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The Rapture


Summary

The Second Coming of Christ and the Rapture of all Believers happens AFTER the Great Tribulation and BEFORE the Wrath of God (= Post-Trib-Rapture before the Wrath).



The term rapture refers to the future removal of all Christians - the dead and the living - from the earth towards the Lord Jesus Christ, who descends from heaven.


The timing of the rapture is disputed. Today, most Christians hold the pre-tribulation rapture doctrine:

According to them, the return of Jesus takes place in 2 steps: first the secret rapture BEFORE the tribulation, and then, seven years later, the visible return of Christ.


But for 1800 years Christians did not believe in a pre-tribulation rapture, for example: Martin Luther, Johannes Calvin, John Wesley, Matthew Henry, William Tyndale, John Wycliffe, George Whitefield, Jonathan Edwards, John Knox, John Bunyan, Georg Müller, and later Charles Spurgeon, William Booth …


This website provides a comprehensive critical analysis of the pre-tribulation doctrine. The following rapture model is advocated on this website:




Bible text:

1 Thessalonians 4:16-17 16 For the Lord Himself will descend from Heaven with a shouted command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first.

 17 Then we who are alive, who remain shall be caught up [or: snatched away] together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air; and so we shall always be with the Lord.




Explanation of the scheme


In the Book of Revelation - the last book of the Bible - the events of the Last Days are first presented in 7 seals (see below for the complete text of the Bible):


In Revelation - the last book of the Bible - the end-time judgements upon the Earth are presented one by one in 7 seals, 7 trumpets and 7 bowls.

Most exegetes assume that this is also the chronological sequence (i.e. first the seals, then the trumpets and last the bowls).


The first 5 seals occur before the bowl judgements, which are the bowls of wrath. How the trumpet judgements are to be classified chronologically would still have to be examined more closely.

The rapture of the church and the return of Christ occurs during the time of the 6th seal


1st seal: A victor conquers with a bow (Greek toxon)

2nd seal: Peace is taken away from Earth and people kill each other

3rd seal: A famine and inflation (1.1 litres of wheat for a day's wage)

4th seal: ¼ of the earth is killed by sword, hunger, death and wild animals.


The 1st seal may have already begun, perhaps it is the global victory that has affected all nations since the beginning of 2020.


The events of the 2nd and 3rd seals also seem to have already begun: Societal schism worldwide and high inflation, and increasing famine.


The 4th seal is still to come.


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The 5th Seal is a glimpse of Heaven, where the slain saints (i.e. the real Christians) cry out to God:


Revelation 6:9-11 9 And when He opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain because of the Word of God and because of the testimony which they held.

 10 And they cried with a loud voice, saying, How long, O Lord, holy and true, will You not judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth?

 11 And a white robe was given to each one of them; and it was said to them that they should rest a little while longer, until ‹ the number of › their fellow servants and their brothers, who were about to be killed as they were, was filled up.


The vengeance or the wrath of God has not yet begun with the 5th seal, because:

1. The martyrs ask, crying: How long (until when) … ?

2. They are answered: They should still wait until their brethren would join them in full (likewise to be killed).


The great tribulation (that is the great suffering of the saints) will end with the last martyr. Only then does wrath or vengeance come upon the ungodly who dwell on the earth.

When exactly the great tribulation begins is not written.


The great tribulation will most probably last 3.5 years.

Nevertheless, it may not be entirely excluded:

- that the great tribulation will not take place in one piece, but in stages

- that the great tribulation may not be everywhere at the same time or of the same duration everywhere

since the Scriptures also speak of a time, two times and half a time (Daniel 7:25 / Daniel 12:7 and Revelation 12:14).


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With the 6th seal, the great tribulation will end, through an unprecedented catastrophe that immediately precedes the visible return of the Lord Jesus Christ. Then the people will confess that the wrath of God has come:


Olivet Discourse about the end-time
Matthew 24
The 6th Seal
Revelation 6

Mat 24:29-31  29 But immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light;

Rev 6:12-17  12 And I looked when He opened the sixth seal, and behold, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became like blood.

and the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken.

