Now if you would take a Bible in hand and turn with me to Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians, chapter 4, in our ongoing study of Paul’s teaching in this letter. First Thessalonians chapter 4. We’ve come to verses 13 through 18.
Now you may have noticed, as we’ve read through the letter over these weeks together, that Paul has alluded to the return of Christ at the end of the age again and again. So everything he’s saying is colored by the light of that great future and glorious event. In chapter 1 verse 10, Paul described the conversion of the Thessalonians as a “turning to God from idols to serve the living and true God and to wait for His Son from heaven whom He raised from the dead, Jesus, who saves us from the wrath to come.” So to be a Christian is to wait for His Son from heaven, to wait for His return. In chapter 2 verse 19 Paul describes the faithful Thessalonians themselves as his own “crown of boasting before our Lord Jesus at His coming.” In chapter 3 verse 30, Paul prayed that the Thessalonians, that their hearts might be established “blameless in holiness before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all His saints.”
So the return, the coming of Jesus, has been a minor theme, a subtle note sounding in the background, hinted at there and there in the music of Paul’s teaching, weaving in and out of the score as it were, but now beginning here in verse 13 and really running through verse 11 of chapter 5 as we are going to see, it becomes a major melody line. The second coming of Christ is of course a subject that attracts considerable interest and no small debate among serious Christians. But let’s remember as we study Paul’s teaching here that Paul is not writing to satisfy the intellectual curiosity of his readers, not the Thessalonians and not us. He is writing to give them, he is writing to give us hope. That’s his purpose – to give us hope. He commended the Thessalonians, do you remember back in chapter 1 verse 3, “for the steadfastness of their hope in the Lord Jesus Christ.” That hope refers primarily not to a subjective feeling of hopefulness but to a settled confidence in the objective reality of the final coming of Jesus Christ to reign. That is the Christian hope. And Paul is writing to help the Thessalonians, he is writing to help you and me grasp that hope and benefit from it.
Now as we unpack the teaching of the passage, I want to highlight for you four themes. First, in verse 13, I want you to notice the need for hope. The need for hope. Paul is addressing a pressing pastoral issue at Thessalonica that can only be answered by renewed clarity, by a deepening understanding of the subject of the Christian hope. The need for hope. Secondly, verses 14 and 15, the basis of hope. Paul points to three things in particular – the historic facts, the future promise, and the revealed word – as the foundation basis for our sure and certain hope. The need for hope. The basis for hope. Thirdly, verses 15 through 17, the sequence of our hope. Paul gives us some sense of the order in which the events of that glorious final day will unfold. The need, the basis, the sequence of hope. And finally in verse 18, the ministry of hope. Here’s what we’re supposed to do with this vital truth. Here’s how we are to use it for the good of our brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ. The need for hope, the basis of hope, the sequence of hope, and the ministry of hope.
Before we look at each of those, let’s bow our heads and pray and ask for the Holy Spirit’s assistance and then we’ll read the passage and consider its teaching together. Let us all pray.
Holy Spirit, would You come now, Lord and giver of life, and shine the light of Christ into our sin-benighted understanding that Your truth might speed ahead and be honored among us, for Jesus’ sake. Amen.
First Thessalonians chapter 4 at the thirteenth verse. This is the Word of God:
“But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep. For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words.”
Amen.
Let’s think first about the need for hope. The need for hope. I had the great privilege of sitting with Marcy and Margaret Anne Forester a week ago last Thursday in the last few hours before Margaret Anne went home to be with Jesus. She was sharp and aware and adamant that her time had come and she was ready to go and be with Christ. She opened her eyes and she smiled and held my hand as we prayed together, and when I finished, she tapped her thigh with her index finger almost impatiently insisting that as far as she was concerned, right now was time to go. Now as a pastor I’ve been in that situation from time to time and generally speaking – I wonder if the other pastors in the room would agree – but generally speaking those who trust in Christ and have walked faithfully with Him in life, they face death very differently than those who do not, who have not. When the time comes, they are ready and there is a discernible calm and a bright hope that just can’t be missed. Of course the same can’t always be said for those of us who remain. For Christians, I’ve discovered, the truth is that grieving is much harder than dying tends to be. For Christians, grieving is much harder than dying tends to be. Christians, generally speaking, die full of hope and at rest, but those of us who are left to grieve, it’s not nearly such a straightforward experience. Grieving is much harder than dying tends to be.
