Rapture and End Times

Then I saw Him open the sixth seal. A violent earthquake occurred; the sun turned black like sackcloth made of goat hair; the entire moon became like blood; the stars of heaven fell to the earth as a fig tree drops its unripe figs when shaken by a high wind; the sky separated like a scroll being rolled up; and every mountain and island was moved from its place.

Then the kings of the earth, the nobles, the military commanders, the rich, the powerful, and every slave and free person hid in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains.

And they said to the mountains and to the rocks, “Fall on us and hide us from the face of the One seated on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb, because the great day of Their wrath has come! And who is able to stand?” (Revelation 6:12-17)

 

Death from Above: Mass Extinctions Tied to Comet Strikes / Space.com, November 3, 2015

Many of Earth’s mass extinctions over the eons have been caused by comet strikes, a new study suggests.

Over the past 260 million years, cratering rates on Earth have peaked every 26 million years or so, in tune with a previously noted cycle of mass-extinction events, researchers found. Furthermore, five of the six largest impact craters known from the last quarter-billion years — including the 112-mile-wide (180 kilometers) crater associated with the demise of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago — were gouged out at roughly the same time that a mass extinction occurred.

“The correlation between the formation of these impacts and extinction events over the past 260 million years is striking and suggests a cause-and-effect relationship,” study lead author Michael Rampino, a geologist at New York University, said in a statement. “This cosmic cycle of death and destruction has without a doubt affected the history of life on our planet.”

The finding, which was published online last month in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, lends support to the venerable but much-debated “death from above” hypothesis set forth to explain the periodicity observed in Earth’s mass extinctions.

Every 26 million years or so, the idea goes, our solar system travels through the Milky Way galaxy’s dense midplane, and the resulting gravitational jostles send comets that normally reside in the distant Oort Cloud barreling toward Earth and other planets close to the sun.

Much of the gravitational perturbation, according to this hypothesis, is caused by mysterious dark matter, which far outweighs “normal” matter but neither emits nor absorbs light and is therefore difficult to study. And dark matter may further contribute to mass extinctions, Rampino suggested in a controversial study published earlier this year, by heating up Earth from the inside, leading to huge, climate-altering volcanic eruptions.

While Rampino and Caldeira identified 10 mass extinctions in the last 260 million years, some other metrics recognize just five such events in the past 450 million years or so. (It depends on how high above background rates an extinction event must be to qualify as “mass.”)

The worst of these “Big Five” events occurred about 250 million years ago, at the end of the Permian geologic period. During this event, known as “The Great Dying,” about 90 percent of Earth’s species was lost. For comparison, scientists estimate that the dino-killing event 65 million years ago took out 50 to 75 percent of all species.

After the Rapture, the Lord removes His divine protection over the Earth. His protection has safeguarded us from the very worst of calamities. Without His protection, the Cosmos takes it’s natural course.

Unfortunately for the World, after the Day of Christ (the rescue of the Saved) comes the Day of the Lord (the judgement of the Lost):

Woe to you who long for the Day of the Lord!
What will the Day of the Lord be for you?
It will be darkness and not light.
It will be like a man who flees from a lion
only to have a bear confront him.
He goes home and rests his hand against the wall
only to have a snake bite him.
Won’t the Day of the Lord
be darkness rather than light,
even gloom without any brightness in it? (Amos 5:18-20)

Very shortly, the entire unsaved world will have to go through their own version of “the Great Dying“:

I will completely sweep away everything
from the face of the earth—
this is the Lord’s declaration.
I will sweep away man and animal;
I will sweep away the birds of the sky
and the fish of the sea,
and the ruins along with the wicked.
I will cut off mankind
from the face of the earth.
This is the Lord’s declaration. (Zephaniah 1:2-3)

As the second half of the 7 years of Tribulation progresses, the wrath of God is fully unleashed upon the earth. The first three Trumpet judgments are clearly from “falling stars”:

The first angel blew his trumpet, and hail and fire, mixed with blood, were hurled to the earth. So a third of the earth was burned up, a third of the trees were burned up, and all the green grass was burned up.

The second angel blew his trumpet, and something like a great mountain ablaze with fire was hurled into the sea. So a third of the sea became blood, a third of the living creatures in the sea died, and a third of the ships were destroyed.

The third angel blew his trumpet, and a great star, blazing like a torch, fell from heaven. It fell on a third of the rivers and springs of water. The name of the star is Wormwood, and a third of the waters became wormwood. So, many of the people died from the waters, because they had been made bitter. (Revelation 8:7-11)

As the 7 year Tribulation reaches the end, the judgments become so severe that the “Great Dying” reaches the climax. These are the Bowl Judgments, that end with the destruction of Babylon the Great:

Then the seventh poured out his bowl into the air, and a loud voice came out of the sanctuary from the throne, saying, “It is done!” There were flashes of lightning and rumblings of thunder. And a severe earthquake occurred like no other since man has been on the earth—so great was the quake. The great city split into three parts, and the cities of the nations fell. Babylon the Great was remembered in God’s presence; He gave her the cup filled with the wine of His fierce anger. Every island fled, and the mountains disappeared. Enormous hailstones, each weighing about 100 pounds, fell from the sky on people, and they blasphemed God for the plague of hail because that plague was extremely severe. (Revelation 16:17-21)

The Harvest of the Saved

The traditional view of the Rapture, the “harvest” at the end of the age, is that there is only one harvest, and then comes the end. However, Scripture gives abundant witness to show that it actually consists of three separate phases that differ in timing, as well as in the crop harvested.

