quote:
I appreciate what you are saying and can practice those things. It isn't foreign to me, I've just needed the encouragement. You make it sound easy in a sense. In any case I can certainly be practicing it while you address the prophecies and I would like you do that.
Okay, then for some objective relief, let's consider one passage you mentioned.
For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are living, who are left remaining unto the coming of the Lord, shall by no means precede those who have fallen asleep; (v.15)
Because the Lord Himself, with a shout of command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of God, will descend from heaven, and the dead in Christ will rise first. (v.16)
Then we who are living, who are left remaining, will be caught up together with them in the louds to meet the Lord in the air; and thus we will always be with the Lord." (v.17) (First Thessalonians 4:15-17)
1.) It is true that Paul says
"WE" here. But his speaking is general. We who are of the Body of Christ. All believers in Christ are a part of this general great
"WE".
2.) This rapture is not the secretive pre-tribulation rapture. This is the public, spectacular, rapture of the majority of the believers at the end of the great tribulation. The Lord's coming as a thief in
Matthew 24:36-42 is a sudden, secretive, rather concealed rapture BEFORE the commencement of the great tribulation. This rapture of
First Thessalonians 4:15-17 is at the
"last trumpet" which should be the seventh trumpet at the end rather than the beginning of the great tribulation. This is the rapture described in
Revelation 14:14-16 described as the
HARVEST meaning the MAJORITY of the crop. This is tumultuous, loud, public, spectacular rather than sudden, secretive, surprising, and designed to rescue saints from the hour of the trial before the start of the great tribulation.
3.) Since this is the rapture of the majority rather than than the remnant, by this time the remnant of minority have already been raptured.
This is probably the meaning of the words -
... we who are living, who are left remaining
If Paul merely meant we who are living it would have been adequate for him to write
"we who are living"/ He adds something ...
" ..., who are left remaining". This may mean that SOME who were LIVING were previously raptured. And those who were left behind are those who are both living
AND LEFT REMAINING.
For example, in
Revelation 14 the
FIRSTFRUITS are seen having been raptured and standing before Christ in the third heavens in
verses 1 through 5. Then the events of the great tribulation are summarized in
verses 6 through 13. Beginning with
verse 14 we see the public reaping of the majrity HARVEST. FIRSTFRUITS taken before the great tribulation is followed BY the great tribulation. Then those who are ALIVE and LEFT REMAINING as a HARVEST are reaped at the conclusion of that time in
verses `4 through 16.
Thus EARLY ripened crop is taken. And LATTER ripening HARVEST are those who include the ALIVE and LEFT REMAINING.
The early rapture is pre-tribulation. It will include a minority of those asleep who died ready and those who are alive at that time who are watching and ready.
The latter harvest rapture of the majority is at the end of the great tribulation. It consists of those asleep who died not ready and those who are alive and left remaining whose time is then to be taken up.
The use of the word
WE is just Paul speaking generally. Both FIRSTFRUITS and HARVEST comprise an all-encompassing
WE in that sense.
The PLACE to which the two raptures take place are also not the same. The former pre-tribulation rapture is to the throne in the third heavens
(See Revelation 12:5). But the rapture of the majority Harvest is to the AIR
(First Thess. 4:17 which means that by that time He has made His journey FROM the third heavens down to the close proximity to the earth's surface in the air.
™ Version 4.2
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