Put your six gun away, Yosemite, you are firing at the wrong guy, I agree with you...mostly, except for your take on the word “rapture.” It IS in the Bible, in the Latin translation of 1 Thess. 4. It does not take place before the tribulation, it takes place in one event at the end of the tribulation. Post-trib rapture, not pretrib rapture.
"It IS in the Bible, in the Latin translation of 1 Thess. 4. "
Let's read
1 Thessalonians 4:14-18 again:
"For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them which sleep [are dead] in Jesus will God bring with Him.
"For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent [precede] them which are asleep [are dead].
"For the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, and with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first:
"THEN [and not one second before!] we which are alive [Paul wrote to the church, the saints] and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord" (1 Thessalonians 4:14-18).
If you're talking about the
" parousia", that Greek word is found in many scriptures concerning the Second Coming of Christ.
In Strong's Exhaustive Concordance, number 3952 it's rendered:
"a being near;
advent;
often, return-spec. of Christ to punish Jerusalem, or finally the wicked: aspect, coming, presence."
There are three different Greek words which are used relative to Christ's return to this earth.
They are:
(1) parousia, as already defined;
(2) epiphaneia, or, the "Epiphany," the Advent (arrival) of Christ, meaning "a manifestation, appearing, brightness,"
and, (3) apokalupsis, meaning "disclosure, appearing, coming, lighten, manifestation, be revealed, revelation."
Matthew 24, Mark 13, and Luke 21 are the focus of that :Coming" .
But "Rapture" is NOT in the Bible.