At Thessalonica, the first generation of Christians were dying and some of the members of the church had been so sure that Jesus was going to return within their lifetimes, within the lifetime of that first generation of Christians, that the death of that first generation precipitated something of a crisis of faith for them. What does it mean? Where are our loved ones now? Does their death mean that they will somehow miss out on the glory of the return of Jesus when He comes? Or have we perhaps lost them completely? How do we make sense of the death of a Christian? After all, didn’t Jesus say that He is the resurrection and the life and if you live and believe in Him you will never die? So what do we make of the death of these first believers? That was their question. These were the sorts of issues they were likely wrestling with, unprepared for what seemed to them an unexpected delay in the return of Christ, an absent, greater clarity about the fate of those who have just died. You can understand their grief was especially acute in those circumstances. For the Thessalonians certainly, but for us too, grieving was much harder than dying tended to be.
And so Paul writes here to them amidst their grief to offer hope, to offer hope. Look at verse 13. “We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep,” – he means those who have died – “that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope.” Now notice carefully what he does not say. He does not say, “We do not want you to grieve, brothers, for those who have fallen asleep.” That’s not what he says. Grief is appropriate. Grief is godly. Jesus grieved, didn’t He, at the tomb of Lazarus, His dear friend, and Jesus’ tears sanctify the tears of all His people. There is no sin in grief, per se. Grief is not the problem. Hopeless grief is the problem. Hopeless grief. He doesn’t want us to grieve, he says, “as others do who have no hope.” You’ve lost someone you love – grief is the right response. Death, after all, is an unwelcome intruder, so grieve. But if you are a Christian, death does not have the victory. Jesus has the victory, so do not grieve as those who have no hope.
And the key, Paul says, to hopeful grief, not hopeless grief but hopeful grief, he says the key is understanding. Do you see that in the text? “We do not want you to be uninformed that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope.” The teaching of Christian truth is the instrument of hope in the Christian heart. The teaching of Christian truth is the instrument of hope in the Christian heart. And make no mistake, the best time to get the truth, especially the truth of the Christian hope, bolted into place in our understanding so that hope is there when we need it, the best time for that is long before death intrudes into our family stories. And that’s what this passage is for. There are some plants – I found this out recently – like eucalyptus or a plant called banksia, they have what are called serotinous fruits or cones. That means that the fruits or the cones that they produce are completely covered in resin and the only way the seeds that they contain can come out and germinate and grow is by fire. Fire melts the resin. Hope is a serotinous cone. You can make a t-shirt with that on it, I guess! Hope is a serotinous cone. Paul is sowing the truth in our hearts so that when the fire of grief burns hot it will open and germinate and blossom into bright Christian hope so that we grieve, we grieve, but we do not grieve as those who have no hope because the truth has been planted deep in fertile soil in all our hearts. So it matters that we get the content of the Christian hope clear. We need hope.
But then secondly I want you to look down at verse 14 and 15 and notice then the basis of our hope, the foundation of it. There are three elements, as I said earlier, that form together the basis of our hope – the historic fact, the future promise, and the revealed word. That’s the basis of our hope in this passage. Notice the historic fact first of all. “For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so through Jesus, God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep.” The ground of our future destiny is the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. Now just to be clear, when Paul says, “Since we believe that Jesus rose from the dead,” when Paul says that he isn’t relativizing the Gospel, putting it out of the realm of objective facts and into the realm of subjective belief, as if he was saying, “I’m not sure about this, but I believe that Jesus died and rose again, and since I do, here’s my hope for the future.” That’s not his point at all. Rather, Paul is saying this – “Jesus died and rose again – fact! And since we have come to place our faith in that face, and believe in Him who died and rose again, there are consequences for us. We too, therefore, shall live again.”
The point he is making, do you see, is that the basis, the foundation of our future hope is Christ’s historic cross and empty tomb. If He had not died, sin would remain to be paid for. If He had died and not risen, death’s bondage and dominion would continue universal. But He has died that our debt might be paid in full, and He has risen that death’s mastery might be shattered for all His people. The crucial point is this is historic fact. It’s not make believe. It’s not wish fulfillment. It’s not the desperate fantasy of deluded minds. It’s history. It’s history. It really happened. The nails were driven into His wrists and ankles as He hung between two thieves. He bled out, breathed His last, was laid in the tomb, and on the third day the stone rolled away and the Lord, the Maker, rose in resurrection victory. The tomb is empty and Jesus lives. There is no hope without that. The fact, the historic fact.
