"What A Day Of Rejoicing That Will Be"

and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first.”

The dead believers...our mothers, fathers, husbands, wives, children, grandmothers, grandfathers who have

passed on ahead of us will be the first to be caught up to meet the Lord.

Now notice that it is only the departed believers who will arise--no unbeliever will be resurrected...not at

this point.

And it will be the bodies of the dead believers that are resurrected!

The believers themselves, that is, their spirits, are already with the Lord...

...and when Christ returns

...their bodies will be raised and transformed to live forever with God...

...the change will be--as the Scripture declares: the infusion of a totally new nature!

As the Bible tells us in 1 Corinthians: “Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the

perishable inherit the imperishable....for the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with

immortality.”

Our present bodies are corruptible and mortal, but the nature of our new bodies will be incorruptible and

immortal!

Just think, no more arthritis, no more aches and pains, no more disease, no more cosmetic surgery!!!

“But somone may ask, ‘How are the dead raised? With what kind of body will they come?...

....All flesh is not the same: Men have one kind of flesh, animals have another, birds another and fish another.

There are also heavenly bodies and there are earthly bodies; but the splendor of the heavenly bodies is one

kind, and the splendor of the earthly bodies is another....

....So it will be with the resurrection of the dead. The body that is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown

in weakness, it is raised in power; it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body.”

The new bodies we will recieve as believers will be perfected so that we can live with God forever in the

new heavens and the new earth.

“And after that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to

meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever.”

This is where the great union of the living and the dead will take place!

We shall be reunited with all our loved ones, and even more wonderful than that--we will be reunited with

all believers of every generation!

We will all be together...

...rejoicing in the presence of Him who has saved us and transformed us into perfect and eternal beings...

...What a day of reunion and rejoicing that will be!!!

“Therefore encourage each other with these words.”

God does not reveal the events of the end time simply to satisfy our curiousity...

...He tells us about these glorious events so that we can prepare and comfort one another.

There is no need for complete discouragement on this earth...

...no need for extreme and paralyzing sorrow and grief...

...no need for hopelessness...

...and there is no need for ignorance concerning these things!

Because the Lord Himself has given us the most glorious of all hope!

As John was given a glimpse of heaven....

...he wrote in Revelation: