For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him.
For if (not doubt: the indicative follows) - confirmation of 1 Thessalonians 4:13, that the removal of ignorance as to sleeping believers would remove undue grief respecting them (cf. 1 Thessalonians 4:13. "hope"). Our hope rests on our faith ("if we believe"). 'As surely as we believe that Christ died and rose again (the very doctrine taught at Thessalonica, Acts 17:3), so also will God bring (not only raise, but bring) those laid to sleep through Jesus with Him' (Jesus. The order and balance of the members of the Greek sentence require this translation). Believers are laid in sleep by Jesus (through Him death to them is sleep), and so will be brought back from sleep with Jesus in His train when He comes. The reference is not to disembodied souls, but to the sleeping bodies. The facts of Christ's experience are repeated in the believer's. He died and then rose; so believers shall die, then rise with Him. In His case death is the term (1 Corinthians 15:3; 1 Corinthians 15:6, etc.); in theirs, sleep. His death has taken for them the sting from death. The same hand that shall raise is that which laid them to sleep. 'Laid to sleep for them the sting from death. The same hand that shall raise is that which laid them to sleep. 'Laid to sleep by Jesus' answers to "dead in Christ" (1 Thessalonians 4:16).