Sunday School: Caught Up Together in the Clouds (1 Thessalonians 4:1-11)

You are listening to the teaching ministry of Gabriel Hughes. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday on this podcast, we feature 20 minutes of Bible study through a

New Testament book. On Thursday is a study in the Old Testament, and then we answer questions from the listeners on Friday.

Each Sunday we are pleased to share our sermon series. Here's Pastor Gabe. All right, let's turn in our

Bibles to 1 Thessalonians chapter 4 once again. There's not a reason to have to rush through this.

You know, as the lessons have been planned out, we should be in chapter 5 today. Last week we were still kind of answering some questions from chapter 4.

So I'm going to come back to that again today. We'll begin in 1 Thessalonians 4 .13. We'll read through 5 .11,

and we'll just kind of take this as it comes. We actually have three Sundays as a cushion in case we do go over.

So the Sunday school lessons had been planned to go to the end of November, but then all the rest of the

Sunday school teachers are just kind of on their own for the three Sundays of December that they're meeting. They can put together whatever messages they want.

I know Andrew's going to be doing something on Advent. I think that Michael's in the Gospel of Luke. So as we're talking about these things pertaining to the end and the return of Christ and the resurrection of the dead, if this takes us a few extra

Sundays to talk about, that's fine. We've got it. So 1 Thessalonians 4 .13, I'm going to begin by reading verses 13 to 5 .11,

and then we'll pray again. The Apostle Paul speaking to the church in Thessalonica, but we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope.

For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep.

For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the

Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the

Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel and with the sound of the trumpet of God.

And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are 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. Therefore encourage one another with these words.

Now concerning the times and the seasons, brothers, you have no need to have anything written to you, for you yourselves are fully aware that the day of the

Lord will come like a thief in the night. While people are saying there is peace and security, then sudden destruction will come upon them as labor pains come upon a pregnant woman and they will not escape.

But you are not in darkness, brothers, for that day to surprise you like a thief.

For you are all children of light, children of the day. We are not of the night or of the darkness.

So then let us not sleep as others do, but let us keep awake and be sober.

For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk are drunk at night.

But since we belong to the day, let us be sober, having put on the breastplate of faith and love and for a helmet the hope of salvation.

For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our

Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, so that whether we are awake or asleep, we might live with him.

Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing.

Let us pray. Heavenly Father, as we come back to this text today, I pray that you lead us and guide us according to these things, that our hearts are filled with hope, that we endure to the very end, continuing to look to Jesus Christ, the author and the perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is now seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

A day is coming, which has been fixed by you, on which Jesus Christ will return to take up his saints and judge those who did not believe.

And I pray that we, with eager hearts, continue to long for that day when we will be with the

Lord forever in glory. You show us these things according to your word, through your apostle

Paul. May we receive this as the word of God and be comforted. It's in Jesus' precious name that we pray.

Amen. So last week, some of the things that we were talking about were concerning that whole concept of the resurrection of the dead.

And how would we even get somebody to understand this? How would we get somebody to believe this? Because this is all so incredibly miraculous.

And even to some extent, sounds incredibly absurd. If we are not believers, if we're naturally minded people, as it says in 1

Corinthians 2 .14, the naturally minded man cannot discern spiritual things. So if we're left in that state, we'd be reading something like this and say, boy, that is just crazy.

That's nonsense. When I was younger, I was talking with a pastor right after church.

Church got done, and I went up to the pastor, and I was talking with him. And while we were standing there talking,

I was a teenager at this time. While we were standing there talking, there was a man that came up and wanted to speak.

He was really, really eager to talk. He was also a visitor, had never been there at the church before. I didn't recognize him.

I don't think the pastor recognized him either. And so he clearly wants to talk to the pastor about something.

And so the pastor just says to me, hang on just a second. Let me talk to this gentleman first. So he turns to the man, and the man says to him,

I just have a question for you, and I just wanted to see if you would clear this up for me. The pastor said, okay.

And the man said, so you believe that there was this man named Jesus, really lived, really performed these miracles, actually raised the dead.

And he himself was crucified. He's God. He's a God man.

And as a God man, he was killed by other men. He was crucified on a cross.

He was buried in a tomb. He rose again from the dead. And you believe his disciples were standing there and watched him rise up into the air and disappear in a cloud.

And you believe he's coming back again on a white horse? And the pastor's standing there going, amen.

