ath, and that, because He did, the ugly thing
wears a softened aspect to believers, and is but sleep. He died that we
might never know what the worst sting of death is.

We note further that, in order to bring out the truth of the gracious
change which has passed on death physical for His servants, the
remarkable expression is used, in verse 14, 'fallen asleep through
Jesus'; His mediatorial work being the reason for their death becoming
sleep. Similarly, it is only in verse 16 that the bare word 'dead' is
used about them, and there it is needed for emphasis and clearness. When
we are thinking of Resurrection we can afford to look death in the face.

We note that Paul here claims to be giving a new revelation made to him
directly by Christ. 'By (or, "in") the word of the Lord' cannot mean
less than that. The question arises, in regard to verse 15, whether Paul
expected that the advent would come in his lifetime. It need not startle
any if he were proved to have cherished such a mistaken expectation; for
Christ Himself taught the disciples that the time of His second coming
was a truth reserved, and not included in His gifts to them. But two
things may be noted. First, that in the second Epistle, written very
soon after this, Paul sets himself to damp down the expectation of the
nearness of the advent, and points to a long course of historical
development of incipient tendencies which must precede it; and, second,
that his language here does not compel the conclusion that he expected
to be alive at the second coming. For he is distinguishing between the
two classes of the living and the dead, and he naturally puts himself in
the class to which, at that time, he and his hearers belonged, without
thereby necessarily deciding, or even thinking about, the question
whether he and they would or would not belong to that class at the
actual time of the advent.

The revelation here reveals much, and leaves much unrevealed. It is
perfectly clear on the main point. Negatively, it declares that the
sleeping saints lose nothing, and are not anticipated or hindered in any
blessedness by the living. Positively, it declares that they precede the
living, inasmuch as they 'rise first'; that is, before the living
saints, who do not sleep, but are changed (1 Cor. xv. 51), are thus
transfigured. Then the two great companies shall unitedly rise to meet
the descending Lord; and their unity in Him, and, therefore, their
fellowship with one an