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James 5:1 (KJV) Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you.
Showing posts with label Part 3 of 5. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Part 3 of 5. Show all posts

Friday, December 28, 2012

Lucifer & Company Return - Part 3 of 5




Posted on November 18, 2008 by Sharon K. Gilbert


For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven,
I will exalt my throne above the stars of God;
I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north;
I will ascend above the heights of the clouds;
I will be like the most High.
Yet thou shalt be brought down to hell, to the side of the pit.

–Isaiah 14


“The problem is not the abyss.
The problem is what comes out of the abyss.
The abyss is a place, it is a horrible place. It is without question that it exists, and it is, without question, dimensional. It is from that side, what has been invisible to our eyes, will be opened in such a way that the dimensional impact will be catastrophic.


The events we see now, the wars, the hunger, the blackness. You can feel it in the air, you know that something is coming. But that is nothing by comparison to the shock and awe that the abyss will release. These destructive powerful beings will be unbound, and they only have one nature, they only know one thing: destruction, harm, torture, pain…creating agony and a psychological wish for suicide.


“Let me ask you, what would you do if it opened now? Where would you be? God has already made it clear that only those who have the seal of God, the Spirit of God will be protected. What is it that Jesus Christ offers? “You can feel it in the air, you know that it is coming.”
– Russ Dizdar


DANCING WITH THE STARS

A sleep trance, a dream dance,
A shared romance,
Synchronicity

– The Police, Synchronicity 


IN 1951, Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung presented the concept of synchronicity to the Eranos meeting in Zurich, Switzerland. The suggestion that chance, coincidence and parallel circumstances were driven by underlying causality has been accepted by mystics and theologians for millennia. Carl Jung’s introduction of the concept to mainstream medical thought was, and continues to be met with varying levels of skepticism.


In 1952, Jung and Nobel laureate, physicist Wolfgang Pauli published, Synchronicity — An Acausal Connecting Principle, a collaborative effort born of a series of Pauli’s “initiatory” dreams which began shortly after his successful formulations of key principles of particle physics, an emerging, invisible and often seemingly contradictory discipline. It is from this strange world that a new breed of scientific giants would emerge, many shattered to the core with the implications: the known laws of science actually account for far less observable reality and that there are phenomena that are beyond the factors and laws of recognized physical science.


Theoretical and quantum physics have long been regarded as the high ground of scientific study, and subsequent conclusions were literally turning the world inside out. From microscope to telescope, science was measuring, fusing and splitting elements—at last viewing an invisible netherworld. Wolfgang Pauli’s consideration and acknowledgment of an underlying, governing dynamic provided a strong endorsement and formed the scientific equivalent of composer Richard Wagner’s social concept of metapolitics.


Carl Jung gave us his thumbnail description of synchronicity with a quote from Lewis Carroll’s, Through the Looking Glass, where the White Queen says to Alice, “It’s a poor sort of memory that only works backwards.”


A MEMORY THAT ONLY WORKS BACKWARDS

In recent years, the corresponding disciplines of historians, geologists, linguists, archaeologists, socialists–virtually every ‘ology’ and ‘ism’ have seen vigorous challenges and calls for re-examination of entrenched theoretical and social paradigms: there was a time when Earth was in balance and evidence for universal cataclysm is substantial. Sacred texts have been saying it all along. So have folklore and legends, mythology and religion, as have the ritualistic practices of different cultures throughout the world. Uniformity commences at least in part, from the inclusion of astronomical data; cataclysmic events; and a broadening of the definition of “text” to include mythology, archaeology, art, religion, ritual and other historical evidence. Consequently, a remarkably coherent but penetrating theme emerges.


Though a great deal of research and published documentation have been strongly dismissed by traditional academia, there is an enormous swell of contemporary interest within both the scientific and linguistic communities that supports many of these recent conclusions. So strong is the collaborative evidence that some who have departed the academic research and publication environments are confident that the current generation of historical perspective will greatly outdistance the classical perspective within twenty years.


