I remember one time when I was in first grade and I was having trouble with an addition or subtraction problem that had maybe 3-digit numbers (can’t remember for sure), so I raised my hand for help. An older student came over and tried to help me solve it, but I felt she was doing it wrong. I knew that I was doing it wrong, but she was too. Don’t ask me exactly how I knew this or if my perception was even correct or not, but I was like no that’s not the answer. Maybe I knew how to check my answer, but not how to actually get the correct answer? I don’t know. So I raise my hand for help from the teacher, and this boy sitting in front of me turned to me and he was like she’s smart, she doesn’t need help. I was like yes I do, and I started to cry.
What does that have to do with a post on the rapture? I was reminded of it because in my mind I knew I and the other girl were doing it wrong. I feel a little like this about the Rapture because in my mind, I think I see what Scripture says and am left wondering how come other people aren’t seeing this? Is it just me? Let me start off by saying that I haven’t heard of anyone having this perspective, so if anyone else does I don’t know of them and have not met them. This is something that I’ve drawn from reading the Scriptures, and I could be wrong. I don’t think this is a salvation issue, so simply agree to disagree if you like. If you see it differently and have your own Scriptures to back up your point, feel free to give your own input. We are to correct each other after all. “Teach me and I will hold my tongue; cause me to understand where I have erred” (Job 6:24). We are also not to twist Scriptures, which should be taken seriously as that leads to the destruction of many. I don’t think this perspective does that though. If you’re interested in an alternative perspective, backed by Scripture, but probably different from most people’s, keep reading. Anyway, if you haven’t read any other post or anything, then you should know 2 things. One is that I used to be Catholic (most of my life) and therefore I didn’t really grow up with the rapture idea protestants seem to be more familiar with. I don’t know exactly when I came across the idea, but I didn’t buy into it. I’ve never seen the “Left Behind” series or anything. Once I started studying Scripture though, even before I ended up becoming Christian, I later did wonder whether this idea was backed up by Scripture so it was one of the topics I investigated. What I found though, to me, did not sound like a good thing. It’s actually kind of creepy and ominous, so I don’t know how people don’t see this. Is it really just me? Okay, let’s dive in. First of all, in the end times there is supposed to be a time of tribulation. Now, apparently there are at least 4 major eschatological views that theologians have. Don’t ask me what they are or mean. I know it includes pre-millenial, omnilennial, post-millential, post-trib, pre-trib, and so on and if you know the terms then go give yourself a sticker. I’ve only been briefly introduced to them and I don’t think I fit into any of those categories. For all we know, they could all be wrong. Let God be true and every man a liar right? Even me here, but let’s continue. Tribulation. Turn to Matthew chapter 24 and you’ll find the following quotes. “… the love of many will grow cold. But the one who perseveres to the end will be saved” (verse 12-13). “… at that time there will be great tribulation, such as has not been since the beginning of the world until now, nor ever will be. And if those days had not been shortened, no one would be saved; but for the sake of the elect they will be shortened” (v. 21-22). Nowhere does Jesus mention people being “raptured” away. He says that the days of the tribulation will be shortened for the sake of the elect, the people that will be saved in other words to go live with God forever. God’s people that happen to be alive at that point in time will not be spared and will have to endure to the end. So where does my sudden judgment idea come from? Let’s look a little deeper. Luke chapter 17 confirms the above points and adds to them. “As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be in the days of the Son of Man; they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage up to the day that Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all” (v. 26-27). “Similarly, as it was in the days of Lot: they were eating, drinking, buying selling, planting, building; on the day when Lot left Sodom, fire and brimstone rained from the sky to destroy them all. So it will be on the day the Son of Man is revealed” (v. 28-30). So far, we’ve established that when Jesus returns, it will be like in the days of Noah and Lot. People were going about their business as usual, and then they were destroyed. That is a sudden judgment. God is very patient with us, not wanting anyone to perish but everyone to be saved, but just like in those times, one day our time will run out. Flood, fire and brimstone, bad things, and now people think we’ll be “raptured” like it’s a good thing? Logically, that’d be like saying okay in this bag of MnM’s maybe I’ll pull out a Skittle this time? No, that’s a bag of MnM’s and this is what God is saying, a sudden judgment. At least it seems that way to me. Not convinced? Let’s keep going. Going back to Matthew 24, Jesus is talking about Judea having to flee to the mountains after the “desolating abomination” is standing in the “holy place” when he says, “a person on the housetop must not go down to get things out of his house, a person in the field must not return to get his cloak” (v. 17-18). This mean’s God’s people are still on earth and fleeing. If we turn to Luke 17, we are told the same thing. Basically, the person “must not return to what was left behind” (v. 31). Verse 32 tells us to “remember the wife of Lot.” When Sodom and Gomorra were judged, God told Lot not to look back. His wife disobeyed and was turned into a pillar of salt. Yet another sudden judgment. Remember Ananias and his wife? When they tried to steal from the early church lied about it instead of repenting and confessing, they suddenly died. Or remember when somebody who was not consecrated or ordained to touch the ark of the covenant touched it as they were transporting it and they suddenly died, scaring even David for a while so that he didn’t take it into the city with him for a few months. God sometimes judges people suddenly, that’s not a new idea though the “prosperity gospel” preachers that think “God is love” only seem to have forgotten these things. Where is people’s fear of the Almighty Lord? Luke then records that “on that night there will be two people in one bed, one will be taken, the other left” (v. 34) and the same applies to the women grinding. I think this is one of the Scriptures that the Bible talks about people twisting to their own destruction, but again, keep reading to the end. Anyway, if one is taken and the other left, then why tell the one left behind not to look back? The disciples ask where the person is taken. Why would they ask “where?” in reference to the person that stayed behind? They stayed where they were, either on the housetop, in the field, in bed, grinding, wherever they happened to be. The disciples had no need to ask where the person left behind was. That’d be like me saying I went to the library with my brother, and then I left him there. Why would you ask where I left him if I just told you I left him at the library? You’d more likely want to know where I went after (or why I would leave him, maybe he needed to study and I’d pick him up later but that’s irrelevant). The curious disciples asked about where the people were taken. And what did Jesus say? Did he say they’d be in heaven with His Father, receiving their well-earned reward? No. He said, “Where the body is, there also the vultures will gather” (Luke 17:37). Another tough saying from Jesus. No, I don’t think they are enjoying cotton candy in the clouds. I think those “taken” were judged suddenly like those people in Noah’s flood story and the Sodom and Gomorrah folks in the Lot story. This more logically follows the tone and theme of the rest of the passages, and if you’re still not convinced, it’s even a reference to passages in the Old Testament! Briefly going back to Matthew, it says “Wherever the corpse is, there the vultures will gather” (Matthew 24:28). What does that mean? Let’s look at the Old Testament. 1 Kings 14 talks about Jeroboam whom God exalted as king, but who did not keep the commandments and instead worshipped other “gods.” God says that “when one of Jeroboam’s line dies in the city, dogs will devour him; when one of them dies in the field, he will be devoured by the birds of the sky” (v. 11). A little further, it says that king Baasha also “did evil in the Lord’s sight, imitating the conduct of Jeroboam” (1 Kings 15:34). So this king gets the same consequence with the dogs or “if he dies in the field, he shall be devoured by the birds of the sky” (1 Kings 16:4). Being devoured by birds is a bad thing. The left behind person wouldn’t be devoured if they are supposed to be fleeing without looking back. The “taken” person must be the one devoured, and if they are being devoured, then their body is not being treated as a temple of the Holy Spirit but as a carcass of meat. As if these two examples aren’t enough, if we go further back to the book of Deuteronomy chapter 28, we see that God has consequences for those who forget him and don’t “harken to the voice of the Lord” (v. 15). “The Lord will put a curse on you… for the evil you have done in forsaking me” (v. 20). The cursed “will become a terrifying example to all the kingdoms of the earth” (v. 