The Fathers Enter the Kingdom

Jesus spoke of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob entering the messianic-age kingdom on multiple occasions.¹ One time was in the early part of his preaching career, during his “Great Galilean Ministry.”² Matthew says a Roman centurion expressed faith in him by affirming his absolute authority:

When Jesus heard it, He marveled, and said to those who followed, “Assuredly, I say to you, I have not found such great faith, not even in Israel! And I say to you that many will come from east and west, and sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven. But the sons of the kingdom will be cast out into outer darkness. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” (Matt 8:10–12)

About two years later—in his “Later Perean Ministry”—Jesus was on his final journey to Jerusalem. He then revealed that few in Israel would enter the kingdom of God (Luke 13:22–27). He contrasted God’s rejection of them with his acceptance of the Gentiles: 

“There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, and yourselves thrust out. They will come from the east and the west, from the north and the south, and sit down in the kingdom of God. And indeed there are last who will be first, and there are first who will be last.” (Luke 13:28–30)

In these two passages, Jesus described the elect enjoying the messianic-age kingdom banquet. He mentioned this banquet again the night before his crucifixion: “I bestow upon you a kingdom, just as My Father bestowed one upon Me, that you may eat and drink at My table in My kingdom” (Luke 22:29–30). This theme—the Jewish fathers entering the kingdom, followed by an influx of Gentiles, to feast at God’s messianic-age table—was an integral part of Jesus’ three and one-half year ministry.

This observation supports the interpretation I have suggested for some key statements in Paul’s “rapture passage” (1 Thess 4:13–5:11): 

The dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with the Lord. (1 Thess 4:16–17)

I suggested (here) that Paul’s vivid images of the dead rising and the living being “caught up” mean the same thing as Jesus’ gathering passage in the Olivet Discourse: “He will send His angels, and gather together His elect from the four winds, from the farthest part of earth to the farthest part of heaven” (Mark 13:27). Both passages describe what would happen immediately after the coming of the Lord in that generation (cf. Mark 13:26, 30; 1 Thess 4:15). Both give assurance that God would gather his elect, whether living or dead, into the messianic-age kingdom. I then said (here) that Paul elsewhere never associates the resurrection with the coming of Christ and his kingdom in his near future. If he does in his “rapture passage,” it is an exception.

In this post, I will show that Jesus’ teaching about entering the messianic-age kingdom banquet supports my thesis. I will arrange my discussion around the participants in this gathering to show the timing, nature, and implications of it. Jesus mentioned three general categories of people who would enter the kingdom: (1) the dead saints, (2) the living saints, and (3) the “sons of the kingdom.” 

The Dead Saints

Robert H. Stein makes an important observation about Abraham,³ Isaac, and Jacob: “This threesome symbolizes Israel.”⁴ Jesus gave a hint that he had more than this trio in mind: he included “all the prophets” as the subjects of his remarks (Luke 13:28). William H. Van Doren says the Lord meant that all “Old Testament saints are fully blessed in the Kingdom.”⁵ Jesus specified the patriarchs and prophets to represent Old Testament Jews who had faith like theirs.

To state the obvious, these individuals were dead when Jesus spoke these words.

The Jews to whom Jesus spoke would “see” these (dead) Old Testament saints enjoying the messianic-age kingdom banquet. I have said elsewhere that such “seeing” statements often do not mean perception through natural (ocular) sight with physical eyes.⁶ For example, when Jesus told Caiaphas that he would “see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Power, and coming on the clouds of heaven” (Matt 26:64), he did not mean the high priest would do so with his natural eyes. To “see” in our present passages means the Jews would be “made aware of the presence of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and all the prophets in the kingdom of God.”⁷

When Jesus said these things to the Jews, the Old Testament saints were not in the kingdom of heaven. The reason is simple: God had not yet established it. The Jews could not “see” Abraham in the kingdom because he lived about fifteen centuries before God set it up in the days of the Roman kings (cf. Dan 2:44). This fact accounts for Jesus’ future orientation: “many will come … and sit down”; “the sons of the kingdom will be cast out.… There will be weeping”; etc. God would set the banquet table in his kingdom, then the saints would enter it.

