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Republished by Zero Lift-Off Only The Beginning
by Lawrence Morra for non-profit educational blog sharing purposes only.
I believe that this fine perspective and explanation offered to us by Jack Wellman is a very honest and fair assessment on the subject of Rapture in a relatively short concise piece, to perhaps settle the matter for some while for others it will serve as an impetus to search much deeper into as much of the Scriptures as it takes to further satisfy one’s quest to perhaps be even more definitive about End Time events. God bless you all and God’s love and peace fill you, in the name of Jesus Chris our Lord and Savior. Amen.
Where does the Bible mention the rapture? Is the rapture true?
What is the Rapture?
The word rapture comes from the idea that we will be “caught up” (Greek, “harpazo”) to be with the Lord before the tribulation comes. The words “caught up” come from the Greek and mean to “be taken by force,” almost as strong a word as kidnapping, so the rapture is a belief that Christians will be caught away in a secret coming of Jesus Christ Who will gather all believers to Himself. Some teach that He will take all of the believers out of the world before the Great Tribulation comes. In this way, Christians will not have to go through the tribulation, but some believe they will be raptured during the middle of the tribulation. Either way, many believe that the rapture is part of God’s secret wisdom where all believers will be removed from the earth, and then all “hell” literally breaks out on earth. There are also many who believe that the tribulation already came in AD 70 with the destruction of Jerusalem, including the temple, and that this was foretold by Jesus during the so-called Olivet Prophecies in Matthew 24. They believe this because Jesus said that “there are some standing here who will not taste death until they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom” (Matt 16:28), and that coming, in this case, was God’s judgment on Jerusalem, who as a whole, rejected Jesus Christ. For certain, all believers “wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come” (1st Thess 1:10), but not all agree on the rapture and the Great Tribulation or even if they are biblical. I hope I don’t shock you, but really, that’s okay.
Being “Caught Up”
How old is the teaching about the rapture? The roots of this belief go back to 1590 where a Jesuit Priest (Francisco Ribera) taught about a 3 & ½ year tribulation. The next reference is with the 17th century Puritans who believed in an escape from God’s wrath, so the man credited with this belief, John Nelson Darby (in 1827), had several others who held to this idea before he did, but these were in the minority. So has the rapture of the church always been taught from the very beginning? It doesn’t look that way from church history because of the roaring silence on this subject in the writings from the early church fathers. Some would argue yes because of the Apostle Paul’s writing 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” (1st Thess 4:15-17). Jesus and Paul have both said that no one knows when His coming will be. Paul wrote that “the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night” (1st Thess 5:2), the very same language Jesus used in describing His coming, and since it’s always night somewhere on the earth, this means He could come, day or night, for what’s night in one place is day in another. Those who believe in the rapture believe we won’t have to face God’s coming wrath (Rom 5:9), and speaking of the end, Paul says “We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed” (1st Cor 15:51), meaning some will not be dead at Christ’s appearing, but “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” (1st Cor 15:52).
Discrepancies
Some Bible scholars and theologians see some discrepancies about the belief that there will be a secret coming or secret rapture. For one thing, the angels said after Jesus’ ascended up to heaven, “This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven” (Acts 1:11), and the Apostle John wrote Jesus’ revelation to him, saying “Behold, he is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him, even those who pierced him, and all tribes of the earth will wail on account of him. Even so. Amen” (Rev 1:7). It would seem that “every eye” would by necessity mean everyone living on the earth at the time, but even those who have died (Dan 12:2-3). After Jesus gives His Olivet Prophecy, He concludes by saying “then they will see the Son of Man coming in clouds with great power and glory” (Mark 13:26). Right after every one will “see the Son of Man coming,” Jesus will “send his angels and gather his elect from the four winds, from the ends of the earth to the ends of the heavens” (Mark 13:27), so first off in this order; everyone sees Jesus coming in great power and glory, and then He gathers the elect (Christians) from all over the earth. This would seem to make the rapture pointless since if every eye will see Him, and then next, He gathers His church from all over the world, what is it about this that’s secret?