But then because of the historic fact, that historic fact guarantees, Paul goes on to say, a bright future promise. The historic fact of the cross and resurrection guarantees a future promise. “For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep.” The dead are with Jesus, and when He comes back they will come with Him. And as I said a moment ago, the link that connects the historic fact of the cross and empty tomb to the future promise is – “we believe.” We believe. The thing that takes what Jesus did and makes it the guarantee of our future destiny is “we believe.” “For since we believe Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep.” Since we believe Jesus lives, even so we can face the future, we can deal even with death, full of bright hope. If Jesus lives, so shall we because we believe.
“Jesus lives and so shall I. Death, thy sting, is gone forever. He who deigned for me to die, lives and the bands of death to sever. He shall raise me with the just, Jesus is my hope and trust.” The hand that takes hold of the Christian hope is trust in the cross and resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. Do you believe? Do you trust in, to you entrust yourself to the Lord Jesus who died and rose for sinners? Faith and faith alone secures for you a place among those whom God will bring with Jesus when He comes again.
At Margaret Anne Forester’s funeral, just on Friday, the family asked me to preach on Revelation 21 and the promise of the new creation and the new Jerusalem that will come down from heaven from God, a bride adorned for her husband. And I said the key that opens the gate of the new Jerusalem is faith alone in the crucified and risen Christ. Margaret Anne possessed that key and the gates of glory were flung wide to welcome her. What about you? What about you? Do you have the key to the gates of the Celestial City? Do you? They will not open for you without it. The key is, “we believe.” Do you believe?
The historic fact. The future promise. There is also the revealed word – the third part of the basis of our future hope. The revealed word. Look at the beginning of verse 15. Verse 15, “For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord.” Now there are scholars, some commentators, who take that to refer to some special, divine revelation given to the apostle Paul directly concerning that subject on the basis of which he now writes to encourage the Thessalonians. But many other scholars point out the striking parallels between 1 Thessalonians 4 and 5 and the teaching of the Lord Jesus Christ in Matthew’s gospel, chapters 24 and 25. And they argue that more probably the word from the Lord to which Paul is referring is his reflection on the teaching of Jesus in that place. Here is Paul’s meditation and paraphrase of the teaching of Jesus Christ. I think on balance, given those parallels, the latter group of scholars are probably correct, but either way, whether Paul received specific revelation from the Lord about this or is teaching the Thessalonians in the light of Jesus’ words in Matthew’s gospel, the point still stands the same. The warrant for confidence in the things Paul is teaching us here rests on the inspired Word of God through Paul to the church. In other words, the Thessalonians and Paul are not sitting around after dinner speculating about the end times and Paul is throwing his opinion into the pot along with everyone else’s. This isn’t Paul’s best guess about the future.
Some of you might have read about the death this past week of the comedian Bob Newhart. In 2019, a New York Times interview with him when he was 90 back in 2019 asked him about death. And Newhart told the reporter, “I think I know what’s on the other side, but I’m not sure. Maybe it just ends. Some people think you come back.” How very sad. The lack of clarity as he is facing eternity. That’s not at all how Paul speaks about the world to come. “I think I know but I’m not sure. Maybe it’s this; some people say it’s that. No, no,” Paul says, “what I am telling you here is not the product of my imagination. It’s not even an educated guess. It is a word from the Lord. This is what Jesus taught us. He alone is in a position right now really to know, after all. Anchor your hope here, not in what you want, not in response to what you fear, not in your best aspirations or your brightest imagination. Anchor your hope here – in the Word of the Lord. You can trust the Word of the Lord.” The need for hope. The basis of hope.
Thirdly, notice what Paul says about the sequence of our hope. Verse 15 makes it clear that Paul is concerned about the sequence, the order of events, doesn’t it? “We who are alive,who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep.” So the order and the sequence here matters. The Thessalonians were worried that their deceased Christian loved ones would somehow miss out on the glory of the return of Christ or perhaps be left relegated somehow to second class status. But Paul says, “No, if we are still alive when Jesus comes we won’t precede the believing dead. No, no, here’s how things are going to go.” He tells us first there will be a descent followed by an assent. A coming down and a going up.
Look at the coming down, the descent first. Verse 16, “The Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God.” This will be a personal return. Paul is emphatic, isn’t he? “The Lord himself will descend from heaven.” It’s not a metaphor. It’s not a metaphorical or a mythological return. He Himself is coming. Do you remember what the angels told the amazed and stunned disciples in Acts chapter 1 verse 11 when they’d watched the risen Savior ascend into the clouds and disappear from view as He rose to reign from the throne of heaven at the Father’s right hand? Do you remember what the angels told them? “Men of Galilee, why do you stand staring into heaven? This Jesus,” that is to say, “This same Jesus, not any other, not any pretender, this very same Jesus who was crucified and buried and rose and spoke with you over these forty days, this Jesus who was taken up from you into heaven will come in the same way as you saw Him go into heaven.” This is the moment that Paul is describing for us right here – a personal return.
