This is the final installment of our three
part series on rapture references in the Bible.
We concluded part two with Paul's letters to the
Thessalonians.
Written about 20 years after the cross, they were the first
definitive teaching on the rapture given on Earth, and as we saw
Paul placed it before the End Times judgments, saying the Church
was not appointed to suffer wrath but to receive salvation
through our Lord Jesus Christ (1 Thes. 5:9).
About three years after the Thessalonian
letters Paul wrote 1 Corinthians and in chapter 15 added
more detail to his rapture teaching. We'll begin the final
installment there.
What Will We Look Like?
In
1 Corinthians 15 Paul was teaching about the
resurrection, responding to questions about how the dead will be
raised and what we'll look like. He used an example from
agriculture to describe it. You can't tell what a plant will
look like by examining the seed.
You have to plant it and wait till it grows. When it does
the plant will look different from the seed, but the farmer will
recognize it as having come from the seed he planted.
He said that's the way is is with us.
We can't enter Heaven in our earthly state, so we have to
be changed into our heavenly state.
When we are, the splendor of our heavenly body will be
different from the splendor of our earthly one, but we'll still
be recognizable.
Just as we can we can tell the sun from the moon and the stars
from either and from each other, so it will be with us.
We'll all be unique, recognizable individuals.
Then in 1 Cor. 15:51-53 He wrote;
Listen, I tell
you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be
changed—in a flash, in the
twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will
sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be
changed. For the perishable must
clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with
immortality.
The Greek word for mystery means secret.
By saying he was going to tell them a mystery, Paul was
saying he was about to reveal a secret.
And here it is.
When the Lord comes down to meet us in the air we'll
receive no advance notice.
In one instant we'll be going about our business here on
Earth and in the next we'll be standing in the Kingdom.
It will happen so fast we won't have time to blink our
eyes. We'll hear the
Trumpet call of God and the voice of the archangel and we'll
step out of this world into the next one. As we look around
we'll realize that multitudes of believers from the Church Age
have joined us. The
dead will have been given new bodies and the living will have
been transformed from mortal to immortal.
Paul said we'll know as we're known (1 Cor. 13:12),
so just as the Lord will recognize each of us, we'll recognize
each other. And John
said that what we'll be is not yet known, but we know that when
He appears we'll be like Him (1 John 3:2) To me that
means we'll have the same capabilities that He demonstrated
after His resurrection.
Don't confuse the trumpet we'll hear with
the 7th Trumpet of Rev. 11:15.
In the first place what we'll hear is the trumpet of God,
mentioned elsewhere only in Exodus 19:13 & 19.
The 7th Trumpet is blown by an angel in
Heaven, announces the beginning of the Great Tribulation, and is
never called the last trumpet.
As I said, the phrase Trumpet of God only
appears twice in the Bible. The first one is in Exodus 19
at Mt. Sinai and the last one is in 1 Thes. 4.
There are some incredible parallels between the giving of
the Law and the Rapture of the Church.
And as you might expect there are also some big
differences. We'll
look at the similarities first.
Both are accompanied by the audible voice of
God and both create a Kingdom. At Mt. Sinai the Israelites were
redeemed from slavery, at the Rapture we're redeemed from sin.
They were consecrated, we're perfected. They washed their
clothes, we're given clean clothes. God came to the Mt. top,
Jesus comes to the air. At Mt. Sinai Moses and Aaron went up, at
the rapture we go up. At Mt. Sinai Israel was wed to God. At the
Rapture the Church is wed to Jesus. At Mt. Sinai God dwelt with
Israel and at the rapture the Church will dwell with Jesus.
Since many Biblical models are necessarily
incomplete, there are also some obvious differences. Only Moses
and Aaron could ascend the mountain. Anyone else going up passed
from life to death. At the rapture we all go up and everyone
passes from death to life. God promised to dwell with Israel if
they obeyed. We will dwell with Jesus because He obeyed. They
changed themselves temporarily, He changes us permanently.
