13 But we would not have you ignorant [This is Paul's habitual formula, used either negatively or positively, with which to start a new topic (Rom. 1:13; 11:25; Col. 2:1; 1 Cor. 10:1; 11:3; 12:1; 2 Cor. 1:8; Phil. 1:12). It shows us that what he is now about to say has no connection with what precedes. It seems that Timothy brought Paul word that many Thessalonians entertained the crude notion that only the living would participate in the joys of Christ's coming, and that all those who were so unfortunate as to die before that event, would thereby forfeit their share in it. It is not strange that such a doctrine should spring up among those who had been so hastily instructed as the Thessalonians, especially when we may safely surmise that many new converts had been added to their number since Paul's departure], brethren, concerning them that fall asleep; that ye sorrow not, even as the rest [the pagans], who have no hope. [Paul speaks of the dead as sleeping, employing the beautiful New Testament metaphor (John 11:11; Acts 7:16; 1 Cor. 15:18, 51), in which the grave becomes a couch wherein the body rests until it is wakened at the resurrection. Those grossly pervert the metaphor who use it to prove that the soul also slumbers. The apostle does not forbid sorrow over our departed (Acts 8:2; John 11:35), but that despairing grief which characterized the pagan of that day who had no hope of a resurrection. Alford gives such quotations as these from pagan writers. Theocritus: "Hope goes with life; all hopeless are the dead." Æschylus: "Once dead there is no resurrection more." Cetullus: "Suns may set and may return; we, when once our brief life wanes, have eternal night to sleep." Lucretius: "None ever wake again whom the cold pause of life hath overtaken." To these might be [19] added the pathetic lines of Moschus: "We shall sleep the long, limitless, unawakable slumber," and the citation of Jowett as to "the sad complaints of Cicero and Quintilian over the loss of their children, and the dreary hope of an immortality of fame in Tacitus and Thucydides." The Christian should stand in contrast to all this, assuaging his sorrow by a blessed hope.] 14 For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also that are fallen asleep in Jesus will God bring with him. [Paul here founds an affirmation on the intimate relation which exists between Christ and his people; a relation which he elsewhere likens to the union between the head and the body (Eph. 4:15, 16); the argument being that if the head enjoys a resurrection, the body must likewise share in it. "With him" does not here mean that Jesus will bring the disembodied spirits from heaven to the resurrection, but that God, who brought Jesus from the grave, will also bring from the grave, in conjunction with Jesus, all those who entered it with their lives spiritually united with Jesus. But the bringing from heaven is taught at 1 Thess. 3:13.] 15 For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we that are alive, that are left unto the coming of the Lord, shall in no wise precede them that are fallen asleep. [The facts here set forth were revealed to the apostle by direct revelation, as at 1 Kings 20:35, and he had many such revelations (1 Cor. 11:23; Gal. 1:11, 12; 2:2; Eph. 3:3; 2 Cor. 12:1). Paul declares that the living shall not go before the dead to meet the coming Lord. The "we" in this verse has led many to think that Paul expected to be alive when Jesus came, but conversely the "us" at 2 Cor. 4:14 proves that he expected to be then dead, and the schedule of events which at 2 Thess. 2:1-5 he says must take place before the coming, favors the latter view. The truth is, Paul uses "we" as a mere word of classification, as we might do in a sentence like this: "We of the United States now number eighty odd million; a century from now we will number--" etc. This would not imply that the writer expected to be then alive. [20] 16 For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven, with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God ["Himself" shows that the Lord will not come by messenger, or by representative, but in person. Paul does not describe any of the convulsions of nature which accompany the advent (2 Pet. 3:10; Rev. 20:11); but he mentions three sounds which will accompany it, for these have to do with the resurrection which he now has under discussion. The shout of Christ the King is the signal that the awful moment has arrived. Immediately after it the voice of the archangel is heard summoning the other angels to the performance of their duty; viz.: the gathering of the saints (Matt. 24:31; Mark 13:27), which are just being roused from the slumber of death by the trumpet of God. The word "archangel" is also used at Jude 9, where we are told that the archangel's name is Michael. It is used nowhere else in Scripture, and there is no hint that there is an order or class of archangels. Michael is the chief or ruler of all the angels (Rev. 12:7). The trumpet is called "trump of God," because it heralds the approach of God, and summons the people to meet him (Ex. 19:16-19). There is no hint as to who blows this trumpet, though it is mentioned several times--1 Cor. 15:52]: and the dead in Christ shall rise first; 17 then we that are alive, that are left, shall together with them be caught up in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord. [Some, mistaking the spiritual resurrection mentioned at Rev. 20:4, 5, for a literal one, have thought that there are two resurrections, one for the righteous (the first resurrection) and one for the wicked (the second resurrection). Of course such a doctrine is abhorrent to the idea of a single hour of judgment, with the saved upon