Paul also pens two letters to the church in Thessalonica. There are plenty of commentaries that deal with the context of Thessalonica and, to be honest, I haven’t had the opportunity to study the context of Thessalonica as much as I would like. While I have heard different explanations for it, it would seem that the people of Thessalonica had a clear misunderstanding of the proper response to the “return” of Christ.
One thing that becomes abundantly clear (again, addressed in NT Wright’s work Surprised by Hope) is that the early believers had a definite understanding of Christ’s very close return. This may not be as far-fetched as it sounds to us from where we sit, but I’ll deal with that theology at some other point. At any rate, it is safe to say that early Christians in the Roman Empire believed they might see Christ’s return in their lifetime, or the lifetime of their children.
Apparently this had impacted the Thessalonian community in such a way that it led to their disengagement. If Christ was about to return and make the whole world right, why should we spend all of our time working? Paul addresses some of these misunderstandings by talking about the need for the believers in Thessalonica to work, for “the man who does not work, does not eat.” It is also to this world that Paul speaks of parousia.
Parousia is the Greek word we often translate as “second coming.” While this is actually a very accurate translation, the term is loaded with historical context we usually miss. These details can be found by studying NT Wright, Ethelbert Stauffer, the early church commentaries by Roland Worth, and others.
Parousia referred to the second coming of an emperor. In a Roman world that had experienced the havoc of multiple earthquakes (as we mentioned before), the emperor would make a visit to the city (you could think of how a modern-day leader might visit a disaster zone). After surveying the extent of the damage, the emperor would leave behind a large sum of money that the people of the city were to use to rebuild. Everyone knew the emperor would return one day and you would have to give an account for what you did with his deposit.
This return was called a parousia, and we know Thessalonica experienced at least two of them in the first century. According to historical record, there appear to be common themes experienced in any given Roman parousia.
The emperor would arrive to the sound of a loud trumpet. As soon as the lookout saw the emperor’s entourage (more like a small army) arriving in the distance, the call would go out. The city would not want to be caught with Caesar banging on their front door.
When the emperor arrived at the city, he would pay the obligatory respects to the dead. In the ruins of ancient Greco-Roman cities, I have always seen the graveyard just outside the main entrance to the city. It was their way of honoring the dead and those who had gone before them.
After the emperor had paid his respects, the people of the city would go out to meet him. This meeting was referred to in the Greek as eis apantesien. The goal is to go out from the city, meet the emperor with joy, and take him by the hand to show him the city and the great work that had been done — in his honor, of course.
Consider the context of the church in Thessalonica and the following words from 1 Thessalonians 4:
For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. 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. Therefore encourage one another with these words.
Paul describes the second coming of Jesus like the parousia of the emperor. To a church that is having a hard time understanding the need to engage in the work of the Kingdom (or physical labor, for that matter), Paul describes the second coming as aparousia, communicating to the people of Thessalonica that they have work to do, because God left them with a deposit and expected them to use it to restore and reconcile, heal and rebuild. In Paul’s picture, there is a trumpet sound, the dead in Christ rise first, and we are caught up to “eis apantesis” Jesus in the air.
The irony runs thick here, for the theology that loves to quote this verse as backing for the idea of the “rapture” is the same theology that commits the sin of the Thessalonians. Far too much Christian theology espouses an idea that we are all going to leave this place someday. If this is true, then our goal is to have as many people “on our team” as possible before “some glad morning, when this life is over…”
But this is the exact idea Paul is teaching against. Paul is not arguing for a disengaged theology; he is arguing for a theology of complete and urgent engagement. Jesus is going to come back. He left us with the deposit of the Holy Spirit, and we’re going to have to show him what we did with the place.
You see, we are caught up to meet Jesus in the air as he is “coming down from heaven” for his parousia.
To quote one of my favorite teachers, “I get worried that too many Christians are going to be on their way up and out of here as Jesus is coming down, and they’re going to pass in the air!”
This is not a theology of disembodied evacuation; it’s a theology of physical participation.
May God remind us that we have work to do here — today. May He remind us that Jesus taught us to pray, “Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” May we look forward to the day when the trumpet might sound and we might go out (or up) to meet Jesus on his way down, in order to joyfully take him by the hand and show him around at the things we were able to accomplish with His help.
And when He shows up, I pray we might have something to show Him.
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