Your Dead Shall Live

In this series of posts, I am proposing a better way to understand Paul’s comforting words to the Thessalonians:

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)

N. T. Wright makes some comments about this passage that run counter to the popular view (at least in America):

In Paul the ‘Day of the Lord’ is clearly something which might well happen during the continuing lifetimes of himself and his readers. It is something you might hear about by letter.… I have no hesitation in saying that, had Paul been alive in the year we call AD 70, when the convulsions in Rome during the Year of the Four Emperors were quickly followed by the destruction of Jerusalem, he would have said, ‘That’s it. That’s the Day of the Lord.’¹

Paul’s mixed metaphors of trumpets blowing and the living being snatched into heaven to meet the Lord are not to be understood as literal truth … but as a vivid and biblically allusive description of the great transformation of the present world of which he speaks elsewhere.²

A “great transformation” was underway when Paul wrote this passage: the transition from the Mosaic age to the messianic (kingdom) age. I want to show how Wright’s perspective can help us better interpret Paul’s words. 

I have said that Paul’s vivid images—the dead rising and the living being “caught up”—mean the same thing as Jesus’ “gathering” language in the Olivet Discourse (cf. 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, both living or dead, in heaven or on earth, into the messianic-age kingdom. I noted that Paul elsewhere never associated the bodily resurrection with the coming of Christ in his near future. If he did so in the “rapture passage” (1 Thess 4:13–5:11), it is an exception. In my last post, I showed that Jesus’ sayings about entering the messianic-age kingdom banquet support my thesis: all the dead elect—including Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and the prophets—would enter the kingdom with the (living) Gentiles when God thrust apostate Israel out of it.

Now, I want to add another fact that supports this line of thought: the prophets had used resurrection language to describe the transition from the Mosaic age to the messianic age. In several instances, they said this resurrection would occur in connection with Israel’s messianic birth pains.

When Paul wrote 1 Thessalonians, the time of Israel’s birth pains was at hand (cf. 1 Thess 2:16). Jesus had foretold this in his Olivet Discourse (Matt 24:8, 21, 34), the “word of the Lord” to which Paul appealed (1 Thess 4:15).³ This time of “great tribulation” would end the Mosaic age (Matt 24:1–3, 21). The messianic age, which began with the ministry of John the Baptist, would continue with Christ reigning in heaven (cp. Acts 2:30–31).

In this post, I will discuss the first of four Old Testament passages that show the prophets used resurrection language in connection with the Mosaic-to-messianic age transition. In future posts, I plan to discuss the other three and incorporate them into the inmillennial prophetic model.⁴ This nuanced model will then help us better understand 1 Thessalonians 4:16–17.

Isaiah’s Resurrection Prophecy

Isaiah spoke of a future (to him) day when God’s people would enter a strong city with walls of salvation. They would cry, “Open the gates, that the righteous nation which keeps the truth may enter in” (Isa 26:2). The prophet said this entrance would coincide with the destruction of another city: God would “bring down … the lofty city” to the ground (Isa 26:5). 

Isaiah then made a somber observation—Israel’s previous labor pains had been fruitless:

As a woman with child is in pain and cries out in her pangs, when she draws near the time of her delivery, so have we been in Your sight, O LORD. We have been with child, we have been in pain; we have, as it were, brought forth wind; we have not accomplished any deliverance in the earth, nor have the inhabitants of the world fallen. (Isa 26:17–18)

Perhaps his first readers asked a natural question: What person or event will change this futility and allow the nation to enter the city? A Divine Person answered—the holy nation would enter the strong city through a resurrection: 

Your dead shall live; together with my dead body they shall arise. Awake and sing, you who dwell in dust; for your dew is like the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead. (Isa 26:19)

But the Divine Person said a time of great danger would follow this resurrection. The holy nation must take refuge from God’s coming judgment:

Come, my people … hide yourself, as it were, for a little moment, until the indignation is past. For behold, the LORD comes out of His place to punish the inhabitants of the [land] for their iniquity; the [land] will also disclose her blood, and will no more cover her slain. (Isa 26:20–21)

I have inserted land for earth because the Hebrew word can mean either. In this context, “the decisions and actions of God in this period have focused on ‘the land’ and its inhabitants as well as on Israel and Jerusalem.”⁵

 God said that, after this judgment, “Israel shall blossom and bud, and fill the face of the world with fruit” (Isa 27:6). 

The New Testament Interpretation

The New Testament shows the fulfillment of this prophecy. In the “last days” (Heb 1:2) of the Mosaic age, God created “a holy nation” comprising all people who had faith like Abraham. These were destined to be the “people of God” in the messianic age (cp. Gal 3:7; 1 Pet 2:9).

The writer of Hebrews said this “holy nation” had come “to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem … the general assembly and church of the firstborn” (Heb 12:22). In the apostles’ generation, these saints were saying, in effect, “Open the gates, that the righteous nation which keeps the truth may enter in” (Isa 26:2). 

The same writer shows this entrance would occur when God shook the Mosaic-age kingdom out of existence, allowing the messianic-age kingdom to remain:

He has promised, saying, “Yet once more I shake not only the earth, but also heaven.” Now this, “Yet once more,” indicates the removal of those things that are being shaken, as of things that are made, that the things which cannot be shaken may remain. Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us have grace, by which we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear. (Heb 12:26–29)

This would happen, he says, when Christ came in “a very, very little while.”⁶ 

Jesus was clear about the destruction of Isaiah’s “lofty city”; this referred to the destruction of earthly Jerusalem in his generation. Jesus said, “When you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation is near” (Luke 21:20). That lofty city must fall before the “righteous nation” in Isaiah’s prophecy could enter the “strong city.” 

