A can of worms

The term, if I understand correctly, comes from the Latin translation of the word Harpazo. In Latin it was translated Raptuzo (or something like that), so in English they used the word rapture. At least that is how I heard it explained anyway. That could at least get you started on researching the etymology of the terms. It is derived from the words we now read in the KJ, "Caught Up." And at least those that I have heard preach it have been concerned about being saved from the wrath of the Lamb, not the wrath of Satan, to be technically fair.

Can I recommend that you watch Chuck Missler, he can be seen on youtube - his series that I watched recently on the Revelation was absolutely brilliant and such an eye opener.
He explains everything with such depth he was about 15 weeks on just the first three chapters. I found him totally engrosing. I'm sure you won't be disapponted.

Well in all actuallity I agree with you, We see the pattern of the Bible of God's people going through the tribulation rather than being plucked up and removed from it as to avoid problems. My dad and I get into discussions about this and I believe that the great falling away mentioned very well could be a large group of pre-tribulation believers that are swayed by the persecution thinking God has forsaken them. I generally lean more towards the Post-trib camp because to me logically I will be spending my life preparing for the tribulation to come rather than having the mindset of I don't need to do anything because I will be raptured anyways. I however tend to say that I don't care what you believe Pre or Post or even Mid we need to be preparing for the Return of the Lord.

God Bless,
Matthew

Matthew wrote:

We see the pattern of the Bible of God's people going through the tribulation rather than being plucked up and removed from it as to avoid problems. My dad and I get into discussions about this and I believe that the great falling away mentioned very well could be a large group of pre-tribulation believers that are swayed by the persecution thinking God has forsaken them. I generally lean more towards the Post-trib camp because to me logically I will be spending my life preparing for the tribulation to come rather than having the mindset of I don't need to do anything because I will be raptured anyways. I however tend to say that I don't care what you believe Pre or Post or even Mid we need to be preparing for the Return of the Lord.

I agree for the reasons cited.

Corrie ten Boom would also agree with you, Matthew. She said the same thing. She said Hollanders were taught this pre-trib rapture believing fully that no tribulation can ever come to them. When WW2 came upon them and they were invaded and had to live under German rule, the people were not prepared spiritually to handle this and thus many fell away.

As I understand Scripture the only suffering the Believer will be spared is the one in hell. Otherwise, we can reasonably expect all kinds. Of course, one can avoid some suffering - depending on how you define suffering - by making lifestyle choices in line with God's will. This alone should be a great motivator to flee temptation/sin.

My thoughts....

ginnyrose

Jesus does not even know when He will return, so how can we pin a certain time on anything related to this?

Hrmmmm...I would say that Jesus did not know when he gave up all of his divinity to become a man, but when he ascended to the father, his purpose became to set the world in subjection under his feet, so He is the lamb worthy to open the scroll. I do not think he is willfully ignorant of those things now as he was on the earth. The Father gave him the right to sit down at His right hand. Which means he now reigns. The ascension changed a lot of things for the Messiah, so I would say that your statement here was only true when he walked the earth...it may not be true now brother.

In Christ.

Jer.

There are many of us who believe that the Lord may gather His Bride BEFORE the period in which God's wrath will be poured out upon the entire world. Anyone would admit that this entire topic can be debated (even heatedly by those who are so inclined).

The period of the "Great Tribulation" will be horrible -- but not because of the wrath of men or even Satan. Jesus said that those days will be like the days of Noah...eating, drinking, marrying, etc... Rather, it will be horrible because it is God who will be pouring out HIS wrath that has been stored up.

Instead of "opening a can of worms" of divisive debate, it is highly constructive to encourage and challenge the brethren to simply be prepared. We should be prepared by seeking the Lord and spending time daily in His presence. We should also be prepared for tribulation -- because "in this world you shall have tribulation." I believe that this is enough to sustain believers who truly seek the face of God.

Sorry, I meant to pose my earlier statement as more of a question. Meaning I have that idea in my head for some reason...I will look at the word for a bit and see if my reasoning is sound or if it is not. I am thinking of Philippians Chapter Two, Revelation, and some of Jesus own statements when I said what I said.

Gaebelein's Annoted Bible
1 Thessalonians 4:1

IV. THE SEPARATED WALK AND THE BLESSED HOPE

CHAPTER 4

1. The separated walk (4:1-12)
2. The coming of the Lord for His saints (4:13-18)
Verses 1-12. "Furthermore, then, brethren, we beg you and exhort you in the Lord Jesus, even as ye received from us, how ye ought to walk and please God, even as ye also do walk, that ye would abound still more. For ye know what charges we gave you through the Lord Jesus. For this is the will of God, even your sanctification, that ye should abstain from fornication; that each of you know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor (not in passionate desire, even as the Gentiles who know not God), not overstepping the rights of and wronging his brother in the matter, because the Lord is the avenger of all these things, even as we also told you before, and have fully testified. For God has not called us to uncleanness, but in sanctification. He therefore that (in this) disregards (his brother), disregards, not man, but God, who has also given His Holy Spirit to you" (corrected translation).

Having spoken of being unblamable in holiness at the coming of the Lord he exhorts them to live now in sanctification. The motive is to please God. The believer should constantly in his daily life ask himself this question, "Do I please God?" Exhortation to purity in abstaining from fleshly lusts follows. Fornication, licentiousness in various forms were closely connected with the idolatrous worship from which these Thessalonians had been saved. The lust of the flesh was a part of this former religion, as it is still today among different heathen religions. But why these exhortations? Because they were surrounded by these things on all sides, and because the old nature with its tendencies towards these evils was still present with them, as it is with all true believers. No circumstances or position can make the believer secure against these things, without exercise of conscience and self-judgment, and hence these solemn admonitions from the Lord. Each was to possess his own vessel (his own wife) in sanctification and honor, this would be a safe-guard against the numerous immoralities practised among the heathen. If in this matter any one overstepped the rights of another and thus wronged his brother by committing adultery, the Lord would be the avenger; it would be a complete disregard of God who has not called His people to uncleanness, but unto sanctification, to be separated from all these things. Needful were these exhortations for the Thessalonians as they are still to all of us.

And the best remedy against these evil things is brotherly love. He had no need to say much about it, for they themselves were taught of God to love one another. But he exhorts them to be quiet and to mind their own affairs, working with their own hands, as he their leader had exemplified it when he was among them.

Verses 13-18. "But we do not wish you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them that are fallen asleep, to the end that ye sorrow not, even as others who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, so also God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep through Jesus. For this we say to you in the Word of the Lord, that we, the living, who remain to the coming of the Lord, are in no way to anticipate these who have fallen asleep; for the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with an assembling shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trump of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first; then we, the living who remain, shall be caught up together with them in clouds, to meet the Lord in the air; and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with these words."

These words contain one of the great revelations of the Bible and require therefore closer attention. It is a special and unique revelation which he gives to the sorrowing Thessalonians, occasioned by the mistake they had made when some of their fellow believers had died, and they feared that these departed ones had lost their share in the coming glorious meeting between the Lord and His saints. They sorrowed on their account like those who have no hope. (Their pagan neighbors had no hope of meeting loved ones again after death. Classic Greek and Roman writers abound with dreary expressions of the hopelessness of death.) We must remember that the New Testament was not yet in existence; only one of the gospels, was written; and not one of the epistles. And so the Lord gave to the apostle the special revelation which would quiet their fears and put before them the details of the coming of the Lord for all His saints, those who had fallen asleep and those alive when He comes.

Our Lord spoke that blessed word to His eleven disciples, "I will come again and receive you unto myself, that where I am ye may be also" (Joh 14:3). It is the only time He mentioned His coming for His own, and in speaking of it He did not tell them of signs to precede that coming, such as wars, false Christs and the great tribulation. It was the simple announcement that He would come again and receive those who are His to Himself. He did not say a word about the manner of that coming and how He would receive His own into glory to be with Him. Nor did the Thessalonians hear definite teaching on this from the lips of Paul. They knew He would come again; they waited for Him. But as to the manner of His coming and concerning those who had already fallen asleep and their relation to that event they were in ignorance. Beautiful it is to see how graciously the Lord answered the question of these sorrowing ones and how much more He adds for the comfort of all His people.

The first statement is in verse 14. "For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, so also God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep through Jesus." Let us first notice that blessed statement that "Jesus died." Of the saints it is said that they have fallen asleep; but never is it said that Jesus slept. He tasted death, the death in all its unfathomable meaning as the judgment upon sin. For the saints the physical death is but sleep. (Some have perverted the meaning of "sleep," and, instead of applying it, as Scripture does, to the body, they apply it to the soul. Soul-sleep is nowhere taught in the Bible and is therefore an invention by those who handle the Word deceitfully.) And He who died also rose again; as certainly as He died and rose again, so surely shall all believers rise. God will bring all those who have fallen asleep through Jesus with Him, that is with the Lord when He comes in the day of His glorious manifestation. It does not mean the receiving of them by the Lord, nor does it mean that He brings their disembodied spirits with Him to be united to their bodies from the graves, but it means that those who have fallen asleep will God bring with His Son when He comes with all His saints; they will all be in that glorified company. When the Lord comes back from glory all the departed saints will be with Him. This is what the Thessalonians needed to know first of all. Before we follow this blessed revelation in its unfolding we call attention to the phrase "fallen asleep through (not in) Jesus"; it may also be rendered by "those who were put to sleep by Jesus." His saints in life and death are in His hands. When saints put their bodies aside, it is because their Lord has willed it so. "Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His saints" (Ps 116:15). When our loved ones leave us, may we think of their departure as being "put to sleep by Jesus."

But blessed as this answer to their question is, it produced another difficulty. Hearing that the saints who had fallen asleep would come with the Lord on the day of His glorious manifestation, they would ask, "How is it possible that they can come with Him?" Are they coming as disembodied spirits? What about their bodies in the graves? How shall they come with Him? To answer these questions the special revelation "by the Word of the Lord" is given, by which they learned, and we also, how they would all be with Him so as to come with Him at His appearing. "For this we say to you by the Word of the Lord, that we, the living, who remain unto the coming of the Lord, are in no wise to anticipate those who have fallen asleep." He tells them that when the Lord comes for His saints, those who have fallen asleep will not have an inferior place and that, we, the living, who remain to the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. When Paul wrote these words and said, "We, the living, who remain," he certainly considered himself as included in that class. The two companies who will meet the Lord when He comes, those who have fallen asleep and those who are living, are mentioned here for the first time. How the living saints will not precede those who have departed and the order in which the coming of the Lord for His saints will be executed is next made known in this wonderful revelation.

"For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with an assembling shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trump of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first, then, we, the living, who remain, shall be caught up together with them in clouds, to meet the Lord in the air, and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with these words." This is an altogether new revelation. Nothing like it is found anywhere in the Old Testament Scriptures. In writing later to the Corinthians Paul mentioned it again. "Behold I show 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 trump; for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed" (1Co 15:51-52).

The Lord Himself will descend from heaven. He is now at the right hand of God in glory, crowned with honor and glory. There He exercises His Priesthood and Advocacy in behalf of His people, by which He keeps, sustains and restores them. When the last member has been added to the Church, which is His body, and that body is to be with Him, who is the head, He will leave the place at the right hand and descend from heaven. He will not descend to the earth, for, as we read later, the meeting place for Him and His saints is in the air and not the earth. When He comes with His saints in His visible manifestation, He will descend to the earth. He descends with a shout. It denotes His supreme authority. The Greek word is "keleusma," which means literally "a shout of command," used in classical Greek for the hero's shout to his followers in battle, the commanding voice to gather together. He ascended with a shout (Ps 47:5), and with the victor's shout He returns.

The shout may be the single word "Come!" "Come and see" He spoke to the disciples who followed Him and inquired for His dwelling place. Before Lazarus' tomb He spoke with a loud voice, "Come forth." John, in the isle of Patmos, after the throne messages to the churches had been given, saw a door opened in heaven and the voice said "Come up hither" (Re 4:1). "Come" is the royal word of grace, and grace will do its supreme work when He comes for His own. But there will also be the voice of the archangel (Michael) and the trump of God. The archangel is the leader of the angelic hosts. As He was seen of angels (1Ti 3:16) when He ascended into the highest heaven, so will the archangel be connected with His descent out of heaven. All heaven will be in commotion when the heirs of glory, sinners saved by grace, are about to be brought with glorified bodies into the Father's house. Some teach that the voice of the archangel may be employed to summon the heavenly hosts and marshal the innumerable company of the redeemed, for "They shall gather His elect together from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other" (Mt 24:30. (Prof. W.G. Moorehead, Outline Studies.) But this is incorrect. The elect in Mt 24 are not the Church, but Israel. Dispersed Israel will be regathered and angels will be used in this work. Furthermore the angels will do this gathering after the great tribulation and after the visible manifestation of the Lord with His saints. The coming of the Lord for His saints takes place before the great tribulation.

