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“We exhort you, brethren…to be quiet and mind your own affairs, and work with your own hands” (1 Thessalonians 4:10-11 JND).
“For we hear that there are some which walk among you disorderly, working not at all, but are busybodies” (2 Thessalonians 3:11).
Evidently there was a real problem in Thessalonica with this kind of people, for the Apostle Paul mentions it in both of the epistles he wrote to them. It is easy for us to wish to be involved in other people’s affairs, and to be so busy in this that we do not look after our own affairs properly. It is nice to inquire about others when we wish to be a help to them, and especially when they are in trouble, but idle curiosity that wants to know everything about everyone else is really nothing but gossip. This almost always leads to trouble, for things get repeated and often exaggerated, so that what is said is not even true. This causes hard feelings and eventually may destroy our Christian fellowship with others.
It is important to mind our own business, unless the Lord leads us to seek out someone else who really needs help. Then let us keep to ourselves anything that we may know about them.
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