Charles Ellicott Commentary 1 Thessalonians 4:8

"Therefore he that rejecteth, rejecteth not man, but God, who giveth his Holy Spirit unto you." — 1 Thessalonians 4:8 (ASV)

“So you see that to act contemptuously in the matter is to act contemptuously not only towards your neighbor, but towards God Himself, and this, too, after He has given you a gift which should have preserved you from these corruptions.”

He . . . that despises.—The verb means to treat as insignificant either persons or things. Here the object is not supplied in the first instance, in order to heighten the effect of the second clause. If we were to supply it, it would include all the rights which the immoral person spurns: “the commandments which we (mere men as you thought us) gave you,” the “brother” whose domestic happiness has been invaded, the unfortunate victim herself, and, finally, the “honor” due to the sinner’s own body. Since it was God who ordered the relationships in which we all stand to one another, contempt for these relationships is contempt for Him.

Who has also given.—Mistranslated for “who also gave.” St. Paul is looking back to the day when he confirmed them; for the right reading is not “unto us,” but “unto you,” or more correctly “into you”—that is, “to enter into you, and dwell there” (John 14:17, and many other places). The word “holy” in the original is very emphatically put: “Who also gave His Spirit—His Holy Spirit—to enter you,” thus bringing out the startling contrast between such foul lives and the holiness which befitted and was possible (Romans 6:14; Romans 8:3–4) for men in whom the Holy Spirit, communicated by the laying on of hands, condescended to dwell.