1 Thessalonians 1:4-5

1 Thessalonians 1:4-5. Knowing your election, a further reason for his thanksgiving. Paul knew that God had chosen as well as called those to whom he writes. He knows this by the following sign: that our gospel came not unto you in word only, etc.; his call seemed to carry with it power to move them, and enable them to obey it, the Holy Ghost entered with it into them, and much assurance or a full conviction of its truth was wrought in them. [It should be mentioned that many interpreters understand these three terms as descriptive not of the effects in the hearers, but of the characteristics of the apostle's preaching. But comp. chap. 1 Thessalonians 2:13.]

As ye know what manner of men we were among you. Paul had concluded from the manifest effects of the word upon them that they were God's elect, even as they had concluded, from his zeal in preaching it, that he believed it to be the word of God. The know of this clause has a reference to the knowing of 1 Thessalonians 1:4.