Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of 1 Thessalonians 4:18
Wherefore comfort one another with these words.
18. Wherefore comfort one another with these words ] Lit., in these words, in the revelation just communicated the readers are to find comfort for each other under their recent bereavement, and in all such seasons. Observe how wishful the Apostle is that his flock should minister to each other. Comp. ch. 1Th 5:12; 1Th 5:14, and notes.
Comfort or encourage: same as the “exhort” of 1Th 4:1 ; 1Th 4:10; it denotes any kind of animating and cheering address. See notes on “exhortation,” ch. 1Th 2:3, 1Th 3:2.
“Listen! it is no dream: the Apostles’ trump
Gives earnest of the Archangel’s; calmly now,
Our hearts yet beating high
To that victorious lay,
(Most like a warrior’s, to the martial dirge
Of a true comrade,) in the grave we trust
Our treasure for a while.”
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Wherefore comfort one another – Margin, exhort. The word comfort probably best expresses the meaning. They were to bring these glorious truths and these bright prospects be fore their minds, in order to alleviate, the sorrows of bereavement. The topics of consolation are these: first, that those who had died in the faith would not always lie in the grave; second, that when they rose they would not occupy an inferior condition because they were cut off before the coming of the Lord; and third, that all Christians, living and dead, would be received to heaven and dwell forever with the Lord.
With these words – That is, with these truths.
Remarks On 1 Thessalonians 4
1. This passage 1Th 4:13-18 contains a truth which is to be found in no pagan classic writer, and nowhere else. except in the teachings of the New Testament. For the elevated and glorious view which it gives of future scenes pertaining to our world, and for all its inestimable consolations, we are wholly indebted to the Christian religion. Reason, unassisted by revelation, never dared to conjecture that such scenes would occur; if it had, it would have had no arguments on which the conjecture could be supported.
2. The death of the Christian is a calm and gentle slumber; 1Th 4:13. It is not annihilation; it is not the extinction of hope. It is like gentle repose when we lie down at night, and when we hope to awake again in the morning; it is like the quiet, sweet slumber of the infant. Why, then, should the Christian be afraid to die? Is he afraid to close his eyes in slumber? Why dread the night – the stillness of death? Is he afraid of the darkness, the silence, the chilliness of the midnight hour, when his senses are locked in repose? Why should death to him appear so terrible? Is the slumbering of an infant an object of terror?
3. There are magnificent scenes before us. There is no description anywhere which is more sublime than that in the close of this chapter. Great events are brought together here, any one of which is more grand than all the pomp of courts, and all the sublimity of battle, and all the grandeur of a triumphal civic procession. The glory of the descending Judge of all mankind; the attending retinue of angels, and of the spirits of the dead; the loud shout of the descending host; the clangor of the archangels trumpet; the bursting of graves and the coming forth of the million there entombed; the rapid, sudden, glorious change on the million of living people; the consternation of the wicked; the ascent of the innumerable host to the regions of the air, and the solemn process of the judgment there – what has ever occurred like these events in this world. And how strange it is that the thoughts of people are not turned away from the trifles – the show – the shadow – the glitter – the empty pageantry here – to these bright and glorious realities!
4. In those scenes we shall all be personally interested. If we do not survive until they occur, yet we shall have an important part to act in them. We shall hear the archangels trump; we shall be summoned before the descending Judge. In these scenes we shall mingle not as careless spectators, but as those whose eternal doom is there to be determined, and with all the intensity of emotion derived from the fact that the Son of God will descend to judge us, and to pronounce our final doom! Can we be too much concerned to be prepared for the solemnities of that day?
5. We have, in the passage before us, an interesting view of the order in which these great events will occur. There will be:
(1)The descent of the judge with the attending hosts of heaven;
(2)The raising up of the righteous dead;
(3)The change which the living will undergo (compare 1Co 15:52);
(4)The ascent to meet the Lord in the air; and,
(5)The return with him to glory.