Flowing from within this reorganization are essentially two streams:

1. The acknowledgment of the existence of extremely sophisticated civilization(s) with a knowledge of physics and communication with the corresponding level of technology, and the use of it for peace, plenty, and universal harmony: the Mouseketeers, the My Way’ers the ‘Way of Cain’ers’, the politically correct;


or


2. The acknowledgment of the existence of extremely sophisticated civilization(s) with a knowledge of physics and communication with the corresponding level of technology, and the use of it for weaponization resulting in massive pre-historic destruction: the pesky fringe, doom-and-gloomers, ‘dead scientist/reporter/researcher’ aficionados. 


Likewise, these draw from two streams of evidence:

1. Testimonial evidence, both ancient and contemporary, which include archaeological, consistency of myth, ritual, cultural traditions, texts, tablets and cutting edge linguistic and scientific examination;


and


2. Revelatory evidence and numinous insight—be that insight holy or profane.

Either way, there is need for renewed investigation and reconciliation.


MYTHING LINKS
 
Most ancient civilizations have spoken of a Golden Age, a time of deep mystery, hidden kingdoms, cosmic destiny. A time of abundant life and fertility, Edenic existence, Platonic perfection, the terrestrial in balance with the celestial, before the imbalances and disharmonies, before the “Fall.” The “Once upon a time” era.


Almost universally, the descent from a Golden Age spreads from memory of a “celestial race” of the Hyperborea, the land beyond the aurora, the North Winds, the polar, “ice regions” of the planet, a race of colossal beings engaging in projects of massive scale. These are the primordial ancestors of Helena Blavatsky’s “root race” philosophy: the four races that inhabited the Earth before our current epoch, the “Ancient High Civilizations” dating back hundreds of thousands of years. It was during the time of the Third Root Race, the Lemurian epoch, according to Blavatsky’s The Secret Doctrine, the Synthesis of Science, Religion and Philosophy (1888), that “gods walked the earth and mixed freely with the mortals” before being destroyed by a cataclysm that made it uninhabitable.


Jean-Claude Frère in Nazisme et Sociétés Secrètes (1974), proposes that the pristine survivors migrated to a region now covered by the Gobi Desert and founded a new seat, Agartha, the “center of the world.” It was from these ancient survivors that the Fourth Race was birthed, the “brilliant” Atlantean civilization which, according to Frère, prospered for 2,000 years before succumbing to another catastrophe. The subterranean Agartha however, the center of the earth, survived and the “Masters of the World” continue to dwell in multiple levels of chambers, dispatching orders to selected “initiates” such as Solomon, Pythagoras, Apollonius of Tyana, and Jesus.


From Agartha, the Fifth Root Race emerged as the Aryan people, migrating in two directions. One ventured north and west, conquering the lands of the sub-races in hope of rediscovering and occupying the Hyperborean “homeland.” The second group traveled south into the Himalayas, Tibet and India, finding dwelling places in caves and sub-surface caverns. The ruler of this underground kingdom is “Rigden Iyepo”, the “king of the heart of the world”, the “Lord of the Flame”. With his legions of Aryan Ascended Masters, this king is described as the possessor of an astonishing occult power known as Vril. The keeper of this gate and Rigden Iyepo’s representative on the surface is, the Dalai Lama. 


Jean-Claude Frère describes the migrations:

“…the sons of the Outer Intelligences are said to have split into two groups, one following the “Right-hand Path” under the “Wheel of the Golden Sun,” the other the “Left-hand Path,” under the “Wheel of the Black Sun.” The first group preserved the center of Agartha, that undefined place of contemplation, the Good, and of the Vril force. The second supposedly created a new place of initiation at Shambhala, the city of violence in command of the elements and human masses, hastening the arrival of the “charnel-house of time.”


Adolf Hitler put it this way:

“It is from there that the final stage in human mutation will emerge – the MAN-GOD! This splendid Being will become the object of universal worship!”