Theirs was an event accompanied by great fear, ours is an event
anticipated with great joy. After all Mt. Sinai was the
presentation of God's Law, and the Rapture is the manifestation
of His grace.
God blew the First Trump in
Exodus 19 in
preparation for the giving of the Law, and will blow the the
Last Trump in 1 Thes. 4:16 to initiate the Rapture.
Rescuing The Righteous
Abraham had reminded the Lord that His
character wouldn't allow Him to judge the righteous with the
wicked. Even though
the negotiated requirement of 10 righteous men to spare Sodom
and Gomorrah hadn't been met, God instructed the angels to
remove Lot before destroying the cities.
Speaking of this
Peter wrote, “if this is
so, then the Lord knows how to rescue godly men from trials and
to hold the unrighteous for the day of judgment, while
continuing their punishment.” (2 Peter 2:9)
Peter wanted us to see from the example of
Lot that it wasn't an isolated incident but was meant to convey
a general principle.
The Greek word translated “from” in the NIV is more clearly
rendered “out of” in the King James. It means away from the time
and place of the event being referenced.
We see a similar idea conveyed in Isaiah 57:1
The righteous perish,
and no one ponders it in his heart;
devout men are taken away, and no one understands that
the righteous are taken away to be spared from evil.
Here the Hebrew word translated “taken
away” means to
gather in, receive, or remove. God's character is such that He
can't allow the righteous to be punished with the wicked.
The 7 Churches Of Rev. 2-3
In a previous study I've demonstrated how
the seven churches of Rev. 2-3 chronicle Church history.
I showed how the first 3 churches (Ephesus, Smyrna and
Pergamus) have all disappeared and the remaining 4 Thyatira,
Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea) are all present today.
Viewed in chronological order and compared to Church history
these four represent the Catholic, Protestant, Evangelical and
Apostate churches of today.
In Rev. 2: 22-24 the Lord warned
that some from the Church in Thyatira will face the tribulation
while others will be rescued and share in rewards that are
uniquely reserved for true believers, which includes the
rapture. The distinction will be made on the basis of their
beliefs. Those who've remained true to the Gospel will go while
those who adhere to the Catholic church's “Jesus plus Mary,
grace plus works, and Scripture plus sacraments” doctrine will
not.
In the letter to Sardis, which represents
the main line denominations, Jesus warned of dead orthodoxy
having only the appearance of life.
“Remember what you have received and heard and obey it,”
He said, “Or else you won't know at what time I will come to
you.” He was referring to the Gospel, and notice He said “to
you”, not “for you”.
Many in the main line denominations don't know they need to be
born again, haven't got a clue that we're in the end times and
have never even heard of the rapture.
As in Thyatira, he said there are a few in Sardis who
have remained true.
They'll walk with Him for they are worthy.
Once again some will be taken and some left based on what
they believe.
Philadelphia is often called The Church of
the Rapture because of the Lord's promise to keep us from the
hour of trial that's going to come upon the whole world (Rev.
3:10). The Greek
word translated “from” here is the same one Peter used in
describing the Lord's ability to rescue godly men from trials.
Remember it means away from the time and place of the
event being referenced, in this case the End Times judgments
that are coming upon the whole world.
Because we've kept His word and not denied His name, He
has promised us a place in the New Jerusalem, where only those
whose names have been written in the Lamb's Book of Life can
enter (Rev. 21:27).
This is the Lord's personal confirmation of a pre-trib
rapture, which when John wrote this in about 95AD had been
taught on Earth for nearly 50 years.
The “Church” at Laodicea is really an
apostate movement, a spiritual rebellion.
Although it has been around through out the Church Age,
it's current prominence is a sign that the End of the Age is
approaching (2 Thes. 2:3) Thinking of itself as rich and
self sufficient, it lacks the one thing money can't buy, a
Savior. He's outside the door knocking, hoping someone will
hear. There's no
promise to rescue the group, who will be spit out of his mouth,
only to individuals who hear and respond.
Come Up Here!