What place in this series of wonders will be assigned for the resurrection of the wicked, is not mentioned here. The object of the apostle did not lead him to advert to that, since his purpose was to comfort the afflicted by the assurance that their pious friends would rise again, and would suffer no disadvantage by the fact that they had died before the coming of the Redeemer. From Joh 5:28-29, however, it seems most probable that they will be raised at the same time with the righteous, and will ascend with them to the place of judgment in the air.
6. There is no intimation here of a personal reign of Christ upon the earth. Indeed, there is no evidence that he will return to the earth at all. All that appears is, that he will descend from heaven to the regions of the air, and there will summon the living and the dead to his bar. But there is no intimation that he will set up a visible kingdom then on earth, to continue a thousand or more years; that the Jews will be re-collected in their own land; that a magnificent city or temple will be built there; or that the saints will hover in the air, or reign personally with the Lord Jesus over the nations. There are two considerations in view of this passage, which, to my mind, are conclusive proof that all this is romance – splendid and magnificent indeed as an Arabian tale – but wholly unknown to the apostle Paul. The one is, that if this were to occur, it is inconceivable that there should have been no allusion to it here. It would have been such a magnificent conception of the design of the Second Advent, that it could not have failed to have been adverted to in a description like this. The other consideration is, that such a view would have been exactly in point to meet the object of the apostle here. What could have been more appropriate in comforting the Thessalonian Christians respecting those who had died in the faith, than to describe the gorgeous scenes of the personal reign of Christ, and the important part which the risen saints were to play in that great drama? How can it he accounted for that the apostle did not advert to it? Would a believer in the persocial reign now be likely to omit so material a point in a description of the scenes which are to occur at the Second Advent?
7. The saints will be forever with the Lord. They will dwell with him in his own eternal home; Joh 14:3. This expression comprises the sum of all their anticipated felicity and glory. To be with Christ will be, in itself, the perfection of bliss; for it will be a security that they will sin no more, that they will suffer no more, and that they will be shielded from danger and death. They will have realized the object of their long, fond desire – that of seeing their Saviour; they will have suffered the last pang, encountered the last temptation, and escaped forever from the dominion of death. What a glorious prospect is this! Assuredly we should be willing to endure pain, privation, and contempt here for the brief period of our earthly pilgrimage, if we may come at last to a world of eternal rest. What trifles are all earthly sorrows compared with the glories of an endless life with our God and Saviour!
8. It is possible that even the prospect of the judgment-day should be a source of consolation; 1Th 4:18. To most people it is justly an object of dread – for all that they have to fear is concentrated on the issues of that day. But why should a Christian fear it? In the descending Judge he will hail his Redeemer and friend; and just in proportion as he has true religion here, will be the certainty of his acquittal there. Nay, his feelings in anticipation of the judgment may be more than the mere absence of fear and alarm. It may be to him the source of positive joy. It will be the day of his deliverance from death and the grave. It will confirm to him all his long cherished hopes. It will put the seal of approbation on his life spent in endeavoring to do the will of God. It will reunite him to his dear friends who have died in the Lord. It will admit him to a full and glorious view of that Saviour whom having not seen he has loved; and it will make him the-companion of angels and of God. If there is anything, therefore, which ought to cheer and sustain our hearts in the sorrows and bereavements of this life, it is the anticipation of the glorious scenes connected with the Second Advent of our Lord, and the prospect of standing before him clothed in the robes of salvation, surrounded by all those whom we have loved who have died in the faith, and with the innumerable company of the redeemed of all ages and lands.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 18. Comfort one another with these words.] Strange saying! comfort a man with the information that he is going to appear before the judgment-seat of God! Who can feel comfort from these words? That man alone with whose spirit the Spirit of God bears witness that his sins are blotted out, and the thoughts of whose heart are purified by the inspiration of Gods Holy Spirit, so that he can perfectly love him, and worthily magnify his name. Reader, thou art not in a safe state unless it be thus with thee, or thou art hungering and thirsting after righteousness. If so, thou shalt be filled; for it is impossible that thou shouldst be taken away in thy sins, while mourning after the salvation of God. They that seek shall find.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
The apostle makes application of all this discourse to the end he designed, which was to comfort them under their sorrows for departed Christian friends; and he saith not, be ye comforted, but
comfort one another, to put them upon the great duty of Christian sympathy; though this is a duty we owe to all, yet especially to the saints, and more especially of the same particular congregation. And funeral sorrows are usually most afflictive, and therefore need to be allayed with words of comfort; and not with any words, but, saith the apostle,
with these words, or these things, as the Hebrew, the things or words that he had before laid before them. The philosophers used many arguments against the fears of death, and for comfort under funeral sorrows, but Christians should fetch their comforts from the Scriptures. These are the best, most solid, most durable, and universal, and therefore the apostle commends them to the believing Romans, Rom 15:4, as here to these Thessalonians particularly. These considerations, that those which sleep in Jesus shall rise again, and that we shall meet them again, and we and they shall be for ever with the Lord together, are a great relief against the sorrows of their departure hence. And the comforts arising hence may serve to support under other sorrows as well as these, which the apostle also might intend in the words.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
18. comfort one anotherinyour mourning for the dead (1Th4:13).
