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In the neighborhood of Thessalonica - Salonica it is now called - there may be seen at the present day ancient tombs on which are to be read inscriptions expressing hopeless regret for the dead. The Church addressed by St. Paul was a little community which had learnt to enjoy a strange, new view of the state and prospects of the departed, planted in the midst of a great pagan populace that held the melancholy sentiments of these epitaphs. Contrasting the Christians with "the rest" of the people, the apostle reminds them that they should not give way to the despairing sorrow that was natural to men who had no hope.

I. OUTSIDE CHRISTIANITY SORROW FOR THE DEAD IS HOPELESS.

1. History and experience establish this fact. Pagan tombs everywhere express themselves with various degrees of despair, but never with cheerful hope. Nations like the Egyptians that had a firm faith in a future life can scarcely be said to have enjoyed any hopes respecting that life. A general dream of immortality pervades our race; but it is everywhere dim and cheerless. Many men at all times have broken away from it altogether, and have said with Catullus, "When once our brief day has set we must sleep one everlasting night."

2. Reasoning cannot conquer the common hopelessness of sorrow for the dead. The arguments outside Christianity may be divided into two classes:

(1) Naturalistic; e.g. from the nature of consciousness, from the indestructibility of all known existences, from the general instinct of immortality, from analogies of sleep, transformations of insects, succession of winter, spring, etc. Less and less weight is being ascribed to all such reasoning. It will not bear the strain of anxious doubt. The mourner turns his eyes in vain to nature for comfort.

(2) Theistic.

(a) In the wisdom of God. Man's life being but imperfectly developed here, the Divine idea of humanity would be vain and futile without a larger world for realizing it.

(b) In the justice of God - the necessity of a future judgment.

(c) In the goodness of God. A father would not mock his child by creating him so that he has a great hunger for a future which is unattainable. Nevertheless even these arguments do not satisfy, for who can venture to speak with assurance of the high counsels of the Almighty? and, moreover, they presuppose a knowledge of the character of God which only Christianity clearly furnishes.

II. CHRISTIANITY DRAWS THE STING OF HOPELESSNESS FROM SORROW FOR THE DEAD.

1. It does not destroy that sorrow. To do so would be impossible. We must grieve at parting from those who are dear to us. Indeed it would be unhealthy for us entirely to conquer natural sorrow. We should have to conquer natural love first. A softening, subduing, purifying mission comes with this grief, and is one of the best means of helping us to receive Christian truth.

2. But Christianity removes the sting from this sorrow by depriving it of hopelessness. The hope which St. Paul refers to is plainly the hope of receiving back those who have been taken from us by death. They are gone, but not gone forever. Every weary year as it passes bring us nearer to the happy reunion. The words of St. Paul plainly show that he believed in the mutual recognition of friends in the future life.

III. THE DEATH AND RESURRECTION OF CHRIST ARE THE SECRET OF THIS CHRISTIAN TRANSFIGURATION OF SORROW FOR THE DEAD.

1. The strongest argument to convince men generally of a future life is to be found in the resurrection of Christ taken in connection with his life and teaching. He spoke of judgment and of eternal life. He confirmed his words by rising from the dead. The confirmation is twofold.

(1) The resurrection is a Divine authentication of the claims and mission of Christ.

(2) It is an instance, a crucial test, a proof that a future life is possible.

2. For Christians the death and resurrection of Christ are grounds for enjoying the hope of a reunion of all the dead who die in the Lord.

(1) The triumph of Christ is here shown. Now, the object of his death and resurrection was to redeem the world. But this redemption would be vain if there were no resurrection. "If in this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all men most pitiable." The resurrection of Christ proves that the object of his death was obtained, it must therefore be followed by the resurrection of his people in order that the redemption thus accomplished may be fully realized in them.

(2) The union of Christians with Christ secures their resurrection. His experience becomes the experience of his people, because he lives in them and they live in him (1 Corinthians 15:22). - W.F.A.

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KJV: But I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope.

WEB: But we don't want you to be ignorant, brothers, concerning those who have fallen asleep, so that you don't grieve like the rest, who have no hope.