These three phases of the harvest are: the barley crop, the wheat crop, and the crop of grapes. Our Lord is profoundly merciful, and does not want anyone to be lost forever. All three positions are correct. There is a Pre-Tribulation, Mid-Tribulation, and Post-Tribulation Rapture!

The Barley Harvest and Rapture of the Saints

During the growing season of a farmers crop there is a first fruits growth that comes up in the field first.  This crop is to be an offering to the Lord.  It is to be tied with a red cord or a sheave to make it well known to all who are in the field that it is an offering to the Lord.  We, as Christians and Messianic Jews, are the first fruits of the field of harvest.  We are marked by the Holy Spirit as belonging to our Lord.  Jesus was the first fruit and we will follow after Him.

These who believe are the barley grain. Barley grain is a soft seed. In days of old when they wanted to separate the grain from the chaff they would put the barley on a sheet holding the four corners and would raise the sheet to the wind. This process is called winnowing. It would easily separate the two and would give them the pure grain. This is what we are like. We are soft and pliable in the hands of the Lord to be corrected and re-aligned to His ways.

But now Christ is risen from the dead, and has become the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since by man came death, by Man also came the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive. But each one in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, afterward those who are Christ’s at His coming. (1 Corinthians 15: 20-23)

After this I looked, and there in heaven was an open door. The first voice that I had heard speaking to me like a trumpet said, “Come up here, and I will show you what must take place after this.” (Revelation 4:1)

We believe we will be part of the “in-gathering” (or Rapture) with Christ Jesus during this time. We will not experience the wrath of the 7 year Tribulation period:

For God did not appoint us to wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, that whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with Him.  (1 Thessalonians 5:9-10)

The Wheat Harvest and the Tribulation Rapture

About half way through the 7 year peace treaty there will be a Rapture of the Tribulation Saints by the Lord.  Before this can happen, many prophecies will occur that are in Ezekiel 36-39. There is also a direct correlation with the 7 year peace treaty, the rebuilding of the Temple, and many other things spoken in the written word of the Bible (the inspired Word of God). As you begin to study this, you will see for yourself that this is true.

After these things I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one could number, of all nations, tribes, peoples, and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, with palm branches in their hands… (Revelation 7:9)

Then one of the elders answered, saying to me, “Who are these arrayed in white robes, and where did they come from?”

And I said to him, “Sir, you know.”

So he said to me, “These are the ones who come out of the great tribulation, and washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.  (Revelation 7:13-14)

So we see in the above passages this wheat harvest will be a very great harvest, of those that had robes by virtue of their Faith in Messiah, but were not yet ready when the Bridegroom came for the Bride at the First Resurrection Harvest.

Wheat is a tougher grain than barley. Thousands of years ago, farmers used a tool called a “tribulum” to separate the chaff from their wheat. Today our word “tribulation” is derived from the name of that tool. It takes a tribulum to break the seed from the chaff. It goes through a breaking process to become free and be what our Father, the God of Abraham, Issac and Jacob, would have us to be sons.

We have a God who loves us so much that He sent His only Son, Jesus, Yeshua to come in the flesh and dwell among men, teach us the way, die for us as a perfect sacrifice with all the sins of the past, present and future upon Himself, and taking the stripes upon His back, shedding His precious blood, was buried, raised, and ascended into heaven, sitting at the right hand of the Father and making intercession for us.  He did it all for us! Just as the ancient farmers used a tribulum to separate the chaff from their wheat, God will use the Tribulation to separate the chaff from the lives of the Christians at this time.

The Last Harvest and the Second Coming of Jesus Christ

The final harvest will be the grapes harvest that comes from the four corners of the field.  The grapes have to be crushed to be made into “New Wine.”

The Great Tribulation will bring this about. This symbolizes the people who accepted Christ during the second half of the 7 years, known as the Great Tribulation. That group of people will have to endure the most horrendous time on Earth ever.

Then I looked, and there was a white cloud, and One like the Son of Man was seated on the cloud, with a gold crown on His head and a sharp sickle in His hand. Another angel came out of the sanctuary, crying out in a loud voice to the One who was seated on the cloud, “Use your sickle and reap, for the time to reap has come, since the harvest of the earth is ripe.” So the One seated on the cloud swung His sickle over the earth, and the earth was harvested. (Revelation 14:14-16)

This Rapture is symbolized by the Two Witnesses, who finish their testimony and are martyred by the Beast.

Then they heard a loud voice from heaven saying to them, “Come up here.” They went up to heaven in a cloud, while their enemies watched them. (Revelation 11:12)

As you can see, if you are not a believer, it would surely in your best interest to come to know Jesus as Savior early rather than later. You can claim Him now:

Jesus, I thank You that You came to save us from our sins and redeem us back to the Father God that was lost when Adam sinned in the garden.  Please forgive me of my sins and I choose to turn from them and I ask You to help me to sin no more.  I invite You Jesus to be my Savior and Lord over all of my life. I invite the Holy Spirit to live in me and teach and guide me.  Thank you Lord Jesus! Amen! 

Because you have kept My command to persevere, I also will keep you from the hour of trial which shall come upon the whole world, to test those who dwell on the earth.
(Revelation 3:10)  

The end is coming – sooner than we think!

.