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
Wherefore comfort one another with these words. Or doctrines; as that the saints, when they die, do not cease to be, but are asleep, and asleep in Jesus; that their souls are with him, and their bodies sleep in his arms, and are his care; that these will be as soon with Christ, as the saints that will be alive when he comes; that the coming of Christ will be with great power and glory; that the righteous will rise first in the morning of the resurrection, and before the living saints are changed, and are with Christ; that they will both be taken up together to meet him; and that they shall all be with him, and that for ever, and never part more; than which nothing can yield more true and solid comfort, under all the trials and troubles of this life, under all diseases and distempers of body, under all afflictions and persecutions for Christ’s sake, under the loss of near and dear relations, and in a view of death and eternity: some copies read, “with these words of the spirit”; and so the Arabic version, “with these spiritual words”: for such they are, being the word of God, as in 1Th 4:15.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
With these words ( ). In these words. They were a comfort to the Thessalonians as they still comfort the people of God.
Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament
1 ) “Wherefore comfort one another” (hoste parakaleite allelous) “Therefore comfort or console you all one another”; it was to our Lord’s church, in a restricted sense He promised, “I go to prepare a place for you”, and “I will come again to receive you to myself”, not to the sum total of the world, and to the Galilean brethren He pledged that He would return as He went away, Act 1:10-11; Joh 14:1-14.
2) “With these words” (en tois logois toutois) “with these (particular) words”, of the resurrection and Second coming of Christ; The second coming of Jesus Christ is the remedy and solution to all the ills and problems of the redeemed and of the Church who look for His coming, 2Co 1:3-4; 2Ti 4:7-8; Rev 22:12; Rev 22:16.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
18 Comfort. He now shews more openly what I have previously stated — that in the faith of the resurrection we have good ground of consolation, provided we are members of Christ, and are truly united to him as our Head. At the same time, the Apostle would not have each one to seek for himself assuagement of grief, but also to administer it to others.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
(18) Comfort one another.Here is a balm for the sorrow of 1Th. 4:13. Bather, in these words than with; Repeat these very words to one another, and you will find the comfort. What bereaved Christian has not found this true?
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
18. Comfort words After they had been read unto all, (1Th 5:27,) record them in your memories; and be ready to remind one another of their consoling import.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
‘Wherefore comfort one another with these words.’
The word for comfort is parakaleo, ‘comfort, strengthen, firmly assist’. The first comfort is found in that they need no longer fear at the thought of those who die in Christ missing out. They will share all the glory of His coming. The second, of course, is in that these words are a comfort and a strengthener to all Christians, especially when the going gets tough. For all the sacrifices of ‘training’ for success have the reaching of the objective firmly in mind.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
1Th 4:18 . A concluding exhortation.
] not to exhort (Musculus), but to comfort ; comp. , 1Th 4:13 .
] denotes nothing more than words . Erroneously Aretius, Flatt, Pelt, Olshausen, and others: principles or doctrines (of faith). And denotes on the ground of these or the above words.
Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary
REFLECTIONS
READER! what a blessed consideration is it, to the renewed soul in Christ, that He who is made of God to us wisdom, and righteousness; is no less our sanctification, and redemption? And, it is among the most blessed of all thoughts, and which God the Holy Ghost is forever impressing on the minds of his people, that our oneness and union with the Lord Jesus, brings up after it, an interest, in all that belongs to him as Christ. Our union with his Person, gives a security to our life in him, our graces from him, and our everlasting happiness with him; for assuredly, where He is, there must his members be. Precious Jesus may I never lose sight of those gracious assurances of thine. Because I live ye shall live also.
Blessed Lord the Spirit! thanks to thee, for sending thy servant to teach the Church, how to regulate our sorrows, when under bereaving providences. Never let my soul mourn anymore when any die in the Lord. Tears may fall. Yea, Jesus will not be displeased when they fall. It is the funeral of nature. And Jesus, who wept himself at Lazarus’s tomb, will not be angry if any weep at mine. But grace triumphs. It is not death, but sleep, yea, a sweet refreshing sleep, when Jesus calls home his members. But while we hear the voice which John heard, we may write it as the inscription on the graves of the saints. Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord! And, as sure as they sleep in Jesus; so sure God will bring them with Jesus in that day when he comes. And ye members of Christ, who are yet unborn, whom Jesus shall appoint to be alive at his coming; ye also shall partake in the triumphs of his coming. Though ye go not down to the grave, yet will the Lord change your vile bodies, under which ye groan, and fashion them like unto his glorious body; according to the power whereby he is able to subdue all things to himself. Lord! give grace to thy Church, that amidst all the dying circumstances of thy people her below, we may be able to comfort, and to exhort one another with these words!
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
18 Wherefore comfort one another with these words.
Ver. 18. Wherefore comfort, &c. ] Scripture comforts come home to the heart, so do not philosophical. Nescio quomodo (saith Cicero of such medicina) morbo est imbecillior. And albeit it is marvellous sweet to meditate (as Mr Knox found it on his deathbed, so that he would have risen and gone into the pulpit to tell others what he had felt in his soul, Melch. Adam. in Vit.), yet there is a special force of strong consolation in Christian communication, which the Lord usually watereth with the dews of divine blessing.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
18 .] , so then: reff.
. , comfort: cf. , 1Th 4:13 .
, not things , here or any where: but words: these words , which I have by inspiration delivered to you.
It will be manifest to the plain, as well as to the scholar-like reader, that attempts like that of Prof. Jowett, to interpret such a passage as this by the rules of mere figurative language, are entirely beside the purpose. The Apostle’s declarations here are made in the practical tone of strict matter of fact, and are given as literal details, to console men’s minds under an existing difficulty. Never was a place where the analogy of symbolical apocalyptic language was less applicable. Either these details must be received by us as matter of practical expectation, or we must set aside the Apostle as one divinely empowered to teach the Church. It is a fair opportunity for an experimentum crucis: and such test cannot be evaded by Prof. Jowett’s intermediate expedient of figurative language.
Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament
1Th 4:18 . . Paul had an intelligible word upon the future, unlike the Hellenic mysteries which usually made religion a matter of feeling rather than of definite teaching (Hardie’s Lect. on Classical Subjects , pp. 53 f.). A pagan letter of consolation has been preserved from the second century ( Oxyrh. Papyri , i. 115): “Eirene to Taonnophris and Philon good cheer! I was as grieved and wept as much over Eumoiros as over Didymas, and I did all that was fitting, as did all my family. But still we can do nothing in such a case. So comfort yourselves. Goodbye.” One of Cicero’s pathetic letters ( ad. Fam. , xiv. 2), written from Thessalonica, speaks doubtfully of any re-union after death (“haec non sunt in manu nostra”).
Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson
Wherefore = So then.
comfort. Same as “beseech”, 1Th 4:10.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
18.] , so then: reff.
., comfort: cf. , 1Th 4:13.
, not things, here or any where: but words: these words, which I have by inspiration delivered to you.