The trump of God is also mentioned. This trumpet has nothing to do with the judgment trumpets of Revelation, nor with the Jewish feasts of trumpets. It is a symbolical term and like the shout stands for the gathering together. In Nu 10:4 we read, "And if they blow with one trumpet, then the princes, the heads of the thousands of Israel, shall gather themselves unto thee." The shout and the trump of God will gather the fellow-heirs of Christ. "The dead in Christ shall rise first." This is the resurrection from among all the dead of those who believed on Christ, the righteous dead. All saints of all ages, old and New Testament saints, are included. This statement of the resurrection of the dead in Christ first disposes completely of the unscriptural view of a general resurrection. As we know from Re 20:5 the rest of the dead (the wicked dead) will be raised up later. He comes in person to open the graves of all who belong to Him and manifests His authority over death which He has conquered.

The dead in Christ will hear the shout first and experience His quickening power; they shall be raised incorruptible. What power will then be manifested! "Then we, the living, who remain, shall be caught up together with them in clouds to meet the Lord in the air; and so shall we ever be with the Lord." All believers who live on earth when the Lord comes will hear that commanding, gathering shout. It does not include those who only profess to be Christians and are nominal church-members, nor are any excluded who really are the Lord's. (The so-called first-fruit rapture, which teaches that only the most spiritual of all true believers, who have made a deeper experience, etc., will be caught up, and the other believers, though they are true believers of God, will be left behind to pass "through the great tribulation," has no spiritual foundation and is wrong.) The question, "Who will be caught up into glory?" is answered in 1Co 15:23--"All who are Christ's." The change will be "in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye" (1Co 15:52). Then this mortal will put on immortality. It will be the blessed "clothed upon" of which the apostle wrote to the Corinthians: "For in this tabernacle we groan, being burdened; not for that we would be unclothed (death) but clothed upon, that mortality might be swallowed up of life" (2Co 5:4). Then our body of humiliation will be fashioned like unto His own glorious body. it is the blessed, glorious hope, not death and the grave, but the coming of the Lord, when we shall be changed. And it is our imminent hope; believers must wait daily for it and some blessed day the shout will surely come.

When He descends from heaven with the shout and the dead in Christ are raised and we are changed, then "we shall be caught up together with them in clouds to meet the Lord in the air." It will be the blessed time of reunion with the loved ones who have gone before. What joy and comfort it must have brought to the sorrowing Thessalonians when they read these blessed words for the first time! And they are still the words of comfort and hope to all His people, when they stand at the open graves of loved ones who fell asleep as believers.

Often the question is asked, "Shall we not alone meet our loved ones but also recognize them?" Here is the answer: "Together with them" implies both reunion and recognition. These words would indeed mean nothing did they not mean recognition. We shall surely see the faces of our loved ones again and all the saints of God on that blessed day when this great event takes place. The clouds will be heaven's chariots to take the heirs of God and the joint-heirs of the Lord Jesus Christ into His own presence. As He ascended so His redeemed ones will be taken up. Caught up in clouds to meet the Lord in the air; all laws Of gravitation are set aside, for it is the power of God, the same power which raised up the Lord Jesus from the dead and seated Him in glory, which will be displayed in behalf of His saints (Eph 1:19-23). Surely this is a divine revelation.

"How foolish it must sound to our learned scientists. But, beloved, I would want nothing but that one sentence, 'caught up in clouds . to meet the Lord in the air,' to prove the divinity of Christianity. Its very boldness is assurance of its truth. No speculation, no argument, no reasoning; but a bare authoritative statement startling in its boldness. Not a syllable of Scripture on which to build, and yet when spoken, in perfect harmony with all Scripture. How absolutely impossible for any man to have conceived that the Lord's saints should be caught up to meet Him in the air. Were it not true its very boldness and apparent foolishness would be its refutation. And what would be the character of mind that could invent such a thought? What depths of wickedness! What cruelty! What callousness! The spring from which such a statement, if false, could rise must be corrupt indeed. But how different in fact! What severe righteousness! What depths of holiness! What elevated morality! What warmth of tender affection! What clear reasoning! Every word that he has written testifies that he has not attempted to deceive. Paul was no deceiver, and it is equally impossible for him to have been deceived" ("Our Hope," February 1902).

