There’s this thing that always happens that never ceases to amaze me: When I’m choosing the next book that we should go through on Sunday mornings, obviously I have no idea what’s coming down the road. But God does, and it’s amazing how often the message lines up perfectly with what’s going on either in our church family or around the world.

This is one of those times. Every time there’s some major conflict, there’s a corresponding uptick in the amount of talk about the return of Christ, the end of the world, Armageddon, the Mark of the Beast, etc., etc.

I guarantee you there are books being written right now, and worse yet, some of those books will be bestsellers… at least until it turns out that they weren’t right!

Classic example, scientist/mathmetician John Napier (1550–1617), discovered logarithms, a much faster way of doing complex multiplication. He promptly used his new discovery to try to calculate when Christ was coming back, and pegged it at 1700. His commentary sold a ton of copies, had multiple printings… until about 1701.

Recap

Paul tells us what we need to know not to be uninformed about those who are asleep, so that we grieve with hope, like people who know God.

Do you believe that? Because on this topic in particular, it’s really, really important that you do.

These believers in Thessaloniki were worried about their bro/sis who had already passed away missing out on the coming of Christ. Paul tells them, in effect, “Trust me, you don’t have to worry about it…”

• IF Jesus died and raised from the dead, and
• IF they died in Him,
• THEN they will rise just like He did.

We’re united with Christ, nothing will separate us.

Last week, we were focused on the topic of grief and hope, and I said we’d come back and spend some more time on the details of the Second Coming that we see in the end of chapter 4…

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. 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.

1 Thessalonians 4:16–17

So Why Have Hope?

• Jesus Himself is coming—he’s not sending someone else.

• These descriptions of a shout, an archangel, a trumpet, they’re all harkening back to the OT, and they’re all military related. The First Advent He came as the Suffering Servant? The Second Advent, he’s arriving as the Conquering King.

  • Victory over evil (air).
  • Victory over death (not dead anymore!)

• Caught up together in the clouds (God’s presence, glory)

“Meet the Lord in the Air”

The meaning may seem obvious to us what they mean. But what happens after we meet Him there?

That word translated “meet him” is rare in Scripture, only used two other places in the NT. And since we should always let the Bible interpret the Bible, let’s quickly look at both of them.

At the end of Acts, Paul finally gets to Rome. And when he does…

Now the brothers and sisters from there had heard the news about us and had come to meet us as far as the Forum of Appius and the Three Taverns. When Paul saw them, he thanked God and took courage.

Acts 28:15

And then they stayed there forever, at the Three Taverns?! No, they went out and met him there, and came together back into town.

The other use is when Jesus is telling the parable of the ten virgins, which, incidentally, is about His Second Coming, BTW… there’s this bridal party, they’re waiting for the Groom to arrive. They fall asleep, and their lamps go out…

“In the middle of the night there was a shout: ‘Here’s the groom! Come out to meet him.’

Matthew 25:6

“Come out to meet him,” and then stay out there with him? No, of course not, it’s the wedding feast! The Groom has finally come! You go to greet him and then you all come back in together and let the party begin!

Now let’s read verse 17 again, with that context in mind…

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.

1 Thessalonians 4:17

“Meet the Lord in the air,” and then stay there with him forever? Doesn’t really make sense.

And even less so if you look at the extra-biblical, cultural context of the phrase. This word Paul uses is unusual in the NT, but it wasn’t unusual to the Thessalonians—they certainly would have known what it meant as an important Roman city along the main road through Macedonia.

This was the word they used when the king/emporer/Caesar was coming to town. It’d be pretty rude/disrespectful to just stay put and wait for him to show up, wouldn’t it?. All the important people in the city go out to meet him, and then what, stay out there and have a picnic?! Not at all. They’d go out to greet him, and then royally escort him with a big parade, through the town, to his rightful place, on the throne.

Paul’s writing this letter from Corinth, where they made “Corinth Coins” commemorating coming of Caesar. And that coin uses this word. Paul knew it, the Corinthians knew it, and so did the Thessalonians.

The point is that the King is coming, and when he comes, we’ll meet him in the air… and then accompany him right back here again, and “so we will always be with the Lord.”

1 Thessalonians: Preparing to Greet the Coming King

So if we meet the Lord in the air, what then? And when is this going to happen?

That’s a good question.

Ever been around one of those people, who can only talk about/study this topic? It’s generally a miserable experience for everyone involved!

I want to briefly explain what those people are talking about. Talked to Kay a lot about this, don’t want to seem like some nerdy college professor or a wing nut.

Reality is that people have been arguing 2,000 years or so. Even the early church fathers (first 200 years) didn’t all agree.

It basically all comes down to what you believe about the millenium (1,000 years). Here’s the passage:

Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven holding the key to the abyss and a great chain in his hand. He seized the dragon, that ancient serpent who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years. He threw him into the abyss, closed it, and put a seal on it so that he would no longer deceive the nations until the thousand years were completed. After that, he must be released for a short time.

Revelation 20:1–3

Annnnnd that’s it. Those are the only verses in the Bible that explicity speak of this thousand-year reign of Christ.

And (painting with a broad brush) there are basically three schools of thought on how things will play play out:

1. Pre-millenialism
2. Post-millenialism
3. A-millenialism (or “realized”, now)

Premill ∙ History

• At the end of this current age, there will be a period of great tribulation, followed by the Second Coming of Christ.
• The millenium is a literal one thousand year reign of Christ.
• After that thousand years, Satan is released and there’s the battle of Armageddon, Satan is defeated, New Creation.
• This view is called “historic” because it’s what the majority of early church fathers believed to one extent or another—not all, but most.

