1. The Rapture and the Resurrection (1 Thessalonians 4:16-18)

2. Jesus Christ will return!  John 14:1-3 - Jesus said, I am going to prepare a place for you… I will come back and take you to be with me (heaven).  Acts 1:9-11- The angels said, This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.  1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 – Paul describes Christ’s return.

3. The Rapture and the Resurrection (1 Thessalonians 4:16-18)

4. Jesus arose, so we will too!  1 Corinthians 15:20-23 – But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep…. 22 For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. 23 But each in turn: Christ, the firstfruits; then, when he comes, those who belong to him.

5. The Rapture and the Resurrection (1 Thessalonians 4:16-18)

6. The Resurrection/Rapture Church Age Today 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 1.Christ returns accompanied by the living souls of all believers who have died. 2.The bodies of believers who have died are resurrected and joined with their souls. 3.Believers still living on earth are raptured. 4.And thus all believers in Christ are joined together with Christ.

7. The Rapture and the Resurrection (1 Thessalonians 4:16-18)

8. The rapture delivers Christians from God's judgments on earth  1 Thessalonians 1:10, … and wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead – Jesus, who rescues us from the coming wrath.  Revelation 3:10 …I will keep you from the hour of trial that will come upon the whole world.

9. The Rapture and the Resurrection (1 Thessalonians 4:16-18)

10. We are given new bodies!  1 Corinthians 15:50-53 (ESV) – I tell you this, brothers: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable.  51 Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed,  52 in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed.  53 For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality.

11. The Rapture and the Resurrection (1 Thessalonians 4:16-18)

12.  Romans 8:23 – We ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body.  Philippians 3:20-21 – But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, 21 who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body.  1 John 3:2 - Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. We are given new bodies!

13. The Rapture and the Resurrection (1 Thessalonians 4:16-18)