The Fullness of the Gentiles
Just before Paul wrote that all Israel will eventually be saved, he wrote that “a partial hardening has come upon Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in” (Rom 11:25). It is true that present-day Israel is not receptive to Jesus being the Messiah, so the hardening of the Jews is still occurring, so what is this fullness of “the Gentiles” that is to come? Is this when God will have saved the very last one He plans to save, and then the end comes? Is there a certain person who will be the last one to be saved and thus, fulfill the time of the Gentiles, and then all of Israel will finally be saved? This verse is not enough to suggest that conclusively. The fullness of the Gentiles could be when their time is up, meaning we’re still in the time of the Gentiles and that will end with the literal, physical return of Jesus Christ. Jesus did say, “Every eye shall see” Him.
Is it a Non-Essential?
I have seen so many different beliefs on the rapture and the tribulation that all views cannot possibly be true, and since they can’t all be true, some of these views must be wrong. What we do know is that there are not many paths to God, and Jesus is just one of those many paths. Not true. He declared He is the only way to be saved (Acts 4:12). We can’t even come to the Father except through Christ (John 6:44), which absolutely excludes all others. Since there are so many conflicting views about the rapture, we should show grace to those who don’t agree with us. It’s unwise to divide over something that doesn’t affect our salvation. We can be wrong about the tribulation and still be saved. We can be off on the tribulation but still enter the kingdom. We don’t have to know all mysteries to know how to be saved, because the main things are the plain things, and these main things are the non-negotiable things (Rom 10:9-3). If we believe that Jesus is not God, and He was only a man or a prophet, we’ve got the wrong Savior, so you must have the right Jesus (having the right Savior) or you will not be saved. Let us show grace, longsuffering, and patience with those who believe differently than we do about non-essentials (like tongues), and just agree to disagree, however let us all agree on the facts that Jesus was born of a virgin, is both God and Man, lived a sinless life, and was crucified and rose again on the third day, and died to reconcile us back to God. Today He lives to intercede for the saints. These are the essentials that we must all agree on or we can’t call ourselves Christians.
Conclusion
There is often a lot of tension during Sunday school and Bible studies over these issues, therefore, I think it’s wise to avoid teaching those things which tend to divide, and focus on the things that tend to unify us (Acts 16;30-31), because on these essentials, we can all stand in agreement and stand our ground. It is only on this solid Rock we must stand…because all else is sinking sand.
Article by Jack Wellman
Jack Wellman is a father and grandfather and a Christian author, freelance writer, and pastor of Central Christian Church in Lincoln, KS & also a Prison Minister. He did his graduate work at Moody Theological Seminary. His books are inexpensive paperbacks that are theological in nature: “Teaching Children The Gospel/How to Raise Godly Children,“ “Do Babies Go To Heaven?/Why Does God Allow Suffering?,“ “The Great Omission; Reaching the Lost for Christ,” and “Blind Chance or Intelligent Design?, Empirical Methodologies & the Bible.”
Jack has written 1062 articles on What Christians Want To Know! Read them in the archive below.
If you like what you’re reading, you can get free daily updates through the RSS feed here. Thanks for stopping by!
More on this subject here: What is the Tribulation Period?
Lawrence Morra
Zero Lift-Off 
Hi Lawrence !
Thanks for re-publishing this.
It is so true : ‘the main things are the plain things’.