You pretty much summarized it right there. But the guy was speaking with such, you know, just skepticism.

How could you possibly believe this? First Corinthians 1 .18 says that the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved, it's what?

It's the power of God. We hear the message of the cross and we rejoice because we've been saved by God through this sacrifice of Christ, that God has shown mercy to us, that someone would be sent to us to preach the gospel and we would come to faith and believe all by the miraculous working and power of God.

And so we see these things as incredible. As we go through this and we try to figure out how do we make these things make sense to the naturally minded person?

We cannot. We simply speak what the scripture says and God, by a work of his spirit, will change the heart of a person from being a skeptic to a believer.

That's all the work that God does in the heart. We must be faithful to these things, to preach exactly what

God has said to us according to his word. Let's preach the word, the full counsel of God. You know, when the apostle

Paul went out from the midst of the of the Judaizers in Corinth, where he was speaking with the

Jews there in the synagogue, when you read about this in the book of Acts, him coming to Corinth for the first time, he shared with them the full counsel of God, it says, and they would not believe what it was that he said.

And so finally, at the end of that, he shakes his cloak like he's leaving the synagogue. He shakes his garment as though to to shake himself of them.

And saying, I have I have preached to you everything. I've left nothing out.

Your blood is on your own heads. From now on, I'm going to the Gentiles.

That was a reference back to Ezekiel 33, where Ezekiel was told that if the watchman sees the sword coming and does not sound the alarm, then anybody who gets taken away by the sword when it comes, his blood is going to be on the watchman's hands because the watchman saw that this was happening and yet did not warn the people.

But if the watchman sees him coming and sounds the alarm, but the people don't listen to the watchman, then they'll be taken away by the sword.

But the watchman will have saved his own life. And so we, being faithful to these things, to the word of God, must preach what it is that has been preached to us, the full counsel of God, leaving nothing out.

And by doing so, we have saved ourselves, saved by Christ, of course, but we have been obedient unto what it is that he has called us to do.

Anybody who will not listen to this message, it's not because we didn't dumb it down to a certain degree that they might be able to believe it.

We have to put it in natural terms so that everybody can understand that the naturally minded man is not going to understand this.

If we make this something natural or something explainable that therefore you can believe it because you can wrap your natural mind around it, well then we've actually gone away from the supernatural, which is clearly being spoken to us here in this word.

What is it that we're reading about? The return of Christ who has ascended into glory.

And we see this presented to us in two ways. In 1 Thessalonians 4, 13 to 18, we read about the salvation of the saints, right?

We're taken up with them. The dead in Christ will rise first, verse 17, then we who are 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. So the first part is about our deliverance.

What's the next part about? Chapter 5 verses 1 through 11, the next part we read about the judgment that comes upon those who did not believe.

You yourselves are fully aware, verse 2, that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night. While the people are saying there is peace and security and then sudden destruction will come upon them as labor pains come upon a pregnant woman and they will not escape.

But it's also said to us here that we are not in darkness, verse 4, for that day to surprise you like a thief, but we're all children of light, children of the day.

So on that day that Christ returns, for us, it's going to be a day of salvation. But for those who do not believe, it's going to be a day of dread.

And we must teach both things. It's necessary for us to teach both. My friends, the fear that I had over the sin that I had committed against God, I had because I realized if I continued in that sin,

I was going to perish in judgment. There are a lot of people that will say, well, you should only preach the merciful parts.

You should only preach grace because, you know, love, love, that's what's going to win people.

You just love them and that's what it is that's going to win them. I tell you, if you don't warn them about the judgment that is coming, then you don't love them.

Because Jesus warned us about that judgment. Paul is warning about that judgment. So we must warn about the judgment also.

Mercy is not mercy if you don't know what it is that Jesus has saved you from. He saved us from the wrath of God that is coming against all the unrighteousness of men.

So we see that on that day, it is a day of great deliverance, but it is also a day of great judgment.

And we've also seen here, and we've talked about this as we've been going through 1 Thessalonians, Paul has that tendency to speak of things either as a nurturing mother or as an exhorting father.

Back in chapter 2, verse 7, we were gentle among you like a nursing mother taking care of her own children.

And then later on in verse 11, for you know how like a father with his children, we exhorted each one of you and encouraged and charged you to walk in a manner worthy of God.

So we have that same kind of tone going on here in 1 Thessalonians 4, 13 through 5, 11.

The first section, verses 13 through 18, is very nurturing, very comforting, like a mother encouraging her children.

And then chapter 5, verses 1 through 11, is a lot more exhortational.

There's more instruction that's being given there regarding the return of Christ there in chapter 5 than what we received in chapter 4.

One of the things we come to understand by this is that the promise of Christ's coming and even the promise of judgment that are going to come upon those who do not believe stirs us to obedience.

Look at chapter 5, verse 6. So then let us not sleep as others do, but let us keep awake and be sober.

Verse 8, since we belong to the day, let us be sober, having put on a breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet the hope of our salvation.

And then verse 11, therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you were doing.

You're finding instructions here. So in light of the fact that Christ has saved us, that he's coming again, and that judgment is coming upon those who do not believe, this would motivate us to obedience, that we obey because God has been good to us, that he has saved us from judgment.

So we would live our lives in such a way that would be pleasing unto the Lord. That was the verse that started this section, chapter 4, verse 1.

Finally then, brothers, we ask you in the Lord Jesus that as you receive from us how you ought to walk and to please

God just as you are doing, that you do so more and more. So even this good word about Christ delivering us and bringing us into his kingdom, even this motivates us to obedience and doing so more and more.

We don't just give mental assent to these things that we have read, but we truly have come to know and believe that Jesus is the

Christ, that he is the king, and we desire to please our king in the way that we live within his kingdom.

Now, let me come back here for a moment to a portion of the end of chapter 4 that we didn't quite finish up last week.

So in verse 16 we read, well, hang on, let me go back to verse 15, for we declare to you,

I'm sorry, no, verse 14, going back up even further, verse 14, for since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so Jesus, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep.

And I've said to you that this could be understood in a couple of different ways. The way that we commonly understand it is that since we're talking about the return of Christ here, then the reference to Jesus coming back will bring with him those who have fallen asleep is a reference to Jesus returning with the souls that have already gone to join with him in glory, right?

So that's one way that we read it, that's the way it's commonly understood. It could also be understood this way, that we're not talking about yet those souls returning with Christ because Paul hadn't gotten to that part of the promise yet.

So he references later on in verse 16, the Lord himself will descend from heaven.

So he hasn't quite come yet to Jesus descending. Instead, what he references here in verse 14 is that God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep, meaning that those who have died in the body and have gone into the ground, their souls have gone to be with the

Lord. So there is a resurrection for them that has already happened just as Christ is alive from the grave.

So they also have gone to be with God. As Paul had said to the Philippians, to be out of the body is to be present with the

Lord. So when their bodies died, they went to be with Christ. And this is a comfort again, that Paul gives to the

Thessalonians who is Greeks. They believe that, hey, when a person died, that was just it. They became worm food.

There wasn't anything else to come after that. And so they, they struggled with that and even wondered, hey, of our brothers and sisters that have died before Christ returned, did they miss that day?

And so Paul is assuring them, no, we will all be together on that day. Even those who are brothers and sisters in Christ who have fallen asleep, they're already with Christ.

And then we'll see them again when he returns and their bodies will be raised to be reunited with their souls.

And then we who are alive, who are left, we'll join them together in the clouds and meet them in the air.

And so we will always be with the Lord. Now this is not the only place that Paul has talked about this.

This is the earliest place that Paul has talked about this. Because if you remember back to the introduction of 1

Thessalonians, this letter was either Paul's first or could have been his second if Galatians was first.

So some scholars believe 1 Thessalonians was Paul's very first letter. Others believe it could have been the book of Galatians.

But if this is, but either way, whether you're talking about Galatians being the first letter or 1 Thessalonians, this is the first place that Paul has ever talked about the return of Christ, at least as far as, as his writings go in what we have of the, of the teachings of the apostle

Paul. So he talks about it here, but it's not the only place in canon where he speaks about this.

Let's go to 1 Corinthians 15, go to 1 Corinthians 15. So we know 1

Corinthians 15 is that apologetic defense that Paul gives for the resurrection of the dead and not just Christ's resurrection, although that is most certainly what's in view here, a defense that he gives for Jesus rising from the dead, but he's especially giving a defense for even the very doctrine of the resurrection of the dead, that we also rise from the dead.

