With These Words
13 We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers and sisters, concerning those who are asleep, so that you will not grieve like the rest, who have no hope. 14 For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, in the same way, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep. 15 For we say this to you by a word from the Lord: We who are still alive at the Lord’s coming will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep. 16 For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the archangel’s voice, and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. 17 Then we who are still 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. 18 Therefore encourage one another with these words.
1 Thessalonians 4:13–18 [CSB]
He says, ENCOURAGE ONE ANOTHER WITH THESE WORDS!
What words? Is it…
“Look on the bright side”? “Things could be worse”? “While there’s life there’s hope”?
What about when there’s no more … Hope… I mean… of this life?
He says, ENCOURAGE EACH OTHER WITH THESE WORDS, THESE WORDS from God…
It is He who says that the past… it is covered, and the present? It is shimmering in His hands as if He makes it move according to His Will… and the future? Yes… it is absolutely certain …and solid as stone. Therefore:
13 We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers and sisters, concerning those who are asleep, so that you will not grieve like the rest, who have no hope. 14 For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, in the same way, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep. 15 For we say this to you by a word from the Lord: We who are still alive at the Lord’s coming will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep. 16 For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the archangel’s voice, and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. 17 Then we who are still 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.
ENCOURAGE ONE ANOTHER WITH THOSE WORDS.
And… no matter how unbelievers try to encourage themselves, God says they HAVE NO HOPE.
It means, they have no future, or no future that bears thinking about. That’s the real reason why unbelievers don’t have funerals anymore.
No, they say, “It’s not about…well we don’t like to say it…but, you know…death.”
“No, we… we have celebrations of life!” – a life that’s been lost, a celebration of what was once for a little while in this world, because they’ve got nothing but that little while in this world.
But… by God’s mercy, we celebrate life now, and you know what? It’s just for practice. Just wait… Just wait until we start really living!
And so… when one of us falls ASLEEP IN JESUS, we hold a funeral, looking square at the present and straight on to what’s next.
Because a funeral is about death, and about beating death forever. We grieve, but “We DO NOT GRIEVE AS THE REST DO, because we know… and we say this to you…
15 … to you by a word from the Lord: We who are still alive at the Lord’s coming will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep.
Yes, I know, we will still be here dying, while they have that over with. Yet, they DIED IN CHRIST: They’ve shared in that part of His experience. And they are now getting in on all of His experience.
For instance, JESUS DIED – AND ROSE. IN THE SAME WAY, GOD WILL BRING THOSE WHO SLEEP IN JESUS WITH HIM.
And until then, while their bodies sleep in the grave, they’re in Heaven already, just like Jesus on Holy Saturday, while His body slept in the grave – just like Jesus and the thief on the cross, from the instant they leapt from their bodies to Paradise.
Everybody who’s died… trusting Christ…from the beginning of time is already in on that part of Christ’s experience…
NOW! …and looking forward to what’s next–the resurrection of the body and the life of the world to come.
They haven’t got that yet. So, why not?
Because God loves every last sinner who’s going to be saved on earth up to the last second of time, and loves them so much that He decreed that even Moses and Esther and St. Joseph, and your dearly departed grandfather…and my grandmother…
He decreed THAT THEY WOULD NOT BE MADE COMPLETE – NOT WITHOUT US! NOT WITHOUT you!
So… until then, all they are is … holy, alive, sinless, brilliant, powerful, free, and “lost in wonder, love, and praise,” while their dust… is just sleeping, says the Lord.
What do you mean sleeping? Those bodies are dead! Jesus says, “No! They’re sleeping…if I say so!
Because if they wake up, they must have been asleep, and those bodies are going to wake up, just like Mine did, when I say so,” …so says Jesus!
And the seconds are ticking by.
Now there is something to think about when we drive by a cemetery. Because every Christian grave in there is a launching pad. 10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2 … and counting.
… meanwhile…
WE, WHO ARE STILL ALIVE,
we’ve got to think like that.
Got to STAY ALERT!
Got to love,
Got to give and forgive.
Got to fight off sin and the traitor inside us,
Got to stay clear, regardless of the devil’s smoke and mirrors.
Got to PRESS ON TO TAKE HOLD OF WHAT GOD TOOK HOLD OF us FOR—A KINGDOM that shall have no end.
We must not live as if anything here were IT. Even unbelievers know better than that, once their hearts get broken.
They’re still WITHOUT HOPE, but at least they’re asking, “Is this all there is? Is this IT?”
No. The sky’s wide-open overhead. It’s just a trick of the light that makes it seem so solid. There’s nothing in His way between you and Him! From the huge Heaven…on every side…it’s all clear, straight down…to right here…to ground zero.
So, expect to be interrupted by the future everlasting.
Why do THE REST have no future, or none that that bears thinking of? Because they still haven’t settled up for the past. Because Christ’s payment for their past is nothing to them.
And that, by the way, is how you can tell the ones who do have a future: Christ’s payment is everything to them.
It’s the “Atonement wondrous, once for all,” by which they’ve been BORN AGAIN with AN INHERITANCE that’s rushing toward them.
