| Geneva Study Bible {2} For this is the will of God, even your {b} sanctification, that ye should abstain from fornication: (2) This is the sum of those things which he delivered to them, to dedicate themselves wholly to God. And he plainly condemns all filthiness through lust, because it is altogether contrary to the will of God. (b) See Joh 17:17. People's New Testament 4:3 This is the will of God. What he had taught them was the will of God and needful to their sanctification, or holiness of life. That ye should abstain from fornication. The student of the Epistles will note how often this command is repeated to Gentile churches, a fact easily explained when we remember that fornication was considered no sin among the heathen. Wesley's Notes 4:3 Sanctification - Entire holiness of heart and life: particular branches of it are subjoined. That ye abstain from fornication - A beautiful transition from sanctification to a single branch of the contrary; and this shows that nothing is so seemingly distant, or below our thoughts, but we have need to guard against it. Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary 3. For-enforcing the assertion that his "commandments" were "by (the authority of) the Lord Jesus" (1Th 4:2). Since "this is the will of God," let it be your will also. fornication-not regarded as a sin at all among the heathen, and so needing the more to be denounced (Ac 15:20). Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary 4:1-8 To abide in the faith of the gospel is not enough, we must abound in the work of faith. The rule according to which all ought to walk and act, is the commandments given by the Lord Jesus Christ. Sanctification, in the renewal of their souls under the influences of the Holy Spirit, and attention to appointed duties, constituted the will of God respecting them. In aspiring after this renewal of the soul unto holiness, strict restraint must be put upon the appetites and senses of the body, and on the thoughts and inclinations of the will, which lead to wrong uses of them. The Lord calls none into his family to live unholy lives, but that they may be taught and enabled to walk before him in holiness. Some make light of the precepts of holiness, because they hear them from men; but they are God's commands, and to break them is to despise God. | 