Premill ∙ Dispy

• If you’re American, this is the one you’re probably most familiar with.
• You’ll notice that not much changed in the chart here. The dispensational view take the historic premill view and add a couple of things to it.
• Most significantly, an extremely sharp division between the Church and the ethnic people of Israel.
• Based on that specific reading of the whole story of the Bible, they add a secret coming of Christ to take the Church out of the world before the tribulation; that’s what’s commonly called the Rapture.
• This flavor of premillenialism isn’t called “historic” because it’s pretty much brand new compared to the other three views—people have only believed it for the last 250 years or so.

Postmill

• The millenium is not a literal, physical reign of Jesus on earth for a thousand years, but a future “golden era” where the Gospel will so reach the nations that they will all be “Christian”, and that is the way that Christ is reigning—through his Church ruling the world.

Amill/Inaugurated

The millenium is the entire time from Jesus death/res/ascension until He comes again. Jesus is currently ruling and reigning with his saints from heaven. Satan is bound so that he is incapable of stopping the spread of the Gopsel.

So which is it? I’m not going to tell you… because I don’t know.

Oh, I know which of these I believe matches up closest with Scripture… most days. But I also know that there are loads of people way smarter than me, know their Bibles way better than me, have been walking faithfully with God for a lot longer than me, that would totally disagree with me.

And that’s okay, because while these things are important, they are not primary. did you notice something about each of those charts? They all end up in the same place.

There are Christian leaders, pastors, missionaries, and thousands upon thousands of faithful brothers and sisters throughout history who have held all four these positions.

So let’s get to some practical application as we wrap things up…

Keep the main thing the main thing.

The plain things are the main things,
and the main things are the plain things!

Allistair Begg

If you dive deep into this end of the pool, just remember to come up for breath every once in a while, so you don’t spiritual drown yourself in a sea of minutia that has no bearing on loving Christ or others.

I’m not saying they’re unimportant, it absolutely affects the way you see the world… I’m saying it’s not of utmost importance.

The main thing: The King is coming! Maybe before tribulation, maybe after, maybe before a literal thousand years or a symbolic one, but the point is that He’s coming, and you better be ready to meet Him.

And when he comes, it will be the great and terrible Day of the Lord. Great for those who follow Him, terrible for those who don’t.

And until then, keep the main thing the main thing. Which also means…

Don’t divide the family of God over these things.

There are close-handed and open-handed issues.

Twice in this section Paul says to encourage one another with these words. Not fight over these words, get upset about these words,

The plain things are the main things, and the main things are the plain things. Jesus is coming.

About the times and the seasons: Brothers and sisters, you do not need anything to be written to you. For you yourselves know very well that the day of the Lord will come just like a thief in the night.

1 Thessalonians 5:1–2

But since we belong to the day, let us be self-controlled and put on the armor of faith and love, and a helmet of the hope of salvation.

1 Thessalonians 5:8

Everybody always wants to know when… it’s natural. Fight the urge.

Don’t fall for the trap of obsession about these things, because it’s so prevalent right now.

• Pat Robertson came out of retirement a couple weeks ago, just to say that Vladimir Putin was being, and I quote, “compelled by God” to invade Ukraine, because through that he’ll get to his ultimate aim, which is war with Israel, which is also God’s will. Okay.

Meanwhile, in the Bible, Jesus says…

“Now concerning that day and hour no one knows—neither the angels of heaven nor the Son—except the Father alone.

Matthew 24:36

It’s on a need-to-know basis, and if Jesus isn’t on the list, I doubt Pat is, either! Or me, you… I’m probably not gonna figure it out.

Earlier in same chapter…

For nation will rise up against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be famines and earthquakes in various places. All these events are the beginning of labor pains.

Matthew 24:7–8

Labor pains… meaning new life is coming.

• If you obsess over what’s complex, you minimize what’s simple.
• If you emphasize your pet theories, you deemphasize the absolute certainties.
• If you make secondary things primary, you’re inevitably making primary things secondary.

There’s a lot of people who love to study the coming of Jesus more than they love Jesus.

Be absolutely relentless with people.

“This is it, end of the world.”
‌*“Could be, we’ve been in the last days for 2,000 years now. But one things for sure, He’s coming, and it’s going to be great. Plus He’s bringing with him so many people that I love and that I’ve missed, to see them again in their new resurrected bodies, it’s gonna be amazing. I can’t wait.”*

They’ll either be convicted and encouraged because you challenged them to keep the main thing the main thing, or they’ll find you annoying enough to leave you alone!

Richard Baxter was an Anglican pastor in the 1600s, wrote an amazing hymn that sums it up perfectly.

Lord, it belongs not to my care
Whether I die or live;
To love and serve Thee is my share,
And this Thy grace must give.

If life be long, I will be glad,
That I may long obey;
If short, yet why should I be sad
To welcome endless day?

My knowledge of that life is small,
The eye of faith is dim;
But ’tis enough that Christ knows all,
And I shall be with Him.

Richard Baxter

MISSIONS: No matter what, more people need to be there on that day. More people need to hear. And…

This good news of the kingdom will be proclaimed in all the world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.

Matthew 24:14