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1 Thessalonians 4:16–17
“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.”
Christ’s exaltation, Westminster Shorter Catechism 28 tells us in its summary of Scripture, consists of His resurrection, ascension, session (sitting at God’s right hand), and return. Having looked at the first three elements of our Lord’s exaltation, today we will consider the exaltation of King Jesus in His return.
Several passages of Scripture tell us that Christ will come at the end of history to consummate His kingdom. The Apostle Paul gives us a basic sequence of events in today’s passage. He says that Jesus will descend with the voice of an archangel and the blowing of the trumpet. Our Lord’s return will not be in secret but will be audible and visible. Then the dead in Christ will rise and be caught up to meet Jesus in the air, with anyone who is alive at the time of His return going up as well (1 Thess. 4:16–17). Thus we see that the return of Jesus will manifest His exaltation to the entire world.
Other texts indicate that we will see the exaltation of Jesus in His return in His delivering the kingdom to God the Father (1 Cor. 15:24–28). How can this be our Lord’s exaltation if He is giving up His kingdom? Here we must understand that this will not be Jesus’ abdicating His reign over all. It has reference to a specific surrendering of one aspect of His mediatorial reign. Jesus will be our King and Mediator forever, but there is one thing that He will not be doing forever: “restraining and conquering all his and our enemies” (Westminster Shorter Catechism 26). This aspect of His reign will continue until “he has put all his enemies under his feet” (1 Cor. 15:25), and only at that point will He hand over the kingdom to the Father. Francis Turretin comments that what the Son will hand over is not “the very substance of the kingdom, but only . . . the mode of its administration, which is concerned with collecting, governing, and defending the church from her enemies (which will have no more place after all her enemies are vanquished).”
At His return, Jesus will no longer be conquering His enemies or protecting us from them by restraining them because they will have been finally vanquished (see Rev. 20:7–15). Then creation will be renewed and transformed into its final perfected state (21:1–22:5). There will be no sun or moon to shine on the new creation because God will give it light, and the Lamb—the Lord Jesus Christ—will be its lamp (21:23). The brightness of our Savior’s exalted glorious countenance will shine on us forever.
Coram Deo Living before the face of God
We do not know when Jesus is returning, but we do know that it could be at any moment (1 Cor. 15:52). Are we looking forward to that day? Do we long to see Christ our exalted King displaying His glory for all to see? Are we setting our hope on His return?
For further study
- Acts 1:6–11
- 2 Thessalonians 2:1–8
The bible a year
- Psalms 137–141
- 1 Corinthians 10
- Psalms 142–147
- 1 Corinthians 11