Spiritual Growth #1 – “The Rapture”

In Part or Full?

Sunset off Kohala, Courtesy D. Smith

Let’s see where Christians who think “like a child” make mistakes because we know Scriptures “in part”, versus Christians who have the capacity to see the whole Scriptural picture because we “know fully”(1 Cor. 13:11, 12 NIV). A good place to start is the rapture event:

For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive 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 Thess. 4:16, 17).

Many charismatic churches and their leaders bring the people great hope and joy for the last days. We rejoice that we’re going to be caught up to meet the Lord in the air, and be with him forever. And while these phrases are all true, our “in part” assumption will also bring us great shock. Shall we let believers who “know fully” explain to us “why”?

Clearly, God has set the rapture in Divine Order. That means, like a domino effect, everything happens one after the other. The last domino does not fall before the previous ones do. To support this premise of Divine Order, we look at five key words in the rapture verses: FIRST, THEN, and TOGETHER WITH THEM.

The dead in Christ rise FIRST. That means we who are alive will witness a rare phenomenon—thousands upon thousands of dead Christians will rise (anistēmi, stand up) from wherever their corpses, ashes, or bones are; only THEN will the rest of us who are alive be raptured—TOGETHER WITH THEM! See that? Rapture includes both living and dead Christians who are “in Christ” (Gal. 5:24; 2 Cor. 13:5). So, if we don’t see our Christian grannies, or uncles, or dads, or moms rise (stand up) from their places of rest first, then it’s not time for our rapture because Scripture says we are caught up together with them!

The full news is that “the dead in Christ” will participate in the rapture, too. Aloha!

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Scriptures are taken from the Holy Bible, King James Version, Cambridge 1769. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Scriptures marked “NIV” are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved