In this message we will continue to consider our experience and enjoyment of Christ in His coming as the hope of the church.
The hope of Christ’s coming is our comfort concerning the dead in Him. According to 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18, the hope of Christ’s coming comforts us concerning the dead in Christ, in order that we would not sorrow or lose heart but instead believe that all the dead ones will be raised up to meet the Lord with us in the air on the day of His coming.
In verses 13 through 18, Paul gives an elementary word concerning the Lord’s coming as a comfort and encouragement in the death of the believers. What Paul describes in this passage is the general hope of all believers. This is the hope of a holy life for the church life. Because of man’s fall there is no hope for the fallen human race. The only expectation that unbelievers have is death. Death is their destination. Day by day they are living with a view toward their death, and they are on the way to death. Thus, death is their future. In Ephesians 2:12 Paul describes the hopeless situation of unbelievers: “You were at that time apart from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of the promise, having no hope and without God in the world.” Unbelievers have no hope because they do not have God. Because they are apart from Christ and their living is without God, they do not have any hope. The only thing that awaits them is death. For this reason, unbelievers do not like to think about their future. Actually, they do not have a positive future. In their future looms the darkness of death.
To the believers, however, Paul presents in 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 a basic concept of the hope of our Christian life. He wants to impress us with the fact that the Christian life, which is a holy life for the church life, has a hope. Therefore, this life is absolutely different from the hopeless life of fallen mankind. The hope of the Christian life is the Lord’s coming back, and this hope includes resurrection.
In verse 13 Paul says, “We do not want you to be ignorant, brothers, concerning those who are sleeping, that you would not grieve even as also the rest who have no hope.” The words those who are sleeping refer to the dead (v. 16; John 11:11-14; 1 Cor. 11:30). The death of believers is considered by both the Lord and the apostle as sleep. Perhaps by the time Paul wrote this Epistle, some of the believers in Thessalonica had died. Otherwise, there would have been no reason for Paul to write about this matter.
In 1 Thessalonians 4:14 Paul continues, “If we believe that Jesus died and rose, so also those who have fallen asleep through Jesus, God will bring with Him.” To believe in the hope described here includes believing in the Lord’s resurrection. Anyone who does not believe in Christ’s resurrection will not believe in this hope. But if we believe in this hope, this indicates that we have already believed in Christ’s resurrection.
Verses 15 and 16 say, “For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are living, who are left remaining unto the coming of the Lord, shall by no means precede those who have fallen asleep; because the Lord Himself, with a shout of command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of God, will descend from heaven, and the dead in Christ will rise first.” We need to pay careful attention to the word rise in verse 16. If the dead are already in heaven, what need is there for them to rise? If they are truly in heaven, they do not need to rise. Furthermore, they do not need to be raptured or to be caught up to the Lord. Their only need would be to descend from heaven with the Lord Jesus. The fact that verse 16 says that the dead in Christ will rise indicates that they must be in some place other than heaven.
In verse 15 the Greek word translated “coming” is parousia, or “presence.” In verse 16 the Greek words rendered “shout of command” implies a signal for assembling. The trumpet of God is the last trumpet (1 Cor. 15:52), a trumpet for assembling God’s redeemed people (cf. Num. 10:2).
In 1 Thessalonians 4:17 Paul goes on to say, “Then we who are living, who are left remaining, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air; and thus we will be always with the Lord.” According to this verse, both the dead and the living believers will be caught up to the Lord. First the dead will be raised, and then the living believers will be caught up together with them to meet the Lord in the air.
In Revelation 12 the man-child, that is, the overcomers, is caught up, raptured, to the throne of God in the third heaven before the great tribulation, the last three and a half years of the present age (vv. 5-6, 14). In 1 Thessalonians 4:17 the majority of the believers, including those who are resurrected from the dead and those who are living at that time, are raptured to the air at the end of the great tribulation, at the time of the Lord’s coming (parousia).
According to the Bible, in Hades, there are two sections: a section of comfort and a section of torment. The dead believers are in the comfortable section of Hades (Luke 16:22, 25-26), Paradise (23:43). Dead unbelievers are in the section of torment. The section of torment and suffering is different from the lake of fire. The unpleasant part of Hades may be compared to a jail in contrast to a prison. A jail is a place where criminals are held temporarily. But after a criminal has been tried and judged, he is taken from jail and put into prison. The sinners now in the section of torment in Hades are awaiting the final judgment, which will take place at the white throne of God (Rev. 20:11). After that, the sinners will be cast into the lake of fire, the eternal prison.
The dead saints are in Paradise, and when the Lord Jesus comes, they will rise up. However, they will not rise up to heaven; rather, they will rise up, and then the living saints will be caught up together with them in the clouds. This is the reason 1 Thessalonians 4:16 says that the dead in Christ will rise first. Then, according to verse 17, those who are living will be caught up at the same time with the dead believers to meet the Lord in the air.
According to the Word of God, when the Lord Jesus descends from heaven, the dead saints will rise up. Their spirit and soul will rise out of Paradise, their body will rise up from the tomb, and their spirit and soul with their body will make them perfect. They will then join the believers who are living, and together we will all be caught up to the Lord.
As Christians, we should live a holy life for the church life. This life has a hope, the hope that the Lord whom we are serving today will come back. At His coming back, the saints who have died will rise up from Paradise and the tomb to be caught up with those who are alive and remain.