The church in America especially, has adopted an unbiblical position concerning the rapture. The dominant view that the church gets called up to heaven before the tribulation begins on the earth cannot be supported from the New Testament. Many have been taught that Jesus comes back twice. First, he comes to gather the elect and take them back to heaven, then seven years later, he returns to establish his kingdom on this earth. That perspective cannot be supported by the Olivet discourse, the gospel of John, 1 Corinthians 15, 1 & 2 Thessalonians, and the Revelation of Jesus Christ. Yet 1 Thessalonians 4 is the passage that is quoted to support the rapture as a separate and distinct event. This is the view of pastors like John MacArthur and others. The popular website www.gotquestions.org illustrates the dominant position.
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 prophesy, 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.
Anyone who will let the Scripture speak for itself will not adopt
the view that the Rapture and the Second Coming are distinct events. The position that can be most easily
supported by Scripture is the truth that the rapture of the saints is one of
the things that happens when Jesus returns to establish his kingdom of this
earth. And yes that does mean that
some believers will experience tribulation.
The word rapture (like Advent) has a Latin origin, but rapture is
found only once in the Latin New Testament.
Whereas the Latin word Advent with its various endings (-us, -um, &
-u) occurs throughout the New Testament to describe either the first coming of
Christ or his Second Coming or the arrival of someone else. And advent is
consistently a noun. Nouns represent
persons, places, entities, events, things, etc., whereas verbs describe an
action. Thus, we can say Jesus is coming
again, in which case we are describing the action of coming or we can say 'the
coming of the Lord' in which case we are describing the actual event. While this seems technical, it is critical to
understanding the text. The Greek, Latin,
and the English language all make clear distinctions between nouns and
verbs. So in 1 Thessalonians 4:15-17 we
see Paul is describing the Second Advent of the Lord Jesus Christ, and one of
the things that will happen during the Advent is the rapiemur (the rapture) of the saints or the catching up or the
gathering of the saints.
|
1 Thessalonians 4:15–17 (Clementine Vulgate
[Latin]) |
1 Thessalonians 4:15–17 (English Standard Version)
|
|
15 Hoc enim vobis dicimus in verbo Domini,
quia nos, qui vivimus, qui residui sumus in adventum Domini, non præveniemus eos qui dormierunt. 16 Quoniam ipse Dominus in jussu, et in voce
archangeli, et in tuba Dei descendet de cælo: et mortui, qui in Christo sunt,
resurgent primi. 17 Deinde nos, qui
vivimus, qui relinquimur, simul rapiemur
cum illis in nubibus obviam Christo in aëra, et sic semper cum Domino erimus. |
15 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. 16 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. 17 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. |
When you see in the Scripture the clear distinction between the adventum, the noun and rapiemur, the verb, I can't understand
how the church ever adopted such an unbiblical position as to take 'the
catching up of believers into the air' and separated it from the Second Advent
of Christ.
Let's imagine for a moment that we are the church at Thessalonica,
and all we have is the book of Matthew in Greek and a letter from Paul written
to us (the local church).
And we notice that both Paul and Jesus use the same Greek word to
describe the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ—the word παρουσία or parousia. Now would we conclude Jesus and Paul
are talking about the same event or a different event?
Jesus uses parousia
four times in the discourse on the Mt. of Olives, and Paul uses parousia four times in his first
letter to us (church at Thessalonica). Jesus refers to a 'loud trumpet call'
and Paul talks about 'the sound of the trumpet of God.' Then Jesus says the
angels will gather the elect (Mt 24:31) and Paul says ‘we who are alive, who
are left, will be caught up.' Are Paul and Jesus talking about the same event
or two different comings? If the only reasonable conclusion is Jesus and Paul
are talking about the same thing—how did the church develop an eschatological
position that the rapture is distinct from the Second Coming occurring before
the tribulation? When Jesus said:
"Immediately
after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the
moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from heaven, and the
powers of the heavens will be shaken. 30 Then will appear in heaven the sign of the Son
of Man, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the
Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. 31 And he will send out his angels with a loud
trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end
of heaven to the other. (Matt 24:29-31)
This is not a gray or a debatable interpretative discussion. There is only one Second Coming. And this Second Coming happens after 'the
tribulation of those days' according to the Son of God. The next text www.gotquestions.org presented
as an authoritative passage creating a distinction between the rapture and the
Second Coming is 1 Corinthians 15:50-54:
I tell you this, brothers: flesh and
blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the
imperishable. 51 Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all
sleep, but we shall all be changed, 52 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. 53 For this
perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on
immortality. 54 When the perishable puts on the imperishable,
and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is
written: "Death is swallowed up in victory."
The problem with referencing this passage is it doesn't reference
the rapture. The text says nothing about being raptured (in the Latin) or
caught up (harpazō in the Greek)
or 'gather his elect.' But Paul does refer to the 'last trumpet,' so it is
very reasonable to conclude that Paul is once again talking about the parousia since he uses that Greek word
in 1 Corinthians 15:23. And indeed, no one would consider the 'last trumpet' to
be a trumpet call that sounds before the 'loud trumpet call' of Matt 24:30 or 'the
trumpet of God' in 1 Thessalonians 4:16 or the 7th trumpet of
Revelation 11:15.
Words matter. What was written by the biblical authors determine
the systems of theology we form. We
develop our understanding of the end times from the New Testament's words, and
we are not free to randomly ignore what the actual text says or the connection
points easily established by comparing one portion of Scripture with
another. Finally, study 2 Thessalonians
2:1-12 especially vs. 1, 3-4, & 8 and Paul removes all doubt concerning the
unbiblical notion that the rapture is distinct from the Second Coming in 1
& 2 Thessalonians. See the comparative analysis of the Olivet Discourse to 1
& 2 Thessalonians in the chart below.
