The Rapture / an essay

Freerepublic | 6/12/2014 | Self

[Shadowstrike]

It’s called the word of God, the Bible, the LETTER He wrote to His children.

Not trying to be sarcastic, but when you read His word, do you actually understand it?

If you believe in the Rapture, I’m sorry then the answer is no.

And, if you’ll give me a few days to get the scriptures I’ll show you the proof you seem to need. Sad that it needs to come from man, when Father said it in His letter. THAT should be enough.

[MHGinTN]

FRiend, I have been studying His Word for forty plus years. But it will be interesting to see the twists Catholicism or some other ism has put in the way of believers. The truth of the Rapture has been a topic debated among believers since 100 AD. It has been sporadically debated ever since. I'm sorry you're sad that I am obeying God's push to stir this issue up because the hour is so late. Perhaps in compiling your 'proofs' you will come to see His Truth.

[MHGinTN]

BTW, you might take a look at my profile page, since you have none to show us.

[alexander_busek]

He backed it up with what he believes is evidence. If you have a problem with that, find the courage to say so in detail, rather that taking drive-by pot shots. Otherwise you'll be mistaken for a punk.

Your point is well taken!

I should have written:

Yeah, nothing else is required: certainly not evidence which would hold up under critical scrutiny (e.g., cross-examination in a courtroom, or with a panel of unbiased experts applying Aristotelian logic).

Regards,

[Elsie]

Ya get what ya pay for!

[Elsie]

No one can tell if I misspell a word when I’m talking...

[Elsie]

and where it talks of the Air, it means in a breath.

Thanks for straightening THIS out!

Ya just can't TRUST them bible translators!

[Elsie]

Not trying to be sarcastic, but when you read His word, do you actually understand it?

Said Phil to the eunuch.

[Cap'n Crunch]

That’s just one reason I don’t pay.

[Cap'n Crunch]

The more I think about ‘ya get what ya pay for’ the more I wonder. Hope I’m not reading too much into that statement, sometimes I do but I think my points will be valid none-the-less.

Anyway, are we only entitled to post if we pay? How do you know if I pay or not? Just a guess on your part? If you do pay does that mean that one is entitled to post whatever they wish and cry to a moderator when someone posts something the payer doesn’t like?

In light of some of the things I see posted here, was what I posted that egregious?

Personally I thought comparing Jack Chic tracts to these type of postings was spot on.

[MHGinTN]

"In the twinkling of an eye we will be changed into SPIRITUAL BODIES." IF this is an example of your comprehension level, I am not encouraged that you will offer us something of truth. John writes, "Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is." {1John3:2}

Can a 4 dimensional being see the fully a higher dimensional being? Your answer is found in Daniel Chapter five, where a hand reached into Belshazzar's world and wrote on the wall at palace party central. No one saw the arm to which the hand was attached, nor the body or where it stood, for the dimensional reality of that messenger was greater than the people in the room. But John tells us we shall see Him as He IS, for when He appears we shall be made like Him so we can see His higher dimensional state which could appear and disappear and leave a rock tomb without rolling away the stone. [Recall the angel rolled the stone away for the women, so they could see that He was no longer int here.] Jesus Himself refutes your assertion when it was raised by His disciples as they clamored that what was before them in the closed and shuttered Upper Room was a ghost. He asked for something to eat. Does a spirit eat?

Luke 24:36-43

And as they thus spake, Jesus himself stood in the midst of them, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you.

But they were terrified and affrighted, and supposed that they had seen a spirit.

And he said unto them, Why are ye troubled? and why do thoughts arise in your hearts? Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself: handle me, and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have.

And when he had thus spoken, he shewed them his hands and his feet.

And while they yet believed not for joy, and wondered, he said unto them, Have ye here any meat?

And they gave him a piece of a broiled fish, and of an honeycomb. And he took it, and did eat before them.

[The Grammarian]

I cite Ephraem the Syrian because we have negative neybobs on these threads that insist the notion of Rapture is a nineteenth century creation.

I don't think that's it so much as dispensationalists mean something different by 'rapture' than the rest of us do. For example, to Catholics, 'rapture' is most often taken to mean "prophecy that takes place while the senses are suspended in ecstasy" (New Advent encyclopedia).

Ben Witherington explains it in a couple of Seven Minute Seminary segments on Seedbed.

