You'll have to forgive me Truly and others who may be reading, as I'm a little focused here on what I want to get out and so I'll have to take the time to read over your comments afterward. Hopefully I can remember where I left off, since I've been gone a few days.
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Ok, so I was talking about Jonah and the whale... kidding.
No, what I want to try to pick up on or go back to is again the trumps and the change into the spiritual body to close. You need to realize when these events take place and kind of get straight the trumps of God, because you know, even in one of those "rapture verses" there's mention of the trump of God. It's again in 1 Thessalonians 4:16. "For the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the
trump of God, and the dead in Christ shall rise first."
You know, it's interesting that in my companion bible it references this word trump with Matthew 24:31. I'm going to go ahead and quote that.
Matthew 24:31 And He shall send His angels with a great sound of a
trumpet,and they shall gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.
God's elect all over the world will be gathered back to Him. But when does this occur? Go up 2 verses in the same chapter of Matthew and what does it say? It says immediately AFTER the tribulation of those days. Is there anything hard to understand about that? In verse 26 it is talking about the Antichrist when it says people will say He(Christ) is in the desert or in the secret chambers, and Jesus Himself said believe them NOT. He's telling all of us that those who are alive will go through that tribulation of Antichrist. You see, the problem here lies in the fact when people try to add something to the Word or interpret it not as God has interpreted it, but as they want it to be interpreted themselves. They want to add another advent, or another "rapture" where Jesus whisks them away before the tribulation occurs, and it just is not biblical. The "counter" to this, is that "Oh, well Christ is going to come and rapture away the true Christians, and then He's going to come back again and these people are people who were left behind and saved or came to believe during the Tribulation". At no point did Jesus say, at no point does the Word say you will be removed before Antichrist appears. It says you will be kept, saved, protected, however you want to word it from the hour of temptation. But do you really think God is unable to keep you from that hour unless He whisks you out of here? Are you going to find Antichrist tempting? It's man's interpreting it that way, incorrectly, that says that. I've thought of a couple other things I can mention a little later. I may never get done here.
But we'll focus on the trumps. There are 7 of them, just as there are 7 seals, and 7 vials, or "bowls". The seals are what you are supposed to seal in your mind,so that you know the events that are going to transpire. The trumps are the sound or call to action, and the vials or bowls are the pouring out of God's wrath. So what are these trumps? What actions are they calling us to, and what specifically and when do these things occur?
Go to Revelation 8 starting with verse 6 and you'll come across the first four trumps. I'll actually start with verse 7. Verse 6 introduces them, 7 is the first trump.
Revelation 8:7 The first angel sounded, and there followed hail and fire mingled with blood, and they were cast upon the earth [and the third part of the earth was burnt up]: and the third part of trees was burnt up, and all green grass was burnt up."
Revelation 8:8 "And the second angel sounded, and as it were a great mountain burning with fire was cast into the sea: and the third part of the sea became blood;"
Revelation 8:9 "And the third part or the creatures which were in the sea, and had life, died; and the third part of the ships were destroyed."
There's the second.
Revelation 8:10 "And a third angel sounded, and there fell a great star from heaven, burning as it were a lamp [torch], and it fell upon the third part of the rivers, and upon the fountains of waters;"
Revelation 8:11 "And the name of the star is called Wormwood: and many men died of the waters, because they were made bitter."
There's the third trump. Are we "raptured away" yet?
Revelation 8:12 And the fourth angel sounded, and the third part of the sun was smitten, and the third part of the moon, and the third part of the stars; so as the third part of them was darkened, and the day shone not for a third part of it, and the night likewise.
Spiritual darkness and Satan trying to imitate the arrival of the true Christ. Again, these are the trumps of God. Which one involves the gathering back to Him? Does it seem like it's occurred in any of these?
Revelation 9:1 "And the fifth angel sounded, and I saw a star fall from heaven unto the earth: and to him was given the key of the bottomless pit [pit of the abyss]."
Revelation 9:2 "And he opened the bottomless pit; and there arose a smoke out of the pit, as the smoke of a great furnace; and the sun and the air were darkened by reason of the smoke of the pit."
Revelation 9:3 "And there came out of the smoke locusts upon the earth: and unto them was given power, as the scorpions of the earth have power."
That's the fifth trump. It's definitely getting pretty bad at this point, isn't it? Again, does it look like any of these trumps is bringing about a "rapture"?
Revelation 9:13 "And the sixth angel sounded, and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar which is before God,"
Revelation 9:14 "Saying to the sixth angel which had the trumpet, Loose the four angels which are bound in [at] the great river Eu-phra'-tes."
Revelation 9:15 "And the four angels were loosed, which were prepared for an hour, and a day, and a month, and a year, for to slay the third part of men."
This is the sixth trump. So there's one more, right? Naturally, if you go to the end of Revelation 9 after this 6th trump, it gets worse and worse. But let's look at the 7th trump. When is that blown? It is blown in Revelation 11. The two witnesses have been killed, 3 and a half days pass, and they are resurrected and taken back to heaven. There's a massive earthquake and instantly 7,000 are killed. Then we go to Revelation 11:15
Revelation 11:15 "And the seventh angel sounded; and there were great voices in heaven, saying, The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of Our Lord, and of his Christ; and he shall reign for ever and ever."
Well why would that be? Because it's the time in which Jesus Christ is coming back to reign. That's the time that He comes back, at the 7th trump, and not before. That word trump in 1st Thessalonians 4:16 should really clue you in to the fact that this gathering back to the Lord occurs during one of the trumps, and you need to know which one. How would you get harvested out of season? You would get harvested out of season because you didn't have a clue at which point Jesus Christ was coming back and when you were gathering back to Him. You went running to the first Christ who shows up, which unfortunately is Satan because you thought you were going to be raptured away. It's very serious friends. It's
very serious, because I know none of you want to be in that boat.
But if Christ is coming back here to reign, why would we be going up into the air, as it says in verse 17 of 1st Thessalonians 4? You know what the word "air" is? Look it up in a Strong's Concordance. It's not talking about the sky.
It's Greek word 109-ahr
aer
ah-ayr'
from aemi (to breathe unconsciously, i.e. respire; by analogy, to blow); "air" (as naturally circumambient):--air.
You see, one thing happens when Christ returns, and that is all flesh is done away with. We'll get to that in Corinthians, 1st Corinthians actually.
Jason