Potential. What a great word! It means something that can develop or become actual. It’s a promise of good things to come. I think of the word potential when I read the letter of Paul to the Thessalonians. It’s a lovely little letter, sometimes overlooked because of its simplicity.

When Paul wrote the letter it was not to correct any great theological error nor to rebuke a great sin. Instead, Paul wrote it from the heart of thanksgiving. At a time in his life when there was little encouragement, messengers came from Thessalonica with word that his converts there were continuing steadfastly in the Gospel he had brought them. Paul wrote this letter to encourage them to fulfill their potential “to life lives worthy of God, who calls you into his kingdom and glory.”  [I Thessalonians 2:7]

I remember a passage from a song my kids used to sing, “I am a promise, I am a possibility, I am a promise, with a capital ‘P.’ I am a great big bundle of potentiality!”

Each of us is a great big bundle of potentiality. God has promised to not only begin a work in us, but to complete it. God’s promise is our potentiality. Because He said he would do a work in us, and that He would complete that work, we have potential that is truly supernatural; supernatural because it originates and finishes in Him.

As Paul wrote to the Thessalonians, he expressed his thanksgiving for what God had begun to do in them since their conversion. He also however, set out a path for them to walk to fulfill their potential and see the completion of God’s work in their lives.

I don’t know about you, but even at almost 80 years old I’d like to see the potential God has placed in me mature and become a complete work. Walk with me through Thessalonians, and remember, you are a “great big bundle of potentiality!”