Active
Not tonight my friend...I'm done for now. My head wants to explode and I'm having a difficult time thinking...Goodnight.
Rapture is false Doctrine
Active
No doubt you remember that the New Covenant was written in Greek. The problem comes up when we translate it to English then back into Greek..Do we use the same words they used? Do we translate things based on our experience, in our times, and our culture? No wonder we get confused.
1 Thessalonians 4:16-18
16 ὅτι αὐτὸς ὁ κύριος ἐν κελεύσματι, ἐν φωνῇ ἀρχαγγέλου καὶ ἐν σάλπιγγι θεοῦ, καταβήσεται ἀπ’ οὐρανοῦ, καὶ οἱ νεκροὶ ἐν Χριστῷ ἀναστήσονται πρῶτον,
17 ἔπειτα ἡμεῖς οἱ ζῶντες οἱ περιλειπόμενοι ἅμα σὺν αὐτοῖς ἁρπαγησόμεθα ἐν νεφέλαις εἰς ἀπάντησιν τοῦ κυρίου εἰς ἀέρα · καὶ οὕτως πάντοτε σὺν κυρίῳ ἐσόμεθα.
18 ὥστε παρακαλεῖτε ἀλλήλους ἐν τοῖς λόγοις τούτοις.
Loyal
Here's what I do with Bible passages with tricky translation issues. First look up the passage in an online interlinear Bible.
That gives an idea of how the words fit together. Then follow the links on the key words, see where and how the word is used elsewhere in the scriptures.
This hardly makes me a scholar of Greek, but it's enough to get a better sense of the original languages and to make an informed judgement on what others say.
That gives an idea of how the words fit together. Then follow the links on the key words, see where and how the word is used elsewhere in the scriptures.
This hardly makes me a scholar of Greek, but it's enough to get a better sense of the original languages and to make an informed judgement on what others say.
Member
I'm new to end times prophecy. Though I arrived at a post trib, pre wrath belief, after believing the pre-Trib lie for 40 years, I always got stuck on the final verse (listed below) regarding the harvest at the end of the world. It would support the video's no rapture interpretation, because the tares are gathered for burning, thrown into the fire, and THEN, the righteous are seen left on the earth in the Father's Kingdom. But then other verses say we will meet Him in the air. Oh well, back to the drawing board.
Mat 13:41 "The Son of Man will send forth His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all stumbling blocks, and those who commit lawlessness,
Mat 13:42 and will throw them into the furnace of fire; in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.
Mat 13:43 "Then THE RIGHTEOUS WILL SHINE FORTH AS THE SUN in the kingdom of their Father. He who has ears, let him hear.
Active
Unless, of course there IS one upcoming. I wouldn't even BOTHER with any "Prophet" that presents himself that way.
Member
Agree. One of those preachers, who called the rapture "our only hope", in a state of fear, is what made me question pre-trib, and do my own study to find out it's a lie. Jesus is our only hope!
I have to credit the evil leaders in my state, for beginning to persecute the church. They've driven me hard back to God, and into a deeper faith I never would have arrived at in the good old days.
2Ti 3:12 Yea, and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution.
Member
The 144,000 sealed Jews are following the antiChrist as their Messiah until he's revealed mid trib at the Abomination of Desolation to actually be Satan. He stops the practice of sacrifices in the new Temple (obviously, they still don't know Jesus is the Lamb of God sacrificed once for all). God opens their eyes and they see they were deceived by the antiChrist and run for their lives into the hiding place God prepared for the second 3.5 years, so Satan can't kill them.
So, if the 144,000 are deceived for the first 3.5 years, then in hiding for 3.5 years, who is evangelizing for Christ during those 7 years?
How could the secular, unrighteous Jews in Israel be converted if even the sealed ones don't know Jesus is the Messiah until they run into hiding?
Who is converting who if the church is gone, as you state?
(I believe the church is here for the 7 years because Jesus said He would return after the Tribulation).
Member
When Noah and Lot are taken, God's Wrath is immediately delivered and the unrighteous are destroyed. Noah gets in the ark and it starts to rain immediately. Lot is told not to turn around - I bet to protect him from being blinded by the light of the explosion God set off to incinerate those cities.
