on it seems likely that they even
supposed them to be altogether cut off from the benefits and
blessedness of that coming by not having been able to see it in the
flesh. Thereupon St. Paul puts them right by saying,--using the same
argument as in that great resurrection chapter, 1 Cor. xv.,--that "_if
we believe that Jesus Himself died and rose again, even so also those
who through Jesus have fallen asleep will God bring with Him_," that
is, will God bring back to us when He brings back to us Jesus.

You may just observe, by the way, that the whole force of what the
Apostle says is very commonly lost, by a wrong method of reading these
words. We very commonly hear them read, "will God bring _with_ him."
But thus we, as I said, lose the force of the argument, which is:--If
Jesus, our first-fruits, our representative, died and rose again, so
will all who die in union with Jesus rise again. And in order to that,
the same power of God which brings Jesus back to us, will with Him,
with Jesus, bring their spirits back, in order to that resurrection.

Well, what then? "_This we say unto you by the word of the
Lord_"--thus the Apostle introduces, not an argument, not a command or
saying of his own, but a special revelation--"_that we, which are
alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord_" (for notice that at
first, at the early time when these Thessalonian epistles were
written, first of all St. Paul's letters, the Apostle looked forward
to that day of which neither man nor angel knoweth, as about to come
on in his own time) shall have no advantage, no priority, over them
which have fallen asleep. And why? For this reason--that "_the Lord
Himself shall come down 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:_" that is, shall rise before anything else happens--any
changing, or summoning to the Lord, of us who are alive.

Now here let us pause in the sacred text, and consider what it is
which we have before us. Mind, we are speaking to-day, as the Apostle
is speaking in this passage, entirely of the blessed dead; of those
of whom it may be said that through Jesus their death is but a
holy sleep. We have clearly this before us:--at a certain time,
fixed in the counsels of God, the Father, known to no created
being,--mysteriously unknown also, for He Himself assures us of this
in words which no ingenuity can explain away, to the Son Himself in
His