We all agree that Christ will come again, and whenever that is, (for only God knows the time) we need to be prepared. 🌷🤗
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Hi Sally! 🌷🤗 Of course I knew you would get it or where I’m coming from in regard to what irked me about Christians trying to outshine one another when they are all dirty rags and none are worthy, no not one! This was the reason I even went to the bother of looking for a balanced view about Rapture and make a post because some people were arguing on another social media not with me but just differing on this issue with each other and so I thought let me try to help them all come together; good luck with that! This matter of Christian’s picking on other Christian’s might be getting worse or in any event isn’t changing. Back in February I had this to say again to a similar lot of people calling themselves Christian’s! This is just a fragment of what I said, “I personally think God is about as fed up with us as He should be and we should have never allowed what’s happening; but He is a Kind and Merciful God that is giving all that rope! I plan to not waste the opportunity to carry my weight or my end of the bargain to at least not have him say those words to me; so tread carefully all of you; is all I can say in fair warning. Remember, “None are worthy, no, not one.” The words I was referring to are, “And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, you that work iniquity”
You can see I had a couple of additional lengthy comments to make here today and it still boils down to something you and I touched on before many weeks ago, of how will this look to those poor lost souls out there who have had no Church or a fouled up life and perhaps were inspired by God’s Holy Spirit or a kind word, to really look at this thing called Christianity that Jesus Christ supposedly God, who came here to save us from ourselves; what will these people think to see bitter arguments and BS flying back and forth and not the message that Jesus was all about; will they be happy and say on boy I found my home I want to know more, and, please you nice Christians teach me, I need so much help and you must be the right people to seek help from!!! Piss me off is all this does; the world is going to hell in a hand basket and I see Christians from one denomination or another pulling the others apart for not agreeing totally with them! Oh some people are so damn righteous and I don’t dare be in their presence; they would surely cause me to turn to ash having the veil of truth and judgment around them! What A-holes!
Can I not be made to feel so upset in this present Helter-Skelter Madhouse!
Oh, the Devil is getting his due, in spades! Pray incessantly and get on your knees to Jesus and never be like Kaepernick that heathen taking a knee with now the whole of the NFL bowing to NWO forces from Satan!
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Hi Lawrence !
Yes, I agree with you so much !
The Christian bickering all stems from pride, and we know how God feels about that.
Two ladies at our church were bitter rivals because they each sought to be the ‘holiest’ in the church.
Their quarrels were well known to all of us.
One year, during Lent, they argued fiercely about the colour of the altar cloth.
Lady ‘A’ liked the cloth, but Lady ‘B’ was very upset, because it was not purple enough, she named the colour ‘cranberry.’ And after much bickering, finally Lady A got her own way.
A sad note, after all the arguing and vying for attention in the church, the church is now permanently closed.
It did not survive priest betrayal, parishioner fighting, and then closure due to ‘the virus’.
As you rightly say, none of us is righteous, and when we become aware of this, we develop humility, and the Lord can then give us his grace.
It is upsetting for sure, when Christians should be pulling together, they are in fact, harassing each other. No wonder non-Christians are not lining up to attend any church.
However, I think about the arguing, and I feel compassion for those ‘Christians’ who are desperately trying to tell us that they are ‘right.’ 🌷🤗
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Hi Sally…this part of your response immediately brought deep emotion into my thoughts and heart as i wanted to even cry. This is the same old failing that has cursed mankind since the fall yet it seems so many would rather be blind to these simple truths and move forward into the Holy Light of our Lord with Grace.
“As you rightly say, none of us is righteous, and when we become aware of this, we develop humility, and the Lord can then give us his grace.” Yes, humility is very lacking in this modern world today and I think especially because of technology and pop culture people have become more arrogant building up pride in their hearts rather than the other way around and wanting to serve God and fellow humans, the children of God. We’re in the full blown ME culture and the culture of death too, so for many persons the inner dialog has become the world revolves around me not even the Son of God; but because we know if someone makes Jesus truly the center of their life allowing Him to be front and center continually there is no way that pride could be such an issue or stumbling block! Perhaps your local Church is an example of what God is doing and will do much more as the weeks and months pass during this turbulent unprecedented time; of His taking away what we won’t appreciate and respect, especially the things of the greatest importance and the Church is at the Apex of those things on earth that we should hold sacred! God did smite and chastise in the Bible and I’m sure He is now too. Very sad to me, but, of course the message of hope and love prevails; only lessons learned in such a hard manner isn’t really necessary and does so much harm in the process, also, so much time and energy wasted that could have been modeled into good works and deeds that the Lord desires for us to do in this world while we have time. Time is always running out and much more for some than for others. 🌷🤗
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Hi Lawrence !
As we are told in John 15, that God purifies his church by pruning the parts that produce no fruit.
As you rightly say, it is a ME culture today, with people being proud of their own opinions.