In theosophic vision, it is through deep meditation that one can indeed apprehend an entrance to the “real world” by making a pilgrimage to an inner pole or “Orient” that is not found on maps. A journey to the origin of the soul is often depicted by a “World Tree,” the colossal Yggdrasil, spanning nine regions and presented as ascension through a column of light commencing in the abysmal darkness of non-being, to a light coming from an indescribable darkness that is so dark as to appear as luminous light.


In Iranian theosophy, the spiritual ascent to a heavenly pole is described as a magnet used to draw beings to its Sphere of Spheres, the threshold of which is the Emerald Rock, allowing access to the Green Island where the hidden Imam dwells. Although the twelfth and prophesied Imam of Islam is recorded as having disappeared in the tenth century, the Ishraqiun (the Oriental theosophers) believe that he remains “occulted,” hidden in the green region and remains a “mystic Pole.”


Michael S. Heiser, author of The Divine Council, and editor for Logos Bible Software is a researcher into ancient and Biblical language and studies. Here, he discusses the concepts of territorial rulers, ancient fallen entities, and legal rights to specific geographic areas:

“The Bible describes a world where cosmic-geographical lines have been drawn. Israel was holy ground because it was Yahweh’s inheritance. The territory of other nations belonged to other elohim because Yahweh had decreed it as such. The lands of the other nations were populated by those who worshipped the corrupt elohim, and by the remnant of those who had been fathered by other elohim.* 


History appears to us as a lineal past, moving forward, yesterday is over, completed, and we move forward. What is seldom considered is that the land, which is subject to entropy, can contain other entities, either a part of or apart from its familiar properties. We not only live in history, we live upon history, and, in a larger measure than perceived, we live within a pre-existing and continuing pantheon of history.


Published in 1879, Edward Bulwer-Lytton’s novel, Vril: The Power of the Coming Race, describes Vril as a form of earth-energy possessed by an extremely powerful subterranean race associated with “life-giving elixirs”, “force ray cannons”, electro-magnetic transmission rods, and Atlantean “spiritual exercises”. 


At the heart of Vril lies the “Enochian” knowledge of sonic equations with mirrored waveforms of light and electro-magnetism, capable of interacting with and affecting the human nervous system and consciousness (as well as ‘other life forms’), geophysical structures, planets and other stellar systems. It has been suggested that the frequencies of this language of light can be so precise that the center elements of the Great Pyramid at Giza are tuned to the frequency of a human heartbeat. 


The ancient wisdom of electrical conductivity, hydro purification processes, and geomantic energy fields was orally communicated and eventually recorded textually within the tablets with astounding scientific and technical accuracy and through the traditions of indigenous cultures to describe the Earth’s emanations and the corresponding alignment of the emanations of humans.


This tuning of frequencies would in fact align with the very real phenomenon of so-called Ley Lines, lines of electromagnetic energy crossing the grids of the Earth and forming nodal points, which frequently reveal archaeological evidence of layering of cultures and time periods over specific areas. Often these pathways are used for ceremonial purposes with remarkably similar rituals being performed by an entirely different culture.


In Teutonic geodetic tradition, these Heilige Linien or holy lines (described as ‘Ley Lines’ by Alfred Watkins in 1921), were evidence of the endemic pantheon to which the Reich was both an extension and a vehicle. Along these lines are natural outcroppings, caves and springs as well as megalithic structures, which include standing stones, circles, tombs, and altars.


The Reich, and specifically the SS, spared nothing for the spiritual ideals and the quest of Blud und Boden, blood and soil, as revealed by Walter Darre, the Reich’s Minister of Agriculture. Expeditions to the Middle East and the Far East proved to be spiritually and practically energizing. The commitment to the quest for total supremacy permitted all manner of strategy; nothing was above this pursuit. The numerous expeditions to Tibet produced the only complete copy of the Buddhist Kang Shur, a collection of ancient writings presumed to include massive information from pre-classical and Atlantean texts. 