Why would God wait 7 years to deliver His Wrath? That is inconsistent with your two examples?
I think the church is confused about the difference between tribulation and wrath.
Revelation says God's Wrath is in 7 bowls which are poured out AFTER the seven years end - (Rev 16:1-17)
It also says God will give the power to Satan to make war, kill and produce famines, etc., for seven years, much like He gave Satan the power over Job, his family and land. Nothing of the horror that happened to Job was God's Wrath - it was all the devil.
The same will be true during the 7 year Trib.
Active
Interesting point. Where does it say the the wrath is seven years after the beginning of the tribulation period? It does not...Three and a half years after the tribulation starts comes the wrath...Why is God waiting so long? Because he's giving people one last chance. Like with Noah...It took Noah how long to build the ark? I find anywhere from 50 to 120 years....Lets say 50 years..ok? So anyway, the entire time Noah was building the ark, he was also preaching to the 'tourists' to repent and be saved. No That's not true...He did not preach...He did not call his neighbors to be saved.... but yes...the wrath is a part of the tribulation periond where from tribulation people begin to know TRIBULATION with !!!! Three and a half years into the tribulation....Don't stick around to see if I'm right.
Loyal
Some of what you're saying is Not Biblical. Look at Revelation 7:3 'until we have sealed the servants of our God on their foreheads. Then "I looked and a great multitude which no one could number , of all nations , tribes, people, and tongues standing before the throne and before the Lamb.... worshipping God. Those multitudes are those who came out of the great tribulation and washed their robes and made them white in the blood of he Lamb." So, No, they are Not following the Antichrist for those 1st 3 1/2 years of the tribulation time.
The purpose of those 144,000 was To evangelize the Jews still on the earth. Those multitudes Did come to Christ.
Member
- Rev 12:12 Therefore rejoice, ye heavens, and ye that dwell in them. Woe to the inhabiters of the earth and of the sea! for the devil is come down unto you, having great wrath, because he knoweth that he hath but a short time.
Member
How can the 144,000 preach Christ as the sacrificial Lamb of God while they're sacrificing goats in the Temple for 3.5 years? The 144,000 are following a political leader. When Satan enters that man's body mid-trib, and he is revealed as an imposter at the Abomination of Desolation in the middle of the 7 years, the 144,000 then run into the hiding place God prepared for them the last 3.5 years. They weren't preaching to anybody during the whole 7 years, they were following Old Testament law. I think it's obvious when the devil couldn't get the 144,000 sealed Jews (the woman, Israel) he went after the "remnant of her seed who have the testimony of Jesus Christ" which are the Church Saints.
- Dan 9:27 And he shall confirm the covenant with many for one week: and in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease, and for the overspreading of abominations he shall make it desolate, even until the consummation, and that determined shall be poured upon the desolate.
Rev 12:13 And when the dragon saw that he was cast unto the earth, he persecuted the woman which brought forth the man child.
Rev 12:14 And to the woman were given two wings of a great eagle, that she might fly into the wilderness, into her place, where she is nourished for a time, and times, and half a time, from the face of the serpent.
Rev 12:15 And the serpent cast out of his mouth water as a flood after the woman, that he might cause her to be carried away of the flood.
Rev 12:16 And the earth helped the woman, and the earth opened her mouth, and swallowed up the flood which the dragon cast out of his mouth.
Rev 12:17 And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.
Loyal
I've just been looking at the account in Genesis -- where do you find the 'from 50 - 120 yrs' --I don't see a time-line given. The assumption is that it took a long time To build the ark. There had never been rain and no had had built anything like an ark. So -- the assumption has been that during the time it took To build it, people were Probably asking questions to Noah and his sons. And he had a chance to share what God had told him to do. The people -- why do you refer to them as 'tourists'. They were living their lives just as we do. God's Word tells Us to repent, too. Actually we're not told any of the conversations he'd have with the others close by. But nowdays -- when something is being built, there's usually curiousity involved. Or we are sharing what we Are doing because it's important to us.
