesh Fornication God's Holy Immorality Lewdness Purity Purpose Sanctification Sanctified Sexual Unchastity Whoredom Yourselves
1 Thessalonians 4
1. He exhorts them to go forward in all manner of godliness;
6. to live holily and justly;
9. to love one another;
11. and quietly to follow their own business;
13. and last of all, to sorrow moderately for the dead.
17. followed by a brief description of the resurrection, and second coming of Christ to judgment.














(3) For.--The word further enforces the appeal to their memory: "Ye know what commandments . . . for this (you will recollect) is what God wants;" "a commandment given through the Lord Jesus," being, of course, identical with "God's will."

Your sanctification.--In apposition to the word this. The mere conversion, justification, salvation of us are not the aim of God: He would have us holy. The general idea of sanctification passes however here, as the following clauses show, into the more limited sense of purification.

Fornication.--The word is often used in late Greek for any kind of impurity, as, e.g., 1Corinthians 5:1, of incest; but here it must be understood in its strict sense. To the Gentile mind, while the wickedness of adultery or incest was fully recognised, it was a novelty to be told that fornication was a "deadly sin;" hence the strange connection in which it stands in the Synodal letter to the Gentile churches (Acts 15:20; Acts 15:29; Acts 21:25). This consideration also makes it easier to understand how St. Paul can praise these Gentile Thessalonians so heartily, although they need earnest correction on this vital point. It is a true instance of the sacerdotal metriopathy (or, compassionate consideration) towards the ignorant and deceived. (See Hebrews 5:1-2.) . . .

Verse 3. - For this is the will of God. The phrase, "the will of God," has two significations in Scripture: the one is the determination of God - his decree; the other is his desire, that in which he delights - a will, however, which may be frustrated by the perversity of his creatures. It is in this latter sense that the word is here employed. Even your sanctification; complete consecration; holiness taken in its most general so. use. Our holiness is the great design of Christ's death, and is the revealed will of God. Some (Olshausen, Lunemann) restrict the term to moral purity, and consider the next clause as its explanation (comp. Romans 12:1). That ye should abstain from fornication; a vice fearfully prevalent among the heathen, and which, indeed, they hardly regarded as wrong. Especially it was the great sin of Corinth, from which the apostle wrote, the patron goddess of which city was Venus.

Parallel Commentaries ...


Greek
For
γάρ (gar)
Conjunction
Strong's 1063: For. A primary particle; properly, assigning a reason.

it is
ἐστιν (estin)
Verb - Present Indicative Active - 3rd Person Singular
Strong's 1510: I am, exist. The first person singular present indicative; a prolonged form of a primary and defective verb; I exist.

God’s
Θεοῦ (Theou)
Noun - Genitive Masculine Singular
Strong's 2316: A deity, especially the supreme Divinity; figuratively, a magistrate; by Hebraism, very.

will
θέλημα (thelēma)
Noun - Nominative Neuter Singular
Strong's 2307: An act of will, will; plur: wishes, desires. From the prolonged form of ethelo; a determination, i.e. choice or inclination.

that
Τοῦτο (Touto)
Demonstrative Pronoun - Nominative Neuter Singular
Strong's 3778: This; he, she, it.

you
ὑμῶν (hymōn)
Personal / Possessive Pronoun - Genitive 2nd Person Plural
Strong's 4771: You. The person pronoun of the second person singular; thou.

should be holy:
ἁγιασμὸς (hagiasmos)
Noun - Nominative Masculine Singular
Strong's 38: From hagiazo; properly, purification, i.e. purity; concretely a purifier.

You
ὑμᾶς (hymas)
Personal / Possessive Pronoun - Accusative 2nd Person Plural
Strong's 4771: You. The person pronoun of the second person singular; thou.

must abstain
ἀπέχεσθαι (apechesthai)
Verb - Present Infinitive Middle
Strong's 568: To have in full, be far, it is enough. From apo and echo; to have out, i.e. Receive in full; to keep away, i.e. Be distant.

from
ἀπὸ (apo)
Preposition
Strong's 575: From, away from. A primary particle; 'off, ' i.e. Away, in various senses.

sexual immorality;
πορνείας (porneias)
Noun - Genitive Feminine Singular
Strong's 4202: Fornication, whoredom; met: idolatry. From porneuo; harlotry; figuratively, idolatry.


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NT Letters: 1 Thessalonians 4:3 For this is the will of God: (1 Thess. 1 Thes. 1Th iTh i Th)
1 Thessalonians 4:2
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