This, like so many things I write, began with a conversation. In this case, it turned out to be one-sided. It ended with the other person telling me that discussions about the rapture are filled with fallacies, and comparable to eating a cupcake, nutritionally pointless. So much for our morning get-together with some of the guys from church.
Fast forward about 10 years, and I recently found myself in Costco trying to get a prescription for a new pair of glasses. As I stood outside the office talking with my wife, a man walked by wearing a Christian warrior T-shirt. Moments later, a man seated near me had a humorous conversation with his wife that gave him away as a Christian. I assumed that this was the Holy Spirit's nudge to walk through this open door in which I might be able to say something encouraging about Jesus and His soon return to catch us away.
Immediately after I said, Wouldn't it be something if the five of us just suddenly disappeared in the rapture? The seated man immediately scoots forward, turns slightly left so as if to be facing me, clears his throat, and proceeds to rebuke me by saying, “There is NOTHING in scripture that convinces me that we can expect a rapture of the church, and therefore I do not believe we should be talking so openly and boldly about such things.”
To be honest, any passages that might have come into mind flushed right out of my head, and that man was immediately called into the optometrist's office.
At that moment, I made a mental commitment to study up on the rapture.
I want to begin with an obvious argument, one used by those who are unwilling to read/study for themselves.
The term rapture is non-existent in the English translations that the majority of us use!
Ah, then why are we discussing the rapture?
Because
our understanding of rapture
has some of its
origins in the early Latin
texts.
It is
found as rapio or
rapturo,
depending on who you listen to, but its meaning is the same as the
Greek word we are familiar with, harpazo,
and it means to
be caught or snatched up, almost as if violently.
In Paul's first letter to the Thessalonians, he writes,
1 Thessalonians 1:9-10 NKJV “For they themselves declare concerning us what manner of entry we had to you, and how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, (10) and to wait for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead, even Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come.”
These people turned to God;
They wait anxiously for His Son;
And, they know that He, Jesus, is the one who will deliver us from the wrath to come.
Paul's purpose in writing was to strengthen their faith and provide them with assurance of Christ's return for His bride.
If you read Paul's letters to the church in Thessalonica, you will gain insight that supports the need for enthusiasm about the “rapture”.
Let's just say, for giggles, that you refuse to accept that we, the church, will be caught up in time to deliver us from God's wrath that is coming upon the earth – a time that is effectively pointed at the Jews that would not believe that Jesus is the Messiah, and the nations (the Gentiles).
If God's wrath is what you long for, then it is your hope and dream; and you will suffer at least some of what we see when we read Revelation 6 and beyond – God's wrath beginning to be poured out.
To wet your whistle, I present to you Revelation 6:4 – the second event.
Revelation 6:4 NKJV Another horse, fiery red, went out. And it was granted to the one who sat on it to take peace from the earth, and that people should kill one another; and there was given to him a great sword.
This is God using humanity to kill humanity.
Consider what is happening in Iran right now. BTW, Wikipedia shows that “On 17 January, The Sunday Times reported that at least 16,500 to 18,000 people had been killed and 330,000 were injured.”
In light of the wrath that is to come, these numbers are meaningless.
Revelation 6:8 NASB: I looked, and behold, an ashen horse; and he who sat on it had the name Death; and Hades was following with him. Authority was given to them over a fourth of the earth, to kill with sword and with famine and with pestilence and by the wild beasts of the earth.
A fourth of the earth's population is killed by various methods, and this is just the beginning of God's wrath.
The catching or snatching away of the church is intended to remove us before the wrath.
Since Paul is the primary articulator of the church's catching away, let's focus on him for a moment.
“While preaching Jesus as Messiah (the Jewish king) in Thessalonica, Paul had been accused of preaching another king besides Caesar (Act_17:7). The very young Thessalonian church continued to experience persecution after Paul’s departure, but he encourages them with the promise of a future hope, which applies even to those who have already died” (1Th_4:13-18). (The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, Copyright © 1993 by Craig S. Keener)
Paul’s entrance and exit from Thessalonica are recorded in Acts chapter 17. It did not go well for him there, and noble men escorted Paul and Silas to safety. From this point, they traveled on to Berea. The Bereans were the ones who studied the scriptures to validate or disprove Paul's message.