Accompanying the Kang Shur were over 1,000 Buddhist monks known as the Adepts of Agartha to be used for translation and extraction and for the study of their telepathic abilities. These adepts, also known as the Order of the Green Men were found, in 1945, by the invading Russian army: all victims of ‘suicide’. Photographic records reveal that the Dalai Lama has maintained, at the least, close ‘social’ ties with high level SS as recently as 2001.


Vril then, would be a description of synchronistic driving “forces” or perhaps governing spirits, assigned and bound to a location, a colloquial designation for a ‘collective conscious’, the akashic records, the ‘mystical knowledge of the aether’. The recurring rhythms of Vril maintain the integral cosomology of a living Earth which is mirrored in the physical, emotional, and spiritual construction of the cosmos.


It is highly likely that ‘Vrilian’ access was at least in part, achieved by German scientists during World War II. The 1990 reunification of Germany resulted in much more than geopolitical and social restoration. The surrender and relinquishment of thousands of meticulously documented patent, scientific, and military records have enabled, at least, the theoretical reconstruction of much of the Reich’s most sensitive material.


“LESSONS FROM THE SUDETENLAND”
 
Benjamin Netanyahu’s powerful treatise on the tragic lessons of the Third Reich’s occupation of a strategic area along the borders of Czechoslovakia and Poland, and the perilous similarities to the current Middle East and Israel, are more applicable today than when first published fifteen years ago.

The geopolitical implications are obvious, seemingly omnipresent, and never-ending. Less obvious, but exponentially more sinister, are the spiritual subtleties which undergird this area and a planet in the throes of a cauldron of seemingly unrelated catalysts which are rapidly converging.


Included in the area designated The Sudetenland are small German, Polish and Czechoslovakian villages near the Sudeten Mountains. Currently, this region includes Środa Śląska, Poland, Lubiez, Poland and Wroclaw, Czechosovakia, near the 51st Parallel.


Along with their remote geography, this region has the additional benefit of a massive labyrinthe of caves and well-built mines, enhancing the strategic appeal for weapons development, testing and storage. It was in quiet, deep rural caverns that one of the largest, most powerful (and correspondingly) most highly classified weapons ever engineered is believed by many to have been constructed.


DAS LATERNENTRÄGER
 
Code named, Projekt Kronos (‘Kronos’ = Saturn or ‘time’ ), Die Glocke (‘time’ or ‘clock’ or ‘BELL’), Tor, (German for gate), or most frighteningly, Der Laternenträger (Lantern Bearer), a loose metaphor for the Light Bearer, Lucifer. Under such names, the Reich’s ultra classified, “War Decisive”, high energy weapon was built—and many believe tested.


The Bell’s capabilities went far beyond what anyone could possibility imagine: the manipulation of energy, gravity and matter—and consequently, the manipulation of time itself, which would most certainly correlate with chronos (‘Kronos’), literally having the ability to manipulate time – and ‘unless those days be shortened’…..


Contained within the physics of The Bell, an apocalyptic specter of future technology emerged. Constructed and maintained in the massive, concrete underground facilities, The Bell’s corresponding, above-ground testing unit was a housing of highly radioactive concrete identified as, “The Henge.” 


British and Polish researchers Nick Cook and Igor Witkowski have identified a program that served as a “parallel operation” to Paperclip. Called Project Lusty (Luftwaffe Secret Technology), it documents the transfer of 110,000 tons of scientific papers to the US over a period of three months, as well as records from the German Patent Office, found 1,500 feet underground and consisting of approximately 225,000 volumes. Although there remain various levels of acknowledgment of the evidence associated with The Bell itself, the technology for such an undertaking was clearly and thoroughly documented as are the implications: ‘just where is the weapon?’–‘who has the technology?’–and ‘who else might have similar technology?’


