THE TIMING OF THE RAPTURE

To,

My Fellow Believers in Jesus our Lord

Dear brothers and sisters,

After quite some time I am returning to writing. Had I not felt irresistible inward pull to write it, I wouldn’t have. It is about the timing of what we call the RAPTURE. I did talk about it before in my blog and yet, because I got some new light on the topic, I must bring it to you. I have no assertion to make. I never do. What I am trying to do is making known to you some new thoughts based on some Bible verses. These thoughts crossed my mind about five to six days back when I was taking bath! If you let me know what you think about it, I will be no little thankful to you.

Let me straightaway put them forth. Here…

There are different views about when the Rapture will take place: whether before the Great Tribulation or in the middle of it or after it. There was a time when I thought that this event might possibly take place at the time that the Lamb breaks open the Sixth Seal. This is because it is exactly at this time that the world sees both God the Father and Jesus (God the Son). I thought that the very first time the world would see Jesus again would be at the time when He would appear in heaven to take the Church out of the world – before the Great Tribulation starts.

I thought the Rapture was a pre-tribulation event on the basis of Jesus’ comparing the situation that would prevail at that time with that of Noah. I thought just as God took Noah and his family out of the world before the Great Flood began, Jesus would also take His Church out of the world before the Great Tribulation starts. This thought would never fail to elate me. It greatly relieved me from the worries about the woes that would beset the people who would live through the terrible period of time under the dispensation of the Antichrist.

But, the thought that recently struck me startled me out of the self-complacency in which I was living. This thought was, Whether the Death riding on the Fourth Horse of the Apocalypse could be the Antichrist. What made me seriously think about this possibility was the shockingly close comparison that this rider riding the pale horse bears with Jesus. Jesus claimed to be the Life; so the Antichrist must be the Death! After all, the latter would be the direct opposite of the former. The fourth horse rider is named Death! Nothing in Bible is accident; neither is this piece of detail in the Book of Revelation. See Revelation 6:8.

Another thing, it is indicated in the four Gospels that the coming of Jesus to the world was also the coming of the Kingdom of Heaven to them. If anyone would reject Him, it would tantamount to rejecting the Kingdom of Heaven. Similarly, the Death that rides the pale horse brings with it the Hades, which is the direct opposite of the Kingdom of Heaven! The parallel between Jesus and the fourth horse rider of Revelation 6 is quite striking.

The thing is that the appearance of the fourth horse rider is before the opening of the Sixth Seal. If the events contained in the Sixth Seal are indicative of the Rapture, then it simply means that the Antichrist appears before the Rapture. And, if this is the case, then the Church will have to go through the tribulation period!

What St. Paul has to say in Chapter 2 of 2 Thessalonians DOES seem to support this view. Let me quote it here:

“Now, brethren, concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to Him, we ask you, not to be soon shaken in mind or troubled, either by spirit or by word or by letter, as if from us, as though the day of Christ had come. Let no one deceive you by any means; for that Day will not come unless the falling away comes first, and the man of sin is revealed, the son of perdition, who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God or that is worshiped, so that he sits as God in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God.”

As it is, we are already seeing the falling away and opposition to God. People already have faith in the power of untruth and corrupt practices in different aspects of life. They strongly believe that success cannot be achieved by positive means in the present world. Even among the Christian, there are very few who have taken stance not to give in to the corrupt practices of the world no matter what.

Daniel 8:23 refers to the moral depravation that will be prevailing in the world, and which is considered to be the very sign that will show that the stage is ready for the appearance of the Antichrist. It says,

“When the transgressors have reached their fullness,

A king shall arise,

Having fierce features,

Who understands sinister schemes.”

Looking at the present day world, we cannot but have the feeling that the transgressors are well on their way to reach the fullness that is talked about in the above quoted verse. The New World Order is no longer an idea. We are seeing it right before our eyes. And it is a matter of pride among masses to proclaim that Satan is their god. He is the initiator of this order. It is essentially his. So the question, now, is, How near the appearance of Antichrist is?!

It is very much relevant for the believers in Christ to know that most probably we are living in the time of the Third Seal. The First Seal introduced what I would call neocolonialism. It seems to have begun with 9/11 attack on America. All big powers of the world, who had established colonies in past, are again engaged in controlling their colonies in different ways. The second rider seems to have done his bit and now we are hearing about global food shortage and the soon-to-be-running-out stocks of wheat and oil.

Wheat, barley, oil….These are the things of which special mention is being made in the description of the events that unfold when the Third Seal is broken. The UN has even given the time period within which this food crisis will take over the world. Shockingly, it is not more than four to five months.

I am talking about what characterizes the period of the Third Seal in order to imply that we are already in it! And the reason why I am saying that we are possibly in the time of the Third Seal is to point my readers to the fact that, if we are really in the time of the Third Seal, the Fourth Seal is the next big thing. Looking at the pace with which things have started happening since the start of the pandemic, it won’t be wrong to say that the Fourth Seal or the Antichrist is right at our threshold.

BOOKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR:

https://www.amazon.in/Bertrand-Hatia/e/B00W7E3BEO/ref=aufs_dp_fta_dsk