RAPTURE NOT IN THE BIBLE

I Think It's a Deception by the "Beast"

{https://www.learnreligions.com/what-is-the-rapture-700643}

I wrote about the Rapture previously at acts15church.substack.com/p/rapture-fraud-v-reality. I came across another good source below. I've had the suspicion for a long time, which that previous post/transcript of a Rumble video supports, that the idea of the Rapture was made up by worshipers of the "Beast", who has a plan to deceive Christians into joining in worshiping "the Beast" instead of God, by setting up an End Times Armageddon with a Zionist fake Israel. I think that's why the ruling class, starting with Napoleon, if not earlier, has wanted to recreate the state of Israel. It's supposedly a homeland for the Jews, but most of the people there seem to be Khazars and atheists. When the New Testament talks about Israel and the New Jerusalem, it's talking about the faithful followers of Jesus and the Kingdom of God on Earth after Satan, i.e. corruption, is destroyed. It's not talking about the old kingdom of Israel. The following is a transcript of a video, called The Rapture is NOT in the Bible, at youtube.com/watch?v=IjJwFZipGpE.

RAPTURE & REVELATION. People believe all kinds of things that aren't actually in the Bible. For example, the forbidden fruit in the Garden of Eden is never identified as an apple. The Bible never says it was a whale that swallowed Jonah. The Gospels don't say how many wise men visited Jesus after his birth. And the rapture, well, that's actually not in the Bible at all. Let me explain. For many Christians, especially in the United States, the rapture is believed to be an indisputable doctrine of our faith, right up there with the virgin birth and the resurrection. Many have been taught that someday, in the twinkling of an eye, every true Christian will suddenly disappear, caught up into heaven with Jesus with only a crumpled heap of clothes left. The rapture is how Christ will rescue his people from God's judgment of the earth, but everyone who's left behind will face the terrors of the tribulation. It makes for a great story. That's why it's been made into so many books and movies over the years. The Left Behind series alone has sold over 65,000,000 copies. With many reaching #1 on the New York Times bestseller list. The evangelical industrial complex of movies, books, radio stations, mega churches, television and conferences has so thoroughly disseminated the rapture narrative and made so much money doing so, that few people stop and ask themselves the most important question of all. Is the rapture actually in the Bible? So let's look at the evidence first. When thinking about the future, the return of Christ and the final judgment, many Christians turn to the Book of Revelation, and you'd expect to find the rapture there, too. After all, Revelation is like the Portland, OR of the Bible. It's where you find all the weird stuff: prostitutes riding dragons; creatures covered with eyeballs. But one thing you won't find there is any mention of the rapture. Not a word.

MAT 24, LUK 17. Instead, there are two other New Testament passages that rapture advocates go to. So let's look at each one and find out what they actually say. The first is Matthew 24. In this chapter Jesus is talking to his disciples about being vigilant for his return because he will come suddenly and unexpectedly. And verses 40 and 41 are where we get the famous rapture language of being left behind. Jesus said two men will be in the field. One will be taken and the other left. Two women will be grinding with a hand mill. One will be taken and the other left. Well, there it is. Just like in the movies, one person gets raptured to heaven and the other is left behind to face the tribulation. Well, not exactly. You have to read these verses in their context because what comes right before is really important. As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage up to the day Noah entered the ark, and they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away. And that is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man: two men will be in the field, one will be taken and the other left; two women will be grinding with a hand mill, one will be taken and the other left. Jesus compares his second coming to Noah's flood. In that story, Noah and his family were the ones left behind, and everyone else was taken by the Flood. So when Jesus says when he returns, one will be taken and another left behind, the one who's taken isn't being raptured into heaven. They're being taken by God's wrath and judgment. It's actually the person who's left behind who's safe, like Noah. There's a parallel text in Luke 17. That makes this even more clear. Jesus says, I tell you, on that night two people will be in one bed, one will be taken and the other left. Two women will be grinding grain together, one will be taken and the other left. Where, Lord?, they asked. That is, where were they taken? He replied, Where there is a dead body, there the vultures will gather. Jesus is talking about being taken by death and judgment. After all, dead bodies and vultures doesn't sound much like heaven. So the very verses where we get the Left Behind language isn't about the rapture at all. And the crazy part is that even rapture advocates admit this How? Lindsey's best selling book, The Late Great Planet Earth, which before the Left Behind series probably did more to popularize the rapture than anything else, never uses Matthew 24 or Luke 17 in its argument. And theologians of Dispensationalism ... agree that Matthew 24 is not about the rapture.

1 THES 4. So if Revelation doesn't mention the rapture and Jesus doesn't mention it, where does it come from in the Bible? Well, let's go there to the one passage that the entire rapture theology hangs on. This is it. This is the big one. The only place in the entire Bible that seems to talk about the rapture is First Thessalonians 4. "According to the Lord's Word, we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord Himself will come down from heaven with a loud command, with the voice of the Archangel, and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever." OK, let's break this down. The Thessalonians wrote to Paul because they were worried about their Christian sisters and brothers who died. What would happen to them when Jesus returned, they wondered. Paul's responding to that emotional pastoral question in verse 15. He talks about the coming of the Lord. The Greek word Paul uses here is parousia, and in the ancient world it referred to a formal visit by a king or dignitary. Here's how it worked. When a royal delegation is approaching a city, a messenger would blast the trumpet. Then the citizens of the city would flood outside the gates and line the road, often shouting and celebrating the arrival of the king or dignitary. Then they would accompany him through the gate into the city. And by the way, the most honored citizens of the city, the VIP's, would greet the royal delegation first. All of this was a very common, very familiar custom. In fact, we see this in the Bible itself. In the Gospels, when the people of Jerusalem found out Jesus was approaching, they took palm branches, lined the street and met him outside the city gate. They shouted and celebrated and then followed him into Jerusalem. Today we commemorate that event on Palm Sunday. That's Parousia. That's exactly what Paul is referring to in First Thessalonians Four with one big difference. Paul says King Jesus isn't coming on a road to take possession of a city. He's coming from the heavens to take possession of the whole earth. Paul says that when Jesus returns as the true King, a trumpet will blast and all his people will meet him in the air. And here's the cool part. Paul says the dead in Christ will rise and meet him first. Why? Because they're the VIP's. In other words, you don't have to worry about your dead sisters and brothers. Jesus is taking care of them and they get a place of honor when he returns. Then the rest of us will meet Christ in the air, and together we will escort him to the earth, and we will reign with him here. 1st Thessalonians 4 isn't about the rapture at all. It's about Jesus returning to rule over the earth. And that would have been obvious to Paul's ancient audience, who greeted delegations and dignitaries this way all the time. But we've made it into a rapture text because this custom of Parousia is completely foreign to us.

PAROUSIA V. RAPTURE. But there's more. A few more important details support this reading of the passage. First, Paul says this will be a very obvious and public arrival, with a loud shout and a trumpet call. He says something similar in First Corinthians 15:51 and 52. When Christ returns, a trumpet will sound. And the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will all be changed. It's a big, loud, obvious event. But that's not the rapture. The rapture {according to Dispensationalists} is supposed to be a secret, leaving the world confused about what happened to everyone. Second, rapture advocates say that only believers who are alive are taken into heaven to avoid the tribulation on the earth. After all, the dead don't need to be raptured from the earth. They're already gone. But here Paul says both the living and the dead will meet Jesus in the air. This is a resurrection event. The dead will be raised. It's not a rapture event. Finally, third, Paul ends by saying we will be with the Lord forever, but he never says where. He will be with the Lord, rapture advocates say, will be with him in heaven. But Paul is careful not to use the word heaven here. Instead, he uses a different word, saying we will meet Jesus in the air, a word which means the lower parts of the sky. It's not the word for heaven. And that makes sense. Because this is a scene of Jesus returning to the earth where we will reign with him, not one of believers being taken away from the earth to heaven.

SUMMARY. So let's summarize what we found. The rapture is nowhere in Revelation. The famous taken and left behind words of Jesus in Matthew 24 are actually about judgment, not the rapture. And the big one, First Thessalonians 4, is about Jesus' Parousia, his royal return to earth and the resurrection of believers, not our secret escape from the tribulation. Here's my point. Like the apple in Eden, or Jonah's whale, or the Three Wise Men, sometimes we need to rethink what we think we know about the Bible. We need to slow down and ask if we're putting too much authority into our traditions and assumptions rather than the actual words of Scripture. The rapture sells a lot of books and it makes for exciting movies and maybe it was even part of your journey toward faith. But no matter how popular it may be or how sentimental it is in your Christian community, if the rapture is not in the Bible, then it absolutely needs to be left behind.

{MY COMMENT. I don't believe the Bible is infallible, so none of its writers were either, including Paul. Only God is infallible. The "word of God" in the Bible doesn't mean the Bible, because the Bible wasn't written until the time of Moses. So the "word of God" didn't come to Abraham as a book. It must have been a voice or an inner voice. Even if "word of God" meant the Bible, books can't be infallible. Anyway, when Paul said the living and dead faithful will meet Jesus in the air or in the clouds, he likely didn't mean literally, but figuratively, similar to the ancient Parousia tradition.}