In the 'end of the day' - apparently no one believed anything that Noah and his family Might Have Been sharing. We picture the people seeing the water falling from the sky and Then they believe that something Strange was happening and Then they wanted to 'be saved' from the rising waters. But it was too late. They missed the opportunity Of the ark saving them.
So you're comparing That with the 'wrath of God during part of the tribulation period'???? Because God was disappointed that the people He'd created had turned really evil and decided to destroy all the wickedness -- except for Noah and his family.
Loyal
You've got your stories confused. It was Noah and his sons and wife with the flood waters.
It was Abraham and Lot -- Sodom and Gomorra -- being destroyed.
Or you're comparing the two incidences?!
I think People are confused with the difference between tribulation and wrath. Born again believers are assured of tribulation during their lives. The Wrath of God is for those who've rejected Him.
Okay -- you guys are referring back to the video.
The 144,000 are sealed when they are living during the 7 yrs. of tribulation -- they are evangelizing the Jews who were not previously accepting Jesus Christ as their promised Messiah. We Are told that multitudes Did accept Him as their Messiah at the end. We're Not told What they are telling/ sharing with those non-accepting Jews. They were Jews evangelizing other Jews. This is the 2nd chance for the Jewish people. The time of the Gentiles is over.
Just sharing my 2 cents worth.
Active
Do you remember when God sent His angels to take away Lot and His family before destroying Sodom and Gomorrah? Genesis 19
He took them away and after the city was destroyed by fire.
This passage explains God's way of dealing with certain situations. He remains always the same.
We don't know if the rapture will happen before the great tribulation or not. It probably refers to the very end when everything will be destroyed. This is the wrath that we probably speak about. It might happen then.
We don't know all the details, but I think it will happen.
Notice that before the Lord destroyed Sodom, Abraham asked Him if He was going to destroy the city, if there were righteous people there. Notice that, because there were not enough righteous people (except Lot), the city was destroyed. Genesis 18:23-33
The sin and iniquity was so much that there was nothing else to do there. He anyway sent for His angels to take away Lot from there.
The world we are living now in, is been kept only because there are still righteous people there (Christians redeemed by Jesus), even if they are few. But in the moment they will cease somehow to be, the end will come.
The Christians are like the salt of this world. One of the functions the salt is having, is to preserve.
He took them away and after the city was destroyed by fire.
This passage explains God's way of dealing with certain situations. He remains always the same.
We don't know if the rapture will happen before the great tribulation or not. It probably refers to the very end when everything will be destroyed. This is the wrath that we probably speak about. It might happen then.
We don't know all the details, but I think it will happen.
Notice that before the Lord destroyed Sodom, Abraham asked Him if He was going to destroy the city, if there were righteous people there. Notice that, because there were not enough righteous people (except Lot), the city was destroyed. Genesis 18:23-33
The sin and iniquity was so much that there was nothing else to do there. He anyway sent for His angels to take away Lot from there.
The world we are living now in, is been kept only because there are still righteous people there (Christians redeemed by Jesus), even if they are few. But in the moment they will cease somehow to be, the end will come.
The Christians are like the salt of this world. One of the functions the salt is having, is to preserve.
Loyal
Hi @Ivan Chamurliev, you're talking about the rapture doctrine as if it is a firmly established Biblical principle. But there is hardly any evidence in the scripture for anything like a rapture event.
Examine carefully the passages that are most often referred to in the rapture debate asking what the original writer was saying to the first readers and how it fits to their overall message.
Active
Hi Hekuran. I am just saying what the Bible states about the topic. We all the passages in the new testament speaking about something similar. Maybe because you don't find the word "rapture" in the Bible, you say that is not firmly established event. Ok, I just used this word, because I didn't know how else to put it, but looking at the scriptures, we can assume that something can happen and God could remove His elected ones.
Now, what we don't know is, if this will happen before or after the great tribulation and in which way it will occur, but the same is with some other parts of the scripture that we also don't know. They need to be taken by faith.
Loyal
Honestly, there is nothing in the Bible that indicates God will remove his people.
Loyal
1 Thessalonians 4:17
Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord.
Matthew 24:40
Then two men will be in the field; one will be taken and one left.