It will be manifest to the plain, as well as to the scholar-like reader, that attempts like that of Prof. Jowett, to interpret such a passage as this by the rules of mere figurative language, are entirely beside the purpose. The Apostles declarations here are made in the practical tone of strict matter of fact, and are given as literal details, to console mens minds under an existing difficulty. Never was a place where the analogy of symbolical apocalyptic language was less applicable. Either these details must be received by us as matter of practical expectation, or we must set aside the Apostle as one divinely empowered to teach the Church. It is a fair opportunity for an experimentum crucis: and such test cannot be evaded by Prof. Jowetts intermediate expedient of figurative language.
Fuente: The Greek Testament
1Th 4:18. , comfort one another) in your grief. Comp. also 1Th 4:11.
Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament
1Th 4:18
Wherefore comfort one another with these words.-Because the dead shall be raised, and those who remain alive shall be caught up in the twinkling of an eye, and because this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. When our brethren in Christ sleep, we must comfort one another with these words. These promises of the future resurrection to those in Christ should be grounds of comfort to Christians when their brethren in Christ die. It is a sleep, a rest in Christ Jesus, whence they will come forth with new life and vigor and increasing joys. [What congregation is there in which there is not need of this consolation? One needs the comfort today and another tomorrow; in proportion as we bear each others burdens, we all need it continually. The unseen world is perpetually opening to receive those whom we love; but though they pass out of sight and out of reach, it is not forever. They are still united to Christ; and when he comes in his glory he will bring them with him. Is it not strange to balance the greatest sorrow of life against words? Words, we often feel, are vain and worthless; they make no difference in the pressure of grief. Of our own words that is true; but those we have been considering are not our own words, but the words of the Lord. His words are living and powerful. Heaven and earth may pass away, but they cannot pass. Let us comfort one another with these precious words.]
Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary
Wherefore: 1Th 5:11, 1Th 5:14, Isa 40:1, Isa 40:2, Luk 21:28, Heb 12:12
comfort: or, exhort, Heb 10:24, Heb 10:25
Reciprocal: Num 10:10 – in the day Ecc 4:10 – if Jer 51:61 – read Joh 11:19 – to comfort Joh 11:28 – and called Joh 12:26 – where Act 18:23 – strengthening Act 20:12 – were 1Co 14:3 – comfort 1Co 14:31 – all may be 2Co 1:4 – that 2Co 5:8 – present 2Co 13:11 – be of good Col 3:16 – teaching Col 4:8 – and comfort Heb 3:13 – exhort
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
1Th 4:18. Comfort is rendered “exhort” in the margin, and that is one of the definitions given in the lexicon. However, verse 13 indicates that Paul wrote these verses for the comfort of those who were sorrowing over the dead, hence the word in the common version is correct.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
1Th 4:18. Wherefore. There being no ground for your supposing that your dead friends will suffer any disadvantage from dying before Christ comes.
Comfort one another with these words. Paul scarcely expects that mourners will themselves remember in their grief that which should alleviate it; but he calls upon their fellow-Christians to assume the office of comforter. And that no one may excuse himself on the score of having no consolation to offer, he gives them wherewithal they may mitigate the bitterness of bereavement.
Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament
That is, draw matter of consolation to yourselves from the foregoing considerations, against the loss of your deceased friends; intimating, that the best and choicest of comforts, for supporting the spirits of men under afflictions in general, and the loss of dear relations in particular, are drawn from the holy scriptures; comfort one another with these words, that is, with such scriptural words as he had now written.
Fuente: Expository Notes with Practical Observations on the New Testament
The Second Coming Is a Message of Comfort
1Th 5:1-3
When Will the Lord Come Again?
Unbelievers, according to Paul, reassure themselves by saying there is no reason for concern. He explained that the second coming would be as sudden as the onset of labor pains. Those who fail to be watchful will not escape the Lord’s wrath ( 1Th 5:1-3 ).
Fuente: Gary Hampton Commentary on Selected Books
Wherefore comfort one another with these words. [Thus are we commanded to tell all Christians who mourn that they will meet their lost in Christ on the day that Christ appears, and that in sweet union and communion they will ever be with him.]
Fuente: McGarvey and Pendleton Commentaries (New Testament)
The hope of being reunited with saints who have died and, what is more important, with Christ, gives believers a hope that we can and should use to comfort one another when loved ones die.
