entombed within them, and they shall all live again upon the earth h. The text indeed speaks of the righteous only, who had fallen asleep in Christ: but in other passages we are informed that the ungodly also will hear the voice of the Son of God, and, in obedience to it, come forth from their graves1. Irresistible will be the summons, when " the voice of the archangel, and the trump of God," shall sound. When Jesus came in his state of humiliation, thousands withstood his voice : but none will, " when he shall come in his own glory, and the glory of his Father, with his holy angels." The great and mighty, as well as the mean and insignificant, shall come forth alike, each re-united to his kindred body, and each appearing in his own proper character.]
Next, those who remain alive upon the earth will
be changed —
[Certainly those who are on the earth will not be changed first ; and it appears, that they will remain unchanged, whilst all who have ever died are restored to life. What a sur- prising sight will it be, to behold such countless multitudes of the children of Adam bursting forth from their graves, and standing up, an innumerable host, in their incorruptible and
glorified bodies ! But, this once effected, the people
who are then living upon earth will be changed in an instant, their mortal and coi'ruptible bodies becoming at once, and without any dissolution preparatory to it, incorruptible and immortal. This is the order which St. Paul has specified also in another epistle : first the trumpet, then the rising of the dead, and then the change of the living k. Well may the Apostle call it a " mystery1." But as all will then be in that form which they will bear to all eternity, what an amazing difference will then appear in those who once perfectly re- sembled each other ! the godly how beautiful ! the ungodly, how deformed ! both having either heaven or hell depicted in their very countenances ! Amazing sight ! how infinitely sur- passing all human conception !]
Then will they all together be " caught up to meet the Lord in the air" —
[Yes, into the presence of their Judge must they go : and as the earth would not be a theatre sufficient for the occasion, they must meet the Lord in the air. Blessed, blessed sum- mons to the godly ! With what joy will they go forth to meet Him, whom unseen they loved, and out of whose fulness they received all the grace that ever they possessed, " their spirits
h Rev. xx. 13. i John v. 28, 29. Dan. xii. 2.
k 1 Cor. xv. 51—53. ' 1 Cor. xv. 51.