was so instructed as to know that the day of the Lord was to come like a

thief in the night, and that, knowing this, it would not be 'overtaken like a

thief'.  The church is contrasted with the 'overtaken' world just as children

of light are contrasted with darkness.  They are urged to vigilance and to

put on the armour in view of the hope of salvation.  This exhortation arises

naturally out of the earlier verses as written, but it has no meaning if this

church expected to be taken away before that day had come.

There is an intimate connection which may be easily seen between the

close of 1 Thessalonians 4 and the opening of 1 Thessalonians 5.  1

Thessalonians 4:13 opens with the words 'I would not have you ignorant', and

in verse 2 of chapter 5 the apostle continues, 'You yourselves know

perfectly'.  Both sections deal with 'sleep' and both end with the thought of

'comfort'.  In 1 Thessalonians 4:14 we read:

'For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also

which sleep in Jesus will God bring with Him'.

If we interpret this to mean that when the Lord Jesus returns He will

bring the saints who have fallen asleep with Him from heaven, what can be the

meaning of the next verses, which distinctly teach that the living shall take

no precedence over the saints who have died, but that together they shall

meet the Lord in the air, and thus only, be for ever 'with the Lord'?  The

passage refers to the resurrection: 'We believe that God will bring - ago -

(from the dead) with Him' (Who was also brought from the dead -- anago --

Hebrews 13:20).  The apostle was ministering the comfort of the Scriptures to

those who were sorrowing for the dead in Christ, and his comfort is

resurrection at the Lord's Coming.  The actual return of the Lord is

described in 1 Thessalonians 4:16:

'The Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the

voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God'.

We see no reason to teach that the 'Lord Himself' is the 'archangel'

here.  We have already seen, in considering the teaching of Jude, that

'Michael the archangel' is closely linked with the Lord's Coming.  Moreover

Daniel 12:1,2 is a passage which must not be lightly set aside:

'And at that time shall Michael stand up, the great prince which

standeth for the children of thy people: and there shall be a time of

trouble, such as never was since there was a nation even to that same

time: and at that time thy people shall be delivered, every one that

shall be found written in the book.  And many of them that sleep in the

dust of the earth shall awake'.

Now if the archangel of 1 Thessalonians be the Michael of Daniel 12, we

have a strong link established between the hope of Israel and the hope of the

church during the Acts.  Further links come to light in 2 Thessalonians, but

our space is limited, and we may be able to look back to this epistle when

dealing with the second letter to the same church.

If it should be asked how it has come about that so many errors have

been introduced into the teaching of these epistles, we can only put it down

to the fact that as a result of confusing the two dispensations divided by

Acts 28, truth gathered from Paul's later ministry has been brought back into

this earlier period.