1 Thessalonians

The account of Paul's founding of this church is recorded in the seventeenth chapter of Acts. After he and Silas were thrown into prison in Philippi because of their preaching of the Gospel, an earthquake shook down the prison doors and freed the prisoners. Paul was then freed by the Roman magistrates, and he left Philippi and went to Thessalonica. Many of the places where Paul preached have crumbled into ruin, but Thessalonica is still a thriving, bustling metropolis. It was then the capital of Macedonia, but it is now in Greece proper, and is called Thessalonike.

From the account in Acts, we learn that Paul had only been there about three weeks when persecution began and he had to leave the city for his own safety. He went down to Athens and from there he sent Timothy back to Thessalonica to see how these Christians were doing. He was very disturbed about them; he felt that perhaps the persecution they were undergoing would drive them from their faith.

He went on to Corinth where he founded a church after several months of difficult labor. After some time, Timothy returned to him at Corinth, bringing word of how the Thessalonians were doing. The bulk of Paul's letter to them expresses his exhilaration at their thriving faith, but also takes time to address some of their concerns.

Apparently, there was some confusion over what happened to believers after death, as evidenced by Paul's comments in 4:13-5:11. These verses are among the most descriptive in all of Scripture regarding the resurrection of the dead. There is considerable debate on this topic, probably because relatively speaking, there is not alot said about it and therefore room for speculation. The event that Paul describes here is known as the "rapture" and refers to a future time when Jesus will descend from Heaven along with the souls of believers who have passed away. At this time, the souls of believers will be joined with their physical bodies in a glorified, perfected state. They will be different but reminiscent of our earthly bodies and obviously miraculously reconstructed from decay . This is what Paul means when he says "the dead in Christ shall rise first". Believers currently alive at the time of the rapture will not experience death but will be taken up into the clouds, in bodily form, with Jesus immediately. This is not the Second Coming, for Jesus will not actually return to earth to set up His earthly kingdom at that point. There is even more debate about when this will occur, which we will deal with in Revelation if not sooner. But there are four basic elements to eschatology (the study of the end times)...the Rapture, the Tribulation, the Millennium, and Armageddon. Where the rapture falls in that ordered sequence is hotly disputed.

But Paul's point was not to outline eschatology but to comfort these new believers in their grief over lost loved ones.He wanted them to have peace that their loved ones were in the presence of God, awaiting the resurrection. The Bible does not teach the concept of "soul sleep", in which our souls are unconscious from the moment of death until the resurrection. Nor does it teach an intermediate waiting area. The doctrine of purgatory is not based on our Bible but comes from the Apocrypha, which is a collection of books NOT considered to be inspired Scripture except by the Catholic church. Just as Jesus told the thief on the cross, "today you will be with me in paradise", we can rest assured that at the moment of death, our souls go immediately into the presence of the Lord.

Tomorrow's reading: 1 Thess. 5:12-28; 2 Thes. 1:1-3:18; Acts 18:4-23