Blog In Audio:
Greetings,
Today I am in Deming, New Mexico. I have had a wonderful weekend with my church family here. Thank you to all who came this weekend to CitiLife church. God’s presence and favor is upon you, and His influence of life and love is going to impact your community more and more. I am looking forward to meeting with leaders tonight.
The world around us is shaking, but the kingdom of God within us cannot shake. We must not be distracted by the kingdoms of the world. What should our focus be in a shaking world? The apostle Paul’s letter to the Thessalonian church gave hope to the early church in a time of testing and it gives hope for us in our shaking world.
The letter written by Paul to the believers in Thessalonica was one of the first letters written to the believers of the first century church. It was written to the church, the habitation of Christ, as they had now existed for a little over twenty years and they were facing increased opposition by the anti-Christ spirit of that day. Like all words from God, there are increasing layers of truth and life in what God decrees. One view of the fourth chapter of 1 Thessalonians has been that it is a letter regarding a one day coming of the Lord in the future and a rapture of Christian believers into the presence of the Lord. This view did not become the focus of this letter until the nineteenth century. Since God’s words increase from glory to glory, there is clearly a culmination of this truth for us all in some way. There are various interpretations as to what that looks like, but there is for sure a guarantee of a full glory of being one with God in Christ for eternity.
Paul wrote this letter to a firstfruit church concerning things that were literally occurring in their day. His purpose in writing this letter was to comfort the first century believers who were facing persecution and the tribulation for being a church that was birthing the New Covenant reality of the growing Body of Christ for the generations to come. Christ was being opposed by anti-Christ, but Christ would overcome, and in the future, there would be more realities of the constant and increasing coming of the Lord to cause the kingdoms of the world to become kingdoms of Jesus as Lord and Christ. The words of Paul were not merely a promise for something thousands of years in the future. They were words of promise for the moment at hand. Some had already died in the faith and Paul was charging the church to know the truth of the present and future promises of glory.
1 Thessalonians 4:13 But I do not want you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning those who have fallen asleep, lest you sorrow as others who have no hope. 14 For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with Him those who sleep in Jesus. 15 For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord will by no means precede those who are asleep. 16 For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. 17 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. 18 Therefore comfort one another with these words.
In these Scripture verses, Paul was encouraging the church in regard to the coming of the Lord. The word for until is a Greek word that can also be translated as to or into. It is not a word necessarily indicating a moment of time but can also be a process of time. The word for ‘coming’ in this Scripture is the “GSRN 3952. παρουσία parousia; from the present participle of GSRN 3918; a being near, i.e. advent (often, return; specially, of Christ to punish Jerusalem, or finally the wicked); (by implication) physically, aspect.” It is a present tense word and not a futurist tense word. It is a happening and a continued happening. The promised place of destiny for the dead in Christ and for the living was, and is, a transition to a dimension of increased life. It is a place of being caught up in the breath.
This is not a place of going up into the sky, but a place of entering into the further dimension of life in Christ. This was the testimony of the first martyred saint, Stephen. As the crowd hurled stones at his physical body he gazed to heaven and saw Jesus standing at the right hand of God. Stephen was the firstfruit of those who sleep in the Lord. His sleep was a transition into the greater glory of God’s presence. As the apostle Paul wrote, to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord (2 Cor. 5:8). This was the testimony of Stephen as he was caught up into the breath of eternity.
Acts 7:54 When they heard these things they were cut to the heart, and they gnashed at him with their teeth. 55 But he, being full of the Holy Spirit, gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God, 56 and said, “Look! I see the heavens opened and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God!”
Upon Stephen’s death he was caught up into a dimension of eternity with Jesus. The Lord met him in the breath, in the dimension of Christ in heaven. The dead in Christ rise first and those in Christ who continue into the constant and increasing realities of the coming of the Lord will be participants with them in the breath. The breath is the connection of the Spirit. It is not a natural air, but the breath of the Spirit that keeps us and unites us in life, in this world, and in the world to come. The living believers in Christ and the cloud of witness in Christ are partners in a constantly increasing coming of the Lord. Those who sleep in Christ transition into the greater glory of God’s house. Those who remain in this world in Christ grow in the glory of the increasing presence of Christ in His body through a growing revelation of God’s glory in the earth.
Blessings,
Ted J. Hanson
Donations can be made at the link on the home site of:
Checks can be made payable to House of Bread Ministry and sent to:
House of Bread Ministry, 3210 Meridian St., Bellingham, WA 98225
To avoid us paying a transaction fee from your donation, you can also set up a payment or an automatic payment from your bank to House of Bread Ministry. Just set it up as a ‘bill pay’ through your online bank account and your bank will mail a check to House of Bread Ministry. We will record your payment as a donation to House of Bread Ministry (E.I.N. 91-2009037) and we will send you a contribution receipt at the close of the year.
Our Ministry Information Is:
House of Bread Ministry
3210 Meridian St.
Bellingham, WA 98225-1728
Available on Amazon
