- Are We in the End Times?
- Are You Ready for the Rapture?
- Is This the Judgment?
- Are the Works of God Being Displayed in Us?
When our daughters were young, they each had a small electric four-wheeler. These things had an accelerator pedal, and the farther down you pressed it, the faster the car would go. You braked by taking your foot off the pedal. Our girls would ride all over our backyard on those things. Little brother, unfortunately, was too small to ride.
The only problem was that he disagreed with that. One day Kim asked me where he was. I had no idea. I looked outside, and there he was, standing on a four-wheeler (because he was too small to sit on the seat and still hold the handlebars), with his full weight on the accelerator, zooming across our backyard with a big smile on his face. I ran as fast as I could and snatched him off the four-wheeler just before it crashed into our fence. He looked at me with a huge grin and said, “Again!”
In my previous post, we began looking at the answer to the question, “Are we in the end times?” While we’re not there yet, I did mention that the next end times event will be the Rapture. So what is the Rapture?
The name “Rapture” comes from 1 Thessalonians 4:17, where the Bible says that we will be “caught up” or “snatched up.” The word means exactly what I did to our son that day when I snatched him up off of that four-wheeler. You could say that I “raptured” him. When the Bible was translated into Latin, they used the word “rapio” for “caught up,” and from this word we get the term “rapture.”
Two passages in the Bible speak about the Rapture. We’ll start by looking at 1 Corinthians 15:50-53:
I tell you this, brothers: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality.
Back in verse 35, Paul acknowledges the questions, “How are the dead raised, and with what kind of body will they come?” Here’s a summary of how Paul answers those questions.
Our current bodies, dead or alive, cannot enter eternal life (v. 50). Our bodies are perishable and designed only for our temporary life on this planet. When a believer dies, his body remains here, and his spirit enters into the presence of the Lord (James 2:26; 2 Corinthians 5:8). This, however, is only a temporary, incomplete situation.
At some point, the spirits of believers will be reunited with their physical bodies, but these bodies will be changed into eternal, imperishable bodies designed for eternity (v. 51). The Rapture, the return of Christ for His church, will be marked by a trumpet sound, and in an instant, the physical bodies of Christians who have died will be raised, united with their spirits, and transformed into imperishable, eternal bodies. Christians who are alive at the time of the Rapture will never experience physical death, as they will instantly receive their eternal bodies (vv. 52-53).
That’s what we know from the Corinthians passage. God allowed Paul to give us a little more insight in 1 Thessalonians 4:14-17:
For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep. For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord.
Now with this passage added to the first one, along with a few others, we can piece together the events of the Rapture:
Jesus will descend from heaven, where he has been preparing a place for us (John 14:1-3; 1 Thessalonians 4:16). The spirits of all believers in heaven will descend with him. He will shout as he descends, and this will be a command for the bodies of the dead to rise. We will also hear the voice of an archangel and the sound of the trumpet call of God. The entire event will happen instantaneously (1 Corinthians 15:52).
Jesus will physically resurrect the bodies of every Christian who has died (1 Thessalonians 4:14-15), regardless of the condition of the body. The perishable remains of their dead bodies will be raised, changed into imperishable bodies, and joined together with their spirits, which have descended with Jesus.
Then those believers who are alive on the earth at the time will be “caught up” or “raptured,” and will meet Christ in the air. This is when the living will receive their imperishable bodies (1 Corinthians 15:51,53; 1 Thessalonians 4:14-17).
At that point, and remember that all of this happens in an instant, all believers of all time will be in our imperishable, eternal physical bodies. We will then ascend with Jesus to heaven, where he has prepared a place for us (John 14:3).
There will not be a single believer left on the planet. You can imagine what this will be like for those who are left here. The sudden disappearance of millions of people around the world will be shocking and, in some cases, catastrophic. This will set the stage for the end times. Just like I did with my son, believers will be “snatched up” before the four-wheeler of life hits the fence known as the Tribulation.
This is incredible news for Christians! Look again at how Paul ended his paragraph in 1 Thessalonians:
Therefore encourage one another with these words. (1 Thessalonians 4:18)
If we are already in heaven when the Rapture takes place, we get to come down with Jesus to be reunited with brand new bodies. I think mine will be tall and muscular with a full head of hair! (I’m not overweight. My doctor recently told me I’m the perfect weight for a person who is 6’ 2”. Unfortunately, I’m only 5’ 7”.)
If we are alive on earth at the time of the Rapture, we’ll be gathered by Jesus and given our new bodies without even going through death! Amazing! Either way, we will be in our new bodies with Jesus for all eternity!
Remember, there is nothing in prophecy that must happen before the Rapture takes place; it could happen before you finish reading this sentence. Or this one. The point is, the Rapture can happen at any time.
If that frightens you, remember that Paul wrote this to comfort his readers, not to scare them. His main point was to remind us that the dead and the living are going to be reunited one day. All of us have lost loved ones, and we feel the pain of that separation. But if our loved ones were believers, and if we are believers, then that pain of separation is only temporary. The grief is real, but it’s grief with hope. We will be reunited with our loved ones! If you’re already a believer, you have no reason at all to fear. You will be with Jesus for eternity. Period.
If you’re afraid, now is the time to make sure you are ready. Have you accepted Christ as your Savior and Lord? If you have not, is there any reason not to do that right now? Simply admit to God that you have sinned against him and that you need His forgiveness, accept God’s forgiveness of your sin, and commit to His leadership in your life.
You can say to God, in your own words, something like this:
“Dear God, I know that I need forgiveness. I admit that I’ve done wrong, and I deserve to pay the penalty for that. I believe that Jesus died to take my punishment, and I choose today to accept your forgiveness and your leadership and control of my life.”
For believers, how should we react to the news of the Rapture?
Live as if each day is your last. Live a holy life (2 Peter 3:11). Be ready if Jesus comes today.
At the same time, live as if he will not come in your lifetime. Live with eternity in mind, attempting to serve God in such a way that the impact of your life with outlive you.
Jesus is coming for his children.
Maranatha!