Because of the nature of the letter to the church in Thessalonica and the soundness of the biblical doctrines, I can easily make several assumptions.
First, I presumed that Paul had a reasonable amount of time with them.
Obviously, that was not the case. Paul had no idea how much of an uproar the Jews would have brought against him.
If Paul had known he would only be speaking there for 3 weeks, he surely would have stuck to the basics of Christian doctrine; at least that is what the religious zealots who are entrenched in every church I have had anything to do with would have said. Perhaps, knowing that he would be under attack on short notice, he then chose to preach things that most of you have never heard in your church, the Revelation.
Secondly, I assumed he had established some elders in this church, and that may have happened.
When would he have done that, besides the fact that this was an established synagogue, and not looking for someone to bring about a different way of thinking?
The third thing that dominates my thinking is the depth of his conversations with them about the things of God.
Most people will struggle for months with the concept of eternal salvation, and yet in Christ, it is well-defined. A simple example of this is found in:
John 10:28 NASB and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand.
Paul reasoned with them for three Sabbaths.
I cannot imagine him taking non-Sabbath days off. Three weeks might not have been enough time for him to set up his tent-making operations, let alone make a couple of dollars to buy groceries. But apparently, you can make a huge impact on receptive ears in three weeks. Nonetheless, in three weeks, he gave them a solid foundation and a bit more.
What I constantly remind myself is that Paul’s first stops were always to the Synagogues. Here, you should find people who are well established in the law and the prophets due to oral tradition.
The truth the Holy Spirit gave to Paul was based on the Law and the Prophets, so he does have common ground.
In recovery, I have found that the greatest testimony of Christ’s work in me has everything to do with what I personally know and have experienced - freedom and hope. This is what Paul found, and the message he spread.
Jewish ways and traditions run deep, but then history proves that, but so does Israel's affinity for idolatry; we will ignore that for the moment, seeing as we all struggle with that one.
However, within three weeks, many of these “church” goers were ready to kill Paul, or at a minimum run him out of town. It may have been a free city and not under the heavy hand of Rome, but insurrections were put down swiftly. Regardless, Paul and Silas are now gone, and therefore Paul writes,
1 Thessalonians 4:13 NASB (13) “But we do not want you to be uninformed, brethren, about those who are asleep, so that you will not grieve as do the rest who have no hope.”
I think it is brilliant how the Holy Spirit opens so much truth to the Thessalonian church in just one sentence.
Paul used the word we translated as "uninformed," not because he had left out valuable information in his three-week crash course on eschatology, but because someone had come back later and muddied the waters of truth, probably by bringing external circumstances into the picture.
You know how some people are so good at pointing out the obvious to you, for the express purpose of keeping you founded in sound doctrine. I suspect they mean well, but their delivery has no intent other than to point out your fallacies and how undisciplined you are at exegeting the Word (which may mean you have not illustrated or explained the Word well enough for their liking), all the while trying to make themselves look better.
Another
aspect of this verse is
the
ramifications of
being
asleep.
No, I am not talking about falling asleep in church; I do it all
the time. Besides, the setting is perfect for sleeping.
Asleep should mean physically dead. If it were not for the fact that our souls never die, I would think that some are spiritually dead already. So Paul is referring to those who had only recently died.
Why would Paul have to have a conversation about them grieving over those who have died?
No one is saying that it is not okay to grieve the loss of a loved one. However, if I have hope, another aspect of Paul’s conversation, then I should understand that because they too had a relationship with Jesus Christ, I would see them again. This one verse is an allusion to our being with Jesus, as the rapture is written all over it.
The same guy who shut down our morning conversation because he alone felt that the mention of the rapture deserved the brunt of his displeasure feels strongly that we should focus only on the church's doctrines. Really, what does that mean, because those can be different depending on what denomination you are in?
Doctrines, in general, are the basics that establish our relationship with God.
An example might be found in the Apostle's Creed:
I believe -
In God the Father - Maker of heaven and earth;
And in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord.
Who was conceived by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary.
He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried;
He descended into Hades, and on the third day, He rose from the dead;
I believe in the Holy Ghost;
The holy catholic Church; the communion of saints;
The forgiveness of sins;
The resurrection of the body;
In the life everlasting.