25). Remind you of *ahem* Noah or Lot and their contemporaries? Anyone? And, surprise, “your carcasses will become food for all the birds of the air and for the beasts of the field, with no one to frighten them off” (v. 26). How would you like to be eaten by birds and beasts? *Gulp* Anyone weird enough to think that might be some sort of “honorable” death also has to take into account that God calls these flesh-eating birds “loathsome” and they are not to be eaten (see Leviticus 11:13-18), at least in the OT though I don’t think we eat them even today. Anyway, if the bodies that become food are part of the plan to set an example to the rest of the nations, then again I see a parallel here to the end time bodies of the “taken” being used for the ones “left behind,” aka the church that will suffer during the tribulation, to not forget God even then. Again, I don’t see how these things can fit into the popular idea of the church being raptured. Jesus doesn’t just randomly quote stuff, there is always a deeper meaning behind his words. And while initially the words may sound dismissive, random, or just downright confusing, Jesus is most definitely pointedly answering the disciples in a way that, as usual, is left to the hearer/reader to understand. It implies we must be familiar with the Scriptures. If not, then get familiar. Seek, study, and see whether these things are so. I’ve also heard the idea that only some people will be left to endure the tribulation while others are “raptured” away if they’re good enough, but doesn’t that sound like a works-based salvation idea? How good do you have to be to earn being raptured away? I’ll come back to this point in my conclusion and why I think Satan loves this idea. And again, what about the birds Jesus mentions eating the carcasses? Who is being eaten and why? Explain it to me if you see it differently, but I don’t see it. Then there’s people that will bring up the being caught up in the clouds verse. I think when Paul says this, it is referring to when Jesus returns. This would be after the tribulation, not before. When he returns, every eye will see and it will be sudden like lightning. And if we’re literally “caught up” or not (if it’s figurative?), I don’t know but I don’t see it mentioned or hinted at in these other passages. There’s exegesis, which is where you take what the text says and interpret it based on what it says about itself. This is what we should all be doing and what I’ve tried to do here. Let Scripture interpret itself. Jesus quoted the Old Testament? Then let’s go see what it has to say, right? Then there’s eisegesis, where people interpret a text based on their own preconceived ideas and try to make it say something it doesn’t. Like growing up with a “church rapture” idea but again, I don’t see this actually backed in Scripture. What do you think Satan would get more use out of? People thinking they’re “safe” and “always saved,” living a “comfortable” or “happy” life and one day they’ll be “raptured” away from all life’s troubles? Or that we actually have to examine ourselves lest we fall, sometimes we will suffer in this life, and there will be tribulations we must endure until we are with God? The latter is actually Biblical. In the first case, I think people would get lazy and rely on false comfort. They would think being a Christian means you’ll never suffer and one day God will take them away from the tribulation meant for everybody else but them because they are a “good person” and God “loves everyone.” In reality, we know Scripture says the road to salvation is narrow, but the way to destruction is wide. And imagine if people were raptured, all the people “left behind” that would get depressed or angry and lose their faith or hope in God because it didn’t happen the way they thought. The world isn’t full of Job’s that say God gives and takes, let’s praise Him “in the storm” anyway. Especially not now in the “high self-esteem,” proud millennial generation that more often than not calls to mind the word “spoiled”…. It may not be a popular idea, but I think this “Left Behind” idea serves Satan’s agenda, not God’s. Use Scripture to convince me otherwise. But I think it’s yet another of Satan’s lies, so let’s stand with God’s truth and then nobody will be shocked when the church isn’t raptured away from their troubles. Like Paul and Silas singing in the jail cell, may we keep singing praises to God no matter what persecutions, trials, or tribulations we face. Even the great tribulation, if we live through it. Unlike those that say “come Lord Jesus,” which I sometimes feel when I see all the corruption, innocent deaths, and countless evils in the world… I pray, Lord have mercy and patience with the world and with us as we lead more souls to You before Your return. Comments are closed.
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