1 Thess. 4:13-18; Rev. 20:1-6, Hope (3)

We are continuing through our outline on 1 Thess. 4:13-18.

·        RESURRECTION.  There are two phrases of concern here.

o   Phrase #1: Jesus died and rose again, v14.  As we have noted before, this is the foundation, the firstfruits.  What can we say of Jesus’ resurrection?  First, it was a bodily resurrection.  The soul, the real person inside, never ceases to exist and thus it was with Christ.  Second, the body bore resemblance to His body before death (He still had the scars from the nails and spear).  Yet, third, there were differences, as when He entered a room that was locked when appearing to His disciples.

o   Phrase #2: the dead in Christ will rise first, v16.  This is what Scripture elsewhere calls the first resurrection, the first kind of resurrection which is the resurrection of the just.  It is explained more in Rev. 20:4-6.

·        RAPTURE.  The phrase of concern is: we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air.  We use the term rapture (from the Latin) but the word here (caught up together) is simply the conveying of a person from one place to another.  Note the other uses in the NT (Ac. 8:39; Rev. 12:5; Jn. 10:28).  What makes this event special is that we do not meet Christ in Israel which is where He will be in His return but we meet Him in the air. 

o   Who is raptured? Believers who are still living when He comes for the Church.

o   When this happen? When He comes for His Church, after the dead in Christ are raised.  We have gone into detail elsewhere explaining why we believe this occurs before the seven year tribulation.

o   Where do we go?  Specifically: in the clouds to meet Him in the air.  This is the distinctive of the rapture as opposed to the second coming when Christ comes to earth.  

·        REUNION.  Thus we shall always be with the Lord.  To summarize, when we meet Him in the air we will be there with Him as well as with those who have died in Christ.  This is the point Jesus makes through Paul to bring comfort to the Thessalonian believers.  Paul encourages the church to speak these words to each other and we should take this into account.  When we grieve the loss of loved ones in Christ we should speak these words.  They are true.  They perfectly fit the situation.  We will be together again and it is proper for us to anticipate this event and being with loved ones as well as with our Lord.

 This passage tells us something about the love and fellowship of the body of Christ.  We miss our spiritual family just like we miss our physical family when they are gone from this life.  The catching away of the Church ought not to be a contentious subject where we argue about the timing and so forth.  It should be a subject of immense comfort to us.