[MHGinTN]

I'm sorry, but this man starts with a false assertion. Matthew 24 is not a proof text for the Rapture. It is teaching by Jesus dealing with THE DAY OF THE LORD. 1Thess4:13-17, John14, 1Cor15:51-53, AND 1Thess2:1-9, these are the texts to focus upon for the removing of the Holy Spirit indwelling Believers during the Church Age. To even use the phrase 'Church Age' is to affirm there are dispensations. Jesus reinforces the truth of dispensations by telling His disciples in the Upper Room discourse that He is instituting a New Covenant. The old covenant was a performance based contract where God said to Israel 'if you will do this, I will do thus'. The New Covenant says I WILL DO and by believing in Me you shall have the Life of God's Promise. It is not a performance based covenant, it is a Proclamation of judicial absolution, that In Christ there is now therefore no condemnation. God loves us not 'id we perfrom' not 'because' we perform, but because He loves us 'anyway' ... 'For while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.' 'That ALL who believe shall have eternal life.'

The Rapture is theologically sound because The Restrainer is taken out of the way BEFORE the lawlessness can come in upon the Earth in full. The mystery of lawlessness was already working when Paul wrote his letters. BUT for the man of sin, THE lawlessness to be reveal the believers in whom dwells the Holy Spirit will be removed, Raptured from the Earth, Departed from their standing against the lawlessness. 2 Thess2:3

Thanks for the ling, but no thanks. Conflation such as that man is using causes confusion or abandonment from searching in a Berean Way.

[MHGinTN]

And you do not see how Ben is completely discombobulated in his stumbling explanation? Shall I enumerate, or are you sold on the errors Ben offers. ... And don’t quote me his CV, what he is saying is in error, so how much grist after his name means nothing to the leaven he is offering.

[MHGinTN]

Zing

[Talisker]

I should have written: Yeah, nothing else is required: certainly not evidence which would hold up under critical scrutiny (e.g., cross-examination in a courtroom, or with a panel of unbiased experts applying Aristotelian logic).

LOL, yeah, just like all religious beliefs are, including yours.

Right?

So what religion have you found that does all that? Because I'm sure you wouldn't be a part of anything less.

Right?

[The Grammarian]

John Fletcher uses the term 'dispensations' as well, but that doesn't mean that that 1700s-era Anglican Methodist was a premillennial dispensationalist.

Also, as to Matthew 24, Darby's Synopsis of the New Testament says of it that it specifically refers to "the last days, the last three years and a half before the judgment which will be suddenly poured out at the coming of the Son of man"--the dispensationalist's tribulation--and that Jesus will "gather all the elect of Israel from the four corners of the earth" before Jesus gathers the Gentiles together too. Sounds like Darby is using it as a prooftext for a post-tribulation rapture, to me. Likewise, websites like PreWrathRapture.com say that the idea of a 'pre-wrath' rapture depends on their interpretation of Matthew 24.

[MHGinTN]

Se post # 74, where Sky Pilot posted a very useful chart which details from Bible passages the differences in The Rapture and the Second Coming.

Sky, this is so far the second time I've used that handy chart. Thanks again

[MHGinTN]

Matt 24, Mark 13, and Luke 21 do not pre-figure the Rapture of the Church. In the Church Age there is no distinction between Jew and Gentile. Jesus in the Olivet Discourse answered the specific question asked of Him by His Jewish Disciples, regarding the Temple and Jerusalem, possibly because they were still trying to fathom how the throne of David would be accomplished if this great city is destroyed.

We can reason this because the Discourse starts with them pointing to the Temple and the magnificence of Jerusalem and Jesus responds to this specific focus. In the Rapture passages, God offers to the believers a comforting prophecy, not to assure them they will not be persecuted, but to assure them that they have not missed the Departing of the Bride before THE WRATH of God is poured out upon the lawlessness.

[MHGinTN]

"... that Jesus will "gather all the elect of Israel from the four corners of the earth" before Jesus gathers the Gentiles together too." This cannot be referring to the Church since during the Church Age there is no distinction between Jew and Gentile. Likewise the separating of sheep and goats has nothing to do with The Church. When Jesus comes back to set foot on the Earth, his elect come with Him down from Heaven. The elect have to be taken into Heaven before the Second touch down don'tchaknow. If they are taken away anytime after the Tribulation begins then this would violate the clear Biblical doctrine of immanency, which omits there being any signs of the event to occur. The parables Jesus gave, like the one of the virgins and the oil in their lamps, support the snatching away suddenly.