The choice of the Sudetenland for the construction of some of the Reich’s blackest projects was not solely determined by isolation and convenience. To the contrary, SS requirements would actually have found them secondary to spiritual inclination. The Reich’s reliance on otherworldly divination was far greater than those in this world would ever dare, or unfortunately, seek to understand. 


From the perspective of recent history, the heinous memory of the Holocaust has come to represent the darkest depravity of humanity. “Holocaust” is literally a “whole burnt sacrifice,” and it is difficult to imagine how an entire population could fail to recognize, much less dismiss, such abhorrent degeneration. What today has been attributed to the “cultural climate of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century,” has yet to be recognized by most as a spiritually vulnerable and easily influenced and dominated society.


A “little dabble do ya” is perilously effective when applied to spiritual anemia and in the dark world of ancient rulers and principalities, there is always homage due, via predetermined and prescribed ritual. If so, history can possibly be retro-viewed from a perspective of spiritual predilection. The figureheads, i.e., those identified by history, are thus caught in the much stronger undercurrent of the unseen and prevailing warlords, and by such manipulated into a specific protocol of sacrifice. Europe’s long history of fiery slaughter has been well documented, from individual burning at the stake to horrors of holocaust, and perhaps more.


It is interesting to note that the Prince of Persia, discussed in Daniel 10, apparently had similar sacrificial preferences (Dan. 3) and that theosophic teachings specifically cite a common Aryan lineage. The ancient, dark rulers have yet to be quenched, and there is strong evidence that their realms expand and overlap, quite possibly in a cumulative manner but unquestionably when entreated and unchecked.


The Book of Enoch has recently become of great interest in Western society, perhaps because of its recognition as a reliable extra-Biblical text, but largely because of the detailed roster of entities, both holy and malevolent, as well as the specific descriptions of their disposition, aspirations and contributions. 


Man was not created with an inclination toward evil, but in short order fell prey to it, quickly learning that the forbidden knowledge/gnosis would now both expose and permit the sacred and diabolical. And of the latter, the most heinous of all is war and the very real and raging dynamics behind it.


1 Enoch 8 speaks of a fallen one, Azazel, who “taught men to make swords, and knives, and shields, and breastplates, and made known to them the metals of the earth and the art of working them….” In eons past, dark personalities have clashed with the righteous as well as among themselves.


It is reasonable to expect that man would need to be taught in methods and strategies of warfare, as in a pre-fall world, for there had been no experiential knowledge. As a consequence of the Edenic fall, there would be need of explanation for man’s development of warfare, the implements and the strategy. The highly sophisticated and comparatively supernatural Watchers and their offspring are recorded as the instructors of mankind, and there is no record of interruption or termination of this activity.


The documents procured via Lusty provide evidence for what many post WWII scientists and militarists knew: the science of the Third Reich had been wandering and probing the bizarre world of particle physics. A territory wounded by war would regroup and collectively summon the best and the brightest to worship on a renewed altar of science: underground.


“To those of us who believe in physics, this separation between past, present, and future is only an illusion, even if a stubborn one.” Albert Einstein


In what may prove to be the most exquisite paradox in history, a generation of academicians, at long last theoretically sanctioned via Jung/Pauli, allowed the blending of the ‘meta with the measured’. However, these same, enlightened scientists appeared to disregard the concept that, while the physical appears to be bound within a lineal history, the specific ‘world’ being examined by the very same scientific discipline, was not.


References cited in Parts III and IV:


The Myth Book, Michael S. Heiser, PhD
www.michaelsheiser.com

The Green Man, a Bibliography
www.egreenway.com/meditation/greenman.htm

Joscelyn Godwin, 1996
Arktos: The Polar Myth in Science, Symbolism, and Nazi Survival, 1996

JK Rowling on “Hagrid”
www.accio-quote.org/themes/hagrid.htm

William Anderson and Clive Hicks
Green Man: The Archetype of Our Oneness With the Earth, 1991


Benjamin Netanyahu
Lessons from the Sudetenland





Dan Brown
Angels and Demons, 2000
Atria Books, New York, NY 10020


European Organization for Nuclear Research, CERN
http://public.web.cern.ch/public/

Alan Redpath
Victorious Christian Living, 1955



Saturday, August 11, 2012

The Promise of the Rapture - Part 3

II. THE TIMING OF THE RAPTURE

Now it is necessary to review the event series in which the rapture of the Church will take place. It is crucial that this series of events be brought into perspective and that their order of occurrences be recognized. Otherwise it is easy for one to fall prey to one of the misunderstandings concerning the timing of the rapture in the eschatological event series.

