" The LORD Shall Descend ! "

 

1st.Thessalonians 4:16-18 "For the LORD HIMSELF shall descend from Heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of GOD: and the dead in CHRIST shall rise first: then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up (raptured) together with them in the clouds, to meet the LORD in the air: and so shall we ever be with the LORD. Wherefore comfort one another with these WORDs."

     Today's text describes the manner of CHRIST's coming. It will be personal: "For the LORD HIMSELF shall descend from Heaven" (v.16). Only the blood-washed church possesses this "blessed hope," not the unbeliever, not the merely religious, and certainly not the one whose hope rests only in this world. We are not to be looking for a reformed, "Christianized" society or for a movement that will "bring in the kingdom." We are to watch for JESUS CHRIST to come and receive us unto HIMSELF. If the expectation of HIS appearing is not a blessed, happy consideration for you, then perhaps you are not numbered among those who can declare, "We believe" (vv. 14ff).

     Furthermore, CHRIST's coming at the rapture will be "with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of GOD" (v.16). Be careful not to confuse the coming of the LORD for the saints "in the air" and the coming of the LORD "with the saints" at the end of the Tribulation to defeat the Antichrist (Jude 1:14-15 pictured above; Revelation 19:7-14 partially pictured above). The trumpet mentioned in Matthew 24:31 and Revelation 11:15 is heard by those who find themselves in the midst of the Great Tribulation; on the other hand, the sound of the trumpet in today's text (as well as 1st.Corinthians 15:50-54) distinctively announces the saints' deliverance from their natural, mortal bodies when they receive their glorified bodies at HIS appearing. We must rightly divide the WORD of truth (2nd.Timothy 2:15), and this means we must understand the dissimilarities, as well as the similarities, in the events surrounding CHRIST's return. What a comfort it is to know that GOD has "not appointed us to wrath" reserved for the unbelievers who know not CHRIST (v.18 cf. 1st.Thessalonians 5:9-11). DWC

Your servant in CHRIST,

Julie

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