so that no one would be shaken by these afflictions. For you yourselves know that we are destined for this.

For this is God’s will: that you become holy, ¹  that you keep away from sexual immorality,

For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, so also we believe that ¹  God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep as Christians. ² 

We know, ¹  brothers and sisters ²  loved by God, that he has chosen you, ³ 

that each of you know how to possess his own body ¹  in holiness and honor,

He died ¹  for us so that whether we are alert or asleep ²  we will come to life together with him.

See that no one pays back evil for evil to anyone, but always pursue what is good for one another and for all.

For you know quite well that the day of the Lord ¹  will come in the same way as a thief in the night. ² 

For in fact when we were with you, we were telling you in advance that we would suffer affliction, and so it has happened, as you well know. ¹ 

exhorting and encouraging you and insisting that you live in a way worthy of God who calls you to his own kingdom and his glory.

so that your hearts are strengthened in holiness to be blameless before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his saints. ¹ 

Finally then, brothers and sisters, ¹  we ask you and urge you in the Lord Jesus, that as you received instruction from us about how ²  you must live and please God (as you are in fact living) ³  that you do so more and more.

And so ¹  we too constantly thank God that when you received God’s message that you heard from us, ²  you accepted it not as a human message, ³  but as it truly is, God’s message, which is at work among you who believe.

So ¹  when I could bear it no longer, I sent to find out about your faith, for fear that the tempter somehow tempted you and our toil had proven useless.

Now we do not want you to be uninformed, ¹  brothers and sisters, ²  about those who are asleep, ³  so that you will not grieve like the rest who have no hope.

because they hinder us from speaking to the Gentiles so that they may be saved. Thus they constantly fill up their measure of sins, ¹  but wrath ²  has come upon them completely. ³ 

For we tell you this by the word of the Lord, ¹  that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will surely not go ahead of those who have fallen asleep.

And you became imitators of us and of the Lord, when you received ¹  the message with joy that comes from the Holy Spirit, despite great affliction.

For from you the message of the Lord ¹  has echoed forth not just in Macedonia and Achaia, but in every place reports of your faith in God have spread, ²  so that we do not need to say anything.

in that ¹  our gospel did not come to you merely in words, ²  but in power and in the Holy Spirit and with deep conviction (surely you recall the character we displayed when we came among you to help you). ³