the right hand and the lost upon the left, but it shall be fully discussed in its own place. Those who hold this theory appeal to this passage in proof of it, reading it thus: "The dead in Christ shall rise first, and the dead out of Christ shall rise second." But in order to make it read thus they have supplied a correlative clause which [21] is totally foreign to the context, and which crowds out the correlative which Paul himself has given; for "shall rise first" is correlative with "then shall be caught up." The apostle has been drawing a comparison, not between the righteous dead and the unrighteous dead, but between the dead and the living at the hour of the advent. He began this comparison at verse 15, and he here completes it by showing that the supposition that the living would precede the dead is so contrary to the facts that, on the contrary, the dead will be raised before any ascension is allowed the living, and then after the resurrection of the dead, the living and the dead shall be caught up together to meet the Lord. That glorious change, wherein the mortal puts on the immortal, as indicated at 1 Cor. 15:51, 55, will no doubt be simultaneous with the resurrection of the dead. The phrase "caught up" implies the sudden and irresistible power of God. We are not to understand that we are to be caught up with clouds, but that we will meet him who comes with clouds (Dan. 7:13; Rev. 1:7; Matt. 24:30). He makes the clouds his chariot (Ps. 104:3). The term "air" is used generally for the region above the earth. No doubt we will be caught up far beyond our atmosphere into the realm of pure space--Eph. 1:3; 2:2.] 18 Wherefore comfort one another with these words. [Thus are we commanded to tell all Christians who mourn that they will meet their lost in Christ on the day that Christ appears, and that in sweet union and communion they will ever be with him.]

      V. 1 But concerning the times and the seasons, brethren, ye have no need that aught be written unto you. [When Christian hopes are thus vividly pictured forth, our human nature naturally asks, "When?" (Luke 21:7). The Thessalonians had been fully taught by Paul that the time of the Lord's coming was unrevealed (Matt. 24:36; Acts 1:7), and that therefore Paul could not enlighten them on this point. The term "times" indicates long eras, and "seasons" the briefer epochs into which they are divided.] 2 For yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord [22] so cometh as a thief in the night. [Here is an echo from the lips of Jesus (Matt. 24:36-51; Luke 12:39, 40). See also 2 Pet. 3:10; Rev. 3:3. The coming of the thief implies our loss, if he catches his asleep and unprepared. How fearful our loss if we are not prepared for the coming of the Lord--Heb. 10:31.] 3 When they [the thoughtless and careless] are saying, Peace and safety [i. e., there is no ground for apprehension], then sudden destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman with child; and they shall in no wise escape. 4 But ye, brethren, are not in darkness, that that day should overtake [surprise] you as a thief: 5 for ye are all sons of light, and sons of the day: we are not of the night, nor of darkness; 6 so then let us not sleep, as do the rest [the pagans], but let us watch and be sober. 7 For they that sleep sleep in the night; and they that are drunken are drunken in the night. 8 But let us, since we are of the day, be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love; and for a helmet, the hope of salvation. [The idea that the thief comes in the night as set forth in verse 2 suggests the thought that those that live in the night must find it hard to guard against him. But those who live in a perpetual day are not easily surprised by a thief. Now, the Christians, being enlightened as to the Lord's coming, lived in such a perpetual day; in fact, to use a Hebraism, they were "sons" of the light and of the day; i. e., they belonged to the day. There was no need, therefore, that their spiritual faculties should be asleep. Day is no time for such sleep, and those that dwelt in it should find it easy to watch and be sober and wear their armor as good soldiers, while those who dwelt in the night would find it hard to keep awake, to keep sober, or to wear armor. It was common in the East for people to be drunken in the night-time, as they were ashamed to be seen intoxicated in the daylight (Acts 2:15). The nights of the Greeks and Romans were given to revelry, and it was counted an especial mark of profligacy to be drunken in the daytime (2 Pet. 2:13). Polybius [23] emphasized the abandoned condition of a drunkard by saying, "Even by day he was often conspicuous to his friends, drunk."] 9 For God appointed us not unto wrath, but unto the obtaining of salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, 10 who died for us, that, whether we wake or sleep [live or die before his coming], we should live together with him. [This verse is suggested by the word "salvation" which precedes it. The hope of salvation may well defend us in the hour of temptation, and it should be strong enough to do so, for God has not appointed us to be lost, but to be saved, and has given his Son to die that we might be saved; and so, whether we remain alive unto his coming, or pass to our rest before that day, we may be assured that we shall live in one company with him.] 11 Wherefore exhort one another, and build each other up, even as also ye do. [As Paul closed his main teaching about his Lord's coming with an injunction that the Thessalonians comfort each other with it (chap. 4:18), so he closes this afterpiece to it with a similar injunction that because of it they should exhort and strengthen one another.]

[TCGR 19-24]