NOTE:  This reflects the Full Preterist, or Realized Eschatologist which is a heretical viewpoint due to its denial of the future return of Christ and the resurrection. This is not the view of the partial or "inconsistent" Preterist.

We

"We" in this passage refers to Paul, Silvanus, Timothy, and the brethren in their time - not to "us" as the readers in the present time. Keep in mind that the New Testament was written for us, not to us. Now notice what Paul wrote in this passage,  ". . . we who are alive, and remain until the coming of the Lord."   They were expecting of an imminent coming in their lifetime.  The text does not read, "we might all be changed. . ." or, "we might not all sleep. . ."  Was Paul inspired to be wrong? 

The Last Trumpet

There appears to be a connection between 1 Thes. 4:15-17 (the "rapture" passage), Matt. 24:30-31 (the Olivett Discourse), 1 Cor. 15:50-5 (the "Last Trump"), and Rev. 11:15 (the 7th Trump) as being the same event because of the last "trumpet of God":

"And then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, the all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky with power and great glory. And He will send forth His angels with a great trumpet and they will gather together His elect from the our winds, from one end of the sky to the other" (Matt. 24:30-31).

"Now I say this, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. Behold, I tell you a mystery, we shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet; for the will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed" (1 Cor. 15:50-52).

"And the seventh (trumpet) angel sounded; and there arose loud voices in heaven, saying, 'The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord, and of His Christ; and He will reign forever and ever" (Rev. 11:15).

This can be none other than the trump of God of 1 Thess.4:16, and the last trump of 1 Cor.15:52. If not, then do the scriptures teach two separate gatherings preceded by two universal trumpets? Why make them all the more confusing (a fact evidenced by the attempt to divide Matthew 24), by placing them both at a coming of Christ, a consummation of an age, a gathering together of the elect in the clouds, and an inheriting of the kingdom, (Matt.8:11-12, 24:3, 30-31, 34; 1 Cor.15:23-24, 50-52; 1 Thess.4:14-17)? It should be readily apparent that the trumpet is one and the same. Equally certain is the fact that Matthew 24 places the sounding of that trumpet at the fall of Jerusalem in A.D. 70, before that first-century generation passed, (Matt.24:31,34).  If we don't relocate this prophecy of Matt. 24 into our future, then it was a prophecy to them, who were there at the Mount of Olives, when Jesus spoke, that is: in "that generation" (Matt. 24:34). The gathering seems to be the event known as "the rapture." If not, why would the same language be used in both verses? If this language can be dismissed as an event other than the "rapture" then why take anything as referring to that event? Notice that this "gathering" was to take place in that generation - in the first century. 

Coming in the Clouds

"And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other." - Matthew 24:30-31

In biblical language "clouds" are symbolic of God's wrath and judgment against the enemies of His people. For instance, the Lord said that He would ride into Egypt on a cloud and punish them:

"The burden of Egypt. Behold, the LORD rideth upon a swift cloud, and shall come into Egypt: and the idols of Egypt shall be moved at his presence, and the heart of Egypt shall melt in the midst of it." - Isaiah 19:1 

The Lord did not literally ride on a cloud, the egyptian's hearts did not melt within them, but Egypt did receive this judgment at the hands of the Assyrians (Isaiah 20:1-6). The idea of Jesus physically coming on the clouds would have been contrary to the nature of their understanding of the OT prophets. . . this language was used as a way of conveying God's message of wrath to come.

In 1 Thessalonians 4-5 Paul spoke of the same coming of the Lord to gather the saints. How many comings of the Lord, with his angels, in fire, in power and glory, to gather the saints, are there in the NT? Just ONE! In verse 13, Christ clarifies that this is what will occur in that generation when He comes. The significance of this is that when Christ came in the clouds, he literally, yet spiritually, gathered those that were alive to be caught up in the kingdom with Jesus Christ, and Jesus Christ spiritually returned with the believers to the earth, to ever be with them. This was a spiritual event that was visibly manifest in the destruction of Jerusalem.

Caught up in the Air

What does the word "air" mean here? Is it in our atmosphere or the air we breath? We can compare Scripture with Scripture to arrive at a conclusion. The word "air" is an another word for heavenly or spiritual realm. Satan was called "the prince of the power of the air." If that is the same "air" where the saints were to meet and be gathered, then there is no necessity for us to believe that the rapture gathering and meeting was to be physical or visible anymore than Satan's kingdom was physical or visible. The "gathering together" is in the heavenly places in Christ - the spiritual kingdom of God. Being caught up together in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air is the end-of-the-age gathering together of God's elect. It was accomplished when the faithful remnant of Jewish believers with the ingrafted Gentiles was transformed into Christ's new spiritual Israel when the old covenant was taken away in AD 70. 

"And you were dead in your trespasses and sins, in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air," - Ephesians 2:2

"in the dispensation of the fullness of the times He might gather together in one all things in Christ,
both which are in heaven and which are on earth; in Him."
Ephesians 1:10

Conclusion

According to full preterists when Jesus Christ returned in 70 AD He gathered the elect of all the ages into His spiritual kingdom and all believers now live in that kingdom (Colossians 3:1-4).