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First Thessalonians, part 13, Paul's Comforting Words

The main subject in 1 Thessalonians 4:16, 17 is not an escape from the earth but the resurrection, the gathering of the saints, and their permanent union with Christ.

Caught up

The verb translated “caught up” is Greek harpazō, meaning “to seize, snatch, or catch up.” It describes a sudden act of divine power. The same word is used when Philip was “snatched away” by the Spirit (Acts 8:39), when Paul was “caught up” to the third heaven (2 Corinthians 12:2), and when the male child was “caught up” to God (Revelation 12:5).

The Latin Vulgate translated harpazō with rapiemur, from which our English word “rapture” ultimately derives. Thus, “rapture” is a legitimate term for the catching up itself, although the theological system commonly called “the rapture” may include ideas that must be established from other passages.

The words “together with them” are crucial. Paul has just said, “the dead in Christ will rise first.” The dead are raised, and subsequently, those who remain alive are caught up with them. Compare this with 1 Corinthians 15:51, 52, “we will all be changed, in a moment [atomos, “atomic change”], in the twinkling [blink] of an eye, at the last trumpet.”

Hence both groups undergo the necessary change from mortality to immortality and are united as one company.

This directly answers the Thessalonians' concern. Those who had died were not going to miss the coming of Christ.

In the clouds

Clouds frequently signify the glory and presence of God. God descended upon Sinai in a cloud (Exodus 19:9; 24:15–18), where Moses went up to meet Him. The glory cloud filled the tabernacle (Exodus 40:34–35) and later Solomon’s temple (1 Kings 8:10–11). Daniel saw “One like a Son of Man was coming, with the clouds of heaven” (Daniel 7:13).

Jesus applies this imagery to His own coming in Matthew 24:30, “they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky with power and great glory.”

Thus Paul’s “clouds” should probably be understood within the biblical theme of the Shekinah—the manifested glory of God. The saints are gathered into the glory of Christ at His appearing.

To meet the Lord

An especially significant word is apantēsis, “meeting.” The same noun occurs in Matthew 25:6, “Behold, the bridegroom! Come out to meet him.” The virgins go out to meet the arriving bridegroom. It also occurs in Acts 28:15, when believers from Rome heard that Paul was approaching: “they came to meet us as far as the Market of Appius and Three Inns.” They went out from Rome to greet Paul and then accompanied him on his journey into Rome.

This provides a useful background for 1 Thessalonians 4:17. The picture is of citizens going out to welcome an arriving dignitary or king. This fits Paul's use of parousia in verse 15. Parousia means “presence” or “arrival” and could be used for the arrival or official visit of an important person. Therefore, Paul's imagery naturally allows this sequence: The King descends; His people rise to meet Him; they welcome Him at His parousia.

The word apantēsis does not, by itself, specify where the group goes afterward. Nevertheless, its usage does not require the idea that Christ reverses direction and takes everyone back to heaven from whence He has come. The wise virgins meet the bridegroom and escort him to where they have been waiting. Paul’s friends in Rome meet him to escort him to Rome. The imagery in 1 Thessalonians 4:17 shows that the saints on earth will go forth to greet the returning King and escort Him to the earth.

Other Greek words describe ordinary encounters. The verb synantaō, “to meet, encounter, come together with” can describe quite ordinary encounters. In Acts 10:25, we read of Peter’s trip to Caesarea to meet with Cornelius and his Bible study group. It says literally, “Cornelius, having met him...” using the term synēntēsen, the aorist of synantaō.

Again, we read in Luke 8:27,

²⁷ And a man met Him [hypantaō] from the city who was possessed with demons.

These are more ordinary examples of a meeting. What makes apantēsis so significant is how the New Testament uses the term in a particular context of meeting Christ as a visiting dignitary. The focus is not about Christ escorting saints back to heaven but the reverse.

Another prophetic word picture is seen when Peter went out to meet Jesus in the storm in the middle of the lake (Matthew 14:29-32). His intention was to escort Jesus to the boat, not to be taken back to the high mountain where Jesus had come from. No word for a meeting is used in the passage, but the story is a prophetic picture of the coming of Christ to the overcomers in the midst of tribulation.

In the air

The meeting takes place “in the air” is from the Greek eis aera. But what is the contrast? Is it somewhere “up” above the earth, or does it indicate that they will not be underground in the tombs? Paul does not specify, but the overall concern of the Thessalonians was about the dead overcomers missing His parousia.