A. When the Lord descends from heaven (1 Thessalonians 4:16)

It is clear from Romans 9-11 that Paul considered the teaching of things to come to be a vital part of the discipling through which a new believer should be taken. In my book "True Evangelism" (or "Biblical Evangelism")--as practiced by Paul in Romans 1:15-6:10," I show that Paul practiced five very careful steps in his evangelism. This book already has been published on CD by LOGOS in Oak Harbor, Washington. In my second book on Romans (in the publisher's hands) I show that in Romans 6:10-15:31 Paul then took five very careful steps in the discipling of the one who has come to Christ. The third step which he took is found in Romans 9-11. In this section he focuses upon the teaching of the believer of things to come. It is clear that he knew that the understanding of the great things that our God is going to do in the future serves as a powerful incentive for the believer to live a spiritual life as he or she looks forward to these great events in the future.

In Paul's ministry it is apparent that he practiced the principles, both of evangelism and of discipleship which he teaches in the book of Romans. Acts 17 describes his work of founding the church at Thessalonica. We are told that he came there and that for "...three Sabbath days [he] reasoned with them out of the Scriptures, opening and alleging that it was necessary for Messiah to have suffered, and to have risen from the dead, and that this Jesus, whom I preach unto you is the Messiah. And some of them believed and consorted with Paul and Silas, and a great multitude of the devout Jews also and of the chief women not a few" (Acts 17:2-4). But the following context shows that the unbelieving Jews raised a tumult that greatly troubled the city. As a result Paul and Silas left Thessalonica by night and traveled on to Berea.

In that short time of three weeks it is obvious from statements made in First and Second Thessalonians that Paul had taught the believers things to come. But it is also clear from 1 Thessalonians 4:13-14 that he was concerned about the fact that they had not fully grasped all that he had been able to teach those believers in the fragments of time that he was able to be with them. It is clear that Paul, in his first epistle to the Thessalonian church, was writing to help them to understand more about the rapture. He sought to help them to understand that believers that had died now were with the Lord and would be returning to earth with Him to receive their resurrected bodies at the rapture. And as he developed that theme in 1 Thessalonians 4 he also clarified the fact that, when the Lord descended from heaven with believers that already had died, immediately afterward living believers would be transformed into their eternal bodies and caught up to be with the Lord.


B. At the great shout of the Lord (1 Thessalonians 4:16)

As Paul developed those truths about the resurrection of departed New Testament believers who were in Christ Jesus, he adds details concerning the immediate event series. Suddenly believers on earth would hear the voice of the Lord from heaven as He descended to catch up believers, both those resurrected and those transformed to be with Him. I have suggested earlier that the call that took John, the elder statesman of the book of Revelation, into heaven in Spirit to hear of the great things which yet were to come. And I have suggested that John probably is somewhat of a forerunner of the church in this regard, and that the shout of the Lord is that which will take us from our earthly residence to our promised heavenly residence. Christ had said in the upper room in John 14:1-3: 

"Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God. Believe also in Me. In My Father's house are many mansions. If this were not so I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. (3) And when I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and I will receive you unto Myself in order that where I am, you also may be."

I think that it is altogether possible that the voice of God that we will hear will be the voice of our Savior speaking the very words to us that He spoke to John the Apostle long ago. "...Come up here, and I will show you things which must be after this" (Revelation 4:2).