And remember, Paul's talking to the same kind of people here in Corinth that he, as he's talking to in Thessalonica, Corinth was a little further south, but still part of that same

Greek people. So the Corinthians, like the Thessalonians, before they came to faith, they believed, as most

Greeks did, that when you died, that was just it, that was the end of your life. Body goes into the ground, soul goes nowhere.

They don't go up to Mount Olympus and dwell with Zeus. In fact, according to most of the, of the lore concerning the gods, their soul would actually go down to Hades and be part of the river of the dead, which is a very uplifting message, is it not?

So that's the way that the Greeks thought about this. And so Paul is speaking to them about the resurrection of the dead and especially speaking to those who doubt that this thing is really a real thing and saying in verse 20, so I'm in first Corinthians 15, verse 20, but in fact,

Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep.

So meaning Christ is the first one to rise from the dead, being the first fruits means there's going to be others.

There will be others that will rise from the dead too. He's the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. Verse 21, for as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead.

Who is the man that brought death into the world? Adam. Right. Verse 22, for as in Adam, all die.

So also in Christ shall all be made alive. Now I've heard this verse used to espouse universalism.

What's universalism? It's the idea that everybody's going to heaven anyway, right? Doesn't matter what you believe.

You can even live like a hooligan your entire life, lived a totally depraved life, but we're all going to get to heaven.

We all end up there before God. One of the mantras that goes along with this is love wins, right?

And I remember talking with a man one time and he said, he, he believed this very thing. And he said to me, we all get to God one day, all of us will get to God.

And I said, well, see that, I believe I agree with totally. He's like, Oh really? You agree with that? I said, yeah, we all get to God.

It's whether or not you will live with God forever, or he will send you to hell. We all stand before him in judgment, all roads lead to that throne.

But only one road leads to eternal life. And that's Jesus Christ. All other roads lead to judgment and eternal punishment.

So yes, indeed, everybody gets there. And some have used this passage to say, see, it says in Christ, all shall be made alive.

So that's universalism. That's not what Paul is saying here. As in Adam all die, all of us are in Adam.

Every single one of us were born in Adam. We were all born that way. We're all descendants of Adam.

So we're born in Adam. And we have his sin nature to rebel against God and to go our own way.

Every single one of us are like this. But when we come to faith in Christ, we're no longer in Adam.

We're in Christ. So we're born in Adam. We're born again in Christ.

And so only those who are in Christ will be made alive.

As in Adam all die. Everyone who is in Adam dies. So also in Christ, everyone who is in Christ shall be made alive.

So what Paul is saying here is only those who are in Christ will experience this resurrection from the dead.

Verse 23, but each in his own order, Christ the firstfruits, then at his coming, those who belong to Christ.

Okay, Christ the firstfruits, then at his coming, those who belong to Christ. Then comes the end when he delivers the kingdom of God to the father after destroying every rule and every authority and power.

For he must reign until he has put all of his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death.

For God has put all things in subjection under his feet. So there Paul talks about the resurrection of the dead, that all who are in Christ will be raised also.

Now skipping down to verse 32, halfway through the verse,

Paul says, if the dead are not raised, let us eat and drink for tomorrow we die.

Do not be deceived. Bad company ruins good morals. Wake up from your drunken stupor as is right and do not go on sinning for some have no knowledge of God.

And I say this to your shame. So if we have been brought from death to life, even in the present, we must live in such a way that we show that we belong to Christ and not to this world.

Right now, look at what Paul goes on to say. Verse 35, continuing on in that, in that section.

But someone will ask, I love this. I love this question. I love this response. But someone will ask, how are the dead raised?

With what kind of body do they come? What does Paul say? Verse 36.

You fool. Yeah, I just love that. You foolish person. Now, now

I love that in my own confessing my own ignorance, even because I would ask the same question.

I mean, I'm not any different than anybody else in Corinth. Well, how, how are we raised? Like, what kind of body are we raised with?

And, you know, if we're in some kind of Bible study and the Apostle Paul is there leaving, leading the Bible study, looks right at me and he goes, you idiot, because that's what that means.

You foolish person, you numbskull. What you sow does not come to life unless it dies.

And what you sow is not the body that is to be, but a bare kernel, perhaps of wheat or of some other grain.

So what, what Paul is going into here is he's showing from natural revelation that we can even know by what we observe in the world around us, how this works.

