2 Thessalonians 1:1-4, 11-12

“When the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven… to be glorified in his saints.” (2 Thessalonians 1:7, 10)

The wording resembles the first letter’s address (see comment there) except for the addition of “our” in the phrase, in God our Father . This clarifies that God is being presented, not as the Father of Jesus but as the Father of his people and, specifically, of the church of the Thessalonians . The greeting also parallels the first letter’s (again, see the comment there), but it is expanded by the addition of from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ , which becomes Paul’s regular form of greeting in later letters (cf. Rom. 1:7; 1 Cor. 1:3; 2 Cor. 1:2; Gal. 1:3; Eph. 1:2; Phil. 1:2; Col. 1:2 and for variants, cf. 1 Tim. 1:2; 2 Tim. 1:2; Titus 1:4; Philem. 3). It makes explicit what is implicit in the simpler form: God (as author) and the Lord Jesus (as agent) are together the source of our salvation, which is entirely of grace (“the extravagant goodness of God,” see disc. on 1 Thess. 1:1) and which results in our peace .

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