Paul calls on the Thessalonians to remember his team’s conduct while in the city. If the new believers were beginning to wonder about the motives of the missionaries (e.g., greed, 1 Thessalonians 2:5), and thereby question the divine origin of the message they preached, they need only think back to the way Paul and his co-workers acted while still with them. When they remembered that the missionaries had taken nothing from them, but had worked hard to remain self-sufficient, they would be assured that the preaching of the gospel had not been a trick aimed at squeezing money out of them. Even if the Thessalonians had not been able to see Paul’s motives, they had observed his conduct; and their observations must surely have led them to the conclusion that the message which they had heard truly was the word of God, not a Pauline money-making scheme. Their present sufferings and the possible accusations against Paul and his co-workers need not raise doubts about their decision to follow Jesus, God’s Son.
9 For you remember, brothers, our labor and toil: we worked night and day, that we might not be a burden to any of you, while we proclaimed to you the gospel of God.