There are at least five other versions of the creed, none wholly in agreement with the other. While there are only four words in here that give me grief, the overall impact is YES, this is what I believe. These statements are Biblical and validate our hope.
Moreover, if my argumentative friend were to read them again, he might realize that they include the concept of the rapture. It is clear that Paul believed wholeheartedly in the harpazo, or snatching away, of the church.
My friend had to let me know that “the rapture did not exist until the 1800’s.” Moments like this make me wish my brain worked better. How dare you accuse me of dispensing fallacies when you make an uneducated statement like that? While it may be true that the term “rapture” did not become popular until the 1800s, that does not make it meaningless or nonexistent. The word rapture is derived from the Latin rapiemur and appears in the Latin Vulgate. It effectively means a snatching away.
From Wikipedia:
The Latin Vulgate translates the Greek ἁρπαγησόμεθα as rapiemur,[21] from the verb rapio meaning "to catch up" or "take away".[22]
1 Thessalonians 4:17.
Let us get something straight. Jesus only guaranteed us a few things:
In this world, you will have tribulation.
What does that mean?
It means that the potential of things becoming extremely hard and you being killed is a harsh reality. Tribulation does not equal Wrath. Tribulation is a way of life, and NO, God is not terribly interested in whether you drive the newest Mercedes-Benz.
You, as a follower of Christ, will be hated by all men.
That includes religious folk.
Jesus said, I will not leave you, nor forsake you. I will come back for you.
There is a valid hope, and it includes a life with the Father in a land of peace.
Some of the questions you have to ask yourself, if you are trying to make a decision as to whether the rapture is relevant or not, is: Who spoke about it, and can we trust them?
Jesus spoke about it.
John’s gospel is one of the largest collections of references to the concept.
John 14:3 ASV And if I go and prepare a place for you, I come again, and will receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.
John 14:18 KJV I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.
Is it possible that other terms are being used and I am missing them?
Absolutely! It is called:
(His coming)
2 Peter 3:3-4 KJV Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts, (4) And saying, Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.
(Our gathering together)
2 Thessalonians 2:1 KJV (1) Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together unto him,
(His coming in the clouds)
Mark 14:62 KJV And Jesus said, I am: and ye shall see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven.
(The day of the Lord Jesus)
2 Corinthians 1:14 MKJV (14) even as you have recognized us in part, that we are your rejoicing, even as you also are ours in the day of the Lord Jesus.
Paul never left the subject untouched, whether he called it our hope or our gathering to Him.
1 Thessalonians 4 may answer any questions we have, if we give it a chance.
1 Thessalonians 4:14 MKJV (14) “For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again.” This is one of those things that define us; it is essential, doctrinal, and foundational truth for every believer. “..even so God will also bring with Him all those who have fallen asleep through Jesus.”I can apply this statement to two things. First, since the dead in Christ will rise first, they will be with him and possibly be considered to be brought with Him. The second is at the end of the seven years, the time of God’s wrath upon the earth.”
Zechariah 14:5 KJV “And ye shall flee to the valley of the mountains; for the valley of the mountains shall reach unto Azal: yea, ye shall flee, like as ye fled from before the earthquake in the days of Uzziah king of Judah: and the LORD my God shall come, and all the saints with thee.”
Here is the passage that tends to trouble me.
1 Thessalonians 4:15 KJV (15) For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep. “For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord.”
If Paul has to reestablish where his inspiration comes from, that tends to tell me these people have really had their boat rocked.
Speaking from experience, I came to the Lord at perhaps age 12. I tend to cling to that age as a reference point. In reality, evangelistic preachers would come about every six months. I, like so many others, would go down front to repent and be born again; why? because I never had an assurance of my salvation. Mom did not help much with that, as she would emphasize that some minor stupidity we pulled as kids needed to be repented of, or God just might bypass us, and we would end up in hell. Needless to say, most of my childhood was filled with fear.
Paul rehearsed with them.
“that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep.”
This tells me that one of two things has affected them. Someone has come after Paul left and preached a message that confuses or contradicts what Paul taught; that, or they focused on “the tribulation”, as a perceived evidence of the seven years after the rapture, has come to their minds.