However, I remind myself, on my daily walks to the Duck Pond, where the ducklings are now as big as their moms, that God makes no mistakes. He asks us to persevere, trust, and obey. 🌷🐕🤗
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Hi Sally! 🌷🐕🤗 Oh I been persevering, had to fight the whole damn corrupt system on my own with no one willing to roll up their sleeves and fight with me when I was attacked by the same system I worked to preserve all of my adult life but found it was polluted and rigged with very nefarious persons not unlike what the Middle Ages were like in some ways with a King and dukes and earls along with all of the ruling nobles that could do as they please but crush anyone they decided was a threat to their power. The only reason I got through all the being my own lawyer and out thinking all of them was God made sure I had a couple of the right people in key places or facilitate the need for them to work with me as I battled for years in that nightmare. The stress level alone was enough to give a person a stroke but somehow I’m still able to walk talk and chew bubble gum all at the same time. Must be God has something in mind for me to complete for Him or I would be gone several times already. There was a time in Chicago when I was a very young man on foot hitching to Minnesota which is nothing like it was back then compared to now as we all know from the news coverage lately! In the late to wee hours I was about to walk through a dark tunnel alone but God made sure I stopped dead in my tracks or I would have been dead before I got to the other side of that tunnel. There are reasons some very good ones why I tell people to get their minds right or won’t take their guff because I know from whence I speak that they are inviting calamity and ruin with some pretty stupid ideas or so much arrogance they need to be slapped upside the head to wake up. Not my job, but, I do try to warn people seeing as how I have this medium to say what I mean and mean what I say; here people can gain from what is said from experience or they can ignore; their choice! The old adage comes to me that my Dad or a couple of uncles would tell me; “Wise Up!” Another that just popped in my head which is way before my youth or was even way before I was born, but, think I know why it came to mind is, “Shiver me Timbers;” and that is related to that tunnel and what stopped me from a horrible fate. 🌷🐕🤗
Thanks for flushing up my memories! 😁😉🕊✝️🕊🙏 🐕
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Hi Lawrence – Yes, there are many twists and turns through life.
The Lord was watching over you when you were travelling, for sure.
Yes, people who ignore the Lord are inviting calamity, as you say, and we sure need God’s wisdom on this earthly pilgrimage.
There are whales here now, Lawrence. They are swimming back and forth here behind the house, and sometimes they breach and jump high in the air and land with a loud splash. 🤗
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🤗 Sally thanks…first for sharing the visual image of the Whales and breaching!!! That is something I have to watch from shore in that place or one like it where it it’s the natural migratory path or grazing territory to see the awe of the picturesque raw natural beauty of those magnificent leviathans of the deep that God created, OMG I really freak in my head thinking of watching that scene someday if god wants me to see it because I do think Whales are so beautiful and intelligent but they are so huge and graceful too!
Talk about a Divine Intervention I have not only witnessed it more than once but it was me being intervened and more than once, a few of them were quite extraordinary and blew my mind in a way but not upsetting just so glad that God is really there and allowed me to know He is in charge and didn’t want some bad things to happen to me, I’ll cry if i think too long about it because i always think I’m not so special and oh my God why would you be so kind to me!!! Now I am starting to cry! I can change the topic a moment, i just made a kettle of Rotini multi-colored pasta and I do make my own sauce from scratch but saw this glass jar of interesting sauce in a shop I was in recently so I had to try it, far from a cheap commercial Ragu and the like, this is called The Vine and you said a little while ago how God prunes the Vine, and I had no idea I would be making this, hadn’t even connected to this jar until now being VINE! It was nearly 10 US dollars but I like quality so I pay, no worries there after all like Mother always said, “you are what you eat!” This is a Butternut Squash Sauce with tomato of course added and all pure organic no GMO and the finest ingredients so for a quick meal this is awesome. I tasted the sauce before I got back here to send this comment and it is delicious so I’ll be buying a few more jars to keep on hand probably this weekend when I go out to meet a lady I met when out shopping last week; to have coffee and shop around again. Anyway, the sights and sounds you have going on there are phenomenal and glorious, so going through the winters is worth it to have the spectacular awakening and presence of all that nature during the comfortable season. I was just talking to a younger man who lives nearby sharing a large home with his fiancées aunt and he and I were just saying right now the hot muggy sweltering heat is not fun but it won’t last here and say down in Florida where I almost moved many years ago staying at a friend’s home in Sarasota; it feels like this many long months there and I tried to beat the heat going out at the crack of dawn to jog or hike and it was wicked hot immediately, so you can’t enjoy the outdoors very much unless you stay in a pool or inside with the AC on and not enjoy it at all. At least in our 4 season domain in the coldest months we can dress warm and stay out for extended periods which is when I do the longest several mile hikes with my dog, right now she can’t take all this heat so I took my mountain bike out earlier and get a workout, but, not too long because it is deadly to overheat in this 100 degree or more temp and humid conditions. In our cold season its nine to get in after a few hours outdoors and have a hot chocolate with marshmallows and watch a movie anyway!