C. At the sounding of the voice of the archangel (1 Thessalonians 4:16)

At about the same time believers would hear the ringing shout of the archangel. The book of Jude in verse 9 leaves no doubt about the name of this great angel who is the highest of the angels. His name is Michael. And what is it about which he will be shouting? I suspect that this great archangel, who will lead the good angels of heaven in the war against those angels who have rebelled with Satan during the tribulation (Revelation 12:7-9) may be shouting a warning to the hordes of the angels who today are obedient servants of Satan. If I am right, it is a warning for these fallen angels to stand back and not interfere with the events of the rapture of the church age saints.

D. At the blast of the trumpet of God (1 Thessalonians 4:16)

At approximately the same time our atmosphere will be rent by the great sound of the blast of God's trumpet. This sound will ring out, either as a part of the warning given to the fallen angels or as a call to the saints of this age as they are called forth from earth into the Lord's heavenly presence. On the other hand, this great trumpet blast may possibly be heard by all who have rejected Christ and may serve to indicate that the door of salvation in the Church now is closed. But we must never make the mistake of saying that no one could be saved after the Church is caught up to heaven. Indeed, the book of Revelation makes it clear that there will be multitudes who believe during the tribulation. However, these will not be part of the Bride of Christ, the Church. The destiny of multitudes of these who believe in the tribulation is to die at the hands of the world ruler of the tribulation (Revelation 7:9-12). And their heavenly destiny is different also. Those who are saved during the tribulation serve God in a different way than the Church, the Consort of Christ, will serve Him. (14) 

"...These are those who have come out of the great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and have made them white in the blood of the Lamb. (15) Therefore they will be before the throne of God, and they will serve Him day and night in His temple, and He who sits on the throne will dwell among them. (16) They will not hunger any more, neither will they thirst any more, neither will the sun light upon them nor any heat, (17) for the Lamb Who is in the midst of the throne will feed them, and He will lead them unto living fountains of waters, and God will wipe away all tears from their eyes" (Revelation 7:14-17).

E. In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye (1 Corinthians 15:51-52)

We have seen in First Corinthians 15:51-52 that the Rapture will be a remarkably sudden event. After the resurrection of those in Jesus whose bodies sleep in death, "...We will all be changed in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we will be changed." There will be no time for those who have delayed responding to the gospel invitation to join the glad group of believers who suddenly are launched on their journey to the mansions which the Savior has prepared for us. The entire event including the resurrection of departed believers and the transformation of living believers will take place in the time that it takes a beam of light to glance off of the eyeball.


F. At Christ's return with the dead in Christ (1 Thessalonians 4:13-18)
 
It was concern on the part of the Thessalonians, apparently conveyed to Paul, either by a letter or by a personal messenger, that led the Divine Author to direct Paul to give that church further information about believers who had died. Paul carefully explained in 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 that, while the bodies of these believers were asleep, they actually were with the Lord. This is the truth that he had conveyed to the Corinthian church in his second epistle to them. Earlier in the chapter he has made it plain that the believer who dies should expect immediately to be clothed upon with a body in heaven. He has contrasted the believer's life in his mortal body with the fact that, at death, the believer immediately would be with the Lord. "We are confident and willing rather to be absent from the body and to be at home with the Lord. Therefore we labor in order that, whether present [in one's body] or absent [from one's body in death], we may be accepted by Him" (2 Corinthians 5:8-9). And in 1 Thessalonians 4 Paul has made it clear that the home going of all believers will take place in that moment when Christ and the great host of believers whose spirits already are with the Lord will return from heaven so that they may take part in the rapture. Paul says in 1 Thessalonians 4:13-14 that the return of Christ and of the departed spirits of believers begins that great event. 

"But I would not have you to remain ignorant, brothers, concerning those who are asleep so that you do not sorrow, even as others [the unsaved] who do not have any hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with him those who sleep in Jesus."

