Signs in the heavens?!

It was in the very early hours of Tuesday that my wife and I were travelling back home`from Meigneux, south-east of Paris. We had stayed there with friends on Sunday night but, when leaving on Monday morning, I had a "senior moment" and left both my laptop and my "banana pouch" behind! This was only discovered some three hours, and 175 miles later when we stopped for lunch! Thankfully, my dear wife had her purse (my wallet was in the pouch!), so we ate before returning to Meigneux - and then starting our journey all over again! 

Just south of Périgueux, I noticed the first flash of sheet lightning. However, there was no sound of thunder, and no rain. Perhaps I had made a mistake (it has been known to happen!!). We travelled on and, gradually, we saw more sheet lightning, and even forked lightning. As the sky was also cloudy, the effect was strange and, as the flashes became more frequent - with, still, neither thunder nor rain, some words of the prophet Joel, quoted by Peter in his sermon on the first Day of Pentecost, came to mind: "And I will show wonders in the heaven above, and signs on the earth beneath, blood, and fire, and vapour of smoke; the sun shall be turned into darkness and the moon into blood, before the day of the Lord comes, the great and manifest day." (Acts 2:19-20; emphasis added). I should mention that the thunder and rain, and very strong winds, did arrive long before we reached home!

Now, the "day of the Lord" to which the prophet was referring, is the day of judgement that the Bible assures us is coming. However, although there are some who would disagree, many believe that, before that Day there will be a period of tribulation, but that it will be preceded by what is generally referred to as "the Rapture". I devote a full chapter in my first book (Great Words of the Faith) to the subject, but wish to share the "bare bones" with you in this, and the next (and maybe the one after that!) post.

For this post, let us deal, simply, with what the rapture is. It is, I believe, that event that will take place “… 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.” (I Cor.15:52).  It is that event at which “… the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the archangel's call, 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, shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air; and so we shall always be with the Lord.” (I Thess.4:16-17; emphasis added). 

Those words of Paul to the Thessalonian believers were in answer to something that was troubling them.  They were looking forward to the return of the Lord Jesus, as had been promised (see Acts 1:10-11).  But they were concerned about their believing friends who had already experienced physical death.  Paul was able to assure them that, at the Rapture, the bodies of those who had died before, and whose spirits had already passed “through the veil” (see ch.25), would rise to join with believers who were still physically alive, and that they would all meet with the Lord together – “in the air” (the realm in which the satan thinks that he has the power: Eph.2:2).

So, what do Paul’s words tell us about the Rapture?  He refers, first of all, to the departure we shall make. “… first the Christian dead will rise; then we who are left alive shall join them, caught up in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air.” (I Thess.4:17; NEB). We will leave this earth, with all of its sin and evil; its pain and heartache; its downright rottenness; its satanic influence on all that is good and true. 

We may note the certainty of this departure.  In I Thess.4:15, Paul says “Here we have a definite message from the Lord “ (Phillips).   No theory; no speculation; no hypothesis that Paul has formed by himself; but a definite “message from the Lord” and, as such, an absolute certainty – something of which we may be completely assured.

We may also be assured that it will be sudden.  In I Cor.15:52 we are told that it will be “… in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, …”  It won’t be a long, drawn-out, process.  It will happen (as the late Tommy Cooper might have put it!) “just like that”!

The word translated “caught up” in I Thess.4:17, is from the Greek root harpazo.  This has the idea of being snatched up.  William Hendriksen has this to say: “The suddenness, the swiftness, and the divine power which is operative in this being snatched up are here emphasised.  The survivors [saints] have been changed ‘in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye’ (I Cor.15:52)”.

The departure we shall make – certain, and sudden.  However, we must also consider the destination we shall have - but that will be for next time!