1 Thessalonians 4 Finally, brothers, we beg and beseech you in the Lord Jesus to follow our instructions about the way you are to live so as to satisfy God; you are leading that life, but you are to excel in it still further.

Moffatt⁽ⁱ⁾ ¹ Finally, brothers, we beg and beseech you in the Lord Jesus to follow our instructions about the way you are to live so as to satisfy God; you are leading that life, but you are to excel in it still further. ² You remember the instructions we gave you on the authority of the Lord Jesus. ³ It is God's will that you should be consecrated, that you abstain from sexual vice, ⁴ that each of you should learn to take a wife for himself chastely and honourably, ⁵ not to gratify sensual passion like the Gentiles in their ignorance of God — ⁶ no one is to defraud or overreach his brother in this matter, for the Lord avenges all these sins, as we told you already in our solemn protest against them. ⁷ God did not call us to be impure but to be consecrated; ⁸ hence, he who disregards this, disregards not man but the God who gave you his holy Spirit. ⁹ You need no one to write you upon brotherly love, for you are yourselves taught by God to love one another, ¹⁰ as indeed is your practice towards all the brothers throughout all Macedonia. We beseech you, brothers, to excel in this more and more; ¹¹ also, endeavour to live quietly, attend to your own business, and — as we charged you — work with your hands, ¹² so that your life may be correct in the eyes of the outside world and self-supporting. ¹³ We would like you, brothers, to understand about those who are asleep in death. You must not grieve for them, like the rest of men who have no hope. ¹⁴ Since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, then it follows that by means of Jesus God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep. ¹⁵ For we tell you, as the Lord has told us, that we the living, who survive till the Lord comes, are by no means to take precedence of those who have fallen asleep. ¹⁶ The Lord himself will descend from heaven with a loud summons, when the archangel calls and the trumpet of God sounds; the dead in Christ will rise first; ¹⁷ then we the living, who survive, will be caught up along with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we shall be with the Lord for ever. ¹⁸ Now then, encourage one another with these words.