THESSALONIANS CHAPTER IV.

[1 He exhorteth to go on in godliness, 7 to holiness, 9 to love, 11 to quietness. 
15 The saints' resurrection, and Christ's second coming]



FURTHERMORE then we beseech you, brethren,
and exhort you by the Lord Jesus, that 
 as ye have received us how ye ought to walk and 
to please God, so ye would abound more and more. 
2 For ye know what commandments we gave you 
by the Lord Jesus. 
3 For this is the will of God, even your sanctification, 
that ye should abstain from fornication:
4 That every one of you should know how to 
possess his vessel in sanctification and honour;
5 Not in the lust of concupiscence, even as the 
Gentiles which know not God:
6 That no man go beyond and defraud his brother
in any matter: because that the Lord is the avenger of 
all such, as we also have forewarned you and testified. 
7 For God hath not called us unto uncleanness, 
but unto holiness.
8 He therefore that despiseth, despiseth not man, 
but God who hath also given unto us his Holy Spirit. 
9 But as touching brotherly love ye need not
that I write unto you: for ye yourselves are taught 
of God to love one another. 
10 And indeed ye do it toward all the brethren
which are in all Macedonia: but we beseech you, 
brethren, that ye increase more and more;
11 And that ye study to be quiet, and to do 
your own business, and to work with your own
hands, as we commanded you;
12 That ye may walk honestly toward them that 
are without, and that ye may have lack of nothing. 
13 But I would not have you be ignorant, 
brethren, concerning them which are asleep, that ye 
sorrow not, even as others which have no hope. 
14 For if we believe that Jesus died and rose 
again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will 
God bring with him. 
15 For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord,
that we which are alive and remain unto the coming
of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep. 
16 For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven 
with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with 
the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first:
17 Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught 
up together with them in the clouds, to meet the 
Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord. 
18 Wherefore, comfort one another with these words.