Jesus, in his messianic banquet sayings, pictures the dead as entering the kingdom at some point in his future. This orientation matches Paul’s statement in his “rapture passage” (1 Thess 4:13–5:11): the dead would rise to meet the Lord in the air in his future (1 Thess 4:16–17). It also matches Jesus’ gathering statement in the Olivet Discourse: the Son of Man would send his angels to gather the elect in “the farthest part of heaven” (Mark 13:27) at his coming in his generation (Mark 13:26, 30).

The Living Saints

The Jews to whom Jesus preached would also “see” living saints come into the kingdom banquet. Gentiles and Jews—sons of Abraham by faith (cf. Gal 3:7)—would fulfill ancient prophecies: they would flow into the kingdom throughout its duration. Some of these living souls were alive in Jesus’ generation; most would live at a later time. In the Old Testament, God had made many promises that this would happen. For example, in Isaiah, he said, “Fear not: for I am with thee: I will bring thy seed from the east, and gather thee from the west” (Isa 43:5).⁸

Again, the Jews would see this in their future. The centurion, with his great faith, was an example of what would later happen on a much larger scale. 

That living saints would enter the messianic-age kingdom banquet matches Paul’s statement in his “rapture passage”: there the living would be caught up (1 Thess 4:16–17). Some of Paul’s readers would be “alive and remain” to see people “caught up” to meet the Lord and enjoy his fellowship forever. It also matches Jesus’ gathering statement in the Olivet Discourse: the angels would gather the living elect “from the farthest part of earth” (Mark 13:27) at his coming in his generation (Mark 13:26, 30).

The Sons of the Kingdom

Jesus spoke of another group in his sayings about the kingdom: “the sons of the kingdom” (Matt 8:12). I have said (e.g., here) that Israel after the flesh (1 Cor 10:18) was God’s “church kingdom” during the Mosaic Age. For reasons that will soon appear, “the sons of the kingdom” must mean the apostate Jews, both living and dead, who did not have “the faith of Abraham” (Rom 4:16). 

God was about to expel the non-elect (faithless) Jews from the Mosaic-age kingdom. And, like the foolish virgins of Jesus’ parable, they would not enter the messianic-age kingdom when the Son of Man returned.

Jesus said God would “thrust out (Gk. ekballō)” the Jews from the kingdom. This word means “to throw or cast out of a place,”⁹ or something similar. Someone (or something) must be in a place to be thrown out of it. The central idea of this word is a forced movement from inside to outside some entity, and this is apparent in each of the eighty-five times it appears in the New Testament. The gospel writers use it often to signify Jesus casting out demons from a person, for example. In the Old Testament, Israel’s Exodus from Egypt provides a helpful example:

The LORD said to Moses, “I will bring one more plague on Pharaoh and on Egypt. Afterward … he will surely drive you out (Gk. ekballō LXX) of here altogether.” (Exod 11:1)

Moses later says, “They were driven out (Gk. ekballō LXX) of Egypt” (Exod 12:39). Pharaoh could not have driven Israel out of Egypt if they had not been in that country. 

So, God could not cast out the “sons of the kingdom” from the kingdom and into outer darkness had they not been in his kingdom. All Jews, both faithful and apostate, both elect and non-elect, were in the God-ordained Mosaic-age kingdom. This is the kingdom out of which God would cast the apostate Jews.

With this information, we can bring Jesus’ future-oriented perspective into focus. The Jews to whom he was speaking would see the Old Testament faithful in the kingdom and the Gentiles coming to join them when God thrust out the sons of the Mosaic-age kingdom. 

The Scriptures show when that would happen. On Tuesday¹⁰ of Passion Week, Jesus had told the apostate Jews of a time when “tax collectors and harlots [would] enter the kingdom of God before [them]” (Matt 21:31). He told them, “The kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof” (Matt 21:43). Later that day, he said, 

“Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation. O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing! See! Your house is left to you desolate.” (Matt 23:36–38)

Still later that day, Jesus described the “great tribulation” and the signs that would precede the temple’s fall. That event would end the Mosaic-age kingdom (Matt 24:1–31). Then, the angels would gather all God’s elect—dead and living—into the messianic-age kingdom (Matt 24:31). All these things would happen in Jesus’ generation (Matt 24:34). God would “thrust out” the sons of the kingdom and issue the command to gather the elect when the temple fell.

Most commentators struggle to account for this timing. Their prophetic models force them to think Jesus is talking about the end of the messianic age. For example, Robert H. Stein says, the Jews would see the patriarchs sitting “‘in the kingdom of God’ … at the consummation of the kingdom of God.”¹¹ But Jesus said they would see this when God cast out the “sons of the kingdom” at the beginning of the messianic age, not at its end! That event happened at the consummation of the Mosaic-age kingdom in AD 70.

The faulty prophetic models create other closely related problems. If Jesus’ kingdom banquet sayings refer to the consummation of the kingdom, we must assume that God will “thrust out” some people from heaven! Stein seems to recognize this difficulty when he says, “This should be understood as exclusion, for they are not expelled after entry but are not allowed to enter the consummated kingdom.”¹² But, as I said above, one cannot “thrust out” someone from a place they never occupied. A wrong view of prophecy makes this commentator assert a meaning for this Greek word that it never has elsewhere. As Hendriksen says, for God to “thrust out” the Jews from the kingdom means that “not only was admission refused, but also they were forcefully expelled.”¹³

Conclusion

The interpretation I have offered for 1 Thessalonians 4:16–17 agrees with two other significant passages: Jesus’ gathering passage in the Olivet Discourse and his messianic-age kingdom banquet sayings. 

The dead saints “rise first” (1 Thess 4:16), are gathered from “the farthest part of heaven” (Mark 13:27), and enter the messianic-age kingdom banquet (Matt 8:11). 

The living saints are “caught up” to be with the Lord (1 Thess 4:17), are gathered “from the farthest part of earth” (Mark 13:27), and come into the kingdom of God to commune with the Old Testament saints (Luke 13:29).

The timing statements in each of the three passages also match. Paul said his “rapture passage” events would occur while some of his readers were still alive (1 Thess 4:17). Jesus said the gathering of the elect would occur in his generation (Mark 13:30). And the Lord said the messianic-age kingdom banquet would occur when God “thrust out” the apostate Jews from their Mosaic-age kingdom in his generation (cf. Matt 23:36).

In the 1 Thessalonians “rapture passage,” Paul was not speaking about the bodily resurrection that will occur at the end of the messianic age (cf. 1 Cor 15:23–25); he was talking about the saints—dead and living—entering the kingdom of God at the beginning of the messianic age. 

1. I am here abandoning my format for naming the posts in this series on Paul’s “rapture passage” (1 Thess 4:13–5:11). Before, I simply changed the part number at the end of the name; now I will use more descriptive titles. If I had continued the former scheme, the title of this week’s post would have been The Dead Will Rise First — Part 6.
2. I am using the chronology and titles in Archibald Thomas Robertson, A Harmony of the Gospels for Students of the Life of Christ (New York: Harper, 1922).
3. The image in this post is Abraham and the Three Angels by Rembrandt  (1606–1669). This file (here) is in the public domain (PD-US).
4. Robert H. Stein, Luke, vol. 24 of NAC (Nashville: Broadman & Holman, 1992), 379. Stein (n161) says, “The threesome is also found in Luke 20:37; Matt 8:11; Acts 3:13; 7:32; Deut 1:8; 6:10; 9:5, 27; 29:13; 1 Kgs 18:36; 2 Kgs 13:23.”
5. William H. Van Doren, The Gospel of Luke: Expository and Homiletical Commentary (1876–78; repr., Grand Rapids: Kregel, 1981), 547.
6. Michael A. Rogers, Inmillennialism: Redefining the Last Days (Tullahoma, TN: McGahan Publishing House, 2020), 156–62.
7. William Hendriksen, Exposition of the Gospel of Luke, New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1980), 707 (emphasis added).
8. I devote a section in my book to this subject: Rogers, Inmillennialism, 166–78.
9. Henry George Liddell et al., eds., A Greek-English Lexicon (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996), 236.
10. Robertson, A Harmony, 160.
11. Luke, 380 (emphasis added).
12. Luke, 380 (emphasis added).
13. Hendriksen, Luke, 707.