It’s also going to be a royal return. The term Paul uses in verse 15 for “the coming of Christ” was originally used in the ancient world as the term for the state visit of the emperor. Visiting a province or a city, they would come with fanfare and with their armies and with heralds going before them. It was an occasion of gravity and solemnity and festivity and celebration. And in the New Testament, this word becomes virtually a technical term referring to the return of Jesus Christ. This is what is going to happen at the end of the ages. The King of kings will come, in person, back to His world to take full and final possession of it. He is coming to reign.
Personal. Royal. Visible and unmistakable is the third thing that Paul is making clear here. No one will miss it. Jesus will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with a voice of an archangel, with the sound of the trumpet of God and the dead in Christ will rise first, then we are who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. This is the great event, sometimes called the rapture in Christian jargon, that the New Testament actually describes in very uniform ways. There is – let me be clear now – there is only one return of Jesus Christ. He will come back once at the last day. And that return will be public and open, seen and heard by all people. There is no hint anywhere in the Bible of any such thing as a secret rapture.
In our text, you will notice the return of Christ and the rapture of the church will take place accompanied by fanfare and angelic shouts and the sound of the command of God. This is very public indeed. Jesus doesn’t slink back incognito to be seen only by believers and no one else. No, Matthew 24:30, Jesus says, “All the tribes of the earth will mourn and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory and He will send out His angels with a loud trumpet call and they will gather His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.” You see the similarities with our text – clouds and trumpets and angels. “And all the tribes of the earth,” Jesus says, “will see Me when I come.” Similarly John, in Revelation 1:7, speaks about the rapture this way. He says, “Behold, He is coming with the clouds and every eye will see Him, even those who pierced Him, and all the tribes of the earth will wail on account of Him, even so, amen.” So there is a descent, a coming down of Jesus in victory to judge the world. It will be personal and royal and public and unmistakable. Every eye will see Him when He comes. There is a descent.
There is also in the text, notice, an assent, a going up. Verse 16, when Jesus comes “the dead in Christ will rise first.” There will be a resurrection. Actually there will be a general resurrection of everyone, believer or otherwise. “The dead in Christ will rise first” – that is, in relation to those who are still alive at the coming of Jesus. But the believing and the unbelieving dead will actually rise together at the same time. In John 5:28-29, Jesus said an hour is coming when all who are in the tombs will hear His voice and come out. Those who have done good to the resurrection of life and those who have done evil to the resurrection of judgment. Likewise, Paul in Acts 24:15, there will be a resurrection of both the just and the unjust. So the dead will rise – the wicked to eternal condemnation and those who are in Christ to eternal life. But then, resurrection life will even overtake the living, Paul says, who believe in Jesus. They will undergo a kind of living resurrection of their own. First Corinthians 15:51-52, “Behold! I tell you a mystery. We will not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised imperishable and we shall all be changed.” And then on that day, with resurrection bodies at last, fitted perfectly for life forever in a new creation, we will all rise together to meet Christ in the air.
Meeting Him in the air, by the way, is important because the air is the symbolic realm of the demonic, of the devil. Ephesians 2:2, the devil is “the prince of the power of the air.” But now here is the true King, do you see? He is coming to lead His people in triumphal procession and to execute His judgment on all His enemies. And where does His victory parade take place? It takes place in the realm where Satan is said to rule. He comes in the air and we will all meet Him in the air. Jesus’ victory over all His and our enemies on that day will at last be total and complete and we shall join Him in that glorious victory. That’s what the symbolism here is teaching us. And having gone up to meet Him, in a kind of mini-ascension of our own that will be the echo and imitation of His, Paul says from then on we shall always be with the Lord.
Here’s the cash money of this whole preceding paragraph. Here’s where it’s all leading. It’s not just an interesting account of the sequence of future events, it is the mechanism by which we shall all come, if we are Christians, to be forever with Jesus – face to face with the risen, exalted Christ, in glorified new bodies of our own, living forever in a new creation at long last. That is, or ought to be, the longing of every believing heart. It’s not a longing for the great reunion to see grandma or grandpa again, as sweet as that will be. It’s not the thrill of meeting Moses or talking to David or interviewing Peter. I have some questions for Mary. I’d like to know what that was like for her, to be the mother of the Messiah. I’ve got questions; you’ve got questions, no doubt too. I can’t wait to ask my questions, though honestly I suspect when the great day dawns at last, all my questions will seem instantly frivolous. It won’t surprise me if I completely forget every one of them when at last I get to see with glorified eyes of my own the mysterious radiance shining from the face of the Lord Jesus Christ. If I still have questions on that day, I expect they will all be about Him. All my attention will be riveted on Him. All my happiness will derive from seeing Him.
