1 It remaineth then, brethren, that we beseech and exhort you by the Lord Jesus, as ye have received of us how ye ought to walk and to please God, that ye abound therein 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 abstain from fornication;
4 That every one of you know how to possess his vessel in sanctification and honour;
5 Not in passionate desire, as the Gentiles who know not God.
6 That none circumvent or defraud his brother in this matter, because the Lord is an avenger of all these things, as we have also told you before and testified.
7 For God hath not called us to uncleanness, but to holiness.
8 He therefore that despiseth, despiseth not man but God; who hath also given you his Holy Spirit.
9 Touching brotherly love, we need not write to you: for ye yourselves are taught of God to love one another.
10 And indeed ye do it toward all the brethren that are in all Macedonia; but we exhort 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 hands, as we commanded you;
12 That ye may walk decently toward them that are without, and may want nothing.
13 Now we would not have you ignorant, brethren, concerning them that are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others who have no hope.
14 For if we believe, that Jesus died and rose again, so will God bring with him those also that sleep in Christ.
15 For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left to the coming of the Lord, shall not prevent them that are asleep.
16 For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven, with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first.
17 Then we who are alive, who are left, shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air; and so shall we be ever with the Lord.
18 Wherefore comfort one another with these words.