I don't know when this started, but we have done this to ourselves.
The seven years are called the time of God’s wrath upon the earth. Jesus indicated that it would be a time of such great tribulation that, or they told them that no one would survive unless God shortened time. It is a time of judgment. If I were Paul and I had only three weeks to bring you up to speed, establishing that you are no longer under condemnation for your sins would be high on my list of priorities. Just because we are forgiven, purchased out from under the debt we owed, does not give us that full access we see; acceptance of Jesus Christ as the one who paid that price does.
I do not understand, for the life of me, why God needs these old bodies, but he seems to want them attached to the souls they belong to.
This next verse is the snatching away for which we long. We, out of habit, call it the rapture.
1 Thessalonians 4:16-17 KJV (16) For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: (17) Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.
For me, the key argument about why I should understand, believe, and preach the coming of Jesus Christ, something I happen to believe is imminent, comes in the next verse. It also happens to be the last verse of chapter 4.
1 Thessalonians 4:18 KJV (18) Wherefore comfort one another with these words.
Since Paul had already encouraged and admonished the church, it makes sense to say, "Use these words to comfort one another." If he had placed this sentence elsewhere in the text, then I would have to wonder what kind of documents they have to refer to to gain this encouragement. You do realize that all they had was the Holy Spirit and their memories to hold them together.
I believe, especially now, that we were meant to understand and preach this message. I believe it is even more relevant today because many around us have seen these prophecies happen before their eyes. Israel's becoming a nation is one of them.
If, as some will say, the Church must endure the Tribulation… why does Scripture repeatedly promise our removal from wrath?
The pre-tribulation rapture is not built on one verse. It is a cumulative argument in which aspects of our faith, such as doctrine, timing, language, and biblical patterns, converge.
Start with Christ’s promise:
“My Father’s house has many rooms…
I am going there to prepare a place for you… I will come back and
take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.”
John
14:2–3
This is not Christ descending to rule; this is Christ receiving His people and taking them to the Father’s house.
Paul describes the same event:
“…we who are still alive… will be
caught up together… to meet the Lord in the air.”
1
Thessalonians 4:17
“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…”
1 Corinthians 15:51–52
The
word changed, in verse 51, also means: caught up or
received.
This is comfort language, not judgment language,
and Paul frames this as a rescue from divine wrath:
“…Jesus, who rescues us from the
coming wrath.”
1 Thessalonians 1:10
“For God did not appoint us to suffer
wrath…”
1 Thessalonians 5:9
“Since we have now been justified by
his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through
him!”
Romans 5:9
The Tribulation is repeatedly
described as heaven’s (God's) judicial wrath
(Revelation
6:16–17).
If the Church is exempt from wrath, removal before that period is the instinctive reading.
And what a surprise, even the Old Testament points to the same pattern.
“Go, my people, enter your rooms…
hide yourselves for a little while until his wrath has passed by.”
Isaiah 26:20
God shelters His people while His wrath sweeps the earth.
Jesus confirmed this removal-before-judgment template.
“But the day Lot left Sodom, fire and
sulfur rained down… It will be just like this on the day the Son of
Man is revealed.”
Luke 17:29–30
You can find the full narrative of Lot and the angels sent to bring the wrath in Genesis 19. They were restrained from bringing the destruction until Lot and his family were safe.
While there was no urgency or destruction seen with Enoch, what is important is the method and swiftness. We should not assume there were no safety reasons for extracting Enoch from the earth, because Genesis 6 tells us about the depravity of humankind. We should not assume that the decline in moral standards began only after Enoch's removal.
“Enoch walked faithfully with God;
then he was no more, because God took him away.”
Genesis
5:24
The writer of Hebrews tells us,
“By faith Enoch was taken from this life, so that he did not experience death…” Hebrews 11:5
As with Enoch, there was no urgency due to violence; it was merely time for the old prophet Elijah's time to leave the earth. 2 Kings describes the event like this,
“After
they had crossed over, Elijah said to Elisha, “Tell me, what can I
do for you before I am taken away from you?” “Please, let me
inherit a double portion of your spirit,” Elisha replied. “You
have requested a difficult thing,” said Elijah. “Nevertheless, if
you see me as I am taken from you, it will be yours. But if not, then
it will not be so.” As
they were walking along and talking together, suddenly a chariot of
fire with horses of fire appeared and separated the two of them, and
Elijah went up into heaven in a whirlwind.
As Elisha watched, he cried out, “My father, my father, the
chariots and horsemen of Israel!” And he saw Elijah no more. So
taking hold of his own clothes, he tore them in two. Elisha also
picked up the cloak that had fallen from Elijah, and he went back and
stood on the bank of the Jordan. Then he took the cloak of Elijah
that had fallen from him and struck the waters. “Where now is the
LORD, the God of Elijah?” he asked. And when he had struck the
waters, they parted to the right and to the left, and Elisha crossed
over.”
2 Kings
2:9-14 BSB
Jesus also had something to say about Noah's deliverance from the coming wrath.
“Just as it was in the days of Noah…
the flood came and destroyed them all.”
Luke 17:26–27
It is logical to assume that judgment waits until the righteous are secured, and this pattern echoes throughout Scripture:
Much like we saw with Enoch
“And
he ordered that the chariot be stopped; and both Philip and the
eunuch went down into the water, and [Philip] baptized him. And when
they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord [suddenly]
caught away Philip; and the eunuch saw him no more, and he went on
his way rejoicing. But Philip was found at Azotus, and passing on he
preached the good news (Gospel) to all the towns until he reached
Caesarea.”
Acts
8:38-40 AMP
God repeatedly demonstrated His ability to remove His servants before catastrophic judgment. The Tribulation (as we unwisely call it) is expressly named,
“For,
note well, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will release
from captivity My people Israel and Judah, says the Lord, and I will
cause them to return to the land that I gave to their fathers, and
they will possess it. And these are the words the Lord spoke
concerning Israel and Judah: Thus says the Lord: We have heard a
voice of trembling and panic--of terror, and not peace. Ask now and
see whether a man can give birth to a child? Why then do I see every
man with his hands on his loins like a woman in labor? Why are all
faces turned pale? Alas! for that day will be great, so that none
will be like it; it will be the time of Jacob's
[unequaled] trouble,
but he will be saved out
of it.” [Matt. 24:29,
30; Rev. 7:14.]
Jeremiah 30:3-7 AMP
Jacob = Israel. It is not the Church. Revelation reflects this shift. The word “church” saturates chapters 1–3, then disappears from the seals, trumpets, and bowls; and we see the evidence of this when it says,
After these things I looked, and behold, a door was opened in Heaven. And the first voice which I heard was as it were of a trumpet talking with me, saying, Come up here, and I will show you what must occur after these things.” Revelation 4:1 MKJV
Those things are the end of the church age.
In the Revelation, the focus soon returns to Israel and the nations. It has been explained to me, by smarter men than I, that these elders, crowned, enthroned, and rewarded, are the church already in heaven. We see this in Revelation 4:4.
“…around the throne were twenty-four
other thrones, and seated on them were twenty-four elders. They were
dressed in white and had crowns of gold on their heads.”
Revelation 4:4
Now comes one of the strongest images in the New Testament: the Restrainer.
“…the one who now restrains it will
do so until he is taken out of the way. And then the lawless one will
be revealed.”
2 Thessalonians 2:7–8
If you study scriptures enough, you will come to realize that the arrival of the Antichrist is that thing that unleashes God's wrath upon the earth.
If restraint is the Spirit’s work through the Church, the sequence is clear: removal of the saints, the revelation of the Antichrist, and the onslaught of God's wrath. the Tribulation.
“Because
you have kept My command to persevere, I also will keep you from the
hour of trial which shall come upon the whole world, to test those
who dwell on the earth.”
Revelation
3:10 NKJV
The word translated as "kept" or "keep" is the Greek tērēsō. It means to watch, observe, or keep your eyes on. It also means to guard as a prisoner, and to keep (held) back or in store.
The Church is told to expect Christ as the next event.
“…we wait for the blessed hope…” Titus 2:13
“You also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him.” Luke 12:40
“Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come.” Matthew 24:42
“The Judge is standing at the door!” James 5:9