Actually the Christ-centeredness of this vision comes out beautifully if you notice the prepositions Paul uses in this whole paragraph to describe the believer’s relationship to Jesus. “Through Christ,” verse 14. Jesus is the one who makes it all happen. “In Christ,” verse 16. Our union with Him cannot be dissolved, not even by death, but will be consummated one day in glorious resurrection. And “with Christ,” verse 17 – forever and ever together in fellowship and mutual love and delight. The need for hope. The basis of hope. The sequence of hope.
And now finally, look at verse 18 – the ministry of hope. What are we supposed to do with all of this? What difference should all of this make, it’s use, it’s function? Verse 18, “Therefore encourage one another with these words.” What do you tell grieving people? Paul says tell them Jesus is coming soon. Resurrection is coming soon. The new creation is coming soon. The death of death is coming soon. The great reunion is coming soon. And we will all be together at last, always with the Lord, very soon. Here is the ministry of hope. And it’s a command – did you notice that? You are commanded to do this. “Encourage one another with these words.”
In the section just prior to this, as we saw last time, Paul was talking to us about brotherly love – caring for one another in the fellowship of the church. Here is another practical expression of brotherly love in the life of the local church. “Encourage one another with these words.” Get this crystal clear, sharp-edged vision into clear focus in your mind’s eye. See the great day; press it down into your heart. This is where we are going. This is our destiny. This is the finish line towards which we have been running all these years. And remind each other about it. Keep it before each other’s attention. One reason, you know, that our mutual encouragement may often be so very ineffective, so fleeting and temporary in its impact, may be because we are telling each other all sorts of things, sometimes even good things, but we’re not reminding one another of these things. Jesus is coming soon! Get ready! Press on! Do not lose heart! Keep hope burning! The trumpet will sound! Christ will descend. The dead in Christ will rise and we will ascend to meet Him together in the air and so we will be forever with the Lord. The darkness won’t last. Your sin won’t last. Satan will not win. The world will not always be so broken. Jesus is coming soon. Hold on. Press on. Keep on. Encourage one another with these words.
We need to cultivate the practice, the discipline, of waiting. I get impatient. Don’t you? But we need to cultivate the practice of waiting. We need to become like the watchmen. Do you remember the watchmen at the end of Psalm 130, verses 5 and 6? Do you remember the watchmen? “I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, my hope is in His Word. My soul waits for the Lord, more than watchmen who wait for the morning, more than watchmen who wait for the morning.” What is it about these watchmen that makes them such a helpful illustration of waiting in hope? It’s 3am on the nightshift. How are you going to make it to the end of your shift? You’re exhausted. You look at the clock – just a couple more hours; just a few more hours. It will be morning soon. The sun is coming up. The dawn will break. “Weeping may last for the night; joy comes in the morning.” The day will break and the shadows will all flee away. That’s how you make it through the night. That’s how you make it till Jesus comes. So keep going. Encourage one another with these words.
The need for hope. The basis of hope. The sequence of hope. And the ministry of hope. May God give us grace to exercise that ministry in the fellowship of this church. Let us pray.
Our Father, we confess to You that we have looked for hope in all sorts of places, perhaps most commonly to our own strength, our own intellect, our own creativity, our own wisdom, our own know-how. We are self reliant. And yet now as we bow before You, we confess how inadequate our selves really are as a source of enduring hope. Our only hope in life and in death is that we are not our own but belong both body and soul to our faithful Savior, Jesus Christ, who with His precious blood has redeemed us from our sin and from all the power of the devil so that not a hair can fall from our head apart from the will of our Father in heaven, and because of whom indeed all things must work together for our good and for our salvation. We bless You that You have given us Your Spirit who makes us heartily willing and ready from now on to live unto Him. Give Him to us still yet more that our hope may be bright and clear and strong, and help us as we cling to the Christian hope of the coming of our Redeemer to practice the ministry of encouragement to one another that together we may persevere until at last the sun rises. Make us like watchmen waiting for the morning. More than watchmen wait for the morning, may our hope be in the promise of Your Word, for we ask it in Jesus’ name, amen.