And, O Lord, forgive me for selling my birthright for a mess of…well anything…like Esau did…
I mean, after I have seen His cross and know the future, to sin and risk it all, to sell my birthright for a bowl of…a mess of…(just a old sinful mess)… to risk having the future find me lost in my mess, with a future that doesn’t bear thinking of.
Have you been negotiating the sale of your future? Have you been planning to keep on in some sin?
Stop and think!
Stop and look: Calvary covers it all. It is still NOT THAT WE LOVED HIM BUT THAT HE LOVEs US, and still says, MY GRACE IS SUFFICIENT FOR YOU. Yes, YOU. Even while the world ends.
Then, He will SHAKE THE SKIES AND THE EARTH, SO THAT ONLY WHAT CAN’T BE SHAKEN WILL REMAIN.
In the meantime, LET US receive GRACE and GRACE and GRACE TO SERVE GOD ACCEPTABLY WITH REVERENCE AND GODLY AWE…NOW…
…like the AWE that’s going to flood us on that day, in a minute… any minute… any second now…
THE LORD HIMSELF WILL DESCEND FROM HEAVEN WITH A SHOUT.
How many times has He said, “Yes… but… Not yet. Not yet. Fight on.”
Is it hard to be a Christian? Only if you’re doing it right.
How many times have you said, “When, Lord, when?”
Then suddenly, He will be SHOUTING, “Now!”
Shouting to wake the dead, and with all His holy angels, WITH THE CRY OF THE ARCHANGEL, with his battle CRY, as Michael descends for Satan’s final ruin and the end of all the darkness, the CRY OF THE ARCHANGEL who saw us created and saw us fall and saw his Maker die to buy us back, his CRY when he sees the Day “for which creation and all its tribes were made,” the Grand Finale of God’s eternal Plan, with sin blown away, Eden green again and Adam and Eve raised from the dust, young, holy, and immortal… at GOD’S TRUMPET CALL.
At GOD’S TRUMPET CALL!
… like the trumpet call from the top of shaking Mount Sinai, calling down, “Come to Me!” AND THE DEAD IN CHRIST SHALL RISE FIRST like fireworks, like a meteor shower falling upward, and THEN, WE WHO ARE ALIVE WILL BE CAUGHT UP TOGETHER WITH THEM, WITH Adam and all our beloved dead in Jesus!
CAUGHT UP! He says, because it’s all by grace. We shall not climb up, nor hop up, nor build a tower to Heaven, nor pay our fare, nor even plead with Him to take us.
You’re going to be CAUGHT UP. The word there means, “seized, grabbed, clutched, embraced,” – how long has He loved you?
He WILL CHANGE OUR LOWLY BODIES TO BE LIKE HIS OWN GLORIOUS BODY.
We are to share that experience, too. IN A MOMENT, IN THE BLINK OF AN EYE WE SHALL BE LIKE HIM, CHANGED BY HIS APPEARING, FOR WE SHALL SEE HIM AS HE IS, and we shall see Him shouting, “At last! At last!”
He died to see that day come.
HE WILL REST IN HIS LOVE; THE LORD WILL REJOICE OVER YOU WITH LOUD SINGING ON THE DAY He GATHERS His JEWELS. And by JEWELS He means us.
How is that possible?
But then, WE’LL BE CAUGHT UP IN THE CLOUDS – and how’s that possible?
TO MEET THE LORD IN THE AIR!
Which is as impossible as sinners saved by grace alone, as impossible as WHEN WE WERE HIS ENEMIES WE WERE RECONCILED TO GOD BY HIS DEATH.
As impossible as “love to the loveless shown that they might lovely be!”
We don’t know yet what “possible” means.
And natural law really is just what God ALMOST does… for these present moments which He holds trembling in His hand.
But you’re going to see NEW SKIES, NEW EARTH and the thief on the cross crowned with glory and honor. We’re going to descend WITH THE LORD into the NEW CREATION.
WITH THE LORD, because Heaven and earth will be one, at last.
Heaven will descend for the Wedding Feast. The heights will come upon us. THE THRONE OF GOD WILL BE among us. THE DWELLING OF GOD will be WITH HUMANKIND. HE WILL LIVE WITH us, and we’ll join Jesus in the life He’s living. WE WILL BE WITH THE LORD FOREVER.
IN His PRESENCE IS UTTER JOY and shade and solace and lightning and thunder AND PLEASURES FOREVER.
“Then the River, then the Tree,” then THE SOUND OF THE LORD GOD WALKING IN THE GARDEN IN THE COOL OF THE DAY.
So…
Keep on, Christian! WEEPING ENDURES FOR THE NIGHT, BUT NOT AS others weep. WEEPING ENDURES FOR THE NIGHT until it’s suddenly interrupted, until THE LORD HIMSELF DESCENDS …
Well and I thought He’d never come but this is IT!
While THE DEAD RISE, and WE WHO ARE ALIVE are CAUGHT UP TOGETHER WITH THEM, then to BE WITH THE LORD FOREVER where you belong, where human beings have always belonged, WITH THE LORD…
Where human flesh is finally well and strong and splendid…where human intellects are finally clear and fast and full…where human wills are free at last and EVERY KNEE SHALL BOW.
In the meantime, for however much of a meantime there may be, ENCOURAGE ONE ANOTHER WITH THESE WORDS. Amen.
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