For the newly baptized believers of Thessalonica who had converted from paganism

and a culture with loose ethics, the warning of St. Paul would have been hard to

comprehend. “It is God’s will that you should be sanctified: that you should avoid

sexual immorality…For God did not call us to be impure, but to live a holy life” (1 Thes

4:3-7). Slowly but steadily, the Gospel of Christ expelled the lax moral standards

prevalent at that time and heralded a new era. Sadly, the decline of Christian influence

is progressively manifested in declining moral standards worldwide. It is no wonder

that there is a growing indifference to the demands of the Gospel among the youth,

who mostly have been brought up in a culture of hedonism and self-centeredness. Yet

it is in this very culture that we, as Jesus Youth, are called to hold aloft the banner of

truth that sets people free.