Bear with me please and consider the Lord’s judgement when he wiped out the Earth, but saved Noah and his family.
Consider Lot and his family, and how the Lord had to “remove” them before he could destroy Sodom & Gomorrah.
Jesus refers to these two exact events while describing the time of his coming (in the clouds for His Church). He always removes His people before Judgement.
Refer to Matthew 24:37-39 & Luke 17:28-30. You make some excellent points about persecution. We have that in this life. But there is a huge difference between worldy persecution and God’s Judgement, which the last 7 years of this age is. God cannot allow His Church to suffer Judgement with an unbelieving world.
The Church has the most marvelous destiny of any group of humanity to ever exist.
Bear with me please and consider the Lord’s judgement when he wiped out the Earth, but saved Noah and his family....
Jesus refers to these two exact events while describing the time of his coming (in the clouds for His Church). He always removes His people before Judgement.
Noah and family in the arc is described as a baptism, which is to say, a symbolic judgment ordeal. They were carried safely through judgment.