At the beginning of Rev. 4, John was
called forward to the End of the Age and up into Heaven to
observe and report on events that were nearly 2000 years in his
future. When he
arrived at the throne of God he saw a group never before seen
in any of the Bible's pictures of God's throne.
Isaiah didn't see
them (Isaiah 6) Ezekiel didn't see them (Ezekiel
1 & 10), and even Daniel, whose vision was oriented in the
End Times only saw a vague hint in the form of plural thrones (Daniel
7:9). I'm
speaking of the 24 elders sitting on thrones encircling the
Throne of God (Rev. 4:4)
These 24 elders confuse some people, but
they shouldn't. Their appearance gives them away. They have
thrones, so they're rulers. They surround the Throne of God, so
they're assisting Him. They're seated, so their work is done.
They're dressed in white, so they're righteous. They're wearing
crowns, so they're kings. It's the Greek "stephanos" crown so
they're victors, over comers. They're called Elders, a title
associated with the Church. That's a pretty strong case for them
representing the Church, and no one has ever come up with a
better one.
Some try to explain the 24 thrones by
saying that they belong to an unidentified group of ruling
angels. But four prophets saw the throne of God and recorded
their experience. Of
the four, only John saw them.
And note that the Church won't receive crowns until the
Bema Seat judgment that takes place after the Rapture. Is this a
symbolic view of the church in Heaven before the judgments
begin? It looks that way to me.
The Song Of The Redeemed
And when he had taken it, the four
living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the
Lamb. Each one had a harp and they were holding golden bowls
full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints. And they
sang a new song: "You are worthy to take the scroll and to open
its seals, because you were slain, and with your blood you
purchased men (us) for God from every tribe and language
and people and nation. You have made
them (us) to be a kingdom (kings) and priests to
serve our God, and they (we) will reign on the earth."
(Rev. 5:8-10)
This is a controversial passage and taken by
itself its difficult to understand. But even though most
of the modern translations read like the one above,
both the King James Version and Young's Literal
Translation put the passage in the first person plural as I've
indicated in parentheses. The first person version helps
supports the view that the 24 Elders represent the Church.
Also the Greek word for King and Kingdom is
the same, differing only by gender. King is the masculine
form and is the one that appears in
Rev. 5:10.
(Kingdom is feminine.) So the verse is more grammatically
and theologically correct when it's translated Kings and
Priests, which define the Church, rather than a kingdom and
priests. And there's no other group that fits the
description of verse 9. Finally, the song is more
consistent with the context of the passage when it's sung by the
redeemed Church, not by a third party singing about the Church.
Taken together Rev. 4-5 present a good circumstantial
case for the Church being present in Heaven before the wrath of
God begins in Rev. 6.
As we've already seen, this is what the Bible has
promised from the beginning.
Who's That With The Lord?
Speaking of the anti-Christ and his 10 king
confederacy Rev. 17:14 says,
“They will make war against the Lamb, but the Lamb
will overcome them because he is Lord of lords and King of
kings—and with him will be his called, chosen and faithful
followers."
This is an overview statement that
describes the Great Tribulation, during which Satan, working
through the anti-Christ, will attempt to assert his ownership
claim to Planet Earth.
Rev. 17:13 says these 10 kings will have only that
one purpose during the time of their reign. In Rev. 3:10
Jesus called that time the hour of trial that's coming upon the
whole world. In
Matt. 24:21 He called it the Great Tribulation.
Rev. 17:17 says that the Lord will agree to their
rule in order for them to accomplish His purpose, not theirs,
and that's to destroy the Great Prostitute. Once they're
finished with her He'll appear to personally oversee their
defeat. And guess
who'll be with Him when He returns? His called, chosen and
faithful followers.
That can only be the Church, in Heaven during the Great
Tribulation, and returning with Him at its end.
From Genesis to Revelation, the
overwhelming weight of evidence, some circumstantial and some
testimonial shows that the Lord
always intended to remove the Church from Earth before
the End Times Judgments and to hide us in His Father's house
until His wrath has passed by.
Even so, come Lord Jesus.
02-12-10
