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What is the difference between the Rapture and the Second Coming?

Question: "What is the difference between the Rapture and the Second Coming?"

Answer: The rapture and the second coming of Christ are often confused. Sometimes it is difficult to determine whether a scripture verse is referring to the rapture or the second coming. However, in studying end-times Bible prophecy, it is very important to differentiate between the two.

The rapture is when Jesus Christ returns to remove the church (all believers in Christ) from the earth. The rapture is described in 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 and 1 Corinthians 15:50-54. Believers who have died will have their bodies resurrected and, along with believers who are still living, will meet the Lord in the air. This will all occur in a moment, in a twinkling of an eye. The second coming is when Jesus returns to defeat the Antichrist, destroy evil, and establish His millennial kingdom. The second coming is described in Revelation 19:11-16.

The important differences between the rapture and second coming are as follows:

1) At the rapture, believers meet the Lord in the air (1 Thessalonians 4:17).

2) At the second coming, believers return with the Lord to the earth (Revelation 19:14).

3) The rapture occurs before the tribulation (1 Thessalonians 5:9; Revelation 3:10).

3) The second coming occurs after the great and terrible tribulation (Revelation chapters 6–19).

4) The rapture is the removal of believers from the earth as an act of deliverance (1 Thessalonians 4:13-17, 5:9).

5) The second coming includes the removal of unbelievers as an act of judgment (Matthew 24:40-41).

6) The rapture will be secret and instant (1 Corinthians 15:50-54).

7) The second coming will be visible to all (Revelation 1:7; Matthew 24:29-30).

8) The rapture is imminent; it could take place at any moment (Titus 2:13; 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18; 1 Corinthians 15:50-54).

9) The second coming of Christ will not occur until after certain other end-times events take place (2 Thessalonians 2:4; Matthew 24:15-30; Revelation chapters 6–18).

Why is it important to keep the rapture and the second coming distinct?

1) If the rapture and the second coming are the same event, believers will have to go through the tribulation (1 Thessalonians 5:9; Revelation 3:10).

2) If the rapture and the second coming are the same event, the return of Christ is not imminent—there are many things which must occur before He can return (Matthew 24:4-30).

3) In describing the tribulation period, Revelation chapters 6–19 nowhere mentions the church. During the tribulation—also called “the time of trouble for Jacob” (Jeremiah 30:7)—God will again turn His primary attention to Israel (Romans 11:17-31).

The rapture and second coming are similar but separate events. Both involve Jesus returning. Both are end-times events. However, it is crucially important to recognize the differences.

In summary, the rapture is the return of Christ in the clouds to remove all believers from the earth before the time of God’s wrath. The second coming is the return of Christ to the earth to bring the tribulation to an end and to defeat the Antichrist and his evil world empire.

[Some changes to formatting of article, but all wording is the same...]

Everything you've written or reposted here came as a result of, not the cause of, the adoption of the recent teaching that there is a distinction between the second coming and the rapture.

It is begging the question. It is an attempt to create a distinction where none exists. It is an example of a secondary hypothesis being invoked to rescue a failed primary hypothesis. They are all assertions. There is no difference demonstrated at all.

There is nothing in I Thess 5:9 to indicate a pretribulation rapture. There is nothing in Revelation 3:10 to indicate a pretribulation rapture. There is no teaching anywhere in the New Testament that indicates that believers are to be whisked out of the world for deliverance from tribulations or troubles or anything of the sort.

In fact, Jesus warned that the believers would undergo tribulation, that the love of most would grow cold as a result of the increase in wickedness, that they would be persecuted, hated by all nations, and put to death because of him and that because of this many would fall away from the faith.

Jesus warned the believers to persevere unto the end. He warned them that when they saw the desolation that caused abomination they should drop everything and take off for the hills. He didn't say, "Go up on your rooftops and wait for me to snatch you away." Instead he said, "Don't even bother to go back into the house to get something you've forgotten. Don't come back in from the fields. Pray that it won't take place in the winter or on the Sabbath. It's going to be dreadful for pregnant women and nursing mothers." He said that if those days had not been cut short, no one would survive but that they'd be shortened for the sake of the believers.

Right after that he told them to specifically watch out for folks telling them that Jesus is secretly appearing here or there, that those who teach this are false Christs and false prophets. Following this he said that when he returned, it would be like the lightning flashing in the east being visible in the west. It wouldn't be a hidden thing.

There is no teaching anywhere in the New Testament that the gathering of believers to Jesus in the clouds following the resurrection of the believing dead at the last trumpet would be secret. In Matthew, Jesus says that at his return at the blast of the trumpet he gathers the believers after the tribulation, not before. He gathers them after every living person on earth has seen the signs of his coming in the sky and has known exactly what it meant. Now, just on the basis of identifying features between what Paul said in I Corinthians and Jesus said in Matthew, the putative secret rapture could not be before the tribulation because it happens at the last trumpet. Gee, if this pre-trib rapture last trumpet is a distinct event from the sound of a trumpet at the appearance of Jesus in the sky seen by every living person on earth that happens after the tribulation, then it couldn't very well be the last trumpet, but the next to the last trumpet. And the first resurrection described in Revelation would be, instead, the second resurrection.

You're engaging in the theological equivalent of Bill Clinton saying, "It depends on what the meaning of is is." Like Bill Clinton, it wraps you even deeper into tangles of contradiction and ad hoc meanings and special pleading, like the poor souls who say that "the blessed hope" refers to a pre-trib rapture and "the glorious appearing" refers to the second coming. If you're a believer who happens to be alive at the return of Christ, it will because you have passed through the great tribulation without being beheaded for your faith. To give you courage not to fall away, this is why he said, "See, I have told you ahead of time."

At any rate, it should give you pause to consider that the teaching of a secret appearance of Jesus before his public arrival visible to the entire planet is something Jesus warns about as being the teaching of false Christs and false prophets.