Okay. So once again, last week there was, there was the question about how can we come to a natural understanding of these things, which, which are happening supernaturally?

Well, if they're not going to believe the supernatural, they're not going to believe the supernatural with a natural mind.

That's just what it comes down to. If a person does not believe, then it's because these are spiritual things that there are spiritually discerned.

They don't have the spirit of God in order to believe them. But what Paul points out here is that even the person who does not have the spirit of God to understand what we're reading in 1

Thessalonians 4 and 5, they have no excuse. They're not going to be able to stand before God on that day and be able to say, well, you didn't tell us.

You told them, but you didn't tell us these things. Paul is showing even from nature, we can understand this concept of a seed going into ground and becoming something else.

And so as we see that happening in nature with seeds, so we should be able to understand that the same thing happens with the human person, with the body.

Why does a person not believe that? Why do they not understand it? Because they don't have the spirit of God to understand it.

But they're without excuse in even the things that have been made. So this is the point Paul makes in Romans 1, verses 18 -20, for the wrath of God is revealed against all the unrighteousness of men who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.

They love their sin, and so because they want to sin, they don't want to listen to the truth.

But Paul goes on there to say that what is known about God is plainly shown to them.

For even his divine attributes, namely his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived in all that has been made.

So they are without excuse. That's Romans 1 .20 for those of you writing that down. So Paul is saying that from nature, you can see these things.

They just don't want to because they love their sin. And so you should be able to recognize, even from nature, body goes in the ground, it comes out something else.

And he even calls the Corinthians fools for not getting that. You see that? So what kind of body do they come with?

You fool, why are you even asking me that? It's a different body. Because you see that even in nature.

Look at verse 37. And what you sow is not the body that is to be, but a bare kernel, perhaps of wheat or of some other grain.

But God gives it a body as he has chosen, and to each kind of seed its own body.

For not all flesh is the same, but there is one kind for humans, another for animals, another for birds, and another for fish.

There are heavenly bodies and earthly bodies. Now Paul is still talking naturally here.

He's not talking about spiritual heaven and physical earth. He's talking about a physical heaven. There's heavenly bodies.

It's like we even see different, those bodies that exist up there in the heavens can't exist here on earth.

You bring the sun down here to earth, it destroys the earth, right? There's the glory of the heavenly, that's of one kind, he says, still in verse 40.

And the glory of the earthly is of another. There is one glory of the sun, another of the moon, and another glory of the stars.

For star differs from star in glory. So it is with the resurrection of the dead.

What is sown is perishable. What is raised is imperishable. It is sown in dishonor.

It is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness. It is raised in power.

It is sown a natural body. It is raised a spiritual body.

If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body. Thus it is written, the first man

Adam became a living being and the last Adam became a life giving spirit.

But it is not the spiritual that is first, but the natural, then the spiritual. The first man was of the earth, a man of dust.

The second man is of heaven. As was the man of dust, so also are those who are of dust.

And as was the man of heaven, so also are those who are of heaven. Just as we are born the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the man of heaven.

Make a little more sense? Now, it's interesting to note here that as Paul is talking about the physical resurrecting of the body,

Jesus physically raised from the dead. His body literally came out of that tomb.

And the body, the same body that was crucified on the cross is the body that came out of the tomb.

And yet, what does Paul call that body? What did he call it here?

He said it's a spiritual body. What is sown is perishable, what is raised is imperishable.

Verse 44, it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body.

If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body. Now, this really was

Jesus' body. He really did rise from the dead. But it was different.

Like he came before the disciples. What did he show to them to show it was really him? The nail scars in his hands and in his feet.

Thomas was able to touch the spear point in his side to know that that's where the spear went in.

And Thomas said, I'm not going to believe unless I be able to see those things. And Jesus let him touch them. He let the disciples touch him to see that he was real.

He was not a ghost. He was physically there with them. He ate breakfast with them in John.

Ghosts don't fix you breakfast and eat it with you. So, Jesus showed that he was really there with them.

But it was different. How is it different? Well, he was not going to die again.

That body that was raised was now imperishable. You couldn't do anything to it. They could crucify him once, they're not going to crucify him again.

So it is raised, but it's raised different. Also you just look at the fact Jesus just kind of came and went as he pleased, right?

And he just appeared there. Like, hey guys, you know, ah, he shows up and he has to say, fear not, right?