Oh, I just had sautéed some mushrooms the other night so I add that to my pasta dish to have the grated parmesan cheese and Italian bread with it, but, my pooch loves Italian too, so I don’ add the mushrooms to hers and she is good to go! Keep me posted on those whales and let me know if they do anything that surprises you even more if that is possible, LOL!!! 🤗😊😄
🌷🐕🤗 I’m thinking about Moby Dick now, and, what a great old classic movie they made with Gregory Peck!!! I have it and may watch that later tonight! I don’t like the killing the whale thing at all, but, it was how people lived and they needed the whale blubber for oil lamps and other things! But, I like the movie for its dramatic tension or drama as well the great actors and cinematography but in the end the Whale wins out and that makes me happy! Those guys messed with the best and lost! Ha, ha.
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Hi !
That butternut squash sauce with tomato sounds delicious. ‘The Vine’ sounds like a very gourmet brand.
It will be nice to meet that lady you met, and go shopping again.
I miss shopping in a larger centre. For specialty items we travel to St. John’s, which is our capital city.
The pasta that you made sounds delicious. Pasta is great comfort food.
Your mom was right about the importance of good nutrition.
There was a beautiful pink sky this evening, so hopefully tomorrow will also be lovely.
It is pleasantly warm here in the summers, probably the average daytime temperature is around 75 degrees Fahrenheit.
Lawrence , you would also find the Puffins that live on the cliffs around here very amusing.
The Puffins are so funny looking, and they move their wings like hummingbirds.
When I visit the colony of Puffins, I am amazed again at God’s sense of humour. 😁
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😁 Oh Sally…I must have forgotten you have Puffins up there and I always wanted to see them in the wild too! Very cute! Think, I could sit and watch them for hours snapping away photos or video.
Actually the weather is moderate there and delightful because you have the built in AC or thermostat of the cooler massive ocean water moderating all around so it can’t heat up too bad there! The sky sounds like it was a magnificent sight and I would expect your weather to be pleasant tomorrow too! Mom being old school and very homeopathic not taking any meds for anything all of her adult life which thank God I took after her in that department but I had to take several after my industrial injury but weaned off them with the help of some homeopathic remedies and balancing my autoimmune system again which got all out of whack totally making me get ill often but almost killing me at one point and my even having anaphylactic shock to a slight food allergy that mushroomed into a life or death reaction. I was again blessed that God made sure just weeks before what seemed on a whim bought a bottle of liquid Benadryl which I drank down and reversed what would have been a complete closure of my trachea in minutes and suffocation obviously and I was alone so nothing else would have saved me.