And the blessedness "to meet the Lord in the air"! We shall see Him then as He is and gaze for the first time upon the face of the Beloved, that face of glory, which was once marred and smitten on account of our sins. And seeing Him as He is we shall be like Him. How long will be the meeting in the air? It has been said that the stay in that meeting place will be but momentary and that the Lord will at once resume His descent to the earth. We know from other Scriptures that this cannot be. Between the coming of the Lord for His saints and with His saints there is an interval of at least seven years before the visible coming of the Lord and His saints with Him. The judgment of the saints, by which their works and labors become manifest must take place. There is also to be the presentation of the church in glory (Eph 5:27; Jude 1:24). Furthermore the marriage of the Lamb takes place not in the meeting place in the air, but in heaven (Re 19:1-10). He will take His saints into the Father's house that they may behold His glory (Joh 17:22). But what will it mean, "So shall we be forever with the Lord!"

"In this part of the passage, where he explains the details of our ascension to the Lord in the air, nothing is said of His coming down to the earth; it is our going up (as He went up) to be with Him. Neither, as far as concerns us, does the apostle go farther than our gathering together to be for ever with Him. Nothing is said either of judgment or of manifestation; but only the fact of our heavenly association with Him in that we leave the earth precisely as He left it. This is very precious. There is this difference: He went up in His own full right, He ascended; as to us, His voice calls the dead, and they come forth from the grave, and, the living being changed, all are caught up together. It is a solemn act of God's power, which seals the Christians' life and work of God, and brings the former into the glory of Christ as His heavenly companions. Glorious privilege! Precious grace! To lose sight of it destroys the proper character of our joy and of our hope" (Synopsis of the Bible).

In Christ: Phillip.

From [url=carm.org]carm.org:[/url]

If Jesus is God why did He not know the hour of his return?
Matt. 24:36; Mark 13:32

1.(Mark 13:30-32), "Truly I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things take place. 31"Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will not pass away. 32But of that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but the Father alone,"

2.(Matt. 24:36), "But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father alone."

This statement is found in the gospel of Mark and Matt. 24:36. The answer is simple. Jesus is both God and man (John 1:1,14; 20:28; Col. 2:9) and during His ministry in Jerusalem, He was cooperating with the limitations of being a man. As a man, Jesus walked and talked. As God He was worshipped (Matt. 14:33; 28:9; Heb. 1:6), prayed to (Zech. 13:9; 1 Cor. 1:2), etc. This is called the Hypostatic Union.

During His earthly ministry He moved in the power of the Holy Spirit and did His miracles by the Holy Spirit and not by His own divine power. This is because He was made for a little while lower than the angels (Heb. 2:9) and had emptied Himself and taken on the form of a man [Kenotic Theory--my edit(Phil. 2:7)]. This would explain why in Matt. 12:22-32, when the Pharisees accused Jesus of casting out demons by the power of the devil, Jesus said that blasphemy against the Holy Spirit would never be forgiven? Why? Because Jesus, as a man who was ministering completely as a man under the Law (Gal. 4:4-5), did His miracles by the power of the Holy Spirit. This demonstrates that Christ was completely human and dependent upon God and that He was cooperating with the limitations of being human. That is why He said He didn't know the day or hour of His return.

However, we see that after the resurrection of Christ it is said of Him that He knows all things (John 21:17) and that He is omnipresent (Matt. 28:20). Therefore, after His resurrection and glorification, the Lord Jesus did know all things.

Is this what you intended to say? I mean, is this what you believe?

Wow...now that I look at that, that is a terrible quote :(...I meant he gave up his power as God. Sorry, no I do not believe that...All the things he did though, he did by faith in his father...by doing all the things which pleased Him. Sorry. I regret wording it that way. It would seem from many instances that Jesus laid down his divine Power...that is more what I meant.

Guess this is confirmation I should have kept my fingers out of the eschatological cookie jar!

Giggles response is kind of what I had been trying to get at, even though I have never heard the term kenotic, or hypostatic union before. 1 Corinthians 15:24 is also an interesting verse indicating that the rule and authority is His now, until the end when He will give it back to the Father. For now He must reign until he puts all His enemies under his feet.

Carm has some good articles.

i sincerely regret that the statement was made in the first place: speaking without having studied into the issue. Can you say "fool"? If not, folly will suffice.

Don't be so quick to judge yourself this way brother. There are so many ways that fellowship has corrected and cleaned up bad thinking and bad doctrine I have held. There is not a single person whom has it all down pat. For we only see through a glass dimly. I would think that one of the reasons to have a "Forum" for Christians would be to hash some of these issues out as long as we maintain humility in doing so. It only gets foolish and stupid when we refuse to keep a humble heart.

"Iron sharpeneth iron, so a man sharpeneth the countenance of his friend." Proverbs 27:17