G. After the resurrection of the dead in Christ (1 Thessalonians 4:16c)

Thus is clear that the rapture awaits the return of believers whose bodies sleep in Jesus. The rapture cannot begin until they are returned to earth from heaven to receive their resurrected bodies. Indeed, their resurrection will be the first stage of the rapture. And Paul immediately deals with this factor in 1 Thessalonians 4:15-17. (15)


"For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and who remain until the coming of the Lord [in the air before the tribulation] will not precede [i.e., go before, not prevent them. Actually the old Latin word prevenir actually did mean "to go before." The problem is that the English word "prevent," found in the KJV, which is derived from that has changed its meaning so completely that it is inadequate any more for conveying the information it once gave]. those who are asleep [i.e., who have died]. (16) For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first...." It is only then that believers who still are alive will be caught up. (17) "Then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air: and so we will be forever with the Lord."

H. At the moment of our up-gathering-together (2 Thessalonians 2:1)

In Second Thessalonians 2:1 the Apostle introduces a new term to describe the assembling of the saints of the Church age and their abrupt departure for their heavenly home. In his first chapter Paul has been comforting the believers at Thessalonica concerning the dreadful trials through which they were passing. There were some believers who had concluded that already they were in the great tribulation. The first chapter of Second Thessalonians is written to quiet the hearts of these believers. It is written to remove their confusion concerning their fear that their persecutions and tribulations indicated that they already were in the great tribulation. He has made it plain that believers will not be involved in the righteous judgment of God when He would punish those that did not know Him. He describes the escape of believers from that tribulation in 2 Thessalonians 1:6-10). 

(6) "...It is a righteous thing with God to recompense tribulation to those who trouble you; (7) and to you who are troubled, rest with us when the Lord Jesus will be revealed from heaven with His mighty angels, (8) in flaming fire taking vengeance on those who do not know God and who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, (9) who will be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power when He will come to be glorified in His saints and to be admired in all them that believe...."

It is then that Paul introduces the new way of describing the means by which believers will escape the sufferings of the great tribulation. He continues in chapter two showing the difference between the judgment of the unbelievers at His coming from the departure of those who will be believers here on earth at the time that Christ delivers believers before that time of trouble. He says in 2 Thessalonians 2:l-2, 

(1) "Now we beseech you, brothers, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ [to earth, which clearly has been described in 2 Thessalonians 1:7-9 above] and by our up-gathering-together unto Him, (2) that you should not be shaken in mind or be troubled, neither by spirit or by word neither by letter as if it had come from us, as [thinking] that the day of the Lord is at hand."

As we have seen, this glorious moment when we are caught up to be forever with the Lord is described by a new word in 2 Thessalonians 2:1. There the Greek word episunagooge is used and that carefully has been distinguished by Paul from the day in which Christ will suddenly appear on earth at the end of the tribulation in fiery judgment upon unbelievers. I prefer to translate this single Greek word as "up-gathering-together" and recognize that it refers to the rapture. I do not accept the application of Granville Sharp's rule to this first verse. That would indicate that "the [previously mentioned] coming of our Lord Jesus Christ...," His coming in fiery judgment, and the rapture are the same thing or at least occur at the same time. The view that insists on this interpretation of the timing of the rapture is called "the post-tribulation rapture." Instead, the following context shows that this was the very problem which the Thessalonians were facing. Chapter one clearly shows that they thought that the trials that they were facing indicated that they were entering that terrible time of trouble. Paul plainly tells that church that, instead of being troubled of heart and thinking that the day of the Lord was upon them, in reality they would be resting beyond the reach of the tribulation with which the day of the Lord is introduced. That is precisely why he says to that church,


"Now we beseech you, brothers, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ [to earth, in the early stages of the day of the Lord which clearly has been described in 2 Thessalonians 1:7-9 above] and by ourup gathering together [the rapture] unto Him, (2) that you should not be shaken in mind or be troubled, neither by spirit or by word neither by letter as if it had come from us, as [thinking] that the day of the Lord is at hand."

Part 4 Tomorrow