Christ is coming for His saints and will come with His saints. The succeeding verses then unfold how to this end, our Lord will first come for them: “For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout … and 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 Th. 4:16–17). The Lord coming for His saints, and then bringing them with Him, are two events that Scripture nowhere presents as following each other in quick succession without a moment’s break, as some teach.

I vividly remember rising one morning very early when on a ship between the Shetland and Orkney Islands. The faint light was sufficient to fade out of the sky the shining of every star but one. There shone the brilliant Morning Star in its solitary beauty. Far away on the horizon, the sun, hidden as yet, was beginning to shoot upwards beams of light before it emerged into sight, turning night into day. The star shone by night. The sun ruled the day. It was impossible for both of them to shine together at the same time.

And this is just the illustration the Scriptures use. Our Lord presents Himself as “the Bright and Morning Star,” the coming of the Lord at the Rapture. The Old Testament ends with the hope of God’s earthly people, the Jewish nation, looking for the Lord’s return to earth to reign. We read, “But to you who fear My name the Sun of Righteousness shall arise with healing in His wings” (Mal. 4:2). What a wonderful prospect for this poor blood-stained, tear-soaked earth to find peace, quiet, and security at last. The scepter will be in the right hands at last, even those of our blessed Lord.