Paul elsewhere calls Satan “the prince of the power of the air” (Ephesians 2:2). One might therefore see symbolic significance in Christ meeting His glorified saints precisely in the realm that had been associated with hostile spiritual authority. If so, the scene depicts the public overthrow of the former ruler and the installation of the rightful King and His saints.

Yet 1 Thessalonians itself does not explicitly make this connection, so it is better regarded as a possible secondary implication rather than Paul’s main point.

Always Being With the Lord

This is the climax of Paul's statement.

Notice what Paul does not say. He does not say: “And so we shall always be in the air.” He says: “And so we shall always be with the Lord.” The promise concerns relationship, not geography. It is about unity, as opposed to being separated. Wherever Christ establishes His rule, His resurrected saints are with Him. This recalls Jesus’ words in John 14:3, “I will come again and receive you to Myself, that where I am, there you may be also.”

It also anticipates Paul's later statement in Colossians 3:4,

⁴ When Christ, who is our life, is revealed, then you also will be revealed with Him in glory.

The great hope is therefore not merely being taken somewhere else. It is being permanently united with Christ in His glorified condition and Kingdom.

My Father’s House

The “many mansions” in John 14:2 are not large houses in heaven. This verse is often interpreted as Jesus going to heaven to construct individual residences for believers. The familiar KJV wording, “In my Father’s house are many mansions,” has reinforced that picture. But the Greek points in a somewhat different direction.

The Greek is: en tē oikia tou patros mou, “in the house of My Father.” John has already used virtually the same expression in John 2:16, where Jesus says concerning the temple: “stop making My Father’s house a place of business.” So within John’s Gospel, the “Father’s house” naturally evokes the idea of God’s dwelling place or temple.

This begins an important theme in John’s gospel. God’s dwelling place is ultimately associated with Christ and those who are united with Him. The Greek word for “mansions” is monē, meaning a dwelling place, abode, or place of remaining. It does not mean a luxurious mansion in the modern English sense. The NASB therefore gives the more accurate translation: “many dwelling places.”

Even more significantly, monē occurs only twice in the New Testament—and both occurrences are in John 14. The second occurrence is John 14:23,

²³ If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our abode [monē] with him.”

That verse is extremely important for interpreting verse 2. In verse 2 Jesus speaks of many monai—many dwelling places. In verse 23 Jesus says that the Father and Son will make their monē with the believer. Thus John’s own usage suggests that the subject is considerably deeper than houses in heaven. It concerns the mutual indwelling of God and His people.

We should notice that Jesus does not say He is going to build houses. He says He is going to “prepare a place.” How does He prepare it?

The context of John's Gospel suggests that He prepares our access to the Father through His death, resurrection, and ascension.

1 Peter 2:5 says,

⁵ you also, as living stones, are being built up as a spiritual house for a holy priesthood…”

And Paul writes in Ephesians 2:21,

²¹ in whom the whole building, being fitted together, is growing into a holy temple in the Lord.

The believers are not merely going to God’s house. They are becoming part of God’s house. The emphasis is ultimately not upon where the disciples will be but with whom they will be: “that where I am, there you may be also” (John 14:3). This is very similar to 1 Thessalonians 4:17, “and so we shall always be with the Lord.” Both passages make presence with Christ the central promise.

The biblical trajectory therefore moves from God dwelling in a physical sanctuary, to God dwelling in Christ, to Christ dwelling in His people, and finally to the complete union of God and redeemed humanity. Seen in that light, John 14:2 need not be understood as a promise that Jesus went to heaven to construct literal mansions. The “many dwelling places” are better understood in terms of places in the Father’s household and presence.

Comfort one another

In 1 Thessalonians 4:18, Paul then tells us why he gave this revelation:

¹⁸ Therefore comfort one another with these words.

The Greek verb is parakaleō, which can mean comfort, encourage, exhort, or strengthen. This takes us back to the problem introduced in verse 13: “we do not want you to be uninformed, brethren, about those who are asleep, so that you will not grieve as do the rest who have no hope.”

Paul is not primarily satisfying curiosity about end-time chronology. He is comforting grieving Christians. Their loved ones who had died in Christ were not lost. They had not forfeited their place in the Kingdom. They would not miss the parousia. That is the “comfort” of verse 18.

It is therefore important to read verses 17–18 in the context beginning with verse 13. Paul’s central revelation is the victory of resurrection over death. The separation caused by death is temporary. Resurrection reunites the body of Christ, and thereafter neither death nor mortality can separate them again from Christ—or from one another.