The pasta was great and me and the dog loved it! The Vine is a very high end gourmet sauce so good to have some on hand when in a pinch for a quick whip it up dinner! Yes the funny thing about this lady is we can talk like a breeze and she is much younger than me but we both are so much into the will of God and our purpose for being here outlook. We only met because the timing of everything that day up to the actual talking introduction was on a connecting dots rhythm and we both were not wearing masks lol! She had one but took it off at the self-checkout and then draped it over her mouth on the way out but before near the exit door took it right off again. So, we both talked about how this thing happened and what should be done such as my idea to form a coalition which some conservative government officials in Washington are talking about already too; to not mandate anything but if people want to wear one it is their choice but nobody should be forced and I told this new friend I will not be forced by anyone to do anything of the kind. Give and inch and they take a yard Sally; remember that one? They may very well be testing people and if they all give in then when it comes time to chip us all most will be sheeple! I ain’t no sheep and I won’t be chipped or bullied I’m a free human being and I abide by good and proper law but not CONTROL, that ticks me off big time! I also believe in exposure over time building up immunity or that herd immunity concept. I like how the American forefathers put together such a great Bill of Rights and The Constitution stating how we are all endowed with God given inalienable rights and they should not be infringed upon or can’t be denied! I know first-hand what it’s like for a government to have government overreach and violate major rights which they did to me and ruined some property abusing me as a human being and as a good honest tax paying CITIZEN! They at that point gave more rights to illegals and pissed on me! If I was a left fringe group member like BLM or ANTIFA they would have had the kit gloves on and cut me checks or said don’t worry about it we can work around you, look what those destructive sad excuses for humans are getting away with and I a good citizen not bothering anyone get my property invaded and destroyed with NO MERCY, whats wrong with this picture; but a good guy comes in last every time my friend! Did it payoff to be a good guy all my life and then to be screwed over royally? Of course it did, “vengeance is mine says the Lord thy God.” I must be in this position for His purpose, but, it hurt and did much damage! Suffering is part of life!
God bless you and have a great Wednesday! Say hi to those Puffins for me too!
🤗 🙏🕊✝️🕊🙏 🤗
Oh almost forgot to mention. Dessert was lemon pie filling in a glass Pyrex bowl topped with fresh strawberry slurry compote topped with vanilla organic yogurt then finally Haagen Dazs strawberry ice-cream, I tend to pig out on my desserts! It’s not every day either! 🤣😜😉👍
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Wow, Lawrence, what a dessert !
I checked out ‘The Vine’ pasta
sauce which you recommended. Fabulous !
I will look for it in St. John’s or order online. Thanks for telling me about this. 🤗🌷
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🤗 Yummy for the tummy! Sure thing! I use my imagination with deserts; I figure why not try being original and blend some favorite sweets, fruits and whatever strikes your fancy to create a stupendous dessert! Even toss in some fragments of chocolate bar or nuts to top it off. I always loved that stove top cooked lemon filling from back when as a boy my mom would make lemon meringue pies; which takes only minutes to make like a pudding, but, the lemon flavor is a top favorite of mine. Bon-appetite. 🌷😁
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Actually, Ireneus apparently had pretrib view of the rapture. He was born in Smyrna in 130 AD. A quote attributed to him is:
And therefore, when in the end the Church shall be suddenly caught up from this, it is said, There shall be tribulation such as has not been since the beginning, neither shall be.”
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Yes Marcia there are some references to End Time especially in the book of Revelation but the numbers of people I find arguing about what is going to happen and how it will unfold or that there is a Rapture in some peoples way of seeing the Scriptures while some say no there isn’t; wasn’t meant for us to argue over when the practice of the faith and living in accordance with the actual teachings of Christ who demonstrated these things is of utmost importance, especially now with so many people running away from Church and goodness and embracing evil or vile disgusting lifestyles! This all reminds me of Sodom and Gomorrah and this time it’s much worse exponentially, especially now with technology propagating evils that the peoples of the past didn’t even imagine! I find it very disturbing when so called Christians of whatever denomination or focus start picking on other Christians or pointing fingers saying ah huh see you are wrong and it will happen like this, or you have it all wrong! That is such stupidity in my eyes and I dare say if Jesus were here he would be quite displeased with how so many have twisted and perverted His intent and personal firsthand teachings for the children of God to live by. Discord and division is always of Satan and any simple mind can understand that principle which is demonstrated clearly in the Bible and specifically the direct teachings of Jesus Christ. I try not to get angry, but, when I see so called Christians attack another Christian over these issues I get very ticked off and want to slap someone upside the head and say, how dare you arrogant jerk attack other Children of God, making a mockery of the faith and Jesus who died on that cross so you could live, who the hell are you! The devil works overtime now and that is quite obvious by what has happened to our once Great Beautiful Nation under God, which is now a hellhole in many locations and spreading. A Nation where there are so many extreme radically different positions on what America is and how people should or can live; so differing, that these peoples cannot and will not find any middle or common ground anymore; so that is leading to catastrophe obviously! People better wake up fast, is all I can say. Amen.