 13 And the stars of heaven fell to the earth, as a fig tree drops its untimely figs when it is shaken by a mighty wind.

 14 And the heaven was removed as a scroll when it is rolled up, and every mountain and island were moved out of their places.

 30 And then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the heaven, and then all the tribes of the earth will wail, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.

15 And the kings of the earth, the great men, the rich men, the commanders, the mighty men, every slave and every free man, hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains,

 16 and said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us and hide us from the face of Him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb!

 17 For the great day of His wrath has come, and who is able to stand?

31 And He will send His angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they will gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of heavens to the other.




The rapture is the gathering of all the chosen ones (the elect), i.e. all true Christians, towards the Lord.

Before that, all the saints who have died will be resurrected and the saints who are still alive will be transformed in an instant:


1 Corinthians 15:51-52 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 incorruptible, and we shall be changed.


The resurrected and the still living saints will be raptured together away from the earth to the Lord (see above 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17).


Note that it is written: The transformation happens in a moment; and not: the rapture happens in a moment.


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With the 6th seal begins the vengeance, the wrath of God upon the ungodly people who are then still left on earth. The wrath of God consists of 7 bowl judgments.


The church (= those who believe in Christ) will be raptured in time before the judgements of wrath. But the church comes into the great tribulation. The great tribulation and the wrath are not the same!


The term "the great tribulation" or "the great distress" or "the great affliction" refers to the time of suffering of the saints from all nations by the Antichrist.


But the great tribulation is not - as is often claimed - the time of God's wrathful judgements.



Bible text on the seven seals



Bible Text from the Book of Revelation (Rev)

1st Seal

Revelation 6:1-2 1 And I saw when the Lamb opened one of the seven seals; and I heard one of the four living creatures saying with a voice like thunder, Come and see.

 2 And I looked, and behold, a white horse; and he who sat on it had a bow; and a crown was given to him, and he went out conquering, and so that he might conquer.

2nd Seal

Rev 6:3-4 3 And when He opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature saying, Come and see.

 4 And another horse, fiery red, went out. And it was given to the one who sat on it to take peace from the earth, and that they should kill one another; and there was given to him a great sword.

3rd Seal

Rev 6:5-6 5 And when He opened the third seal, I heard the third living creature say, Come and see. And I looked, and behold, a black horse, and he who sat on it had a pair of scales in his hand.

 6 And I heard a voice in the midst of the four living creatures saying, A quart of wheat for a denarius, and three quarts of barley for a denarius; and do not harm the oil and the wine.


4th Seal

Rev 6:7-8  7 And when He opened the fourth seal, I heard a voice of the fourth living creature saying, Come and see.

 8 And I looked, and behold, a pale green horse; and the name of him who sat on it was Death, and Hades followed behind him. And authority was given to them over a fourth of the earth, to kill with sword, with hunger, with death, and by the beasts of the earth.


5th Seal

Rev 6:9-11 9 And when He opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain because of the Word of God and because of the testimony which they held.

 10 And they cried with a loud voice, saying, How long, O Lord, holy and true, will You not judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth?

 11 And a white robe was given to each one of them; and it was said to them that they should rest a little while longer, until ‹ the number of › their fellow servants and their brothers, who were about to be killed as they were, was filled up.


6th Seal

Rev 6:12-17  12 And I looked when He opened the sixth seal, and behold, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became like blood.

 13 And the stars of heaven fell to the earth, as a fig tree drops its untimely figs when it is shaken by a mighty wind.

 14 And the heaven was removed as a scroll when it is rolled up, and every mountain and island were moved out of their places.

 15 And the kings of the earth, the great men, the rich men, the commanders, the mighty men, every slave and every free man, hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains,

 16 and said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us and hide us from the face of Him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb!

 17 For the great day of His wrath has come, and who is able to stand?

7th Seal

Rev 8:1-7 1 And when He opened the seventh seal, there was silence in Heaven for about half an hour.

 2 And I saw the seven angels who stand before God, and to them were given seven trumpets.



Updates with new topics will come up later  -  State: December 26, 2024