The New Testament says much about the resurrection in Isaiah’s prophecy; it refers to Christ rising from his grave. All of God’s elect rose from the dead with him. Paul said, “even when we were dead in trespasses, [God] made us alive together with Christ” (Eph 2:5; cp. Col 2:13; 3:1).

The joy of this resurrection fills the pages of the New Testament. Christ’s apostles told the people of God to “awake and sing” after they had risen with Christ, just as Isaiah had said they would. Speaking to Christians, Paul said, “Awake, you who sleep, arise from the dead, and Christ will give you light” (Eph 5:14). He told those who had before been “dead in trespasses and sins” to give God glory “in the church by Christ Jesus” (Eph 2:1; 3:16). As Isaiah had foretold, the righteous nation had risen with Christ’s body; the earth had cast out the dead!

The need for God’s people to hide “for a little moment” from God’s judgment of the land is also clear in the New Testament. Jesus said he would judge Israel for all the righteous blood she had shed (cp. Matt 23:35–38). He told Christians what they must do to survive this trial: 

When you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation is near. Then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains, let those who are in the midst of her depart, and let not those who are in the country enter her. For these are the days of vengeance, that all things which are written may be fulfilled. (Luke 21:20–22)

After these things, the Son of Man would “send His angels … and they will gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other” (Matt 24:31). The elect would “fill the face of the world with fruit” (cp. 1 Thess 1:8; John 15:8, 16).

Conclusion

Isaiah prophesied about events in Jesus’ generation, but he did not list them in strict chronological order. He spoke of entering the strong city (Isa 26:1), then the destruction of the lofty city (Isa 26:5), then the Divine Person’s resurrection (Isa 26:19), then God’s judgment of the land (Isa 26:20–21), then God’s people filling the world with fruit (Isa 27:6). 

The New Testament gives the actual order of the historical events: Christ’s resurrection, then God’s judgment of Israel (including his destruction of Jerusalem and the temple), then the elect being gathered into the kingdom to fill the world with fruit.

What can we say about Isaiah’s order? I will make two observations and a suggestion that will affect our understanding of 1 Thessalonians 4:16–17. The first observation is that we can group Isaiah’s movements into cause-and-effect categories. The desired effects were (1) entrance into the city and (2) filling the world with fruit. The causes were (1) the fall of the lofty city, (2) the resurrection of a Divine Person, and (3) God’s judgment of the land. 

My second observation is that we can think of the items in Isaiah’s list as a chiasm:

A. Effect: to enter the “strong city” (Isa 26:1)

B. Cause: the fall of the “lofty city” (Isa 26:5)

C. Cause: the resurrection of a Divine Person (Isa 26:19)

B’. Cause: God’s judgment of the land (Isa 26:20–21)

A’. Effect: to fill the world with fruit (Isa 27:6)

I am not saying Isaiah was conscious of this structure. I am offering it as a way to visualize the high points of his prophecy.

My suggestion is this: the causes form an inseparable triplet—all of them were necessary to achieve the desired effects. The goals were for the “holy nation” (1 Pet 2:9) to enter “the Jerusalem above” (Gal 4:26) and for them to “make disciples of all the nations,” filling the world with the fruit of the Spirit (Matt 28:19; Gal 5:22–23). These objectives depended on Jerusalem’s destruction, Christ’s resurrection (which was at the heart of this prophecy), and God’s judgment of the land in Israel’s “great tribulation.” All three causes were necessary to produce the effects.

When Paul wrote 1Thessalonians, the Divine Person—Christ Jesus—had already risen from the dead. God’s judgment on Jerusalem and the land of Israel was imminent. This historical situation, in light of Isaiah’s prophecy, made Paul’s resurrection imagery appropriate: the dead were about to rise and the living were about to be caught up with them into Isaiah’s “strong city.” They would then fill the earth with fruit during the parousia of Christ in the messianic age. Paul knew that all of Isaiah’s causes were necessary for the people of God to enter the glories of the messianic age.

The Apostle did not think literal bodies would fly through the air before some Thessalonians died; he knew the bodily resurrection would occur at the end of the messianic age, not its beginning. He also knew that God would complete Isaiah’s triplet of causes before some Thessalonians died. The Son of Man would come in his kingdom before some of them tasted of death (Matt 16:28). Jesus had guaranteed it (Matt 24:21, 34).

1. N. T. Wright, Paul: In Fresh Perspective (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2005), 141–42.
2. “Farewell to the Rapture,” N. T. Wright, https://ntwrightpage.com/2016/07/12/farewell-to-the-rapture/.
3. See What “Word of the Lord”?
4. For documentation of this model see Michael A. Rogers, Inmillennialism: Redefining the Last Days (Tullahoma, TN: McGahan Publishing House, 2020), 244–62. It is available here in hardcopy and here as a PDF. A free summary PDF document of inmillennialism is here.
5. John D. W. Watts, Isaiah 1–33, vol. 24, rev. ed., Word Biblical Commentary (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2005), 406.
6. Commentary on Hebrews 10:37 in William Gouge, Commentary on Hebrews (1866; repr., Grand Rapids: Kregel, 1980), 366.