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Thanks Larry for doing justice to the subject of tribulation and the consequent or expected rapture. God bless you
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Just wanted to offer information that I found which wasn’t overtly biased and the added benefit of how it honed in on the fact that these interpretive differences among Christians aren’t that important to argue over them when put in the bigger picture context. The true common denominators are simple and prevalent through the Holy Scriptures, and I do believe God the Father wants us to focus on those details and practice what Jesus demonstrated, not trying to prove who knows more precisely how the end will come for this world and what it will look like as if that matters more than sharing the vital messages that Christ shared with the Apostles and the multitudes. The need for love, humility, compassion, ceaseless devotion, forgiveness and mercy are some of these simple cornerstones of the faith which the majority of the world’s peoples aren’t practicing hardly enough at all, so trying to explain or spending time arguing about the end of the world makes no sense when there is so much in the current time of existing in it to be accomplished. To me like cutting off ones nose to spite one’s face!
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Absolutely. What the world and humanity really needs are the virtues and values you encapsulated – “love, humility, ceaseless devotion, forgiveness and mercy …” Those are among the core values of Christianity which humanity lost to the concepts of relativism and values clarification. Today we are faced with the consequences of love for our own choices rather than God’s will. A great piece you did, Larry.
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Thanks Matt…too bad things have gone so radically left of center or so many people are such damaged souls that seeing the light of truth and knowing God in order to do His will doesn’t even interest them in the least! Such a sad place for humanity to be when today the opportunity to have so much information at our finger tips which can provide insight and wisdom if one does this while opening the heart to the Lord, yet so many multitudes don’t make any effort to do so. The culture of death has taken a strong grip on the hearts and minds of so many. Secularism is so attractive to many of these individuals which to me is the serving of the beast; the precursor to worshiping the coming antichrist.
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I couldn’t have put it well as you have done. Secularism and the culture of death have muddied the minds of many, already sold on the lie of the devil.
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Thanks Matt…too bad things have gone so radically left of center or so many people are such damaged souls that seeing the light of truth and knowing God in order to do His will doesn’t even interest them in the least! Such a sad place for humanity to be when today the opportunity to have so much information at our finger tips which can provide insight and wisdom if one does this while opening the heart to the Lord, yet so many multitudes don’t make any effort to do so. The culture of death has taken a strong grip on the hearts and minds of so many. Secularism is so attractive to many of these individuals which to me is the serving of the beast; the precursor to worshiping the coming antichrist.
True but I know just like it wasn’t too late for Dismus hung up on a cross with the benefit of God Almighty nailed to the one next to him he had a last minute pardon from the Governor in a sense, a stay of execution, of his immortal soul; but God made sure that whole monumental event the Greatest Story for mankind ever told went down the way it did to illustrate that there is hope, but, it takes the honest desire genuine effort to go straight and be right with God by the sinner; without that, just like Scriptures say about the overly rich man getting through the pearly gates would be “like passing a camel through the eyes of a needle.” But, I see this takeover of many of the devils minions along with willing multitudes of lost souls who are lusting for the culture that brings only death, the eternal one; as in separation from God and His kingdom eternally. They are throwing their own souls into hell!
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Thanks very much indeed Larry for the splendid and inspiring expansion to the thought. My hope and prayer is that more Americans on the left see through the veil of deception and courageously re-elect Trump for a second term. By the end of his second 4 years, the leftists with all their atrocities will fade and Americans will know peace and progress. The left is scared of losing relevance as I am convinced that they are now conscious of their evil deeds and frantically and wrongfully cooking more sinister acts to bury their deeds.
In the American Congress, God has raised fearless, courageous and intelligent persons to call out the minions of the devil on the other side. We continue to pray and expose their evil.
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Reblogged this on The Searchlight.
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