"Paul’s central point [in 1Th 4:13-18] is that Christians who have died are in no way behind those who are alive at the Lord’s coming, since the dead will actually rise first; then, we will all go together to meet the Lord in the air." [Note: Thomas R. Edgar, "An Exegesis of Rapture Passages," in Issues in Dispensationalism, p. 204.]
Note that it is not the Lord’s return by itself that Paul offered as encouragement here (cf. Tit 2:13) but the reunion of dead and living saints and their shared glory in His presence.
Both pretribulationists and posttribulationists agree that the revelation Paul just gave is a comfort to believers. The hope of translation before death that Paul revealed is greater than the hope of resurrection after death that the Thessalonians had held. Will this translation occur before the Tribulation or after it? Pretribulationists say it will occur before. Consequently we have a very comforting hope. Not only may our translation precede our death, but it will also precede the Tribulation. Furthermore it may take place at any moment. Posttribulationists say our hope consists only in the possibility of our being translated before we die. We may have to go through the Tribulation. Therefore the Rapture is not imminent in their view.
"The hope of a rapture occurring after a literal great tribulation would be small comfort to those in this situation [i.e., in mourning for loved ones who have died]." [Note: Walvoord, The Blessed . . ., p. 96.]
". . . although the church has gone through periods of great persecution in the past and undoubtedly may go through greater and even more intense persecutions before Christ returns, nevertheless, the view of a posttribulational rapture is impossible for the simple reason that it makes meaningless the very argument that Paul was presenting in the Thessalonian letters. Paul was arguing for the imminence of Christ’s return. This is to be the major source of comfort for suffering believers. If Christ will not come until after the great tribulation (that is, a special period of unusual and intense suffering still in the future), then the return of the Lord is not imminent and tribulation rather than deliverance is what we must anticipate." [Note: James Montgomery Boice, The Last and Future World, pp. 41-42.]
I prefer the pretribulational explanation of 1Th 4:13-18 for the following reasons. The passage pictures the Rapture as an imminent event, but it is not if the Tribulation must come first. Second, Christians are not destined to experience the outpouring of God’s wrath (1Th 1:10; 1Th 5:9-10), which the Tribulation will be. Third, the prospect of an imminent Rapture is a much greater comfort than the prospect of a posttribulation Rapture, and Paul revealed this information to provide comfort. Fourth, there is no mention of the Tribulation in the passage, but that would be appropriate and reasonable if it will precede the Rapture. The pretribulation view existed in the church long before John Nelson Darby (1800-1882) popularized it. [Note: See Timothy J. Demy and Thomas D. Ice, "The Rapture and an Early Medieval Citation," Bibliotheca Sacra 152:607 (July-September 1995):306-17.]
A comparison of 1Th 4:13-18 with Joh 14:1-3 shows that they refer to the same event.
|
John 14:1-3 |
1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 |
|
trouble |
Joh 14:1 |
sorrow |
1Th 4:13 |
|
believe |
Joh 14:1 |
believe |
1Th 4:14 |
|
God, me |
Joh 14:1 |
Jesus, God |
1Th 4:14 |
|
told you |
Joh 14:2 |
say to you |
1Th 4:15 |
|
come again |
Joh 14:3 |
coming of the Lord |
1Th 4:15 |
|
receive you |
Joh 14:3 |
caught up |
1Th 4:17 |
|
to myself |
Joh 14:3 |
to meet the Lord |
1Th 4:17 |
|
be where I am |
Joh 14:3 |
ever be with the Lord |
1Th 4:17 |
A similar comparison of 1 Thessalonians 4 and Revelation 19, which describes the second coming of Christ, reveals that these two chapters must describe different events. [Note: Both comparisons are from J. B. Smith, A Revelation of Jesus Christ, p. 312.]
|
1 Thessalonians 4 |
Revelation 19 |
|
Only the righteous are in the picture. |
Only the wicked. |
|
The dead are raised to life. |
The living go to death. |
|
The saints ascend to meet the Lord. |
Saints descend with the Lord. |
|
They are the guests at the marriage supper of the Lamb. |
They constitute the supper of the great God. |
|
They are forever with the Lord. |
The leaders and all their followers are cast into the lake of fire. |