The disciples are terrified. Hey, how many of us were here in the room? Now there's another one in here. Where did he come from?

So Jesus could just kind of appear and disappear as he so pleased. And yet when he went to be with his father in heaven, he raised up from their presence before their very eyes.

He could have just vanished, but that's not the way that he departed from them. He left by going up into the cloud, and as it says in Acts 1, the angels that appeared and stood there with the disciples said, hey, this savior who has departed from you in this way is going to come back exactly the same way again.

And as Jesus says in Matthew 24, the entire world will see him. As lightning is seen in the east as far from the west, so will be the coming of the son of man.

So just the way that he went is the way that he's going to return and the whole earth will see his return. So we have this body that's raised from the dead.

It's something, it's really that body, but it's also something different. Now there are things that we can explain with natural examples as Paul does here.

There are things that we can explain even with the scriptures as the scripture gives us those explanations.

But you're still sitting here this morning going, Gabe, I got a lot of questions. That's fine.

Me too. I still have a lot of questions. What is this going to be like? The spiritual existence that we will be in with God forever in glory is so different that how do we put it into words?

And my friends, this is why revelation, the book of revelation is so difficult to comprehend and why we argue about what the different signs and symbols throughout revelation means.

It's because we're trying to understand things of the eternal with our finite earthly minds.

That's difficult. So John gives it to us in terms, in things that we can understand, but we're still just getting a glimpse.

We can barely fathom what it is that he was seeing and what he was experiencing while he was with the angel being shown this revelation of the things that must soon take place.

The apostle Paul in second Corinthians chapter 12, he says, I know of a man who was taken up into the third heaven and he's speaking of himself, but humbly.

So he's talking about it in the third person. He says, I know a man who was taken up in the third, in the, in the third heaven, whether in the body or out,

I don't know. And he was shown things which no eye can see and no ear can hear and mouth speak of those things that he observed.

Paul was given a vision of heaven and when he came back, he couldn't talk about it. So don't listen to any of these people who say that they died, went to heaven and came back and now they're writing a bestselling book about it.

Those series of books are referred to as heaven tourism books. It's like, I went up to heaven, I looked around,

I came back and I'm telling you a story about it. Doesn't happen. None of these people did that. If the apostle

Paul was not going to do that, you can't do that. Okay? The apostle himself would not speak of what it was that he saw.

And one of the reasons, not just because it was not appointed to him to speak of what it is that he saw, but because it's so grand, it's so incredible.

How do you put it into words? So we have these glimpses in places like this in first Corinthians 15 in first Thessalonians four and five and in the book of revelation, but it barely gives us the tip of the iceberg of all that we are going to see on the day that the

Lord returns. And that day when our bodies are transformed to be like his glorious body by the power that enables him to subject all things to himself.

As it says in Philippians chapter three, man, I get worked up talking about it. Yeah. Wonderful.

Thanks Lois. But all of these things are given to us that we would be comforted.

Now we have this wonderful promise. Um, I, I have to take ibuprofen every morning or my left leg is on fire.

It's part of the nerve issues that I experienced in my lower back. I didn't do that this morning, so I am in pain as I'm speaking to you today, but that pain reminds me this is temporary and I get to be done with this body and have it transformed into something that doesn't experience pain anymore.

When my lowly body is transformed to be like his glorious body and that promise is given to me in scripture,

I don't know what it's going to be like. Have you ever, have you ever been so sick before you're sick in your bed and you're just laying there going,

I don't even remember what it was like to be, to be healthy anymore. Have you ever been that sick before? God, what was it like to be healthy?

So we can barely understand what it's going to be like to have a body like that. But when we get there, as Paul said in Romans chapter five, it's not even worth comparing the sufferings that we endure now to the glory that we're going to receive if we endure.

So let's hold to these promises as marvelous as they are, as, as beyond our minds as they tend to be.

But we know it was given to us by God. We know it was given to us by the one who came down from heaven and was able to speak to us about those things from that place that he came.

And we hold fast to these promises. We hold fast to Christ. We look forward to that great day.

And at the same time, encouraging one another, because that's the instruction that Paul has there for the, for the Thessalonians, encourage one another up with these words and build one another up just as you were doing.

And then we also warn those of the judgment that is to come so that they don't perish in that judgment, but they by faith in Christ will likewise live forever with us in glory.