1 Thessalonians 4:17

then we that are alive, that are left, shall together with them be caught up in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord. [Some, mistaking the spiritual resurrection mentioned at Revelation 20:4-5; for a literal one, have thought that there are two resurrections, one for the righteous (the first resurrection) and one for the wicked (the second resurrection). Of course such a doctrine is abhorrent to the idea of a single hour of judgment, with the saved upon the right hand and the lost upon the left, but it shall be fully discussed in its own place. Those who hold this theory appeal to this passage in proof of it, reading it thus: "The dead in Christ shall rise first, and the dead out of Christ shall rise second." But in order to make it read thus they have supplied a correlative clause which is totally foreign to the context, and which crowds out the correlative which Paul himself has given; for "shall rise first" is correlative with "then shall be caught up." The apostle has been drawing a comparison, not between the righteous dead and the unrighteous dead, but between the dead and the living at the hour of the advent. He began this comparison at verse 15, and he here completes it by showing that the supposition that the living would precede the dead is so contrary to the facts that, on the contrary, the dead will be raised before any ascension is allowed the living, and then after the resurrection of the dead, the living and the dead shall be caught up together to meet the Lord. That glorious change, wherein the mortal puts on the immortal, as indicated at 1 Corinthians 15:51; 1 Corinthians 15:55; will no doubt be simultaneous with the resurrection of the dead. The phrase "caught up" implies the sudden and irresistible power of God. We are not to understand that we are to be caught up with clouds, but that we will meet him who comes with clouds (Daniel 7:13; Revelation 1:7; Matthew 24:30). He makes the clouds his chariot (Psalms 104:3). The term "air" is used generally for the region above the earth. No doubt we will be caught up far beyond our atmosphere into the realm of pure space-- Ephesians 1:3; Ephesians 2:2]