What happened in every place where Paul gained converts?
Wherever Paul gained converts, the new believers turned from idols to the living God. Because they came out of a culture totally different from Christianity, they came under pressure and intense persecution from their idolatrous friends and relatives. This held true for the Thessalonians and other converts in Macedonia and Achaia.
Les teaches that in every place Paul gained converts, the pattern was the same: they turned from idols to the living God. He points out that this took something, because these people were leaving a culture totally different from Christianity. Whenever people are saved and become believers, they come under pressure and intense persecution. Paul kept this uppermost in his mind as he wrote, knowing that new converts did not have an easy role living among idolatrous friends and relatives. The Thessalonians in northern Greece, near Philippi, were a prime example, and the same was true in Macedonia and Achaia.
For they themselves shew of us what manner of entering in we had unto you, and how ye turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God;