Sorry...you are wrong. As I pointed out to another FRiend: We can certainly debate the timing of the event in 1 Thess 4...and 1 Cor 15....and I could spend a couple of hours on the phone showing you how the two events (this event and the actual second coming) have to be different. HOWEVER...that is not the point.
You are saying: THERE IS NO RAPTURE.
That is absolutely false. Even if, as my post-trib brethren believe, this event occurs AT the time of the second coming...and even if this event IS the second coming, as you say it is...it is STILL a rapture. Why?
Because, in context and with scripture supporting scripture (1 Cor 15)..."We shall not all sleep...but we shall all be changed." AND..."Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up..."
Now...the word RAPTURE is simply from the latin word for "caught up"...rapiemur.
So...you are saying there is no "rapture"...yet all theword "rapture" means is "caught up"...and IN CONTEXT (you bold letters)...it means CAUGHT UP ALIVE. Right?
That's a rapture. That's a catching up. Even IF it is the second coming...it still is a rapture because 1 Thess 4:17 says "CAUGHT UP" and the word in Latin is rapiemer and people just transliterate it "Rapture."
When was the last time you called Jesus...Iesu? When was the last time you called Jesus...Yeshua? If you call Him Jesus MORE than you call him Yeshua...then you are also transliterating a name. It's a translation of a word found in scripture...NOTHING MORE.
The timing of the event is where the debate comes in...but to say the event doesn't exist is to deny the words "CAUGHT UP"..."rapiemer."
Belief in a rapture as you may envision one, or as Tim LaHaye has indicated he envisions one, or as Darby envisioned one, or as any dispensationalist innovation envisions one, is certainly not a necessary condition for salvation. And as most dispensationalists envision one, it logically presupposes a third coming (at worst) and a two-stage second coming (at best). THIS contradicts the words of Jesus in the timeline of events He set forth.
Belief in the resurrection is, on the other hand, necessary. There are no linguistic gymnastics required for that.
I'm Orthodox, friend. I speak English and I call Him Jesus, or Lord.
As far as transliteration goes, I'd be much more concerned with what the scriptures say in Greek than Latin. “Being caught up," or some derivative of the word - arpagisometha (ἁρπαγησόμεθα) in Greek - is used 13 times in the New Testament. And not until Darby and the Plymouth Bretheren was the vision put forth as accepted by so many now. As a matter of fact, the 3rd Ecumenical Council (Ephesus, 431) denounced millennialism as a "deviation and a fable."
So that's where I'm coming from.
EXCELLENT, WELL PUT POINTS.
THX.